A winter’s tale

 

Marie barely shuffled down the side of the deserted road.  A knapsack filled with a few of her most treasured belongings sagged heavy on her small shoulders.  Time and distance were dropping off like the streetlights were becoming fewer and fewer.  Houses had stopped long ago.  Fields had been put to sleep under thick blankets of snow. 

 

Life below the heavens was growing dimmer as her body temperature plummeted.  For no reason she was in touch with, she made feeble efforts to keep her thoughts active, alive.  She tried to remember what had happened to her family.  She thought they were dead, the immediate ones.  The others were distant, indifferent.

 

She felt the muscles along her neck and shoulders tighten under the knapsack straps and soon she began to tremble violently, involuntarily.  Pieces of a memory seemed to shake loose.  One piece, of coming out here for an internship at The Daily News, fit with Michael.  He helped her with her writing, helped her get hired as a reporter, like him.  There was love.  A house.  Together.

 

The pain of the cold pierced her ears.  In their ringing she heard a man’s voice, could see his handsome face.  She lifted a frostbitten hand toward him, barely formed a whisper of the word, “Michael…”  She shuffled forward, almost fell.  No one was there.  Tears froze to her bloodless cheeks. 

 

The last streetlight faded away with the feeling in her legs.  She stumbled, dropped to her knees, and crumpled in pain.  The remaining heat and strength within her began to drain fast away after her last coherent thought:  she would never have accepted the promotion over Michael if she had known he would throw her out in the cold in a jealous rage, at the expense of her love for him.

 

Fini

 

PHOTO CREDIT

 

Dark, snowy road from http://lh4.ggpht.com/_xcfjtMYWJZE/R2HWT-eLc5I/AAAAAAAAA1I/wIvM_f-WDxM/IMG_0722.JPG

 

 

 

Click here for more on prompt “#139 – A Winter’s Tale” from other Sunday Scribblings participants

Another human god – Add to cart

 

Camille Saint-Saëns, 9 October 1835 – 16 December 1921, shown here in 1875

 

 

I’ve been hanging out at the ‘rents during this Thanksgiving holiday, and today have been hanging out mostly with my dad.  With all the ailments that go along with his age, and then some, he enjoys nothing more than sitting in front of the Bose with a smokin’ classical CD under the laser. 

 

So from that all-classical collection I mentioned in the Cream rising to the top post,  I dared choose a CD that I’ve been avoiding for years—Camille Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3 in C minor, Op. 78, a.k.a. the organ symphony—and we sat down for a music appreciation session.  And I’ll be darned.  Now I’m enamored with a dead classical composer.

 

This No. 3 was the bridge to adoration over the crazy Saint-Saëns waters I remembered as a kid to a more stereotypical symphonic sound with the added genius, not only of its hooky theme, but of using the fiercely spirited pipe organ as just another orchestral instrument, standing out no more than another of the many violins for the most part, and of interjecting some slick piano arpeggios similarly, well-placed and not overdone.

 

Classical music was in my ears every day of my formative years, and because it wasn’t my thing, it became as a barely noticed score playing behind the movie of my life.  But sitting here today, reading the CD booklet, reading about who Camille Saint-Saëns was, what made him tick, along with listening to his No. 3, opened me up for a cognitive experience.

 

The guy was a prodigy and one of those fortunate few who could do many things exceptionally.  In addition to music, he was a writer of plays, poems, and essays, essays not just on music but on philosophy, archaeology, astronomy and botany.  That wows me but leaves me strangely lukewarm.  The juice for me is in this guy’s countenance and personality.

 

He was noted as being restless, nervous, “irritable, whimsical, ironical, paradoxical, indulging in sudden changes of opinion, faithful to friends, appreciative of certain rivals,” to name a few of the mostly difficult things I find myself to be.  Certainly, I don’t draw any parallels beyond that, but it’s always nice, amidst one’s mediocrity, to have a few trifling traits of a genius if you haven’t been named after one at least.

 

What challenged one amongst us could not love a genius who “was of less than average height, thin, nervous, sick-faced; with great and exposed forehead, hair habitually short, beard frosted.  His eyes were almost level with his face.  His eagle-beak would have excited the admiration of Sir Charles Napier, who once exclaimed:  ‘Give me a man with plenty of nose.’”

 

But he also was a “man that knew the world and sparkled in conversation; fond of society; at ease and on equal terms with leaders in art, literature and fashion.” 

 

I’ll take one.  He’ll look nice next to Malmsteen.

 

 

ADDITIONAL INFO

 

Saint-Saëns’s Symphony No. 3 was commissioned by the London Philharmonic Society, and was given its world premiere by that orchestra in London on May 19, 1886. 

 

Saint-Saëns wrote 5 symphonies but only 3 were numbered.  His initial 4 symphonies were written by the age of 24.  This last one, No. 3, he finished at age 51.

 

CREDITS

 

Photo of Camille Saint-Saëns at age 40 from Encyclopedia Britannica http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic-art/518193/13986/Camille-Saint-Saens-1875

Quotes in paragraphs 6 through 8 were from American critic, Philip Hale.

 

YouTube excerpt from the second movement of Symphony No. 3 played by the NHK Symphony Orchestra.  Conducted by Emmanuel Villaume.  Suntory Hall, Tokyo, 2008.

Let him among you who is without sin…

.

 

 

James left the church a convicted man.  The preacher’s sermon had ripped into his holier-than-thou heart and exposed the stench of his arrogance.  At the time, he’d looked around, certain that everyone in the sanctuary had seen the blackness spewing out of him, but anyone he made eye contact with only smiled warmly at him.  The whole place had been filled with love and acceptance and he’d been shaken to the core, moved to change his life. 

 

He took a route home from the church that would take him by the mall.  He pulled into the parking lot, found a curb spot for his Cadi, and headed into the mall, direct to the Christian store.  He went straight to the pimply-faced, on-fire-for-God lad behind the counter and asked where he might find these certain stones he’d heard about that had inspiring words printed on them.   “You know…like Love, Faith, Hope, Humility…I’m especially interested in Humility,” James said.

 

“Oh me, too!” the pimply lad exclaimed, raising his hands to the ceiling.  “Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you!” he shouted.  Then he looked back at James and said enthusiastically, “Yes, sir!  Follow me, right over here!”

 

James followed.  He fidgeted while the pimply lad poured over the rack of boxes and packages of inspiration stones while humming, “Our God is an Awesome God,” and he wondered what could be taking so all-fired long.

 

Just as James was about to ask what the problem was, the lad shouted victoriously, “Aha!” as he whipped around with a bag of stones in each hand.  “Out of all the brands on this whole rack, only two included stones that have ‘Humility’ on them.” The lad chuckled and said, “I guess that says something, eh?”

 

James just raised an eyebrow.

 

The lad cleared his throat, “Alrighty then!  Two choices here, sir, the earthen colors or the neon.”

 

James chuckled at the irony of a neon Humility stone.  He patted the lad on the shoulder and said, “I’ll take the earthen ones.”

 

He paid for the stones and headed home with the Awesome God tune stuck in his head.  It’d been a long time since he’d felt this moved.  The reviving and building up of chapter 11 corporations that he’d dedicated his life to required a combination of high-end intelligence, determination, and brutality.  He’d become a blood-thirsty junkyard dog, a pitiful failure in relationships, and this morning at church, that view of himself had hit him full on.  Now, he was looking forward to building a better James.

 

He ripped open the package of stones and dumped them on top of his dresser.  He sorted through them until he found the Humility stone.  The instant he picked it up he felt heat from it.  It warmed his fingertips and became hot.  Just as he was about to drop it, he felt the heat leave his fingertips, spread up his arms and into his chest, filling his heart with the glow of peace, joy, and hope.  He felt instantly changed, euphoric, holy, and oh so grateful that God had blessed him in this way.

 

The next day, James awoke, his head a mix-master of business ideas as usual.  Then he remembered church and the sermon and the Humility stone and that he was a changed man.  Funny, he didn’t feel as enthusiastic about that as he had yesterday.  Still, when he went to his dresser to get his wallet and change, he grabbed the Humility stone.  He looked at it a moment.  Nothing.  He shrugged.  Then he felt it, the heat, the euphoria, the holiness, the gratefulness to have found this amazing stone.  He smiled and stashed it in his pocket.

 

From that moment on, the Humility stone got radically put to the test daily:  on the way to the office, fighting the traffic, fighting the expletives; at his building, dealing with the morons in the elevator, dealing with stifling his derogatory comments; passing the obnoxious admin on the way into his office, passing up the urge to belittle her; attending ridiculous meetings, attending to and checking his anger.  Each time he felt the old mechanisms of arrogance beginning to churn, he reached in his pocket and fingered the smooth, warm stone.  Peace would always pervade.  Gratefulness would always follow.

 

Months went by like this.  He’d wake up busy-headed, remember he was a changed man, hit the shower, dress, grab the Humility stone off his dresser and head to the office.  The people he worked with and dealt with on a daily basis had noticed the positive change in him and some had even dared to mention it.  It was good to get that confirmation, but the biggest boon was less resistance in getting what he wanted.  He understood now more than ever that people just want to be recognized and heard, and if he just shot a couple of genuine looks and a few agreeable, acknowledging words in their direction, he could leave the steam-roller at home.

 

The only thing that gave him cause for concern at this point was the upcoming annual meeting of stockholders.  That would be the biggest test of his newfound humility.  Ridiculous agenda items were scheduled, ones he didn’t believe in, and one proposal, in particular that would require his company to reimburse stockholders of expenses incurred in certain situations.  On top of that offense, the Chairman was a real asshole.  But the Humility stone hadn’t failed him thus far, so why should it then?  He put his hand in his pocket and got a fix.  Thank God!

 

On the day of the stockholders’ meeting he awoke as usual and, he was pleased to note, with no sign of agitation or even concern regarding the meeting.  He hit the ground running, went through the drill, grabbed the stone, and out the door he went.  He showed up at the 9am affair confident, in good spirits, and of course, humble.  All was going swimmingly.  He’d successfully checked the barrage of affronts he’d had good cause and plenty of opportunity to unleash, until the Chairman singled him out and cornered him on a proxy issue. 

 

As proud of himself as he was to not have needed the stone prior to this moment, James knew one more split second without it could blow everything he’d worked for in this meeting and potentially cost his company funds that would trickle down to affecting execute perks.  He slid his hand into his pocket for the Humility stone.  Something was wrong!  The stone felt different. 

 

The Chairman was growing impatient and queried him  for an answer a second time.  He pulled the stone out of his pocket and looked at it.  Gratitude.  Shit!  He’d grabbed the wrong damned stone.  “Well, bloody hell!” he thought.  He got cold, felt the power of humility drain out of him and he let the Chairman have it with both barrels.

 

Fini

 

 

 

NOTES

 

1.  The idea for this piece came from listening to Diane Rehm interview Maya Angelou regarding her newest book, “Letter to My Daughter.”  When asked by Rehm what the most important life lesson she’s learned is, Angelou says, “I believe the most important lesson any human being, I, can learn and practice, is an attitude of gratitude.  Gratitude.  To never be modest.  Modesty is a learned affectation.  It’s stuck on like decals.  And as soon as life slams the modest person against the wall, that modesty will drop off and you’ll see the real person come out.”

 

2.  I got carried away with Awesome God youtube offerings, so the wide spectrum is listed below solely for posterity:

 

Live traditional version of the chorus by the one and only Michael W. Smith

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYLJdPRO3BI

 

Home recording, violin and piano – priceless http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRqWccM9J-Q

 

Hip hop going on to Texas boy, Kirk Franklin’s, version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sb32yHS8MBQ&feature=related

 

The good old Rich Mullins full version http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PrLH6kImNd8

 

 

PHOTO CREDITS

 

Broken stained glass window from http://k41.pbase.com/u40/fredarmitage/large/39366086.brokenstainedglass.jpg

 

Inspiration stones from http://www.thevelvetbow.com/zen-cart/images/The%20Velve%20Bowt009_edited_440.jpg

 

 

 

Click here for more on prompt “#138 – Grateful” from other Sunday Scribblings participants.

Here’s what’s going on outside

 

 

Here’s what’s going on inside:

 

It’s time for a change.  The look is too stark, too white, a promoter of milquetoast.  Apprehension is allowed to run willy-nilly while its synonymic buddy Trepidation quivers and pees in the corners.  There is a scarcity of attitude and therefore a deficit of it-ness.  There’s an absence of color and therefore a lack of black.

 

Change has been happening.  The feel, the aura, has been working itself out since the sites and aims days.  Feels like Whippet on the way to Tibetan Mastiff.  Maybe this is just the boof and whimper of a small dog’s dream, but something is happening.  Something’s working its way up from the silt in pangs timed seven hours apart.

 

In my twenties when I got this feeling, like something significant was going on, I only felt sent for but unable to go, as my grandmother used to say in so many words.  I only felt an impatience that I couldn’t nail down and a sense of hope that this whatever-it-was would provide its own vehicle for whatever-it-wanted-to-do.  That was in the vicinity of Confusion, this is in the infinity of Blogworld.

 

I may join Mrs. Giovanna in the cuckoo’s nest, put her blue/black birds in the header of a page as dark as the Club De Ville, and bear upon it the fruits of creative writing as taught by Bukowski.  Or, from an aside of thick grey, nearly black, I may fix my one green eye on the temporariness of life and the other permanently dilated eye on the wisdom of a conventional teacher.  Either way, I’ve got to find a way to not try to be.

.

. 

 

If I taught creative writing, Charles Bukowsi

 

now, if you were teaching creative

writing, he asked, what would you

tell them?

I’d tell them to have an unhappy love

affair, hemorrhoids, bad teeth

and to drink cheap wine,

to keep switching the head of their

bed from wall to wall

and then I’d tell them to have

another unhappy love affair

and never to use a silk typewriter

ribbon,

avoid family picnics

or being photographed in a rose

garden;

read Hemingway only once,

skip Faulkner

ignore Gogol

stare at photos of Gertrude Stein

and read Sherwood Anderson in bed

while eating Ritz crackers,

realize that people who keep

talking about sexual liberation

are more frightened than you are.

listen to E. Power Biggs work the

organ on your radio while you’re

rolling Bull Durham in the dark

in a strange town

with one day left on the rent

after having given up

friends, relatives and jobs.

never consider yourself superior and /

or fair

and never try to be.

have another unhappy love affair.

watch a fly on a summer curtain.

never try to succeed.

don’t shoot pool.

be righteously angry when you

find your car has a flat tire.

take vitamins but don’t lift weights or jog.

then after all this

reverse the procedure.

have a good love affair.

and the thing

you might learn

is that nobody knows anything–

not the State, nor the mice

the garden hose or the North Star.

and if you ever catch me

teaching a creative writing class

and you read this back to me

I’ll give you a straight A

right up the pickle

barrel.

 

CREDITS: 

 

bukowski and typewriter from http://www.corneliastreetcafe.com/data/Bukowski_W_Typewriter.jpg

 

bukowski poem clipped from http://www.misanthropytoday.com/if-i-taught-creative-writing-by-charles-bukowski/

About Mrs. Giovanna

 

Marsha Giovanna completed the last incline of her morning run, the long, hot haul up Dunlin Road.  She turned onto Grebe, the last leg of her run, a long stretch of road where the northwesterly wind sliced sideways across it.  This particular wind carried the cold, damp meanness off the last great lake and slammed it, with intent to destroy, into any living being or thing in its path.  There was nothing to buffer it here but wide open fields of aging cornstalks waiting to be harvested for silage.  Soon, there’d be nothing at all to slow it down.

 

The Dunlin/Grebe intersection was Marsha’s cue to begin putting her jacket back on so her sweat wouldn’t turn to ice when the wind hit her like a brick wall.  As she ran, she untied the jacket from around her waist and shrugged it onto her shoulders.  She fumbled with the zipper but the wind was meaner than ever with a front on its heels and it kept wrestling the two sides of the jacket from her hands.  Irritated, she switched to a jog and glanced down to manhandle the thing, but her eyes locked instead on a huge dead crow mashed bizarrely into the pavement on the side of the road.

 

It was one of those horror movie smacks to the eyes that cause a kneejerk impulse to hit the dirt or cover your head, but it’s too late.  You can’t rewind and not see what you just saw.  The image is already seared into the web of blood vessels in your retinas for all time.  Close your eyes anywhere, anytime, and there it is, flashing amidst the accumulation of other freakish things.

 

Each day after that, Marsha couldn’t help but shoot a look over at the dead crow as she ran by.  She watched over time as it flattened out thinner atop the pavement and dried out more and more until it was a network of sinews intertwining mostly bones and feathers that ruffled, lifting partially, suggestively in the wind. 

 

She feared the day it might become dry and light enough for the wicked lake effect wind to slip under it, flip it up, and give it flight again.  What if it happened right as she ran by?  What if it flew at her and the sideways wind flattened it against her and she couldn’t get it off?  Goosebumps covered her skin as the what-ifs ran rampant through her head creating images so terrifying that she nearly fainted at their sight.

 

The notion of changing her running route flitted through her head at least once per day but never held her attention for long.  She loved her current route.  It was so perfect with the beautiful countryside views and the flats and inclines spaced out just right.  And although she shrugged off the notion of changing it mainly because, on the surface, it was ridiculous to be held mentally hostage by a dead bird, deep down she felt an unhealthy pull toward it that she felt powerless to short-circuit.

 

Eventually, her perspective became too skewed to dispossess herself of the dead thing.  She began running every day instead of just weekdays, and running hard.  With no chance for her muscles to recuperate, her body was wearing down.  Any sane voices within her head that tried to warn her to slow down, to save herself, were by now so small and weak that they went unheard.  And so the route never got changed.  She ran it day after day until it finally happened.

 

She had run off Dunlin and onto Grebe and from a distance, thought she saw the flattened mass of bird remains vibrating, being buffeted by the high wind.  She thought maybe that’s all it would do, that she could get by it today, and tomorrow she’d definitely change her route.  But then, as she got closer, she saw one whole side of the bird flip up.  Only part of the body and the left wing was still stuck down. 

 

She gasped as a clammy wave of fear washed over her.  Hopelessness followed.  Everything felt empty, unreal.  Her head felt like a cavernous theatre playing a horror movie in which she was the victim.  She was only vaguely aware of a thought to turn around and go back but she couldn’t do anything about it.  Her body just kept going.

 

She became aware of another thought to begin a speed drill now, to run by the flapping bird remains as fast as she could, to get way on down the road before the bird was loosed and went airborne, but instead she felt her heel strikes pounding in rhythm with the flapping.  Aghast, she tried to sprint, to change the rhythm, and as soon as she did, the flattened mass lifted and spiraled toward her.

 

She screamed and spun around and ran from the thing, ran for her life.  It occurred to her to try to run without touching the ground.  She heard the evil wind laughing as the matted network of bone, beak, claws and feathers smacked into her head.  She flew screaming, flailing at the thing to get it off, but it was tangled in her hair.  She could feel the prick of the bones and the scratch of the claws and it was too much for her to take.  She felt herself losing consciousness as she fell to the ground.

 

 

Every morning it’s the same.  She wakes in an enclosed area to a smell she can’t place.  She hears cawing outside the enclosed area.  She crows back and waits for a reply, and when she gets it, she tries to take flight.  And when she tries to take flight, she realizes that she’s restrained.  She looks down and sees her feathers all ruffled and in need of preening and both wings and both legs strapped down.  She caws and screeches and strains her neck and head around to peck at the restraints but she can’t reach them.  She senses the presence of a stranger who comes to her, a danger, that gently enfolds her and pricks her with a slender silver spine.  And soon she doesn’t worry about the restraints.  Soon she feels herself soaring over cornfields, lighting in the tops of trees, cawing warnings to her fellow crows when strangers or other danger is near.  Four caws for danger.  Two caws for all clear.  She hears voices outside the enclosed area, caws four times and tilts her head to listen.

 

“Oh, good morning, Mr. Giovanna!” the nurse said cheerfully.  “You’re right on time, as usual, I see!  Your wife has had her medication and is up and about, peaceably unrestrained at the moment.  You can go on in.”

 

Mr. Giovanna smiled and nodded politely, “Thank you, Julia.”  He started toward Marsha’s room, stopped and turned back toward Julia and asked, “Any new developments?”

 

Julia’s eyes filled with sympathy and she shook her head, “I wish I could tell you some good news…”

 

Mr. Giovanna’s hopes fell again, yet he managed a smile, “That’s OK, Julia.  I just like to ask…in case…”  He smiled again, turned and walked down the hall two doors to Marsha’s room.

 

It’s always the same.  Before going into Marsha’s room, he makes a little clacking sound with his tongue that she seems to like.  He keeps the noise up until he’s inside the room and she acknowledges his presence and caws twice.  Then she tilts her head and squints at him, which feels as a fond smile, and she makes the same clacking sound.  She begins preening her feathers and he begins brushing his hair and moustache, straightening his suit and touching up his tie.  When she’s done preening, she shakes out her feathers and bird dust puffs up and out like a mushroom cloud and settles all around on the floor. 

 

After that communal bird activity, Mr. Giovanni reaches inside his coat pocket and pulls out a small bag of Marsha’s favorite corn feed.  On seeing it she tilts her head and squints with pleasure then takes two steps toward him and tilts her head in the opposite direction, waiting.  He opens the bag and feeds her a kernel at a time telling her what a pretty, pretty bird she is and how much he loves her.  Sometimes she lets him stroke her head or scratch her skinny bird neck.  And as he does so, his heart sings as part of him cries.  For he has noticed the new flight feathers coming in over the months she’s been confined here.  And he fears the day a wind might enter her room and she will rise up and take flight.

 

Fini

 

 

PHOTO CREDITS:

 

Blue/black birds from “Flu Bird Horror” sci-fi movie at http://www.wlug.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/birld.jpg

 

Row of dead crows from http://www.partypro.com/mm_PARTYPRO_/Images/X1536.JPG

 

 

 

Missalister’s “About Mrs. Giovanna,” copyright © 2008, was spun off the Sunday Scribblings prompt “#137 – Stranger.”  Click here for more on prompt #137 from other Sunday Scribblings participants.

The plan

 

NOTE:  I’ve been hooked on David Bowie’s “Changes,” the lyrics of it, and the lyrics of other of his songs that have saved portions of my life.  I’m excited, ecstatic about the changes Obama’s going to bring, and I’m ready to make changes in my lifestyle that might facilitate his changes.  I’ve been through a difficult block of change, a three-for-one package deal, a combo career, geographical, and relationship change that spawned this piece.  But changes in the dog, my truest friend of almost 14 years, are where my heart’s at lately.  I’ve pushed this aside since the wee hours of October 21^st when it happened, but it’s been nipping at my heels so I’m letting it out into the front yard. 

 

 

 

We’d rushed Nova to the emergency veterinary hospital.  I’d filled out the initial paperwork and been briefed by the doctor.  It looked like a vestibular episode, he’d said, and it was decided to leave him there for an estimated twenty-four hours for supportive care and testing.  I wrapped up the paperwork and dropped a $500 deposit.  Then they led me to the back so I could say goodnight.  I was afraid I’d be saying goodbye, not goodnight, and I could tell I had only a limited amount of time before I broke down.  I slapped at both sides of my face just hard enough to sting a bit to keep me with the program.  I needed just enough time to go back there and tell my boy the plan like I always do when we have to part.

 

The back room was a sea of tables and equipment.  Nova was lying on his side flanked by the vet and an assistant.  He was stabilized, an IV needle in his left arm.  The vet smiled at me.   Not a pointless smile, but one that actually had some love and strength in it.  He seemed a great guy, so calm, so easy going and personable, and very knowledgeable from what I could tell.  I went around to the back of the table where it looked like I could get the best access to Nova’s head, so I could whisper in his ear.  I whispered, I prayed, I spoke to him, and spoke and spoke, all the words and phrases he loved to hear.  He opened his eyes and lifted his head toward me.  I held him.  I kissed him.  I told him I loved him.  I said he needed to stay here for awhile and I’d be back to get him as soon as I got the word.

 

I walked back around the table and he struggled to get up to go with me, his eyes full on me, brightening with intent and hope.  That show of love and loyalty about killed me and I almost lost it.  I went back to the side of the table and told him the plan again.  I kissed him again and squeezed his arm meaning I’m serious, he needs to stay.  The assistant finally stepped in and attended to him and I headed for the door.  I wasn’t going to make it out of the building before the meltdown.  I ran into the restroom and let my heart explode.  I wouldn’t need it anymore anyway.  My sobs drowned out the world but my tears wouldn’t wash me away.  There was no escape from the pain.

 

In the car on the way home in between sobbing, I went over the events of the evening trying to find a reason for all this.  What had he eaten?  What vaccines had he just had the other day and could they have caused a reaction with something else?  What had his behavior been like the last week, two weeks, month?  Were there any signs of anything weird?  I was raking my brain in desperate, inefficient strokes, for something I could use, something that made sense.  I flashed back over the nightmare of waking to Nova’s desperate breathing and the scuffle on the bed as he tried to right himself but kept flopping in circles.  I flashed back over the rush to the telephone, the panicked dash for clothes, any clothes, the nightmare ride to the hospital.  It was living hell. 

 

The first strike against us was the time, 3:30 a.m., and the second strike was the rain that made the lights of oncoming cars on the pavement look like the surface of a glaring, blinding, watery sun.  Nick was driving and I was in the back trying to hold steady a dog that was trying to flip like a fish.  He vomited and then shit.  And I was straddling it all, holding him to the seat back talking a greased streak of his favorite words interspersed with Dear Gods and Sweet Jesuses.  Nova was all stiff and straining his head up and right, his eyes wide, wide open, the whites too visible.  “Pig eye,” I call it, all up and back like a stuck, squealing pig.

 

So many things went through my head.  I thought he was dying.  I thought he wouldn’t make it to the hospital.  In some sane moments along life’s path prior to this I remember trying to deal with the fact that there’d come a time he’d have to leave this planet and I’d have to say goodbye for good, and it wasn’t like this.  It wasn’t him so traumatized and out of touch that I’m not sure if he even knew who I was.  It was more like we had knowing eye contact and said a knowing goodbye during which I’d tell him the plan—he could go on ahead if he had to and I’d be there as soon as I could get there.  Then I thought maybe it would be better, easier, him not knowing me from a lamp post.  No matter how it happened I couldn’t picture my life without my best and truest buddy by my side.

 

And then a thought struck me, stunned me silent.  These death vibes and sobs aren’t doing my boy any good.  In the universal scheme of things they’re just dragging him down and putting trash vibes out there for everyone else as well.  Nova’s not dead.  And there’s a possibility he’ll be OK.  “Believe” echoed in my head.  “If ever there was a time, now is it.  Believe.”  And in that instant I knew where people who’ve lived through the most horrific tragedies get their power.  It had been an inconceivable concept, prior, and now I could see it had to be this sort of shift from a power infinitely bigger than the smallness of my humanity. 

 

After we’d got back home I lay in bed in what was left of the darkness, eyes wide open, my brain whirring, stuck on high.  It was weird not having the boy lying at the bottom of the bed crowding my feet.  But my main thoughts had become about supporting him with my belief.  This episode of his could be a fluke.  And I’d be no good to him if I was dead tired when the vet called in a few hours.  I looked at the clock.  5:37am.  I’d sleep until 8:30 then start a coffee IV drip in preparation for the vet’s call at 9:00.  But I couldn’t sleep.  I heard the Blues Brothers’ Peter Gunn Theme in my head.  The sassy horns and the lazy-rolling, growling R’s of a sax army ran as background music to an abbreviated inquisition, “You know the ‘Nova Series’ kids’ books you were supposed to have written years ago?”  Yeah.  “Write them now.”  Ah…OK…  And Nova?  “He’ll be OK…”

 

Fini

 

 

 

 

Click here for more on prompt “#136–Changes” from other Sunday Scribblings participants.

 

 

In good company

 

 

 

The cottage has a life of its own.  Its secret is palpable.  It’s clear that the wind and waves have played passionately here.  And the air inside is still and smells of a million bright memories.  Sunshine is thick, the smile of it bursting within, the reflection of it shimmery on the water without.  All the fond things inside—the baskets, the kitchen utensils, the wicker chairs—are exactly as they were left on the last good day of summer.  And there’s a feel, as if the cottage has hustled to put everything back where it belongs on hearing footsteps crunch the stones outside.  But it’s obvious the serenity of early morning fogs, the beauty of the days, and the cycles of the moon have not only been its daily guests, but have long accepted the cottage as one of their own.  Joy follows relief to feel this, to see with certainty that this special place in my heart will remain safe and just as I leave it, each time I leave it—in good company.  And when I return again to help shore it up for the winter months, it will act as now, as if nothing at all has happened, or moved beneath the stars.

 

Fini

 

Goodbye computerized Dallas TX, hello small-town upstate NY

 

 

The good deed for the day is done.  I voted at the local fire station around 10:15am ET today using one of the most antiquated voting machines I’ve ever seen, the old lever system as pictured above.  The instant I saw the thing regret mired me in a perfectionist’s nightmare.  Even being cognizant of that, I still wasted time wishing I’d thought not to assume, but to wonder, and maybe even find out what kind of system this one-horse town would be using.  Then buzzers and a red-flashing warning went off in my head as I realized what was going on.  The seniors of the world were meting out a measure of punishment on the youngers of the world.  I looked around me.  Sure enough.  At this ‘tween time of day I was surrounded by them.  Just get this over with, I thought to myself as I stepped quick into the booth.  I grabbed the curtains and tried to close them but they kept snapping back open.  A senior volunteer hollered over at me, “You have to pull the red lever to the right to close the curtains and begin voting!”  I turned back toward the contraption, What lever? I thought.  Oh THAT lever!  The bigass one that coulda poked my eye out with its potential to be so obvious…  I looked back at the volunteer and she smiled sicky-sweet.  So, I thought, this is how seniors feel in front of a Mac.

 

 

PHOTO CREDITS:

Ancient voting machine snagged from http://www.ctemploymentlawblog.com/voting_machine_1.jpg

Keep your coins from http://eskar.dk/andreas/wanting_change.JPG

For the love of words

 

Note:  I’ve felt a pull toward Thom G’s flash fiction lately.  This piece got the juices flowing.  I had to try it.  This piece pushed me over the edge.  They look like tidy cuts of cake but for me it was anything but.  It took me half a month to come even remotely close.  I love the concept and want to do more.  Call this Attempt #1.  

 

 

 

“The Writer,” by Cathleen Rehfeld, available as of May 7, 2008 for purchase at Art on the Boulevard Gallery in Vancouver, WA 360-750-4499

 

 

She stood in front of her side of the closet in her underwear and a skin-tight, see-through top.  Her eyes were glassy, blank, staring at the skirts, now blurred into one cloud of fuzzy color.  She felt panic awakening and tightening around her throat at the thought of loving him so much she needed him like air.  Blissful unity usurped creativity the day they got married a year ago and she’d not been able to write a thing since.  Something had to give.  She snatched at the skirts in the closet like salvation and put on the shortest, tightest one she could find.  She felt herself gravitate toward her dresser and rummage through the top drawer.  Her fingers became tangled in fishnets and she ripped them as she fought to escape.  She put them on anyway, breathlessly.  She watched herself lean down and slip her fingers through the straps of a pair of red stilettos.  And as she put them on, she saw herself walking ahead of the roaring flames of a scandal that would burn any possibility of a bridge back to him.

 

Fini

 

 

PHOTO CREDITS:

  

“The Writer,” original oil painting by Cathleen Rehfeld http://rehfeldart.blogspot.com/

 

Red stilettos from http://images.somalifestyle.com/somaimages/DSC_7366_lg.jp

 

 

 

Click here for more on prompt “#135 – Scandalous” from other Sunday Scribblings participants.