Paddington, It Will Be All Right

the clouds seem restless
like something opening up
blue lakes here and there
thrusting the light forward
the sun popping
where'd she go, the sun?
tufts of dark
spots of light
powdered green
racing caterpillars
long necks, gaping shovels
sponge-like sky
heraldic
small blue lake in the sky
gray sharks swim over
no form, no faces, no angels
purposeful, with a plan I do not know
frivolous
where are the trains?

the marsh

The marsh looks very plush this morning. Thick, healthy. Guess it liked the rain we had, or maybe it is that way because of the high tide that came in awhile back and turned the marsh into an ocean or at least that is what it looked like out our window. At breakfast Carol spotted a dolphin catching fish, bringing his catch up onto the bank, and I ran to the living room for the binoculars. See him? Yes, I saw him splashing around looking for more fish and it was quite a sight. But he decided breakfast was over, I guess, because he headed on back to the ocean, until he was out of our sight. Carol saw a couple of dolphins in the channel close to the house, but I haven't. One could stand and look out over the marsh for hours and watch the pelicans dive for fish, or the heron or Ibis, or egret. But as I get to know something about these birds and fish, their habits, etc. the timing will be a lot better and I won't be looking at a quiet Marsh, which is itself interesting and beautiful, but will catch its wild life and all the shenanagans that go on there.

on the beach this morning

It was just what I needed -- a nice walk on the beach with Mike and Carol. The sun was hitting my back, although it was quite early. Not many people here yet. The pelicans put on a show of their own, diving into the waves, not quite sure what to do with their feet, but moving very fast, grabbing a fish then up and away. It was an interesting few minutes (seconds?) they took to establish themselves and stay put, wings flapping, beaks seamingly heavy but up and down and very fast.

I was distracted by a find of Carol's just then -- a crab, just up and out of the sand in one of the small "puddles" made by the incoming tide. The crab was a little annoyed, I thought, as he moved his large appendage in a thrusting sort of way, opening his mouth to show small claws (teeth?)

Anyway, I've a lot to learn yet (and I'm only 89). Anyway, watching the pelicans and looking to see where Carol was, I found myself in deeper water than I had planned on, and one more step landed me face down in the Atlantic ocean! Wow! The water was warm and a kindly hand extended by a large man there, helped me get to my feet and establish just where I was, then Carol, and I was back to stable footing near Mike.

We walked then a bit further, my clothes soaking wet but loose and already drying in the sun, we looked again at the crab, and Carol then spotted a sand bubble and said, "look, there's another one." She maneuvered the sand a bit with her fingers and then started digging. There it is! Another one and this time I really did see the popping eyes. Then a large threatening claw moved out and upward, and bubbles started to ooze from his mouth. Then I saw the litle claw-teeth (?).

This crab really did seem very aggressive, his large claw thrashed about and Carol was brave enough to flip him over a bit where we could see the underside, with all the little moving appendages. I could have stayed there all day, bending over them -- or maybe not. But never have I ever seen such defensiveness -- So crabby. And that little thing that we had disturbed went right back, down deep into the sand, while we headed for home.

Family

Working on my family tree is never-ending,
as I pick up photos here and there, I start to wonder was I there
then -- too many things going on at once; too many people
A lot of bending. Confusion and whatever transpired, I am left
with a happy feeling of being with each and every one
of my brothers and sisters. Some of those special moments
pop into my head now and then, but it's my very scrambled memory
that keeps changing the scene. Interruptions, there when
the memory brings forth one moment clear but brief,
and there must be a lot more I've not remembered -- good grief!
Who's keeping score?Frustrating, like not being able
to finish a book when you can't find it again
or somebody took it, so make your own ending
and as I write, and look out the window,
a heron in sight, Carol leaves not only the breakfast table
but even the kitchen, Mike too, not in sight

It's got to be Friday -- Oh, I'll see them about
when I learn what I'm doing
or who's going out.

caterpillar

The sky is dull, nondescript? No, there's the sun. It's behind me this morning. Just as I turned my head it hit me -- right in the eye. It's going to be a sunny day and I guess this tiime of year, that means hot. That's okay. We get through the hot days, especially those of us who don't have to be on the roof, or in a caterpillar somewhere. Caterpillar. What a nice name, better than John Deere. I always loved caterpillars anyway. I wasn't a little boy, ever, but I loved to watch these big machines with shovels move large chunks of marble or rocks, or telephone poles, when my sister used to take us in her Ford coupe to Milford or Framingham, or somewhere else. Especially liked the little furry gold and black caterpillar that was on the grass under an apple tree, or the one I was watching slowly making its way along one of my father's planks laying across a steamy hot mortar bed, which I was quickly pulled away from. Later on there were more and I could watch them. They didn't try to avoid me, like the worms did. When I spotted a worm, the minute I turned my head he was gone back into the ground. Sometimes when my father, or brother Joe fished, they would let me pick them up one by one and drop them into a pail or tin can. I thought they were collecting them for me but I learned about fishing, saw the fishing poles and watched while they maneuvered the wriggling worm onto a hook -- oh, that I didn't like so much but learned to accept it, I felt it though and wondered if it hurt. They let me hold a worm in my hand. I wasn't too comfortable about it. I wanted to hold a caterpillar but I don't think I ever got that chance.

The Mocking Bird

Wait! I'm not ready yet. But the mocking bird sings, and the light persists. My eyes refuse to open and the sun beckons to me. I stretch, try to cooperate with the sun. Put my two hands on the side of the bed -- Carol puts my hearing aid in and the mocking bird gets louder. I lift my body, forward. I can do it, I thought. I fix my eyes on the sides of the bathroom door, where each hand will go has to be determined. I lift up off the bed.

Here goes. Now, yes I'm awake. What a beautiful day, sun shining, birds singing, and especially the mocking bird who sits on the corner of the roof outside my bedroom window. I don't know who she's mocking this morning but it's wierd. Maybe she's mixed up, can't get the sound just right that she wants to mimic. I take another look out the window -- she's gone now. The marsh is low. Don't know when the tide is due to come up and spill into the marsh, and bring the herons and ibis, maybe pelicans, and me to the window or to the porch with binoculars,. Then to my bird log to write up the specifics. What's today, I ask. The response isn't enough. I know it's Thursday, June something - 4? Is it going to be a warm day? Who knows, you say. Who can predict the future?

So I settle back. Right! Brace yourself, come what may. Write.

Home for a Visit

Morning is here again. I look in the mirror at my face -- ooh! Is it
the South Carolina sun? Carol says, don't look in the mirror first
thing in the morning. You're fine. Write!

I'll be going to Massachusetts soon and look forward to seeing
everybody again. And my house. I wonder who lives there now? Mice?
ants, spiders, moths? birds? squirrels? What are they eating? We
left no food. They could read. I left lots of books in the library
there. Oh, the worms. They may have gotten to the books. I'm not
sure I want to go back into that house now. But I was brought up
there, and there are things...things!

What things? All around us, some of them ours, some we wished were
ours, and we kept our things in a box -- maybe the little wooden box
that the codfish came in when the fishman with the truck came by, It
had a slide cover and we could print our name on top, so noone else
would touch our things, unless we let them. We loved the codfish
cakes my mother used to make for lunch sometimes. Left a nice salty
taste in your mouth. I loved that!

And bread and molasses too -- I loved bread and molasses. That's what
I'll ask for when I go up to Massachusetts. Bread and molasses, and a
glass of milk. But in Chelmsford, it won't be the same.

Together, or Not

One thing I remember about my sisters is that there would always be me and one other, never Lily and Thelma, never Esther and Lily, nor Thelma and Mabel, Thelma and Esther, Mabel and Lily, oh! so many combinations, but it was always one of these and me.

My brothers, however, were most of the time in twos, or threes, or even fours. I don't know why this was so. But it was very special if I had one brother to myself -- say,

Eddie, who lived next door let me watch his fingers as he strummed his banjo, let me pick cherries from his cherry tree,

Leo, who taught me to play the violin, who let me spin his records of overtures to The Barber of Seville, Aida, Tosca and others, the Greats: Beethovan, Chopin, Handel, Grieg, Tschaikowski, the opera tenors and other great music treats. Leo had a Victrola and I had to kneel on a chair to reach the record player. He taught me how to place the needle down carefully so as not to damage the record, and who leaned over my shoulder while I struggled with bookkeeping and accounting, giving me some really good pointers that made me understand what I was doing,

Tommy, who would watch an insect with me, or show me the roots of a tree, or a serated leaf, or take me in the canoe and let me paddle up front,

Jimmy, who listened to me "play" the violin, and then played something for me to listen to, and who loaned me a dollar one day when I was desperate to buy some school card with my name on it which we couldn't afford, nor could he,

Charlie, who would also let me paddle the canoe, or would look up from a book he was reading to talk and tell me what he had just learned from it, or hand me something he thought I would like to read, or just talk

Joe, who would have me touch his pet, a turtle, a skunk, , a rooster, a crow or a birddog and tell me they were my friend and not to be afraid.

Ernie, of course, was just a kid like myself, but he too was fun to be with, alone or with others. Ernie was always pushing me away, but I was more than willing to "go get" anything he wanted, and listened to him and hung on to his every word.

My sisters? I think mostly I was in the way, when they were learning to cook, sew, or doing their own thing. Except for my sister, Mabel who took "us kids" (Esther, Ernie, myself and younger brother Richard) for rides in her car, and showed us what to look for, like cows, horses, churches with their towers and crosses, out-of-state number plates on cars, water and boats on a river when we crossed over a bridge.

Brothers, I had 8 of them. My younger brother, Richard, died at the age of l0, when I think I was about l2. Sisters, I had 6, but only knew 5. A sister who died before she was a year old, had she lived would have been another older sisters.

What a wonderful family I grew up in.

Lily

If Lily were not in plain sight in the kitchen, on the porch near the kitchen, in the dining room or living room, and you saw her just a minute ago, then she had to be in the library.

So you take a quick glance into the library -- she's not at the piano and besides you would have heard play (although she does play more softly than anyone I know), or on the typewriter (and I've never heard such a quiet typewriter either!). Probably the TV is on, or there are just too many people in the house.

When Lily had a story to write for the newspaper, she would just slip in there and type it. I think it was just her slipping in and out of the library, taking or making phone calls in the hall, and getting right back there at her typewriter that the rest of us didn't have quite programmed in our head. I suspect that when we peered in one door, typewriter in sight and she not there, she was on the phone in the hall, from where she may have slipped right through dining room, living room, the front hall and through the other door, back to the library and her typewriter. Or, you try again and she's not there -- maybe she is on the sunporch, looking at something or somebody out the window, or upstairs for something or other. As you may have guessed, Lily was good at slipping in and out of places. She could be right there with you and if you looked away for a second, she could be seen 'way down there by the river, or could have disappeared into the greenhouse in back of the garage.

But, if you took the time to clip her writings from the newspapers, you would find that she not only typed up weddings and anniversary and birthday parties, holiday or other special functions at the churches, or parks, she threw in short pieces about birds, rare or otherwise, children playing, or just about the pleasures of canoeing on the river, or enjoying flowers that came up unexpectedly, wild or planted by someone last year. She made up stories of human interest, of antics of animals or children. Every day she typed and every day she clipped from the newspaper.

And she had time to cook and prepare meals, to run errands in her car sometimes to drop her writings off to another Milford Daily News person, or just to "pick up something" from "somebody." She found time to garden, to help Tommy in his greenhouse, to help Miriam with whatever in her house, or to hellp her plant something in her yard.

Lily found time get our mother settled for the night, play scrabble with us, and then go to bed and read.

But when did she type?

Ruth

Ruth was a beautiful woman. Skinny, but with the most beautiful skin I ever saw, smooth and white, round dark brown eyes, beautiful teeth. Jimmy was small, played the violin, had a great big smile. He was special, and he now had a beautiful wife and three small children. When they walked up to visit us, Jimmy was always outside with my father and Ruth, with the children, would come in and sit in the kitchen with my mother and the rest of us.

The oldest son, Allan, was frail with bowed legs -- which my sister Mabel, a nurse, called "rickets." Ruth would have no part of "rickets" for her first-born, Allan. She argued consistently with Mabel, "He doesn't have rickets" she would say. I listened to this argument over and over again. It disturbed me. I asked Mabel about "rickets" and she would say, "He needs to be in a hospital -- his legs can be fixed -- it's a bone disease -- it has to be attended to early. I then began to wonder about Ruth. Why didn't she listen to Mabel? Allan was one of my favorite nephews, when my brother, Eddie moved away, with "Little Jimmy" and Donald. And I wanted Allan's legs to be straight, normal. He was such a cute little guy, big brown sad eyes. I used to read to him when I could. But most of the time, the three little ones clung to their mother's knees wailing, and she would say, "oh she wants her bottle and I told her she's too old for that," or "he wanted to go to his other grandmother's house," or "he wants to go down to see the river. -- don't pay any attention to them." But of course we did pay attention -- how could we not?

All conversation of course was out of the question becauses of the screaming and bellowing of the children, and the angry mother. Stopping to appease did not help because usually it meant a kick with a small but sharp foot --sharp because of the angle of the child's foot as it landed on your leg or stomach. Or, if not a kick, a bite, with sharp little first teeth. Then, a piercing scream when Ruth herself bit back. I can see now her slender white fingers with the diamond that Jimmy had given her, although I don't know how he could have afforded it, holding the child tight to keep him still.

I loved that little boy, Allan, even when he bit me.

Old Maple Tree

A sad day it was when our Eddie's old Maple Tree came down. This was the tree that was in the way of his "perfect" hedge, when he lived with his family, next door to us. He loved the tree, though, and stopped his hedge for the tree and picked up on the other side.

The tree would remember all the people that went in and out of that house while Eddie and his small family lived there, and would remember the families that came after he left. him. The tree remembers

The day my neighbor ssid -- that tree is dangerous. See those branches -- right over my house, and yours, right over our cars sitting there in the driveway. It's got to come down. Yes, I said, it is dangerous -- would wreck your car, and if lightning struck and it hit the house, someone could be killed. Yes, it should come down. I was sad when I said that.

Sitting on our porch, we often watched a squirrels scampering up and around another interesting tree growing up there. and leaning very close.

One day, a squirrel ran across the driveway carrying a baby squirrel in her mouth. We watched as she moved across the lawn, toward the lower lawn and river and then across the small marsh, built up into a small island, There were many tree down there but a large willow tree right by our dock was her choice, but we lost sight of her then. But before long, there she was again, crossing our driveway, then the patio, with another baby in her mouth. This went on, with many trips -- at least four, possibly five. Oh, that poor mother, we said. And we knew she had been evacuated from her home in that tree.

We tried, many times, to recognize that mother squirrel among the many that came and went but felt we had lost her. Now, when I see the squirrels running across our patio and up and around that tree, I think some of them are her babies, and feel happy.