Robert Johnson Lyrics

The words of an old Robert Johnson song filled the bar, You better come on in my kitchen, and the sweet sounds of an acoustic guitar accompanied them, ' cause it's gonna be rainin' outdoors.

In the dim light and smoke, the crowd had gotten quiet and all eyes turned to the stage. Seated on a plain hardbacked chair, the singer and his guitar were barely visible but the music came though clearly. He was wearing a worn out denim shirt, faded jeans and cowboy boots and his eyes were cast downward as he picked the old guitar. The other musicians on stage stood respectfully still. I reached for my camera and then thought better of it, preferring to close my eyes and lean my head back.

Such moments are rare in the dark, smoky bars where I spend so much of my time. The music is usually in a long competition with conversations and laughter and the sounds of drinks being served. Disputes can get loud and lengthy and eveyone shouts to be heard over everyone else. This night had been no different until Robert Johnson's lyrics had begun to drift out over the crowd. When a woman in trouble, everybody put her down. She look for a good man, but he can't be found. You better come on in my kitchen, cause it's gonna be rainin' outdoors.

The first time I ever heard a Robert Johnson had been over thirty years ago, sitting on a plastic tarp in the woods in Lincoln, Massachusetts in a raging thunderstorm. Taj Mahal was on stage, singing to over a thousand cold, wet and dedicated blues lovers who might, at any moment, be washed away by the torrential rain but who would never leave voluntarily. He sang one song - the one I was hearing in the bar - for over forty minutes while all around him people swept water off the stage, scurried to cover equipment with plastic and prayed that the tent top would hold. And it did. Despite the storm, it had been one of the best days of my life - Doc Watson, Bill Monroe, Bela Fleck, Michelle Shock - no one had cancelled and no one had left. We sat in water up to our ankles and ate fried chicken and potato salad and drank cheap wine out of paper cups and were transported by the music and Robert Johnson's lyrics. The sky never cleared that day and the rain never let up but nothing stopped the music.

I remembered that day and couldn't help but smile. Meanwhile, the song ended and there was a fraction of a second of dead silence before the bar erupted in applause. Robert Johnson Rules! someone shouted over the noise. Yeah, buddy.

Just a Joke

By the time she was the age I am now, my mother had pretty much given up. Too many years of alcohol and inactivity had allowed her weight to soar out of control, her knees had given out, she'd developed diabetes and chronic bronchitus and the cancer was waiting in the wings. She took to wearing oversized floppy dresses or cheap polyester pants and they emphasized her weight rather than hide it. She took a fancy to the color red and decorated her nails, mouth and cheeks with it and her gray hair took on a yellowish tint. She had become a caricature.

We left for Nova Scotia on a clear May morning, my grandmother's Lincoln crammed to the breaking point. We'd make Maine by lunch and be in New Brunswick by evening. My mother insisted on driving and Nana napped in the front seat most of the way while the kids occupied themselves in the back. We made several stops for gas and restrooms and each time a smiling attendant would come to the drivers side window then draw back as my mother attempted to flirt with him. At the border, my grandmother decided to drive and as she walked around the rear of the car, she suddenly stopped and I saw her face go white with anger. Once across, we pulled into the first service station. Nana got out and had a brief conversation with the attendant who nodded, went into the station and then reappeared with a scraper tool. She directed him to the rear of the car and stood over him as he knelt at the bumper. In a minute or two, he stood and placed something in her hand and she told him thank you and tipped him five dollars and got back into the car without a word. My mother sat in silence, refusing to meet my grandmother's furious eyes and after a few deep breaths, Nana started the car and pulled back onto the highway. The rest of that day's driving was done in deadly quiet. When my mother reached for the radio, Nana slapped her hand away with a sharp reprimand.

It was after eleven when we reached St. John and the hotel. My mother had become anxious and edgy and Nana's patience finally snapped. For Christ's sake, my mother whined, It was a joke. I jumped at the sound when Nana slapped her and my mother began to cry. It was trashy and I won't have it! my grandmother responded in a tone that scared me more than the slap.

The next morning, wedged under the seat, I found the ragged edged bumper sticker. It was white with bold, black lettering and read simply Ask me, I might.

The Secret to a Long Life

The secret to a long life, Michelle Shock wrote, is knowing when it's time to go.

I was in high school when a well known and popular classmate took a shotgun and used it to take his own life. He had his entire life ahead of him and for reasons none of us ever understood, all he saw was darkness. His friends and family were devastated, classes were cancelled for the funeral, and a memorial service was held to try and help us make some sense of it and grieve. The principal quoted Elizabeth Kubler Ross, someone most of us had never heard of. We had the immortality of youth and couldn't even begin to imagine any harm coming to us never mind old age, sickness, the consequences of carelessness or as the saying went, the wages of sin. We just knew someone we had cared for was gone and we didn't know why.

Even now, my high school years feeling a hundred years ago, it's unimaginable to see only darkness. The light may be obscured or even only a dim flicker, but it's there, so maybe it's more than just being able to see it - maybe we have to want to see it and want it badly enough that we can overcome the seductive side of suicide. I wonder what went though his mind, what thoughts could possibly have brought him to see only one option. What could have been so intolerable, so powerful, that it blinded him to the facts that even the worst situations change, that no state of mind is forever.

Death, my daddy used to tell me, is always harder on the ones left behind. I try to see it as part of the process,
an inevitable transition from one plane of existence to another. As with all things, we do the best we can and move on. I am incredibly grateful for my life so far - it has been a wild combination of highs and lows, happiness and sadness, accomplishments and failures, love and loss. Life is a good plan.

Beware of Dog

This morning, I slipped her red "Beware of Dog" tee shirt over her head and tucked Butterbean underneath my jacket. We were going to make a comfort call.

My friend Scotty had lost his beloved cat, Cleopatra, over the weekend. I knew there was nothing I could do to help but I suspected that a day with Butterbean might be a comfort. He would bring her bed out onto the counter, share his cheeseburger with her at lunch and bring her a coffee drink on his break. She would jump into his arms at every opportunity and plaster him with kisses in between seeing old friends and making new ones. I hoped she would be a comfort to him as she is to me.

Her brown eyes lit up the minute she set eyes on him and when he called her name, she turned into a small bundle of quivering, wriggling, and squirming anticipation. In a matter of seconds, she had covered his neck, ears, and face with enthusiastic kisses and I became an afterthought. There's nothing quite like unconditional love to help a broken heart. I slipped out quietly, knowing that she might miss me for a few minutes but would quickly adapt. She was in a familiar and friendly place and I was leaving her in good hands.

It worked.

Bird Watching

After the rain, the birds clustered around the mudpatch turned mini lake in the yard behind us. Sparrows and wrens dove and splashed and shook their feathers while two robins fought a fierce territorial battle at the fence line and the squirrels looked on indifferently. It was a grayish kind of day and more than a little chilly but none of them seemed to mind. As a general rule, all birds look alike to me with a few exceptions - robins, doves, cardinals, bluejays, an occasional woodpecker - and while I'm glad to have them and do try to keep them fed in winter, I can't tell them apart. Dr. Bill, however, is an avid birdwatcher and devoted to hummingbirds. From his dentist's chair, I have a full view of his garden and all the visiting birds and it calms me to watch them. It doesn't calm me anywhere near the way his nitrous oxide does but it helps.

Years ago, living in Back Bay in Boston, pigeons would sit on the outside window sills of the apartments and our cat would sit inside. The birds would coo and she learned to coo right back. We were a single cat household at the time and JB swore that for year the cat thought she was a pigeon. Now, being a multi cat household, all the little ones are fascinated by the birds as well as the squirrels but there's no cooing. They sit like statues with only a tail switch to give them away, hypnotized by the wild things that run free in the outside world and, I hope, grateful not to be among them.

Nature is filled with great wonders and small miracles, cruelty and wisdom. The strong survive and the weak are lost and somehow the planet is kept in balance in the process. God and Mother Earth are watching us all, down to the last sparrow.

The Current Crop of Cats

Patch sits in the shadows of the window blinds, warmed by the sun and half asleep. She is a pastel tortoiseshell, colored in soft shades of gray, brown, and white. She was an outside cat until she appeared on my doorstep and I often wonder if she misses the freedom of her old life. She is a gentle natured cat, quiet and friendly and there are times you'd never know she was around. She sleeps on my pillow at night and sometimes will softly paw at my face or hair.

Muggs sleeps in a basket under the other window. At eight months, she is still very much a kitten - a long, lean, brown toned tabby with a feisty, playful nature. She overflows with energy, ambition, fearlessness and curiosity. She is the first and the loudest on the counter for meals and the only one to reguarly stalk and pounce on the other cats. She will, I hope, eventually outgrow her regrettable kamikaze streak.

The oldest, Chloe, is by coloring and termperment, a dark cat. A tabby with black and brown tints and a sweet heart shaped face, she hates across the board. She will fly into a rage at the sight of the dogs and refuses to have anything to do with the other cats. She sleeps lightly, a part of her always on the alert for the first sign of danger, quick to give a warning growl if her space is compromised. Even in my arms and purring there is a tenseness in her small body, a readiness to flee that never completely relaxes. She's a tiger when cornered and has a number of hiding places that I've never found. No one but me has seen her for years.


Mischief is black and white and longhaired, very shy with people and very timid with the other animals. She moves cautiously around the house as if doing reconnaissance and prefers high places, out of reach of the dogs.
She defers to the other cats in all areas except food - in this, she stands her ground and can become quite vocal -
and she is content to stretch out on the counter and watch the world go by. She is undemanding, quiet, happy to be part of the overlooked chorus.

The youngest of the trio of black cats, Murray is small, fit and trim and something of a troublemaker. He has a Jimmy Cagney look about him, slightly swaggering with a challenge in his yellow eyes. He walks confidently, head up, tail stretched out behind him, each step sure and definitive. He is an expert in covert approaches and will often land in my lap with an unexpected thud, seemingly from out of nowhere and indifferent to the fact that there may already be a cat in place. If, however, his bravado is met and matched, he will quickly retreat with a kind of dismissive dignity.

Widget, solid black and half Persian with a silver undercoat, slinks. She keeps low to the ground and moves slowly and deliberately, reminding me of an industrial push broom. She shuns the other animals, avoids strangers, and spends most of her time under the bed sleeping. She will growl if approached and often swats at the other cats when feeding but never with claws out and she will run rather than fight. Rarely, she will seek me out and want to be held and those moments are precious to me. She is a suspicious animal, independent, self sufficient, and quite beautiful.

Nicodemus is twenty pounds of mellow - at peace with himself and the world around him. He lazes in the sunshine and when he walks, he strolls, unbothered by the dogs or whatever other chaos surrounds him. He's laid back and
equally content to be stroked or left to himself. He will curl up with Butterbean or crawl into my lap, whichever is closest and he's amazingly light on his feet. He tolerates everything with good humor and a relaxed sort of resignation mixed with a healthy purring. He is comfortable, casual, and unfailingly tolerant.

The current crop of cats is as different and distinct as all those who have gone before - all have been special and
precious and irreplacable in their own ways. Each is a unique gift from God, given over to me for temporary care. However long or short their lives may be, they will be loved and kept safe while they are here.

For Cleopatra and Scotty.

No Sign of Snow

Yesterday's forecast predicted snow - it seems cold enough and the skies are overcast, but there's no sign of snow. I can remember my daddy leaving for work on winter mornings and warning us to dress warmly - he had seen what he called a snow sky.

It's really more something you sense than see, like the feel of the air before a tornado watch. You go outside and can feel the threat of weather bearing down. Batten down the hatches, my grandmother would say, storm's a comin'. When I was growing up, I heard that often. I would walk into the house on an ordinary after school day and suddenly find myself in the eye of a storm. My mother, knitting and watching soap operas from her old green chair, smoking and well into her after lunch manhattens, would say nothing. She was waiting, just waiting. It was a bad sign but I knew that nothing would break until supper so I escaped to my room.

Supper began with noise from the kitchen. Things began to be slammed around, dishes flung onto the table, cabinet doors shut with force enough to make the glasses rattle. Unsuspecting, whether from intentional blindness or his eternal optimism, my daddy would walk straight into this commotion of rage. Readjusting at first glance, he would loosen his tie, put down the evening paper and ask What's happend? and she would turn on him with a vengeance.

From my room, I could hear the arguement escalate. The milder and quieter he became, the more it infuriated her. It might be about anything - a poor report card, being late from school, a call from a neighbor, being out of bread. She would shout, sulk, threaten or cry until she got her way. Sooner or later I would hear his footsteps on the stairs and there would be a tap at my door. Your mother..... he would begin and then his voice trailed off and with an apologetic attempt at a smile he would say Never mind. It's not important.

When he finally refused to fight anymore, things died down and he was able to placate her. Supper began and ended in tense silence and I left them at either end of the table, locked in wordless, useless combat. In my room, I opened a window to the cold night air and sat looking out at the stars.. After a while I heard the sound of the downstairs television, volume turned up to try and drown out the raised voices. There was a sound of breaking glass, a door slamming, and a car ignition starting. I heard my mother climb the stairs and held my breath, waiting to see which direction she would take, toward her room or mine. She paused at the top of the stairs and then her bedroom door crashed shut.

With a sigh of relief, I watched as my daddy drove away in the old Mercury station wagon. It had begun to snow as he'd predicted and although it was bitterly cold, this night's storm was over. It had indeed been a snow sky.

Rinse and Repeat

You have only to speak her name and her tail begins to wag joyfully. Her brown eyes radiate love and trust and she is relentlessly happy whether dancing around on her back legs or burrowing into the small spaces between you and the blankets. She loves life outright and with a passion and is an immeasurable comfort, asking nothing but affection and a warm place to sleep. Of all the dogs I have known, she is the sweetest and most faithful and she wins hearts wherever she goes.

It is with great reluctance that I carry her to the kitchen sink. The towel and shampoo are laid out on the counter and the water is running and she knows what lies ahead. She looks at me with broken hearted, betrayed eyes but she doesn't struggle, instead she begins to tremble. I talk to her softly as I pour warm water over her shivering little body and lather her with suds, rinse and repeat the process. She shakes as if she might actually break as I wrap her in a towel and begin to dry her off and those eyes look at me with huge sorrow and disappointment. A minute or two with the hair dryer, some gentle combing, and she's done.

She races for her corner of the couch and her heating pad and the bath is instantly forgotten just as I am instantly forgiven.

Working at the Walmart

Things were going according to plan until the socks.

The Walmart cashier stopped, examined them carefully, then snapping her gum and looking over my head announced, Dey ain't got no price. I looked up from my checkbook and automatically apologized. Shifting her weight to one hip and holding the offensive, unpriced socks in her hand, Cain't ring'um if dey ain't got no price and gave her gum another smack. I took a deep breath and said as pleasantly as I could manage, Can you send someone to get a price, please. With a look that was suspiciously like a sneer, she threw the socks aside and said Ain't got nobody to check. I paused, not quite sure of what to say next and wondering if the socks were worth the inevitable struggle. The cashier stood, chewing her gum indifferently and looking expectantly at me. Slowly I asked, You want me to go check? She shrugged her shoulders elaborately and said nothing.

There were other people in line behind me and I regretted what I was about to do but I regretted the loss of customer service more. I put my pen down and leaned across the counter. Look, hon, I just want the damn socks. Figure it out. She glared at me for a second or two then shouted to another cashier who in turn shrugged and shouted to yet another cashier. Eyes began to turn in my direction and the people behind me began to get restless. The cashier turned back to me then pointedly looked at the other customers in line and rolled her eyes.
I took another breath, reached for the socks and flung them on the counter. Then get me a damn supervisor and maybe they can find a price or I'm going to stand here all day.

The sound of my own raised voice grated on me. I dislike scenes and the people who cause them and I am not the kind of person who loses her temper in public. Leastways, I didn't used to be. But there comes a time in each of our lives when we've had just one too many sullen, rude, inarticulate, gum chewing, shallow end of the gene pool sales person giving us attitude. This was my time.

After several minutes of this retail stand off, a supervisor appeared who priced the socks at $2.99 a pair. The cashier, postured in insolence and now sulking, looked at me. Well? she demanded, $2.99?

Fine! I snapped at her, wanting nothing more than to be done the with entire transaction and leave. The socks hadn't been worth it after all.

Let's Pretend

Music Appreciation, 101 with Mr. Kovac.

He was a small, fastidious man with a tiny mustache and a thick accent. He always wore a suit and tie, including a vest with a pocket watch, and he taught us to play "Country Gardens" on the flute. He encouraged each of us to find an instrument and then dedicate to it. The piano and the violin were the most popular.

He lived alone in a tiny apartment that he called a flat and gave after school music lessons to supplement his teaching income. The rooms were dark, heavy curtains kept the light from coming in and the furniture was ancient and massive. Small lamps were placed here and there in corners and they threw shadows over the furnishings. With very little imagination, an old wingback chair became a magic throne, the old fashioned sofa
turned to a creature. He insisted we close our eyes when playing - it would help us feel the music and lessen the stuffiness of practice sessions. A metronome clicked steadily during each hour - the footsteps of the creature as he approached, we pretended. We would be snatched from our instruments and thrown into an oven like Hansel and Gretel for surely Mr. Kovac was a witch in disguise, preying on children with his musical spells.

Coming into the light after a lesson was reassuring but still we left on the run, never knowing when we might be pursued by some apparition and dragged back. She reads too many fairy tales my grandmother advised my daddy
darkly. he's just a poor music teacher.

Being a down to earther, feet firmly planted in reality, my grandmother took a dim view of what she saw as my overactive imagination. When I told her about the village of Weeper Whineys that lived under the shelf in my closet, she gave me a swat followed by a serious lecture on letting my imagination run away with me. She believed that the world was a solemn place and that children should be prepared for it. "Let's pretend" creatures that lived in my closet - no matter how real they were to me - did not qualify as proper preparation and when I turned her kitchen broom into an Apache pony and warwhooped my way through the house, she sighed deeply and despaired of my future. But she also let me ride.

It seems now as though she was trying to find her way with her grandchildren as she had been unable to do with her own daughter and it was a difficult road for her. She was frightened for us, frightened that she would fail us as she thought she had failed my mother, frightened of what we might become. So she was strict, at times distant, often humorless and at the same time, generous, kind, good natured and loving. She was a paradox of conflicting emotions and I suspect that she never stopped struggling to do the right thing. Sometimes fairy tales and denial have a great deal in common - they're both "Let's pretend" games.

The Wrath of God

"Somebody better be dead." my grandmother said grimly as she reached for the telephone. It was just after three on a pitch dark Sunday morning in July and Nana didn't take kindly to having her sleep interrupted. She answered but there was menace in her tone and her voice was just shy of a growl. "What?" she demanded into the receiver.

She listened in silence and too curious for my own good, I crept out of bed to the dining room. She was standing by the window to the sunporch, the telephone to her ear, shoulders hunched over and her glasses dangling from one hand. Barefoot and still, she said "All right." and slowly hung up the telephone, cursing under her breath. "Who's dead, Nana?" I asked and she looked at me as if in a daze, then abruptly came back to herself. "Nobody, " she said sharply, "Go back to bed."

She padded to the kitchen and lit a lamp. I heard familiar sounds - wood being added to the stove, water pouring into the coffee pot, a match being struck to light a Kent 100. After a little while, she walked back into the dining room and sat in the semi darkness, silently smoking and drinking coffee. I had almost fallen back to sleep when she came into the bedroom and drew her rocking chair up to my bed. The sky was beginning to lighten and I could hear the sounds of birds beginning to sing as she talked to me about my mother.

"Your mother didn't come home tonight." she began. I didn't understand a lot of what she told me but the pain on her face and the anger in her eyes came through only too clearly. She spoke for a long time, about how hard it could be to be an only child, about how easily they could be to spoil, about liquor and quick fixes and unhappiness, about getting even, about hate and tolerance, about living with hopelessly misery-loving people. She didn't shed a tear and when she was done, she said simply, "It's not your fault."

My mother had gone to the dance the night before, gotten drunk, and left with a carful of equally drunk fishermen. In the early hours of Sunday, the car had been found in a ditch, its occupants passed out cold and reeking of liquor and vomit. Several hours later she stumbled back home looking, as Nana described it, "like the wrath of God". She came through the back door and got as far as "Mother, I can explain...." when my grandmother turned from the kitchen sink and in a tone I'd never heard her use before said flatly, "You are a married woman with children, " and my mother had the decency to look down, "And I never. Want to hear. Another word about it." Each word was said coldly and emphasized with a stab at the glass she was washing. Hungover, sick and caught, my mother began to protest and shaking with rage, my grandmother smashed the glass on the counter where it shattered and shouted "Not one word! Not ever!" and my mother fled in tears.

Matter of factly, Nana brushed the broken glass off the counter and into her apron then carefully carried it to the waste basket in the corner. The sound of it falling reminded me of china clinking together. I could hear my mother wailing from an upstairs bedroom but if Nana heard, she gave no sign. Instead she untied her apron and wearily hung it on a hook, then stood at the counter and stared out at the yard. When she saw my reflection in the window, she turned to face me with a tired half smile. "Mind what I told you." she said quietly. "It's not your fault."

In a few days, the whole incident seemed to have been forgotten. Nana kept a watchful eye on the liquor as well as on my mother's comings and goings and though the hostility between them was always there, it didn't break through to the surface again. Both mother and daughter had a knack for pretending all was well between them and life returned to normal. Each went about their days alone and in silence.

Waiting on a Train

The train was dead still at the crossing and I was 9th in the line of waiting traffic. We sat with engines turned off, driver side windows down, reading newpapers and smoking. A jumble of sound from the competing radio stations filled the morning air, classical mixed with rock, mixed with country, mixed with news. We were patient in our waiting, unlike the handful of drivers who turned around and roared off with expressions of disgust on their faces, leaving trails of exhaust behind them. Hurry up and wait! someone yelled as they pulled away.

There's a lot of waiting to be done in this life and I've discovered a vital truth - patience takes practice. There are times when we just need to "be" and leave the chaos behind. I focused on the train as it sat across the tracks, implacable, calm, waiting, not concerned that it might be late to it's destination. Railroad men walked the tracks unhurriedly, calling to each other and waving signals. The red crossing lights flashed steadily, almost leisurely. In my rearview mirror, a woman was checking her make up. In front of me, I could see the driver on his cell phone, one arm stretched casually across the passenger seat. The train remained motionless and we waited.

There was a house across the street with brown shutters and in serious need of painting and I noticed the front door was the old fashioned kind, heavy wood with visible grain running through it, brass handle still gleaming and stained glass in an arc at the top. I wished for my camera. On the other side of the street there were warehouses and aluminum buildings, a strange contrast. A man walking a German Shepherd came down the street at a brisk pace. He carried a styrofoam coffee cup and would drink quickly each time the dog paused. Looking at the train and the line of traffic, he shook his head and smiled sympathetically. The train didn't move and we waited.

I noticed how blue the sky was, how warm the air was for a January morning, how the clouds were like white cotton balls moving along on puffs of air. Squirrels were chattering in the trees and running along the power lines and a youngish looking black and white cat appeared on the doorsteps of the house with the brown shutters and began to wash it's face. A gang of children rounded the corner with knapsacks and bookbags, laughing, shouting, and roughhousing with each other. And still the train sat idly and we waited.

Just maybe there was a lesson to be learned here about the things we miss if we never slow down or have to wait for a train.

Give Me the Pieces

Some nights, after supper, my daddy would change from his street clothes and spend the evening in his workshop.
It wasn't much - a long workbench with a vise at one end, and shelves for his tools at the other - hammers and saws and screw drivers and little bottles of different sized nails. He puttered mostly in solitude, humming along to the portable radio he kept on the window sill for company. He repaired small things - a broken clock, a loose table leg, a drawer that wouldn't open. And he tinkered with the electric train set that he had so carefully set up and painstakingly maintained. We all have our places of refuge - mine was the library, his was a cold, damp corner of the basement.

If my mother was out, I would sit on the cellar steps and watch him through the railing. I brought him broken toys and dolls with broken limbs, stuffed animals with missing eyes, a domino set that needed repainting. He would patiently repair what he could and explain why when he couldn't. He still smoked in those days and carried his matches and Lucky Strikes in his shirt pocket and I can see him bent over the vise, smoke circling around his head as he concentrated on his work. He was somewhere in his forties then with a full head of dark hair, clear blue eyes, and a slight resemblance to Henry Fonda. He had an unusually kind face and a gentle, peace-seeking nature but the weariness of his marriage had left it's marks and he often struck people as a quiet man carrying an endless sadness.

The cellar workshop had become his quiet time, his escape from the world of work and the duties of family, his private space. I was too young to understand the value of quiet time for adults but I sensed the need of it in him and tried not to intrude. Rusty, our old and much scarred orange tomcat, would drift in and take his place at the tool end of the workbench and there the three of us would be with public radio playing in the background and the electric train running it's course under the stairs.

Give me the pieces,
and I will restore it,
Put it together again.

Don't be dishearted,
and please don't discard it,
for it will be better than ever, my friend.

Lindy Hearne

General Store Wars

In the beginning, there was one general store on the island and it belonged to my Uncle Norman and Aunt Jenny. It was a long, low building in the town square and was as much a gathering place as a general store. Nana bought her staples there - bread, milk, soda, small housewares. Vegetables came from Lilly Small's garden up island and meat came from the meat truck that made it's rounds once a week from the mainland but candy, matches, cleaners and the like, all came from Norman's Store.

When McIntyre's opened not but a hundred feet away, there was mild chaos. The family bought a three story old building and converted it into a fancy two story store with their living quarters on the third floor and two gas pumps in front. You could buy rope, magazines, shovels, chain saws, slickers, sweet rolls. There were two pop cases just the right height to open and dip your hand into the freezing water and pull out an Orange Crush. There were stacks of lightbulbs, paper goods, seeds, cigarettes and tobaccco, car parts, venison steaks, shampoos and soaps, penny candy. Benches were installed around the counters so the old men could gather and smoke and swap tall tales. The war of the general stores was in full swing.

Norman and Jenny had no choice but to try and compete, so the old, low building was abandoned and a bright, new store was built in front of their house. Polished wood floors, spotless new glass display cases, painted benches and nearly everything that McIntyres carried was put in. A gravel parking lot was created in front and steps were added the width of the building. They set out rocking chairs and iron pots filled with sand for cigarette butts and on warm afternoons you could often see Uncle Norman sitting alone and smoking, a tattered newspaper in his lap
and his old cat alseep at his feet.

In a different environment, one or the other might have won but the small island community opted for a system of free enterprise and both stores survived in their own ways. What had begun as a war turned into an almost friendly competition with both stores mildy trying to outdo each other and both respecting their separate ways.
Nana said there was something we could all learn from this small drama - she called it peaceful coexistence.

The Milkman Cometh

When I was in elementary school, our milk was delivered directly to our back porch. Every other day, the open sided dairy truck pulled into our driveway, picked up the empty bottles and left full ones. The driver's name was Jimmy and he was a high school student who rose every morning at 4 to make his dairy run. No matter the weather, Jimmy made his deliveries one way or the other. He was proud of having a job, of being recognized on his milk route, of knowing his customer's names. During the spring, we would sometimes see him on our way to school and he would wave and yell to us, The Milkman Cometh! and then laugh.

In those days, the city was loosely divided into three sections. Arlington Heights was where all the money was. Homes were built on oversized lots and had swimming pools, tennis courts, trees, and people to tend them. There were expensive cars in the driveways and expensive clothes on the kids. The other end of the city was at the Cambridge line where the homes were built in three stories with different families to each floor. It was an area of
liquore stores, a chemical factory, gas stations. Kids that lived there knew the bus routes. In the middle, where we lived, was East Arlington. Far less rich than The Heights, far less poor then the Cambridge end, we were in the middle of the middle class. Jimmy's route was our section of the city but he lived along the Cambridge line. What few gangs existed then mostly came out of the poorer section of town. They wore black leather jackets, black motorcycle boots and were said to carry knives although no one had ever actually seen one. They traveled in packs,
kept to themselves and were satisfied to prey on the old and the weak. They survived on their reputations and their looks and were usually written off as bad seeds but not dangerous. A few days after Jimmy refused to let them ride in the milk truck, they ambushed and stabbed him, smashed all the milk bottles, scattered the glass over the street and overturned the truck before running away. Jimmy died in surgery.

It was a level of violence that no one was prepared for and no one understood. The five gang kids responsible were all caught in a matter of days and all five were convicted and sent to prison but it comforted no one. A new milkman took Jimmy's route but we never asked his name.

Green Appples

"Don't eat the apples," my grandmother Ruby told me firmly, "Green apples will make you sick."

High in the branches of the apple tree, her warning seemed more like a challenge. I could see her on the veranda,
a shawl around her shoulders, a basket of corn beside her rocking chair and several ears in her lap. Her spectacles glinted in the late afternoon sun as she glanced my way every now and then but she said nothing more. I could hear Uncle Byron's chain saw in the distance, my daddy playing the old pump organ from the parlor, voices drifting down from the barn where my brothers were playing in the hayloft. An old mama cat was asleep atop the well, her kittens tumbling around her and playing kitten games. Ruby rocked on. And I ate the apples.

Later, as she humorlessly forced some god-awful home remedy down my throat, I vowed to listen to her in the future.She held me silently through the chills and vomiting, put hot towels against my belly and cold ones on my face and made me rinse my mouth with water mixed with mint leaves. She was no-nonsense practical, grimly methodical, and not in the least sympathetic. She had doctored many a child who had hadn't listened to her downhome advice and would waste no pity on the self inflicted.

Though the lesson of the green apples is still with me, listening may never be what I do best. I think perhaps that Ruby knew that and wanted me to learn on my own. We learn the most by our mistakes she told me the following morning as she made me dry toast and ( of all things ) apple juice. It was a gentle version of "I told you so." and it was said with love and just the slightest suggestion of a smile.

The Curse

The Thursday before that Easter Sunday was sunny and mild. We were at a special Sunday School class, very early in the morning, as we were to be baptized at Easter services. The boys were all in suits and ties and the girls were all in white dresses. I began to feel sick about halfway through and in the ladies room I discovered the blood - it had soaked through my underwear and my slip and the back of my dress. There was an unfamiliar pain in my lower belly. Panicked and horrified, I stuffed my panties with paper towels and fled, too embarassed to ask for help and too frightened to do anything but run.

I tied my jacket around my waist to hide the bloodstains and began the journey home. I didn't dare take the bus so I walked the entire way. By the time I reached the corner of our street, the pain had intensified and it didn't seem possible that I'd be able to walk the last seven or eight blocks. I could feel the blood, it seemed to be gushing out of me. In desperation, fearing I might bleed to death before I could get home, I called my mother from a pay phone in front of the Rexall Drugstore. She was not but seven or eight blocks away, she had a car, and it would've taken five minutes to come and get me. Instead, she told me to go into the drugstore and see the old pharmacist. She told me what to ask for and then told me to come home. When I began to cry, she hung up.

Morris had been the Rexall pharmacist for as long as I could remember. He was old, white haired with a thick mustache and wore his gold rimmed reading glasses on a chain around his neck. He was a kind man, always quick to smile and be helpful. He wore his name tag on his white pharmacist jacket and he was was always starched and immaculate. In and out of tears, I told him what my mother had said to ask for and he came out from behind the corner, put an arm around my shoulders and led me to the back of the drugstore, away from the curious customers. Do you know what to do? he asked me softly and when I shook my head and begin to cry even harder, he knelt in front of me and lowered his voice even more. Are you bleeding now? I couldn't look at his concerned, kind eyes but I nodded and getting to his feet he leaned over and whispered to me Don't be afraid, it's going to be fine.He gave me his handkerchief, a brown paper bag with REXALL DRUG printed in bold letters on it, and a hug. This is natural he told me and then quietly gave me my first lesson on what he called becoming a woman.

She was sitting in her chair watching game shows when I got home. Without glancing up from her knitting, she asked Did the old Jew fix you up? I said yes and slowly climbed the stairs to my room. It's called the curse, she called after me, It'll happen every month and you can't take a bath while you have it. Take an aspirin and get cleaned up.

I said a silent prayer of thanks to Morris and did as I was told.

The End of the Road

The last real house on the point belonged to the Blackfords, an old island family who had mostly died out by the time I was a child. It sat up on the hill directly across from the breakwater and past it were the shacks inhabited by the most desperately poor and Old Hat, the shotgun-toting resident mad woman. It was as if an invisible line had been drawn at the edge of the Blackford property and to cross it invited peril. It was a land unto itself - a handful of falling down one or two room shacks set back from the path and surrounded by litter - broken wagon wheels, rusty barrels, boards with nails waiting for unsuspecting small feet, useless appliances, abandoned rocking chairs, the remnants of a whiskey still. Nana called it The End of the Road and we were strictly forbidden to pass it. Don't go past The End of the Road was a morning litany and was always followed by Aunt Florrie will be watching.

Aunt Florrie was the last living Blackford. She lived alone and spent most of her time on her sunporch, doing delicate embroidery and keeping watch for straying children. She and Old Hat were bitter enemies as more than one misdirected shotgun blast had found its way to her windows, once frightening her so badly that she had fainted and fallen down the outside steps. When she came to, it was in the mainland hospital with a broken hip and a grudge that she held the rest of her life. Even before her hip fully healed, she had become the self appointed sentinel of The End of the Road. She had found an old pair of binoculars and stationed herself where she had a clear view and could monitor Old Hat and keep an eye out for the children who were so tempted to trespass. She would coax us away with cookies, ice cream, a game of dominoes, even a new litter of kittens. Then she would talk to us ever so seriously about the dangers of crossing the line - how a shard of glass could slash an ankle or a rusty nail could cause blood poisoning, how we could fall and break a leg, how we'd never be able to outrun a shotgun blast. This last said with a clenched jaw and a vindictive gleam in her eyes. She warned us of gangrene,
reptiles, old uncovered wells, farm implements with teeth. One step over the line could be your last! she told us grimly. And we listened with wide eyed fascination and belief, impressed and enchanted as only children can be with such tales of horror. Then she would smile sweetly at us and say Now let's all have cookies!

Aunt Florrie and Old Hat feuded the rest of their lives but at a distance. After they were both gone, the islanders would say that the frequent thunderstorms were the two old women quarreling in heaven.

A January Morning

Caught off guard by the ice, the dogs skidded across the back deck and tumbled to the frozen grass, getting to their feet and looking at me with a mixture of surprise, resentment, and just a hint of hostility. They hadn't counted on winter turning their backyard into a sort of wasteland. Everything was frozen over and slick and as they headed for the back fence with ice crunching under their feet I could sense their suspicion. This was a new and unfamiliar world and so far hadn't been friendly. Then a squirrel made his precarious morning run across the top of the fence and they forgot the ice as they gave frantic chase.

Back inside, toweled off and comforted with an extra biscuit, their minds went on to other things as dogs' minds will.Their natural ability to forgive and forget is enviable and though the entire scene would likely be repeated at lunch, for the moment they were content and the backyard was put out of their thoughts. As I went about the morning routine, I thought how nice it would be if God had given all His children this magical gift for erasing unpleasantness. By the time I left for work, both dogs were asleep and dreaming .... perhaps of squirrels and spring and extra biscuits.

When I find myself wishing for a simpler life, it's good to be able to realize I already have one.

Above Ground

A cold, dismal rain falls over the weekend. Ice begins to form on the branches outside my windows and they turn stark and shivering. A flood watch goes into effect, flights from Dallas are grounded, travel advisories are issued.
I wake a little after midnight, hot and sleepless and annoyed. Turning down the thermostat doesn't help, in another hour I wake again. The third time, desperation takes over and I turn the heat off and wrench open a window. Cold air floods in and I crawl beneath the covers with a cat on my pillow and the small brown dog curled up against my back and finally manage to sleep. My last thought is to hell with the electric bill.

Monday morning is even worse - the house is freezing and the weather is hateful. The rain has turned to sleet and leaving the warmth of the bed takes enormous effort especially when I can feel the beginnings of a dull headache behind my eyes. But there are nine cold and hungry animals circling the bed and although I have a sinking feeling that I'm going to regret it, there's no choice but to get up and face the day.

At the kitchen sink I dole out cat and dog food and try to find a redeeming quality for the day. I'm still looking while standing under a hot shower, while changing litter boxes, while putting on makeup and when I try to coax the dogs outside. It doesn't come to me until I am driving to work on this Martin Luther King Day.

I may be cold and miserable and cursing the weather and my insomnia. But I am also still above ground.

Black Cats & Harmonica Players

It's no secret that I'm exceedingly partial to black cats and harmonica players.

My house has never seemed exactly right without a black cat in residence - it feels off balance. Of all cats, a black cat has the most poise and elegance. Once they outgrow kittenhood, they become graceful and dignified.
They cultivate mystery and a few will even play on our superstitions. They expect but don't demand attention,
they are aloof but loving, they don't indulge in the wild antics of tabbies nor the vanity of calicos. A black cat never scrabbles for his food but eats calmly and has good manners. They are generally well read on the subject of owners and while they prefer to keep a civilized distance between themselves and other cats, they will never cross the line and be the instigator of quarrels. If provoked, they will simply turn and walk away with a dismissive flick of their tail. They do not care to discuss the subject of dogs but if forced to share a home with one, will display a remarkable tolerance for what they see as a lesser species with precious little self-respect and even less intellect. Look into the eyes of a black cat and you will see a reflection of your better self.

Among musicians, harmonica players stand alone. To watch a good one is to marvel at the complicity of hands and breath, facial expressions and muscle movements. Thought, motion, and breath all work together to produce music. The harp is eloquent in it's simplicity and purity - it can shriek to the skies or whisper like a caress, it can be joyfully raucous or so sweet that one note fills all the empty spaces within. Harmonica players capture the essence of what music should be and then breathe it to life. No other instrument demands as much.
Watch a harmonica player and you will see an elemental musician.

In a perfect world, Stephen King would write a new novel every month, thin would be out of style, every animal would have a good home, there would be more chocolate than you could possibly eat, Garrison Keillor would be on the radio every day, all men would be silver haired and shaggy, and every home would have at least one black cat and a harmonica player.

The Woodchopper

There's a whisper on the nightwind,
There's a star agleam to guide us,
And the wild is calling, calling.....let us go.
Author Unknown


By trade, he was a fisherman but on the side and in his heart, Uncle Len was a carpenter. He treated his craft with care, integrity and patience - first he built my playhouse complete with door and working windows, then lovingly fashioned a cradle, a dollhouse, a toy chest, and a sled. Each was carved and sanded and painted one step at a time, slowly and with with meticulous care to detail. That they were made for a child of ten made no difference to him as he worked on everything he made the same way. When he had finished a piece, he would wrap it in blankets and padding and load it into the back of his ancient pick up truck and drive down the hill and into our driveway. Eventually, the playhouse was completely furnished from Uncle Len's workshop.

He was a tall, slender man and as he aged he came to look almost frail except for his blue eyes and snowy hair. He favored heavy workboots and dark green overalls from the Spiegel catalogue and wore his carpenter's belt with pride. His workshop was always neat with everything in it's place and a layer of sawdust on the floor. The smell of cedar chips and sweet pipe tobacco seemed to trail afer him like a faithful old dog and his hands were frequently bruised and stained with paint or varnish. He was a widower with a grown daughter, his granddaughter was my best friend and he lived alone in a tired, old two story house just up the road. When Nana asked him why he didn't spend a little more time on his house and a little less time on what she called his "fancies", he shrugged and said that the house suited him the way it was - It be just a house and we both be goin' soon he told her mildly. She scolded him but to no avail.

One afternoon during the demolition, my grandmother walked up the road and returned with a wind gage of sorts,
a brightly painted woodchopper who spun in the direction of the wind and chopped like a madman when the wind blew. She planted it next to the flagpole and checked it each morning and evening, claiming it helped her predict the weather. It had been the last "fancy" that Uncle Len had finished and it stood spinning and chopping for years.
It always made her smile.

Honorable Men

The Canteen was wedged between the breakwater and a row of tumbledown fishing shacks, a disreputable piece of real estate that had been precariously built so that it's entrance rested on the side of the road and the balance of the building was supported on wooden stilts. It was a shaped like a boxcar, always in a state of disrepair and not at all the sort of place where "nice girls" were seen.

When the noon whistle blew, The Canteen came to life with factory workers of all ages. They wore overalls under their slickers, heavy flannel shirts and rugged, rubber boots. Young or old, they were all rough looking, working men, coarse-voiced from smoke, whiskey, and hard living. They walked heavily and shouted good natured curses at one another while they ate huge plates of smoked fish and overcooked vegetables and downed cup after cup of bitter black coffee. When the whistle blew again at one, they gathered their gloves and leather aprons and bloody boning knives and returned to the factory, leaving a blue tobacco haze hanging in the air.

In the evenings, having washed off the factory smells and changed clothes, they returned. They smoked and drank and played cards and argued about who was better, Patsy Kline or Kitty Wells. Fights were not infrequent but they never amounted to much - two fools get themselves all likkored up, can't even throw a straight punch was Nana's assessment. On the rare occasion that someone was hurt, he was dragged up the road and she would grimly doctor them in her own kitchen. Ain't a man among you worth the price of the ammunition it'd take to shoot you she would say loudly as she washed away blood and applied bandages. And in the event of an under their breath curse word,
You best mind your tongue, boy, you ain't too old for me to wash your mouth out with soap. And these great, hulking fishermen would hang their heads and mutter apologies. The next day there would be a basket of fresh vegetables or just baked bread or fresh haddock filets at the back door. These were men who paid their debts - mostly uneducated and unskilled, plain spoken and poor, sometimes a little frightening, but honorable.

A hurricane devastated the fishing fleet, the industry, and The Canteen as well. It's remnants slowly disintegrated and then disappeared altogether, the grass grew up the hillside and wildflowers blossomed in the ditch. No trace of the little roadside dive is left except in the memories of the old men who spent so much time there and the children who hung at the windows and watched.

Without change, something sleeps inside us and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken. - Frank Herbert

Sanctuary

St. Luke's was a small Catholic church in walking distance from where we lived. Unlike the massive Protestant church that we attended on Sundays, St. Luke's doors were always open. Sunlight filtered through the stain glass windows and made pastel patterns on the walls and the sisters would often be at prayer in the afternoons. They dressed in full habit then and moved with enviable grace and a sense of tranquility that was uniquely comforting. Mass was still said in Latin, adding mystery and importance to the rituals, and I was fascinated by it.

Father Martin was a young priest with good posture and kind eyes. His robes flowed as he walked, hands clasped together, head down, lost in thought or maybe in prayer. I imagined him to be the perfect parish priest - dedicated to God, doing good works, seeing to the needs of others, saving souls. One sunny afternoon, he stopped and knelt beside me on the prayer bench. He made the sign of the cross and then spoke gently, Can I help you? When I shook my head, he smiled and got to his feet gracefully, touched my arm and said in that same gentle voice, Stay as long as you like.

I'm not a Catholic, Father, I said, dreading that he would tell me to leave. Father Martin turned and still smiling, said If you don't tell, neither will I.

The quiet of the small church, the peace it seemed to offer, drew me back. The doors closed behind me and the traffic noise was shut out along with the problems of the world. There was safety and shelter inside and I often imagined a presence - quiet, strong, serene. An overactive imagination, my family would've said, God's house is a refuge one of the sisters told me, What you feel is Him. I wished for her faith and conviction but was satisfied to have found sanctuary. My own church was hollow and loud, it overflowed with the righteous, the rigid, and the properly dressed. The fear of God was a constant theme, lessons of sin and redemption thundered from the pulpit, dire warnings of hellfire and damnation for all those who refused to come to God by way of the Baptist path. My church frightened me as though at any moment fire would rain down on the congregation and God would take His revenge on this gawdy, overdone, wannabe cathredral. The simplicity of St. Luke's seemed truer and knowing that it's doors were never locked seemed more the way God might want.

Doorway People

He sat crosslegged in the doorway of the abandoned building, eating doughnuts from a dirty Krispy Kreme bag. He flashed me a toothless grin, this old, black man with a ragged ski cap pulled low over his forehead. And then he offered up his bag of doughnuts.

Generosity of spirit lives in mysterious and unexpected places.

I wanted to take his picture but the camera spooked him and he waved it away with an extravagant shake of his head. Most people - even those who wake up in cold, downtown doorways - say yes but I always ask and always respect their wishes when told no. When I was a child, my grandmother would sometimes treat me to an afternoon of shopping - Jordan Marsh and Filene's each had stores in downtown Boston - and if I was very good, she would take me for a ride on Boston Common's swan boats. Even then, the Common and the downtown streetcorners were littered with the homeless. They slept on the grass and on the benches and panhandled around the theatre district - raggedy, dirty, unshaved and unwashed old men who reeked of whiskey and stale tobacco. If they approached us, Nana would glare and wave her cane in their direction.
She called them bums and winos, too shiftless to work for a living and warned me repeatedly don't get too close, you'll catch something. I never doubted her.

But now I'm not so sure and I think we should have been kinder.

The Dog Who Disliked Traffic

The old house sat on a corner lot in what had once been a prestigious section on the city. It was like a grande dame fallen on hard times - looks and wealth gone, but still an impressive sight. The landscaping was kept up, the shutters newly painted, white wicker furniture was casually scattered along the wraparound veranda. The entire front yard was enclosed by high, iron fencing which turned nearly sinister after dark.

The dogs, three in all, were behind the fence. A smallish, tricolored, shorthaired almost-beagle, a good sized black lab mix, and a shaggy, medium sized mutt of no recognizable origin. The almost-beagle kept mostly to the veranda,
content to sleep in the sunspots and raise its head to briefly howl at passersby. The lab strolled the fenceline with
dignity and cautious reserve but at a friendly voice would immediately fall to the ground and roll over in submission.
The mutt, however, was driven. He raced frantically back and forth from one side of the fence to the other, snarling and barking at the traffic, the pedestrians, the trees, the leaves and anything else in motion. Hackles raised and teeth bared with the approach of every vehicle - he seemed to have a special grudge against traffic waiting at the red light.

The old lady came around the corner hauling her two wheeled shopping cart behind her. She wore a bright red scarf and old fashioned rubber boots and carried a paper grocery bag in her free hand. The mutt charged the fence at full speed and jammed his snout through the bars, his barking close to hysterical and his entire body poised for attack.
She hardly spared him a glance as she navigated the broken slabs of sidewalk trying to balance her cart and her bag of groceries and not trip, all at the same time. The mutt followed her the length of the fence, frenzied jaws snapping
through the bars, frustrated at her indifference and lack of reaction.

She reached the end of the fence and calmly set her bag of groceries down on the sidewalk, propped her cart up against a tree, and turned to face him. From the pocket of her overcoat she produced a Totes-like umbrella and carefully took off it's wrapper. The mutt, now on his hind legs, froth dripping from his mouth and eyes glazed over,
charged again and again jammed his snout through the iron bars. Canines gleaming and choke chain flying around his neck, he pushed his head through the bars. She raised her umbrella and said clearly and loudly, Language! and administered a sharp rap to his nose. Startled, he withdrew his head and sat down in surprise, looking bewildered and suddenly unsure of himself. Meanwhile, she replaced the wrapper of her umbrella and dropped it back in her pocket. She adjusted her scarf and then raised one finger and wagged it at him slowly, picked up her groceries and cart, and resumed her travels without so much as a backward glance.

Sooner or later, every mutt meets his match.