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Tuesday, July 18, 2006

We're Here to Help

Some time after the accident, the Arnolds dropped by to offer their assistance. While they had lived next to us a long time, relative to other neighbors they were new to our street.

We’d invite you in for coffee, my wife said, but we have no coffee. You understand.

Of course, the Arnolds said. The accident. We’ll bring you some coffee. Would you like that? Would you like some coffee?

Yes, we said. Coffee would be wonderful.

The Arnolds went home and returned with specialty coffee beans, a grinder, cups, spoons, cream, sugar, and a coffee-maker. My wife explained we hadn’t lost our coffee-maker in the accident. Mrs. Arnold said we had to try the coffee from their coffee-maker, that it made the best coffee; and in fact their coffee-maker produced excellent coffee.

This is good coffee, we said.

We drank our coffee in the living room, and I sensed Mr. Arnold eying the room for a seat. The accident had also claimed our window drapes, so people passing on the street could look in at us.

The coffee is wonderful, we said. We’re very grateful for the coffee.

I think we can improve the sitting situation, Mr. Arnold said.

He lugged in their backyard lawn furniture, filling our living room with four folding chairs with adjustable backs, a lounger that reclined according to one’s weight distribution, and a glass patio table with the umbrella. Mrs. Arnold showed us how to properly distribute one’s weight in the lounger. We sat around the patio table with our coffee cups. Mrs. Arnold poured a second serving.

Is anyone hungry? Mrs. Arnold said.

Of course people are hungry, Mr. Arnold said. I’ll be right back.

A few minutes later, he was wheeling his gas barbecue grill into the living room, towing a gardener’s wagon full with grilling utensils, plates, plastic picnic ware, and a large picnic cooler.

Is it okay to grill indoors? my wife asked.

Honey, Mr. Arnold said, you can grill anywhere.

We opened all the windows. Mr. Arnold served up steak, baked potatoes with sour cream, grilled pepper strips. We pulled our chairs up to the patio table and ate.

This is nice isn’t it? Mrs. Arnold said.

It is, we said.

After dinner, Mr. Arnold, at Mrs. Arnold’s direction, set up a small black and white television he had found in his attic.

A little television will help us digest the meal, he said.

We watched a reality show about two couples sharing a hotel room in Las Vegas. My wife asked if we could watch a show on another channel, the one where the police employ circus animals to snare escaped convicts. Mr. Arnold explained his wife really liked the reality shows, and that as soon as it was over he would switch to my wife’s program.

It turned out the little black and white television did not pick up my wife’s channel. In fact, the little black and white television failed to pick up any stations after Mrs. Arnold’s reality show ended.

They suggested we play cards. They suggested euchre.

We don’t know how to play, we said.

We’ll teach you, they said. It’s a lot of fun.

They taught us, but we did not catch on well. We did not understand why there should be a thirty-two card deck instead of fifty-two. We struggled with the concepts of left and right bowers. We failed to see the value in ordering up trump when we couldn’t see our partner’s hand.

Mrs. Arnold tried to be polite with her suggestion that we not trump our partner’s tricks.

Mr. Arnold became exasperated by our persistence in trumping our partner’s trick.

Good God, he said. Don’t trump her trick.

I no longer had a watch, but I could see it was getting late, as it was dark outside our bare windows. I didn’t want to ask the time, though. We had lost nearly everything in the accident, except our sense of propriety when entertaining guests.

Mr. Arnold announced that he would like a drink. Mrs. Arnold made an unpleasant face as she returned the thirty-two-card euchre deck to its brother twenty cards in a rather forceful manner.

It seems a little late to start drinking, my wife said, as support - I presumed - to Mrs. Arnold.

Honey, Mr. Arnold said, It’s never to late to have a drink.

I’m sorry, I said, But I wish you wouldn’t call my wife honey.

I see, Mr. Arnold said.

He calls everybody honey, Mrs. Arnold said. Please don’t take it the wrong way.

No dear, he said, That’s not how they speak here. We need to respect their wishes. It is their home.

Suddenly, my wife suffered a loud, gaping yawn. The Arnolds looked at the watches on their wrists.

You two must be very tired, they said. The trauma of the accident and all.

Yes, we said. We don’t mean to be rude. Of course, we’re most grateful for your kindnesses this evening. We’re just exhausted.

Of course you are, they said. Just get yourselves off to bed. We’ll take care of everything down here.

We can’t let you clean up after us, we said. That would be the height of rudeness.

Oh, Mr. Arnold said, we’re not cleaning up. We’ll be taking turns minding our property. It’s too late and too dark to take it all home now. So I’ll take the first shift here on the lounger, and she’ll relieve me in a few hours.

My wife and I cleared the patio table. We threw away the paper plates and plastic tableware in the kitchen trash, washed the glass pot from the coffee-maker, rinsed the cups. When we returned to the living room, Mr. Arnold was settling into the lounger. We bid him an awkward goodnight and went up to our room.

Since the accident we had been sleeping on the floor in our bare bedroom. We used a comforter as a mattress, covered ourselves with a tarp, and fashioned pillows out of laundry. We had acclimated to the situation quickly, finding we were sleeping better than we had in years, usually straight through the night.

We woke a few hours later, when the Arnold’s switched shifts. Mr. Arnold was a noisy riser, and it sounded as if he had turned over the lounger as he tried rising from it. Then we heard their footsteps mounting the stairs. There was a brief commotion at the top of the stairs, and we guessed the Arnolds were setting up the lounger in the hall. We did not hear Mr. Arnold’s retreat. After the accident, we found we could sleep through anything.

Monday, July 17, 2006

Conference

The situation was reaching a crisis. We went out and inspected the situation. We walked its length north, then south. We climbed a ladder for a different perspective. We discussed digging a tunnel, but it had been raining and the earth was too soft. Besides, it was obviously a bad situation, a situation looking to get worse.

We returned to our office suite to compare notes. We hung our coats on the coatrack. We made hot cocoa. We sat at the conference table and took out our notes. I had taken notes with the mechanical pencil my father presented me upon my graduation. Pastor took notes with a felt-tipped pen purchased from an office supply store.

This is not good, I said.

It’s a bad situation, Pastor said.

This is not the situation we wanted, I said.

No one would want this situation, Pastor said.

Choirman entered the office suite and asked for a briefing. I read my notes aloud. Pastor read his. Choirman pursed his lips and pressed his fingertips together. After we completed the reading of the notes, we sat at the conference table and listened to the second hand on the wall clock.

Deacon came in, sat down, and pursed her lips. She had learned to purse her lips from Choirman. She had adopted his style of lip pursing.

Elders joined us. Elders had given up contact lenses for spectacles in 2001, which had improved her ability to listen to the second hand on the wall clock without pursing her lips. The change had possessed Vicars, and we had been lucky to just let him go without suffering a sexual harassment suit.

We better call Bishop, Choirman said.

We listened to the wall clock some more. The wall clock had been installed precisely for those times when the situation got bad, so we could hear precious moments slip away.

Elders took off her glasses and sucked on the end of the left bow. It seemed a filthy thing to do, but whenever she did it we got a little glimpse into what had happened to Vicars. When she does that, Vicars had said, I have to stare at her breasts. Yes we understand, we had said to him, but you can’t tell her that.

Nobody missed Vicars. He had been a poor note-taker. The only times we remembered him was when Elders sucked on her glasses.

We have to call Bishop, Choirman said.

What do we tell him? Deacon said.

We tell him the situation is very bad, I said.

Is it bad or very bad? Deacon said.

It’s almost a crisis, Pastor said.

It’s definitely reaching a crisis, I said.

But still, Elders said, it has not yet reached a crisis. And as I understand it Bishop does not want to be called unless it is a crisis.

We can only say, I said, that it’s a bad situation.

It’s a situation nobody wants, Pastor said.

Choirman nodded judiciously and thanked us for our time. He said he hoped we would all have a nice weekend.

Before leaving the grounds I took another look at the situation. It had become quite sodden in the rain. By itself that was not unusual. My thoughts turned to the evening’s scheduled racquetball match. My opponent was to be a fellow at least ten years my junior. I knew him to be a raw and reckless player, so I felt confident of victory. As he was Elder’s boyfriend, I hoped to give him a satisfying drubbing.

Friday, July 14, 2006

Little Nudies

It’s on the upper level, so I have to sweep off the snow. With daycare in the morning we’re always running late and ending up on the upper level. So I have to sweep off the snow.

I meet her on the street and we drive to daycare.

How was your day, I say.

Good, she says. Yours?

Pretty good, I say.

We have a happy baby. I hold her and she flaps her arms for her mother. The wife holds her and she flaps her arms for me.

We live out there. More snow. Halfway up the mountain. Roads that never come to any good.

Such a good baby. Sleeps on the way home. Wakes when we lay her on the sofa and pull her from her snowsuit. I put her in the highchair and slice up a banana for her.

The wife starts the baby’s dinner while I go into the cellar to fire up the wood furnace. There’s still some embers, so I don’t need a match. The kindling takes off and I slowly feed it with fingers of ash, letting it catch and then giving it the split oak and cherry. I read an old newspaper I find on the floor. Upstairs I hear the baby slapping and pounding the highchair tray. The wife says, Oh sweetie oh sweetie.

I get upstairs and the baby has dinner all over her face and arms, looking very pleased.

Do you mind giving her her bath tonight? the wife says.

No, I say. I don’t mind giving her her bath tonight.

I draw a shallow tub in the bathroom, take the baby into her bedroom, undress her, remove her diaper. She rubs baby food on my arm. She giggles and tries to roll away. I catch her and carry her to the bathroom, passing the wife in the kitchen. The wife is making our dinner. She says, Hi little nudie.

It’s the little nudie, I say.

The baby sits in the tub, laughing, slapping water. I wash food out of her hair. She has a red turtle she chews. I find the empty shampoo bottle, fill it with bathwater, and squirt her belly. She squeals and her dimples use up her whole face. She has her daddy’s dimples.

I get her clean, then carefully lift the slick, squirming bug, and wrap her in the hooded towel. In the bedroom I powder her, tape on a diaper, load her into fresh pajamas. The wife has a bottle ready for me. The baby holds it to her mouth, freeing a hand so I can sit in the living room and read the paper. She falls asleep before the bottle is done. I burp her against my shoulder, offer her to the wife for a goodnight kiss, and lay her in the crib, winding the musical mobile.

The wife opens a beer for me. We sit across the table from each other.

Delicious meal, I say.

Thank you, she says.

The beer goes quickly. I open another. The Brahms lullaby plays choppily through the house.

So you had a good day today, the wife says.

Yes I did, I say.

Me too, she says.

After the meal, she starts the dishes and I return to the cellar to check the fire and bring in more wood. I put on the old sweater I keep down there and find the pack of smokes hidden atop the heat duct crossing the ceiling. I go out through the bulkhead door and stand in the snow, blowing blue smoke into the night.

There’s fresh snow in the footpath to the woodshed, but I don’t need to shovel it. I put on my leather gloves and start the gathering.

A lot of wood has to come in. I see I have a full night of it, with the bringing it in and the splitting and the stacking. I have to do what I see I now have to do. It wouldn’t be fair to leave all that to a mother and her child.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Bumpkin

The hotel was a good hotel. Daniel liked the hotel, and he liked the king bed in his room. He liked how the television was set into the wall behind louvered doors. He liked adjusting the air conditioning.

Rick came by and said they were going out for dinner. Daniel said he was going to get some fastfood and stay in.

Nate called and said, Rick says you’re staying in.

I am, Daniel said.

You can’t stay in, Nate said.

I’m going to stay in, Daniel said.

He went to a Burger King and returned to his room with two Whoppers, fries, and a vanilla shake. He spread his meal on the king bed, and watched television while he ate. He watched the local news and NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. He watched part of a biography of Bill Gates and the middle third of a Kurt Russell movie.

He decided to take a bath. While he soaked in the tub he called home on the bathroom telephone. It was his first bathroom with a telephone.

I’m in a bathroom with a telephone, he said to his wife.

When are you coming home? his wife said.

Friday afternoon. Hey, I’m calling you from the hotel bathtub.

Do you need to be picked up?

No. Gary will drop me off. You know, I’m taking a bath and talking to you on the phone.

When you get back I want to discuss the car situation.

Okay. But really, I’ve never talked on the phone before when I was taking a bath. I mean, I’m taking a bath.

Baths are nice. Are you calling tomorrow night?

I can. There’s a phone in the bathroom.

Daniel finished his vanilla shake in the bathtub. He had left the television on and could hear a documentary on meerkats. When the bath began to cool he let some out and replaced it with more hot water. He was really living.

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Masterpieces

Garrett discovers that only fat men look good in well-tailored suits. He is of moderate girth, has paid a substantial sum for his well-tailored suit, and is dissatisfied with his appearance in it.

He models it for his friend Geherty.

You look good, Geherty says.

Not as good as a fat man looks, Garrett says.

Geherty considers this declaration. He holds his chin in his hand. He says, You are right. Only a fat man looks good in a well-tailored suit.

They take the matter to Garrett’s tailor, Gund, on Salisbury Street.

You look good in this suit, Gund says.

Not as good as a fat man looks, Garrett says.

Ah, says Gund. You have named a fact. No one can look better than a fat man in a well-tailored suit. It is a simple truth, an irreversible reality. You see, with a man your size or smaller, a tailor has less to work with. Always in these matters the wearer must make a contribution. The tailor must compose the garment so that it fits. But the fat man composes with the tailor. The tailor fits the suit to the fat man, and the fat man fills the suit. Do you not see?

I’ll need a second opinion, Garrett says.

Of course, says Gund. See my former partner Gaslight on Sherman Street.

Well, says Gaslight when they visit him, my former partner and I disagree on many subjects, which explains our parting, but on this we concur. Only a fat man can look truly magnificent in a well-tailored suit. And yes, he is correct on the reason. Think of it as a concert pianist playing a fine piano, or an painter caressing a canvas with oils, or – if you are sports-minded - a champion surfer riding the perfect wave.

Garrett concedes the point. Geherty chips in that his entire worldview has been altered.

Since they are downtown, they take lunch at Gist’s Tavern on Sunday Street. They skip the appetizers and each order the turkey club sandwich. They decline the dessert cart when it wheels around, and finish with coffee. When the check comes they argue over how to split it.

Tuesday, July 11, 2006

To Be Home Again

The snow is just like smoke coming off the boughs and hanging over the road. I’m up Farm-to-Market Road to see what the new owners have done with Grandpa’s old place, getting my fill of fresh paint, new barns, rebuilt stonewalls, and a duck pond, when I see the three deer break from the hemlocks short of the flats.

I watch them cross the open field, kicking up the new snow behind their tails.

A truck is parked up ahead, a rifle barrel pointing out the passenger window. The deer weave over the field and disappear into the far forest. The rifle barrel slides back into the truck cab.

Back home, I knock the snow off my boots and pick up the phone. Dad comes in from the living room, where he’s been feeding the woodstove.

See the house? he says. How’s she look?

Different, I say.

Different all right. Who you calling?

Game warden.

See something?

Some guy hunting from his truck.

I see. You want some coffee? I’m putting water on.

I’ll have some coffee with you.

Sure, have a cup of coffee.

He fills the kettle, takes it to the woodstove, comes back touching his shirt pocket. Guess I’ll go out and have a smoke, he says.

You know Dad, I say, you can smoke in the house. Nobody cares.

I know, but I’m used to it.

He goes out to the garage and lights a cigarette. I stand at the window over the washing machine, holding the phone book. The snow has melted off the driveway and is sliding off the tin roofs of the neighborhood. The untracked yards are settling.

I join him in the garage.

Good snow for tracking, he says.

Is it?

Oh, sure. I never got out this year. It’s too bad. But I don’t mind.

It is illegal, I say, to hunt from a truck.

That’s the law. You know who it was?

Maybe you know.

That’s the problem with calling the warden. You don’t know who you’re calling about.

You think maybe I shouldn’t call.

I’m thinking you don’t know who you’re calling about.

He smokes his cigarette, watching the field across the road and the balsam-furrowed hillside that rises to the line of pines against the sky. He looks at trees as if he knows them personally. I’m not so sure he doesn’t.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Girls I Know

A hot day for a long walk. I stop by the brook, but don’t climb down the bank for a drink. I just look at it. The sight of water flowing over a sandy bed gets me believing anything is possible.

Around the bend and under the maples is the next house. I knock on the door, and when Tralee opens it she does not recognize me.

I was hoping to get a drink of water, I say.

Do I know you? she says.

I live up past the flats, I say.

She lets me in and pours a glass of water from a pitcher in the refrigerator.

You live around here? she says.

Up past the flats, I say.

She pours whiskey into my glass, and some for herself. We drink, sitting at the kitchen table. The windows are open and I hear the old trees sawing in the forest. We drink, and she remembers me.

You’ve been gone a long time, she says.

Not that long, I say.

We drink a little longer, and then she leads me into the bedroom and lets me undress her. She pulls back the bedcovers.

I make the bed every morning, she says.

The sheets are cool. I lay my head on her belly and want to never leave it’s softness. I dream of great waters.

I return home well before dark. My wife asks where I’ve been. I tell her I went for a walk.

You went there again didn’t you? she says.

Yes, I say.

Did you drink of her secrets? she says.

This isn’t necessary, I say.

Did you hold her breasts and dream of swimming?

Enough.

Did you lick her salty shores?

I said enough.

Did you lay your face upon her belly and listen for a message from the sea?

I take the wooden box from the CD shelf and go outdoors. The early evening breeze is in the trees. I lift the box lid and show my wife’s ashes the maple boughs swaying in the wind.

One more word, I say, and I will cast you into nothingness.

That shuts her up.

Friday, July 07, 2006

Night Out

I didn’t want that whore winking at me. My father used to wink at me. Whenever we were hiding something from my mother.

The whore had no business winking at me. I was the customer.

I fastened my trouser belt and shook my finger at her. Listen, I said.

Her face went from that older-sister-with-a-secret look to that older-sister-who-doesn’t-want-you-in-her-room look. No you listen, she said.

I could have cut her. I could have cut her good.

But the knife is for cleaning fingernails and opening mail.

I went down into the street and found a cop.

There’s a whore up there, I said, pointing up to the third floor window.

Surely you jest, the cop said.

When I got home my sister was in the kitchen sorting buttons.

Daddy called, she said.

What are you doing? I said.

I’m sorting buttons, she said.

I made a sandwich and poured a glass of milk. I sat at the kitchen table, eating my meal and watching my sister sort buttons. When I finished I left the plate and glass on the table and went to bed.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Grand Tour

Marlene ordered a Park Sandwich, so I did too. We sat at a picnic table with a couple from Pennsylvania and we ate our Park Sandwiches.

What’s it taste like to you? Marlene said. I mean, besides crunchy?

Crunchy is a texture, I said. Not a flavor.

Crunchy can be a flavor, she said.

Our picnic table was one of thousands in the Picnic Arena. The Picnic Arena could be reached by either the Picnic Arena Trail or the Picnic Arena Interpretive Trail. We had arrived via the Trail, deciding to try the Interpretive Trail on the way back.

The Pennsylvanian couple were Baby Boomers. They introduced themselves as Pat and Gina from Pennsylvania. We’re Baby Boomers, they said.

Only a few years ago nobody would have introduced himself as a Baby Boomer, but after several months of the National Redemption Project people lost their fear.

Where you kids from? Gina said.

Vermont, we said.

Vermont, Pat said. We’ve been there.

Pat and Gina were eating Park Sandwiches.

What’s the point, Pat said, of not having the Park Sandwich? We’re here, aren’t we?

It’s part of the experience, Marlene said. And it’s so crunchy.

Each picnic table sat on its own little island, a raised bed of crushed stone framed by railroad ties, with two steps on the north side and two on the south. Along the west wall of the Arena was the Public Access Platform with Pamplona Style Ramps and I.M. Pei Inserts.

It’s a Full Service Park, Pat said. Says so in the brochure.

No one should miss the Park Sandwich, Gina said. Everyone has the right to try the Park Sandwich.

It’s so crunchy, Marlene said.

It sure is, hon, Gina said.

While we ate we admired the Flags. The Flags hung from the Cathedral Staffs. Pat read about the Cathedral Staffs from the brochure. The Flags had been hanging from them since 2003. Pat shook his head with disbelief and admiration.

What’d you kids think of the Parking Centre? Gina said.

Everyone loves the Parking Centre, Pat said, showing us the quote in the brochure.

He pointed to the Shuttle schedule on the back of the brochure. He said, Not trying to lose you but if you’re doing the Picnic Arena Interpretive Trail, Shuttle seats get hard to come by in the afternoon.

We agreed we should get going. Marlene put our Park Sandwich Certificates of Authenticity in the Park Tote we had purchased at the Park Souvenir Rotunda. I shook hands with Pat and accepted a peck on the cheek from Gina.

You kids headed straight back to Vermont? Gina said.

Oh no, Marlene said. We’re doing all the Parks.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Water Hole

We didn’t meet in a bar, but now that we’ve met, Maria and I always meet in bars. The tables are always round. The bartender sports a moustache. The coasters bear the likeness of the Saint Pauli Girl. The television is turned too low to hear. The waitress has cheeks like apples still on the tree.

Maria wears a shirt to just below the knee. She could wear a shorter skirt – she has the legs for it – but the skirt to just below the knee is her look.

I wear taupe bucks. Bucks under Levis. That is my look.

The waitress takes our order. A Flying Coconut for Maria, a Swim the River for me. The waitress has cheeks like apples still on the tree, the cheeks of a Sunday school teacher. Her name is Annie. If she had been born in 1860 her name would be Mytie Fay and she would be married to a boy that knows the names of wildflowers.

Maria says, We can get chinese takeout and rent a movie. Or we can eat at the Peking Duck and catch a movie later.

We first met at a picnic on North Beach. We walked the bike path along the lake, reaching Chimney Park by dark. We lay on the flat boulders reaching into the bay, and stared at the stars, wishing we knew their names. We said, We should learn their names.