from hallowed ground - a ghost story

You know how you can remember your exact location when you hear certain news? Like when I was  sitting at my desk in my 6th grade classroom in November of 1963 and the PA system crackled as our principal said, “Students, it is with great sorrow that I inform you that our president, John F. Kennedy, has been shot and pronounced dead...”

Years later, I remember, exactly mind you, standing in my living room, just steps from the very room by the way, where Karen had once tried to kiss me, except that I recoiled and then she acted like I’d been somehow mistaken about the whole matter. Anyway that’s where I was standing when our mutual friend, Larry, told me Karen had moved, "lock, stock and barrel" to Boulder, Colorado. Colorado seemed so far away. But, that was me, I was never much for traveling.

“Was it some amazing job offer?” I asked Larry.

“I don’t think so, Darlin'. I think this was all just a ‘spur of the moment’ thing.' “

“Yeah, well I can’t believe she didn’t stop by to say goodbye, or at least call me. Does she even know anyone in Colorado?”

“Not that I know of, Sweetie,” his voice buoying on "know of" and falling on "Sweetie". I’d never been good at identifying gays, but anyone could have recognized the signs in Larry.

Later I searched an old U. S. atlas we had in the apartment. You know, kind of  looked it up. I traced the route she’d probably have taken with my finger. Boulder is just over 1,000 miles from Chicago.

Karen and I had been friends since grammar school. She was in the same grade as me in school but a year and a half older in age. We were fast friends by the time I was 12. I came from a large family and Karen lived alone with her mother, who worked full time. We spent whole summers hanging out together at their usually empty home. This was right around the time I became interested in boys- Wait! Did I tell you that she was what they call drop-dead gorgeous? She was half Irish and half Native American. She had green eyes, long, thick straight brown hair, and those high, prominent cheekbones most people consider a beauty trait. My problem was that every boy I even remotely liked ended up smitten with Karen.

Even though she was plenty smart, Karen didn’t do well in school. Halfway through our junior year in high school, while I was prepping for college, Karen dropped out to take a job as a waitress. It was a career she stuck with for the rest of her life. And somehow she always managed to get hired at the swankiest “in” spots. She was serving alcohol to patrons long before she was of the legal age of 21. While I held down any old minimum wage part-time job I could manage to land, while still living at home and taking classes at a nearby campus, she’d be raking in hundreds of dollars per night in tips.

Though it was clear we were growing apart at this point, we’d still find the occasional night to sit up together chatting until dawn. It was then that she’d tell me about the pilot, lawyer, or local television personality she’d met at work and was currently dating, though she never seemed to stay very long with any particular one.

Finally I met a guy who didn’t immediately lose interest in me and fall for Karen, not only that, but my parents adored him. It was shortly after I introduced the two of them that Karen and I were sitting up having one of our now only occasional confabs late into the night. I think we were looking at a photo album. As I recall, we were sitting directly across from one another, with the album half on each of our touching knees, laughing aloud at some distant memory we’d shared, when Karen, out of the blue, reached over, took my face into her hands and put her slightly open mouth towards my face. I pulled back from her, just before our lips touched. I remember being thoroughly confused. She stammered at first, then laughed and dismissed the whole thing as a joke with “Aww, I was just fooling with you,” and “You should have seen your face!”

She sent me one a single letter from Boulder, the Christmas after the year she moved, to tell me she was now relocating to California. And then another letter the Christmas after that in California to tell me that she’d met some guy in a rock band. About that time I sent her an invitation to my wedding, begging her to phone me so I could ask her to be my maid of honor. She replied via a postcard stating that her mom, who’d moved out to California somewhere nearby Karen, was ill and that thus, Karen would need to stay near her mom.

She never answered my follow-up letter which included photos of my wedding, nor any letter or card I sent after that.

It had been years since I heard from our mutual friend, Larry, so I was surprised when he called me, asking me to meet him for lunch. We met near my workplace and there, he told me that Karen, who it turns out had never married anyone, including that rock musician, had died from cancer and that she’d asked to be cremated and buried at the Indian reservation in northern Wisconsin, where both she and her mom had been born.

I made arrangements to attend the service, going online to book a hotel room for my husband and I, but it turned out the only decent place nearby was the local casino resort on the reservation itself.

Larry had sent driving directions to the reservation burial ground which was nestled in a stand of jack pines just off the banks of the local river. I recalled her stories of swimming in the river as a young child as we drove through the area. The tiny beach adjacent to the saw mill she’d talked about looked so much smaller than her descriptions.

We parked our car and walked toward the group of about 25 or 30 people gathered near the burial site. Larry was there and introduced us around. Karen’s uncle, a full-blooded tribal elder, presided. He spoke both in English and in their tribal tongue, carefully explaining the rite. A tribal group danced to a drumbeat with ("or for," I wasn’t quite sure) Karen's spirit to encourage her on her journey to the next world.

Near the burial spot was a small pile of sage leaves, tree bark and tobacco. They would be burned, her uncle explained, to help us in the healing of our loss and to aid in Karen’s passage. The tobacco smoke would carry our prayers to the Great Spirit, the sage would purify her body and soul, I somehow missed the explanation of the tree bark, perhaps it was the part for our healing. Her uncle fanned the burning embers with an eagle feather and I watched as the smoke curled toward heaven. Another man sang in their native tongue.

After the ceremony, her uncle explained that we would all, individually, take some of the unburnt tobacco and place it on the open grave holding her urn of ashes and that, at this time, we could pause as long as necessary to say our final farewell to Karen. After we expressed our final wishes and dropped our tobacco offering we were to turn away immediately and leave. He spoke in a grave tone as he emphasized, “At this point whatever you do, do NOT turn and look back at the grave. Go to your car or walk out of the cemetery but DO NOT look back.” He was quiet for a moment, perhaps letting us absorb this information, then he continued, “This is a critical moment for Karen. She is in a state of confusion now, but we must not discourage her in anyway from taking her firsts steps on her journey to her new world. Remember, DO NOT look back.” Again he was momentarily silent, then he cautioned, "We also don't want to give her an opportunity to try to take any of us with her. This will be a temptation for her."

One by one we filed by the open grave, each pausing, paying our respects and dropping our tobacco offering on Karen’s urn. And each person that I saw dutifully turned and walked away. Did anyone look back? I don’t know. I only know that I took her uncle at his word and I did not look back.

We had dinner with Karen’s friends and family at the nearby Catholic church hall. It had been a long day, a long drive and my husband and I were both exhausted, so we said our goodbyes and left for our room at the casino resort, arranging to meet Larry there for a drink. We walked around the casino until Larry arrived, then sat with him in the bar and had some wine, discussing how we were all moved by the service.

We bid good-bye to Larry, as he was leaving pre-dawn, and retired to our room. My husband took a shower first and said he would “catch up on the news.” He was sound asleep when I stepped out of the shower. I turned the television off, turned out the lights, except for the lamp by my side of the king-size bed. It had a three-way bulb which I set at the dimmest light. I pulled out a novel from my overnight bag. Maybe it was the wine, but the overpowering fatigue I’d felt earlier was completely gone. I had a suspicion it would be a while before I’d be able to fall asleep.

I was reading my book when I felt a chill. I put the book down to pull the blanket and sheet up over my shoulders, when I noticed Karen sitting in the corner of the room, looking directly at me.

“Oh, I must be dreaming,” I thought, but when I looked around the room, everything was exactly the same, our bags were on the luggage rack, the lamp on my bedside was lit, my husband was fast asleep, my book was next to my pillow, just where I'd placed it moments ago… I felt a feeling of being halfway between alertly awake and just awakening, a strange drowsy feeling.

She said nothing, so I spoke up, “You’re not supposed to be here, Karen. So I’m going to close my eyes, turn my back to you. You need to go, Karen.” I shut my eyes. I rolled over and buried myself in the sheet and blanket. Yet, I could feel her noiselessly move across the room to my side of the bed.

“You need to go, Karen," I repeated. "You need to go to the next world.” I could feel her reach out to me. And then I felt her, still surprisingly warm, hand grab my arm. I shut my eyes even tighter and curled up in a fetal position. Roughly pushing her hand away from my arm, I said in a firm voice, “Don’t be afraid. Go on, Karen, go. You are not supposed to be here.”

I lie there for a long time, deliberately not moving, but aware that she was still present. I didn’t move and I didn’t speak. At some point I must have fallen asleep. I opened my eyes and the room was lightened from the morning sun. I could hear my husband rustling in the bathroom. He poked his head into the room and said, “Hey, I’m going downstairs to look for some coffee for us.”

When he left I got up and opened the shades, washed my face and laughed at my memory of Karen’s ghost. How silly of me, I thought. That was really some humdinger of a dream.

My husband came back with our coffee. He’d also managed to find some yogurt, an orange and a banana. He put the goods on the table, saying, “I slept great. How about you?”

I reached out for my coffee, smiling, eager to tell him of my realistic but crazy dream, when he stepped back and asked with some concern, “Whoa, what happened to you? How did you get those scratches on your arm?”

I looked down to see red abrasions and scratches that looked like I'd been grabbed by some wild animal.

A Walk in the Cemetery

I rose predawn for the 4 1/2 hour drive to visit an aging priest. He'd been "assigned" to finish out his priestly duties, which now mostly consisted of praying, at his religious order's retirement center. The grounds of this senior care home were nestled in a secluded rural area of Michigan with  beautiful gardens and pathways on the sprawling acreage. It was a breathtakingly beautiful mid-October day. We'd been talking about the approach of Halloween, or maybe it was All Saint's Day, I don't remember. I also don't remember who initiated the idea, was it me? or was it him? Either way, we decided to take a walk to the cemetery. It seemed fitting at the time.

We walked slowly. He was in his late 70s, as I recall, and not in the best of health, as he was slow in recovering from a surgery he'd had.

"Do you know any of these guys?" I asked as we passed the headstones of the male-only cemetery.

He snorted and replied, "Oh, do I!"

He pointed with his cane as we passed the gravestones, his face changing from smile to smirk to surly scowl, calling out the names of his now deceased brothers-in-faith.

If close enough, he would not-so-gently double tap the headstone, mutter the man's name followed by a proclamation, in this instance, "That sissy! Hah! They should have buried him in a dress."

"That thick-headed dimwit! Ha-ha!" each "ha" matching the double tap of his walking cane with the stone, "Aah, but a candidate for sainthood! He was venerable in his own mind and it was a miracle he made it through First Studies."

Tap-tap "This one was as arrogant as- as arrogant as- you know, I can't even think of a fitting analogy! Always late for class! He claimed he had trouble waking on time because he was a deep sleeper. Hah! He was weighed down with his own hubris. It was a wonder he could rise at all."

On it went. The name, the taps, the proclamation. "The drunk! For years we'd blamed the staff for the missing booze. When he died, they found empty bottles tucked all over his room."

There were a couple of more notable ones, but I'm at the point in my life where my aging memory cells fail me. Don't you wish you could record everything in life for posterity? Oh wait, I forgot, now we can. But, I had not a smartphone nor a selfie-stick at the time.

His pace slowed, almost to a standstill. He began to lift his cane, then stopped. His face softened to match his voice, as he gently pronounced the name. There was a pause as he gazed at the headstone, then uttered, "My Lord, but I miss that man." Abruptly, his face took on a curmudgeonly look as he did a 180 degree turn. I stood amazed his aging, still-mending body was capable of such a move. He barked in my direction, "It's cold. Let's go back."

Variations on a Theme...

St. John's Wort Blues, part two

It's coming up on three years since I started my blog. Blogger is an easy enough site to use, even for people as non-savvy about tech stuff as me. I don't have anyone to assist me with this. I also don't have a proof reader or any editorial advice and I like it that way. I think, though I'm not certain, that I once turned off the comments option, at least as far as the general public's ability to add a comment, as I didn't care to hear what they had to say. I do occasionally get a comment from a friend or family member, but these are also not available for the general audience to view- I think. 

Shortly after I initiated my blog, I opted to choose a word for a theme and follow it for two or three blogs. For the month of October I'm going to return to a form of that method. On I will parse about my St. John's Wort Blues.

***

This is a beautiful, unusually warm October, so far, out here in Privatopia, actually in all of northern Illinois, including big broad-shouldered Chicago. Lots of reasons to be joyous and I am, but there remains a nagging bit of melancholy that I can't shake, you know the way a cough can sometimes linger long after you've recovered from the cold?

So, Reliable Husband sends me a link earlier this week. We have a digital news subscriptions to the Washington Post and the NY Times. He also reads the WSJ, USA Today, and such. He will often share with me interesting articles he thinks I might have missed. Anyway this particular link says, "End of the World on Wednesday, Says Religious Group"- "Have any plans for Wednesday, Oct. 7? You better cancel them… " begins the article. It turns out those same bible-thumpers from Pennsylvania who predicted back in May of 2011 that the world was ending, have now corrected their calculations and come up with October 7 of 2015 as the new date of the complete annihilation of good old planet Earth.

Now, I'll give Reliable Husband (RH) the benefit of the doubt that he sent the article not knowing I was malingering in my melancholy. But, it does set me to thinking again about the short sweetness of life. "Hey," I ask RH, "If the world was to end today would you do anything different?" Being of the male species, RH pauses a second and quickly mentions sex, the shed we were planning to have built and a red pickup truck he's been thinking about buying. He notices the dismay on my face, laughs, and says, "What? Wrong answer?"

"Well, it's just that I was thinking along the lines of completing a halloween project with our youngest grandchild and making a last visit out to see the older two grandkids in Virginia. But, along with you, RH, my regrets are few. I am completely happy with my lot in life." He smiles contentedly and returns to his coffee.

There are many blessings to aging and retirement.  "Oh yeah, like what?" you ask. Well, such as being free to do things that interest you, but that you never had time to pursue. I bought myself a guitar at a local flea market, which I am now trying to teach my arthritic fingers to play. And RH and I no longer have to worry about food, shelter and college tuition for our now grown children. But, now that I think about it, these sorts of benefits may be offset by the the new problem of worrying about every ailment that comes up. I was never really much of a hypochondriac, but I do give pause now, when I feel a pang or a sensation of general malaise. Is this it? The beginning of the end? RH confesses that he does the same. But, we continue to eat our veritable "apple a day" by exercising, eating healthy and using safe driving practices.

I make my usual super-duper breakfast smoothie, the base of which is 4 ounces of Naked Juice's Kale Blazer to which I add some plain yogurt, any fresh fruit I have at hand and a large handful of additional raw kale or spinach, when I spot the date on the container, "Enjoy by October 7, 2015," that date again! Would we live our lives differently if we knew our own expiration dates?

What if we came with expiration dates?

***

This week we were joyfully playing with our youngest grandchild in Chicago. I'm not allowed to post any photos of him on "social media." But, I don't think they'd mind this pic of his back. Isn't he cute?

Walking the same beach as Reliable Husband and I did as children

The daytime temps are still in the 70's in the city, so we grab a chance to enjoy the beach before the cold sets in. There are a few people who have the same idea. A couple of young mothers with toddlers in tow, a man in his 60s who is continually swimming lengths of the beach, a stand-up-paddle boarder way out past the beach buoys, a young couple, nestled together and sipping takeout coffee as they gaze out at the water, and a homeless man who is doing various physical exercises as his just hand-washed bedding, slung over the railing adjacent to the beach house, dries in the sun. Don't believe all those stereotypes about the homeless, I remind myself.

Flower added to keep homeless guy anonymous

Older man doing beach laps

This is Chicago's Foster Beach. RH and I grew up within walking distance to this very beach. And now we watch in awe as our young grandson frolics in careless innocence on those same sands. Okay, poetically the same sands, as I've seen the Chicago Park District refresh the sand every few years or so.

***

Well, the world did not end on October 7, 2015, at least not the world in the parallel universe in which I currently reside. Yup, life sure is sweet and I wouldn't change a thing.

I've Got the St. John's Wort Blues...

…or Please Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

I do a cursory search of the Internet and find nothing with the direct quote "I've got the St. John's Wort Blues," (or "I got the St John's Wort blues) so, if at some future date, you find the phrase somewhere on the web just remember you first read it here on my blog.

Anyway, it happens to me every year, near the end of summer, a melancholy will come over me, and if I am not careful it will overcome me. This began sometime in the late 1970's, when I was a mother of young children and it was "back to school" time. I learned quickly to control the sweet sadness by acknowledging it and then keeping it tempered by throwing myself into a project that would require a major part of my physical and mental effort, such as, refinishing a piece of antique furniture, completely redecorating a room in our home, or putting a koi pond in the yard.

(I have an acquaintance, who I'll call, oh, I don't know, how about, "Dee?" I'm almost certain Dee does not read my blog, but just in case she does, let me insert a note here, that I by no means wish to make light of those who suffer from depression, a serious illness-

Whenever I try to inject a bit of humor into a story I'm telling Dee, like the time I told her about So&so's husband being diagnosed with Lyme's Disease, she'll say something like, "You know Lyme's Disease is not a laughing matter." To which I, then, must reply, "Of course not. I was not laughing at his having Lyme's Disease, I merely meant that I was amused that when he continually complained to his wife about the fever, chills, fatigue, body aches, headaches, and an occasional rash he'd experienced, her response was, 'Oh, come on dear, how bad can it be? Suck it up, you wimp! You're getting older. You have to expect the aches and pains of old age.'  I find this laughable because it's exactly what I would have said to my Dear-but-Sometimes-Beleaguered Husband." I find humor in human failing, especially my own as a wife, mother, and well, as a human.)

Anyway, back to my melancholy, which returns annually, like the swallows to Capistrano, except I think that happens in the spring, so maybe more like the monarchs' return to Mexico. Alas, in my case, this is not a reason to rejoice. Over the years, I've attempted to understand the root of it. Was the sadness originally a sense of loss of control, that came to a "stay-at-home" mother, upon the return of her children to the school that would dominate their day? Was it a rejection of the schedules and time constraints that came with the academic routine, after a summer of spending leisurely days at the beach with nary a glance at a clock or wristwatch? As the children grew, the melancholy grew in strength. Was it the loss of their childhood, as they grew into adulthood? When they, as young adults, moved away I was crushed with "empty nest syndrome." That may have been the autumn that I single-handedly converted the backyard of our city home into an urban sanctuary, with raised garden beds (plus the koi pond), and replaced the lawn with a patio of antique pavers.

I've done an in depth self-analysis and am pretty certain that autumn reminds me of the inevitability of death, and not in a morbid way, but in a way that the acknowledgment of it makes me appreciate, all the more, every thing I love about life, including the joy of family and thus the pain when children mature and leave home; and including the planning and carryout of labor intensive projects to keep myself feeling useful in their absence.

***

It's the time of year that we must take our boat out of the water and store it for the winter. The boat happens to have a 3/4 full tank of gas, so first we have to burn some fuel. Not-So-Beleaguered-Today Husband and I take her for one last summer ride, or should I say she takes us for a ride?

Oh, and it's a picture perfect end-of-summer day - 79 degrees. The sky is softly dappled with clouds, as if the angels took a sifter of powdered sugar and sprinkled it across the blue. The sun kisses my skin with warmth. I don't worry about sunscreen today. (And to Dee, "Yes, I realize the seriousness of skin cancer.")

The lake is empty because it is past Labor Day and residents and guests are back to their autumnal schedules. Not-So-Beleaguered-Today Husband has the freedom to open up the throttle and careen right down the peripheries of the wake zone. He takes deep "s" shaped curves as we burn up the excess fuel.

I feel the wind in my face, my hair is blowing straight back (like it looks after a visit to the salon), an occasional bit of mist from the wake hits my face and I can faintly smell the lake's weeds and fresh water fish. It's a pleasant smell (certainly nicer than the local 20,000-head hog farm just miles away, which by the way is at its ripest in the fall.)

I look back at our wake and it reminds me of when I was a child and I would rise at dawn to ride my bicycle in the tall grass behind my grandfather's house in Wisconsin. The grass was wet with dew and would fall from the weight of the bike. I'd look back at the curves I'd carved out, in awe of my own cunning.

Depending on the angle, our boat wake occasionally casts a small rainbow, or the beads of water look like diamonds sparkling in the sun.  Together Not-So-Beleaguered-Today Husband and I laugh with pure joy. And my only thought is how I wish that I could preserve this moment forever. I take a photo, but that's not quite the same. I put down my smartphone, determined to experience the moment, to hold it in my brain, you know put it there and then cork it, save it's sweetness for a harsh winter day, then pull it out and sprinkle it on us like my imagined angels with their sifters of powdered sugar.

Angel sprinkled sweetness

Can't do this on weekends! 

See the little rainbow?

A partial view of my melancholy-induced work ;)

It Takes a Lot of Balls...

"Let me tell you one thing that I've learned," he says. "If you are tolerant and speak kindly to people, the world will love you."

I’m not sure where I garnered this quote, as I keep copious notes and often fail to list the reason for my notation. It’s similar to the way I often carefully freeze a leftover sauce that I’ve cooked and fail to label it. Two or three months later I will pull it from the freezer and think, “What in the world is this?” Anyway, I’m fairly certain that this quote hit some point that was pertinent at the time, I copied it and I am now using it for a completely different reason.

***

As I’ve matured I’ve tried to program myself to be more tolerant, respectful and tactful. Maxims and aphorisms taught me by my 7th grade teacher, Sister Beata, my grandfather and that tour guide in Mexico come back to me: “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all,”  “Don’t put forth that to which you can’t attach your name,” and “It’s not right. It’s not wrong. It’s just different.”

I constantly struggle to balance the polarities of my brain. So, if I allow my left brain to dominate, I find myself uptight in my thinking. And though my brain may function like a well-oiled machine, I become bossy and opinionated and a drag to be around.

Now, if I permit my right brain to take command, I’m like a puppy off-leash. I feel creative, but in fact I am so ready to “go with the flow” that I tend to space out, thus am as dangerous behind the wheel of an automobile as a texting teenager.

This struggle is never more apparent to me then when I gaze out at the lovely view from my backyard during a summer weekend day.

I live on a golf course. Did I mention that? We bought the house not exactly on a whim, but without much forethought other than “wouldn’t this be a nice weekend getaway place?” It was a nice place, and we liked it, liked it enough to sell our city house and move here, sort of permanently.

***

Once on a trip to Asia, I was introduced to an elderly farmer. Because it was our first meeting he knelt before me and placed his forehead to the ground as he recognized a sacred or divine essence in me. It’s meant to increase the humility of the person kowtowing, but, for me, it was a pretty humbling experience to have someone kneel before me. 

***

My yoga studies say that the mind seeks confirmation for your preconceived ideas. So, if I view the world as negative and filled with disagreeable people engaged in nefarious activities, that is exactly what I will experience.

***

"Each golfer is a divine being," becomes my mantra. "Each golfer is a divine being." "Each golfer is a divine being." Before I know it, I begin to feel a sense of warm affection for the golfers that frequent our community’s golf course. Community. Now isn’t that a nice word? It conjures up thoughts of fellowship and unity. Aaahhh, I feel my breath slow, along with my pulse and heartbeat.

“Each golfer is a di- “ Just then I spot something that puts my spiritual practice to the test. I see yet another golfer with complete disregard to the etiquette of the game of golf. As I gaze out of the back windows of my home at these buffoons divine beings, my spiritual compassion and tolerance evaporate like drops of morning dew in Death Valley.

I picture myself with a megaphone- no wait! Better yet, an address system with speakers lining the fairway all the way from the tee box to my back yard.

“Hey you! Yes, I mean you, with the so-last-year plaid shorts. How about not putting your lit cigar on the green while you putt?” 

“Ahem, (throat clearing) uh, guy with the blue shirt, along with the big dude-with-the-orange-shirt, do you think it’s possible to park your cart any closer to the green? Does that look like a 30 foot distance to you? I don't even think that is 30 inches, you sluggards!” 

“Argh! At least make a pretense of raking the bunker! It took you two shots to get out of that sand." 

“Mr. Fancy Pants with the tricked-up cart, how about bending over, just once, and replacing those huge divots you take?" 

“Geez! Fix your ball mark on the green. I can see it from here, for goodness sake!" 

"Lenny, please come back and pick up that lit cigarette butt you just discarded or I'm telling your wife."

Golf etiquette pet peeves, I’ve witnessed them all. Fivesomes, cigar butts and granola bar wrappers lining the fairway, sunflower seed shells spit out all over the tee box, speakers on carts to enable listening to AC/DC while golfing, men who “take a leak” near the bushes, and those throwing the flag down on the green as if timber has been felled. But the most outrageous thing I’ve ever seen was a woman, golfing alone, who after putting, drove her cart across the green! I was sitting at my kitchen table, quietly sipping a cup of tea, when my peripheral vision spotted her. I nearly choked to death as I howled to Golf Partner Husband, “Look! Look at that woman driving the cart across the green!” If my phone had been closer I’d have taken a snapshot.

***

Our property is located just behind the green, so it’s to be expected that the occasional ball will be hit on our property. No big deal. We have purposefully not posted “No Trespassing” signs. It is our wish that golfers feel free to walk over and retrieve their errant balls. Heck, I’d invite them to stop for a beer, if I didn’t think it would slow down play, probably one of the biggest pet peeves of golf etiquette. Besides, I know there are plenty of hackers golfers who use expensive top-of-the-line Pro V1’s, Nike One Tour’s or Dixon Fire’s. Of course they are hoping not to have to kiss that ball goodbye. Come on, walk over and pick it up. Shucks, I’ll even help you find it if I’m outside.

But it’s the ones, who think no one is watching, that bug me. Only once, have I witnessed someone actually drive a cart past the OB markers and onto our property in search of a ball. More often I see the golfer who cannot stand the thought of taking a penalty stroke for being out-of-bounds and so proceeds, after taking a practice shot, or three, to hit it off of our lawn or out of my perennial garden bed.

One day recently, while reading on the deck, I saw a young man walk over to take a shot at his ball that was clearly three feet beyond the out-of-bound marker and on our property. “Excuse me,” I say in my most genial voice, “can you please pick that up and play it inbounds?” As he complies, I notice he is playing with a acquaintance of ours and I immediately feel bad as the acquaintance and I quietly exchange greetings.

I go inside and meditate. What would Socrates have thought? What would the Dali Lama say? What would Jesus do? My battling left and right hemispheres ache.

It isn’t worth it, my right brain decides. Tolerance it is. I’ll never say another word. It simply isn’t worth fretting about. The grass will grow back eventually, right? I feel my breath slow, along with my pulse and heartbeat. Aaahhh….

Does that look like "30 feet from the green?"!!?

Hmmm? Is that out or in?

Seriously, can they park any closer to the green!? (& I don't see a handicap flag)

ethereal Mount Airy

She had an eclectic collection of artwork throughout her home. As we stood on opposite sides of a 15 foot long kitchen island in her spacious home I admired a painting that hung next to a massive venting hood hung over a commercial stove. I expressed my admiration for this particular piece of artwork.

"Oh, the rooster? Isn't it nice? I bought it from some bohemian art colony we visited. I've since sought other works by the same artist, but was never able to find anything."

With a smile that begged forgiveness, as if her displays seemed slapdash, which they didn't, she said "I buy things that catch my eye." She waved her hand across the expanse of her first floor, "I bring them home and then, try to figure out a place to display them." 

She inquired about our trip home. I saw an immediate flicker in her eyes when I described the five-state route we'd be driving. Her voice became animated as she waxed on her memories of a small town in western Virginia, strongly urging Dutiful Husband and I make a slight detour that would take us through her home town, certain we'd enjoy the works of numerous local artisans and the great food and drink from nearby eateries. She recalled to me the names of streets and restaurants that were "musts" to experience. Her eyes misted, her voice took on a wistful tone and she gazed off to some unknown spot over my shoulder as she remembered the beauty of the area. Just behind and to her left, I peripherally catch sight of a couple eavesdropping guests and their shirking smiles and quick rolls of their eyes.

Later the eye-rollers would inform me that there was nothing worth visiting in the town she'd mentioned. "Quite frankly," said one, "I've no idea of what she could possible be remembering." The other commented, "Trust me, it's not worth going out of your way. There is absolutely nothing there."

I  thought immediately of a visit Dutiful Husband and I made last year to Mt. Airy, North Carolina...

I'd grown up watching and re-watching episodes of the Andy Griffith Show which showcased the fictitious town of Mayberry, North Carolina. If ever I'd wished to grow up in someplace other than where I did, it would have been this make believe town. Mayberry featured a charming main street which, depending on the episode, was home to a fix-it shop, a barbershop, a movie theater, a drugstore with an ice cream/soda counter, a church, grocery store, bank, beauty salon, a diner and the all-important court house/jail where the protagonist sheriff held court. Off a ways, maybe a block or two, was the school and the gas station, where the local mechanic was as honest as the day is long. Oh and there was a small town doctor, (someone wrote prescriptions for that drugstore.)

Crime was a rarity in Mayberry, moonshiners, the town drunk, the rare lead-footed speeder, an occasional vagrant or con man and once, heaven forbid, there was a thwarted bank robbery. In fact, the occasional trouble maker was always a new kid in town or someone just arrived or passing through, never one of their own townspeople. Aside from the town drunk sleeping off his "snootful" of moonshine, the jail was rarely occupied. There was an indication that raucous and rowdy establishments serving alcohol were somewhere beyond the town's borders, but Mayberry itself was a "dry" town.

Andy, the "sheriff-without-a-gun" ruled with a gentle hand. His inept deputy carried a pistol, but was permitted only one bullet, which he kept in his shirt pocket and only under the most dire of circumstances was he to load this solitary bullet.

Mayberry was as close to utopia as any harmonious community of everyday, working class people could ever hope to experience. The fictional town was based on Mt. Airy, North Carolina where the sitcom's star, Andy Griffith, was born and raised. So, when it turned out that we'd be in the Mt. Airy vicinity as we traveled from Virginia down through the Carolinas, I begged asked Dutiful Husband for a slight detour from our route that would take us for a visit to Mt. Airy.

Years earlier I'd read a real estate news article about "prospering" Mt. Airy. It told of a wondrous spot teeming with upwardly mobile young families and recent retirees. The story stated that the residents "fostered an atmosphere of friendly 'neighborly-ness' " and that it was a town where one could enjoy community events such as summer music festivals, old-fashioned ice cream socials and what not. The article described a main street now featuring a book store, a wine shop, cafes, and a variety of antique and other specialty shops. It boasted of an updated library, newly revived youth organizations, etc. If I couldn't live there at least I could visit this magical town, to see with my own eyes the place where Andy grew up and remembered fondly enough to memorialize it in a television show.

As the day arrived and we neared the town I marveled as the sun began to poke through the clouds, sending beacons of light to showcase some of the area's natural beauty. The first indication we were near the town was the impressive sight of Pilot Mountain, (remembered in The Andy Griffith Show as "Mount Pilot") rising like a pinnacle, seemingly out of nowhere.

Just miles later, Dutiful Husband turned the car onto a central street in Mt. Airy. Somehow, even though deep down I knew better, I'd imagined that I would somehow be taking a step back in time and that, like the news article said, I'd discover "a hidden treasure in the hills of North Carolina." So, much for trumped up publicity articles in the real estate section of the newspaper.

As we drove through the streets everything seemed wrong. I hadn't expect to see the town as Hollywood depicted it, but I also hadn't expected what I viewed from our windshield, and so the sight of H&R Block, Walgreens, McDonald's, Wendy's, Lowe's Home Improvement, Edward Jones, PNC Bank, Wells Fargo, Food Lion, and the likes, lining the streets hurt my eyes. And when I spotted Walmart, "No! Please, not in my Mayberry!"

We parked on Main Street and stepped out of the car and I was dismayed to see numerous duplicates of the black and white Mayberry patrol cars carrying paying tourists as they prowled the streets. Where were the quaint shops the real estate article suggested? Could my eyes not discern them through the garish fronts that cheaply recalled those original Hollywood sets?

Oh, how I wished to hear the soulful bluegrass mountain music of the Darling Family, wafting magically across the hills and dales, as they played from the back of their beat-up pickup truck. Or the distant whistles of coal-carrying trains as they snaked their way through the mountains. Or the sound of fishing reels casting into the  lake. Or kids laughing and splashing in the swimming hole, leftover from the open-face granite quarrying. Or the sound of Opie's bare feet hitting the gravel path as he ran toward the water alongside his father.

I guess it's not much different than today's FaceBook or current social media, Andy chose to showcase only the best. There was, or is, nary a mention of the negative. It is the diaphanous recreation of the place or person we want the world to see that we put forth. A refusal to include, or in the case of my Virginia friend, an inability to take notice that the area where her childhood experiences, which shaped her attitudes about life and goodness, has faded a bit, and that time has eroded some of the beauty and charm.

I know that I will never visit Mount Airy again.

I'm still pulling for the young families and the retirees to recreate my childhood utopia as claimed by the real estate article- But after seeing it firsthand, I now know that Mount Airy has its share of drugs, crime, and "less-than-desirables," who have sought a place of solace there, and I surmise, “Well, why shouldn't they?” Are they not as much a part of life?

Hollywood-type fronts

knife-stabbing in "Mayberry"

Small Town Notes (from Bea Yonder)

Privatopia sits bucolically nestled between farms, farms and more farms. There is the nearby 3,000+ acre hog farm, due east, a family-farm, whose website states "each year we raise 65,000 hogs." I'm hoping that numerical figure is a misprint, but to date it has not been corrected.

Then there is the 800-head dairy farm, due north, which features a cutting-edge anaerobic digester that enables this family to sell back energy to the power grid and produce a solid byproduct which they reuse for cow bedding.

I'm not certain how I feel about all of this occurring so close to the aquifer that supplies our well water, and I'm fairly sure the farmers are skeptical about the runoff of chemicals from Privatopia's "championship" golf course upkeep, but so you have it.

Between and beyond are more family-owned farms that raise sheep, goats, chickens, alpaca, llamas, horses, and even more cows and hogs. And there are the ag-farms, mostly growing corn, corn as far as the eye can see, but it's not for human consumption, it's mostly for the government subsidized production of ethanol. All of these farms, a fledgling winery and small private airstrip, abut our private enclave. If you go out a few miles beyond Privatopia, the farms, winery and airstrip, you'll find a handful of small towns, all with populations less than 1,400. Basically, I live in an area where the livestock outnumber the humans.

One day my urban-reared grandson visits, and the prevailing winds happen to reverse and blow in our direction, he turns to me and asks, "Is there a zoo around here?"

Yet in three short years, I've come to love the colorful flavor of the region. (And, well, I'm working on the odoriferous part...)

Here are some incidents and quotes that I've gleaned in the last 3 years from the local humans- I'll write some other time about what the animals have to say :) 

***

She and I stand side-by-side as I help her sort and pack her belongings. “I’m moving out west, over 1,600 miles. For good, I hope… When? Well, just as soon as I can.” She leans in a bit closer and says, in a conspiratorial-type whisper, “Well, I'm going to try it out for a month, anyway.” She draws a breath and adds, "You know, I've never driven more than 100 miles by myself before."

***

"This fall, I'll start school at UW (out-of-state), majoring in music. Oh, and I can't wait," he stated. There was a pause as he looked wistfully out  the window and continued even more emphatically, "Anywhere but Carroll County. Anywhere!"

***

"People here drink a lot."

When I don't respond, she arches one eyebrow, looks me in the eye and adds, "Even way more than other places, I mean."

***

"Rye-cheer (right here) we got some excellent deer and turkey huntin'."

***

"You never see much in the way of mobility scooters out here. You know, maybe the golf actually helps."

**

"I always swore that I wasn’t going to ever marry a farmer. But guess what? I met a farmer that I loved. I married that farmer, and as he followed his heart, well I followed right behind. You know, you either are born into the farm or you marry into it- well, I'm a double-down."

***

"Are you kidding me?! The farmers out here ought to be f*^%-ing grateful that we're here," he belches, cracks open another beer retrieved from his refrigerated golf cart cooler, takes a long draught, wipes his mouth on his sleeve, nestles the can in it's holder and carefully selects one of his custom crafted golf clubs.

***

"I don’t think I could handle living in a big city or nothing like that," and as I wondered if that was a slight shudder I'd detected, she continued, "Nah, just give me my little old house in my little old town at the end of my little old gravel road."

***

"I've got a story for you," says a friend who resides in a beautiful waterfront home. "We found these deep hoof impressions in the yard and surmised that whitetail deer had passed through, and that the depth of the tracks was due to the excess of rain lately. But, it didn't seem right. So we replayed the nightcam and guess what it was? Three cows straying through our property. Where could they have come from?"

***

She's attractive, affable, efficient and intelligent, all evident to me from the first time that she rang up my purchases. I hear the customer in front of me ask her why she's now working at Casey's General Store and no longer teaching at the local school. She tilts her head, shrugs her shoulders and replies, "Ehh?"

***

"Back in the 60s I applied for my first loan for a new combine, $15,000. My dad said, 'Agh, they'll never give you that much money!' But, I got the loan. Ten years after that a new combine was $30,000. Now it costs me $30,000 just to replace a head on my combine. Today a new Deere will cost you upwards of near a half million dollars."

***

"Hey, M, what're you digging the hole for? Planting in a tree?"

"I'm burying-," he begins, hesitates, sighs, then blubbers, "I'm burying my dog." His grief is obvious, his pain at the loss of a beloved pet, palpable.

"Oh, I'm, I'm so sorry, so sorry," I stammer. "How, how long did you have him?"

"Sixteen years," he sniffs. "I'm burying him here because he always loved the golf course."

"My heartfelt condolences, M. Take care."

"Aww, poor M," I think as I walk away, "that's rough," followed quickly by the thought, "I wonder if he had to get a permit from the Privatopia Board to bury his dog on his own property?"

***

As I exit the building, she is entering. She carefully snuffs out the tip of her half-smoked cigarette on the brick entrance and tucks it into her purse as I hold the door for her. I smile and tell her a story of a high school friend, eons back, who used to do the same, until her straw purse caught fire, from a lingering ember during history class. "Really!?" She pauses a moment, shakes her head and adds, "Well, they're so darn expensive these days, I can't afford to lose even one drag."

***

"Do all of you know how lucky we are to live here??"

("Yes," I think to myself. "Yes, I certainly do.")

***

Happy Independence Day!

sincerely,

Bea Yonder