Stars in the Firmament

Goodnight, Maya Angelou- joining our friend Odetta and the matriarchs of the ages.   We stand taller for your faith and poetry and dignity.

Return of the Native

This harsh winter has brought out the old-timers’ refrain:  ‘Back when I was a kid, we knew what winter was.  We’ve been spoilt with these easy winters.  This is an old-fashioned winter.’  Followed by a satisfied ‘Harrumph’ and the Midwesterner’s perverse glee in recalling just how cold it got last night.  We love to complain about the weather.

I grew up in Thomson in the 50s and 60s, and the winters did seem longer and snowier, if not colder.  Around November the leaden skies descended and we didn’t see much sunshine until April.  We wore rubber boots with fake fur trim and either zippers or buckles.  When we went sledding down by the slough and in the old sandpit, our boots filled with snow and we were soaked through by the time we trudged home, where chili and hot cocoa awaited us.

We skated the rough backwater ice down by John Simpson’s, where the old Melon Grounds lie.  We often had to sweep the snow off the ice.  Occasionally Mom and Edith Cate accompanied us, but mostly we were left to ourselves the day long, until it was too cold and dark continue.  Dick Sloan was probably the bravest skater, jumping muskrat huts and sketching figure 8s.  I can personally attest that the ice wasn’t the best for practicing backwards skating.  After dark we could go down the street to Beth Williams’ house, where her dad had flooded the front yard.  Some winters the fire department was able to create a skating area by the old water tower, and sometimes we ventured out to Cate’s to skate on Johnson’s Creek.

Thomas Wolfe famously said you can never go home again, a Chinese proverb cautions that we never step in the same river twice.  Everything changes.  Some of us leave our geographic homes, others stay.  The common denominator is memory; we retell old stories, we wander back home.

We had a storybook childhood in our village.  That’s the way I remember it, and that’s the way it was.

Potter's Road

I have written a couple of columns for the county newspaper, the Carroll County Review, which is published in my home town, Thomson, Illinois.  The third one is the Mother's Day post.  I am posting the other two - hope you enjoy them.

A couple of weeks ago, I attended a sesquicentennial meeting and the question arose:  what is quintessentially “Thomson?”  Well, the term “quintessentially” did not actually arise, but “What does Thomson mean to you?” evoked a variety of responses. For some, it was watermelons or the old red brick high school. To others it meant the Depot, or sandburrs, maybe McGinnis’ produce stand.  Or the river.

I grew up in the West End, before Potter’s Road became a causeway, before the road was paved and a guard shack stood sentinel.  Potter’s drew us like a magnet to the wonders of the sloughs, the waterlily choked ponds, the old dump.

No one went down there much except the Potters:  Bess, Frank and Ora, Hick and Glen; and Don Hall, whose cabin sailed off for the Gulf of Mexico in the Flood of ‘65.  A few local fishermen were regulars.  Beano and Billy Groharing, my Mom and Mary Simpson were down there nearly every day.

We rode our fat-tired bicycles down past Mr. Dimmick’s house, and it was a hard ride in that sand; sometimes we had to get off and walk.  Catalpas, mulberry trees and black locusts canopied the road, and wild grapevines were entwined from treetop to treetop. We ate all the raspberries we could find, and the air was filled with apple blossoms and the acrid odor of hedge apples from the osage trees.

For a time we had a leaky rowboat, and we rode down to Potter’s with the big oars across our handlebars to spend the day drifting around the backwaters.  My great pal in neighborhood adventures was Billy Groharing.  His dad, Beano, was the school custodian, and his dog Sandy was a fixture on the playground.  Sandy always came with us and had a high old time chasing rats at the dump.  I dreaded seeing rats, but Sandy found them great sport.  We’d be down there all day, poking around, hunting arrowheads and pottery, maybe fishing or trying to spear frogs.  Be home when the streetlights came on, that was the rule.  My Uncle Harry Diehl had convinced Billy that the red lights across the river were the eyes of giant muskrats that populated the sloughs.  So Billy didn’t really want to stay down there too late anyway.

We fished off the road, my folks, Grandpa Bristol and us kids, for crappies and perch and bluegills.  Mary Jo and I used cane poles with no reels, and those old red and white bobbers.  My Dad would go over to Gus Roggendorf’s for a pail of minnies scooped out of a big galvanized tub. We dug our own worms, mostly. We’d install Grandpa in a lawn chair, safari hat pulled down over his eyes.  My sister and I jumped around on the logs and generally disturbed the fish. The ones we did manage to catch were strung on a stringer and left in the shallow water to languish, their golden underbellies and jeweled scales flashing under the water like treasure.

As we got older, my Mom and Roberta Sikkema sponsored a bird-watching 4-H club, the Driftwoods, and we spent a lot of time down at Potter’s on bird watching expeditions. Marilyn Dittmar and Edith Cate helped herd us girls around for picnics.  The Upper Mississippi Flyway was a bird-watcher’s dream all the year round.  I learned to drive on Potter’s Road, taking my Mom out at dawn to watch birds. We drank coffee out of a thermos, with binoculars at the ready.  Back then you could drive east past Frank & Ora Potter’s place and come out by the railroad tracks.

I drive down there now and look out over the riprap, the ancient Woodland mounds exposed, roads paved and camping spots carved out of the undergrowth.  If it’s dusk and I look real hard, I can still see Hick and Glen’s place, the ghost buildings shadows in the fading light and the wood smoke of the campfires. Not so many mosquitoes now, lots of folks I don’t know; folks who won’t ever realize they are camped on Shear’s Point, where we used to sit with our mulberry-stained feet in the sand, never imagining it would be any different.

Happy Mother's Day

As a teenager, the last thing I wanted to do was to be a clone of my mother.   I can remember guys being cautioned, “If you want to know what a girl will look like in thirty years, check out her mom.”  All in all, a pretty scary proposition.

Nowadays, I could only hope to be a clone of my mother, and remember all the moms who helped us along our way.  Our moms baked cookies and brownies and brought them to school for our birthdays. They were room mothers and den mothers and if we messed up, they weren’t afraid to tell us just what our own mom would have told us. 

Moms were everywhere. They worked at the bank, and cooked at the school cafeteria.  They were grocery shopping at Bub Smith’s or Mc Bride’s and if you are old enough, at Sweat’s dime store. You were never unobserved, believe me.  Someone’s mom was looking out the window and picked up the phone to dial your own mom to tell her what you were up to.

Our moms wore housedresses and aprons and had some pretty serious undergarments – items that were hung on the inside clotheslines so they could not be observed by passers-by.  We were instructed in modesty and lady-like behavior and tutored by women who wouldn’t consider going out of the house without lipstick. 

Our moms had a sense of occasion; they got dressed up for church and card club and the rare dinner at Meeker’s.  They had survived The Great Depression and every one of them had a brother or uncle or sweetheart who served in World War II.  Life had touched them deeply.

My strongest impression of those women was a sense of grace, a sense of dignity.  My mom’s friends and my friends’ moms were elegant and funny and well dressed.  I had a cadre of smart, outspoken aunts who arrived in a cloud of perfume and a susurration of silk. They smelled like Ponds and Jergen’s Lotion and talcum.  They carried real handkerchiefs and compacts with pressed powder in their mysterious handbags.

Springtime carries the scent of violets and lilac and lily of the valley - old-fashioned scents that remind me of ladies in hats and gloves and costume jewelry, stockings straight, with smiles that would light up a room - our moms. 

To all the moms, thanks. 

St Patrick's Day/St Joseph's Day

I can recommend Potosi Brewery's Fiddler Oatmeal Stout (Ltd Edition) as a great substitute for Guiness on St Paddy's Day.  It's pretty potent, though.  Be careful.  It comes in a four-pack for a reason.

But today is St Joseph Day, a day of altars in New Orleans.  The following is from a Times Picayune article by Judy Walker:

...'But first: Why St. Joseph altars? And why are there so many here?

The father of Jesus is the patron saint of the island of Sicily. It's said during the famines of the Middle Ages, residents prayed to St. Joseph to deliver them, and the altars are built in thanks on his feast day, March 19.

In the late 19^th century, New Orleans was a major port of immigration for Italians from Sicily. Many settled in the French Quarter, nicknamed "Little Palermo" at the time.

Devout Catholics promise altars for answered prayers and favors granted, such as healing or safe delivery.

A few other areas of the country celebrate St. Joseph as well. Last year, a Buffalo, N.Y., chef was in New Orleans upon publication of her book about her family's St. Joseph Feast, served as a meal.

The food on an altar is supposed to be donated, or "begged." Fortunate ones in the community are to share their blessings. Countless people work on the altars: Altar societies, church members, Catholic and non-Catholic spend untold hours, starting at the beginning of the year. Some visitors try to make a "pilgrimage" to a number of altars on the feast day.

The custom has blended into other parts of New Orleans culture as well. In this city, with its large population claiming Irish and Italian heritage, traditional St. Patrick's Day parades often blend and overlap with St. Joseph Day events. Kerri McCaffety records an African-American Spiritualist church altar in her 2003 book, "St. Joseph Altars," which she says started in the 1930s. And, Mardi Gras Indians have become more involved in celebrating St. Joseph's feast day as well. The famous New Orleans tribes parade for the last time of the season on St. Joseph's Day, or Chief's Day, and references to this culture are being added to altars.

A Mardi Gras Indian flag boy and drummer will talk about their traditions when the priest blesses the altar on March 19 at Rouse's Supermarket on Baronne Street.

Like all traditions, altars have changed and will continue to adapt and change through the years. Perhaps the biggest change is due to the changing demographics in New Orleans. Fewer people in the city are 100 percent Sicilian, so the traditions are being lost, said Pepper Caruso, director of the American Italian Cultural Center and Museum, where an altar is on display all year.

The custom "has gone more towards larger communal efforts because it's so difficult on one family to put on an altar," she said. "We're seeing fewer and fewer of the smaller home altars and more of the larger communal efforts."  

Caruso was on the very first committee teaching Xavier freshman about the altars.

"It was really interesting, teaching my Sicilian grandmother's seed cakes to these young African-American women -- so cross-cultural," Caruso said. "One of my great joys was to see the altar draped in kente cloth. It's a beautiful marriage of cultures. I thought, 'Oh! I love New Orleans!' "'

Lent

Lent is upon us, if not within us.  A prayer:

We reflect Heaven,
all that is sacred
is in our hearts.

All holiness
in our eyes.

We carry Christ's suffering
in our shattered
bodies
and recall

the mind of God
in our dreams.

Requiem for a Non-Believer

I lit a candle last night for my cousin Denny.  He'd be amused by that  - with his signature sardonic grin, a sarcastic remark.  He was pretty sure he'd end up in Hell, if there was such a thing.  Most people would have agreed with him.

We came from a large family of close-knit cousins, aunts and uncles and shared a childhood.  Denny was just a month younger than I, we were practically siblings.  Denny was fearless and careless and burned the candle at both ends, all of those cliches.  He was a shameless huckster and went through money, wives and friends as if there were no tomorrow.  And now there's not.

Who wants to re-live the bad times?  One story, I cannot omit:  for reasons best left to speculation, he and his best friend got in a fist fight one night in his buddy's front yard.  Rumor has it a wife was involved, and tempers were high.  Denny ended up biting off a piece of Jason's ear, and in the confusion, the family cat ran off under the porch with the ear.  My favorite Bad Denny moment.

Denny was always good to me, generous always.  He shared his toys, his amazing train set (the staged wrecks were legendary), his time.  We went to the movies, to the swimming pool, to Mrs. Gregory's little store across Chicago Avenue.  We spent countless nights on the Corey porch, counting the time between the thunder and the lightning flashes over the river, trains rolling heavy down in the switchyard.  We went up the river with his Grandpa Corey on the houseboat.  When my Mom was dying, he drove into Chicago to pick me up and take me to the hospital in the middle of the night.

Those memories are the ones I choose to keep.  I'll miss that wicked grin, the latest crazy scheme.  He had big ideas, lived as large as he could, and died the way he lived.  He died in Nicaragua, living the life with the latest young wife, far from disappointment and heartache he'd never admit.

See ya, Denny.

Cathouse Wednesday on Loran Road

It's Cathouse Wednesday here on Loran Road.  I live with someone who sees no reason to have pets in the house.  And it's his house.  My Old Fat Bastard Cat lives in the shop, it's heated and there are many nooks and crannies to explore, a couple of Labrador Retrievers to lord it over.  Perfect.

Boris likes the shop, but on Wednesday nights - bowling night for the Man of the House - Boris gets to stalk around the house, checking out doorways, looking out the big sliding glass door, making sure all is to his satisfaction.  He prowls the hallway, crawls under beds, peers in the bathtub.  He rolls on the rug and invites a tummy rub.  Sometimes he gets onto the couch for a thorough ear-scratching.  He flashes, purrs and vamps.  He's shameless.

He then hoists his fine tail and stalks to the kitchen door.  His work here is done, and he retreats to his Shop Domain.

A re-post, an ode to Boris:

I have a cat who wears his
gray pin-striped suit with aplomb,
a gentleman cat who seeks
my company,
and purrs in my lap.

If I had a man like that,
I'd feed him good
and stroke his back.
I'd admire his fine gray pint-striped suit.

And I'd swoon
as he purred in my lap.

Cadillac Joe and the Rodeo Queen

Cadillac Joe died last week, passing into the oblivion of the grave; surely there will be tales told and exaggerations made of his sins and follies for a few days.  His money, larceny and drinking make limited fodder, and folks will shake their heads:  I guess he was as sick as he claimed.  The Passing of Cadillac Joe leaves a wife bereft and relieved, no doubt in equal measure.  She'll no longer have to make excuses or field awkward questions about questionable deals and who knows what she knew anyway.  A steep fall for The Rodeo Queen of Illinois, 1968.   We all fall, all fall down.  She'll stay on the farm, of course, the occasional neighbor looking in.

He died at home, few friends remained and fewer cared, made his own bed and died in it.  February is a time for dying if you don't have to be buried in the iron hard ground.  No service or memorial, ashes to ashes, all of us each and all.  We lift a cup to the widow and what might have been if not for what was.  A bad bargain, and she's paid the price, ground down into the fine dust of shame and humiliation from what passed for royalty so long ago:  Rodeo Queen of Illinois, 1968.  No child or family to grieve for her, in ill health herself.  One last bleeding memory, him dying there at home, she calling on the one friend who might come over to say goodbye...she had someone to call, after all.

Choices are hard.  They are not fair, they shape our whole lives and we make them when we are young and ignorant and short-sighted and hopeful.  But there you are, she stuck with him.  She was a pretty girl, and like so many pretty girls, might have been better off plain, might not have caught the eye of a rounder like Cadillac Joe.

She'll stay on the farm, dream of the barrel-racing quarter horse in the mists of the pasture, think of that tarnished crown - you're only Queen for a Year, after all.

A Nye of Pheasants

Again, from Old Reliable St Albans, a nye of pheasants, supported by the Knight of Duplin - who could quarrel with that? - and Egerton (ny v nye).  Well, The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News does, averring that it should be 'An eye.'  So there we are, a small impasse, but an 'eye' is the Old English word for a brood.  All authorities agree that 'nye' in any of its forms refers to only the young. So Lipton opts for the 'fanciful but general' term bouquet, found only in a 1927 compilation by Philip and Helen Gosse.  Kudos to Lipton, the road less traveled and all that.

I thought they were a 'brace' of pheasants, but that could be regional or colloquial - doesn't matter, we don't have many of them left with the fence lines gone and the railroad beds flattened and planted.  A ring-necked cock pheasant used to be a common sight, but they have thinned, with the less decorative and more aggressive wild turkeys coming into their own, apparently.

Our loss, unless you hunt turkeys.  Which, by the way, are called a raft.  To be explained at a later date.

a kyndle of yong cattis

from the Book of St Alban's:  a group of kittens is a kindle, from the Middle English 'kindlen;'  kindle means literally to give birth.  Hence, kinder, kin, kindred - aha.  well, the cats would not be surprised that we all spring from the Great Cat Goddess.

a cloudyr of cattis - (Robert of Gloucester); in the north of England, tomcats were called carl-cats.  This progressed in Hors, Shepe, and Ghoos (1476) to a cluster of tame cats.  I like the distinction.  Housecats became a cluster, and a lot of cats is a clutter.  A number of cats viewed in the dark with their eyes shining is a glaryn.  We've all seen the cats glaryn, I dare say.

After a kindle of kittens, my favorite is a destruction of wild cattes, another gem from Hors, Shepe and Ghoos.

So now you know how I spend my time in this long, cold winter...

A crash of rhinoceroses..

from 'An Exaltation of Larks,' by James Lipton - my daughter Heather recently reminded me of the rhinoceros incident at the Denver Zoo.  My girls don't like zoos and rarely visit them.  The incident in question occurred when they were too young to protest much at the incarceration of innocent animals.  We were strolling along on our way to see the penguins and were stopped by this firehose-like noise and an horrific odor.  A rhinoceros had backed up against a metal door and let 'er rip - pissed the paint right off the door.  Upstaged the cute penguins, for sure.

'A crash of rhinoceroses' is in current use in the Kenya Game Reports.

A Love Poem from Garrison Keillor

A summer night, and you, and paradise,

So lovely and so full of grace,

Above your head, the universe has hung its lights,

And I reach out my hand to touch your face.

I believe in impulse, in all that is green,

Believe in the foolish vision that comes true,

Believe that all that is essential is unseen,

And for this lifetime I believe in you.

All of the lovers and the love they made:

Nothing that was between them was a mistake.

All that is done for love's sake,

Is not wasted and will never fade.

O love that shines from every star,

Love reflected in the silver moon:

It is not here, but it's not far.

Not yet, but it will be here soon.

— Garrison Keillor

Happy Valentine's Day - Early, but I was struck by the poem.  He reads it beautifully.

Sub-Zero

                    A white silence lies
                    between us, an unshared
                    blanket on a cold night.
                    We come and go, making
                    our separate cups of tea
                    and retreat,
                    warming ourselves.

                    The wind has died down,
                    soft drifts pillow the house,
                    soften the hard edges
                    of winter.
                    A sullen sky lies heavy
                    over the valley,
                    dusk comes gentle and gray,
                    a benediction.

                    It has been a long winter,
                    uncommonly cold,
                    uncommonly harsh.
                   We bundle up against it
                    and venture forth,
                    hand in mittened hand,
                    looking toward Spring,
                    hoping for an
                    early thaw.

The new year

has found me, apparently frozen to the keyboard, unable to type or think or do anything but sleep and eat.  I have managed to neglect my blogging project for a couple of months, to my great chagrin.  It's too damned cold to be accountable, so I'm excusing myself.  Period.