A Story: When I was nine—in 1919

 

 

            I heard it before I saw it.

            The humming came from beyond the woods. The sound was lower than the whine of the 13-year cicadas that came out last year. It wasn’t the train––that came from the opposite direction. The noise was coming closer and closer, and I was out here alone.

            My forehead throbbed where Lotus had kicked me five summers ago. From my perch on a low chinaberry limb, I rubbed the scar and wondered what I’d do if I had to escape.

            Should I stay put and hope for the best or run across the yard to the cellar? Trouble was, a big piece of lava rock from Mama’s lily garden anchored the sloping, tin-covered door. Even if I pushed the stone off, could I lift the bulky hatch? 

            Spiders and rats and snakes might waylay me. And bats. We’d had bats scootch under the inside door and fly around in the house.

            Could my legs carry me to the far end of the front porch? What if I tripped over the sandbox? Or stepped on a piece of glass?

            Would anything be scary enough to make me climb over the well curb and hang inside by my hands? I shuddered at the thought of falling in. Frogs had, and they’d died. We could taste them in the drinking water like we tasted bitterweeds in Bossy’s milk.

            No, I’d climb higher into the leafy branches. Maybe I could hide myself into safety. But what if I got so scared my arms turned to jelly?

            The roar grew deafening. Whatever it was rattled and clunked worse than the old Number Nine climbing the grade to Black Mountain. Birdie stood beneath the chinaberry and barked. I shook like the lacy leaves sheltering me. Birdie’s bark became a howl. The earth vibrated. I squinched my eyes tight and hung on, digging my throbbing head into the rough bark. “Dear Lord,” I prayed.

            If I lived to tell about this, I’d better see what hit me. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes a mite. Looking up through a gap in the branches, I saw bright red letters on the gray belly of an airplane not far from my head. SANK WEAVER’S JOY RIDES, it read. The plane touched ground nearby in Daddy’s hayfield.

            Breathing a sigh, I relaxed my hold. My heart pounded like it did after I’d chased Birdie to the lower forty and back. Uncle Sank and his practical jokes. Daddy’s kid brother’d learned to fly planes in the First War. When he came home, he traveled to Fort Smith and gave thrill rides to folks willing to risk the latest invention of air travel.

            Birdie and I lit out to the hayfield. We’d give him to know he scared us out of three year’s growth.

            And for that, he’d have to take us up in his airplane.

History happenings in Octobers of the mid-to-late 1940s

 

This time last year, I wrote about a compendium I’d found. I quoted one item each from A to Z. Today, I opened another book, From Elvis to E-mail: Trends, Events and Trivia from the Post-War Era to the End of the Century by Paul Dickson, published by Federal Street Press, a division of Merriam-Webster, Inc. in 1990. I had used this book only once since 2001. During floor refinishing this summer, everything was moved and this volume was placed with other trivia books on my desk.

                Beginning in 1945 (post-war), the book tells a snippet about every important person, place or thing.

                For October that year are these entries: On the 4th: American occupation authorities in Japan ordered the imperial government to end all restrictions on freedom of speech, religion, and assembly, disband the ‘thought police,’ and release 3,000 political prisoners.

                On October 29: The first American ballpoint pens went on sale at Gimbels in NYC. They cost $12.50 each and quickly sold out.

                On October 16 of 1946, ten top German Nazi war criminals were hanged in Nuremberg. On October 25, President Truman, facing demands for housing from returning veterans and others who waited during the war, declared a state of emergency in housing and lifted import restrictions on lumber. The shortage eased only when builders developed new ways to produce inexpensive tract housing on a large scale.

                On the 5^th of October, 1947, during the first televised presidential address, Americans were asked to give up eating meat on Tuesdays and poultry on Thursdays to help alleviate food shortages and starvation in Europe.

                On October 14^th of that year, Air force captain Charles Yeager, flying the Bell X-1, exceeded the speed of sound to become the world’s first supersonic flier. The sound barrier had been broken.

                On the 20^th, the House Un-American Activities Committee opened public hearings into Communist influence in Hollywood, laying the groundwork for a blacklist of suspected subversives in the movie industry.

                On the 29^th, the General Electric Company, conducting experiments on the control of weather, used dry ice to seed cumulus clouds at Concord, New Hampshire. It produced rain.

                October 14^th, 1948 saw the beginning of a fluoridation program in NYC. The teeth of 50,000 schoolchildren were coated with sodium fluoride.

                On October 22^nd of that year, inventor Chester Carlson put on the first public demonstration of xerography in NYC.

                The first day of October 1949 saw Mao Tse-tung officially proclaiming China a Communist state.

                On the 6^th of the month that year, President Truman signed the Mutual Defense Assistance Act, which gave $1.3 billion to our NATO allies.

                On the 14^th, eleven top Communist leaders were convicted of conspiring to advocate the overthrow of the US government. On the 21^st, all were fined $10,000 and given jail sentences of three to five years.

                On the 26^th, the president signed a bill that raised the minimum wage from forty to seventy-four cents an hour.

                We’ve been told what will happen if we ignore history. Let’s don’t.

Preparing for winter -- again

~Google images~

 

          Time to bring the plants in, says Ms. Janet Carson, the horticulturist. Where do I put them? I ask myself. In front of windows, I answer.
 

          Now, I have plenty of windows but not all of them will host a plant--small, tall, narrow, H-UG-E, like the schefflera that's 3-feet wide and 2-feet tall. OK, narrow it down to possibilities: the breakfast room/green room on the southwest corner. Three windows, two doors. In fact, since the hardwood floors in the office/sunroom are again beautiful (without years of water spots from dripping plants), they won’t go in there. The Green Room/ old breakfast-room area will soon be filled. It reminds me of the late Edna Brown’s room of wintering-over plants.

          The pear-motif-ed curtains are still down to let in the light. I must cut the huge variegated privet from the west window—again for more light.

           Since this is an old house with thin-paned windows, time and weather have messed with the casings, etc. Where air can get in, I either caulk or lay vintage lace into those places, then arrange clear or colored glass pieces on top. One winter, I used fake snow fabric. That way, I could imagine an inside, but never-melting, snow scene.

          This winter, however, the newly-laid vinyl tile floor is to be considered. No water should stand on it, the tile men warned. So each plant must have its own saucer.

          
            At the south windows, on a two-by-twelve, hand-built-by-Dad, bench (we used to sit on at breakfast many years ago), I will arrange the jade plant, an 8-year-old dish garden, a drunkard’s dream, and anything else that will fit. Then, I’ll maneuver the huge schefflera into the corner.

          At the west window, I’ll bring in another like-sized bench from the front porch and place the two ferns on it, and whatever else that there’s room for. Mom’s lacy fern will go in a tall metal plant holder. The smaller plants will rest on the table in the center.

         The angel wings and beefsteak begonias and the pepperomia I might place on card-table chairs or wooden step stools. The mother-in-law’s tongue and split-leafed philodendron, the peace lilies, a corn plant and the Norfolk Pine will more than likely have to spend the winter on a back porch table covered with a flannel-backed plastic cloth. Oh, how could I forget the money plant the church gave me when I retired in 2009?

        
       Changing the subject: The theme of this year’s Season’s Greeting Letters, published in Baltimore by Mohammed H. Siddiqui, was “breeze/ breezes.” Each year he asks for haiku and tanka on a selected theme. I have been lucky enough to warrant a place or two in a dozen years’ issues. This year, he chose these poems of mine:

 

parking lot breezes

aluminum can 

rolling, rolling

 

mid-June rain

 in the porch swing

 making my own breeze

         
   May your autumn breezes bring happiness and contentment.
   And bring your plants in soon.

 

OMGosh! moments

from Google images

 

              9. 22. ’14: OMGosh! It’s 5:48 a. m. Must get up and write down an idea about how to finish a chapter of the sequel and answer a long-ago question in A Journey of Choice. Why was Dovie such a nervous wreck the night Bird Briley threw rocks at Liddy’s house?

9. 23. ’14: OMGosh! A Facebook video shows a huge elk herd crossing a highway, each one jumping the fence. One remained behind. It either couldn’t or wouldn’t jump. It tried to ream a hole in the fence large enough to scoot through. Nope. Loped down the fence a ways, perhaps to find a weak or low spot? Nope. As the herd moved away in single file, the left-behind animal got desperate. It ran back to get a good start. Lo and behold, it cleared the fence and ran like a racer. Voila!

Did the herd wait? No. The leader didn’t know there was a laggard, a coward, a fraidy-elk. Did its mother know, and instead of following, turn back to encourage her child? No. No one—not one came to its aid. “Gotta be brave and do this myself,” it might have thought. Or “Hey, there goes my sustenance. Gotta get outta’ this trap.”

I’m a sucker for a happy ending.

10. 2. ’14: OMGosh! Ten pages before the end of a great novel by Linda Apple (I read both for the story AND—being in two critique groups--the nitty-gritty stuff that’s probably the publisher’s doings), I nearly screamed. In the description of a wedding, Pachelbel’s "Cannon in D" came into focus. Oh, no! Oh, no! Pachelbel’s piece is a canon! I think the publisher’s auto-correct function took over, and since there IS the word “cannon,” the spell check function didn’t flag it. The publisher's been notified, the author said.

10.3.’14: OMGosh! When I opened the large plastic container with last year’s autumn/ Thanksgiving stuff, I was stunned: the real gourds had molded (dumb-da-dum-dumb) and covered all the glass and composite items, too. Yuck. As many years as I’ve used fresh gourds in my arrangements, I should know by now that they need airing so they will dry naturally. I DID salvage enough for a basket full of items that I placed on the buffet.

                10.3. ’14: OMGosh! As I tried to place a new (to me) pear-motif plastic platter—a birthday “flea” from two sisters—between the bracket-held shelves in the back hall, all heck broke loose when a bracket came out of its housing, and the 3/8 inch plywood came tumbling down. Swiftly, I moved my flip-flop-uncovered feet backwards as I yelled. A Niloak vase met its broken self, as did a green glass votive holder and another ceramic vase. The mower keys were under the shelf itself.

                10. 3. ’14: Scrolling through Facebook, I saw a photo that looked like my elder daughter. Beautiful smile, nice hair, well dressed, happy looking. I commented to the one who posted, “Is that J. B. with you? I haven’t seen her in ages.”

                Here’s a new poem:

3 a. m. t-storm

 leaves my yard

full of colored leaves.”

 Happy Autumn.

Epiphany: I've become my mother! But not quite

                For nine days straight, I had to leave the house to go somewhere––a doctor’s appointment, a friend’s funeral, bell practice, church, a monthly luncheon with friends, a monthly breakfast with other friends, the hospital for an out-patient procedure, another bell practice as a sub, a writers’ group meeting. Nine straight days I had to get clean, apply make-up, dress (according to the place/event), be sure I had my phone and keys and purse. And gasoline.

                Afterwards, I re-dressed to my everyday garb and laid my clothes on whatever surface was available in either the bedroom or bathroom. I would likely wear everything again.

                One day, it hit me: I had taken over one of Mom’s characteristics the way she took over Dad’s after his death. Many’s the time I visited and her clothes were layered on the recliner. Some on the back, some on the arms, some in the seat. I don’t remember saying anything to her about putting away her clothes. And I’m glad I didn’t.

                Mom always wanted to look her best even at her advanced age, so she kept her magnifying mirror and her Avon beauty products on the breakfast room table. Sis Carolyn would do her hair between perms. I often laughed that Mom was vain, but now, I do the same thing. Am I also vain? I’ll need to consider changing the description from “vain” to “wanting to look nice.” Yes, that’s it. Even into old age. Especially into old age.

                A third way I have become “my Mom” is that I religiously—no, that’s not the right word—diligently work the crypto-quotes and the crosswords, even if it’s the last thing I do before retiring. Even if it’s nearly midnight. Toward the last, Mom sat in her recliner (moved to the breakfast room where a TV sat) with a crossword book and pencil. Talk about diligence.  It wouldn’t have been right to go behind her and check her words and point out that she didn't do it right. Nope, not for one in her early nineties.

                I’ve followed her and Dad’s life-long penchant for subscribing to the state daily—the Arkansas Gazette, and then the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. They also subscribed to the Benton Courier, as do I, only now, it is the Saline County Courier. So many folks do not get a state paper—only the local one, if that. But I have to remember: most folks get their news from TV and I don’t.

                Also, like Mom, I keep house plants, including her African violets, which have grown and multiplied. I’ve shared them—like I did the pears—with any who want one, and still have babies growing in the kitchen windowsills. One of her two hanging baskets of common begonia is still thriving, though I’ve divided it into two. Her split-leaf philodendron is growing, despite the year I nearly lost it to the cold weather. Even on the back porch.

                But I’m not like Mom in other ways. I don’t attend Sunday School. And I attend church until after the anthem. Even when she couldn’t hear very well, she sat with the other ladies and sang and “listened” raptly. She liked the projection screen; she didn’t have to manhandle the heavy hymnal with her arthritic hands. People adored her.

                I can only hope to enter heaven on her coattails.

Can openers and corkscrews: adversaries

 

 

 

 

Can openers and corkscrews: adversaries

 

 

                Is it because I’m left-handed that these two machines/ implements/ kitchen aids never seem to work right?

                The electric can opener I inherited lies abandoned in an unused file cabinet on the back porch. The new one I bought, likewise. Sometimes they worked; most times, they didn’t. Could it have been the way I held my mouth, as the saying goes? Maddening!

                 I even bought a Pampered Chef can opener—one that, positioned a certain way that I can never remember, opens from the can instead from the lid. I’ve used it once.

                Right now on my countertop, several cans of soup-makings sit with a white-plastic-handled manual can opener on top. I’m hoping their proximity will provide good vibes when I ever get around to actually opening said veggies for said soup.

                Corkscrews are also adversaries. Each one I’ve had works, but holds the cork hostage inside the worm (?) no matter what I do. Short of cutting the cork out by sawing with a steak knife, I usually leave it until it’s needed again. Then, whomever is here gets to puzzle out the solution.

                I’ve begun buying tuna in sealed packages and canned fruit with plastic lids and spoons tucked neatly inside. They’re a breeze to open.

                It’s not my reflexes. I can catch a falling glass before it hits the floor. Or an aluminum pan of hot enchiladas that folds in my hand as I take it from the oven.

                It’s gotta be that I’m left-handed and these implements are made by right-handed men.

                Now and then—mostly all the time—the computer keeps me alert by moving the cursor while I’m typing, pulling up a pale screen of possibilities or skipping about on the page. Just now, the screen moved upward, my text out of sight. It’s a good thing I live alone. Otherwise, my housemates might get the idea that I’m yelling at them from another room. If computers had ears…… oh, dear.

              Another adversary is the neighborhood tom cat, unfixed, who’s found that I feed my cats outside. He lies in wait behind a shrub, on the far end of a bench, or on the rock step to the birdbath.

           The female—the only cat that’s not fixed, and who’s had (as of this very day) her third litter by that roaming roué,--comes to eat, and as soon as I disappear behind the door, he proceeds to nose her out of the dish.

Like some females of all species, she moves out of his way until he is sated. Unless I see him first and spray him with a mixture of vinegar and water.  It’s that, or go sit out near the steps with my bottle. Some days I win; some days he wins. Ambivalence, inconsistency—my strong suit as far as this goes.

Finally, Bermuda grass bedevils me by growing back into the space I removed it for expanding flower beds. “I was here first!” it seems to believe, so I find the hoe and show it who’s boss. For the moment.

Thank goodness, kudzu hasn’t gotten a foot-, uh, root-hold in my place. Bermuda, honeysuckle and privet are all I can handle.

 And that’s debatable.

              Is it because I’m left-handed that these two machines/ implements/ kitchen aids never seem to work right?

                The electric can opener I inherited lies abandoned in an unused file cabinet on the back porch. The new one I bought, likewise. Sometimes they worked; most times, they didn’t. Could it have been the way I held my mouth, as the saying goes? Maddening!

                 I even bought a Pampered Chef can opener—one that, positioned a certain way that I can never remember, opens from the can instead from the lid. I’ve used it once.

                Right now on my countertop, several cans of soup-makings sit with a white-plastic-handled manual can opener on top. I’m hoping their proximity will provide good vibes when I ever get around to actually opening said veggies for said soup.

                Corkscrews are also adversaries. Each one I’ve had works, but holds the cork hostage inside the worm (?) no matter what I do. Short of cutting the cork out by sawing with a steak knife, I usually leave it until it’s needed again. Then, whomever is here gets to puzzle out the solution.

                I’ve begun buying tuna in sealed packages and canned fruit with plastic lids and spoons tucked neatly inside. They’re a breeze to open.

                It’s not my reflexes. I can catch a falling glass before it hits the floor. Or an aluminum pan of hot enchiladas that folds in my hand as I take it from the oven.

                It’s gotta be that I’m left-handed and these implements are made by right-handed men.

                Now and then—mostly all the time—the computer keeps me alert by moving the cursor while I’m typing, pulling up a pale screen of possibilities or skipping about on the page. Just now, the screen moved upward, my text out of sight. It’s a good thing I live alone. Otherwise, my housemates might get the idea that I’m yelling at them from another room. If computers had ears…… oh, dear.

              Another adversary is the neighborhood tom cat, unfixed, who’s found that I feed my cats outside. He lies in wait behind a shrub, on the far end of a bench, or on the rock step to the birdbath.

           The female—the only cat that’s not fixed, and who’s had (as of this very day) her third litter by that roaming roué,--comes to eat, and as soon as I disappear behind the door, he proceeds to nose her out of the dish.

Like some females of all species, she moves out of his way until he is sated. Unless I see him first and spray him with a mixture of vinegar and water.  It’s that, or go sit out near the steps with my bottle. Some days I win; some days he wins. Ambivalence, inconsistency—my strong suit as far as this goes.

Finally, Bermuda grass bedevils me by growing back into the space I removed it for expanding flower beds. “I was here first!” it seems to believe, so I find the hoe and show it who’s boss. For the moment.

Thank goodness, kudzu hasn’t gotten a foot-, uh, root-hold in my place. Bermuda, honeysuckle and privet are all I can handle.

 And that’s debatable.

August, a laggard; September, a runner

 

 

                I thought surely when August finally was finished, I’d have time to work in the yard--digging privet, pulling honeysuckle, trimming shrubs, planting new mums—stuff like that. But it was too hot still, so I waited for the promised cooling.

                When the cool spell descended, I found myself tied to the writing desk and computer. First things first. An eye appointment and a morning spent with colleagues to judge our poetry branch contest entries kept me inside.

                The next week, waiting for folks to come over to gather pears for preserves, I did a smidgen of pruning. Enough to fill a wheelbarrow—Carolina moon-vine, saw briars, privet. Of course, my friends had to see the new floors. And we had to have a coffee klatch afterwards.

The next day it rained. Then I had a trip to Conway for the monthly writers’-group meeting.

                Back to the writing desk to compose another chapter for the Hot Springs novel group. And, of course, this weekly blog post.

                Confession time: On the first Sunday of September, I prepped for church where I’d directed/ played until retirement. Now, I was singing tenor in the choir. The director would be back after recuperating three weeks from surgery. The choir would sing, he’d said, a Communion anthem we already knew.

                But when I arrived in the choir room and opened a bulletin, I saw that he was singing a solo.  Turning on my heel, left. My sis followed me to the car with stuff she needed to return. I told her why I was leaving. “Tell anyone who asks, ‘She comes to sing the anthem.’”

                I want to know how many of you can--and will--set your alarm for six on Sunday morning? So you can get to church by 7:45 for hand-bell warm-up before playing in the service? We all do what we’ve committed ourselves to do, and that’s what happened this past Sunday at Bryant FUMC.

                At my advanced age and disposition, I don’t want to have to be at church at 8 a.m., which is why I dropped out of that church’s choir. Been there; done that; retired; don’t want to do it any longer, especially that early in the morning. Call me a wimp . . . if you dare.

                Finally, three hours before the deadline Monday morning, and by setting the alarm for 5:30, I finished another chapter of the sequel. It required lots of research, and was important in tying up one of the subplots.  I expected the writers to call it an information dump, but they did not, thank their sweet hearts.

                Oh, that same afternoon—Monday—I worked in the iris-yucca bed cleaning old foliage and pulling grass. I also manned the weed-eater until the two batteries gave out. So, I AM getting a little done toward keeping the bushes at bay.

The days are getting shorter, aren’t they? Oh, well, I guess so: it’s mid-September already. Wasn’t it still August just yesterday?