VANISHING

It's in the Church bulletin--I told you that's what they were  up to when they didn't hire you!"
My mother has come into my room, fairly singing the news. (She is "only herself" when she feels vindicated--doesn't matter the issue, only that she's "correct".) This time, it is about the newly announced "melding" of both Catholic schools in the city.

"Mom," I tell her, "the Pastor told me that this was his preferred route--he thinks it is the only way to save both schools--even though I think he's dead wrong..." I turn back to a re-run of "Survivor".

"Well, now there's going to be the first through fourth grade at one school and the fifth through eighth at the other--but it will just be melded into the something called "The Generic Catholic Schools of Gardner", or something like that...I KNEW they were going to do this!" Mom has stopped listening to me.

I highly doubt the name change. However, I do not doubt the plan. This Pastor is the man who,after the retiring Principal of Sacred Heart School had hired me as the "official sub" and went on to recruit me for the new eighth grade teacher--with blossoming hopes of a new arts program and a stronger Language Arts program--not only "un-hired" me, he didn't talk to me for three weeks. This allowed embarrassment between me and the families in the parish who met me at Mass, introduced by their children, as "the new teacher"...and further consternation in my family, whom I was advised that I might tell of my new job by the same Principal (now retired) who had assured me that she had the power to hire and was hiring me as the new eighth grade teacher. So, the freeze-out by the Pastor, (with no notification until I pressed the Principal, about my standing), has made me permanently wary of anything this man does. Most especially, in the arena of Sacred Heart School.  (No reason for my non-hire was given. No apology for being told by the Principal that I had the job--and then it dissolved. No "sorry" for not contacting me for weeks, either way.)

Now, the entity, that for four generations of my family, educated us through junior high, saw us through all the formative sacraments of early Catholicism, and was supported emotionally; spiritually and financially, by my entire clan, is vanishing. It is being absorbed and morphed into something that neither the Irish congregation of Sacred Heart Parish nor the French congregation of Holy Rosary Parish, are satisfied with. (Rivals for all of their existence, they offered healthy alternatives and strong choices to Catholics in the surrounding part of the state. The schools were different in their styles of education--from uniforms and discipline--to the orders of nuns who once solely commanded them.) Having older children separated from their younger colleagues in the Faith will also be a decided difference--as the campuses and buildings are a city apart. (What of families with kids in both places--isn't this simply a greater set of difficulties, not to mention transportation and time-tables?) How can this "solution" be seen as a positive plus?

I have held my tongue most of my life when it comes to the inconsistencies, brutality, hypocracy and illegal actions of the Catholic Church (as opposed to its parishioners and adherents...). I have not protested against the organization--mainly in honor of my family and the nuns and priests and friends who have benefited from and added to the humaneness of the religion. However, there comes a time when one has been mentally buffeted by, physically judged and cast aside from, emotionally ostracized, financially abused, publically embarrassed and spiritually robbed, so one must speak. While I can say that as many good, solid, educated and caring people have entered my life who are Catholic and whom have made a positive difference, I can point out an entire organization which has made me feel guilty, separate from, not as good as, and ever "bad", simply for who I am; who I was born as; who I will forever be.

Even if the Catholic Church as left me in its shadow, my parents and their generation, who have supported and safe-guarded its traditions, are being betrayed. The Church is moving too fast and furious. Too quick to lop off, to close down, to eradicate the very things the elders created or fought so long to uphold.

My parents believed in Catholic education--still do. Though their children and their grandchildren have been out of Sacred Heart School for a decade, they still support it. (As do they the Church, itself.) They are forever suggesting its programs to family friends moving into the town. To have the school suddenly "morph", without so much as a vote in the parish that has kept its corridors open and filled, betrays the decades-long history of both parishes--and denies the cultural traditions that created both schools in the first place--traditions of diversity and richness.

I attempted to explain sociological theory to the Pastor in my interview. He is new here. He is younger than me. He is good friends with the Bishop, who lives an hour away, in a mansion, in a city that is thriving and much larger than this poor factory town. Sacred Heart Church survived because Sacred Heart Parish thrived. Its identity was clear and clearly formed. It's parishioners loyal and proud and needing the personal contacts of the Church at the center of their lives. So, too, with Holy Rosary Church. The very identity of the parish was different, and larger, and culturally connected.

Yes, both are Catholic. However, it was more than Rome that made them important fixtures in the community. Today, while the community begins to disappear--the older generation which created it is in most need of these institutions. The older generation supported and ran and breathed life into these institutions. Now, they need that energy--they need the priests and nuns whom they welcomed and opened their homes and hearts to, in past years. They need the bolstering of their identities within those spiritual hallways. They need the cultural sensitivity that helped foster their organizations and on which this generation built its families.

The Bishop doesn't need what is here, in Gardner. (Only the dwindling funds--and therein lies the core of this problem.) By combining the schools, without a game plan anyone has seen--and surely without a cultural game plan, let alone a publicized educational blueprint in place-- it drops the first shoe. The second will be, surely as the Catholics of this town fear, a closing of several of the distinct houses of worship--cultural meccas for the population that was once the richness of this town--and which might have brought this town back, someday.

People don't support generic sports teams. They hold no loyalty to generic beauty products, foodstuffs nor manufactured goods. Generic items are items you turn to when the best in show are out of your reach, when you are on hard times and a budget and can't afford the top of the line. Do you want to pay premium tuition to a generic school? Do you want to say you are a graduate of such a place? (Would the Bishop attend? Would the Pastor?)

Perhaps I still resonate at the betrayal of those sisters of mercy (Whatever our mixed  memories of them are...) who gave up their lives and their comforts, for the children of our school, living lives of poverty, chastity, and obedience? Nuns, who, suddenly after spending their productive years in service and obedience to the Roman Catholic Church, were cast out of convents, the Church no longer willing to support them, and told to "find service in the world"--without support or funding to do so...  I can own all of these emotional undertows.

But it seems to me, that to homogenize and consolidate the very things which stood out as precious,  and increasingly rare, is stupid. It is short-sighted. It is queasy and common. It smacks of politics, money making, and a sullied bottom line--even as the Catholic Church seeks to remove the mire from its boots. Seeks to right the moral wrongs it once overlooked or hid away. It is the betrayal of a town down on its luck. It is a sucker punch to people who are too old and needy to fight back--and to their legacy passed on to their grandchildren.

The Church I grew up in, for all of its sins, was better than this. There were aspirations and hope.
In Gardner, that is going the way of plain-wrapped obsolesence.

There IS a reason I didn't get that job, a few months ago.

       
 

Ten Crows

There is an old riddle which poses: If there are tens crows on a branch and five of them decide to fly away, how many crows remain?

The difference between "deciding'' and "action" plagues me these days.
Having decided to quit Los Angeles and come to Gardner, my hopes have been called into question, daily. The actions I believed would be in the realm of "Highest Good" have been blocked from the beginning. Connections seem to be tenuous and if not arbitrary, utilitarian. (But then, aren't all human connections based in utilitarian connection--at least, at first?)

Health decisions remain pure--yet health actions remain spotty. (I know I need to walk a mile each day or paddle an hour each day or ride a bike for half and hour or lift weights. I know when I do these things I feel better. My mood improves, at least for a little while. My body shifts its weight. I'm taller and less achey, overall. Yet, every time I decide to undertake the activity, something moves in front of it.) The car is running roughly; the gas tank is empty; the tires need air; the dog wants to go but that means all I'm doing is watching for other dogs and cannot use the track; my Mother wants to go with me to the track, and that means an entire morning shot: she will be done with her walk in fifteen minutes, tops; then its "lets go to the grocery store; let's take a ride and drop in on your sister-in-law; let's take a quick trip to New Hampshire and check the cemetery flowers on your relatives' graves...(She has many other family members to do this with and she drives herself, everywhere. It is just if I'm going somewhere, she wants to know where and for how long...My guilt wrestles with my frustration, hourly...). Sometimes the weather is so shifty, a day planned for kayaking becomes rained out or is too freezing to put the craft into the water. Dad's stationary bike is set up for him--and I'm just too short--besides, it bugs him when someone else adjusts anything. My sister needs me to go to the vet because she is working. My sister needs me to babysit the dog while she runs errands. My niece drops by to "chat". My parents are going out and want me home to watch the dog--and the house. I get a sub job at the last minute. (When are substitute teacher jobs NOT the last minute?) The list goes on. As the t.v. ad states: "There is always an excuse NOT to sweat."
But I have decided that excercise is necessary. The decision stands.

I have decided to continue to write. Every day. Sometimes each hour. From blogs to letters of inquiry and business to poetry. Of course, the novels. Even in the face of constant rejection (for the new fiction), hope springs eternal, helping create an open flower-bed for effort. I still define myself as a writer. I still do publish-- just not the stuff I really want to have a life of its own. Even more than "teacher", I have been a writer my entire conscious lifetime.

However, one needs solitude, quiet, a personal space in which to write (no matter how small), supplies, and time. Uninterrupted hours .In this house, there is no such thing as silence.(As my nightshift sister has come to find.)Screaming neighbors in houses separated by only driveways or narrow lawns. Crying babies; a Catholic grammar school which parades its students to the Church at the end of the street at least once a week, only a block away. City Council members having street repairs and tree trimming and waterworks and electrical services updated, constantly, now that it is in their home neighborhood. A public park at the other end of the street. And everyone has a large dog...Los Angeles had a different kind of "loud", but Gardner rivals it.

Then there is the uber-volumed t.v. sets in several rooms throughout the house. Mostly for the parental units who refuse to admit their diminished hearing. Or forget the sets are on, as they leave the rooms throughout the day, for errands. Or fall asleep in the arms of CNN and whatever baseball/football/hockey games are playing full-blast. There are the constant phone calls from politicians, local and national pollsters; there are twenty-four-seven doctors' secretaries and nurses checking appointments for parents; teeth, eyes, hearts, intestines, screenings, pills, prescriptions, shots, bloodwork, etc. There are insurance agents and home-repair techs and extended friends and family members--also for the parents (this is their home, afterall). There are the nieces who are far more attached to this "base" than I ever was--their needs extending from rides to money to emotional support. All valid. All welcome. However, all unending. And while it keeps my parents alive and vital and in their right minds, it is not the setting in which to get writing done.

Again, no excuses. (Even as every fifteen minutes there is either a knock at my door or a call from the outside hallway or a bang on the radiator leading to my room, from downstairs--the universal "signal" that someone wants me...) My choice to be here. My loft in California was as noisy, but in a different way. One of the reasons I left and came back. Shock of shocks to find not the peaceful setting of an old age residence, as my youngest sister had painted, but, in fact, an aging circus, still very much occupied and rumbling along. The decision to write is high-jacked, daily. The activity is only engaged in about fifty percent of the planned time.

My decision to get at least eight hours of continuous sleep--something I've never been good at attaining at any point in my life--has been firm. The reality is that at night I am most aware of the possible mortality of my parents; my siblings; my pet. A realization that at any moment I may have to spring (as well as I can spring these days...) from bed, pull on reasonable clothing and shoes, glasses, i.d., keys, and be ready to take someone to the hospital follows me to sleep every night. My dreams are filled with it. (So far, only daily emergencies have plagued us--and my other sibs, much more used to dealing with the situations--have stepped up and taken control. But this doesn't stop my
psyche from preparing itself...) Four to five hours are a good bet. The other time is spent stealing short "naps"...the best sleep being from five a.m. to nine a.m.--unless that is interrupted by a call to come substitute teach...oy vay. But, I have decided: eight hours, uninterrupted sleep. Optimum. Indeed.

A clean diet, full of fresh fruit and veggies, low fat, high fiber, preferrably locally grown. Absolutely. But this is Gardner and my family is ruled by my Mother and I am living under their roof. The beans we eat are baked. The veggies are usually cooked or canned or in miniscule salads containing the same iceberg lettuce, tomatoes and cukes from my childhood. Mom insists (grumbling while she does it) that only HER COOKING will pass as the main family meal of each day. So it is porkchops and beefstew and strip steaks and baked chicken and baked fish and lots and lots and lots of potatoes and carrots at every meal. For variety, in summer, there are ribs. (My favorite evening meal is spaghetti and meatballs--but at five p.m., it is a wee bit early to digest.) These menus are not bad nor fast and it is a kind of love that my Mother passes to us. No doubt. For all these things, I am glad. However, it is difficult, after thirty five  years of Thai and Mexican and Vietnamese flavors, or Whole Foods thirty-five varieties of beans and tropical fruits, to be on this regimen. When I have a full-time job and am again, "on my own"...my mind quiets, admonishing me for being spoiled and a piglet enamored of too many choices, reminding me of the fact of starving humans all over the planet...or that, I could further restrict my diet to only those minimal salads. Only oatmeal or yogurt and whatever veggies appear in the evening meal. I can exist on tea. I can offer to cook my own rice. Yes. My decision is to clean up even this meat-heavy menu and do what I know is best for my aging body. Then Ann brings home a coffee-cake and flavored creamer for my coffee...

My decision is to do what it takes to become a Massachusetts public school teacher of English Language Arts. I take the professional classes. I clep the required courses MA won't accept from my New York college work. I pass all the educational tests for teachers which are required before a credential is bestowed. I do the coursework. I get all "A"s. I create a two-foot thick professional portfolio outlining what my philosophy is as an educator and what I have accomplished. I pay my dues and all fees to the university and the state. I apply to any job within a fifty mile radius--only to find, that, through no fault of my own, the university has failed to send my transcripts to the state. Every employer I've applied with has tossed out my resume or upon researching my vitae, found I do not have a current license number--unbeknownst to me! Finally, after six months and no jobs, I call the state and track down the issue. My transcripts! I call the university and find, after two weeks of problems and the Dean's intervention, someone made a drastic mistake and marked me down as having withdrawn from the program!  After a year of courses, a 4.0 average, and my final seminar and portfolio passed in with my program -mates in attendance! My decision to be a public school teacher of English, in MA, has remained firm. The actions continue to be thwarted...

My spirituality remains constant and unwinding. Trying to re-unite with Catholicism, briefly, mostly for the parents' sake, and for the sake of being "pure enough" to teach at the Catholic school in the neighborhood, has ended in embarrassment and bitterness. A decision to overlook the huge issues raging in the Church--especially against women (who have helped to sustain and save the organization!)--only ended in my own passion play at the hands of the parish priest. But that's another story...So, back to the semi-Native hybrid Christianity and Celtic traditions of the invisible forces in my life. At least none of those manifestations has ever betrayed me, nor made me feel less-than!

As for love: the only decision is to remain open: to the Universe.

So, like the ten crows on the branch, I remain.       

Skunks Redux

Like all the males in my family, feeling remorse for a faux pas doesn't really stick. The usual response is a bit of a bemused blush, rapidly turning to angry outbursts and a long harangue about how it is not "his problem"--but circumstances or other people or the angle of the moon over the housetop,etc. This does not make them unloveable--in fact--the females of my family are notoriously forgiving of the men...but sometimes, I just want to scream in frustration!

Dad and Mom have their routines culled from sixty years of marriage. (So, I give them lots of slack just based on that mileage!) A dinner scarfed in twenty-minutes finds Mom wrapping leftovers and Dad clearing the table in time for JEOPARDY! If you are eating at a more refined pace OR if you pause for discussion of any depth, you can just sit there, abandoned, with whatever you still have on your plate, your used utensils and beverage, but they are out of there. Dad loads the dishwasher and refuses any assistance. Indeed, if you attempt more than taking your dishes to the sink, you get a stern reprimand. Okay. I get it. They are feeling independent and the ownership of their own domain. I am still the "child visitor" and need to get out of the way--even as they whisper to friends that having the kids home again doesn't mean that ANY of the housework gets done--sigh. Dad also insists that the dog must go outside, after OUR dinner, even if she has already gone outside to do her "business" after her earlier dinner.  Again, no problem in theory. However, Dad is prone to forgetting that he put the dog in the yard. Then, he goes off to watch t.v. at optimum volume. He neither remembers she is outside nor that the days are getting shorter and the night-living things are coming to visit earlier nor can he hear her bark to be let back in.

That is their routine.
Mom is even deafer than he is, now sitting literally two feet from the giant t.v. with the enhanced dolby speakers on at full blast.
No one hears Maeve barking but  me, upstairs, typing, in my room on the second floor.
Hollaring for them to let her in does nothing.

So, as with  many evenings, I run downstairs and out the back door. However, this evening, the skunk-of-all-skunks has arrived before me...

Maeve can't pass up a good skunk. She has never learned. (Must take lessons from my father.) The blast of skunkfunk hits me full as I open the back door. I reach down, unhooking her from her run and she bolts past me into the house. The King Skunk is strutting in his blue cloud, right by Ann's car. (Ann is asleep, also on the second floor, at the opposite end of the house.) Before I can catch Maeve, she has run into the middle of the livingroom, rubbing her nose and ears on rugs, furniture, and yelping at the parents for not letting her in earlier.

Mom is screaming--finally able to smell the dog--and Dad, in typical MinnsMaleStyle, denies that Maeve has even been sprayed! When he sees Mom's reaction, he admits: "Well, it isn't like the last time...it's not that bad..."
Then he and Mom get into a huge argument about why neither of them remembered putting her out in the yard after dinner...I scoop the dog up, getting now skunkified myself, and haul both our butts upstairs to the shower.
Up there, I strip down for battle, grabbing the peroxide and a bottle of giner and lemon body wash and the dog shampoo and finally the Skunk De-Odor rinse that never really works, but is a quick fix until a better remedy can be mixed.

By then, Ann is awake and barking orders about using her "special recipe".  I can neither take the time to leave the dog, re-clothe with the only clothes I have in the bathroom, go downstairs and dig for ingredients (while stinking up everywhere I walk or touch), mix them in a large and "special container", come back up and expect Maeve will be blithely waiting in the shower for me...so I just get busy shampooing her with the stuff at hand. Ann, cussing and huffing, still half-asleep before her night shift at the hospital begins, pulls together  her skunkjuice, yelling at everyone about how this is the only thing that will work and why don't we ever use it as a first defense--then admits that you can't mix it up and keep it at hand. The chemicals break down over time, so it has to be made fresh, each use.

Ask me if I care, now that I'm as stinky as the sopping dog...

When Ann comes up, I wrap a towel around myself and back out of the shower, only to meet Mom, who is opening windows, and all the shades on the second floor--giving a good peep to the neighbors. Meanwhile Dad is denying that the skunks come out this early and he thought Mom or I had taken in the dog and its Ann's fault for scattering so much birdseed for the squirrels and chipmunks and that the windows should be kept shut because the skunk smell isn't from the dog (It is!) but from the skunks still in the  yard (Also true!).

Ann, meanwhile, doses the dog and the shower with her "special sauce", three times the dog goes through this. Ann pauses to take pictures on the second phase of the operation. Maeve, half -squinting, not even whimpering, knows that once Ann gets hold of her, the routine allows for no complaints nor protests. There is no escape. Meanwhile, Ann assures me she is leaving enough of the secret potion for me to use, when Maeve is de-skunked. I can also have the joy of cleaning the bathroom and laundering all of my skanky clothes and the towels we have used...Lovely.

It is not exactly a scene from "Here Comes Honey Boo Boo", but it ranks close.

Maeve emerges whiter and brighter and fairly non-offensive.
The bathroom--and me--another story, completely.
It seems that when I grabbed her, carrying her like the Baby Jesus, upstairs, her most skunky side was pressed against my chest, so I am as smelly as she was...
There is nothing to do but use the "special sauce" on myself.
And that is how my evening goes.

This morning, Dad is making coffee in the kitchen and whistling and happy. He refers to the skunk episode as if it were an act of God (Maybe it was...) and he had little blame. Of course. He will not switch his routine after dinner. Skunks do not come out that early. Ann is nuts to think they do--and anyway, she is the one spreading the birdseed. He can't smell anymore skunk odor, not even in the yard, so, what's the problem? Why is everyone still upset? This is just life. Period.

Meanwhile, Mom has gone through several bottles of  Febreeze-for-fabrics, uncaring about the poisonous contents. I have done six loads of laundry from the night's adventure. The odor of skunk hangs on the morning air--even as rain in the yard just intensifies it. But, Maeve smells nice.
She only wants to sit in her bed in the kitchen--seeing as it, unlike Ann's bed, upstairs--doesn't reek. She won't even go upstairs to watch t.v. by the air conditioner--her place of queenly comfort in the warmer weather. All the rugs downstairs have to be washed, again, too.

My hair looks like a brillo pad--not in a good way.
My favorite jeans may not be salvaged. A tee-shirt sent a few summers ago by a best friend from New York was a casualty, too. My bedroom is scented with Febreeze, Mom's pot-pouri scented candles, baking soda and peroxide, and lemonginger body wash.

Thank God I didn't get called in to substitute teach this morning.    

LOST LOVERS

There are many people I know who have the ultimate FaceBook list of friends. Every person they have shared more than a sentence with,  had a coffee, a beer, a tear, or a friendly "spat" exchange, they stay in contact with--for reals! So, when it comes to lost lovers, ex-partners, spouses and significant others, they simply add them to the train, seamlessly.

In the old days, when one was conscientious, or polite, or had the time (whatever that meant!) a holiday card list would strengthen the parade of people. Oh sure, the mailing costs alone were increasingly outrageous...still, a sense of community; of belonging; of "doing something during the holidays" prevailed. Some folks would write elaborate and rambling tomes.(New family alliances; lost jobs; babies and pets; even the make, model and color of the most recent car would be included.)

 Hardly a "love note", these letters were often smudged, poorly typed and hand- decorated--but they were a tangible connection to an ever-receding group of friends. Often the butt of comedians and bad toasts, for a few, it might be the only personal mail received the entire holiday season. What amazed me, was the sheer number of these manuscripts that were sent off--and the ambered addresses that would be resurrected in order to mail them.

Today, we have social media. Sometimes it is pointed out that "less is more"--thus the brevity- delight one finds attached to texting and Twitter. (I counter with the number of texts to say pretty inane things...it seems, though, that I'm out-voted.) Social media makes it quite easy to track down old buddies.(Even past lovers.) No more pawing through ancient yearbooks. No dragging college roomies to seedy bars to ply them with drinks (and innocuous conversation) leading to,"So, did you see Soandso at the Reunion in September?" Even criminal and tax info can be gleened fairly easily these days, if one is so inclined.

But, I'm not musing about ways to be a stalker, here. (Nor am I in my cups and feeling alone.) I am simply noticing the transitory nature of human existence, up close and personal. How some folks are masters at holding on to people--even if their holding is illusionary or vapid. Even if the content of those connections is one-dimensional and awkward. (Or maybe, that is the key?) They are not threatening. They are not demanding. They really are not even inquiring. They simply want people to know they are still around--what they are doing--where they have been. (Less important, it seems, is where the other person has traveled. Who the other person has grown into.)

For me, I have been lousy at holding on to connections with lost loves. Friendships are more solid. Friends come back, like the seasons.

 Not so with people who have peopled my heart. It might be that I've never been a good break-up artist. (Either leaving or being left, it has always been a fitful scene.) Short of actual bloodshed, the losses seemed more like the last battle in an epic war--where it doesn't matter who the victor is--only that those final losses were needless.

In such cases, searching for "old loves" via social media, is a waste. Even if one did track down a ghost, what could one say that would actually make a difference?  (A new connection? To what end?) Reburying the dead is not an assignment anyone wants. (All the amends-making-forgiving-and forgetting stuff I've done in spades.)

Yet, if I'm to be honest,there is a kind of soft curiousity, still...a nagging pull. Did they accomplish their goals? What adventures continued forward? Is there any pain? Who might they have turned into? Are they even, still alive?

Because I have not become rich nor famous; have not completed the challenges I set before myself, decades earlier (not yet): have not traveled to Tibet nor met breathing aliens nor founded my own school of the arts nor discovered the answer to world peace, there is little to crow about.

Because I am not seeking an audience for my life, nor a fan-base, I won't be sending any "this is my year" tomes out at Christmas (nor Solstice, for that matter). I don't mean to be harsh. I am not criticizing people who do. It is just not for me.

Yet, my dreams keep popping missing people into my consciousness. Mostly past loves I've lost through the ages. They come back, not in anger or remorse, or even with romantic intentions--they just come back and walk beside me for a while. Not exactly spectres nor portents of doom. They just ...enter. Their tracks are the question marks in my eyes when I awake.

"What was THAT?  Where are they? What am I supposed to know?"

So, for all of you I have lost, for whatever reasons, if you are wondering: the answer is "Yes."
I still do think of you.

I have been forever haunted; you are carried, still, in my dreams.


      

"I felt a funeral in my brain"

As the poet, Emily Dickinson, once wrote, "I felt a funeral in my brain".

 I've said it before: this is a year of funerals.

Perhaps because I am "mid generations"--losing not only friends at mid-life, but the friends of my parents, my aunts and uncles, the friends of colleagues, the friends of our public lives.

 In L.A., in the 1980's, between AIDS and cancer, I saw an entire generation of artists, wiped away. For those of us still standing, going to another funeral was like being in remission: any day another bit of bad news might appear.  It always did.

For a while, funeral services became like weddings: who could be the most creative; who could blow off the biggest 'party'/reception; who could draw the most surreal tears? Not so much bad taste, as much as having to get out from under the terrible oppression. People of every background and ethnicity went over the top for their families--whether blood or chosen--because there was just so much loss. But, even then, our numbness crept in, like a guest at the services.

When I came back to New England, the first thing I did was begin attending funerals.

It began with family then immediately extended outward. I didn't have much in the way of  autumn teaching outfits (mine being from warmer climes), I did,indeed, have a plain black suit, purchased the first week I landed. It has come to be my "funeral suit". Like something out of Ibsen or Tennessee Williams, there was no question of wardrobe on these somber days.

Monday, Mrs. Nancy Anderson, mother to two of my high school friends, will have her funeral services and burial. She was a Lutheran. I haven't seen her family in decades. However, I have been kept informed of their lives, over the years, by my own family.

Though we are far, far removed, my re-awakened New England roots have been itching for new life in their direction. So, after sending condolensces, I will reconnect at the funeral. (No one ever prepared me for any of this stuff...Is there a text I might study, somewhere?) I feel awkward; unsure of what to say; shy; and painfully aware this is not "about me"--it is a funeral, for their mother. Still, how does one begin...or end...with grace?

My friends are very,very upstanding, kind people. No one is going to ask me to leave or begin screaming grudge matches--I have witnessed such outbursts in other locales--though not personally involved. There will be no dramatics; no high-fiving in the sacristy; no "long lost harrangues" in the pews. I know none of their extended family; none of the grand-children or spouses, even. Our ties were decades ago. Though once strong, our paths have shot out in multiple directions. They know I will be there, among hundreds of others, to send their Mom off to her Heaven. (I will also be there to say "gracias".) For now, this is enough.

Mrs. Anderson was the first person to introduce me to avocados--a bit ironic as I spent thirty-five years after that eating them almost daily, in the West. She also took me, along with her family, to Nantucket Island, inviting me to stay with them for a week at a time. Her daughter, youngest son, and I became close on those journeys--exploring the island off-season--seeing it for the first time with my inland eyes. Mr. and Mrs. Anderson got a kick out of that uncovering. (Their kids were past the point of absolute awe, though they loved the history and beauty of the rugged place). Not so this teen.

 When we got back to town, she asked for some of the pencil sketches I'd done, on the trip. (I was shocked that anyone would be interested.) Later, those sketches went up in her kitchen. Framed. (I was too self-conscious to comment, but utterly pleased.)

Some time later, (though it became a turning point in my life--one from which I have yet to fully recover)Wells College was singled out to me by Mrs. Anderson. None of us, not her daughter who  went there a year ahead of me, nor my family, nor myself, could foresee the strange destiny waiting for us there...things rarely turn out as we hope, or plan. It was Mrs. Anderson who embodied the finger of Fate, signaling the trailhead, the back-country path, I would  follow for decades. In many ways, my deepest adventures were initiated by her suggestions. (Not that she knew.)

 Simply for this fact, she remains seminal in my personal history.

 I bow my head and send prayers up in the dark for her. Her own life accomplishments were many. Her family is wide and wonderful. She is what Gardner would dub "a successful citizen" and a law abiding, intelligent, faithful neighbor. A good wife; a loving mother; a woman who gave back to her community to the end of her days. A fateful figure in this writer's life...

So, another chapter closes. This is a post in honor of a passing friend.
Time to iron my black suit.
(Like Emily D., I feel the funeral beginning in my brain...)     

NOAH GETS SWAMPED

So this is the sign we've been waiting for: in addition to both major political parties holding traveling circuses when what we need is serious help for this country; a nation celebrating Labor Day with the biggest gap between rich and poor since its inception; the man playing the Biblical patriarch, Noah, who helped save mankind and all the Earth's animals, as well, from the horrific floodwaters, and sailed to safety, enlightened and emboldened by God, finds himself ten miles off course, marooned on an island, off NYC, in a single person kayak, with another mis-matched male compadre. He hoots himself to safety as a passing vessel goes by in the thickening dark, and then hitches a ride back to the city...

I know it's 2012 and we may all be headed for destruction--at the very least, "lights out"--however, these ironic cartoon scenarios that keep cropping up around us are getting old, very fast. If the survivalists are correct, I may even welcome zombies...

Russell Crowe, respect the sea, Man.