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note: franksolich seeks a primitive for Christmas is dedicated to Skippy on Skins’s island, with the hopes that it illuminates him how to win friends and influence people; how to be constructive in one’s criticism; and how to not nitpick over trivial little mistakes.
franksolich seeks a primitive for Christmas is a work of fiction, but the people and events depicted therein are based upon real-life people and events in the eastern foothills of the Sandhills of Nebraska; I’ve been assured by those who live around here that such depictions have been accurate, and fair.
- - - - - - - - - -
The femme walked in the door, and from the dining room, saw franksolich sleeping on the couch.
He wasn’t expecting her until Sunday, but she’d come back from Omaha early, for fear something had happened in her absence. She’d spent Thanksgiving with her sister and brother-in-law and their family; he hadn’t gone because he didn’t get along with her sister, and her sister didn’t get along with him.
She sighed, and sat down on the floor next to the couch.
He of course couldn’t hear her, being deaf, and slept on, unaware she was even there.
Before she’d left for the holiday, she’d done something of she wasn’t sure he’d approve, and probably he’d already found out about it. But [his business partner] had done the same thing; in fact, his doing it had inspired her to do it, too.
But we both had the right to do it, she convinced herself; after all, he himself had given each of them that right. She was however still nervous how he’d feel about it.
It’s his own fault, she told herself; he never reached out to touch anyone. She’d known him for eight years, and it’d always been this way, as if he were standing behind an impenetrable glass wall. One could see him, but not touch him.
And it wasn’t just her; it was everybody.
She felt his right hand, and it was cold. But he was always cold, cold as ice.
Despite that she’d taken his hand gently, it still woke him up.
- - - - - - - - - -
He blinked, and upon recognizing her, said, “I missed you; I missed you very much. You have no idea how much I missed you. I missed you more than I’ve ever missed anybody in my life.
“Madam, you have absolutely no idea how much you were missed.â€
“Did anything happen while I was gone? It looks like you had some visitors here.â€
“Yeah, I did,†he said, getting up.
“Anything exciting happen?†she asked.
“Well, something did get started, but it never got consu--er, finished, so no, nothing in particular happened. Just four primitives here overnight, three of them as big as bison, and they stank as badly, too.
“The fourth one was okay, but too bossy, I thought.â€
Then he remembered something, looking over to the table in the dining room.
- - - - - - - - - -
The table was still set, as it had been Thanksgiving morning, extending the length of the room, capable of seating eighteen, one at each end and eight on each side. There were four place-settings at the far end, and one at the end several yards away, the large sterling-silver candelabra in the center.
Although of course dinner had not been had.
“You know, dinner was nearly all done, and then something happened, and so it all had to be packed away in the refrigerator uneaten,†he explained to her; “the whole thing’s still here. And the table’s already set.
“Why don’t we just go ahead and have some of it?â€
While he and the femme were pulling the dishes out, the property caretaker came in. He’d been doing a job on another property, and finished, needed to drop off his tools here. His wife was in the big city, and he’d been expected to pick something up for his supper at the convenience store in town, but decided to join them instead.
Just as the food was about getting done, in the door came the retired banker’s wife. Grumpy, who wears his polyester pants hiked halfway up his midriff, wasn’t with her, but her 11-year-old grandson was.
The retired banker’s wife, in her early 80s, was dressed in a big floppy hat, a grey dress, and wearing indeterminable jewelry, real rocks. She’s tall, thin, and elegant, reminding one very much of the late Alice Montagu-Douglas-Scott.
Her grandson always comes out here lately, being a nuisance. He’d learned franksolich had been born without ears, and was always hoping to see what it looked like. Fat chance, kid, the householder thought; better luck next time.
The retired banker’s wife announced there was Christmas greenery out in the bed of the pick-up truck, and so franksolich, the property caretaker, and the too-curious lad went out to get it. It was fir boughs, meant more to scent the house than to decorate it.
Most, they laid on the front porch for later distribution, but some, they brought inside, and he carefully arranged it around the base of the candelabra in the middle of the table.
“Aren’t you going to spread the dishes around?†the femme asked; “it looks odd, four places all together down there, and one place practically at the other end of the room.â€
No, he said; “It looks good the way it is,†as he lit the thirty-two candles.
Then he assigned the femme the far end of the table, as hostess, the property caretaker on her left, the kid on her right, and the retired banker’s wife to his right. And himself, to the other end of the table.
to be continued
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“This is singularly odd,†the retired banker’s wife said, “you two lovebirds sitting half a mile away from each other. And you make such an aesthetic pair when together.â€
He grimaced, but tried to not show it. She was referring to that the femme, as an instructor in dance and dramatic arts, oftentimes put on demonstrations of medieval and renaissance dances using her students…..and franksolich, although he’d do it only with her, no one else.
The man always leads such steps, but as he couldn’t hear the music, he had to watch her like a hawk--to her credit, she did very well in giving cues; they could read each other like a book--so as to look as if he was leading, when actually she was.
The femme was short, petite, and blonde, with small breasts, a small waist, and small hips, for which he was grateful when he had to lift her, as he wasn’t as strong as he looked.
“It’s okay,†he said, ostentatiously arising out of his chair at the other end of the table, walking to her end, executing a half-bow at the waist, and then the two of them giving a public display of affection, passionately locking lips.
“It’s not as if anything’s wrong,†he assured the company.
Having heard a pronouncement from their host he was not likely to elaborate upon, the chitchattery at that end moved on to other subjects, none of which he could hear. It was now truly a candle-light dinner, it being wholly dark and the thirty-two candles the only illumination in the dining room. He didn’t know for sure, but he suspected the nosy young lad had turned on his portable compact disc player, and that there was Christmas music playing softly in the background.
After dessert was served and the electrical lights in the dining room turned back on, the retired banker’s wife inquired of franksolich what he wished for Christmas this year.
“The same thing I wanted last year, but alas couldn’t get,†he said; “I want a primitive for Christmas.â€
He explained for the benefit of the property caretaker, the only one who hadn‘t been around last year.
“I’m still trying to figure out what makes primitives different from decent and civilized people, and I need a sample for study and comparison. I still have all the stuff I intended to use last year, but didn’t--the phrenological charts, the handbooks on homeopathy, the palm-reading charts, the microscope, the petri-dishes, the tape measures and calipers, the drug-testing kits, the Ouija board, the astrological charts, the Rorschach tests, inkblots, &c., &c., &c.
“It’s very intriguing to me, what makes primitives different from us.â€
to be continued
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I like the foreshadowing you used to close part two. :popcorn:
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I like the foreshadowing you used to close part two. :popcorn:
I may have given the impression--especially to lurking primitives already unduly paranoid about franksolich--of being a sort of Dr. Frankenstein, and that a corpse must necessarily be involved.
It's true that brain transplants might be of great benefit to primitives, but no, there's no expectations of being able to do that with a primitive.
It's the same as last year's wish--just a living, breathing primitive up close for a few days, so that one may surreptitiously make measurements and take samples. Observing primitive conduct isn't enough; they are so different from decent and civilized people I'm sure there's physical anomalies too.
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The neighbor, the neighbor’s older brother, and the insurance man from town came out here this morning, dragging something covered with tarpaulin on a trailer behind a pick-up truck.
“Well, if you want it, here’s your primitive bait,†the neighbor said; “something likely to lure one here.
“It’d look great on top of the William Rivers Pitt, and visible from the highway, if we could get the blinking red light in its nose to work.â€
The tarpaulin was pulled off; I’d expected a giant fiberglass “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer†or something like that. It was between nine and ten feet tall, being about one and a half times my height.
“You’re right,†I said; “that’d look great, just great, atop the William Rivers Pitt. Let’s get it up there.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
The William Rivers Pitt is a certain mound that sits about a city-block-and-a-half away from the front porch here, between the house and the driveway. It resembles nothing more than a miniature Alpine Jungfrau, and is prominent enough to be seen from far away, if one is looking for it.
To an outsider, it seems just another bump in the Sandhills of Nebraska, nothing unordinary about it. To a native of the Sandhills, it’s something man-made, but not interesting enough to check any further.
For those in the know, it’s 740+ cubic tons of antique swine excrement from circa 1875-1950, when the family then here raised pigs. (The gigantic barn that stood aside it burned down the Sunday morning the socialists invaded South Korea in June 1950, after which the family went into raising cattle instead.)
It lost its stench and its texture decades ago, now looking like just another pile of dirt, excepting because it’s “warmer†than the ground surrounding it, the lush foliage on it--catnip and tomatoes--stays green clear into mid-December, and begins turning green again early every February following.
I dunno from whence the catnip arrived, but the tomatoes are because the family fed generations of pigs tomatoes if they were plentiful enough, the seeds which apparently pass through the intestines undigested.
The William Rivers Pitt produces bushels and bushels of large firm red fresh tomatoes every year, but whenever I want tomatoes for dining, I buy some at the grocery store in town.
- - - - - - - - -
“Where’d he find it?†I asked; the insurance man from town had gotten it while visiting relatives for Thanksgiving in Sioux City.
A neighbor there of the insurance man’s brother-in-law had been awarded it, among other things, in settlement for a debt owed by a circus company gone bankrupt years and years ago, and it’d been stored in a warehouse there, collecting cobwebs and dust among other circus artifacts.
It was a giant (about fifteen feet long) fiberglass walrus.
to be contined
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I forgot.
I mean to illustrate this story.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/franksolichdrivewayentry_zps34a8f4a7.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/franksolichdrivewayentry_zps34a8f4a7.jpg.html)
the driveway at the turn-off from the highway two miles north of the house
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/franksolichdrivewaymain_zpsc1139920.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/franksolichdrivewaymain_zpsc1139920.jpg.html)
the main stretch of the driveway
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/franksolichhomeoverthehill_zps00088792.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/franksolichhomeoverthehill_zps00088792.jpg.html)
over the hill
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/fog_zps41199e1c.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/fog_zps41199e1c.jpg.html)
around the corner to home
I don't have any winter-time photographs of the driveway scanned; sorry.
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Are you contemplating any therapeutic efforts? Such as aversion therapy or perhaps ECT?
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Are you contemplating any therapeutic efforts? Such as aversion therapy or perhaps ECT?
You mean when it comes to studying a primitive up-close?
No. There's two sorts of people; people who can figure out what a problem is, and people who can figure out how to solve the problem. I'm the first sort of person, laying out the problem, and then letting others brighter and better than me decide how it should be solved.
It's this way in real life; when working with the business partner, I do my part by identifying the problem and where and why it is, and then he takes over and decides what has to be done about it. He's the CPA (certified public accountant); I'm not.
In last year's search for a primitive for Christmas, I explained such a study's, really, for recreational purposes only. I'm deaf; I live in a severely limited world. However, I have, essentially, the same number and volume of cerebral cells as hearing people, and need kept busy. Hearing people use television, radio, the stereo, the cellular telephone, compact discs, music, movies, plays, casual chitchattery and gossip, to amuse themselves.
I don't have "access" to all those things, but the brain-cells must be kept busy.
So I get my intellectual and cultural stimulation by watching the primitives as if I'm watching a show on television.
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The femme arrived from the big city, where she lives, in mid-afternoon, and was aghast upon seeing that grey fiberglass “thing†atop the William Rivers Pitt.
“We hope to do something so as to have the big red light that’s its nose blink,†I told her; “but they’re busy and I’m busy, and so we couldn’t do it today.â€
“You’re making the place look like Coney Island or something,†she fumed.
“But it doesn’t make any difference, madam,†I told her; “I’m fated to be the last inhabitant of this place, as sooner or later it’s to be torn down and the property divided into resort-cabin lots, next year or the year after, or whenever. It’s all going to go anyway, some time.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
We went to the bar in town, for an early supper.
Swede, the cook of Norwegian derivation whose specialty is Italianate cuisine, blinked in surprise when he saw the two of us together, although I had no idea why. We were always together.
I ordered my usual, the hamburger extremely well-done, pressed down hard on the grill so as to squeeze out every drop of grease, and french fries done on the grill and not in the fryer, with a side-dish of sour cream.
The femme took her time, finally deciding upon prosciutto e melone, stracciatella, grissini torinesi, paglia e fieno, spaghetti con la bottarga, cotoletta alla milanese, and for dessert, torta caprese.
We both had coffee with milk for drinks.
- - - - - - - - - -
“You know,†she said, “I know December’s a rough month for you, with so many memories of bad Decembers past. It seems like every sixth or seventh day of the month, it strikes me that you have yet another unhappy anniversary to note. So much seems to have happened to you, in December.â€
“Yeah,†I said, “but I’m cool, copacetic, with it. All these things were so very long ago, and the only one that still stings is December 21. Other than that, December’s a great month, a wonderful month, a delightful month, a wholly awesome month. I love December.
“Of course, it helps that I’ll never again see a policeman walking up to me, his hat in his hand instead of on his head. One could always see, even from far away, that it was bad news.
“Nobody could simply pick up a telephone and call me, and so of the nine events (not all in December, however), in seven of those cases, it was necessary for a civil authority to deliver the news to me face-to-face, in person.
“But it’s all been so very long ago.â€
Swede came out of the kitchen and over to our table, bearing a large tray he carefully set upon a set of uncollapsed legs, and dispensed the appropriate dishes between the two of us. The femme’s, he put down with care and attention; mine, he slammed down onto the table so hard the plates rattled.
“I don’t know why he’s like that,†I said to the femme as Swede returned to the kitchen; “here, I order something that’s easy and quick to fix, while you order things that take time and care and attention, things that are a real pain to put together…..but he treats you like a queen, and me as if I’m some bum who needs thrown out the door.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“Well, what went through your mind today?†the femme asked; “today’s one of those anniversaries.â€
Yeah, I admitted; I’d noted it, it being on this day years ago when I was in my early 20s, that my favorite older brother (out of three) had died at home in his sleep of cardiac arrest, being 40 years old.
This had been in Lincoln, and I was the only other member of the family living in that city at the time, all the others and their spouses and children scattered miles away. A deputy sheriff, his hat in his hand rather than on his head, had come to my place and asked that I go over to identify the body.
It’d been a surprise to me; true, he’d been in bad health due to the afflictions and ailments of affluence, the too-easy, too-soft, too-comfortable, too-secure sort of life. He’d turned decadent, a flaming bon vivant, of sensual rather than spiritual tastes, after our parents had died. He was a high-ranking governmental bureaucrat and a prominent Democrat, having been a hippie earlier.
I’d warned him--and s-o-o-o-o-o-o many times--that when one turns against those values and principles on which one was born and raised, one inevitably turns on oneself, to no happy end.
But who had been I, to advise him?
As the femme of course knows, my parents, both of them born and raised in Pennsylvania, had married and lived in New York City for several years, during which time they had six children, born close to each other. After which followed a substantial gap, and the family moving to the Sandhills of Nebraska, before I came into being when the parents were middle-aged, and two years after myself, a younger brother.
Nobody takes a “little†brother seriously.
- - - - - - - - - -
“This was the brother,†I explained to the femme, “--well, the summer I was three years old, my three older brothers and two neighbor boys were playing Monopoly on the front porch of the house next door. Our parents were working at the hospital, and they were in charge of watching my younger brother, then an infant, and myself.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/3yrs_zpsa9f7dbdd.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/3yrs_zpsa9f7dbdd.jpg.html)
“I have no memory of the event, but sometime in mid-morning, another kid came running up the street and onto the porch, breathlessly announcing, ‘[franksolich]‘s been run over by a car, and he’s laying there, all mashed up, squishing and squirming like a frog that’s been stepped on.’
“My two other older brothers and the two neighbor kids got up, to run over and look, but this brother stayed seated on the porch. ‘You leave, you lose your turn,’ he told the others.
“’He’ll get over it.’
“After which they all sat down, but only for a few seconds, and then everybody got up to go and see, but by that time I’d already been borne away.
“Our last conversation, maybe a couple of weeks before he died, I was griping about something, and he interrupted, ‘I’ve watched you all your life; I think I’ve seen you more than anybody else ever has.
“’There is no force, human or otherwise, that can do you any harm; you’ve been through things that would injure or even kill others--and has--coming out whole and unscathed. There is nothing that can destroy you; you’re indefatigable.
“’Quit whining; the only thing that can destroy you is…..yourself. Nothing, nobody, else can.’
“I think he may have been referring to my drinking, but at any rate, I quit that five months after he died.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“Anyway,†I continued, “I rushed to his place and identified the body. I knelt on the floor beside it--he’d apparently been meaning to turn off the lights of the Christmas tree before going to bed, when it happened--shut the eyes, kissed the forehead, and covered the face.
“Before getting up, I meant to send him to God, ‘Now Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, according to Thy word in peace; because my eyes have seen Thy salvation, which Thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples: a light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel’--something I’d learned in speech therapy, and can recite from memory even today.
“But being nervous, what came out instead was ‘Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord is One’--something else I’d learned from speech therapy a few years before.
“So I sent him away as a Jew rather than a Roman Catholic, but it was okay, because God has a sense of humor.
“Then I walked around the place, opening wide all the windows on all four sides. This was about eight o’clock in the morning, and it was heavily snowing. It wasn’t cold--maybe about 28, 29 degrees, and there wasn’t any wind, just lots and lots of snow cascading down.
“It was weird, being so Christmas-y--the snow, the tree in the living room with the blinking multi-colored lights still on, the wrapping paper, the presents wrapped and unwrapped, and all this other festive regalia…..and a sheet-covered body in the middle of the living room floor.
“I took whatever bottles of prescription drugs I saw laying around, and flushed the contents down the commode. I was surprised they let me do that, because this after all was a death under investigation, but they did; no one made a step to stop me.
“After that, I went into the bedroom and sat on the side of the bed, asking, ‘Okay, what next? What do you want me to do?’ and lit a cigarette. My brother had loathed and detested my smoking as much as my drinking, and here I was, smoking in his bedroom.
“What they wanted me to do, since I seemed so composed--their words, not mine--was hang around, to answer questions. To stay right there with them, until this was resolved. It was obviously a clear-cut case of cardiac arrest, but as it’d happened at home outside the presence of any known witnesses, a lot of things had to be checked out.
“And here it was, the Monday after Thanksgiving; there were a lot of people they couldn’t get a hold of, plus that the city was all but closed down because of the snow.
“So I stayed until the end, leaving mountains of half-smoked cigarettes all over the place.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“When the undertaker came to remove the body about four in the afternoon, all the ‘t’s have been crossed and the ‘i’s dotted now, there arose the matter of clothing for the body; he couldn’t after all be buried in his underwear.
“I opened the door to the closet in the bedroom, finding much to my startlement that it contained only…..his baseball uniform. I wasn’t familiar with his place, and didn’t know where else to look, and so this would have to do.
“But no big deal, I thought; the body had deteriorated substantially the past several hours, and I thought it’d have to be a closed-casket funeral, so nobody’d see what he was wearing anyway.
“I’d greatly underestimated the skills of the embalmist, and the body was put on full display, in his baseball uniform. Many said they thought it was so cool, doing that, because baseball had been a big part of his life; I didn’t bother telling them it hadn’t been done on purpose, only because of desperate necessity.
“Some days later, when my last surviving brother arrived, he and I went through the place, to see what was where, and he opened a closet in another bedroom, showing a whole long row of suits and other clothes.
“He’d always thought of his ‘little’ brother as less than competent, and asked me how I could’ve possibly missed all this stuff.
“I reminded him that our late brother had lived a life vastly upscaler than my own, and that it’d never occurred to me that one would have clothes in more than one closet.â€
to be continued
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The neighbor’s wife came over Monday afternoon, bringing the infant daughter and the 3-year-old son with her; the twin 12-year-old daughters and the 11-year-old son were in school.
She wanted to “coordinate†holiday schedules, mostly errands in the big city. The neighbor doesn’t like shopping, and there’s all the kids, and she doesn’t like to drive. Since we’re very good friends, we try as much as possible to go to the big city together, so as to share the burden.
Myself, I despise--loathe and detest--shopping myself, but at least with her and the kids, there’s some diversion and amusement to be gotten out of it. She told me her hopes and plans, and I outlined my prospective work schedule and social calendar, and at least for the next two weeks, it all meshed together very nicely for both of us.
She noticed a couple of old photograph albums half-shoved underneath the greenery on the dining-room table; the dishes and silverware had been cleared away, cleaned, and put away, but the table’s still spread out its seemingly half-mile length, with the fresh greenery and great big candelabra in the middle.
I’d been showing photographs of my favorite older brother to the femme the night before, after we’d gotten done dining at the bar in town.
(http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y223/dummiedestroyer/oldphoto_zps9961c9f6.jpg) (http://s6.photobucket.com/user/dummiedestroyer/media/oldphoto_zps9961c9f6.jpg.html)
“You know, it was a tragedy, the way his life turned out,†I told her; “he had so much to offer, he was so full of promise, and then to die at the age of 40. If only he hadn’t stultified as a governmental employee, he’d probably still be around today.
“He was the third of the three older brother (there were also three older sisters), and the one closest to me in age from that direction. For whatever reasons, he considered me his special charge, and considered me that way up until he died, long after we both were adults.
“’Little’ brothers can be a nuisance, and I was doubly so, considering that I was a problem child what with the deafness and lack of social graces. Too, we were very different; he was outgoing and immensely popular, while I was, well, what I was. Of all four of my brothers, he was the most active in sports--other than basketball, there wasn’t one he wasn’t involved in--while I never bothered with sports at all.
“Don’t get me wrong; sports are great, and I encourage them.
“But sports demand communication and coordinated teamwork--and most importantly, a motivation to compete.
“It’s never been in me to compete; I just want to be left alone to do my own thing in peace and quiet, leaving others in peace and quiet to do their own things.
“He went away to college when I was still in grade school, but we wrote each other about every other day or so; I still have all those letters. He was most interested in my intellectual development, and always suggesting books for me to read.
“Which I dutifully did, and wrote him of my impressions after finishing each book. He’d turned into a hippie by then, and so one can imagine the ‘reading list.’ But by the Grace of God, I derived meaning from them opposite of what I was supposed to; even as early as the fourth grade, I already knew that ‘liberalism’ was a self-serving, malevolent creed.
“I was most impressed by the biography of the then-celebrity Dick Gregory.
“Admirable man, Dick Gregory, although I’m probably the only person who remembers him any more.
“After our parents died--my father when I was 17, and my mother when I was 18--he more or less took over my life, concerned I was going in the wrong direction. I wasn’t academically inclined--I despised school--and had planned on just hanging around town after graduation, making a living changing and repairing automobile tires or something.
“On our father’s side of the family, there ran an unbroken string of college graduates going back at least six generations, and he wasn’t about to let me break that uninterrupted streak. I argued and fought, but he had enough clout to shove me into the University of Nebraska.
“However, I demanded a price for my acquiescence; that he find me a job in Lincoln, because it was important to me that I worked, rather than just ‘studied.’ Much to my sore surprise, he did, and immediately so; at a wholesale hardware distributor, in charge of firearms and sporting goods. I was working before I even bothered registering for classes.
- - - - - - - - - -
“After our parents died, he changed; it seemed everybody but I changed, getting more negative and unhappy and older. At the funeral of my younger brother, who died a year after our mother, when looking at the rest of the family, I thought, ‘God, I am related to some old people here;’ they were only in their 30s, but at the age of 19, to me, they looked pretty old.
“He himself went to work for the government, and given his ‘people skills’ and education, moved up at the speed of a launched rocket; he knew all the right people, and did all the right things.
“It bothered me, though, because governmental employment is, essentially, brain-deadening work.
“I’m sure it bothered him too, subconsciously, that he was making a lot more money, and working less, than the taxpayers who signed his paycheck, in addition to that he enjoyed job security and great fringe benefits they didn’t get. He after all had the same conscience I have.
“But it never bothered him enough that he’d quit; he liked too much living the good life.
“I know it bothered him, because after he became in bigwig in government, he started acquiring all the ailments and afflictions of affluenza, his health going seriously downhill.
“The last Thanksgiving of his life, three days before he died, he spent with a sister of ours, and her family, during which time he expressed dismay that I’d recently quit the Nebraska Department of Health after three and a half years there.
“He’d always worried about me ending up in some menial blue-collar job, and had viewed this as a Godsend; in his eyes, I had it made. I was going to have a respectable career, job security, and all the good things in life; no one would have to worry about me any more.
“For someone who knew and understood me so well, he’d disastrously miscalled that one.â€
to be continued
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While the neighbor’s wife was here, the femme dropped in, as we’d planned on having lunch together, as we‘ll both be busy doing different things apart from each other this evening, and all day tomorrow. We asked the neighbor’s wife to come along, but she deferred, and left with the children.
“It’s going to be cold and windy here in a couple of days,†the femme told me. “Do you suppose the wind’ll blow away that monstrosity on top of the promontory out there?†She was looking out one of the picture-windows of the dining-room, towards the large grey fiberglass walrus tethered to the top of the William Rivers Pitt.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/18-108_zpsae557b6f.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/18-108_zpsae557b6f.jpg.html)
No chance, I said; “we tied it down pretty good, and as soon as we get time, we’re going do something about making it so its nose blinks, making it visible from the highway.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
Then we drove to dine at the bar in town. Yashoda, the chef from the country club in the big city, whose speciality is Germanic cuisine, was substituting for someone, probably Wanda, whose specialty is eastern Asian cuisine. He blinked in surprise when he saw the femme and I walk in, looking all lovey-dovey and that, although I had no idea why.
I ordered my usual, a hamburger well-done, pressed down hard on the grill so as to squeeze out every drop of grease, french fries fried on the grill rather than in the fryer, and a side-dish of sour cream.
The femme ordered brathühnchen, kartoffelsalat, speckpfannkuchen, wibele, and for dessert, bayrisch creme. We both had coffee with milk.
- - - - - - - - - -
Then we walked across the street to the bank, where I keep one of those large safe-deposit boxes.
I live way out in the country, out in the middle of nowhere, in a very large and brittle old house. I don’t keep anything of value here, instead using the bank for things of intrinsic value, professional storage for the family archives, and important papers are stashed in the safe of the business partner. What I keep out here wouldn’t bring two hundred bucks in a garage sale, unless one‘s into old furniture, but that stuff ain‘t mine.
If some sort of natural or civil disaster happened, all I’d have to do is toss the cats into the car and take off, leaving nothing of any particular value behind.
The safe-deposit box used to contain only a collection of pre-1861 English copper coins, the wedding rings of the parents and grandparents, my mother’s Bellevue School of Nursing pin, a great-grandfather’s pocket watch, other oddments, but over the years it’s gotten congested in there.
I wanted to take out a certain gift I’d been given last Christmas, meaning to give it back to the niece of the woman who’d presented it to me, an ancient Samuel Troll music-box dating from 1866; that story was told in last year’s pursuit of a primitive. The giver of the gift is now in a nursing home and her mind gone, and so it’s safe to give it back, as I never should’ve been given it in the first place.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/st1866_zpsac33fccf.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/st1866_zpsac33fccf.jpg.html)
--not the music box I have, but a near-duplicate, the big difference being that there’s some sort of ornament on both long sides of the one I have, and the brown is darker
“You know, I think she meant for you to keep this,†the femme insisted (she’s argued this before).
“No, I never felt good about having it,†I said.
“What use is a music box to a deaf person?â€
There’s also a sterling-silver glass-domed anniversary clock commemorating the jubilee of H.M. the Queen in 1977, a gold-plated glass-domed anniversary clock commemorating the jubilee of H.M. the Queen in 2002, a diamond-encrusted glass-domed anniversary clock commemorating the jubilee of H.M. the Queen in 2012.
Of course, they’re disassembled so as to fit in the box, and their accompanying glass domes are stored elsewhere, but the femme and I took time to admire the pieces anyway.
The first had been given me by a relative when I was younger; the second I’d purchased myself; and the third had been a Christmas present from the femme last year.
It’s true the diamonds are very tiny, and they’re industrial-grade diamonds, but still, through the artifice of skillfully-placed miniature mirrors in the workings, the workings glitter and sparkle awesomely in the light.
to be continued
-
I had to go out part of the night, until circa 5:00 a.m., as the neighbor needed some help, and I’m about the only spare able-bodied adult male in this half of the county (nearly everybody else lives in the eastern half of the county, making it rather congested over there).
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/shwinter2_zps93548573.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/shwinter2_zps93548573.jpg.html)
It was about zero degrees, but with strong winds, the “wind chill†was about -40.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/stupidbirds_zpsc8311bc3.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/stupidbirds_zpsc8311bc3.jpg.html)
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/shwinter3_zpsd4ec07a8.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/shwinter3_zpsd4ec07a8.jpg.html)
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/somewildanimal_zpsc62735b4.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/somewildanimal_zpsc62735b4.jpg.html)
I’ve never been sure what help I’ve been though, as agriculture was never anything in which I’d been trained or educated. I just do what he tells me to do. It seems to me he does nearly all the work himself, and I’m along simply to render assistance in case he hurts himself or something.
I push, pull, tug, hold, hoist, put down, lay out, go and find, bring over, whatever he tells me to do.
In all my working life, some observing me work have opined it seems franksolich is merely a mute beast of burden, but that’s s-o-o-o-o-o far from being the actual case, it’s absurd.
Being deaf, it takes time for others to explain things to me, and when it’s freezing cold, there’s damned little, if any time, to bother with such niceties. The neighbor knows what he’s doing, and so I don’t need to know the “why,†“how,†and “when†of things; all he has to do is tell me the “what,†and we work together well.
The “whats†this morning usually consisted merely of pointing at something.
He thought it would take “three, four hours,†but we were done in slightly less than two.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/shwinter5_zpse6010190.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/shwinter5_zpse6010190.jpg.html)
Man, it is c-o-l-d out there.
to be continued
-
The femme was here about four in the afternoon, which was a surprise to me; I’d figured she’d stay at home, given the sub-zero temperatures. She inspected the refrigerator and cupboards, and commented we could dine here this evening.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/03-002_zps1202404c.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/03-002_zps1202404c.jpg.html)
Uh, no, I said; “I need to save all that stuff in case I ever get snowed in here. Let’s go to town instead.â€
“But you’ve got enough here to dine clear until March or April,†she insisted; “and besides, you’ve never been snowed in. Every time there’s been a really bad snowfall, lots of people break their necks to get out here to clear the road for you.
“I swear, you get better snow-removal than we do in [the big city].â€
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/03-001_zps5acfcb75.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/03-001_zps5acfcb75.jpg.html)
“They do that because all their beer’s out here,†I pointed out. “They do what they’re supposed to do, and then make their way here, to sit in a warm place, dine, and party.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
We went to dine at the bar in town.
December’s when a lot of people take a day, or two or three, off here-and-there, so as to get ready for Chrstimas, and this evening was no different. There was another substitute cook at the bar, Hop-Sing, from Sioux City, whose specialty is French cuisine.
I ordered my usual, a hamburger very well done, pressed down hard on the grill so as to squeeze out every drop of grease, french fries cooked on the grill rather than in the fryer, and a side dish of sour cream.
The femme had choucroute garnie, moules à la crème normande, pain de campagne, and for dessert, croquembouche. We both had coffee with milk for drinks.
to be continued
-
Dadgum, Coach. You are so prolific in your writing it's hard to keep up with you.
-
Dadgum, Coach. You are so prolific in your writing it's hard to keep up with you.
It's to make up for real life, where I make Calvin Coolidge look loquacious in comparison.
-
Well, Frank, given that I actually don't live that far from you at all, and, given that Christmas is supposed to be all about the spirit of giving and caring (actually it should be that way all year 'round, but that's another discussion for another thread and time), I suppose I could volunteer myself for your study and edification. Since we both having hearing issues (I wear hearing aids) that might make for an even more interesting discussion! And I promise to be nice and on my best behavior, at least as much as a primitive can manage!! :rofl: :rofl:
-
Uh, no, I said; “I need to save all that stuff in case I ever get snowed in here. Let’s go to town instead.â€
“But you’ve got enough here to dine clear until March or April,†she insisted; “and besides, you’ve never been snowed in. Every time there’s been a really bad snowfall, lots of people break their necks to get out here to clear the road for you.
“I swear, you get better snow-removal than we do in [the big city].â€
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/03-001_zps5acfcb75.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/03-001_zps5acfcb75.jpg.html)
“They do that because all their beer’s out here,†I pointed out. “They do what they’re supposed to do, and then make their way here, to sit in a warm place, dine, and party.â€
They're not stupid. O-) :whistling: :tongue:
-
Well, Frank, given that I actually don't live that far from you at all, and, given that Christmas is supposed to be all about the spirit of giving and caring (actually it should be that way all year 'round, but that's another discussion for another thread and time), I suppose I could volunteer myself for your study and edification. Since we both having hearing issues (I wear hearing aids) that might make for an even more interesting discussion! And I promise to be nice and on my best behavior, at least as much as a primitive can manage!! :rofl: :rofl:
Ah, Lisa, long time, no see.
You still living in southeastern South Dakota, around there?
No way could one use a human being as an object of study; it has to be a primitive about whom there's a sense of utter detachment and impartiality.
Although I imagine some sort of comedy skit could be written about two deaf people chitchatting with each other (no sign language); one talking about apples, the other talking about penguins, neither of them realizing they're talking about two entirely different things.
Are you going to vote in the top DUmmies contest?
-
The neighbor and I made a “tour of inspection†this morning, but fortunately found nothing out of order, as it was -5 degrees, but the thingamajig about the wind-chill read -32 degrees.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/0023_zps7e094469.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/0023_zps7e094469.jpg.html)
Man, it is c-o-l-d out there.
One wonders if the Big Zero has any plans to fire up Air Force One, personally flying it out here to the Sandhills to carry us away from this disaster area.
The last place we checked was the property directly across the river from here, for which I’m responsible. The owner, an old grouch (he was considered that, but I always thought he was a nice guy, the salt of the earth, a prince among peasants), died earlier this year, and until his heirs finally decide what they want to do with it, it’s part of my daily routine, going over there to check on things.
Since it’s on the other side of the river, the house doesn’t have access to natural gas, and uses propane.
The 500-gallon propane tank looks pretty full (I keep the temperature inside the house at 55 degrees), but I wonder how long it’s going to last.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/tt_zps48fb5c66.png) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/tt_zps48fb5c66.png.html)(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/nei_zpsb106cfd1.png) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/nei_zpsb106cfd1.png.html)
---franksolich and the neighbor, in warmer times
to be continued
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Ah, Lisa, long time, no see.
You still living in southeastern South Dakota, around there?
No way could one use a human being as an object of study; it has to be a primitive about whom there's a sense of utter detachment and impartiality.
Although I imagine some sort of comedy skit could be written about two deaf people chitchatting with each other (no sign language); one talking about apples, the other talking about penguins, neither of them realizing they're talking about two entirely different things.
Are you going to vote in the top DUmmies contest?
Hiya Frank, good to see you're still doing well!
We still do live in the southeastern part of SD, but are about to move to another part of the state, in the western area, due to hubby's skills being needed in another job there. We should be moved before Christmas, before the cat and I travel to OH to visit family for Christmas.
Yes, I'd imagine that that would be quite a funny skit and you could probably come up with a good one, with your writing talent. One has to have a sense of humor about one's disabilities, or dealing with them would be a lot harder and life would be more miserable. Then again, life, and attitudes, are what we make them, no?
I'm not sure about voting, are the votes anonymous (insert evil grin here)?
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Hiya Frank, good to see you're still doing well!
I'm not sure about voting, are the votes anonymous (insert evil grin here)?
Do vote, madam; it's by private ballot, and that's explained on the campaign-and-voting thread to be posted here later this evening. No one but you and Mr. Wiggum will ever know. Honestly.
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Another day of the deep-freeze; -8 degrees this morning, but no wind. There's supposed to be a heat wave tomorrow, Sunday, with the thermometer allegedly soaring to 16 degrees, but we'll see.
<<<haven't been going anywhere, unless someone needs.
The cats are becoming a problem. They want to go outdoors, but that's not going to happen until temperatures are more clement. There's plenty of room inside this house, but apparently not enough to satisfy them.
This is a very old house, and up until this summer was "L" shaped and had seven rooms, not including the bathroom. Because I'm to be the last inhabitant of it, and because the owners don't care, I had the property caretaker knock down the short "leg" of the "L" this past summer, three rooms, as they were a nuisance.
Which left four rooms, plus the bathroom. The living room is 26'x38', the dining room is the same, 26'x38', the bedroom which at one time long ago was a sun room or dining room is 26'x32', as is the kitchen, 26'x32'. The bathroom is 12'x19'. The cats have access to the whole interior of the house, excepting when I'm using the bathroom.
There are five cats here. It seems to me this is more than enough room for five cats to romp and play. Since the place is more than half windows, it's always light in here. Since the place is sparsely furnished, there's all sorts of empty spaces. There are heat-registers on the floor in every single room, which blow out heat at cat-height, meaning that a cat laying in the center of the floor of any room is blasted with hot air from four sides.
But those times the cats resign themselves to that I'm not letting them outside, they fight and squabble over the same few square inches of territory. All this acreage, and they all want the exact same few square inches.
to be continued
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How many cats are you at now, frank?
When it gets below about the mid-teens here, the spousal unit will grab the outdoor cats, and put them up in the mud room. Just like yours, they want to get out, no matter how much square footage they are provided.
One of them finally snuck out on her midday yesterday when she had the door open only for an instant. It was supposed to get down to -5, so he either froze his cat ass off, or had a nice hole to hide in.
-
How many cats are you at now, frank?
There's just five cats any more--Abbie, Snow, Harold, Ellie, and Jack.
At their peak, there'd been eleven, but old age carried most of those away; as one might imagine, the veterinary bills are much lower than they used to be.
My living room alone is much larger than the 300-square-foot boat on which the cbayer primitive (who's currently getting drunk on Margaritas in the cooking and baking forum) lives. I think there's plenty of room here per cat.
-
It’s a cold dreary day out here on the eastern edge of the Sandhills of Nebraska, well below zero, and so I was surprised when the femme showed up here in mid-morning.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/18-104_zpsbbcfd0b7.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/18-104_zpsbbcfd0b7.jpg.html)
“Brrrrr,†I said; “I wouldn’t be outdoors in this weather to save my life. I’ve already made one trip to town this morning, to pick up some cigarettes, but that’s my limit. No more.â€
She said she had to be out, as she was going shopping in one of the two big cities south of here.
There’s one big city, where she lives, forty-two miles away from here, and then there’s two other big cities, all of them about the same size, about an hour south of here. I dunno what these other two big cities have that her own big city doesn’t, but didn’t ask, as it’d lead to some sort of trouble.
It was early, but we had lunch here; broccoli, cheese, and rice. I even lit the thirty-two candles in the large candelabra in the center of the dining-room table, and we dined at opposite ends of the table. I’d brought in more Christmas greenery and heaped it on the table, too, so there was barely room for our plates.
“Well, what are your plans today?†she asked. “I thought about asking you to come along, but I already knew you wouldn’t.â€
Right, I said; “too much of this buy-buy-buy stuff going on.
“Unlike most people, I’m trying to get into a religious mood for Christmas.
“I’ve been reading the journals I kept during my first Christmas in England, back when I was eighteen years old, and in college.
“The English, now, they know how to do Christmas, and it was so good that remember, I went back there for two Christmases more. No commercialization of Christmas, in England.
“At least that I ever saw.
“What I liked best were the hours-long pageantries of music, lights, color, movement; none of this forty-five minute Midnight Masses; I didn’t go to a service that was less than three hours long. It was great.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/york_zps1c9ea07d.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/york_zps1c9ea07d.jpg.html)
“York Minster was great, the most-perfect cathedral ever built.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/canterbury_zps7939dd54.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/canterbury_zps7939dd54.jpg.html)
“But of course, Canterbury Cathedral was my favorite, because of so many personal associations with it.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/wc-e_zpsdc4a27b4.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/wc-e_zpsdc4a27b4.jpg.html)
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/wc-i_zps278c2b78.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/wc-i_zps278c2b78.jpg.html)
“The best services, though, were at Westminster Cathedral in London. A few hours long, mostly music with damned little chitchat, long lines of choristers and clergy, candles and incense all over, lots and lots of Latin so that God could understand what was being said, splendor and awe all over. Now, that was Christmas.â€
to be continued
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During the night, Saturday night into Sunday morning, it snowed again, here on the roof of Nebraska, in the eastern foothills of the Sandhills. The temperature soared to a Miami-like 9 degrees.
I dunno how much snow we got; judging from the way things are covered, and that there's no wind to blow the snow around, I'd guess maybe three inches.
When I was sleeping during the night, I dreamed I was part of an ice-skating party on the river here. Clare Boothe Luce and I, with our ice-skates still on, were roasting marshmallows at a fire on the riverside, and watching others skate.
There was Lyndon Johnson sliding by us, bent slightly forward, his hands clasped behind his back a la the Duke of Edinburgh or the Prince of Wales.
There was Adlai Stevenson in lederhosen, not being very adept.
And Aristotle Onassis holding hands with Aimee Semple McPherson; McGeorge Bundy with Mary Todd Lincoln; Dag Hammarskjold with Grace Goodhue Coolidge; William Howard Taft (actually despite his size a good ice-skater) with Bella Abzug, and so on.
It was better than any Ice Capades show.
Then everybody left, and I walked back to the house, but in walking back here, I got lost--after all, it's 500 yards between the river and the back porch, a lot of territory--and while stumbling by a grotto, some wimpy-looking guy with a bag of pretzels came out, but before I could ask him where I was, I suddenly woke up.
to be continued
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The neighbor’s wife and all the children came by today; as it’s too cold and there’s too much snow, rather than going to the big city, she and decided to merely go dine at the bar in town.
Swede, the cook of Norwegian derivation, was there.
I didn’t keep track of all the dishes, but the neighbor’s wife had cotoletta alla petroniana, one of the twin 12-year-old daughters had prosciutto di parma, the other twin had acquadella o latterino fritto, the 10-year-old son had what I had, the 4-year-old son had pansotti alla genovese, and the 9-month-old infant daughter had parts of all what her mother had.
I had my usual, a hamburger well-done, pressed down hard on the grill so as to squeeze out every drop of grease, French fries done on the grill instead of in the fryer, and a side-dish of sour cream.
The neighbor’s wife and I had coffee-with-milk; the children all had milk, and excepting for the infant, more than just one glass of it.
For dessert, the other five had cassata siciliana, while the eager young lad and I had big dishes of vanilla ice-cream.
- - - - - - - - - -
We’d drawn names for “big†Christmas presents this year, as we had in the past. I’m of course not part of the family, but I’ve been in on this for more than a decade. It’s always supposed to be a secret, who draws whose names, but somehow the eager young lad had learned that I had his name.
What he didn’t know, because he’s not aware yet that adults know it all, know everything, is that I knew he had my name. If I expected something decent from him, I’d better give him something decent.
I’d discussed it already with his father, the neighbor; I want to get him a firearm that a kid can be competent with, but at the same time, it’s considered an adult firearm, and adults use it. I have no idea what that’d be, but the neighbor and I, as soon as the weather moderates, are going to go around to see some people and their offerings.
Oh my. franksolich purchasing a firearm.
<<<avid supporter of the Second Amendment, but prefers to own an alternative means of self-defense that can actually be more lethal than a mere gun.
- - - - - - - - - -
“Oh, I’m so sorry, I forgot,†the neighbor’s wife said when we all were half-done with dessert. “Today’s one of those unhappy anniversaries for you.â€
Yeah, I said, but it’s no big deal, as it was a very long time ago; on this very day, when I was 23 years old, my grandmother died. My mother, her oldest daughter, had died five years previously, and after that, my grandmother had become the most important person in this life, as I had strained relations with the older brothers and sisters, who’d been hippies and were still Democrats.
My grandmother spent her entire life in northeastern Pennsylvania.
“It was weird, how that worked out,†I said.
“It was in March of that year that my aunt, the youngest daughter of my grandmother, wrote me, saying ’grandmother is dying; you’d better come.’
“This aunt was a registered nurse, and a very good one, and had taken care of my grandmother for years.
“I was too young to have ever known my grandmother as a competent person; as far back as my memory goes, she’d always been senile, and a little bit silly. But a cousin of mine, a year younger than me, and I just naturally ’took’ to her even when we were just toddlers.
“My grandmother was very ancient; she was 89 when she died. Born into a very large family of Slovakian-Judaic immigrants, she’d never had more than a second-grade education. For whatever reasons now long ago lost to history, a German immigrant who was a college graduate (in civil engineering) fell into love with her, and they got married.
“It was a great marriage, as stable and fulfilling as Hell.
“My grandfather was undeniably the one who wore the pants, but that never bothered her, or anybody else. They had six daughters, and at the tail end when my grandmother was middle-aged, a son.
“My grandfather of course had wanted sons, but being deprived of that until near the end, he instead raised his girls as if they were boys. They did all the girl things of the time and place, but they did most of the boy things too; baseball, tennis, hunting, fishing, the hard subjects in school.
“They pre-dated the womens’-libbers by at least a generation and a half; they were all independent and had careers--not mere secretarial or file-clerk stints--before they married. After marriage, they either stayed at home or continued in their careers, whatever worked out. They all married well, and those marriages, every single one of them, lasted the lifetimes of the partners.
“This was a solid, rock-ribbed Republican family-values family.
“I don’t remember much of it, being too young at the time, but anyway, in 1964 my father was a Rockefeller man, and my mother a Goldwater woman. That gives you an idea.
“I suppose they were middle-class, given his income and his status as a professional engineer, but for whatever reasons, they lived in a coal-town, where all the other inhabitants were miners. This was the family that had indoor plumbing, a nice car, and a good office job, but nearly everyone with whom they associated were coal-miners. Everyone was equal in the eyes of God, and so thus in their eyes too.
“It was on a summer Sunday morning when my grandfather was asked to go down into a mine, to inspect something everybody was nervous about. He descended into the bowels of the earth, looked at it, gave his judgement, and then came back.
“However, never having been a coal-miner, he didn’t know how to breathe while down there, and inhaled a particle of coal, causing pneumonia. This was during the height of the second world war, and penicillin wasn’t yet in popular use. He lay under an oxygen tent for three months before he finally died, in middle-age.
“By this time, about half his daughters were competent young adults, and they took over the care and maintenance of my grandmother and her younger children.
“It appears most thought of my grandmother as some sort of incompetent, and so while they of course treated her with dignity and respect, they really didn’t pay much attention to her, personally. That was for her grandchildren to do, especially two of her grandsons.
- - - - - - - - - -
“So it was in March of that year my aunt wrote me, ‘grandmother is dying; you’d better come.’
“Well, I was young and insensitive at the time, and so wrote back, ‘yeah, I’ll come, but I’m not yet sure when.’
“Then my aunt wrote again in June, ‘grandmother is dying; you’d better come.’
“I wasn’t ready to go, I said, but I’ll come sooner or later, trust me.
“Then my aunt wrote again in September, ‘grandmother is dying; you’d better come.’
“Hold on, hold on, I protested, ‘I’m really busy right now, but I’ll come.’
“Finally the first week of December, I received a new letter; ‘Come. NOW.’
“I dropped everything and immediately went. The airplane couldn’t fly fast enough to suit me.
“I arrived there this very morning all those years ago; she died in early evening, my cousin and I holding her in our arms, her soul flying away to God as if a bird quickly and deftly escaping a snare.
“While the body was being wrapped, someone commented, ‘you know, she sure lasted a lot longer than what could’ve been expected.’
“The physician, who was still at the bedside, said, ‘yes; it was almost as if she was waiting for someone, before she went away.’â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“It was then,†I explained to the neighbor’s wife, “that I became acquainted with one of the most hideous, depraved customs of people who have no sense of decency and courtesy.
“Around here, and in all other parts of Nebraska excepting blue-collar working-class ethnic neighborhoods of Omaha, we don’t have ‘wakes;’ they’ve never been part of our culture, part of our lives.
“This was the first--and only--’wake’ I’d ever seen. It was squalid, tawdry, bad taste.
“It was unspeakable. Here, my aunt was all tired out, worn out, and death of course is an occasion for solemnity, contemplation, prayer, and mourning. But she wasn’t going to be left alone.
“My grandmother was very old, and so everybody knew her. Barely had the corpse been carried away to the funeral home, before people were flooding inside the front door, loudly demanding to be fed and liquored. It was a reasonably-size house, but there was standing-room only.
“I was appalled. What the fu--dge was going on here? How come all these people were acting like barbarians, savages, primitives? They were eating like pigs, and making drunken sailors look models of sobriety.
“I could not believe it. I was horrified.â€
to be continued
-
The femme came by last evening, Tuesday evening, which was a good thing, because over the night the Sandhills once again descended into the deep freeze, with wind-chills in the -30s. She brought along a guest, a fellow college instructor from some similar institution in Pennsylvania, visiting here on a seminar.
They wanted to go dine at the bar in town, where Wanda, the cook of Polish derivation whose specialty is Chinese cuisine, was working that night, but I protested, as I was ill. I dunno what it was, but about mid-day the stomach had been seized by something making one wobbly, and I was trying my best to not bother it.
No intestinal distress or gastric gases, just an uneasy stomach. I’d resorted to having only water, nothing else, until the crisis passed (which it hasn’t yet).
So they decided to dine here, on broccoli, pasta, and cheese, while I dined on water.
As the femme and her guest did the cooking in the kitchen, I set up the dining room table, still extended from one end of the room to the other, still with the large 32-taper candelabra in the center, and still with a mountain of natural fir greenery heaped around it. I put their china and silver at the far end, and a glass of water for myself at the other end.
- - - - - - - - - -
I was of course cordial and friendly with the femme’s pal, but still nervous about her. She struck me as having not all, but some, of the major characteristics of primitivity; judgemental, a know-it-all, and contemptuous of all people and places new to her.
And I was right.
Sometime during the middle of the supper, she commented, “You know, it’s very interesting, your accent. You speak differently from everybody else around here.â€
I bristled. “I’m sorry, madam; I’m not speaking clearly enough?â€
“Oh no,†she hastily corrected me; “you’re speaking with utter clarity and preciseness, there’s no mistake about a single word you say, nothing needs repeated or guessed at, but still, you’re speaking differently from everybody else, and you being a native Nebraskan, I thought--â€
Uh oh. The femme had “explained†me to her before they’d arrived.
- - - - - - - - - -
Surrendering, I said, it’s a reconstructed Tudor accent. It’s strange because there’s no one alive who ever heard the Tudor accent in its original. It’s odd, but they have no idea what it is.
Since the femme had already explained me to her, including the secret deafness, I went on. “You see, I didn’t learn to speak intelligibly until I was a junior in college, 20, 21, years old, and as I had no idea of English as it’s correctly spoken, I had to be taught from the ground up.
“Speaking modern English--other than the mere vocabulary, which is something else--was deemed too difficult for me to grasp, and so they went backwards, first to the 18th century accent, then to the accent of the King James Bible and Shakespeare, which I still couldn’t grasp, it being too complicated, they settled upon the English accent as used in the 1542 Anglican Book of Common Prayer.
“The earlier the English is, the less complicated it’s pronounced.
“Yes, yes, it sounds odd, but on the other hand, as you’ve already admitted, madam, it’s eminently understandable. It’s light-years better and easier than the ways I used to talk.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“It must’ve been difficult for you, growing up,†she said.
I bristled. “Actually no, madam; it was as easy as strawberries-and-cream growing up.â€
“But you in a small town and all that,†she insisted.
“No way,†I came back; “that I grew up in small towns was an advantage, not a detriment.
“Contrary to what people in blue states think, small towns are bastions of tolerance, getting along with others, diversity, respect for the limitations of others, acceptance.
“It’s in the big blue cities where bigotry and intolerance flourish, where bullying and isolation and shunning happen.
“I wasn’t even aware there was a problem with the way I talked, until some hippie wearing a McGOVERN-SHRIVER campaign button in Lincoln, mocked me.
“He was right, of course, in that I spoke all wrong and that, but that was rather rude, an adult mocking and ridiculing a 12-year-old kid.
“Some people have no class, and they’re usually a certain sort of primi--er, people.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“Well, what mystifies me is that your parents didn’t do anything earlier--â€
“Whoa, madam,†I interrupted. “My parents, God rest their souls, did all they could, what they could. But as it turned out, they had six hippie adolescents and two small boys at the end of the line, each of them with his own particular problems. By the time they had my younger brother and me, they were pretty old and worn out, mostly from trying to get the older children on the right track…..and failing.
“The one flaw in their thinking--but nobody’s perfect, nobody thinks of everything--was that the deafness, rather than the speech impairments, was the problem that needed addressed. They were trying to solve an insolvable problem, at the expense of dealing with solvable problems.
“They should’ve left the deafness--about which nothing could be done--alone, and instead tackled the problems with speech, about which much could be done. Deafness can be hidden and draw no attention, but there’s no way one can hide one’s speech.â€
I got up to get another glass of water, as this was likely to be a long conversation, and I wished to take advantage of it, as here was someone who needed, badly, illuminated.
to be continued
-
“So you were an adult--true, a young one, but an adult nonetheless--when you decided on your own to undertake speech therapy. Nobody pushed you into it, no one suggested it?â€
Right, I said; “it was just an idle idea of mine, one summer afternoon when I was working in the firearms room of the wholesale hardware distributor where I was employed, and as the University of Nebraska’s school of speech pathology was then located on the city campus, on my way home every day, it was no problem at all to drop in.
“It’s no surprise to me, how life hinges on random by-chance little things, this being one of them. After all, several years later, I ended up wandering around the socialist paradises of the workers and peasants simply because one Sunday evening when writing letters, I discovered I had a spare postage stamp, and wanted to use it up.
“Really. It was nothing more than that.
“So I went there, and got evaluated. They expressed hesitation about me working with their graduate students, because of my age and circumstances. They were at the time (they no longer are) geared more towards speech therapy for young children.
“Also, it was gently suggested my problems were so ‘severe’ as to demand professional, not amateur, help, and that social services would probably be happy to pick up the expenses, as this was something I obviously needed.
“My main objection to that was merely convenience; as I’ve said, the school was located right on my way home, whereas such professional services were located way out on the other side of the city.
"I also pointed out I was fully aware I myself would have to do 90% of the work; that I wasn't going to just sit back and let the other person do it (which of course the other person couldn't anyway).
“They hemmed and hawed, and finally found a graduate student will to take me; she was pretty old, 25 years old, but as things happily worked out, it was convenient for her too. Her husband worked, and she attended school, and they had two small children at home. And my own schedule was such that evenings would work best.
“This way, she had no child-care expenses, and I didn’t have to cut down on hours at work; we met five evenings a week, from 6 p.m. until 8-10 p.m. It was pretty rigorous, because I had said I wanted to do it only two years, until I graduated from college.
“Because it was during the evening, the building was mostly locked up, and we took whichever room had an open door. The rooms were furnished for small children, and we had to sit on those kindergarten-sized chairs.â€
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/begspt_zps2ee07788.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/begspt_zps2ee07788.jpg.html)
franksolich at the beginning of speech therapy; “before†and “after†photographs to come
The two who followed her during the next two years were somewhat younger, 23-24 years old, with this 20-21 year-old “patient.†I think I was so easy to place after the first one, because they didn’t have to adjust their own schedules, evenings working out best for them, too.
“As it evolved, the first student had to tear down, utterly destroy, all of my speech that had been my life; the second one to reconstruct it, and the third one to refine it.
“So the first one had the hardest job; after all, she was bent on destroying my self-identity, and that’s not a comfortable process for anybody.
“It took her three months to get me to look at myself in a mirror. All my life before, the only time I’d glanced at myself in a mirror was when quickly walking past one. She demanded that I look in a mirror as I spoke with her.
“That was Hell; I wouldn’t do it. Every time, after giving it the Boy Scout try, she gave up and we went on to other things. But she began every session trying to get me to look into the mirror, making it pretty clear that sooner or later, I’ve have to.
“So I finally conquered the mirror, thinking the worst was over.
“But no, it wasn’t. Among other things, I had to learn eye-contact.
“I’d always watched people when they spoke to me--I had to, to understand what they were saying--but when I was speaking with them, I averted my eyes.
“That was harder than Hell, but as you can see all these years later, it worked; it’s very hard for me to unglue my eyes from the other person when I’m speaking.
“Now, because of deafness, such therapy involved a great deal of touching, grabbing, and groping.
“And they were young women--good-looking too--and I was a young male. I dunno, but I doubt such a level of intimate personal contact between a speech therapist and a patient would be tolerated today--I mean to say this involved a great deal of touching--but as I considered them as medical professionals, it was okay.
“Nothing untoward, or even mildly uncomfortable, ever happened, although there were times the student looked as if she wanted to beat me up, out of frustration. And any of the three could have, too.â€
to be continued
-
“Well, no way was it fun,†I replied to the guest, after she’d asked why it’d been so difficult.
“My years between 17 and 23 were the roughest years of my life, and these two years of speech therapy were right in the middle of that span, at the nadir. There were a lot of things going on, hardly any of them good, in between the unexpected death of my father when I was still in high school, and when I finally esca--er, graduated from college.
“What I remember most was this sense of urgency that while my whole world was falling apart, it was absolutely necessary that I myself stay together, in one piece. I had to stay together.
“The worst thing I was doing was drinking, and lots of it. For a while, several months or so, I tried marijuana and hashish, but became bored with it, and dropped it, so it didn’t become a problem.
“I was in college, where I didn’t want to be, and resented being, but there’d always been this deal about me that once started on something, I’d better finish it.
“In fact, up to the day I graduated, it never occurred to me that, as a legal and competent adult, if I didn’t want to be there, I didn’t have to; I could’ve just dropped out and went to work.
“Really, that never occurred to me. At no time.
“Once I started something, I was obligated to see it to the bitter end.
“Speech therapy was the hardest thing I’d ever done in my life, before or since; it's very difficult, coming to realize what an ass one has been, and to have all delusions about oneself dashed to pieces.
“I guess too I could’ve dropped it at any time, but something else was going on. Life was so lousy, so crummy, that my five evenings a week there were the only stability in my life at the time. Of course I had friends and stuff, but they were in the same boat I was, lost and at odds with themselves.
“My relations with the older brothers and sisters ranged from non-existent to acrimonious; they were much older than I, married with families, and even into maturity clung to their decadent depraved hippie values. The only thing we had in common was that we’d all come out of the same two bodies.
“Speech therapy was, essentially, all I had that was good.
“If life had been easier for me, I probably would’ve dropped out, but the harder it was, the more I was determined to last it out, to see it to its end.
“In hindsight, I realize what a burden I must’ve imposed upon three innocent young women; I wasn’t just a speech therapy case; I was saturnine, sullen, glum, pissy, bitchy, only reluctantly cooperative, a basket case. They weren’t yet old enough and professional enough to maintain a sense of detachment from a ‘patient.’
“I always thought it’d make a good movie, one of those touchy-feely movies women like so much, three young and naïve women trying desperately to change a surly, snarly, bitter, angry youth around; all the campus scenes, and classical music playing in the background during leaves falling from trees in autumn, the snows of winter, the greening of spring, the hot days of summer. Plenty of light-hearted parts, but also many dark shadows and threatening moments.
“After the first two semesters with the first student-therapist, I was evaluated by professionals, who expressed cautious optimism that all seemed to be going beyond their wildest expectations and hopes. I wasn’t seeing it, though; it seemed to be getting worse and worse.
“I guess it was encouraging that they no longer thought that professional therapy would be better for me than what I was getting from them; that they thought they could handle me.â€
to be continued
-
Oops, it was already dark outside, and the thermometer was visibly falling, so I decided I had to telescope the tale, even though there was s-o-o-o-o-o-o much more to describe, so that the femme and her guest could get back to the big city before it became Arctic.
“The second student-therapist, when I first met her, of course the first things I noticed about her was that she was a blonde, and had jugs way too big for her size.
“Thinking of the first one, who’d been like an old-time schoolmarm, I thought to myself, ‘ah, this is going to be easy; she’s a bimbo, and I’ll get any way I want with her.’
“Once again, proving the futility of first impressions; she was actually the toughest of the three, and drove me hardest of all. I didn’t like it, but resigned myself to it, because she knew what she was doing, and it was all for my own good anyway.
“She was 24, and had a boyfriend who worked until 10 p.m. every night, after which they‘d meet at a late-night restaurant downtown.
“She was also an ‘art cinema’ aficiando, and there was a gap between the end of our sessions, and when her boyfriend got off work…..and it was during this gap that the art museum across the street sometimes showed old classic movies.
“I wasn’t into movies, but as I wasn’t doing anything else in particular at the time, offered to go with her, and be her male escort downtown. Downtown Lincoln had a reputation for crime, but that’s all it was, a reputation. In reality, it was safe, but people usually judge things by reputation, not by reality.
“So….we went to a lot of ‘art movies’ together, and then went downtown. If neither she or her boyfriend cared, I dined with them. But if it looked as if things were going to get passionate, I made up some excuse to not hang around.
“However, despite me doing her this grand favor, she still drove me hard.
“After two more semesters, there was another evaluation by professionals, during which time again I was told “progress†was awesome, that I was truly a phenomenon.
“All of which I dismissed; after all, no one had yet accused me of sounding like Peter O’Toole.
“In fact, I felt as if I were speaking stupider than ever.â€
- - - - - - - - - - -
“After a summer off, I started with a third student-therapist. She was 23--I was 21 by then--from Omaha, a brunette, rightfully proportioned, and always wore a really nice scent. As she had the easiest job of the three--to “refine†my speech--there were no scenes, no tantrums, no explosions, no pouting, no being a jerk.
“I need to stress it wasn’t that the first two were inadequate--no way--it was just that they had tougher jobs to do, and when things don’t seem to be going well, one takes it out on whoever’s driving one.
“The first two were just as wonderful as the third one.
“Anyway, she had a boyfriend in Omaha who was a Nebraska football fan. I had a student football season ticket, which I didn’t use. In my whole life, I’ve seen, in person, the Cornhuskers play a game four times…..and saw them lose all four games. And this, during 10-1 or 11-1 seasons.
“My presence was obviously a jinx on the fortunes of Nebraska football. I offered her the season football ticket, for her boyfriend, which surprised her very much. Yes, yes, yes, she wanted it, but wanted to pay for it.
“Now, even though I’d been laid low, dashed to the pavement, all these few past years, I still retained some sense of morality and principle. The season ticket cost me $25, and she offered me $200 for it, a little less than the going market-rate of $250.
“I was never an eBay primitive, trying to gouge the market for whatever the market was willing to pay. True, I could get $200 for it in a second, but was it right? Charging $30 for it would’ve covered the cost, and the time and trouble of getting it; charging $50 for it would’ve put me in the league of windfall profiteers.
“Just because one’s offered something, doesn’t mean one should take it.
“I solved the matter by simply giving it to her.
“However, that didn’t buy me any favors; while the gentlest of the three, she was still pretty tough.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“About two weeks before the end of our second semester together--it was springtime, it was still light outside, and birds were flying around, apparently singing (although I wouldn’t hear it), and for some reason long ago forgotten, we quit early, she going her way and I going my way.
“When I walked across the street, where the college of business administration was located, a stranger approached me, asking directions to somewhere. I understood the question, but the directions were lengthy and complicated.
“In the past, I would’ve just mumbled ‘I dunno,’ and walked on.
“This time, I explained the directions, the stranger got it, thanked me, and walked on as I walked the other way.
“Then, suddenly inside my head, it was as if the skies had burst open, revealing choirs of angels loudly singing ‘Glory to God in the Highest.’
“There arose a certain violent exhilaration and joy inside of me; inside my head, I started shouting, ‘I CAN SPEAK, I CAN SPEAK! I CAN SPEAK! THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, I CAN SPEAK!,’ and I wanted to do cartwheels, somersaults, and hand-springs all the way home, hugging and kissing and dancing with every person coming my way.
“’I CAN SPEAK! FREE AT LAST, FREE AT LEAST, THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, I CAN SPEAK!’
“Fortunately I managed to get home and collapse on the couch before I made a fool of myself.â€
I looked at the femme’s guest on the other end of the table.
“That may sound corny or hokey, madam, but that’s the way it was, and I’m not embarrassed about admitting it. Despite that much good has since happened since, that particular moment was the most glorious, the most joyous, the most exhilarating, the most awesome, moment in my life.
“I’ve never felt anything close to it. It was the most wonderful, the most glorious, moment of my life.â€
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franksolich two weeks after completing speech therapy, still dazed at the wonder of it all
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franksolich seventeen years after speech therapy, mellow and content
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franksolich recently, still speaking intelligibly after all these years
to be continued
-
Late this afternoon, I went to town, to the house where I’d had Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve dinners last year. My hostess is no longer there, her mind finally corroded, and she having been compelled to move into the nursing home. Her husband had been around last year too, but died earlier this year.
I was hoping to see one of their nieces, a farmwife who lives in the next county, and who apparently is in charge of her aunt’s property. She too had been there last Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve.
But instead, a different niece was there, this one from Lincoln, and circa 60 years old, resembling very much the late Marchioness of Reading; I’d never met her before. She was in the living room, folding and assorting piles of bed linens, towels, blankets, quilts, as the house needs emptied for sale.
After introducing myself, I told her I wished to return something her aunt had given me last year; I’d protested at the gift, saying it was a family heirloom and really belonged in her family, and besides, it was very valuable.
Making no headway at the time, I finally accepted it, depositing it into a safe-deposit box, intending to return it when I could deal with a competent member of the family.
Since she didn’t know me, I had to explain things. My association with her aunt was strictly sentimental, and we’d gotten along like strawberries-and-cream.
“You see, she’s the exact age my mother would be, if my mother were still alive, instead of having died in middle age. Well, actually, she’s eleven days older, but same thing.
“I always wondered what my mother--and my father too--would be like, if she’d grown old, because my image of them of course is frozen when they died, still reasonably young and vigorous. And this was a very long time ago; I have no idea what they’d be like, if they were still around, and gotten old.
“Last Thanksgiving, before dinner, she was showing me some things, including her very large collection of music-boxes.
“Unbeknownst to her, even though I’m deaf, I can ‘hear’ music-boxes, and since it’s so wonderful, I can even fall into a trance, ‘listening’ and rewinding and ‘listening’ and rewinding and ‘listening’ over and over again.
“I hold it in my hand, or shove it against my neck or the side of my head, or set it on a knee-cap, or push it anywhere that the bone is closest to the surface of the skin, and ‘hear.’
“It’s such a rare thing for me to ‘hear;’ I look at catching three minutes of music in the same way hearing people might think of a good hours’-long dinner or some other pleasurable experience.
“I mentioned to [her aunt] that there was a particular piece by Andre-Joseph Exaudet, a minuet, that I first heard on a music-box, and I couldn’t let go. I sat on the side of a bed listening to it for hours, over and over, all the succeeding times being just as good as the first time.
“Every note in it seemed to capture one or another of the essenses of my mother.
“By unfortunate chance, she knew the music, and knew she had a music-box that had it; it took her a while, but she found it, this one,†I said, placing it on the table.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/samueltroll1866_zpsda370624.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/samueltroll1866_zpsda370624.jpg.html)
--not the music-box, but very similar to it
- - - - - - - - - -
“She insisted that I have it, but I refused. This is an 1866 Samuel Troll music-box, and although I have no idea what it’s worth, it’s probably worth a great deal. In between Thanksgiving and Christmas last year, she sent it to a jeweler in Omaha, who cleaned it and authenticated it. She gave it to me last Christmas Eve, and as I was pressed for time, this time I accepted it, with the idea of returning it later.â€
“But why don’t you want it?†the niece asked.
“Well, it’s obviously a family heirloom of yours, madam; she told me it came out here with the family from Indiana in 1879.â€
“Yes,†she said; “they were well-to-do, and in the days before phonographs, they acquired a large collection of music-boxes. I don’t know how many--my cousin’s having the collection appraised--but there were over 200 of them, all of them from before the 1890s.â€
Yeah; I’d seen the collection last year, the whole array.
“But why don’t you want it?†the niece asked again; “she wanted you to have it.â€
“But I don’t know what to do with it,†I said; “to me, it’s just a music-box, and to someone in your family surely it’s more than that.â€
“You should keep it anyway,†she countered; “and surely there’s someone you can leave it to.â€
Uh, problem, I said. “As the last surviving member of my own family, all the heirlooms going five generations past ultimately devolved upon me; I have a whole storage unit rented to hold them, the china, the silver, the linen, the photographs, the letters, the diaries, even, so help me God, a Hawaiian shirt with a straight seam that’d been worn by an older brother of mine when he was little. All sorts of things.
“I have six nephews and nieces-in-law onto whom these things are being passed, and there’s rather much of it already.
“And now there’s this music-box, which is valuable, but has no meaning to any of them.
“I dunno what to do with it; best that it return to your family.â€
“She wanted you to have it.â€
After some more chitchattery, as it was, I resignedly left with the music-box.
to be continued
-
The business partner was here earlier today, and we hauled a horse-trailer to a customer over on the other side of the Missouri River, in Iowa. As I did the driving, I also did all the talking.
Because of my, uh, problem, when riding with someone, it’s always necessary to accommodate for it.
I can drive and chatter, but I can’t drive and “listen,†as that involves deciphering visual clues.
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So when he drives, he talks and I “listen.†When I drive, I talk and he listens.
As I was getting ready to turn on the ignition, he started off, “I’m sorry to bother you about this, because today’s another one of those anniversaries for you; Decembers have to be a drag for you, what with so many unhappy anniversaries.â€
And then as we got underway, I got started. “No, Decembers are great months, wonderful months, glorious months, one of the happiest months of the year for me. Just because something bad happened during some of them doesn’t mean there’s any reason to be sad.
“Things happen all the time, and it’s just by random chance.â€
This was the day my oldest sister, the oldest child of our parents, had died, leaving me as the last surviving member of the family, which had once been very large. She was eighteen years older than me, and died when she was 57 years old.
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The first six children of my parents had been born in New York City, and close together, after which there was a gap of many many years, and after the family had moved to the Sandhills of Nebraska, my younger brother and I came into being.
Since she was so much older than I was--eighteen when I was born, graduating from college the same time I started kindergarten--we never knew each other very well, seeing one another usually only during holidays.
She was a college graduate, both in Nebraska and Virginia, in French.
She was also the first in the family to vote for a (D).
- - - - - - - - - - -
“My father was a true child of the twentieth century,†I told the business partner; “a big believer in ‘planning,’ in ‘scientific methods,’ in ‘control and manipulation.’
“My younger brother and I escaped all that, but the older six were raised by the book, the book of Dr. Benjamin Spock.
“The book was thrown away after the sixth child, because it was thought there wouldn’t be any more.
“So when my younger brother and I came along several years later, the parents were older and tireder, and simply raised their last two by parental instinct.
“The older six took a toll on the parents, to which I credit their early deaths. Both of them died of sheer exhaustion more than anything else. In case you think that’s being egotistical or arrogant, remember that my younger brother and I hadn’t been around long enough yet to cause them any disappointment or discouragement when they died. We could have, but they just didn’t live long enough for it to happen.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“Anyway, so this sister, she married a high school teacher who drank too much; he treated her okay, but his drinking significantly deteriorated his health. Some people can imbibe lots with no ill effects, while just a little bit can significantly impair others, and he was of the second sort.
“They had one daughter.
“Because she was our father’s favorite child, she’d grown up rather high-strung and of the hypochondrial sort. She first started seeing psychiatrists and chomping on mood-altering pharmaceuticals when still in college.
“The problem being, the more she did of that stuff, the more of it she needed to do.
“And it was the same with the next five; they really believed that science and chemistry could cure whatever ailed them; this ‘better living through chemistry’ bullshit.
“I once asked friends of my parents--they having been long dead by this time--why my parents had been that way, putting up with it. I was illuminated that my parents had grown up in times and places where ailments and afflictions were deadly--smallpox, pneumonia, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, whatnot--and that they’d gone into medicine about the same time many pharmaceuticals were invented, which cured, or seemingly cured, such fatal illnesses.
“After all they’d seen and dealt with before, they considered drugs a miracle, and all their older children adopted the same attitude, this ‘better living through chemistry’ bullshit.
After which I reminisced about some of the other brothers and sisters.
“I constantly advised and counseled against their drug-use. Drugs have a use, I said, but drugs were no cure-all; to get better, one had to be doing some other things. And since side-effects from drugs--especially from so many different ones taken at the same time--were, really, unknown, it was best to use them only with great caution, rather than chomping down handfuls of them as if popcorn.
“’Have you ever thought about using God to help you get through things?’ I asked many times.
“But being the less-than-competent little brother, they never paid attention.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“It was at the funeral of my younger brother, when I was 19--he’d been 17--that I saw, starkly, the differences between them and me.
“By this time, they were in their 30s, married with children and careers, but they just seemed, well, incredibly old and negative about things. They’d been upset at this particular death, coming so soon after the deaths of the parents--three in thirty-eight months--and acted as if we all lived under some sort of evil star, as if God were picking on us.
“Which was of course nonsense; it was all random chance, nothing more than that.
“They were just really negative. I had nothing in common with them.
“Of course I loved them, and cared about them, but given their increasing drug-usage, they were becoming harder and harder to reach, and so I decided it was simply best to continue loving and caring, but only from a distance.
“This sister, well, her husband died when I was about 30, from hypertension. Then a few years later, their daughter died, from an internal hemorrhage, leaving her all alone. But the decades of heavy pharmaceutical usage had corroded her mind; there was no point in reaching out to her. I loved and I cared, and showed it, but only from a distance.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
“The last year of her life, she in and out of the hospitals in Omaha quite a bit.
“Fortunately, I had all this unused vacation time from work, and managed to get there to see her every time, even though she had not the slightest idea who I was.
“It was pathetic; the drugs had bloated her with dropsy, making her look nothing more as if a waterbed mattress laying in a bed.
“She had a living will, in which some guy from social services was named, and so even though I was her brother and closest living relative, I had no say in anything.
“I was once asked what I preferred be done, to which I stated that the machines probably shouldn’t be shut off until, by the standards and practices of the Roman Catholic Church, she’d permanently left this time and place. She’d always been, at least nominally, a Catholic, and so I thought that a good guideline--and it was probably in fact used.
- - - - - - - - - -
“That particular December was especially trying; there were so many close calls I found myself driving to Omaha nearly every day in all sorts of winter weather, spending hours in Christmas-lighted waiting rooms, looking over a still-living person whom one could not reach.
“The night she died, I was warned a few hours beforehand that the end was near.
“After a priest administered the Last Rites, I kissed her, and then left.â€
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/0022_zps2e19dae6.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/0022_zps2e19dae6.jpg.html)
to be continued
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The pressure, the stress, the tension, of the Top DUmmies campaign finally having been lifted from the shoulders--although it starts again next week--I slept well last night.
I dreamed I was in a one-horse open sleigh with Clare Boothe Luce, Estes Kefauver, Lucy (Mrs. Rutherford B.) Hayes, and Mohandas Gandhi, skimming over the snow in the woods of rustic Connecticut, in pursuit of a tree for Christmas.
It wasn't a smooth ride, though, because the poor horse kept tripping over croquet wickets buried in the snow that hadn't been pulled up for the winter, and had to dodge chickens allowed to run around free.
-
Earlier this morning, I had an unexpected visitor, a nephew of mine who lives in Denver, and had been visiting friends in Omaha the past few days.
While he was here, the neighbor, the eager young lad, the 3-year-old, and the insurance man from town arrived here after church, to do something about the large fiberglass walrus perched atop the William Rivers Pitt. Since the weather’s more clement now, we hope to get the nose blinking a red light that should be visible from the highway two miles north, indicating to travelers in trouble that someone lives nearby.
“What is that?†he sneered; “it looks like something from SeaWorld.â€
- - - - - - - - - -
This nephew, a graduate in “art,†works in a natural food co-op in Denver, being enamored of the vegetarian life-style. I’m sure he’s supposed to sell stuff, but whenever I’ve seen him there, all he was ever doing was sitting around drinking "tea" with people who I’m sure were supposed to be buying stuff, bitching and moaning and groaning about George Bush, Republicans, capitalists, the 1%, Christian “fundies,†the military-industrial complex, Bohemian Grove, &c., &c., &c.
He doesn’t make a whole lot of money, but spends a fortune on expensive mountain bicycles and trips to exotic places. He lives with a registered nurse who’s a few years older than he is, and who furnishes the dough for such things. I’ve never met her, but from what I’ve heard of her, she’s a primitive, a combination of BainsBane, seabeyond, darkangel218, and Amber on Skins’s island.
She’s had plenty of chances to meet me, but she seems afraid to.
He grew tired of her a few years ago, and is trying to get away from her…..the problem being, she finances his mountain-hiking-bicycling-communing-with-nature life, and he doesn’t want to lose that.
I, his uncle, thinks he’s a jerk about it. True, she may be a primitive, but the woman’s given him things, and if he were a man, he’d be grateful to her. But he doesn’t pay attention to me.
- - - - - - - - - -
He’s the son of a late older brother and a late sister-in-law of mine. I’d always had problems with his mother, a hippie who bought into all of this “let it all hang out†garbage. She always thought that as the brother of her husband, I owed her a closeness, an intimacy, that I wasn’t willing to give her.
It was a pain.
The best one can ever hope from me is a cordial formality, nothing more than that. However, one can think of worse sorts of association than cordial formality, such as outright antagonism or hostility.
His mother had spoiled him, deciding he was the “sensitive†sort, an “artist,†an “aesthete,†raising him to be angry and pissed off against all that is good and decent.
In fact, he’s very much like Atman on Skins’s island, down to the thinning blond hair, although some years younger than his counterpart in Connecticut, and to be honest, my twin over there has some talent, while this kid’s got no talent.
Actually, he’s not that much younger than me.
He’s always nitpicked, criticized, condemned, my own values and lifestyle, even though it’s rude; he has no respect for his elders.
It’s funny, though, because it’s happened two times that one of his friends, upon first meeting me, thought I was his younger brother. And I take every chance I can, to point that out.
Hate, rage, negativity, bitterness, ages one. And not like a fine wine, either.
- - - - - - - - - -
I explained the fiberglass walrus, meant to entice strangers to drop in.
“It looks tacky, really tacky,†he insisted.
“Look,†I said; “we’re way out here in the middle of nowhere; it’s hardly likely many aesthetes come this way anyway. I think it’s funny, and hope the thing lasts at least through half the winter.â€
to be continued
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I would hope that the walrus is holding a TV remote.
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I would hope that the walrus is holding a TV remote.
Like I've said before, this is fiction but based upon real life, as I don't have the imagination to make these things up.
The part about the fiberglass walrus is from my first winter here. I'd moved out here in autumn, and it'd been nearly twenty years since anybody had lived here.
The turn-off from the highway's hard to see, especially in black-as-ink Sandhills nights.
I wanted to be easy to find.
The neighbor's father had a great big huge old fiberglass reindeer--Rudolph, as you might imagine, with his red nose. So we set him up on top of the William Rivers Pitt (we didn't know yet the story behind the William Rivers Pitt), and using an automotive battery, made his red nose blink.
Rudolph lasted maybe half the winter, as the unrelenting winds of the Sandhills ultimately tore him apart.
-
As you know, coach, remotes often have lit control pads which are usually green.
The remote and red nose would add a certain Christmas like atmosphere to the place.
-
“That looks so bad,†the femme complained when she walked inside the front door into the dining room, where I was festooning the table with fresh greenery. I’ve grown rather fond of this idea of greenery scattered all over inside the house; it makes it redolent of Christmas.
“Can you see it from the highway?†I asked; “I haven’t had a chance yet to drive out and check.â€
Yes, one could see it from the highway, she illuminated me. “You can’t miss it.â€
The neighbor and the insurance man from town, with the “help†of the eager young lad and the neighbor’s second son, the 3-year-old, had managed to make the big red light that comprises the nose of the giant fiberglass walrus perched atop the William Rivers Pitt, blink, and apparently blink brightly.
It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here.
- - - - - - - - - -
She told me she had a pre-Christmas gift for me, and insisted I open it up right away.
Every Christmas, we’ve given each other six or eight pre-Christmas presents, things in generally the $50-100 range; the other day, I’d given her a gift card to Hobby Lobby.
It was a music box. “Play it,†she said, “and listen to it. Tell me what the music is.â€
Holding the box in both of my hands--it looks as if I’m squeezing it, but actually I’m only holding it tightly--and sitting on the edge of a dining-room chair, I pressed it against my forehead, and concentrated.
I had to play it two times before I could catch enough of it; “it’s Lo, a rose e’er blooming," I said.
She was delighted at my reaction, but I hope it’s not giving her any ideas for my “big†present from her. Music-boxes are wonderful, but really, it takes time and concentration--lots and lots of concentration--to “hear†them, and so there’s probably many other more-useful things.
Like last year, when she gave me a diamond-studded anniversary clock, one of those clocks where the workings are visible underneath a glass dome, commemorating the 60th jubilee of H.M. the Queen, which ranked as one of the best possible gifts one could get. It’s true the diamonds were industrial-grade and pretty tiny, but it sparkles.
Myself, who makes less money than she does, I give her the same thing every Christmas--five $100 gift cards from Hobby Lobby, with a long-stemmed white rose tied to it. Given that one of the skills she has that’s affiliated with her career is sewing, she appreciates it very much, as Hobby Lobby apparently sells some good fabrics, and she’s always having to design and make costumes and somesuch.
This year, it’ll be $525 though, because that’s what was in the freezer of the refrigerator in spare change gotten throughout the year. Every day, when emptying my pockets, I toss the coinage into the freezer, because this house is easy to break into--all one has to do is walk through the front door--and a freezer’s about the last place a thief would look, for money.
When in doubt, money (or gift cards) always work.
As a “gag†gift--we always give each other one of those--I’d wanted to get her a brassiere from J.C. Penney’s, but even the knowledgeable women of conservativecave couldn’t figure out her size for me. I dunno why it’s so hard; she has a 27†“band†and a 34†“bust;†what more information might one need?
So I had to get her something else.
- - - - - - - - - -
She advised me she was coming over next Saturday, with a friend, to do some Christmas cooking here.
Not for me; it’s just because the kitchen here’s so big and empty and spacious and uncluttered that it’s oftentimes easier to make something here, than in one’s own kitchen. (The neighbor’s wife, for example, cooks the Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s turkeys here; it helps keep her own kitchen uncongested for making other stuff.)
- - - - - - - - - -
Then we went out to dine at the bar in town; Swede, the cook of Norwegian derivation, was there, and she had crostini con condimenti misti, stracciatella, grissini torinesi, spaghetti alla cithara, panzanella, and for dessert, torta caprese, her favorite.
We both had coffee with milk, and I had my usual, a hamburger extremely well-done, pressed down hard on the grill so as to squeeze out every drop of grease, french fries cooked on the grill rather than in a fryer, and a side-dish of sour cream.
On our way back here, I noticed with great satisfaction, yeah, one could see the blinking walrus from the highway. It looks great…..at least from a distance.
to be continued
-
I was in town earlier this afternoon, and as it was convenient, I dropped in to wish a “Merry Christmas†to the county sheriff. This is a small place, with a small courthouse; it’s an easy matter to just drop in and talk with anybody there.
Years ago, the sheriff was a good and close friend of one of my late older brothers, and absorbed his attitude about me, that of being a somewhat less-than-competent person. That’s never bothered me, though; best to be underrated than overrated.
His attitude did change somewhat about three years ago, when in quick succession I was confronted with a firearm, in one case a revolver, in the second case a sawed-off shotgun shoved into my stomach, and both events were caught on camera.
On camera, it looked as if I’d stared the guy down, and in both instances they ran away without having done anything. (The first was later caught and currently resides in the state penitentiary; the second is still at large).
That’s the impression everybody has, that I’d stared them down.
Actually, the truth is, in the first case, I never even saw the gun, as I was focused on the guy’s face, not his hands, and in the second case I was simply startled, wondering why a gun was being jabbed at me.
But as it’s good public relations, being thought of as having stared down a gun not once but twice, I’ve never been inclined to correct the misimpression. It adds to one’s machissimo credentials; this guy has balls of steel.
- - - - - - - - - - -
“I heard you had a theft out there last night,†the sheriff said.
I looked at him as if he were Bozo from Outer Space--not because he was wrong (he wasn’t), but because I the manner of hearing people, he seems to pick up information out of the thin air without actually having heard it.
Life is not fair. Hearing people seem to have some sort of extra-sensory perception that allows them to acquire information easily and effortlessly without really “hearing†it.
While we deaf just plod along, knowing only what we’re told.
Yeah, I said, “but it’s not worth worrying about. It was just a piece of junk anyway.â€
“What was it?†he asked.
“Oh, nothing, really,†I told him; “just a walrus.â€
to be continued
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Grand theft walrus.
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Grand theft walrus.
I'll bet they left the bucket.
-
While in town, I went to see the insurance man, who with the neighbor had set the lighted walrus atop the William Rivers Pitt here, so as to be a beacon for travelers in trouble. It’s important to have something, as there’s nobody else around in this part of the county, and it’s a long walk to town.
Much to my astonishment, he already knew all about it.
Again, leaving me taken aback. When I’d awakened that morning and noticed the walrus was missing, there had been nobody else out here since the femme had dropped me off the night before. And nobody came here between the time I’d awakened, and I went to town.
Only the thieves, myself, and God would’ve known the walrus had absconded.
How do hearing people do this? I fumed. And they do it all the time, picking up information not by hearing about it, but by mere telepathy. We deaf have to be told something happened before we’re even aware it happened. And we’re at a distinct disadvantage, because nobody tells us all, and so we’re compelled to guess--and sometimes guess wrongly--to fill in the missing blanks.
Life is s-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o unfair.
“Well, that’s why people here worry for you so much,†the insurance man commiserated; “things happen around you all the time, but because you can’t hear a noise or sound giving you a clue something’s going on, you aren’t aware of it unless you’re looking directly at it.
“Everybody’s always worried that some day, somebody‘s--like that hippie Wild Bill character from northeastern Oklahoma three years ago--going to come up to you from behind, or from one of your sides, and even if he makes a lot of noise, you’re going to have no idea.
“I don’t see how you can stand the relentless stress of living without knowing what’s going on, what dangers and perils are all around you, and you’re all alone out there. If I were you, I’d want to live in town, so as to always be surrounded by other people watching my back for me.
“Really, you don’t worry about your back at all, and it makes us nervous.â€
Well, whatever, I said.
We both guessed the theft had occurred when I sleeping. And it had in fact been a theft. If the wind had blown the walrus away, there would’ve been parts and pieces left behind. But even the stakes pinioning down the walrus had been carefully pulled out of the ground and taken, along with the automobile battery used to make the red light in the nose blink.
- - - - - - - - - - -
“It’s no big deal,†the insurance man consoled me. “The in-law who loaned us the walrus is a doddering old packrat, with a whole building full of junk like this, and probably he’ll be grateful that since he won’t be getting the walrus back, it freed up more space for him to…..put more junk.
“But really, you need something out there.â€
Because this place is the only inhabited place for miles and miles around, when I moved out here, the owners had insisted that some sort of beacon be here, visible from the highway two miles north. The turnoff from the highway to the driveway leading here is difficult to find, especially during the dark Sandhills nights.
And the reason I live out here is that I was hired by the biggest cattleman in the county to live out here, so as to keep an eye on his flocks across the road (behind the William Rivers Pitt). For years, he’d tried getting one of his own ranch-hands to move out here, but their wives protested--they wanted to live in the crowded, congested eastern half of the county, rather than here. Cattle and horses after all are valuable, and it’s a good thing to keep one’s eye open for broken fences, strays, injuries, and attempts to rustle.
Nothing’s ever happened all the years I’ve lived here; one time, a horse was grazing in the front yard, but that was a small matter. But the cattleman looks at my presence as insurance, and some sort of beacon not only for my protection in case law-enforcement has to show up for one reason or another, but also for the protection of his stock.
When the old woman had lived here, there was a very tall tower, the bottom half metal girds, the top half a telephone pole, in which a bright light had been hung. That had been in use until two years ago, when the owners decided they wished to re-develop this property into a bunch of riverside cabins and permanent homes for their children and adult grandchildren.
And so when that light had burned out, it wasn’t replaced--it’s an awkward matter, requiring a truck with a crane and bucket on the end from the big city--because there’s no point in sinking any more money into something destined to be torn down anyway.
The tower’s already been partially dismantled.
(The re-election of the Big Zero had put a temporary kibosh on those plans, and so now the owners are waiting for the election of a Republican Congress in 2014, before proceeding.)
“I guess [the neighbor] and I can come out,†the insurance man said, “to put up what you’d been using, that gigantic lighted five-pointed star that used to grace that one big church in [the big city].
“A fiberglass walrus is distinctive; nobody steals lighted stars.â€
to be continued
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I liked the bit about the music box. It reminds me of something I'm still trying to learn, which is that part of humility is in accepting gifts or accepting help. I can see your point though, that it would mean nothing to any of your heirs that it might pass on to.
-
This afternoon, after work, I picked up the four oldest children of the neighbor; the 12-year-old twin girls, the 10-year-old eager young lad, and the 3-year-old boy. The neighbor and the neighbor’s wife took their youngest, an infant daughter, with them on a shopping expedition to the big city.
The 3-year-old caused a commotion when we drove up, having noticed the walrus was gone, and a towered star in its place. He looked confused, and then upset.
Even though he’d seen the giant fiberglass walrus only one time, the three or four hours his father and the insurance man had been setting it up, apparently he’d grown attached to it.
Inside the house, he stood in front of one of the picture-windows of the living room, looking out to the William Rivers Pitt, mournfully pointing, his lips trembling, and crying--yeah, he actually started crying--â€Dougie’s gone. Somebody stole Dougie. I want Dougie back.â€
The kids brought their toys along with them, as there isn’t anything, really, for their amusement here; however, they didn’t use any of them, abandoning them on the dining room table as they went on to other things here.
Rural kids have just as many toys and gadgets as kids in big blue cities, but they tend to not play with them nearly as much.
In this case, the two girls were busy in the kitchen, making sugar cookies for a Christmas party at school this coming Friday, the eager young lad helping to decorate them with various colors of icing.
So as to distract the 3-year-old, I grabbed him and a book, and went into the kitchen, too, where I sat at the table, reading to him sitting on my lap, one of his fingers following the line of words on the pages as I read.
I’d picked up a biography of Henry Wallace, and made up a story that resembled nothing what the book said; a tale about a Republican who went bad, turning into a Democrat, and as a consequence, became the laughingstock of the people, dying a clown.
to be continued
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Okay, I've just been notified that circa mid-afternoon today, I'll be having bigger fish to fry the next two weeks, so alas I'm going to have to "the end" this story.
My apologies to Skippy for giving him only a half-done story, but excresence happens.
(http://i1100.photobucket.com/albums/g419/Eferrari/walrus/fra_zpsba45ba86.jpg) (http://s1100.photobucket.com/user/Eferrari/media/walrus/fra_zpsba45ba86.jpg.html)
the end
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The 3-year-old caused a commotion when we drove up, having noticed the walrus was gone, and a towered star in its place. He looked confused, and then upset.
I would imagine Doug taking that remote control was disappointing to children stuck in the waiting room while their parents tried to shop for a car.
It seems only fitting that another disappearance related to Doug would also disappoint children.
My apologies to Skippy for giving him only a half-done story, but excresence happens.
Skippy might want to keep an eye on the DUmpster. I sense a disturbance in the force with his name on it.
-
Skippy might want to keep an eye on the DUmpster. I sense a disturbance in the force with his name on it.
Well, it's too bad for Skippy, but I've just been informed that I'm going to be eliminating water when I get the verified (verified by Diebold) winners of the Top DUmmies of 2013 shortly; apparently there's loads of surprises.
The deal is, I got to leave now, for the big city--and it's cold and high blustery winds--for a medical appointment and some shopping. I'll be gone for some hours. So I won't know until I get back.
Maybe I'll start a new story; I dunno. I must say that as an inspiration, Skippy's been a dud, flatter than other primitives who've been inspirations other times, other stories. I can't get that impression of him out of my head, him wearing a square-cut shirt that isn't tucked inside his pants. Bleeech.