Unfixable

It's a hard lesson and often it takes decades to learn but the fact is, not everything is fixable.

If it were up to me, animal abusers, child molesters and rapists would be publicly castrated and then executed on the court house lawns in as lengthy and excruciating painful a manner as we could think of.

If it were up to me, the inventors of shrink wrap plastic and child resistant pill bottles would be staked out atop fire ant mounds and wrapped in yellow fever blankets.

If it were up to me, every greedy, crooked politician would be stripped naked and hanged in a public square. Twice. And it would be televised.

Such are my dreams these days. I've lived too long and am too tired and broken down to be tactful or superficially nice. I do not, as Salvatore Dali famously said, understand voluntary idiocy.

Until now, my friend Michael has always been able to pull a last minute rabbit out of a last minute hat. Somehow, he's always managed to come up with some scheme or new approach and save the day for himself and the agency and I've been constantly amazed at his persistence and optimism and ability to rebound even from the most dire of circumstances. Until now, I thought it was just a matter of time and creative energy but in recent days and weeks, I realize it's far more serious. I've witnessed him wrack his brain for a solution. I've watched him drive himself into a suicidal depression over paying the bills and feeding his dogs. I've listened to his every desperate and impossible idea. I've heard him wonder aloud, what's the point. I lose sleep for worrying about the future. I can't remember ever seeing a man so utterly and completely miserable, without hope and on the very brink of defeat. Things will look brighter in the morning, I tell him, but the words are hollow and we both know it. The plain fact is that what he does is no longer wanted, no longer attractive, no longer relevant. Modeling has become entitled and frivolous, acting is now a do-it-yourself art. Everybody wants to be an instant star but nobody wants to put in the time or do the work. The big modeling conventions of the past are over, the glory days behind us and everybody still hanging on is scrambling for a new approach or fresh revenue source. Mostly we're all out of ideas.

I try to keep in mind that sometimes things fix themselves if we can manage to stop interfering. Meanwhile, we muddle on, one foot in front of the other, one day at a time, hoping for a turnaround, a better economy, or a miracle.

It's A Cat Thing

The youngest cat watches me walking toward her but it doesn't occur to her to get out of my way. The very second I step over her though, she puts it in gear and skitters backwards. When I compensate to avoid stepping on her, I lose my balance and abruptly find myself on the floor. She watches from a safe distance and I'm absolutely, positively convinced it was an intentional act on her part. She has developed an amazing talent for being indifferently underfoot and/or in the way.

I am not her only target, of course. When she's not running randomly from room to room and feverishly meowing with every other step, she lies in wait - around corners, behind doors, under furniture - for the other cats. She's not much on technique, seems quite content to wait for them to pass by then launching herself like a heat seeking missile. Even when she misses, which is pretty often, the target cat is startled and defensive and a quarrel invariably follows each ambush. It sounds quite a bit worse than it actually is but it's still enough to rattle my nerves and aggravate the dogs, both of whom are unexpectedly tolerant of her. They patiently let her chew on their ears, knead their bellies and even steal their food with barely a whimper. On the rare occasion that she crosses the line, there might be a low growl from the little dachshund but it's perfunctory at best, and usually ignored.

About the time I decide I could cheerfully smother her with her own double paws, she changes tactics and quietly crawls up on the love seat, burrowing into my side and purring like a runaway jackhammer. I scratch her ears and under her chin and she looks at me with those trusting and totally innocent green eyes. My mad instantly fades away and my impatience and aggravation with her evaporate. It's a cat thing.

This Way Out

The look on the cashier's face said it all. It was a mix of weariness, veiled anger, and the certain knowledge that saying what he really thought would get him fired. The customer, a tree trunk of a man in a vile temper, slammed his fists on the check writing platform.

“Where's your supervisor at, white bread?” he demanded. My head snapped up and there was an audible gasp from the people behind me in line. The cashier sighed and reached for the intercom. The customer fumed.

A supervisor arrived and quietly explained to the customer exactly what the cashier had already said. The customer narrowed his eyes and leaned toward the supervisor.

“Figures you'd take his side, Uncle Tom,” he said nastily.

The supervisor's jaw dropped and from behind the barrier of the customer service counter, I saw someone reach for the telephone. The people behind me began moving away to other registers.

A second supervisor appeared, followed almost immediately by a uniformed officer resting one hand casually on his gunbelt. I was thinking that the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups weren't worth it and wishing hard I'd chosen a different line. I wasn't in any danger (it crossed my mind that that was probably exactly what the letter carrier was thinking just before he was shot to death a few door down from my house) but the whole thing was giving me butterflies in my belly. As with any confrontation or even the threat of one, I had an all consuming desire to run. Raised voices make me sick with fear.

Luckily, the big cop had no such problem. The irate customer was ushered from the store and the situation naturally defused itself. No harm, no foul. Except for that shrill, nagging little voice that wants to keep reminding me that the world has changed and none of us are really safe anywhere.

Grudges in the Garden

By the time little Davey Young commenced to courting Margaret Ann Elliot, the families had been feuding so long that no one could remember how it had started.

“Ain't my business,” my grandmother told Uncle Shad over iced tea and pimento sandwiches,

“But after 30 or 40 years, if'n I couldn't recollect the cause of a quarrel, I b'lieve I'd let her go.”

“Ayuh,” Shad nodded, “But you ain't the Youngs or the Elliots. They ain't what you'd call forgivin' folks.”

“Reckon that's so,” Uncle Willie agreed, accepting a sprig of mint for his tea, “They's both hard families. They tend their grudges like some folks tend a garden.”

“Damn foolishness,” Nana pronounced, always preferring to have the last word, and the two men nodded solemnly while she refilled their glasses. The two young people under discussion were disappearing over the rise of The Old Road. At the sound of an approaching engine, they picked up their pace, snatched each other's hands and gracefully jumped the guardrail, vanishing into the fog but it was only Cap's old pickup truck and it passed harmlessly by. It took several seconds before I realized that we'd all been holding our breath.

Not that it made any difference, but the village was far and away on the side of love. Very few were willing to actively risk the wrath of the warring families but islanders tended to turn a blind eye. No one reported when they were seen together, no one followed their movements, no one turned them in at the Saturday night dance. The general feeling was that the sins of the fathers - whatever they might have been - should not be visited upon Davey and Margaret Ann decades later. The elder Youngs and Elliots saw things differently. It was, as anyone could see,

a storm in the making and it broke on a fine Sunday morning just as the Baptist Church let out and Davey and Margaret approached the pastor. They were, as they told him, using the then popular phrase, “free, white and 21” and they wanted to be married. The reaction of their families was predictable - rage, horror, shame and shotguns - and James quickly led them back into the church and sanctuary.

“Not while I draw breath!” Margaret Ann's daddy, Nathan, shouted and took a swing at Davey's daddy, Gilbert, with the butt end of his gun.

“Hell will freeze first!” Gilbert shouted back and rammed his own gun into Nathan's belly. In a matter of seconds, both men were on the ground in a tangle of arms, legs and shotguns, flailing wildly at each other and raising a cloud of dust and gravel into the summer air. The crowd watched with that morbid kind of fascination people have for car wrecks until the families finally stepped in and separated them. Both men broke free and rushed the front doors of the church with God only knew what intentions but the pastor intervened.

“THIS IS GOD'S HOUSE!” he roared at them, “YOU'LL NOT DEFILE IT WITH ANGER OR GUNS!”

This unexpected show of temper was so unlike the pastor, a generally patient, soft spoken, and forgiving man of grace and mild manner, that everyone was caught off guard. Nathan and Gilbert froze in their tracks and it gave James the time to collect himself and his thoughts.

“God's house,” he repeated firmly but calmly, “I'll have no more violence outside or inside it.”

“This ain't your business, Mr. Minister,” Gilbert said sullenly, “Stay outta of it.”

“Send the children out,” Nathan advised darkly, “Or God's house or not, we'll jist take 'em.”

But the island had had enough. Uncle Willlie and Uncle Shad stepped forward. Sparrow hobbled up beside them. Cap and all four of his sons, both the Ryans, and a half dozen of the Sullivan brothers stepped neatly between the pastor and the men with the guns. They were joined by several of the womenfolk including Miz Clara, Aunt Pearl and Aunt Vi. My grandmother sighed, took my hand in her's and moved up beside them. Aunt Jenny and Ruthie came along as well,

then the McIntyres, the Tituses, the Albrights. Miz Hilda and Doc McDonald stepped up arm in arm, then Gene with Buttons at his side, and Johnny with his crowd of brothers and sisters. The rest of the congregation stood squarely and umistakably behind them. The Youngs and the Elliots were outnumbered and outflanked and they knew it. Nathan and Gilbert lowered their guns reluctantly.

James allowed himself a small smile. “Good,” he said approvingly, “Now maybe we can work all this out.” The crowd breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Happy endings though come in all sizes and colors and they're not always what we hope for or expect. After a time, the Youngs and the Elliots did reach a kind of detente and learn how to more or less peacefully coexist, proving that people can change. But without a common enemy,

Davey and Elizabeth Ann changed as well. Without the allure of a forbidden romance, they drifted apart and over time became fast friends but never anything more. They'd taken the long way around, Nana said, but in the end, they got where they were meant to be.

Death of a Mailman

The tragic death of an innocent mail carrier has stunned my small city.

This middle aged father and grandfather was gunned down in broad daylight, not but four houses and a fence away from my own house, in a neighborhood I drive past and occasionally through several times a week. His alleged killer is behind bars, charged with 2^nd degree murder.

The community is shocked and appalled, the mayor ordered flags on federal buildings to half mast, and every politician has offered the appropriate thoughts and prayers to the devastated family.

The first rumor, that he had maced a dog on his route and the killing was the owner's revenge was quickly dismissed. The second, that he had tried to intervene in a case of domestic abuse has more staying power but the truth is that the investigation is ongoing and at this point, no one really knows for sure what happened. A black mailman is dead and a wild-eyed, tattooed, meth-addled white man with bad teeth is in jail. The news reports that the shooter's girlfriend is arrested the following day on drug charges.

It's impossible to make sense of a world where you can be shot delivering the mail.

Hattie & The Road Crew

The crew that came to pave the road was prepared to be resented and distrusted. They were ready for the fog that so often would make their work impossible. They were warned they would not be welcomed. But they were not ready for Old Hat and her shotgun.

“I'd have a care,” Sparrow advised the crew foreman, “She's a dead shot. Why, she kin shoot a flea off'n a damn frog at a hunnert yards and she's meaner 'n a cross-eyed snake.”

The foreman shrugged. He'd been building roads for 3o years, he told Sparrow, and he knew a thing or two about doing it.

“They ain't made anybody can stop a dozer or a hot tar spreader,” he said with a careless grin,

“Sure as hell, not one damn fool old woman with a scattergun.”

“I 'spect you know your business,” Sparrow persisted, “Ain't sayin' you don't. But she don't like strangers and she don't like change.”

“Come hell or high water, this here road's gon' be paved by next week,” the foreman said calmly,

“The province says so and that's that.”

“Ayuh,” Sparrow said and winked at us, “Reckon it's your funeral.”

Hattie's first shot bounced harmlessly off the dozer's shovel. Her second whined past the driver's ear. Her third knocked his hard hat off and sent him scurrying for the floorboards. There was no fourth, Sparrow reported to my grandmother.

“That boy give up right and proper once she aimed that shotgun the last time,” he laughed, “He rammed that thing into park and come outta it like a longtailed cat in a room full of rockin' chairs. Ain't been seen since.”

It couldn't stand, of course, progress was slated for the village and progress it would be. The province was not about to be bullied or put off my one little old lady with a mean temper and a couple of days later the Mounties arrived. Hattie was duly arrested and carted off to the mainland - it was said she fought like a mule and wailed like a banshee - and while she was gone, the road crew returned and quickly finished the paving job. Hattie came home in a fine rage, swearing death and destruction to the province and revenge on anyone who'd helped them but there was no one to go after and she soon wore herself out with threats and temper that no one listened to. By August, she retreated to the shelter of her shack and shotgun and there she stayed. The road had won, albeit on a technicality most folks agreed, since not one inch had ever made it onto Hattie's land. Years later, folks still talked about hearing her old shotgun break the silence of moonlit summer nights as she took potshots at the pavement and cackled with every pull of the trigger. The road may have won, but Old Hat considered it a draw and that was close enough.

Night in the Graveyard

“Dare ya!” one of the Sullivan brothers shouted defiantly.

“Double dare ya!” one of the other brothers added with an unmistakable sneer and a malicious laugh.

And with all the confidence and pride that two stubborn little seven year old girls can muster,

Ruthie and I accepted. We knew if we were caught, we'd likely be grounded for the remainder of the summer – who knew, maybe for several summers to come – but a dare was a dare. We were blessedly sure none of the grownups would understand.

And so it was that by eight o'clock when the light in the lighthouse on Peter's Island came on, we were tucked snugly into one of the upstairs feather beds with the covers up to our chins. We listened to the night birds and the incoming tide and the steady hum of the hydo electric poles for the next three hours, finally creeping out of bed and down the stairs barefoot and hardly daring to breathe. When we got to the kitchen and crossed the linoleum floor directly in front of the sleeping dogs, we moved like molasses, one careful, silent inch at a time. Then we were outside, running like wild animals up the gravel driveway, through the strawberry patch and finally to and across the road to Uncle Willie's pasture. There was a sliver of moon to guide us but otherwise we were stealth itself. The entire village seemed to be asleep, it was eerily still and quiet and when we spoke it was in whispers.

“Car!” Ruthie hissed at me as we passed Curt's shuttered up store and made the turn onto Overcove Road. Like shadows, we dove for the ditch but it was only Hubie and his battered old Volkswagon, making his way home after a night of drinking. He choked and sputtered past us without a glance but we could hear every word of the song he was singing, “Hey, Good Lookin'” by Hank Willliams. The words were clear and sharp on the night air.

“Hubie always could hold his liquor some good,” I whispered to Ruthie once the coast was clear.

“Ayuh,” she whispered back, “But he cain't sing for dogshit!”

We reckoned it was close to midnight when we got to the cemetary but there was no sign of any of the Sullivans. Hearts pounding, we inched open the cemetary gates just enough to squeeze through and cautiously, lightly, carefully walked in among the shadowy gravestones. We could hear each other's fear in our panicky breathing and I think we were both regretting leaving the feather bed for such a foolish and dangerous dare. Could you die of fright, I wondered and thought Ruthie might be wondering the very same thing. An owl hooted and we nearly jumped out of our skins. When something unseen rustled along the tree line and we froze in absolute horrow and desperation.

“Let's go!” I whispered, pulling at her sleeve, “I don't care what they say 'bout us!”

“Don't be such a baby!” she snapped at me, “You'll care in the mornin'!”

I was so scared I wasn't sure there was going to be a morning, but I kept it to myself. Then something slithered by my feet and I let out a small shriek of pure terror. Ruthie caught me square in the jaw with a right hook, hard enough to knock me down, bring me to my frail senses, and pull myself together against the mounting hysteria. She half-pulled, half-dragged me

to the least occupied corner of the graveyard, shoved me roughly down so that my back was to the fence (and to the dark woods, I shuddered at the thought of what fearful, bloody-eyed creature might be hiding in those trees) and setttled down Indian style beside me.

“All we hafta do,” she said with a remarkable calm, “is sit here 'til the sun commences to come up. Then we'll go home the way we come and be in time for breakfast.”

“How we gon' prove to the Sullivans that we was here all night?” I wanted to know.

“We ain't got to prove nothin',” she said grimly, “They'll know allright. They's watchin' and they'll know.”

“But...........” I began and she punched me not so lightly in the ribs.

“Jist sit and shut up,” she told me and moved a little closer, “We gon' be fine and we ain't gonna get caught neither.”

I wasn't convinced but I did sit and shut up. For the next several hours, we sat and shut up, slowly smoking our way through an entire stolen pack of my mother's Parliaments and waiting for sun up. At times it was so deadly quiet that we imagined we could hear the owl smoothing his feathers. At other times, the woods seemed alive with things that crept and crawled and hid and sounded like footsteps.

“Mice,” Ruthie would whisper confidently, “Maybe a fox or a badger. Maybe even a deer.”

I hoped so but I hated how brave she was.

Dawn finally came and the sky began to lighten. There had been no sign of the Sullivans and nothing had come slinking out of the woods to ambush us or do us harm. We had spent a whole night in the graveyard and were just the same as when we went in, then made our way back home the same way we had come and slipped back into the feather bed unnoticed. If it hadn't been for us both coming down with incredibly virulent cases of poison ivy, we might've gotten away with it. Instead, we had nearly a week of vinegar baths, antihistamine shots, and being lathered in calamine lotion daily. In the end, we were so miserable that we confessed, hoping it would somehow ease our suffering. It didn't but Nana didn't have the heart to hand out any additional punishment.

We never did tell the why of it and it earned us the grudging respect of the Sullivans. We were young enough and foolish enough to think it was worth it and at the time, it was.

28 Days

What I remember about the rehab hospital was how plain vanilla and unremarkable it seemed. There was no hint of the madness and desperation behind its walls and certainly no indication that it might be capable of making miracles. I'd driven by the place twice a day, five days a week, for better than three years and had never really noticed it.

Worcester was not a pretty city in the '80's. Urban renewal and gentrification were running wild just an hour away in Boston but Worcester with it's grimy, stale air and dirty streets was as blue collar as it got. The hospital, squarely in the heart of downtown, was an unimposing and easily overlooked three story structure of garden variety brick. It didn't look like the forbidding lunatic asylum I sometimes had nightmares about - Olivia deHavilland's “Snakepit” had made an indelible impression on me and back then there were times when I called my own fragile sanity into question - but it was also clearly not the tennis courts and manicured lawns of Cascade, the convalescent hospital where Bette Davis got well in “Now Voyager”. Sitting in the pot holed parking lot while I killed time waiting for my appointment with my counselor and trying to work up my courage, I saw the sun reflecting off the small third floor windows. Windows with bars, I couldn't help but notice.

“Dextox ward,” my nervewrackingly cheerful and decidedly un-Claude Raines aftercare counselor had casually told me, “As long as they're not violent, the average stay is 72 hours. No visitors, of course.”

Of course, I'd thought and nodded as if I were an old hand at this. I didn't want him to know that I thought at any moment my knees were going to buckle and I'd start screaming.

“Here,” he said kindly and steered me to a chair, “Sit down before you fall.”

I sat. I thought if he kept being kind to me, I might breakdown entirely but I couldn't figure out how to say so.

“Take a deep breath,” he suggested, “Talk if you want to.”

His name was Calvin. He was young, barely into his 40's, I thought, and had been sober for the last 18 years. He wore corduroy jackets, blue jeans and tennis shoes and sometimes smoked a pipe.

I”t gives me something to do with my hands,” he'd told me in an early counseling session, “and my patients seem to be reassured by the image. Image is so important to us, I'm sure you know. Do you smoke?”

“Like a chimney,” I'd admitted.

He'd smiled, brushed aside a stack of papers on his desk and slid a plastic ashtray toward me.

It's not really allowed but I think we'll make an exception this one time,” he'd told me.

More kindness, I'd thought bitterly but had managed to mumble a thank you.

Back in the now, several weeks later, we sat in his small cluttered office with its overflowing bookcases and water colored walls and a streak of sunshine coming from the one unbarred window. Two floors up, my husband was in his second day of detox and I was obsessed with the fear that he wouldn't make it to his third. Truth to tell, I was more than a little stunned that he'd made it to his second.

“Funny, isn't it,” Calvin said quietly, nodding toward a carton of Marboro Menthols in my lap, “cigarettes are allowed but coffee isn't. It's the caffeine, you see, almost as bad as nicotine. He'll get used to it.”

Having lived with the man for a decade, I didn't think so. He'd staged a massive retreat at the news that there'd be no Luzianne Chicory Coffee for 28 days and I'd have bet money he was going to tell them all to shove it and walk out but the nurses just shrugged and reminded him that it was all voluntary and that he could leave anytime. He'd cussed a vicious blue streak, slammed his duffel bag against a wall and torn up the antiseptically made bed but he'd agreed to stay.

Calvin, I realized dimly, would know all about that little scene. As determined as I was not to, I began to cry. Well, it wasn't so much as crying as it was hysteria. I felt as if something had broken clean in two within me, snapped like a branch in a hurricane wind and come crashing to the ground. I wailed. I didn't think I'd ever be able to stop. Ten years of living with a drunk, ten years of lying about it, ten years of protecting him and the image of a happy marriage, ten years of desperation, despair and loathing poured fourth like an open fire hydrant.

Calvin crossed one ankle over one knee and patiently waited me out.

“I'll see that he gets the cigarettes,” he said after several minutes when the waterworks finally receded, “and you can see him day after tomorrow. If you want to, of course. Now, “he paused and handed me a box of Kleenex, “Let's talk about you.”

I was, in a funny and perverse kind of way, relieved he hadn't tried to comfort me. The part of me that was busily, guiltily imagining the horrors on the third floor - restraints and dt's and God only knew what else - didn't need any encouragement. The martyred and resentful part begging for recognition and sympathy after all my self-sacrifice was looking for a medal. And the part that was so deathly afraid of the whole thing being a miserable, public failure wanted only for someone to wave a magic wand and make it all go away. It could be, I was beginning to see, although reluctantly, that comfort would only prolong my illusions. It wouldn't have been a kindness.

“You need a plan,” Calvin was saying, “May I make a suggestion?”

I nodded.

“There's an AlAnon meeting downstairs in a half hour. Start there. Then go home. Eat something. Get some sleep. Just for tonight, let it go and worry about tomorrow when tomorrow gets here. One day at a time. One night at a time. One hour at a time if you have to.”

“Pretty short term plan,” I said shakily and he laughed.

“Pretty short term problem,” he said gently, “Just for tonight.”

Nonetheless, I decided, it was a good plan. I stopped at the visitors washroom to soak some paper towels in cold water and hold them to my eyes until the swelling eased, repaired my makeup as best I could, and then slipped outside to the small patio to smoke a cigarette and, as my grandmother used to say, collect myself. When I felt calmer and cooler and a little more in control, I walked back inside to the meeting. The minute the door swung silently shut behind me, I felt a shadow of sanity wake up, rouse itself, and begin to make its way back to me. I joined the mostly all women circle - some, no doubt, with husbands in the very same predicament as mine on the third floor - and tried to clear my mind. The women I knew smiled at me, peaceful smiles, survival smiles, despite what I knew from their stories were obscene personal tragedies. Sitting across from me was my friend and sponsor, Dottie. “Let go and let God,” she mouthed at me, gave me a wink and then threw open her flowered jacket to show off her bright blue t shirt emblazoned in oversized white letters that read “Surrender, Dorothy!” It was the first time in the lifetime that been the last two days that I laughed, genuinely and out loud, and the other women joined in almost at once. How could you not? “Bless you, Dottie,” someone said and she blushed.

It was still light as I drove the twenty miles to the now empty apartment at the top of Dead Horse Hill. It was pretty country, a little on the rural side, and there was practically no traffic. It gave me a chance to breathe and think and wonder what I was supposed to do now. The cats were suitably glad to see me and the silence of the small apartment didn't bother me nearly as much as I expected. It occurred suddenly to me that in my whole life I'd never lived alone. Now I found myself wondering if I'd like it.

“Well,” I told my small black cat who had been with me the longest, “we've got 28 days to find out, don't we.”

It only took four.

With the accuracy of heat seeking missile, I searched, found, and demolished every despised beer can, full or empty, until I'd filled three lawn and leaf bags. I washed floors and walls, fixtures and furniture, put fresh sheets on the bed, defrosted the refrigerator, Easy Off'd the oven and still made an AlAnon meeting every night. I went to work each day with a renewed sense of purpose and spent my evenings reading, stitching, playing with the cats. I ate exactly what I liked when I was hungry and slept like the dead. I felt free.

Calvin, in a final act of kindness, called at the end of the third week to tell me my husband had pronounced himself cured and checked himself out, a week early and very much against medical advice. There was nothing he could do but warn me.

“He's sober,” my aftercare counselor said neutrally, “But he's not well or much changed. Promise me you'll be careful and remember to take care of yourself. Don't skip your meetings and don't get sucked back in.”

I promised. I thanked him. I assured him I'd see him soon. And then I vomited until my throat was raw.

The homecoming was awkward. He was, as Calvin had said, sober. But he was also defiant, angry, sullen and silent. I knew at once that the minor battle had been won but the great war was hopelessly lost. Then it slowly began to dawn on me that I wasn't - lost, that is - the kindness of my aftercare counselor and my AlAnon group, my sponsor and all the friends who had started out as strangers had been a gift. It had, albeit painfully, brought me to my senses and to strength and reality, all without a single word or gesture of actual sympathy or well intentioned advice. These precious people had comforted me with kindness just as someone had once comforted them. I have done my best to do the same for others ever since.

To The Manor Born

The line to the pharmacy counter was six deep and it took me a minute to recognize the older woman in front of me. The years hadn't been kind to Miz Adelaide – she'd gained a considerable amount of weight, her skin had turned to crepe paper and her once lustrous bleached blonde hair was wispy and balding in places. What hadn't changed was her uppity, self importance – that was still very much intact. She complained and whined about being made to wait to everyone that would listen. She drummed her once perfectly manicured nails on the rim of her shopping cart and tapped her foot in annoyance. She shifted her weight and tried to peer into the pharmacy as if demanding to be acknowledged. Every impatient and put upon gesture was accompanied by a hugely audible sigh but nothing was working. I'm not proud of it, but I was enjoying the moment. I could recall the hundreds of time I'd waited on her in the photo store and seen exactly the same behavior, the same old money'd arrogance and entitlement. In some ten years of weekly visits, she'd barely bothered to learn my name. Even so, I didn't want to risk being recognized so I was careful to keep my back to her and keep my smile to myself.

I'm smart enough to know that how I feel about women like Miz Adelaide is more about me than them but I'm a grudge keeper and think that forgiveness is mostly overrated. As a general rule,

I'm happy to be overlooked except when I'm not. More than once I've had the thought that age clarifies your outlook, not always in a good way. There's a fine line between service and servitude and women like Miz Adelaide cross it without a backward glance or a second thought. Again, I'm not exactly proud of feeling she's earned this particular moment in the pharmacy line but I'm not exactly ashamed either.

She reaches the counter and immediately initiates an argument with the cashier, petulantly complaining about the wait, the lack of efficiency, the price of the prescription and the overall state of the country, which in her opinion is disgraceful and completely the fault of anyone who didn't vote republican. She persists in this shabby tirade well after the helpless cashier (who I suspected wasn't even old enough to vote) has apologized several times, then snatches the pharmacy bag out of the poor child's hand and jerks her shopping cart out of line, plowing directly into the cart of an unsuspecting shopper who happened to be passing. There is, of course, no apology offered, instead she glares at the hapless woman then storms off down the

makeup aisle, looking perfectly prepared to mow down anyone who crosses her path.

“White trash,” a voice behind me says distinctly.

“Sing it, sista,” a second voice adds.

It was a crossroads moment that could've led to a minor riot or at the very least an ugly scene. It could even have led to a conversation. Instead it led to laughter, only a trickle at first, but then a full out wave. Strangers grinned at each other and shook their heads with something very close to pity. Even the pharmacy staff smiled although discreetly. The woman shopper who had almost been run down flashed a thumbs up sign and what could have been a thoroughly nasty incident turned into a small victory for civility and unity.

You can't be beaten by something you laugh at ~ Jonathan Harnisch

Storms

The storm hit just after 4 in the morning with a tremendous shotgun crack of thunder and a protracted series of lightning that lit up the sky like white neon. The little dashshund woke with a start and gave a small whimper before burrowing deeper into my side. The tiny one, fast asleep above my head, barely stirred. The rain came, hard and cold and falling fiercely, tearing the newly blooming azaleas to shreds and bending the crepe myrtles like so many paper straw wrappers. A second crash of thunder set the walls to vibrating and now thoroughly terrorized, the little dashshund yelped and frantically began to dig his way beneath me. I reassured him as best I could, speaking softly hugging him tightly and pulling the blanket over both our heads. It took several minutes but eventually he began to relax, tucking his whole head under my chin and holding on for dear life. After awhile, it got me to thinking about how little comfort we can sometimes offer those we love, especially perhaps when they need it the most.

I had visited my friend, Jean, earlier the day before and come away feeling helpless and worried and depressed. She'd had steroids with her last chemotherapy treatment and was chatty and perky and cheerful enough but she looked beaten up and unhealthily thin. She moved with a fragile unsteadiness and had trouble following the conversation. The skin on either side of her throat was red and raw from the radiation and she kept a cold compress wrapped around her neck and shoulders. It chilled her so she'd tucked her hair under a loosely fitting green knit cap and wrapped herself in a thick shawl. The overall effect was frailty and weakness - I was reminded of a child playing dress up in clothes several sizes too big. We talk and tell stories, make up silly jokes, plan the places we will go when she's well and can taste food again. I tell myself anyone would look like this after 4 weeks of daily radiation and weekly chemotherapy. The doctors tell her, so she tells me, that she's tolerating it well and there is every reason to hope. Maybe so, but there's a part of me that sees shadows in this sweet little house. Granted, they're hiding in the corners for now and there are days when they seem to be gone entirely but

I can't shut them out completely. I'm afraid for my friend and for myself and I despise my helplessness.

Meanwhile, my dear friend, Tricia, has been thoroughly leveled by a gastrointestinal bug. I find her wrapped in a blanket and huddled miserably in her recliner. She looks like – forgive me, Tricia – death on a stick, thin, colorless, fragile and cold, too sick to move. Just like Jean, there's nothing I can do to comfort her or ease her pain and this harsh helplessness gnaws and grates on me like an abscess. There is an almost chronic weariness in her dark eyes, a sense of futility in the circles beneath them. She looks haggard and beaten and racked with pain. A few days later when she rallies - just a little – I wonder at her tenacity and will. I feel grateful and guilty all at the same time, so glad we are such good friends but at odds with myself for not being able to share or at least ease her suffering. It strikes me that the unfairness of how life treats us is a cold hearted bitch indeed and I make a mental note to remind myself to be more aware and appreciative of my own circumstances.

God has a plan, Jean tells me, and it's not ours to know. The agnostic in me thinks it's all a sad, man-made fiction but the part that wants to believe hangs on for dear life.

Tar and Feathers

According to Cap, who delivered the news with a grin and a shake of his head, Mary Louise found out about Ella Ann on Tuesday, Ella Ann found out about Mary Louise on Wednesday, and on Thursday, Travis Prime hastily packed a bag and took off for parts unknown.

“Boy was waitin' on the first crossin',” Cap reported, “Dancin' around like the devil was at his heels and catchin' up fast.”

Nana was unsympathetic. “You lay with dogs, you get fleas,” she said coldly, “Boy never did have the sense God gave geese and neither of them wimmen is blind or stupid. They was bound to catch on sooner or later.”

“Reckon so,” Cap nodded, “Never did unnerstand it myself, all the boy's ever had was them good looks and he'll grow outta them.”

“Good looks and good sense don't always end up together,” Aunt Pearl shrugged, “Leastways he was smart enough to run.”

Aunt Vi sighed. “I s'pose so,” she said sadly, “But I ain't sure he's smart enough to keep goin'.”

On the scandal scale, it was enough to keep the bored villagers talking for a few weeks but, most everyone said, it wasn't much to write home about. And then on one warm summer afternoon,

Ella Ann and Mary Louise happened to run into each other at the post office. They could've ignored one another. They could've had a catfight right in the dusty street. They could've glared and turned their backs. They even could have been frostily polite to one another and left, as the postmistress pretty much expected they would do.

“You jist never kin tell 'bout folks,” Thelma told everyone who would listen, “Who'd a thought to see them two walk out arm 'n'arm like long lost friends! Gon' be a bad day for ol' Travis Prime, I reckon.”

And indeed it was. To the village's bewilderment, Mary Louise and Ella Ann united, pooled their resources and hired themselves a private detective from Halifax to track and locate Travis. It didn't take long before he was found, waiting tables in a down and out diner in a more down and out section of St. John and pretty much living out of his beat up old '47 Chevy. The entire island was on edge with anticipation - the Sullivan boys made a killing taking odds on what the women would do – and it seemed like overnight, the ordinary little scandal caught fire and no one was talking about anything else. Breach of contract and alienation of affections became popular phrases, but both came in a close second and third to tar and feathers. Rumor had it that Travis, feeling rightfully anxious, lit out - sold the Chevy for a song, signed on to an Alaskan bound tramp steamer - and disappeared. There were random sightings over the years, from a logging camp and a fishing fleet to one promising lead from an off shore oil rig but nothing ever led anywhere. Travis was in the wind and for most of the island, it was good riddance. The silver lining was that Ella Ann and Mary Louise became good friends and eventually bought Miz Hilda's old Victorian house, moved in together and rented rooms to the summer folk. On those warm summer evenings, you could see them in their wooden rocking chairs, watching the sunsets and drinking homemade strawberry wine on the veranda with their guests. Travis's name was never mentioned and it was never proven that the women kept a bucket of tar and a bag of feathers in their shed, just in case.

The Third Grave

The air was heavy with a misty, left over rain and the sun wasn't making much progress when I realized the little dachshund had found yet another new way out of the yard. I snatched my keys, threw on on my Nikes and left to go retrieve him. I found him on the lawn of my next door neighbor, sitting still and quiet beside the body of one of my favorite neighborhood cats. It felt as if someone had rammed a knife into my chest. I led my little one back, returned with a towel to wrap up the small, lifeless body and carried him across the street to his home. It was just after seven on a gray-ish Sunday morning and I hated to have to wake Amanda but it'd have been far worse for her never to know. I had to ring the bell several times and listening to her dogs barking from inside, I wanted desperately to give up. She finally answered the door, still rubbing sleep from her eyes and hushing the dogs, frowning at the bundle in my arms.

“Hey,” she began, “What's up and who is............” and then she saw and crumpled into a heap, shaking and sobbing. It was several minutes before she was coherent and all I could do was hold her beloved cat and wait. Words are cold comfort at times like this.

It'd have been unforgivably cruel to bring up the fact that this sweet natured animal would still be alive if he'd been kept inside but it was a thought I'd had about Amanda's cats dozens of times. This is the third one she's lost to the outside world and for the sake of her two remaining inside/outside cats, I had a fierce urge to grab her shoulders and shake some sense into her. I didn't do it, of course, you don't beat up someone who's just lost a beloved animal. Not even when it's the third one, not even when there may be a fourth or fifth.

Later that afternoon, we dug a third grave in the rain-softened ground in her back yard. It was impossibly sad and both of us were in tears. When we were done, we hugged briefly and I walked home slowly to gather my own little ones and be grateful for them.

Three Cookies and a Diet Coke

The line of hopeful wannabe models stretches out the door and around the corner. They are tall and short, black and white, blonde and brunette, thin and family sized. It's going to be another three cookies and a Diet Coke for lunch kind of day.

They have been clearly and specifically told to bring a current photo. Many don't.

They have been clearly and specifically told not to bring their entire family of 12. Many do.

They have clearly and specifically been told what to wear. They ignore the instructions.

They have been clearly and specifically told we will not see children under 6 The 3 year old twins and their parents leave in a huff.

They have clearly and specifically been told about being punctual. I turn away the three who stroll and slouch in a half hour after we start. They decide to argue and it almost turns heated but when I point out that if they can't be on time for an audition, how could I expect them to be on a time for a job, I prevail and they wander away like a herd of lost sheep.

With a little help from Michael, I manage to get them all signed in, seated, and more or less paying attention. He teaches them the basics of posture and a runway walk, then they all read a tv commercial, even the ones who obviously don't consider literacy a benefit and after a quickie question and answer session, we're done.

One or two have the height, one or two have the drive, one or two have the personality, one or two even have the resources but when it's all said and done, we hope for a shining star but settle for a festival of ordinary. Broadway and Hollywood will have to wait for the next crop of starry eyed dreamers.

In the meantime, maybe I can get a decent lunch.

Chickens & Charity

Rain or shine, fine or fogbound, Wednesday was the day Nana made her sick calls.

We packed the old Lincoln with a half dozen or so food baskets, cleaning supplies, a couple of boxes of books and magazines, some odds and ends and second hand clothing, and headed out to make the rounds. Sometimes Aunt Pearl or Aunt Vi or Miz Clara came with us, on rare occasions we picked up Uncle Len or John Sullivan to help with small repairs. If there were children on the list, we would try to include a used toy or game and even would bring one of the dogs. It was what Nana called, OUR CHRISTIAN DUTY.

“What goes around, comes around,” she assured me firmly, “Everyone needs a little charity now and then, whether they want it or not.”

I learned early that charity and pride don't always walk hand in hand and sometimes OUR CHRISTIAN DUTY was not as welcomed as we'd have liked. My grandmother was undeterred by the rare doors that were not thrown open for us and would just leave her care packages on the porches and move on.

“You can't take away folk's pride,” she told me with a smile and a shrug, “Sometimes it's all a body's got left.”

“Pride don't put food on the table or keep the lights burnin',” Miz Clara would observe sourly when her knock on the door wasn't answered but Nana ignored her and checked off another name on her list.

“Returned or not, Clara,” she chided her gently, “Ain't no harm in kindness.”

“Mebbe so,” Clara replied ruefully, “But it ain't no one way street neither.”

“I reckon we'd be done already if you two old hens would quit peckin' at each other,” John Sullivan remarked more loudly than necessary and both women glared at him briefly and then commenced to laugh.

“Wimmenfolk,” Long John muttered, “More trouble 'n chickens and christian duty put together.”

Visiting Hours

A gentle rain washes away the green pollen mist and a light breeze stirs the curtains at the windows. We sit, my friend Jean and I, and talk about everything and nothing – her cancer treatments, the new temporary dog groomer I've found, how she still misses her husband, what life and the future hold – it's comfortable and easy, sad and optimistic at the same time. She looks tired, a little lost, and her mind sometimes wanders. The radiation has stolen her ability to taste and made it hard for her to swallow. The chemotherapy is rough on her immune system. She grimaces and forces down a glass of gatorade. But her smile is still there – it takes a little more effort and lasts a little less long, but it's still there. This isn't her first battle with cancer and she isn't the giving up kind. I can't help but wonder if I were in her place, would I have her courage and grace or would my faith be as strong. Even facing cancer, there's a touch of mischief in that smile, a hint of the hope and humor that sustains her. I'm not at all sure that I would be so strong or so stubborn.

She's about to start the 3^rd week of a 10 week treatment protocol – radiation five afternoons a week plus chemotherapy each Thursday morning – her doctors are hopeful and her spirits are mostly good although every now and then her eyes cloud over and I can see the worry and the fear and the weariness. They creep around the edges of her mind, beckoning to the dark places we try so hard not to think about. She catches herself, shakes it off, closes her eyes and forces herself to breathe and relax, to meditate and let go.

“My mind needs healing as much as my body,” she tells me. Her voice is thinner, shakier than I like to hear, not quite as convincing as a couple of weeks ago. Seven more weeks of this, I think, will she ever be the same?

We have a lunch of buttered croissants, beef broth and smoothies and the minutes slip by as minutes will do.