For the Record

“Honey, remember when you wanted to be a chimney sweep?”

Patrick burst out laughing before he could put words to his answer. “How long ago was that—fifteen, maybe twenty years?”

“At least that”, I smiled back at him, this man who’s mind is a nearly nonstop churning factory of possibilities.

“How about that time when we wanted to build a curved footbridge over that narrow section of the creek about halfway through the meadow? Hadn’t been here a full eight seasons, didn’t know what a solid weekend of steady downpours could do to that creek…” he had a faraway look in his eyes, his brows raised in gratitude and relief that we never moved forward with that project. In one soggy November weekend, we saw what happens when the skies give the creek more than it can swallow in two days.

This brief exchange took place on Saturday afternoon, another busy morning at the farmers’ market now unpacked and set to rest in the mud room. We’d each settled into our own quiet time (two semi-introverts on full tilt for five hours, engaging happily with a steady stream of pleasantly chatty customers wanting to know all about the granola we make…it says a lot about a relationship when you find your respective corners and sink into that blessed solitude without judgment or pouting). Patrick was on the couch, meditating, and I chose to head into town to browse a favorite shop on it’s annual sale day (I was almost out of elderberry tincture). It’s a plant-based remedies apothecary with additional inventory that’s part global bazaar and part museum of natural history. With wellness and goodwill toward others at the heart of the owners’ intentions, it’s a good place to be reminded of what we humans can manage, given the opportunity and the right herbal blends. Plus, they have a gorgeous selection of handcrafted leather journals. I swear, I was mainly there for the tincture.

But resting flat on a round wooden tiered display stand in the center of the shop was a small journal with the phrase “half-assed ideas” stamped into its stiff leather cover. I chuckled to myself and moved on, making my way to the selection of teas in their tall silver canisters. We have far more tea at home than anyone could ever drink (make note, nieces and nephews—you’ll likely inherit most of it when we pass), but you never know if there’s a new one making its debut. A quick scan of the shelves’ offerings told me we were up to date on our home tea inventory and so I wandered back to the round display stand where that little blank journal blinked back at me, wondering what took me so long on the double-take. I scooped it up, and along with my tincture and a tiny free paper cut-out of a red-capped mushroom, stepped back out in the mid-Ohio sunshine, ready to put my weary bones on the couch next to Patrick for a bit.

As is our custom when either of us returns home from a solitary retail endeavor, we pull each treasure from the bag with a story (or explanation, or defense of spending) and a flourish; exclamations of approval or surprise are expected, or at least appreciated. Given the humble quantity of my purchases, I knew it wouldn’t take long, and the journal was an impulse acquisition. As I reached for it, the inspiration for the explanation came naturally.

“Honey, this is for us to use when we have an idea that needs a little more, um, development, and is too good to just toss into the ether, hoping it will stick to something. Don’t you wish we had one of these back when we first moved here?”

Another burst of pure laughter as we both began thumbing through our collective memories’ pages, landing on those moments that at the time seemed like brilliance but were, in fact, the essence and definition of lunacy. Thankfully, most took place or were discussed without witnesses and could sink back into the obscurity of the drawing board without the embarrassing wince of ridicule. But maybe those ideas were just ahead of their time—shouldn’t we revisit them to make sure we hadn’t overlooked some key variable of genius? It was Patrick who called it: “Let’s start jotting down Past Half-assed Ideas and see where that leads”. The title alone got us giggling and we spent the next hour reminiscing and guffawing, endorphins flowing like that November-flooded creek of years ago. If nothing else, our nieces and nephews would stumble across this collection someday and gain a deeper appreciation of their aunt and uncle’s active inner life, accompanied by a few cups of really old tea…

I know some folks who journal and then shred what they’ve written as a daily ritual. I’m sure such a practice can leave one feeling liberated and clean as a whistle inside. As a writer whose genre leans heavily toward memoir, I save every scrap of sentences that show up inconveniently while I’m behind the wheel or in the post-midnight hour demanding my attention. I sometimes forget which jotter or notebook on which nightstand or end table contained that train of thought that will certainly rocket me into the Memoirist Hall of Fame, but I’ll find it eventually. Having kept journals for the better part of forty years now, I also understand that unless there’s an all-consuming house fire, someone will come across the pages of my most vulnerable moments in life, see exactly what I was thinking at the moment, and where I decided to name names. As I get older, I grow less concerned about what others think of me and my meandering rationales or fleeting perspectives. A random list of half-assed ideas seems a goldmine for future generations to stumble upon after I’m dust.

Too bad I won’t be there to join in their laughter, especially if they find this current work-in-progress inspired by a shop owner’s artistry with leather and an alphabet stamping tool. An impulse buy, perhaps, but one with an infinite return on investment.

(Author’s note: The shop I describe here is Old Mr. Bailiwick’s, located in Mt. Vernon, OH. If you live in Ohio, it’s worth the trip, no matter your starting point. And if you’re not a resident of the Buckeye State, their website is the next best thing, though you’ll miss the charming ambiance of the place. Owners Josh and Becky are filled with talents both hidden and out there for everyone to enjoy, and really know their way around gathering, foraging, decocting, leather stamping and infusing. I hope you’ll find your way here someday and claim a few treasures for your own).

Rethinking a Box of Rocks

Patrick is hand-turning a wooden rattle.

No, we’re not expecting (if that were the case, I wouldn’t have a baby shower. I’d hold a press conference). It’s for ceremony and prayer, and he’s been artistically thoughtful about it.

Two weeks ago, he was describing the rattle’s design and asked if he could look through our late neighbor Joe Berg’s rock collection, some of which we’d purchased at Joe’s estate auction several years ago. Patrick was hoping to find a few smaller stones to seal inside the rattle’s seedpod-like shape. Before I continue, yes, I paid money for rocks that weren’t going to resurface our long driveway or dangle all polished and shiny at the end of a silver chain around my neck. But the ones we bought weren’t just any rocks up for bid. Joe and his wife Bea traveled extensively in the early years of their marriage, across the U.S. and abroad, collecting rocks from each place they visited, labeling and cataloging them meticulously for future generations. The sheer story value alone got my attention as I wandered through rows of folding tables set up on the east lawn of their 100+ year-old farmstead, past avocado and harvest gold-colored countertop kitchen appliances, dusty silk flower arrangements and carefully placed Tiffin stemware, some with the original silver sticker still clinging to the base (I came home with some of that too, some creatively acquired road signs and a vintage accordion, but that’s another story…).

The rock collection had been distributed among several shallow cardboard trays that covered at least seven of the two dozen or so 6-foot tables near the farmhouse’s back door. The auctioneer grouped and offered the trays for “choice” (the highest bidder gets to select which and how many box lots they want) or “one money” (all the trays sold to the highest bidder), the crowd inching along with him as each tray was won, and I kept pace with them, knowing exactly which ones I was hoping to bring home. Some of the rocks were massive and needed no box at all for display purposes, their random glints of crystal and quartz winking at us in the summer afternoon sunlight. Like magpies with money, we ping-ponged our bids off one another until the going price sifted some of us out of the running. The large rocks from mostly western states (Arizona, Utah, Colorado) sold first and fast, their new owners cradling them carefully back to their cars and trucks each time the auctioneer hollered “SOLD!” Eight trays remained, their contents small and sorted into square 70’s-era food storage containers without lids. Rose quartz, fool’s gold, bits of real gold in tiny tube-glass lidded containers, obsidian and geodes and flint (polished and unpolished) sat waiting their turn. I’d evaluated all the trays’ contents carefully before the auction began and now stood ready, my cardstock number in hand while the auctioneer offered these last eight trays as “choice” (best auction advice I can give is show up early and examine everything, even the stuff you don’t want to buy. You just never know).

I came home with the six trays I wanted and spent the rest of the afternoon turning over the past, touching pieces of places I’ve never been and imagining the feet of ancestors pressing against the rough surface of time, now scattered in bits on our kitchen table. On this side of things, I will not know what caught Joe’s eye when he glanced down and saw a nondescript gray shard of something that turned out to be petrified wood. It is enough that he paused, held it in his hand and shared it with his children for decades.

I’ve moved these rocks more than once in the past five years, from the bottom of a dresser drawer to the upstairs guestroom and once again this morning, to rest atop the vintage blanket chest that serves as our coffee table in the living room. Where some of them go from there is up to Patrick and the rattle that will eventually enclose them for another who knows how many years. It’s his story to tell, not mine. But for an hour or so after breakfast on a summer Sunday morning, our imaginations meandered across the miles, passing through the ghostly whispers of lives and stories now mingling with our own.

Let the ceremony begin.

And continue.

The Bones of a Thing

At the northwest corner of the walking path parallel the woods, past the Hill and beneath a stand of young sycamore saplings, what’s left of a possum is scattered and pressed into the cool clay soil, the work of some mystical arboreal curator who tends to the living and the dead with equal measure while we sleep. But for a wooden frame and some glass, I could be passing a museum of natural history’s exhibit entitled “Not That High on the Food Chain” or “Late Night Coyote Snack”. One of the creature’s mandibles, incisors perfectly intact, offers a ghostly half-smile and I sift through memories of all the encounters I’ve ever had with a living possum who might have been protecting her newborn babes, that snarling face frozen in defiance and indecision. Sections of lumbar vertebrae here, a radius there, the remaining missing bits carried deeper into the thicket of blackberry brambles by a predator who wanted to eat its meal in peace—I can only imagine what unfolded for both of them as one life was sustained by another (unwillingly perhaps, but how do I know? I wasn’t there at the time and mustn’t assume anything about how such arrangements are made). This pause on my morning walk moved silently from observation to tender memorial service. A whispered “Mitakuye Oyasin” reminds me that I'm not the only one here and someday, my bones too will rest somewhere in the cool clay soil. I hope it’s not a violent end to a life I’ve cherished on this side of gratitude. Having meant that as a prayer and not simply a meandering musing, I send it out and upward to the canopy above, resuming my walk with fresh humility and more than a side eye to the Grand Scheme of Things in whose circle I continue to dance my days.

There’s so much I really don’t know, or ever will.

I live most of the time in wonder and curiosity, hungrily filling my plate with the knowledge of others who spend their days watching and making notes (I know there’s more to it than that, and am certain that such work can be tedious or painstaking, even boring at times. But I daydream about it anyway). I do my own informal research, noticing how this year it seems the sycamores are shedding their bark in greater volume than I recall from past seasons as I step over the curling gray pieces in the short feathery grass of the walking paths. Their now-smooth trunks and branches are a pale celery color and somehow, they look stronger for it, less burdened. Stretching out of their old skin like tall snakes, they push themselves upward into a still-summer blue sky. I join them impulsively for a moment, raising my own arms as far above my head as I can. It does feel good (though my own skin remains intact, which I consider a good and helpful thing for now).

Until scientist Wilhelm Conrad Rontgen accidentally discovered a way to view the bones of a thing while testing cathode rays in 1895 (leading to what we now know as the x-ray machine), we humans had to content ourselves with wondering about the inner supporting structures of a life form, or disassemble a once-living thing to get a closer look at how it all fits together. I’m like more than a few folks in wanting to know what goes on inside a being, how it stands upright or crawls sleekly through the wet grass, soundlessly and with such grace. What gives its flesh a place to hang, how does the architecture know when it’s time to get a move on and what sets it all in marvelous motion? It fascinates me in those last minutes of my lunch hour and I image-search the internet for a visual to satisfy my curiosity for a while. Then it’s back to work, to an aspect of my job that is equally fascinating, and privileged, truly—I get to interview people who want to become volunteer members of the hospice team. It’s no small ambition. The respectfully curious questions I ask help me get to a different set of “bones”—the structure of someone’s beliefs and perspectives, the rich soil of their most precious values, from which everything else springs forth, the nexus point on which all their decisions pivot. In an hour’s time I hear stories that give evidence to a life framed and enriched by giving, a gentle insistence that they be allowed to keep a promise to a dying parent, a clear vision of a future filled with patients of their own as they put their shoulders to the hard wheel of medical school. They tell me much more than I’d ever be allowed to ask, and I hold their answers in sacred trust, fully aware of the gift I’ve just received.

Some people’s values are as loud and clear as a trumpet, others ask that we watch carefully for the slightest nuanced clue before drawing an incomplete conclusion. And some don’t tell us at all until after they’re gone, having lead by example if we were paying attention. All this from what’s left of a possum beneath the watchful rustling leaves of a few young sycamores…

There’s so much I really don’t know.

Or ever will.

Midsummer: Peacock Splendor and Bug Repellent

I’m thinking about asking the good folks at Avon to change the name of their insect repellent from “Skin-so-Soft” to “Skin-so-Tasty”, just to be on the same page as the mosquitoes and biting flies that followed me around the field this morning. I was a two-legged walking marinade for them and have the welts to prove it (no photographs, please. Some of you are eating). But the wild blackberry vines gotta be trimmed so Patrick can mow the paths this afternoon without coming back to the house striped in scratches, so…into the woods I go, smelling delicious to a thousand hungry, buzzing relatives. And here I thought I was pretty high on the food chain. Perspective, my dears. Perspective.

Meanwhile, under the bed in the upstairs guestroom I came across a stash of more than five hundred peacock feathers, shed and collected one at a time over seven years when we had a modest family strutting about the acreage, catching us off-guard with their regal beauty. It’s nearly August, and I lean toward wistfulness as the summer turns this corner without that gorgeous flock entertaining us and leaving their plumage behind on the grass like so many beautiful toys at an upscale daycare center. Sparky was our first, left behind by the land’s previous owners, with the real estate agent trying to figure out how to catch him and take him back to his own farm. He gave up as we moved forward to signing the closing paperwork and yes, we wrote Sparky into the contract, taking out a 30-year mortgage on 41.1 acres and a peacock (when real estate agents gather for conventions and conferences, I’ll bet this was one of the “strange but true” stories swapped over cocktails after the day’s breakout sessions).

Sparky roosted in the old dairy barn built at the sloping end of the driveway, perching serenely on the apex of the roof, pointing his tiny crowned head south and crying out at sunset in plaintive hope for a mate. The first time we heard it, we thought a frightened child had somehow become trapped in one of the rusty milking stanchions and ran toward the sound like heroes on their way to a rescue. Over time, Patrick learned to mimic the sound just close enough to set Sparky off in broad daylight, much to the startled delight of visitors and family. The two of them would call back and forth until someone ran out of vocal energy or the laying flock would charge ‘round to corner of their coop to see what the commotion was all about. For weeks, Sparky called out in vain, no one answering his audible personal ad except Patrick, and so turned his attention to those chickens (a bird is a bird, after all) who paid him no never-mind as he splendidly shook out and arranged his glorious feathers into a majestic half-circle fan of iridescent attractiveness. Oh, they’d look up with their beady little eyes and consider the spectacle for a moment, then resume their aimless ground-pecking, leaving Sparky deflated and lonely still. Can’t blame a guy for trying, right?

But perseverance paid off and one day, a lovely peahen (I named her Claire) came strolling down the driveway looking for the lovelorn vocalist who’d lured her away from who knows what nearby farm with his irresistible siren call. She sized him up, looked about at his land dowry and settled herself in, scouting out her options for ground nesting real estate. She ended up choosing the spot right below the bathroom window, overgrown with lamb’s-quarter, velvetleaf and pokeweed (I suspect she thought the berries would add a touch of decorative whimsy), having already laid her decoy clutch of eggs several yards away in the overgrowth behind the old potting shed to distract any predators from the real deal. We only discovered this ground nest when Patrick was busy with the weed whip, coming dangerously close to decapitating her as she roosted among the stalks. She didn’t budge, even as the snapping plastic string felled the greenery above her head. Patrick jumped backwards when we saw her there, her eye calm and steady, his respect for the protective maternal instinct deepened in an instant. She stayed there until four of the little ones hatched. We didn’t see them until they were old enough to walk safely beneath her sheltering wings and one of them poked its head out of her plumage one afternoon as she walked slowly across the grass below the silver maple on the ridge. We gave her a wide berth as our faces hurt from smiling so wide.

As often happens in the natural course of things, only two of the four hatchlings made it to adulthood—one male, one female. Sparky kept his distance as they grew and eventually took to rearing the young boy (Blue) while Claire kept close to the girl (her name escapes me at the moment but I’m sure it was cute). Blue grew fast and strong as Sparky taught him how to employ his fan to catch what’s-her-name’s eye (with varying degrees of success). We’d often find father and son circling each other in a dizzying game of male dominance while Claire and her daughter browsed alongside the chickens in contented indifference. That indifference must’ve grown some pretty deep roots over the summer because come late August that year, both mother and daughter disappeared into the meadow and didn’t resurface. We never found a feather, a carcass, anything to indicate they’d met an violent end. They just left. I envisioned them picking their way across the neighbor’s soybean field, all their little peahen belongings tied carefully in red handkerchiefs on the end of long walking sticks, chatting about this and that as they set out for their next adventure. Sparky and Blue may have spent a few days looking for them but kept at their circling rituals until Sparky eventually got too old to play. We found him next to the old dairy barn late one summer evening, his feathered body fully intact directly below the spot where he’d perched years ago, calling out for company. Blue took to hanging out near the chicken coop, opening his fan every evening for the girls’ entertainment, like a long-running Las Vegas act. When we finally found his remains behind the old goat barn a few years later, we accepted the end of our exotic peafowl-rearing days. A year later, we started raising Boer goats for meat, but that’s another story.

I remember vividly those hot and sunny afternoons, walking an easy lap from the house down to the barns and the chicken coops, stooping to pick up the long and colorful plumes that Sparky and Blue had shed, marveling at the way the light would catch the golds and coppers buried among the green and deep teal strands, making the feather’s eye even more distinct. I don’t remember being harassed by biting flies or no-see-ums or mosquitoes (though I’m sure they were out there, hungry and searching). Just fantastic color and midsummer contentment. Funny what our minds sort out and focus on…

Five hundred feathers later, I’m perched on the apex of my memories, hearing the echoes of a sky-piercing love call and happy that I had a front row seat to one of the sweetest love stories a flock of birds could offer up.

Looking forward to you, August. And thanks for the flashback.