The Fiddler

Unshaven and pale, his features not just thin but bordering on gaunt, my friend David leaned in and began to talk to me about the cancer.  His voice was clear and quiet but the words were hard to hear - lesions on his liver, they'd told him, multiple and malignant - not the kind of malevolence that would respond to radiation or chemotherapy or surgery.  It was,I began to comprehend although still dimly and as though from a great distance, the worst of all bad news.  His dark eyes met mine, his graceful hands cupped a glass of tonic and lemon, and he talked to me about dying.  I saw then how terribly ill he looked, how drawn and tired and thin and I started to ache with helplessness, wanting to shout down these dreadful words.

He is an artist, a musician, a philosopher, slightly eccentric looking with a tendency to stay on the sidelines and a somewhat shy nature, a thinker rather than a doer and a private sort of man.   He has a horror of this news being spread over some social media site or circulating through the well meaning music community so when he asks for my promise to say nothing of what he tells me, I give it.  His dark eyes meet mine with a sadness so profound I can barely make sense of it and I wonder if he knows how much he is loved by his fellow musicians and artists, how thoroughly and quickly they would come together to support him and raise money.
Then I realize it doesn't matter - he's never been comfortable with any kind of celebrity, dying is no exception. I give my word, knowing I'll regret it but bound by it.  And I listen as he talks to me about discovering his spirituality, about things finally beginning to make sense, about how sometimes things just are what they are without rhyme or reason or fairness.   He talks about the doctors and here is the only flare of real anger - cancer may be taking his body, he tells me, but doctors are taking the rest - his money, his humanity, his self respect and peace of mind.  What they can't cure, they run from, he tells me, by detaching with a violent sort of arrogance, a self serving and insincere indifference.  He illustrates this by sharing his most recent conversation with the cancer specialist - an Asian oncologist with a marginal grasp of English who believes in getting right to the point - stage four liver cancer is untreatable, sorry, my nurse will show you out.

But, he adds with something that might've been a grimly determined smile, he feels fine for now and has a plan, at least for the short term - he will take his antidepressants and anxiety drugs, do his best to surrender his will to his higher power on a daily basis, paint and make music and be as grateful as much as possible.  A fine plan, I tell him, an exceptionally fine and reasonable plan.

The break between sets ends and he returns to the stage.  Despite his frail appearance, his voice is strong and his fiddle playing as good as ever.  Before I leave, I give him a kiss on his beard roughened cheek and he smiles back at me.

It's not enough but it's something.

In Between the Tides

On some clear, summer nights, in between the time when the tide came in and went out again, there would be an interlude of such exquisite peace and serene quiet that it would make you cry.  You could almost hear the dark stretching over The Point - it was in the calm waters, the shimmering path of moonlight across the passage, the lights of Brier Island mimicking the stars - and in front of our house, a soft circle of yellow light from the newly erected street lamp.  There was a sadness in these moments, a deep well of certainty that God was watching and approving.  Sometimes I would wake with a fierce need to be outside, feeling the darkness pulling at me.  I would creep through the sleeping house and out the side door where I could look up at the stars and feel the night breeze over the ocean.  I listened as hard as I could, holding my breath until I could hear only my heartbeat, expecting something to make itself known, to reveal itself from the shadows. Nothing ever did except the now and again quick, sharp footsteps of a lone figure passing by - Walkin' Will Patterson,
mostly known as "Swing" for his love of Bob Wills and The Texas Playboys - and his ability, at least before he'd gone to war, to do an uncannily lightfooted two step at the Saturday night dance.

Nana said he was a broken soldier, a shadow of the young man who had so proudly enlisted and sailed away to France to join the good fight.  He came back thin and pale with shell shocked shy eyes, a ragged scar across one cheek and chronic insomnia.  He walked the island roads at night, alone and sometimes til dawn, his boots echoing on the pavement with a staccato-like rhythm.  It was a lonely, lost sound, especially on those clear, quiet nights in between the tides when everyone else was sleeping and the world seemed so peaceful.

He walked hard with his head down and his hands jammed into his pockets, stopping often to light a match with his thumbnail.  It was so deathly quiet I could hear the match strike and sometimes even see his face briefly illuminated in the small flare.  Then he walked on into the next patch of darkness and eventually out of sight, even out of hearing on the nights he took the still dirt Old Road.  It was said that on some nights he walked all the way to Tiverton and back - 12 long and solitary miles - but mostly it was from The Point to the square, around the cove and then back again.  He walked, he smoked, and he drank from a flask he carried in his hip pocket, night after night, as regular and reliable as the tides.  

War changes them that fights it, Sparrow allowed one afternoon as we sat on his porch and watched the fog coming in from Peter's Island while Swing, who kept body and soul together with odd jobs and his monthly military check, split wood in the side yard.  We couldn't see him but we heard the ax falling as regular as clockwork.  Somehow it was, like boot heels on a paved road in the dark, a lonely and lost sound.

Swing Patterson walked for for some 20 years before they found him on the beach one early morning, his body broken beyond repair by a slide down the embankment near where the guard rail ended on The Old Road.  An accident, everyone agreed, it was a treacherous turn and anyone could lose their footing on a dark night with the fog rolling in and no moon.  No one talked about the fact that the moon had been full and the night clear as glass.

Between the moon and the tides, Sparrow wrote my grandmother, a man's only got so much walkin' in him. 

Man Tracks

For a time between finding a log cabin in the mountains of New Hampshire and living in a nondescript motel on the Massachusetts border, we lived in a small town in Maine, just slightly north of the sister cities of Kittery and Portsmouth.  Neighbors were few and far between and in the winter when the snow drifts reached the window sills and travel turned into an expedition, we bundled up, hunkered down, and went ice fishing.  The cold was mind and body numbing but the solitude and serenity were priceless.  We often saw deer just beyond the tree line and sometimes their tracks led all the way to the back door - it was a small herd of sleek, graceful animals, very nearly tame and when hungry, bold enough to feed off the deck - so gentle-eyed and beautiful to watch that they often took my breath away and made me want to cry.  The family of raccoons that took up residence in the shed was another story - there were two adults and three babies, all fat and sassy despite the lean winter pickings - we heard them chirping and foraging at all hours, watched them comically make their way through the snow, scampering and tumbling over each other like midget circus clowns.  They were fearless little creatures with their bandit eyes and agile paws, curious as kittens and not a bit quarrelsome with the deer, even tolerating the chipmunks and random rabbits who dropped by.  All nature seemed to be in harmony that long, cold, country winter - I'd found a permanent position at the UNH bookstore and my then-somewhat-sober husband worked at a nearby veterinary clinic - we were able to leave and come home together each day and spent very little time apart.  There were times when I felt more like a jailer than a wife, a little lonely and a little isolated, sensing that allowing anyone too close would risk exposure, but mostly I was able to keep the evil thoughts of relapse at bay.
I badly wanted to be happy and became very good at turning a blind eye to the danger signs.  It was my second marriage and I hated the idea of admitting to a fatal mistake.

It all came apart the second winter when I had longer hours to work for the January bookrush.  A fast moving storm hit the coast with a vengeance, downing telephone lines and closing roads and bridges with very little warning, stranding me on the Portsmouth side of the border while my husband was trapped in Maine.  It was two days later when I finally got home and discovered several sets of man tracks leading to and from the back door and into the woods.  Curious why he'd have gone out in such a nightmare storm, I followed them and discovered a small clearing littered with green plastic trash bags half buried in the drifts.  I didn't have to look to know what they contained - the raccoons had found them first and torn them open - scavenged empty beer cans had spilled out and lay randomly abandoned in the snow, the stale smell of Budweiser was strong and violent and sure as I knew the sky was gray, I knew the peaceful country winter was over.

It was idle speculation but I wondered where he'd kept all the empties while waiting for the opportunity to dispose of them.  I wondered where his stash of full ones might be.  I wondered how I hadn't seen it and what to do about it.  For several minutes I thought that hate and rage at being being taken for a fool - again - would suffocate me.
For another several minutes, I let the hopelessness and despair of reality take over.  I felt sick and defeated, betrayed beyond words and fatally sad.  And, I realized, standing in this freezing beer can graveyard, bitterly cold.  Not bothering to conceal my own tracks, I walked out of the woods, back into the gray afternoon light, and into the house.

He was ready for me.

There would be no excuses, no apologies, no lies or illusions.  He wouldn't even make the pretense that he hadn't been drinking but instead stood by the kitchen window with his face in shadow.  I sensed the coldness, the stubbornness, and the sheer defiance and rather than lock myself in another useless and painful confrontation, I walked the few steps to the bedroom, shut and bolted the door and began to pack a suitcase.  When I was done, I put the cats in carriers and slipped quietly out the front door.  There was no question of his following - sober, he might've made some effort to engage me, but after a two day drunk he was all self righteous indignation.  There was no danger here.

It wasn't the first time I'd left and it wouldn't be the last.  I didn't know it then but each time I gained a little strength and a little conviction until at last, several years later, I was strong enough to let go and make my own tracks.

The Lantern Line

There was thunder about as Uncle Shad pitched the last of the new mown hay onto the wagon and saddled up the team.  The horses were restless and we soon lost sight of them in the fog although we could hear their hoofbeats.  Nana watched a little anxiously until the sounds faded then called us for supper.

 Shad's driven that road in fog a hundred times, my daddy reassured her, Don't fret.

 But my grandmother, a natural born worrier, wasn't so easily put off.

I'll just call Elsie, she said, Have her to call me when he gets there.

 Knowing better than to disagree, my daddy just nodded and smiled.

When Elsie hadn't called by seven, Nana sighed and put aside her knitting.  By then we were thoroughly socked in and the foghorn was bleating warnings every ten seconds.  Nobody with a lick of sense would've been on the roads that night but Nana and my daddy trudged to the Lincoln and headed up the drive anyway, the old car's headlights barely making a dent in the fog, as if the whole world had been suddenly encased in wet, dripping cotton.  By then someone had dispatched the lantern line and the village men were walking in tight rows on either side of the road, kerosene lanterns swinging at their sides.  We couldn't see them but we could hear them calling to each other every few paces, keeping the Lincoln safely between the ditches as they walked, guiding and directing with a calm and familiar precision.  Meanwhile, the telephone lines lit up all over the island and a second lantern light formed further up island, slowly and painstakingly making their way toward the first.  Sometime after nine, they converged at the crest of the hill but still there was no sign of Uncle Shad.  Chilled, wet, sweating and beginning to be bad tempered, the men re-grouped and prepared to resume the search when one of the dogs began to bay, a distorted but still sorrowful sound that got everyone's attention immediately.

Over here!  Jacob Sullivan yelled although considering that you couldn't see the hood ornament from the front seat of the Lincoln, "here" was a somewhat relative term.  The men followed his voice and the howl of the dog and soon discovered the wagon, parked neatly on the dirt lane leading to the ballfield, the team still harnessed and standing silently like sentries.  While the men began shouting Shad's name, my grandmother leaned on the horn and the sound blared through the fog with a shocking sharpness, startling the would be rescuers as well as Uncle Shad who had been buried deep and peacefully asleep in the damp hay.

By God, you'll be wakin' the dead! he exclaimed as he brushed aside the blanket of straw and struggled to his feet, What the devil is all this?

You all right, Shad? Jacob Sullivan demanded roughly.

'Course I'm all right, you damn fool, Uncle Shad snapped back as he climbed down and surveyed the scene, Why wouldn't I be?   Pulled over when I couldn't see for the....then he stopped mid sentence and looked around in disbelief....for the damn fog, he finished, trying hard to stay indignant and failing miserably.  There was an extended silence.

Could've gone either way, my daddy said later, but then Jacob started to laugh and it was all over.

The next morning broke clear and fine and fresh.  By then, Shad and the team were home and the lantern line had dispersed.  The old Lincoln was back in the driveway and Nana, too relieved to be angry, was in the kitchen husking sweet corn from a brown paper sack that had been anonymously left at the back door.  Each member of the lantern line had discovered a similar package that morning - some got tomatoes or peppers, sweet red onions or summer squash - Jacob Sullivan got a fresh pouch of pipe tobacco and a thermos of sweet buttered fish chowder.  Good turns, not unlike debts, were routinely repaid on the island.  It was just the way things worked.  

Remington Romances

It was my mother who discovered the stash of narrow ruled notebooks I kept hidden in my closet.

Her rage was instant and fierce when she read them, as if she’d stumbled onto a nest of teenage pornography and not the pitiful efforts of a child who wanted to be a writer and had no idea where to begin – I was, at the time, under the influence of the romance magazines available at the local five and dime store – forbidden and atrociously written as they were scandalous.

 “Trash!” she shrieked wildly at me, “How dare you even think let alone write this trash?”

Notebooks flew in every direction.

“They’re private!” I shrieked right back at her, “How dare you read my private things!”

A wayward copy of “The Carpetbaggers” with its slick and suggestive paperback cover whizzed by my ear and hit the bedroom door with a dull thud.   Rendered as incoherent as I’d ever seen her, my distraught mother began ripping pages from the notebooks and punctuating each ragged handful with a violent curse.  I picked up the thick, dog eared novel gingerly and then dropped it like a hot rock when I  remembered I’d discovered it carefully concealed in her lingerie drawer.  That was bound to come to her as well, I realized, and very likely sooner than later.  Flight suddenly seemed like a reasonable course as opposed to being trapped in a tiny room with stolen property and a mad woman – I screamed some final hateful words in her direction and fled.  Not to be outdone, she flung out her last and best volley but the words were flat and the sentiment too clichéd  to carry any weight.

“You just wait…..” she screamed with a kind of breathless and impotent fury, “….til your father gets home!”

 I ran.  Down the stairs, two at a time, out the front door and onto the sidewalk where each crack looked like an opportunity and I didn’t just step, I pounced with both feet.  I ran all the way to St. Luke’s, a small Catholic church four blocks away.   It was there my daddy found me, sitting miserably on the church steps, afraid to go home but still defiant.   He parked the old black station wagon and came to sit beside me, hugging his knees and looking thoughtful.

“So,” he began neutrally, “You want to be a writer.”

“She had no right,”  I snapped, “And you can’t make me say I’m sorry.”

“Oh, I know.  She’ll get over it.” he told me with a slight shrug of his thin shoulders, “But there might’ve been a better way to handle it.”

“Like what?” I demanded with the sullen righteousness of the unfairly accused.

“Well,” he said and put his arm around my shoulders, “ You might’ve tried writing about something you know about.  Or used invisible ink.  Or found a better hiding place.  Don’t you know the bottom of the closet is the first place she looks?”

I tried hard not to smile at this and he hugged me a little tighter.

A few days later, after the winds had died down, he appeared at my bedroom door with a square shaped, latch locked box containing a dusty, second hand but still reliable – except for a missing “r” key and a tendency to skip if pressed overly hard – typewriter and an unopened ream of clean white paper.

“Just skip a space for the “r” for now,”  he told me with a small smile, “You can fill them in later.”

He patiently showed me how to load the ribbon and insert the paper, set margins, use the space bar, the shift key and the carriage return.

“Two things,” he said, “No more true romance stories.”

I had the good grace to blush at this.

“What’s the second?”  I asked hesitantly.

My daddy, always the peacemaker and perpetually caught up in a mother-daughter dynamic he didn’t understand, smiled again, this time a little sadly.

“Respect the words,” he told me.  “Don’t write anything you’d be ashamed to see in the paper and if this is something you really want, then don’t give up.  Find your own voice but learn to respect the words.  Oh, and here,” he added, producing a paperback from his pocket and laying it on the dresser. “Writers need to read.  A lot.  This is a good place to start.”

It was “Cannery Row” by John Steinbeck, its once glossy cover faded with age and nearly detached from the spine, its pages so well thumbed they curled at the edges.  It was held together with a thin, green rubber band and smelled faintly of pouch tobacco and clove.  It had, I read with a growing sense of wonder, been written before I’d been born, Steinbeck had been in his early forties and the world was recovering from war.   It somehow seemed the perfect choice for my daddy’s back pocket, the perfect gift to pass on.

It was my first grown up book.

More important and more essential, it was my first grown up moment.

Love & Other Expectations

No question about it, if someone was to invent love recognition software, I'd invest down to my last dime.

I haven't given up, not precisely, but the search has worn me down considerably and made me a tad cynical. It's too effortless and comfortable to fall in love when you're young and surrounded by magic ,too trying and time consuming when you're old and have become set in your ways. All the loves of my life have come and gone - passing through like the seasons, always on the way to changing - leaving me to wonder if any were real.

With every beginning, at least so I told myself, I was absolutely, positively, rock solid sure I was on good ground, that such feelings couldn't be anything but love. With each ending, I was equally certain that there would be another chance - mistakes are the best teaching tools, after all, and I was resilient, optimistic, and overflowing with dreams. We are meant to be paired, I told myself, meant to be in tandem and headed in the same direction, designed to search and find a soulmate. After two marriages/divorces - some might say failures - the perfect match was proving annoyingly elusive but I kept faith with the dream and the idea of a forever love, stubbornly refusing to let go.

In the end, I returned to the first and possibly only genuine love I'd ever known - my feelings for animals had been a constant since I first laid eyes on a cardboard box of puppies and been told to choose. Here I knew where I stood, here I was needed and loved without conditions, here I would have given my life to protect another small one. There was no wondering, no second thoughts, no fear for the future. Whether I'm holding a dog or a cat or a chinchilla, nursing a baby raccoon back to health and independence or sitting by the cage of a majestic white tiger, I know what it is to love and it's not what I had always believed - it's far simpler and straightforward and was always within me, right on the surface and waiting for me to find it. I just had to get past the white knights and other expectations.

Love is a warmth that pours outward from the soul, a mysterious and hard to define emotion, far too often confused with other more superficial feelings. I discovered it the instant my daddy placed a sleepy, warm and sweet smelling black and tan daschound puppy in my arms. I was too young to recognize a life altering moment, too much of a child to realize that destiny had just brushed by me, too innocent to comprehend that love doesn't always stand on two feet. I still expected the same feeling to one day overcome me in human form, to find the man I was meant for and live the story book ending. When it's all said and done, a part of me still does - but it's a small part, a whisper, really, and it goes suddenly silent the moment I pick up an animal. It's a non-traditional view of love, I know and I suppose there are people who might think me odd, if they are charitable or delusional, if they are not. But what I feel for animals is something so fundamental, so deeply rooted and just plain right, that I suspect I will never really feel it with a partner. I knew it the moment the tiny daschound pup snuggled into my neck, as surely as I've ever known anything since. There is, between me and my animals, absolute trust, unconditional love, tolerance and patience. We have the same needs - food, shelter, acceptance, security, the occasional afternoon nap, and the same goals, to live quietly and spend our time well. Unorthodox, perhaps, but genuine love isn't limited or confined or always inside the lines like a coloring book. When I began to understand that love comes in all shapes and sizes, that it can't be boxed in or assigned like a part in a play, that it can't be fabricated or manufactured, I also began to understand myself on a different level. The simplest truths are often hidden in plain sight and here was one: In the event of fire or flood or other natural disaster, my husbands were on their own, my first and only priority would be the lives of my animals. Not surprisingly, this revelation wasn't received with much grace but rather with disbelief and surprise, both of which turned to resentment. Here's another: The safety and well being of my animals mattered more to me than either of my marriages - the shock of this awareness was almost heart stopping and forced me to reexamine my motives and my very purpose - except that I had known it all along.

I've learned a few things about love since then. In all its forms, whether between consenting adults, parent and child, siblings or best friends, even between a little girl and her first puppy, it's a rare gift. Some of us search for it, some stumble over it, some do without. But my heart has known it all my life, just not as most of us expect. So if someone does invent love recognition software, I'll get in line, cross my fingers, pay my two dollars and let the fates do as they will.

Meanwhile, there's no need to look for love. Thanks to a cardboard box of puppies at the age of five and a wiggly, tiny bundle of soft fur with big brown eyes, I found it early and it's still everywhere I look. Traditional or not, I'm surrounded and my heart is full.

A Run for the Border

The idea began to crystalize one morning in May, just a few days after the Oklahoma tornado, as I listened to Tom Coburn talk about/dismiss disaster relief for the victims until and unless there were what he sneeringly called offsets.  The loss of lives and property in his own state didn't move him in the slightest - he sat and smirked his way through the interview, redefining political arrogance and hypocrisy - a United States senator, a medical doctor reveling in his power to withhold assistance from those who had lost everything.  It made me ill, made me furious, made me ashamed.  At first, I found myself hoping that neither he or his family would ever find themselves in a position where they desperately needed help but the more I listened, the more I hoped they would.  One thought led to another - climate change deniers, the republican war on women, the poor, anyone of color.  South Carolina re-electing a liar and an adulterer, car thieves and white supremacists in congress along with car thieves.  Those in charge of preventing sexual abuse being predators.  Banks and insurance companies being able to buy politicians like penny candy.  Politicians buying prostitutes and compromising education.  Health care held hostage by the rich and powerful, religion invading and corrupting everything it reaches, terrorists being paid full salaries while awaiting trial, dead children in the streets and a growing gun culture funded by a right wing fringe group and embraced by every inbred moron and tea partier whether they can put together a whole sentence or not.  Not to mention the entire South.  And nobody's accountable.  The inmates are running the asylum and I'm at odds with my government, possibly with my country.

Just suppose, I found myself thinking, I were to say to hell with it.  Just suppose I were to sell everything, pack up the animals and my camera and make a run for the border.

A ridiculous notion, I know, ridiculous and utterly impossible.  The paperwork alone would drown me and I hate snow and cold.  I wouldn't be able to get American cigarettes.  I'd have no way of making a living.  There would be no nightlife, no quick runs to the corner store, no bookstores, no favorite tv shows.  I'd go gray for lack of L'Oreal and I'm not that wild about fresh fish.  I'd miss friends and loved ones, having someone to cut the grass and NPR and maybe a thousand other small things I take for granted here.  Ridiculous and utterly out of the question, a pipe dream born of arrogance, hypocrisy, a handful of corrupt senators and the weariness of one too many bad news days.

And yet it persists, this misty and unrealistic idea of a small house overlooking the ocean, an island of sanity and simplicity out of reach of all that's poisoning this country.  Poisoning me.

Lord knows, I've had more improbable ideas.

There But For Fortune

Every state has them, I suppose, those few tiny towns where inbreeding and poverty and stupidity are in charge.  You avoid them at all costs.  Our's are the road to South Louisiana and if you must pass through, you roll up your windows, lock your car doors and don't stop for hell or high water.  The faces that you see are vacant and dazed, a little menacing, a little too close.  If I'd been standing when one such face appeared at the office window, I'd have taken a step back - I had the disconcerting feeling I was looking into the eyes of a serial killer - or at least someone who kept an arsenal of guns in her basement.  She was tall, thickly built and mostly toothless with a mane of salt and pepper hair.  Stringy and unkempt, it fell past her shoulders and into her eyes in a wild tangle of snarls and knots and she smelled like dirt with undertones of snuff and cooking grease.  She had had meaty, man hands balled into white knuckled fists as they gripped the sign in clipboard.  Every self preservation instinct I had kicked in, episodes of "Snapped" flew through my mind, and it was all I could do to find my voice with those mad eyes glaring at me.

Can't read or write, she told me although it came out more like Cain't rid er rawght and was closer to a growl than actual speech.  I willed my hands to stop shaking and took the clipboard, nodded to her to take a seat and told her no problem, we'd help her fill out the form.  Moving stiffly and slowly, she shambled to a chair and lowered her bulk into it with a grunt and a heavy sigh - the patient in the next chair wrinkled her nose and with a discreet cough, moved several seats away - I imagined if Ted Kaczynski and Aileen Wuornos had ever had a child, this would be the result and the stubborn image stuck with me.  

Lord have mercy, one of the nurses muttered from behind me, Jeremiah Jonhson took a wife!

Knowing I was not completely alone in my uncharitable thoughts made me laugh (a little) and feel guilty (a lot), especially when the chatter in the waiting room turned whispery and unkind, but there was still no denying we all breathed a sigh of release with her departure.  It takes all kinds, as my daddy might've said.

There but for fortune, go you or I ~ Phil Ochs

Crocker Lane

Crocker Lane, directly across from the village church and named for the first family to build on it, wasn't much more than a narrow strip of grass with ruts on either side.  It led all the way from Highway 117 to the aptly named Beautiful Cove, a serenely sheltered inlet of deep woods and driftwood covered rocky ledges with a stunning view of the Atlantic.  Ruthie and I spent hours there, collecting shells and playing in the tide pools, building forts, wading toward the tide as it came in and chasing after it as it went out.  We got there the long way 'round, past Old Hat's where 117 ended and scrambling all the way but we usually came home down Crocker Lane - Ruthie would cut across the square by the post office while I continued to The Point - sometimes catching a ride with the mail car if it were late enough but mostly just walking slowly at the side of the road and bracing myself for an inevitable lecture about my dirty face and skinned knees.

On one afternoon, sleepy Crocker Lane was alive with activity.  Pulling a wagonload of firewood, Denny Crocker's team of oxen had inexplicably gone on strike midway down the lane - both mammoth creatures simply stopped and no amount of coaxing or encouragement could persuade them another step.  Even Denny's whip, which everyone knew he carried just for show and rarely if ever actually used, had no effect - he shouted the commands and gave one of the great beasts a half hearted flick on the hindquarters - but the oxen were rooted to the spot.  Denny pushed and pulled, yelled and sweet talked, threatened and reasoned, all to no avail.  The island's only yoke of oxen dug in and were unmoved by his protests and pleas and it wasn't long before a crowd, some curious and some loudly unhelpful but all thoroughly mystified, had gathered.  They tried car horns, they tried bells, they tried banging cast iron pans together - the oxen showed no interest.  Uncle Bernie fired his shotgun into the air - the oxen blinked, but didn't move.  

Get a tractor! someone in the crowd yelled unkindly and Denny glared.

Meanwhile, his wife, a good hearted, up island girl with a practical streak, arrived carrying two buckets of buttermilk and a half dozen ears of sweet corn.  While Denny fussed and fumed, she calmly tempted the team into motion and led them down the lane, across the road and into the churchyard.  While Denny unloaded the firewood, she stood quietly with them, stroking their shaggy heads and telling them what fine animals they were, what great hearts they had, what noble beasts they were.

My good boys, she repeated softly, What's a tractor know about teamwork.  And then she beckoned Ruthie and me and we each got to ride an oxen all the way home - slow but elegant with the smell of leather and hay and island sunshine.  Nana was in the doorway and the dogs came running up the driveway to meet us, barking and nipping at the oxen's hooves like flies while the placid beasts paid them no mind, serenely putting one foot in front of the other, in tandem, all the way to our back door.

Moved 'em slicker'n bacon grease, Uncle Bernie later reported to my grandmother, Just like that Pied Piper fella!

Nana just smiled.

Some years later, Denny retired the team and put them out to pasture - for a long time we could see them as they grazed peacefully in his fields, harnessed up only for an occasional Christmas sleigh ride.  They'd earned their rest, which as his wife liked to say, was more than anyone would ever say about the tractor.

Any Port in a Storm

Being, as I am, disinclined to look for or expect the best in people, I wasn't terribly surprised to learn that before her most recent divorce - even before the soon to be ex-husband was out of prison, as it turned out - our little nurse had found her latest new man.  In a matter of weeks all the signs were there - late getting in to work, early to leave, being distracted and sloppy, personal calls taking up her every free minute, generally not carrying her weight.  Like a broken washing machine, the cycle begins, ends, and repeats.

Apart from the fact that this one is twice her age and her children don't like him - a fact that has never given her the slightest pause in the past and doubtless will not now - I know nothing about him except that he's unemployed and will surely prove to be abusive, manipulative, lazy, unfaithful and worthless.  Some women are attracted to tall, dark and handsome.  Some to money.  Some to romantic illusions and some to any port in a storm.  If it's got a broken wing or a pulse then it meets all her requirements and everything else is relegated to second or third class.  Her need overwhelms her and past experience tells me in no uncertain terms that she'll lie, cheat, steal and overlook - if not neglect - her children to satisfy it.  Her work will be set aside without a second thought, her family overlooked and exploited.   Hard as I try to tell myself that this time could be different, the truth is that we've all been down this old road with her before, not once or twice but multiple times, and we all know it's a dead end.

I don't pretend to understand what drives people to invite bad decisions in and probably my own experience makes me less tolerant than I should be but I have an urge to shake her violently, to scream, curse and slap her to her senses.  I settle for telling her no when she asks me to cover for her and when she wants to know why, I tell her I'm not obligated to explain.  She's hurt by this and I immediately feel guilty but then I overhear her asking her sister for $70 in gas money.  

Who needs $70 for gas? her sister demands sharply and turns her down cold.  The atmosphere in the office chills noticeably.

Here we go again.  

Misery is a state of mind that we make for ourselves.  $70 in gas money won't get you out.

The Infamous Umbrella Attack & Other Summer Scandals

Taken in by the stranger's charm and charisma, seduced by his sweet talk and smooth promises, Mrs. McIntyre bought the umbrella display - thirty six bright and colorful umbershoots, as the stranger called them, near to guaranteed to fly off her shelves with the first rain.  She'd been doubtful at first, but he'd won her over with his practiced grin, undeniable air of sincerity and sheer persistence - she was not a woman prone to easily parting with her money but he'd been on the road for years and knew just exactly how much pressure to apply and where - she counted out the bills and laid them in his palm and he smiled, allowing his hand to touch the inside of her wrist for just a fraction of a second too long before he pocketed the money and slipped out the doors.  Her heart, weary and worn from shopkeeping, thirty years of marriage and too much time on her feet, skipped a quick beat.  She set the display by the door, between the spittoon and the rifle rack, where you'd practically trip over to get out the door and with a small sigh, returned to filling orders.  She liked the way it looked amid all the practical soft goods and stacks of canned goods - like a bouquet of flowers in the midst of a drab and dull place, a oasis in a desert landscape.  She even said so to Mr. McIntyre but he just looked at her as if she'd been nipping at the medicinal brandy and shook his head.

The umbrellas didn't sell at $2.99 nor at $2.49 nor at $1.99 and by late August it was clear that not even the $.99 with any purchase! wasn't going to produce any results.  The display was dusty and ragged by then and feeling foolish and taken advantage of, Mrs. McIntyre buried it on the second floor behind the cans of motor oil and the used bedsprings.  Eventually it found its way out the back door and was forgotten until almost all of three dozen umbrellas washed up in one of the coves by Miss Clara's - they were sodden and torn up, sticky with sea salt and strands of kelp - but for the island children playing pirates, they made ideal shields and swords.  A small army of us advanced upon Miss Clara's and frightened her painted pony so badly he bolted and crashed through the corral with a panicky whinny, running all the way to Sparrow's in blind terror.  Our pirate days ended in ignoble defeat - under strict supervision, we repaired the corral and then after a meticulous gathering of all the umbrellas, worked our fingers raw to strip and salvage the fabric, the metal rods, the plastic handles.  The Ladies Sewing Circle then turned the whole sorry collection into kites just in time for the Sunday School Picnic and on a glorious summer afternoon, we filled the skies with primary colors.  Even Mrs. McIntyre was pleased and in time we coaxed Miss Clara into forgiveness and the painted pony into trusting us again - which was far more than anyone could say for the silver tongued salesman who made his return later that same summer to a distinctly cool reception.  Mrs. McIntyre was stony faced and unmoved by his wares or promises, throwing him out on his ear and watching him tumble over his dignity down the wooden storefront steps.  He landed on his backside in a pile of pot holders and leather goods, red faced and spouting protests, just as Miss Hilda arrived.

Well done, Elizabeth, she remarked mildly and tapped her riding crop against her boot, I'll just send this bit of clutter on his way, shall I?

The salesman paled, scrambled to his feet and made a run for his car, leaving the pot holders and leather goods - A well deserved bonus! Miss Hilda declared - behind in a trail of dust.  The two women, both usually stern, proper, and with very little in common, rocked with laughter then walked arm in arm into the general store.  A new friendship, based on umbrellas and kites and an honest day's work had been formed.  It would last for years.

That same summer, when the news about the youngest Patterson girl being "in trouble" was all anyone was talking about - she stubbornly refused to name the father despite the wave of righteous indignation and parental threats - it was Mrs. McIntyre and Miss Hilda who took the fourteen year old in, saw her all the way through, stayed with her during the birth, arranged the adoption and cared for her afterward while the family  
fumed and denied her.  She was young and strong and recovered quickly although there would always be a faint aura of sadness about her and when Miss Hilda offered her a position as companion and housekeeper with room and board and her own room, she accepted at once, grateful for the shelter, the solitude, and the second chance.

This unlikely pair of women knew something some of us never learn - you don't have to be young and stupid to make a mistake.  And sometimes it takes more than an umbrella to weather a storm.

Every 3,000 Miles

Funny, how sometimes it takes a lifetime to understand the simplest things.

All that we see, hear, say or feel is color filtered through our own experience - we interpret and then act on what we perceive to be real - molding and shaping our reactions to fit our expectations.  We don't leave much room for the possibility of distortion or misunderstanding.  We hear and see things that aren't real, aren't meant to hurt, aren't said out of malice.  Sadly, we like to be very certain about it and are rarely if ever inclined to back down.  We anticipate people will be carelessly and passively cruel and we practically invite them to do us harm - until and unless we come to recognize that we're filtering. 

I wasn't thought much of as a child.  Much like the adult I became, I was naturally shy, had a stubborn streak, no special talents and liked being a loner.  I loved animals, thought people were impossible to please, and tended to have my nose buried in a book more often than not.  I spent a great deal of time trying to stay out of the way and invisible whenever possible - there was safety in being overlooked - and until I was old enough to fight back, I was happy not to be noticed.  I spoke if called on, made good but not spectacular grades, played sports when forced to, learned piano to please my daddy.  But I never outgrew my mother's voice, never managed to shake off her drunken tirades and resentments and softly insinuating criticisms.  There was always that voice in my head suggesting that I would never be good enough, smart enough, pretty enough or anything enough - I heard it long after she was dead and I was out of range, sometimes I hear it still - because even today I filter through it.  As angry as it makes me, it's very nearly a reflex to look for a hidden meaning behind a compliment or wonder why someone would do something nice for me.  I catch myself at this and even though it doesn't usually help much, I make it a point to deliver a withering scolding to my self esteem.  I don't generally listen but it's good practice.

The really hard part is remembering that other folks have their own filters, in different strengths and assorted colors, but still seeing my actions and hearing my words accordingly.   


Check your filters and replace them as needed.
Don't let dust obscure your vision.
Rotate your tires and change your oil as recommended.
Don't skip the 3,000 mile checkup.

We all run better with regular maintenance.
  

Hit & Run

In the early morning dark there is a sudden scrabble of paws and nails on the hardwood floor, a jingle of dog tags and the sound of flight - a blur of cat moves past me, just a whisker ahead of the black dog - and both come to a screeching halt at the double doors to the sunroom.  It's a minor altercation, over and done with before I'm forced to intervene, no doubt a passing hit and run on the part of the cat or an imagined slight on the part of the dog or both.  These disputes are fairly common - they flare up and die out, the cat escapes, the dog sulks, and all is forgotten.  

In her younger days, the black dog was faster and far more deadly.  Never a sweet natured animal, she favored a hair trigger temper and a highly suspicious nature and was more than willing to act on both.  Now, with a considerable amount of gray in her muzzle and far less spring in her back legs, she's been forced to slow down somewhat.  She hasn't mellowed (far too strong a word) but she has learned to pick her battles and conserve her energy, at least to a small degree and the cats, once terrorized by the slightest flick of an ear or the start of a growl, have become emboldened.  Being cats, they're discreet and approach her with caution rather than wild abandon but they do approach her and are not driven off by empty threats - they appraise and measure her mood, no longer as impressed with the curled lip and bared teeth - it's taken thirteen years but they've learned that she can be outrun and outmaneuvered.  As grateful as I am for this small respite, it also makes me sad to see her on the downside of her life.  I may not like her very much but I love her dearly - it's one of those odd ironies of life, I shouldn't wonder, to love the unlovable. 

Still, it's never a good idea to underestimate her.  She may not be able to jump up on the bed even with a running start and she may not be as proficient as cat catching as she once was - but she's still a handful, as jealous and frantic and loud as ever and with the proper provocation, just as willing to take your hand off at the wrist and be pleased to do it.  She's not been an easy dog to raise or live with or even love.  She's snappish and bad tempered, unpredictable and willful, obstinate, aggressive, hyperactive and untrusting.  She's also smart as a whip, fearless, as loyal as the day is long and uncommonly beautiful.


At least once in our lives, we should love the difficult and maybe even the unrequited.  

Lavender & Pearls

Under usual circumstances I would prefer root canal to having to shoot a wedding but my across the street neighbors have set up a child's birthday party on their front lawn - both sides of the street are so lined with cars that it's impassable, the screaming has been non stop for the last two hours, and the children are running around like mindless little chickens.  The black dog is three quarters out of her mind with the commotion and noise and I feel a little traitorous as I pack my camera bag and prepare to slip out the front door.  I agreed to do this over a year ago (a careless moment undoubtedly brought on by flattery, who imagined they would actually get married) but here it is - a sunny May afternoon with the temperature already in the 90's and a long and stressful evening ahead of me - it's a fine time to remember all the reasons I avoid working weddings.

The bride is a sweet young thing I used to work with and the groom a gifted young singer/songwriter, they've been together for years and I console myself with the notion that apart from her dress, there isn't likely to be much traditional about this wedding.  Seeing them together has always restored my faith in the idea of living on love - they're young, devoted to each other and only mildly starry eyed - a sweet couple whom I have every confidence will have a long and happy life together.  They both love kids, music, life and each other.

The wedding goes without a hitch - the weather is near perfect, the bride magnificent, the groom all smiles. There's champagne and singing, the families gather and celebrate, everything is lavender and pearls and soft light.  As there should be at all weddings, there's a little magic in the air.

It won't be that way forever - magic comes and goes - but sometimes you get a feeling it'll never be very far away.

The Old Flies & Honey Routine

Not IT.

Not the software.

Not the internet speed.

Just a simple matter of an anti virus program that took a slow system to a dead stop.  Our in house IT guy arrived, uninstalled it, and after a week and a half of rage and misery and useless input from useless people, the system returned to normal instantly.  Eight days of hearing hoof beats had produced no zebras, just a wayward old horse.

Following the doctor's instructions, I called the people who had installed the program and explained that they had nearly wrecked us, compromised the practice, inconvenienced countless patients, made it impossible to do our jobs with any degree of efficiency and severely damaged my own mental and emotional health.  A reputable tech support company would've known the risk of the Norton software, I continued, and if they didn't, they should have.  Lastly, I suggested that the doctor be given some consideration on the bill and that we be given an apology.  

They explained to me that effective immediately, they would no longer be offering us technical support as we refused to maintain a basic level of compliance.

In hindsight, I might not have been as diplomatic as I could've been.  I might even, as I admitted to the doctor, been a tiny bit hostile.  He once again suggested that I need to learn to hold my temper with stupidity and arrogance and practice a little tact - the old flies and honey thing, a skill I seem to have quite intentionally  discarded with age - I admit it's more effective if you want to catch flies, but then all you have is live flies and  no sense of satisfaction.  I prefer to swat, sweep them up, and walk away with (at least in my own mind) a certain sense of vindication.

Basic level of compliance, my ass.

Misfits, Morons & Buck Passers

The crisp, clean, cheerful little Medicare card arrived, reminding me I'm now officially a senior citizen and eligible for government health insurance at the bargain price of $1200 a year.  Exactly where this money is going to come from the government doesn't know or care - Not our department!  Social Security tells me with 
a self satisfied, civil servant smirk - and that's when I notice that they've misspelled my name.

I point out that it's their error and I think they should fix it and send me a new card.

They point out that they don't fix their errors and it's up to me to make the time to go to their office, fill out corrected paperwork, request a new card.

I tell them there's nothing wrong with the old paperwork that a course in literacy wouldn't cure, that it was their mistake and that they should fix it and send me a new card.

They tell me that's outside their area and not their policy.

I share my opinion that they are obstructionist, inept, mindless pencil pushers  who would screw up a one car funeral.

We're the government, they reply, Have a nice day.

I am drowning in a sea of misfits, morons and buck passers.

If I Had a Hammer

Technology and blame shifting will be the death of me, I'm sure of it.

After three hours of clicking the mouse and waiting 5,10, even 15 seconds for some kind of reaction from the screen, I'm incoherent with frustration.  I send my third email of the morning to our software rep, demanding to know what's going on.  She finally responds and tells me it's an IT issue.  When the IT guy calls, he assures me it's a problem with our internet speed.  I'm not the least bit surprised when our internet provider smugly tells me it's a software problem.  Technology has become a game of Round Robin and I'm beginning to think that none of the players know their asses from a hole in the ground.  When I share this sentiment with all three of them, things get frosty but they don't get better.  No one will take any responsibility, no one offers a solution, and things gradually grind to a halt.  If I had a hammer, I think to myself and trudge back to his office to give the doctor a no progress report. 

Finger pointing has become a national pastime.  The buck no longer stops anywhere, it just breezes by on its way to the next desk.

It takes 22 keystrokes to reschedule an appointment.  Not to be offensive, but short of a circle jerk, 22 strokes for anything is just plain ludicrous.

I've lost count of the number of times the screen suddenly freezes and then shuts down on any given day.  It needs no provocation.  

I'm asked to write a brief critique of the software application.  You don't have enough pages and I don't have enough time, I write back.

It'll save you time, they said.
It'll save you paper, they said.
It'll save you labor, they said.

Let me tell you about this bridge I have for sale.

Shallow Graves

Sitting in the padded armchair by the window with her ankles primly crossed and one elegantly ringed hand shading her eyes, my Aunt Helen made a minute adjustment to her sweater clip and sniffed delicately.

Really, Alice, she began stiffly, I hardly think.....

Exactly! Nana interrupted briskly, Precisely why no one's asked for your opinion, Helen, dear. More tea?

Thank you, no, Aunt Helen sighed, I certainly don't wish to intrude but....

Then don't!  Uncle Eddie announced from the doorway, Have some tea and shut up for once, old girl.

Poor Helen flinched all the way to her meticulously plucked and arched eyebrows, assuming an injured expression and dabbing helplessly at her eyes.  Predictably, this familiar and wearying routine tried my grandmother's patience and she glared at her sister-in-law without the first glimmer of sympathy, unwilling to spread the slightest bit of oil on the troubled waters.  The sad truth was that no one could abide Aunt Helen with her headmistress manners and inflated sense of self and that we tolerated her only in deference to Uncle Eddie.  My grandmother's brother, a chubby and good natured little man with a hearty laugh, was often the first to mock his self-elevated wife for her high toned speech and tea party mannerisms - he saw something in her the rest of us missed and rarely took offense at her patronizing ways - he seemed to be, in his humble and down to earth way, grateful that she'd agreed to marry him despite his background which she liked to remind him, bordered on the unfortunate.  At best, the family agreed, it was an odd pairing - Uncle Eddie so content and light hearted, Aunt Helen so upwardly mobile and socially motivated.

The current squabble was over me and it didn't seem to be going well - I'd refused to wear the pink hair ribbons Helen had produced for the morning's trip to the mainland and seriously offended her by calling the matching dress something only a sissy would wear.  Undeterred, she'd produced white ankle socks with pink flowers and a pair of glossy black Maryjanes and told me if I wouldn't wear them, then I couldn't go.  I hadn't intended to throw the shoes at her, I assured Nana, it'd just happened.  My grandmother sighed mightily, told me I was a great trial to her, then dug out my usual overalls and sneakers and told me to get dressed while she went to assuage her sister-in-law's hurt feelings.  Aunt Helen, however, was in no mood to be placated - it was hard to tell whether the flying Maryjanes or my stubbornness had wounded her pride more and Nana's patience, always thin when dealing with what she considered Helen's snooty interference, had run out.

Not to be indelicate, Alice, dear, I heard Helen say, But I simply will not be seen in the company of a child who resembles and behaves like a street urchin.

As a street urchin, my grandmother corrected her icily, and if that's the case, then you will stay here.  

Alice, I simply meant.....Helen began but Nana would have none of it.

Helen Morrell, you are an insufferable, self righteous, condescending and tight assed witch and I'll thank you to remember that you're a guest in this house and stop this damnable interfering!  Otherwise you can leave this very minute!

ALICE!  poor Aunt Helen had paled and one anxious hand had flown to clutch at her perfect pearls.

And that's the end of it, Helen, Nana finished, One more word and as God is my witness, I'll slap your dried up, Beacon Hill affected, hifalutin' carcass all the way out the door!

And then, except for Aunt Helen's sobs and my grandmother's fading footsteps, there was a deadly silence.  I sat frozen, too scared and confused to move, sure that somehow it was my fault and that there would be a high price to pay.   I started to cry and my Uncle Eddie noticed me - he glanced at his loudly weeping wife, back at me, back at her.  And then he took my hand and led me out the back door and around to the old whitewashed side porch, sat me down, and produced a large, white, monogrammed handkerchief.  It smelled like pipe tobacco and Old Spice.  I expected a "You'll understand when you're older" lecture and to be sent to my room - instead, he wiped my tears, put one arm around my shoulders, and began to talk to me - it was a long, rambling speech about two women under one roof and jealousy and grownups behaving badly and something he called control.  I didn't understand most of it but I knew he was being kind, just as I suspected he was being disloyal to Aunt Helen and probably not winning any points with my grandmother.  But he didn't seem to mind.

It's all just noise, he told me gently, and it can't hurt you.

We made the trip to the mainland - without Helen, her name was never even mentioned - had a grand, grown up lunch at The Pines, returned just in time to make the last ferry.  And as sometimes happens in families who don't know how to love each other, the ugly scene on the sunporch passed into the realm of forgive and forget.   

At least so we all pretended.  Because memories are all too often buried in shallow graves.

Once We Were Children

Once we were children.

We were protected and cherished, celebrated and loved.  We were taught to trust, listen, tell the truth and respect others.  We were safe and sheltered, provided and cared for.  Or, we were in the way, a bad decision and a burden, resented and even abused. If you come from the former, it can be hard to comprehend the latter but.... whatever we learned, we carried with us into adulthood and kept with us at all times, not knowing how to tell it or let it go, not understanding that the fault wasn't our's.

My friend, Charli, recently wrote very publicly about the sexual abuse she suffered as a child.  It was painful to read and must've been excruciating to write but shame and secrets will only take you so far before you expose it or die trying.  Toxic families forfeit the right to be protected or loved the very moment they side with the abuser, the very moment they take a child's innocence and shatter his or her soul.  If you enable harm to come to your child, you are as guilty as those who inflict it.

The therapists and counselors and self help books will talk to you about forgiveness and healing and moving on, about finding your inner child and making peace with your demons.  They'll warn about how unhealthy hate is, how anger only hurts you, they'll imprint the Serenity Prayer on your forehead and gently, gently remind you that you can control no one but your own self.  All wise and hard won advice, useful if you have a forgiving nature but worthless put against the need to strike back and be vindicated.

Once we were children, kept quiet and kept in line with secrets and shame, alone and afraid.  There were no locks strong enough to keep the predators out and those that should've provided a safe harbor sided against us.  Some still do.  Some always will.  They count on our vulnerability and lack of resistance and most of all, they count on our silence, knowing we've been tricked into thinking that it's our fault.  They're confident and they're safe, certain that we won't tell and risk being labeled or judged or denied or disbelieved.  Violate and betray a child and you create a victim but here's the thing - victims grow up, sometimes as risk takers with a strong sense of self and a need to heal.  We don't just tell, we tell publicly.  We find allies and like souls, we write songs with lyrics that are hard to hear, we find roads to recovery and strength.  We confront, we tell the truth, we don't hide, we don't stay sick and we leave the toxicity of our families behind.

So here, take my hand.  We are children no more.  And in the end, we will win.

Abusers control, manipulate and make you feel like you're the one with the problem.
Stand up, speak out, and take back your life.
You are not to blame ~ Shatter the Silence of Sexual Violence