Among Friends

When faced with being the center of attention, I have two rules - the first is to run.  The second is to run faster.  Giving in gracefully is not something I do well and so it was that I found myself on the way to a gathering of musicians giving their time and money to support me and say a very public thank you for my photography.  Since it was organized in my honor, I couldn't very well skip it - and I needed the money - but I couldn't shake the unsettling feeling that there would be nowhere to hide except behind my camera lens. I hesitated at the doorway, suddenly and alarmingly aware that it wasn't much of a shield and wishing urgently for a partner to run interference.  I was still working up my nerve when the door was thrown open, someone called my name, and deserving or not - ready or not - I was suddenly among friends.  It was too late to run. I muttered a small prayer of thanks for my old Nikon, manufactured a hasty smile and forced my feet to move.

I'm never sure how many people understand just how exactly shy I am, but my friend Charli is one of them.  Despite the fact that these people had come together to celebrate my work, she was careful that attention was only secondarily focused on me - she made sure that the music got the spotlight and when I had no choice but to talk to someone, it was one on one, the only thing I do passably well.  My camera and I were left free to listen and photograph, to be as invisible as possible and it made the afternoon if not joyful, at least some place I was glad and grateful to be.

I can't remember a time when I wasn't hide-in-a-corner bashful, not even as a child.  Crowds suffocate me, parties are to be avoided at all costs, small talk paralyzes me.  Were it not for my love of music and photography, I can easily imagine never leaving my little house except to go to and from work - some of my best nights are spent in the company of cats and dogs, not people - and yet I covet my extrovert friends and their easy, careless chatter.  They are so comfortable, so confident, so un-selfconscious and at home -I can't help but wonder where they learned.

It ought to be less of a struggle among friends, I think to myself as the afternoon wears on and all the familiar and smiling faces come and go.  Hugs and kisses and warm wishes are plentiful and I sense that I will very pleased with my day's work of photographs.   It's always a good thing to survive people being nice to you.

Premonition Gate

We came across it by accident, Ruthie and I, a neglected and overgrown foot path nearly completely concealed in the deepening afternoon shadows on the road to Miss Clara's.  It was thick with brambles and thorny brush, nearly impassable in places what with fallen and twisted branches laying at awkward angles but we were curious and agile children and the day was still young - so we hiked and climbed and hacked our way through, imagining our pocket knives as machetes and the terrain as a jungle trail.  Uncle Bernie had recently read us a Tarzan story about white hunters and the elephant's graveyard and our imaginations were in high gear - we turned the nearby ocean into the Amazon and the wildlife into exotic creatures.  Well fed and unusually tame, we decided, just to be safe.

About a half mile in as we worked our way through the tall grass, we discovered the remains of a wooden fence.  It seemed out of place so far into the woods, out of place and weirdly out of time, and after a bit we decided to change course and follow it.  We walked for another hour or so but there were no other signs of habitation, no remnants of foundations, no leftover stone chimneys - the woods had reclaimed the land, digested it, and then naturally hidden the evidence.  But fences, we knew, were built to either keep things in or keep things out.  Someone had labored long and well here, measured distances, dug post holes, nailed up boards.  Something had been protected and maintained in these woods but we found no signs of what it might've been until much later in the afternoon when the fence finally came to a sudden end in a very small clearing.   By then, it was coming on sunset, the factory whistle was blowing in the distance and we knew it was time to go so we backtracked all the way to the path and then followed the cove road to the coast and the coast to Miss Clara's.  We agreed on two things - to return the next day and not to mention our exploration to the grownups.  Miss Clara sent us both home astride the painted pony.

A fogbank rolled in that night and it was several days before we got back to the woods and this time we took the dogs.  It was quiet that day and we found the path easily, followed it to the fence and finally to the clearing.  Both dogs seemed slightly anxious, we thought, they stayed close to us despite the temptations of the woods, sometimes whining but hardly ever barking, content to follow but not lead.  When we reached the clearing, we almost had to coax them through - their hesitation made us both nervous and we wondered if they sensed something we couldn't see or hear.  

We reached a second clearing just after lunch.  Here there were more old fence parts and scattered boards and rusted nails.  And here the dogs would not cross nor come when they were called.  They sat on the near side, restless and unhappy when we left them behind, barking in protest and pacing.  Ruthie and I had both been raised to respect and trust an animal's instinct and while there was no danger that we could imagine, both dogs were clearly sensing something out of the ordinary and possibly even menacing.  We turned back and that was when Ruthie stepped on the rusty nail - she yelped in surprise and pain and dropped to her knees in a patch of dry, discolored grass - the nail had pierced her sneaker and embedded itself just under her toes.  The dogs suddenly began to howl, an eerie and unexpected sound that gave both of us what Nana would've called the willies.  When we pulled out the nail, it was attached to a piece of wire which in turn was attached to a thin piece of metal, much like a license plate but covered with rust and dried mud and jagged at the edges.  Ruthie carefully turned it over in her hands and we both realized that it was a sign - not like the village signs, usually rough hewn and wooden and hand lettered.  No, this was metal with clearly stenciled black lettering. 
We shook off the dirt, scraped off the mud and sawed through the dried, splintery twines of attached grass.
Premonition Gate, we read outloud.  The dogs gave another spine chilling howl and Ruthie made a disgusted, choking sound and flung the nasty thing back into the weeds.  Without another word, injured foot and all, we were up and running as if the devil himself was on our heels.  

Miss Clara disinfected and bandaged Ruthie's wound, served us warm gingersnaps and cold milk, gave each of the dogs a bone, and mercifully asked no questions until she'd left us alone long enough for us to come up with a story.  Presently she slipped into her old rocking chair with a ball of yarn and her ancient tomcat in her lap.

Wolf, Ruthie said.

Come out of nowhere, I added. 


Wolf, she repeated doubtfully, studying us in the fading light with one eyebrow raised slightly, Come out of nowhere.  

Yes'm, we said together but not daring to meet her eyes.

Ayuh, she shrugged her thin shoulders and looked out over the ocean and the pastel sky, I reckon it could've happened just that way.  Or....she paused, Couple of curious girls could've come across some old, forgotten graveyard that nobody talks about.  Mebbe from a shipwreck nobody wants to recollect, a ship that might've been carryin' human cargo and just happened to dock at the wrong port.  Could be that somebody set fire to that ship 'fore she could leave again and that there were bodies to be set free and bodies to be buried.  Could be those bodies are still there but if that's so......well, I 'spect it be best to leave'em lie.  No need to raise old ghosts.  Got me a premonition about that, don't you know.

Ruthie and I sat, still and silent, too spellbound to answer while Miss Clara rocked serenely on.

Don't see many wolves this side of the island, she remarked after a time, I'd be a mite more careful of them woods if I was you.  Got me a premonition about that too, and here she paused and gave us a direct look, full of meaning and expectation, or maybe it's a prediction, sometimes I can't recollect the difference.  But I don't reckon we'll be seeing many more of them.  Wolves, I mean.

Curious children, generally speaking, are smart children and as Miss Clara knew well, smart children know when to concede.  The thing was that island story tellers were so skillful at blending fact and fiction, so polished at weaving a tall tale convincingly, that it was often not possible to distinguish truth from yarn.  And in the spirit of telling these stories and keeping the legends alive, if one lied then another would swear to it.
Might there have been a slave ship?  Could she have made port with her frightful cargo and never left?  Was there an abandoned graveyard called Premonition Gate deep in the woods?   It wasn't likely, Ruthie and I knew, but we couldn't discount it entirely - even as children, we'd lived long enough with the island's peculiar magic to know that our world was sometimes strange and wonderful and a little mystic.  The painted pony took us home a second time and if anyone questioned our encounter with a wolf in the woods, they were discreet enough not to say.


  

Mud Dreams

The little dachshund, moving so fast he's not much more than a dappled blur, leaps off the back deck and races for the back fence, short little legs pumping like pistons and ears flying.  It's pretty impressive until he reaches the mudflats - then I watch as he slowly, sorrowfully sinks, all the way to his belly in the soft, reddish clay and gets stuck in the sucking mud's relentless, gravitational pull.  The look he gives me is comical, bewildered, a little indignant and a lot frustrated.

I'm coming, I call to him and make my way across what used to be solid ground - not landscaped or manicured or even regularly mowed but at least solid - and pull him from the quicksand-like ooze.  He doesn't struggle as I carry him to a different part of the yard and set him down, doesn't protest when I take his face in both hands and patiently re-explain about the mud.  Stay on this side of it, I tell him, Stay on the hard side.  But of course as soon as I release him, he bolts back, circles around to the edge of the fence and promptly sinks all over again.  This time he gives one of his patented hound howls, a plaintive and forlorn sound that brings an immediate choral response from the other side of the fence and suddenly the entire neighborhood is in an

uproar.  I remember once reading that a single dog barking sets off a chain reaction that eventually goes 'round the whole world - it seemed unlikely but I didn't have a dachshund at the time and now I realize that pretty much anything is possible.  I trek to the fence, pull him free again, and carry him back to the deck where the other two dogs wait impatiently, each wearing that familiar, long suffering expression that smart dogs reserve for not-so-smart ones.

Mind your manners, I tell them tartly, I don't see the Rhodes Scholarship people coming for either of you.

Two sinkfuls of warm water and a quarter cup of oatmeal shampoo later, I wring him out and wrap him up, towel dry him and begin to brush out his coat.  He likes this part even less than the suds but he's a fine, little dog and he tolerates it with a dignified and only slightly wiggle-worm air of resignation.  The process takes some time but as the one and only attempt at blow drying ended in utter panic and a most severely and lengthily held grudge, I know we must do this by hand or not at all.  Finally finished, I re-attach his collar and tags, give him a well deserved biscuit and set him free - he leaps away, all fluff and soft fur, and instantly chases the first cat he sees into the next room.  Predictably, the pursuit reverses itself only seconds later and
he comes running back at full speed with the cat nipping at his heels.

He may not be the sharpest tool in the shed and I've known babies to be conceived and born in less time then it took to housebreak him, but I've never known a sweeter natured or more loving animal.  He's a curious mix of gentleness, timidity, playfulness and affection - a warm bundle of love with sweet eyes and an endearing face who will run at the first sign of drama or confrontation and who is totally undone by a raised voice.  He curls up beside me, falling into an untroubled sleep with his head resting on my hip and I rest my hand on his side, feeling his even, steady breathing and wondering about his dreams.

Mystery in a Cashmere Shawl

She was, everyone agreed, nothing less than stunning and wickedly out of place.

Long red hair coiled at the base of her neck, cameo earrings on thin gold wires hung from her ears and a rust colored cashmere shawl carelessly covered one shoulder.  She was standing alone, leaning over the ferry railing with the sun side lighting her.  When one of the crew approached her for the fare, she pulled a $5 bill from a sequined purse and waved away the change with a shy smile - the ferryman stood awkwardly, not sure what to do next with this unexpected good fortune - and the woman in the shawl laughed, a sweet, light sound not at all unkind, and then firmly folded his hand over the dollar bills and turned back to the railing.

I declare, Nana remarked as she pulled a Kent 100 from its pack and struck a match, That's not something you see everyday.

I wonder who she is, my mother said aloud, lowering her sun glasses for a better look, Surely can't be local.

I expect we'll know by the time we get home, my grandmother said mildly, And don't stare, Jeanette, it's not polite.

She looks like a movie star, I said hopefully.

My mother shrugged diffidently and reached for her Parliaments.

I watched her as we made the crossing.  She was undeterred by the salt spray or the wind that tried so hard to
un-tether her hair.  She just stood, holding the railing and watching the water, glancing occasionally at the opposite shore with a faraway look that I recognized.  She smiled when we passed the lighthouse at Boar's Head and although I didn't know who she was, I was sure my mother and grandmother were wrong - she was local, I was certain - and she was coming home.  It was all over her face.

We docked at Tiverton and and Cap emerged from the wheelhouse to offer her his arm and lead her up the slip.  They made an odd pair, Cap in his patched work pants and boots, flannel shirt rolled to the elbows over his longjohns and the pretty young woman with her hair and shawl dancing in the breeze.

Well, I never!  my mother exclaimed at this unprecedented turn of events and Nana looked on wide eyed with surprise.  

If he bows to her, I swear I'll run the old the old coot down, my grandmother said gruffly as she turned the key in the ignition and the Lincoln came to life with a rumble of engine and exhaust.   The ferryman motioned us forward and up we went, slow and steady, Nana wincing slightly when the back end grated and bounced on the chain link covered slip as it always did.   By the time we reached the top, there was no sign of Cap or the pretty young passenger and we drove slowly off the wharf and onto the dirt road, picking up speed and leaving a cloud of dust as we headed for home.

Peter's Light

At precisely eight o'clock each summer evening, the beacon in the lighthouse on Peter's Island turned red.  It signaled bedtime and my grandmother rounded us up and sent us up the steep, narrow stairs to our rooms, one step closer to September and leaving.

It was a small light, barely enough to send a ripple out over the calm water of the passage but it shone bright and steady all the way to morning.  Sometimes when I couldn't sleep, I would crawl out of my bed and push aside the curtains just to make certain I could still see it.  It seemed to tell me that all was right with the world, that I would sleep and dream peacefully and safely, that there would be another perfect day.  I dreaded seeing the light come on, never wanted to let go of a single hour spent on the island especially with the risk of waking to the steady, sheep-like bleating of the foghorn and a day blanketed with dense, dripping fog.  All you could see was gray, like a cocoon, and Nana would keep us in.  It might last for a day or a week and I could feel this precious time slipping away second by second.  Then one morning it would magically clear - I could smell the sunshine and the grass and the salt fish and would practically trip over myself to get outside and see the ocean and Westport and The Old Road again.  The lighthouse on Peter's Island stood just as I remembered it, bright and clear in the morning sun, reassuring and promising and as unchanged as a picture postcard.

Ruthie and I went round The Old Road, up through the pastures of wild flowers and down again towards the dance hall and the square.  We picked and ate berries on the way, played tag with the dogs and waded through the tide as it came in, collected a day's worth of shells and watched for empty pop bottles to redeem.  We didn't speak it out loud, but we were careful to avoid her her daddy's store and risk being pulled in to the dark backroom with its sacks of grain and flour and sugar - it was his idea of a perfect play area, dim and musty, hard to breathe and right under his thumb - but we wanted to play in the light and the blue green water of Peter's Island.  

I suppose I've romanticized those childhood summers somewhat, gilded the memories to a degree and made the people more than they were.  They were days when anything was possible, when second chances were limitless and kindness was defined by community.  The lighthouse on Peter's Island still stands and its beacon still sends children to bed and brings the rest of us safely home.

From the Pit

News that my friend Kirk has landed in charity hospital with a heart attack reaches me late Friday afternoon.  My emotions are as jumbled as a junk drawer - I'm torn between relief that he's in a safe place where he'll get the care he needs, hope that those he's hurt so badly will forgive and show support, optimism that this might be a wake up call, and of course sadness that it had to happen at all.  The thing that's missing is surprise.  He's been deeply troubled and in a self destructive downward spiral for several months, severely depressed and angry, viciously and hurtfully lashing out at anyone who suggests he stop blaming others for his mostly self inflicted misfortunes.  Fate, it would seem, has struck back.  Karma has stopped him in his tracks and while there is certainly no joy in this, I find myself hoping that some self awareness and good might come from it.

Sadly, the absolute bottom of the barrel is not the same for addicts.  For most of us, a heart attack would get our attention, force us to take a second look at our lives and consider making some changes.  For most of us, losing everything that mattered would provoke, at the very least, an inward - if passing - glance.  But for addicts, there is always the comfortable pit of denial to fall back into.  Someone or something else is always to blame for even the most horrifying and near death circumstances.  Kirk will recover from this brutal assault on his heart and be released but will he change course?  Or simply add this to the long list of crimes against him? I don't know but based on experience and his prior behavior, I'm not optimistic.   

Here's the thing:  Just not drinking isn't the same thing as getting well.  And a lie of omission is still a lie even if you only tell it to yourself. 

An addict will use any means to maintain his safety net - tears, promises, threats of self harm, despair, loss of temper followed by the most sincere and heartfelt apologies.  He'll play on guilt and emotions to distract you, use love to sidestep any issue, try to scare, intimidate and manipulate you.   Challenge him and he'll get furious, accuse you of persecution and abandonment and lack of trust.  Push him and he'll make it your fault.
Tragically, a heart attack makes for some pretty strong ammunition.

Still, there's life and where there's life, there's hope, I tell myself.  

I'm not in hell, he wrote in our last conversation, But I can see it from my window.

Then change windows, I wrote back, Find another view.

Easy for you to say, he snapped back.

No. No, it isn't.

Rain Songs

We started with forty patients on the books and by the end of the day had seen just over twenty - the balance being frightened into staying home because of the rain.  Disagreeable weather has that effect on our elderly patients - they're dependent upon family members or government run vans for transportation, both tend to be reliably unreliable in the best of times and a good rain sends them all into hiding.  With time on our hands in between patients, we were restless and the doctor took on his bear persona - muttering and grumbling under his breath, hovering over us, interrupting and interfering and generally getting in the way.  The call from one patient's granddaughter broke the tension..... Can I bring her next week, Ms B?  She be so slow walkin' I's a feared she might drown.

Absolutely, I said, trying hard to be quick and not break out laughing, Next week will be fine.

The rain continued all the rest of the day, into the night and the next morning.  Gutters overflowed, streets flooded and the level of water in the drainage ditches reached alarming levels.  And still it came.  Driving home in the near dark every innocent puddle produced a blinding, torrential spray - I thought of Dylan singing If it keeps on rainin', the levee's gonna break.  And still it came, steady, strong, unrelenting and unstoppable.
The thought of spring flowers didn't bring much comfort and once home, the battle with the dogs made me short tempered and irritable - standing in water up to my ankles with a broken umbrella and waiting for them to pee brewed resentment on both sides.

She be so slow walkin', I's a feared she might drown, I remembered and smiled in spite of it all as an image of Gene Kelly from Singin' in the Rain came into my mind, a legendary song and dance man with his collar turned up and his umbrella at his side, singing and dancing his way from one side of the street to the other, landing victoriously in every available patch of water.  And smiling.  I vaguely remembered reading somewhere that it had taken two to three days to shoot that particular bit of film, that he'd been cold, sick with fever, drenched to the skin, likely exhausted.  And that his wool suit had shrunk during the process.  But still he was smiling.

The dogs return to the deck - the little dachshund wet and muddy all the way to his belly - and they scramble for the door and the warmth and dryness of the kitchen.  I follow, dry them off and reward each with a biscuit and a "Good Dog!".  It seems wiser not to remind them that there will have to be one more outing before bed.

    

Betwixt & Between

Death and dying are in my thoughts often these days.  The harder I try not to think about them, the more they seem to push and shove their way in.  I don't live a healthy lifestyle - never have - and I fear that one day it will catch up to me.  I'm not so afraid for myself but I am terrorized by the thought of not outliving my little ones.  I simply can't bear the idea of leaving them or even entrusting them to someone else's care.  Dear Lord,
I find myself repeating, please let me be alone at the end, please let their lives be over, don't make me give them up.  I just don't think I'd survive it.  Please, Lord, this is all I ask.

But of course it's not all I ask, not really.  I also ask that my death not be a burden, that it come quietly and with minimum suffering and pain and not make it harder on the ones I love and leave behind.  And that someone will arrange a cremation, then transport my ashes and the ashes of my little ones to Nova Scotia and scatter them from the breakwater at The Point in Freeport.  And that somehow there'll be enough money to pay them to do it.  But if none of that is possible, then please, Lord, just don't let me outlive my babies.

It's not a bad bargain, really.  I haven't lived a sin-free life but I hope the balance sheet will be evened out and that in the end, I'll have done more good than harm.  I hope for death to bring an end to anger and maybe even a little peace.  I pray to be reunited with Joshua and Magic and all the animals I've loved.  I want the afterlife, if there is one - and the longer I live, the more sure I am of it - to be Rainbow Bridge.  If I've earned  heaven, I want it to be with animals.

As I walk into the chapel for my friend Jim's visitation - nobody calls them wakes anymore - I think about living and dying and all the people and things we encounter on the way, how are lives are interconnected and entwined.  I think about the choices we make and how we never know if there'll be a tomorrow, about my friend Henry, withering away in a nursing home, my friend Scotty, who drank himself into his grave.  And my dear and one of a kind friend, Ran, taken cruelly and unjustly before his time.  And I smile and hug all the old friends I haven't seen in years, wondering at how strange and sad it is that the only time I see them is when we're saying goodbye to someone else.  And I'm glad that the deadly seriousness of wakes and the mourning of funerals has given way to visitations and memorial services.  Better to celebrate a life well lived than a death too soon, I think, better yet to celebrate while we're all still here.


The thing that most struck me about the funeral was when the minister talked about the hole that's left in our lives when someone dies.  Don't expect it to be filled, she said flatly, It won't be.  This simple, direct, and painfully true remark went straight to my heart and I think, to the hearts of a great many others.

In the near to panicky rush to heal after such a loss, we can sometimes go a little crazy, rushing here and there to get over the pain and move on to a place that doesn't hurt so much.   We want to put the dreadful sorrow behind us, to bury it like an old bone and plant flowers over it.   Life goes on, we tell ourselves, and there's no time to stay stuck in what used to be.  We try to make grief a whim, a temporary and passing bad patch, as if taking flight will heal the wound and fill the emptiness.  Or we wallow - jumping headlong into the misery that death leaves us with and making no effort to reconcile, no effort to survive it.  Days become grim with sadness and heartache, nights are to be endured.  Every hour is a reminder of something we've lost, of how cruel and unfair life can be, how wrong.  Healing is somewhere betwixt and between, I imagine, somewhere in the gray area we can't quite grasp.  A strong faith may help a little, but in the end, if we come to acceptance, we come to it alone.  

When I was a child, I liked to dig in the dirt in the narrow space between my grandmother's garage and the neighbor's fence.  It was cool and dark and no grass grew there but the ground was soft and pliable, perfect for  digging holes.  I dug for hours, filling plastic cups with the damp dirt and lining them up in neat rows.  It was purposeless but it took up the time and Nana never fussed as long as I emptied all the dirt back into the ground - this was, she reminded me, the route she took to the backyard clothesline and she had no wish to stumble in what she called one of my gopher holes and break her neck.  Dig all you want, she told me, Just fill the holes in when you're done.


And so I did.  The ground was never quite the same though, never as even and smooth as when I'd started and there were always soft spots where a heel might snag and sink, so Nana walked slowly and carefully, mindful of the risk but not willing to take the long way round.  Perhaps, I think as I remember that narrow and dark space, that's how we get over the terrible hurts - by walking slow and careful over the ground we know and love and miss, respecting the holes, but walking just the same.

 



 

One Brief & Shining Moment

I was raised with simple rules.  One was Don't question authority and another was You can't beat the system. As a result, if you're a mile away and even thinking about saying the word "confrontation", I'm locking my doors and finding a closet to hide in.  So it was confusing to arrive home to let the dogs out and discover my back yard had been....well, re-arranged.

At first glance, I thought someone might've detonated a bomb.

The first thing I saw was a mountain of reddish, nasty looking dirt, several feet high.  The underbrush and greenery that had once been the little dachshund's favorite hiding place and retreat was now a brush and debris pile, savagely cut down and piled in a corner.  The hole - easily extending 12 or 15 feet down and equally as long was another 2 feet across with nothing to prevent a cat or dog or person from falling in.  And then there was the 6 foot section of chicken wire, unattached and unsecured, where just that morning there'd been a 6 foot section of privacy fence separating my yard from my neighbor's.  The entire yard was ridged and rutted with mud and overlaid with deeply embedded tire tracks.  And, I realized as I peered into the yard behind me and the one next door, I'd gotten off easy - I at least had some semblance of yard left while all they had was uprooted trees and mammoth, gaping mud pits.  I was trying to remember Loretta Lynn singing about strip mining and Mr. Peabody's Coal Train when the little dachshund trotted past me, ducked easily under the chicken wire and disappeared like a flash into the next yard, just one street away from a busy and nasty industrial thoroughfare.  I moved like greased lightning, snatched both remaining dogs to safety and got in my car to drive around the block - it took ten minutes to track him down and once I'd gotten him back home, I got back in the car and tracked down the construction crew, laying into them like a homicidal fishwife.  They stood, bewildered and mute, as I threatened to have their jobs, revoke their immigration status, make their wives widows.

I barely recognized the voice that was screaming.  If anyone of you sets as much as one foot on my property except to put back my fence, I'll f**king blow you to kingdom f**king come!  You just f**king try me!

In retrospect, I'm sure they thought I'd gone quite wildly mad.  And that immigration thing, well, that had been low.

The next morning as the tell tale sound of heavy machinery cranked up, I went in search of the job foreman. 
He explained to me that the city had contracted him to replace the sewer system for the entire block - a barrage of complaints about sewage backing up into the houses had finally forced the city to act and hadn't I gotten a letter about it.  No, I assured him, I had not.  He apologized several times, assured me he completely understood about the dogs and as he had the means to correct it, he would do so.

Today?  I asked darkly.
Today, he assured me.

And he pulled off his muddy glove, gave me his name, and extended his hand.  I hesitated for a fraction of a second, then extended mine and we shook on it.  

Friends?  he asked with a tentative smile.
As long as my dogs are safe, I agreed, still feeling cautious and remembering that actions always speak louder than words, Friends.

In less than a half hour, he'd erected and stabilized a wire mesh panel across the opening, weighted it down with shale and fastened it at both sides.  It wasn't pretty but it was effective - the little dachshund's disappointment was evident on his next outing - he sat on his side and sulked for several minutes but then perked up when all approximately 350 pounds of neighboring dogs were let out and all came running for the newly secured fence.  The largest skidded to a stop in the dirt before jumping up and testing it, but it held despite his weight and I breathed a sigh of relief.  I'd been so obsessed with keeping my own dogs in that I hadn't considered keeping others out and it suddenly came to me that the little dachshund, in spite of his bravado and the small brown dog, snack sized at best, might easily have been turned into lunchmeat by the gang living behind me.  It was hard to think above the chaos in progress at the fence line - seven dogs all defending their territory and each determined to have the last word so it seemed - and a chill went up my 
spine thinking about all that might've gone wrong but didn't. 

There is, on the seventh day,one brief and shining moment when unaware that the crew was still working, I arrive home and let the dogs out.  There is an  immediate uproar - frantic barking and a veritable chorus of panicky voices shouting or possibly cursing mostly in Spanish ( except for the one clear and very English Holy Shit! ) and by the time I get to the rear of the yard, two hard hats have scrambled for the safety of their bulldozers but the other three are trapped, clinging to and cowering behind the roll of fencing they were in the process of reattaching across the newest and deepest trench.  The 6 pound Yorkie mix, the 10 pound little dachshund, and the 15 pound Schipperke have run all five 200 pound construction workers to ground.  The two smallest ones are the loudest - barking furiously and running back and forth in the mud while the Schipperke circles cautiously in the distance, watching and waiting.  I don't need to be bi-lingual to understand the exchanges between the two men on the bull dozers and the three ignominiously trapped behind the fencing. Derision and mockery are the same in any language.  

The little ones won't hurt you, I tell the crew with a smug smile, But the black one bites and she doesn't like people she doesn't know so you might want to be careful there.  The three stuck behind the fencing paled while the two on the bull dozers continued to jeer and taunt in Spanish.  Maybe you can't beat the system, I thought to myself, making a mental note to look up the origin of Mexican standoff, but now and then you can give it a good kick in the ass.


Then the coal company came, with the world's largest shovel
And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land
Well they dug for their coal till the land was forsaken
Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man

john prine

  

Snippets

Nothing much surprises me about health insurance anymore - these companies, whether public or private have only one job - to withhold as much money as possible for as long as possible using any means possible.  They sidestep the morality, ethics, and consequences of their actions without the slightest effort and get quietly rich while the rest of the country goes bankrupt and people die every day.  Healthcare, much like the banking industry and the majority of politicians, is corrupt, disfunctional, greedy and compassionless.  The people who run it are dedicated to simple principles - keep it inaccessible, convoluted, time consuming and frustrating to the point of tears - hoping that patients, doctors, and health services professionals will eventually give up.

In this war, one of their main weapons is the automated system.  Every insurance company has one and to save a buck or two, most were purchased second hand from third world countries who have yet to discover fire.  The hardware is shoddy and unreliable at best, utterly useless at worst.  Again, to save a buck or two, the software is just slightly more sophisticated than two soup cans with a string between them and the programming - quite intentionally and discreetly done by people without the first encounter with English - is designed to discourage its users, to make navigating the system a nightmare, to fail and fail spectacularly. And should you reach an actual person, it gets even worse.

Snippet:

Thank you for calling Medicare.  Please say Part A or Part B.
Part B.
Silence extending several seconds.
I think you said Part A.  Is that right?
No. Part B.
More silence extending several more seconds.
If you are calling about Part A, please press one.
No, Part B.
Are you calling about eligibility?  Please say the name of the state you are calling about.
Louisiana.
I think you said New Mexico.  Is that right?
Louisiana!  LOUISIANA!
Are you calling about Part A or Part B?

Snippet:
Thank you for calling Humana (or United Health, your choice because it really doesn't matter), my name is
(insert anything long and unpronounceable, again, unless you happen to be fluent in Pakistani or Urdu, it really doesn't matter), How may I assist you?
I need to verify benefits for a specialist office visit.
Certainly, I will be happy to assist you with that.  Will this take place in a specialist's office?

Snippet:
Thank you for calling United Health Care.  May I know your name, please.
Esmeralda.
Thank you for that, Esmeralda.  How are doing this day?
Not all that well, my dog died.
That's good to hear, Esmeralda.  How may I assist you?

Snippet:
Thank you for calling Humana.  My name is (see above) but you may call me Chet.

Snippet:
Thank you for calling United Health Care.  May I know your name, please?
My name is B.
Thank you for that.  Is that B-e-e?
No, just the letter B.
Thank you for that, how do you spell your name?
The letter B.
Thank you for that.  The letter B?  Just the letter B?
PAY ATTENTION!  JUST THE LETTER B!
Thank you for that.  May I place you on hold?

Snippet:
I need to know the benefit for surgery done in the doctor's office.
Certainly, I will be happy to assist you with that.  Where will the surgery be done?

These are not made up, not exaggerated, not for effect.  Insurance companies like cheap labor and don't care how far they have to go to get it or what the cost may be to anyone else.  It makes me ashamed that we allow this and enraged that we reward it.  

Snippet:
We no longer verify benefits if the information is available on our website.
Since I don't have access to the website, perhaps you could make an exception.
No, but I can tell you that the coverage was terminated in 2006.
The last claim you paid was in November of 2012.  How would you explain that?
If you could give me a claim number, I'll be happy to tell you.
We no longer provide claim numbers when the information is available through your claims department. Thanks anyway.

Winnie's Penance

Winnie, Winnie,
Tall and skinny,
Never married, never wed.

Loved John Raymond,
Tried to save him,
Sent him to his grave instead.

It was our version of Lizzie Borden, the story of Winnie McWilliams and John Raymond Stanton, starcrossed lovers who had scandalized the village when my grandmother was just a young girl.  Winnie had discovered John Raymond and an unfortunate waitress from the mainland in the hayloft - in what was then called a compromising position - and she had promptly gotten her daddy's shotgun, taken aim, and without a second's hesitation, fired a single shot.  The waitress died instantly, people said, but John Raymond, who had chosen to make a run for it, tripped and fell to his almost death in a horse stall.  He lingered for nearly a week while Winnie took to her bed, incoherent and grief stricken at what she had done, then died quietly, two days before his 16th birthday.  Inconsolable, Winnie retreated to the ramshackle old farmhouse and there - so the story was told - she remained until the day she died, mourning John Raymond and seeing no one but the Sullivan boy who delivered groceries once a week.  She had, most of the village believed, gone mad with guilt and loneliness, a deadly combination in a fifteen year old girl.  At eighty something years, she fed the horses and chickens, milked the cows for the final time, then fashioned a noose and hung herself from a rafter.

Sin, Nana told me as we stood at the grave, always catches up with you.  In all these years, she never had a day of happiness, not a single day.

She took two lives, Alice, Aunt Pearl said with a shake of her head,

Ayuh, my grandmother said sadly, And she paid for 'em, I reckon.

Mebbe more'n they was worth, Aunt Vi added with a sigh.

Island memories being what they were, the funeral had not been well attended - the waitress had been more or less insignificant as no one had actually known her - besides, she was generally thought culpable for the tragic drama in the hayloft, but John Raymond had come from a typically prodigious family and they were short on forgiveness that overcast August day.  Winnie was laid to rest with only a handful of mourners on hand, even Miss Clara, thought to be a distant cousin of the Stantons, had refused to come and despite Nana's insistent pleas, it was the following summer before she was willing to tend Winnie's modest grave.

Where there's sin, there's blame, Nana reminded us more often than we needed,  And there's always more enough of both to go 'round.

Winnie, Winnie,
Tall and skinny,
Lived alone for all her years.

No one mourned her,
No one loved her,
No one came to dry her tears.

The Wrong House

When Nana had enough of our chatter and wanted us out from underfoot, she would often give us small plastic containers and send us out the the strawberry field.  She knew we'd be distracted by butterflies or bees or our own imaginations and that we could be counted upon to eat more than we picked, but she sent us anyway, not expecting enough for a pie but maybe enough to keep us occupied and out of the house for a few hours.

The field was to the right of the gravel driveway with a footpath cut directly through it.  When we'd had our fill of berries, we would cross the driveway to the tall grass - it swayed and waved in the morning breeze like a calm, caramel colored lake, taller than any of us and smelling of sweet hay.  We would crawl into it, trample down the stalks and become pirates or fortune hunters, lost children or cowboys - until Nana called or John Sullivan arrived to fill his water buckets or the dogs searched us out or we fell asleep in the warm sunshine.  Then we emerged, sneezing, hands and faces stained with strawberry juice and covered with haydust and chaff.  Nana would scrub us clean at the kitchen sink with cold water, a rough facecloth, and a smile.

A quarter each to fill the woodbox!  she would say and Mind the mites and watch for splinters!  

The field of tall grass that began on our property extended all the way to the breakwater.  You could follow it clear to Sparrow's, almost undetected if you were slow and careful and everyone else was occupied, it was the backyard of every one of the four houses on The Point, at least until haying season.  It was a place to go if you didn't want to be found or needed to think things out or were trying to escape chores.  We didn't know that from the hill above it, Uncle Shad could chart our progress and practically see our every step - wisely, he kept watch but kept it to himself.  Little did we know it at the time, but no island child was ever really very far from being watched over - by the time we'd made it to the breakwater below Sparrow's, at least a half dozen pairs of eyes were trained on us - they tracked us, knew where we headed and where we'd end up so that when we got to Miss Clara's and her painted pony neighed in welcome, there were cookies and milk waiting.  We just thought it was some kind of magic.

It was on one of these excursions that we came upon the fox den, a vixen and two infants, living in a fallen log on the hillside just in back of Sparrow's sheep pens.  The wind was blowing out toward the water and she hadn't heard us - that day's Let's Pretend was escaped prisoners and we were on our bellies, inching our way slowly and silently toward freedom - and suddenly there she was, sitting alertly but with her back to us while her babies tumbled about in the grass.  Ruthie and I froze as if a spell had been cast on us, remembering the magnificent deer we had once seen so briefly in the cove and feeling that same kind of wonder.  We watched for several seconds until the babies noticed us and began a frantic sort of high pitched yipping - their mother immediately went into a protective crouch and bared her small teeth at us while emitting a low, warning growl but she didn't come at us - and it was then we saw that one back leg was broken and hanging loosely, a portion of bone raw and exposed.  With remarkable sense but not a word spoken between us, we began to crawl backward until they were out of sight then we ran for all we were worth, detouring to the road and past the ferry, all the way to the breakwater and up the hill that led to Sparrow's.  It was only when he took down his old shotgun and pulled his cap over his eyes that we understood we'd come to the wrong house seeking rescue.  He tramped out the back door, brushing us off with a curse, and headed toward the tall grass.  The mother fox had hidden her little ones and moved on by the time we reached the fallen log, but Sparrow was intrepid and he found her trail and not long after found her, curled up in a nest of dead branches and defiantly hissing at his approach.  He raised the gun to his shoulder and sighted but then nothing happened - the vixen glared at him but made no move to run and the old man finally lowered the shotgun and cursed up a storm, my grandmother would've washed his mouth out with soap, I remember thinking and our's for being with him - and the fox seemed to curse right back, her eyes flashed and she showed her teeth.  Ruthie and I wailed.

Hell and damnation!  Sparrow yelled and threw the shotgun to the ground. Sufferin' Jesus, will the two of ya stop that racket, he roared at us, I ain't agonna shoot the goddam chicken stealin'......  His shoulders heaved with resignation, a man trapped between a predator and the nightmare of two sobbing children who might never forgive him.  Go on back to the house, he said with the finality of a man who knows when he's beaten, Fetch me the trap off the wall and a slab of bacon.

We watched him bait the trap and conceal it in the tall grass with a trail of bacon chunks leading to it.  Later that day, the vixen followed the trail and sprung the trap on the first try.  Sparrow pulled on a pair of thick leather work gloves and awkwardly hauled it back to the house then returned and re-set it for the little ones.  By the time the factory whistle blew, all three foxes were caught and Rowena had been summoned to work her magic on the vixen's leg.  Under her supervision, Sparrow built a wire enclosure at one end of his porch and nursed all three all through the summer.  Ruthie and I visited every day and cried when they were pronounced well and strong and ready to be returned to the wild - we released them in the woods on the road to one of coves where we had seen the deer - they skittered off without a single backward glance.

Not even a fare thee well, Sparrow grumbled as he dismantled the makeshift wire cage, Ain't no gratitude in this world no more.  But we'd seen him smile ever so slightly when the foxes ran off free and wild, and we knew we'd gone to the right house after all.

Captain Hook's Waltz

My friend, Jim, will undoubtedly end up somewhere with a typewriter, a stage, a cocktail and an adoring public.  My mind is full of memories as I sit in this cold chapel, surrounded by strangers and friends alike, all who loved him so dearly.  It is, without exception, the most glorious service I've ever attended - there are tears, to be sure, but there is also laughter and story telling - the sadness we feel at his absence is mixed with the joy at having known him.  My daddy might not have completely approved of laughter at a funeral but I think he'd have understood and been glad for it.  And Jim - well, he loved the spotlight.  The only time I cry is during the playing of Captain Hook's Waltz when I'm instantly transported back in time to a small, dark community theatre, to what he always said was his favorite role.  It was the night I fell hopelessly in love with a pirate and I'm not sure I ever got completely over it.

I'm not sure I ever wanted to.

Peace Out

I suppose that a part of me knew when the telephone rang.  The telemarketers would've been snug in their beds hours before and it was too late for a social call.  I recognized my friend Tricia's number and if there been any doubt with the first few rings, now I knew it was going to be the worst possible news.  For a second or two, I prayed - hoping that our friend Jim had maybe had a harsh reaction to the second round of chemo and radiation, that I would have to schedule a hospital visit the next day - but my heart had tightened and I knew it was a wasted prayer.  I answered and listened, waiting, waiting, and waiting for the reality to take hold, waiting for the words to make some kind of sense.  But they didn't.  After days of trying to process his cancer diagnosis and make it real, I found the fact of his sudden and completely unexpected death beyond my senses and out of reach.  

I didn't cry, couldn't summon tears or overcome the feeling of disassociation.  I felt as if I had been struck, knocked emotion-less and empty, afraid that if I were to reach for something solid, it would evaporate with my touch.  I can't comprehend not running into him at the grocery store, not sitting around Tricia's dining room table after a meal, not ever seeing him on stage again.  I remember a weekend at the lake when we stole his clothes, a dance at a benefit for the Strand Theatre, any number of loud and extravagant evenings at a cozy and popular restaurant, a hug he gave me after I'd had some serious dental work.  I remember his grin and his laugh and his heartbreak.  The world may not be a lesser place with his death, but our small corner of it certainly is.  I remember the first time I ever saw him - he was Captain Hook in a local production of Peter Pan - despite the over the top costume and the stage makeup and the exaggerated gestures, I fell hopelessly in love at first sight.  Later, he signed a picture for me - Barbara, he wrote in flourishing cursive, A fan is a performer's best friend!  Love, Jim....

He wasn't always so serene - life was not always as kind to him as he deserved but I hope he knew how much he was treasured and loved and respected.  He lived alone and left no family - a liberal, a romantic, a writer, actor, singer, gentleman and scholar and sometimes a troubled soul.

Peace, old friend.

Hearts and Minds & Two Dollar Shoes

At some point in my childhood, my daddy decided I was old enough to learn to be responsible for money and he began giving me a weekly allowance.  Each Monday morning, he would take a crisp $5 bill from his worn out wallet and tuck it into my pocket, always giving me the same short speech.

When it's gone, he would say quietly, It's gone. Spend it any way you like but don't look for anymore.

To be trusted to budget wisely and well was no small thing and I took it to heart, thinking it through before I spent the first nickel, weighing the pleasure of a hot fudge sundae carefully against the purchase of a new romance magazine or a trip to Harvard Square.  The temptations of the drug store and the deli were legion but it was the five and dime store that was the most hazardous - fortunately it was just two doorways down from the library and I liked to pretend that it was closed - but in the end, it was the music store that opened its doors across the street that proved to be my ultimate undoing.   There were guitars hung on the walls along with nearly lifesize posters of my rock and roll idols.  An upright piano sat in one corner, its gleaming black and white keys beckoned to be played.  Turntables in suitcase like boxes with carrying handles were stacked everywhere and it was never, ever quiet - music ruled here, the love of it and the sale of it.  Row upon row of display cases held 45's and 78's from every imaginable genre and rack upon rack held sheet music from every imaginable artist. It was here I heard The Mills Brothers and Brenda Lee, Johnny Horton, Hank Williams and Kitty Wells.  Liberace performed his extravagant and glitzy music here, and on Sundays the rich strains of classical composers like Mozart and Bach and Rossini drifted into every corner.  Other days you could hear old blues or barbershop quartets or opera.  No one was too famous, too outrageous, or too unknown not to be showcased here and my allowance as well as my conservative spending suffered greatly for the want of Billie Holiday and Pete Fountain and Mahalia Jackson.

Being firstborn and a daddy's girl - and a musically inclined daddy, at that - I could've batted my eyelashes and sweet talked him into an increase of my allowance and neither my mother or my brothers would've been any the wiser.   Instead, I just doubled down, passed on the sundaes and the five and dime and the busfare it would've cost to get to Harvard Square, and took on chores for the neighbors.  I saved my birthday money and Christmas money and  collected bottles like a fiend, leaving behind the desperate desire for the two dollar shoes in the window of the thrift store and doing without my beloved romance magazines.  Love of music had won over my heart and mind and things were never to be quite the same again.  I never imagined that all these decades later the feeling would be even stronger and that there would come a point when listening wasn't enough.  Of the three great and enduring loves of my life - animals, music, and photography - I've been able to blend the last two and find a place of peace, a comfort zone.

Despite my daddy's warnings, my brothers came crawling for extra allowance money every few days but I was a proud child, more than a  little vain about learning to manage money and over anxious to please the man who provided it.  It was an early lesson in learning the difference between need and want and being happy with what you have.  I never imagined I'd forget it - but then I never imagined I'd survive not having those two dollar shoes.

Sweet Relief

I could blame the black dog, I suppose, but the fact is that this latest dental disaster can only be laid squarely and wholly on my doorstep - she was only doing what comes naturally when she snatched my bottom plate from where I had so carelessly left it, unprotected and out in the open.  After three days of searching, all I was able to find was a sharp edged, pink and white sliver of denture, no bigger than a fingernail.  When I considered the persistence and patience this must have taken, not to mention the very cast iron-ness that would've been required of her belly, I had to admit it was a pretty impressive display of digestive destruction, far more extensive than any of the damage she'd inflicted on previous pieces of bridgework in similar circumstances.
This was no small matter of twisted wire and mangled enamel - no, this was full fledged annihilation with almost no evidence left behind.

How in the world do you eat an entire denture? I demand of her but she only looks at me innocently, one paw raised in supplication - and endearing and often seductive gesture, according to some of the books I've read on the breed - but one I've always suspected she uses to deflect responsibility for her actions.

At least, I tell her with dismal resignation, I won't have to explain teeth marks.  Again.  She lays her head on my knee - forgiveness achieved - and sighs contentedly.

Sharing this latest sin with my beloved dentist is quite out of the question, I realize, so I pocket the shard of leftover teeth and reach for the telephone book.  Neglectful and foolishly careless I may be, but I still have enough pride left to be ashamed - some new and anonymous dental work is clearly called for.

Then in the very wee hours of a Sunday night, I hear the sound of something hard being batted across the hardwood floor - it skitters and slides and I almost ignore it, thinking that one of the cats has gotten hold of a stray earring or perhaps a cigarette lighter - then my eyes fly open and I leap out of bed to find the tabby and the older black cat playing an enthusiastic game of Pong with nothing other than my missing bottom plate.  It's mostly unscathed except for that one little missing sliver and I wash it thoroughly, douse it in Listerine and hold my breath while I slip in in place.  And, sweet relief, it fits almost as it did before.

Back in bed, the black dog raises her head from the pillow and gives me a sweet, sleepy, satisfied smile.

    

The Bear at the Bus Stop

The morning after Christmas is dark and viciously cold - yesterday's rain is now frozen and slick on the streets and in the gutters and the azaleas and grass are stiff with frost and ice.  The dogs hesitate at the back door then make a run for it except for the little one who backs up slowly, keeping one eye fixed on me until she's safely out of reach, then darts for the warmth of the bedroom and her nest of pillows.  I think this evasive action demonstrates remarkably good sense and I don't blame her in the slightest.  Despite the last four days of being off work, of sleeping and reading and retreating, I would join her if I could.  As she well knows, it can be a cold world.

On the drive to work, traffic is so light that it makes me wonder if I'm going back on the right day and that may be why - I think later - that I noticed the girl and the teddy bear.  She's standing at the bus stop, bundled up from head to toe and clutching a cigarette in one gloved hand and a brown, four foot tall stuffed bear with a bright red ribbon 'round its neck in the other.  In addition to the ribbon, the bear is wearing denim overalls with silver buckles on the shoulder straps and holding a hand painted sign that reads HONK IF YOU LOVE JESUS.
No one does but a police car pulls to the curb, lights flashing in the chilly morning air, and after a very brief conversation with the two officers, the girl and her bear are not unkindly escorted into the cruiser and taken away.  The light changes and what traffic there is resumes its morning commute.  There are, I notice, more than one or two tolerant smiles on the faces of the drivers as they pass through the intersection.

I hope it ends well for the girl and her bear.  I hope they're not homeless or escaped from some halfway house or sent to a shelter.  I hope the police will be kind, that the doctors will listen, that no one will take her bear since it may be the only anchor she has.  It's easy to overlook the lost and forgotten people but a four foot bear at a bus stop does  get noticed.  And there are times when the best thing a good friend can do is be nearby, stuffed and silent, but nearby.

Muddling On

We're made to muddle on.

We can race like an old north wind or plod along at the speed of warmed up mud.  Call it tenacity or persistence or sheer stubbornness, but whether it's small things like housebreaking a dog or medium things like teaching yourself plumbing on line or huge things like fighting cancer up to your last breath - we muddle on.  It's hard and unfair and sometimes downright impossible but it's always better than the alternative of six feet under.   We're all terminal, as my friend Tricia reminds me, all dying from the moment we're born.  It's all just a matter of time so we muddle on.

I've reached the point in my life where people I care about are dying.  It's a natural and expected turn of events and I undoubtedly spend too much time thinking about it, possibly because I spent so little time thinking about it before.  You never think about not being here when you're young - it's like looking at the sky and realizing that it's infinite - it always has been but it doesn't cross your mind much.  And then one day it comes to you, usually a little late, that maybe it's time to consider matters of faith and retirement accounts and cemetery plots and final wishes.  It's something of a shock to realize that I actually listen to commercials for life insurance these days, sometimes even come within a hair's breath of taking down a toll free number.
Mortality has never been much more than a disagreeable word to me.  I give it all the space and freedom it needs as long as it's not looking my way.

But here and now, with the news of an old friend's second bout with cancer on my mind and gnawing at my heart, I realize that muddling on is all there is and all we can do.  Time to draw the blinds and close the shutters, I think to myself, lock the doors and pretend it's not happening - though I've fought through it a hundred times over, I still keep a little denial tucked under my pillow - just in case.  There isn't enough to last very long and I can't afford to waste it.

It doesn't matter who you are or what your money can buy or where you are on this world, my grandmother liked to tell us, the tides are inevitable.  They come in and they go out on their own timetable and like it or not, they carry us with them.

And so reality ebbs and flows as sure and certain as the tides.

And we muddle on.