Sometimes when I was, and am, scared, I lock the door to the basement. It’s the scary place where the monsters dwell, and on particularly threatening nights, they come out of the basement, feeding off your fear, and do whatever it is that monsters do. Unless you lock the door. In that case, they are stuck down there, pacing up and down the stairs, helpless until the door is unlocked, in which case you are no longer scared, and they are no longer real.
When I was ten, I had recently been granted the privilege of going home after school instead of to a daycare (which I attended until an embarrassingly old seven years old, the shame) or to my Mom’s office. On this fateful day, there was a storm brewing. I was watching Wheel of Fortune on NBC before the news came on. The wind was howling and the rain was pelting the window behind me, so I had to turn up the volume to hear. On the bottom of the screen, the scrolling bar listed Sioux county (“That’s where I live” I thought) as under a tornado watch. Of course, I knew even then the difference between tornado watch and tornado warning. "Watch" meant nothing, an empty threat. Maybe I’ll come and be a menace, just you wait and see, and there’s a chance I’ll come and possibly get you. Warning meant everything, a threat come to fruition. You’d better run and hide because I’m not coming anymore. I’m already here.
Partway through a commercial break, it started to hail outside. I could hear the house being struck repeatedly by marbles of ice. Thunder crashed around, and the sky was dark purple, giving that color about as ominous a presence as possible. I, a child who delighted in scaring others, was now on the receiving end of fear. I was waiting for Mom, Dad, someone to get home so everything could be okay. Pat Sajak and Vanna White checked to see if there were any RSTLNE’s on the board. I saw the contestant pick, but could no longer really hear, their additional letters and vowels. MCDO. Not much help, this one would be difficult. And the timer started. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. No right answer yet. Five. Four.
Then the sirens went off around town. Knock, knock. Guess who? I knew the drill: go to the basement, it’s the safest place in town, get away from all windows and glass, and bunker down ‘till danger passes. I chased after and grabbed my cat, then sprinted to the basement entrance, where I stopped.
I stared down the stairs, which changed direction a quarter of the way down, leaving the rest of the basement in mystery until you were already there. It was a large place, and it felt old, almost a dungeon. There were several rooms, many of them with offshoots, and nothing was quite level. The walls were white stone of some kind, but you could see the individual bricks, and the wall bowed in and out. Some doors wouldn’t shut unless real force was applied, and then they were twice as difficult to open. And of course, this was where the monsters lived.
I used to go “monster hunting” with friends, snorkels refashioned as guns, and even at two o’clock in the afternoon, I would feel uncomfortable in the basement. After all, we were just playing. We didn’t want to find an actual monster. Monster hunting was much less intimidating looking around the shrubs around the neighborhood.
I looked downstairs, struggling to find the courage to do what I knew had to be done. Outside, the wind and hail were creating a background of apocalypse. I closed the basement door behind me, sealing myself in. I exhaled, reaffirmed the grip on the cat in my arms, and took the stairs one by one. The small, feeble basement windows rarely let enough light in on the brightest days of summer, and at present I could see virtually nothing. And step by step I descended below the ground until I felt the cold floor under my feet. I was in the main chamber, and I traveled by memory to the next room, shuffling along, holding out my cat-free hand feeling for the door, dreading finding something else or, even worse, something finding me.
The door knob was in my small hands, and I slipped into the laundry room, windowless and as tornado-proof as any room in town. I closed the door tight, and wandered forward, now in complete darkness, swinging my arm to find the light cord. I was petrified, because I knew that this was the room where the monsters sprang from, and even though I wanted the light, I was reasonably certain that when I turned it on, there would be something right in front of me. At least in the dark I wouldn’t know, and maybe it would be over before it began.
I gripped the cord, the moment of truth at hand, and I tugged. But something went wrong. The string snapped, leaving the light off, and I was suddenly trapped by the darkness, unable to see or perceive the orientation of the room. I frantically grabbed for the rest of the cord, hoping it had broken low, but to no avail. It was out of my reach. I grabbed my cat closer, and sat down, as terrified a child as possible. Outside, thunder crashed relentlessly and the sirens continued to blare. And I sat, alone in the dark where the monsters lived, clutching my cat, crying for someone to save me.
Showing posts with label Weather. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Weather. Show all posts
Friday, December 31, 2010
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Best of 2010: Lisa Taylor - Fire Season
October is fire season. While the rest of the country swoons over crisp fall air and Mardi Gras foliage, Southern California braces for color of a different sort. We residents scan painfully blue skies for scribbles of smoke. We examine hillsides furred with browned grass, punctuated with the gray-green eucalyptus trees -- ten-story candles, arboreal dynamite. We wince at forecasts predicting “Santa Ana winds” -- super-heated exhalations from the Mojave Desert which often mark fire season’s opening.
I’ve lived in Southern California my entire life. When I was young, the town I lived in, built in a bowl at the center of bone-dry, high-desert foothills, periodically found itself hostage to wildfire. I remember orange skies and ash falling like snow, a layer of black grit on windowsills and the hoods of cars. The omnipresent smell of burnt vegetation and swimming pools sporting an oily slick of spent fuel.
When I was about ten years old, the street I lived on found itself directly in the path of a wildfire. The houses across the street had backyards bordered by natural hillside, separated from relative wilderness by flimsy chain-link fencing. The fire’s point of origin was somewhere to the west of us, started -- intentionally, we found out later -- in the center of a small state park, and blooming outward. We watched the news for word of the fire’s trajectory, paid close attention to the direction and power of the wind. As this was before e-mail, before home computers, before reverse-911 alerts, the information we gleaned was attenuated; it was still possible, despite the orange skies, to feel somewhat removed from the action.
Then we noticed the fire trucks. Five, then six, then seven of them. Converging on our little neighborhood, their shiny red bulk diminishing our homes to mere backdrop. At first, none of the firefighters would talk to us, though we neighborhood kids were dying to talk to them, bouncing up and down on our heels and sprinting back and forth on the sidewalks behind our parents -- our poor parents, whose fear was mostly lost on us, fixated as we were on the firefighters’ uniforms, on their helmets, on their walkie-talkies, the tangible evidence of their importance. Then, receiving word of a shift in the prevailing winds, the firefighters’ focus shifted. A moment of awful, visceral thrill: the firefighters were talking to our parents, telling our parents to pack up and be prepared to leave on their order. We were no longer spectators -- we were the main attraction. We might be on T.V.!
With faces of stone, my parents hustled me and my sister back to our house. We were told we could fill a paper bag each with things from our rooms. At eight and ten, my sister and I did not acquit ourselves particularly well, here: I remember we both stuffed our Barbies and their wardrobes into our bags, but forgot our scrapbooks, our souvenirs. I did have the presence of mind to grab my stuffed rabbit -- named, imaginatively, Bunny -- from its accustomed place on my bed before rocketing out the door, where my parents were waiting in the driveway.
We stood beside our loaded station wagon and watched the firefighters race to the top of our dead-end street, where Little Sugarloaf and Big Sugarloaf (our local names for the neighborhood hills we’d all hiked countless times) could most easily be reached. Our dogs, loaded into the wagon first by my parents (before the photo albums, before my dad’s paintings, before my grandmother’s wedding dress, before my Barbies, for that matter), threw themselves at the windows, barking furiously in an excess of confusion and excitement and doggy-rage. We watched the hill directly across the street.
And then we saw it.
With the speed of water tumbling out of a cup, the fire poured itself over the lip of the hill. Untethered, the fire chewed its way through the brush, through brittle sage and grass and manzanita, a thick spill of red and orange flaring down and out, urged onward by gravity and wind, erasing the usual brown of the hillside. The fire made no sound; it was quiet. Except for the shouts of the firefighters already on the hillside, already in its path, there was nothing to hear. This seemed odd. To my ten-year-old mind, the absence of sound was the scariest bit. Anything moving that fast should have been noisy, should have sounded like a waterfall, like hail, like an engine. This fire was quietly, simply, efficient.
My parents had had enough. We joined our now-hysterical dogs in the station wagon and left.
When we returned to our house several hours later, the only evidence of the fire was a blackened hillside, relieved here and there by the pale gray of scattered boulders, and the smell of ash. The fire was contained quickly, and our neighbors’ homes were spared. Half the kids in the neighborhood vowed to become firefighters when they grew up. And fire season passed.
I’ve lived in Southern California my entire life. When I was young, the town I lived in, built in a bowl at the center of bone-dry, high-desert foothills, periodically found itself hostage to wildfire. I remember orange skies and ash falling like snow, a layer of black grit on windowsills and the hoods of cars. The omnipresent smell of burnt vegetation and swimming pools sporting an oily slick of spent fuel.
When I was about ten years old, the street I lived on found itself directly in the path of a wildfire. The houses across the street had backyards bordered by natural hillside, separated from relative wilderness by flimsy chain-link fencing. The fire’s point of origin was somewhere to the west of us, started -- intentionally, we found out later -- in the center of a small state park, and blooming outward. We watched the news for word of the fire’s trajectory, paid close attention to the direction and power of the wind. As this was before e-mail, before home computers, before reverse-911 alerts, the information we gleaned was attenuated; it was still possible, despite the orange skies, to feel somewhat removed from the action.
Then we noticed the fire trucks. Five, then six, then seven of them. Converging on our little neighborhood, their shiny red bulk diminishing our homes to mere backdrop. At first, none of the firefighters would talk to us, though we neighborhood kids were dying to talk to them, bouncing up and down on our heels and sprinting back and forth on the sidewalks behind our parents -- our poor parents, whose fear was mostly lost on us, fixated as we were on the firefighters’ uniforms, on their helmets, on their walkie-talkies, the tangible evidence of their importance. Then, receiving word of a shift in the prevailing winds, the firefighters’ focus shifted. A moment of awful, visceral thrill: the firefighters were talking to our parents, telling our parents to pack up and be prepared to leave on their order. We were no longer spectators -- we were the main attraction. We might be on T.V.!
With faces of stone, my parents hustled me and my sister back to our house. We were told we could fill a paper bag each with things from our rooms. At eight and ten, my sister and I did not acquit ourselves particularly well, here: I remember we both stuffed our Barbies and their wardrobes into our bags, but forgot our scrapbooks, our souvenirs. I did have the presence of mind to grab my stuffed rabbit -- named, imaginatively, Bunny -- from its accustomed place on my bed before rocketing out the door, where my parents were waiting in the driveway.
We stood beside our loaded station wagon and watched the firefighters race to the top of our dead-end street, where Little Sugarloaf and Big Sugarloaf (our local names for the neighborhood hills we’d all hiked countless times) could most easily be reached. Our dogs, loaded into the wagon first by my parents (before the photo albums, before my dad’s paintings, before my grandmother’s wedding dress, before my Barbies, for that matter), threw themselves at the windows, barking furiously in an excess of confusion and excitement and doggy-rage. We watched the hill directly across the street.
And then we saw it.
With the speed of water tumbling out of a cup, the fire poured itself over the lip of the hill. Untethered, the fire chewed its way through the brush, through brittle sage and grass and manzanita, a thick spill of red and orange flaring down and out, urged onward by gravity and wind, erasing the usual brown of the hillside. The fire made no sound; it was quiet. Except for the shouts of the firefighters already on the hillside, already in its path, there was nothing to hear. This seemed odd. To my ten-year-old mind, the absence of sound was the scariest bit. Anything moving that fast should have been noisy, should have sounded like a waterfall, like hail, like an engine. This fire was quietly, simply, efficient.
My parents had had enough. We joined our now-hysterical dogs in the station wagon and left.
When we returned to our house several hours later, the only evidence of the fire was a blackened hillside, relieved here and there by the pale gray of scattered boulders, and the smell of ash. The fire was contained quickly, and our neighbors’ homes were spared. Half the kids in the neighborhood vowed to become firefighters when they grew up. And fire season passed.
Saturday, October 16, 2010
Josh Grimmer: Before the Flood b/w State of the Union for October 16, 2010
And the rain came down, like they were hoping
The great grey belly in the sky split right open
They sing hand-in-hand to the river
The Lord will keep us forever
- Piney Gir, “Great Grey Belly”
Growing up in the New Englandy area, we got more than enough weather. Insane humidity. Snow for days on end. Buckets and buckets of rain – every year, without fail, on my birthday. We never really got event weather. Two of the three big weather memories I have come from age five or so. There was a night where we got what seemed like ten feet of snow. I went to bed, things were fine. I woke up and the snow was easily twice as high up as the very highest I could stretch my neck.
About six months later, Hurricane Bob came and knocked a bunch of trees down. This was expertly rhymed about by Meg earlier this week, so I feel like I don't need to talk about that. Nothing really notable happened, weather-wise, for another 15 or so years.
I had just failed out of Bridgewater State College (go Bears). I wanted to major in English until I realized I couldn't read. I have this horrible block in my brain that forces me to shut down the moment I open a book. It gets worse as I get older. It's amazing that I can stand to be around my wife, considering how she's always walking around with her face buried in a book. She's like Belle, except she's friends with two talking candelabras. Anyhow, after the English debacle, I switched my major to physics. I love physics – I'm too dumb to major in it. Oh, and I slept through class every day. That didn't help.
So I failed out of school. A lot of people do that. I moved back in with my parents. A lot of people do that. I lived in their basement and wanted to kill myself. A lot of people do that, too. After the initial adjustment period, life sort of rolled on like it does. Job to job, paycheck to paycheck. A basement full of crap – clothes, records, comic books, whatever. I wasn't really dating, I had a terrible car. I worked at Blockbuster Video (RIP) for the stunningly insulting rate of seven dollars an hour. I could feel another low coming along. It was one of those periods in my life – one of a few – where each morning I woke up felt like another loss. I was fighting with my parents every day, my mom especially. I never really got along with my mom. I was a terrible son, she was a terrible mom. We decided to just kind of live with that.
It all came to a head the night of the hurricane. Whatever hurricane it was - I honestly don't remember the name. Norma? Jerry? Partario? I forget. It doesn't matter. Really, it might not have even been a hurricane. All I know is it really started dumping down when I was at work. From 5pm to 1am, all it did was rain. Oppressive, painful rain. If you went outside, it hurt. I somehow made it home with my broken windshield wipers and dim headlights. I got in, took the hottest shower you could possibly take without melting, and went down to my bedroom.
By the time I got home, the water had risen to just beneath the lowest stair. The I fumbled around in the dark for the light switch. The whole basement was flooded. All my stuff - the aforementioned records, clothes, comic books – was destroyed. I sloshed over to my bed to find it soaked through. I pulled back the covers to find a family of mice, huddled up for warmth and hoping not to drown. I wasn't about to shoo them away, so I went back up to the living room and fell asleep on the couch.
Remember my mom? Well she shoved me off the couch at about 5am, asking me if I was on meth. If I had been on meth, I wouldn't have been asleep. That, as they say, was the last straw. I'm pretty sure that's what they say. I had spent years threatening to move away from home. After years of making excuses to stay, I finally had my excuse to leave. The flood might have been the best thing to ever happen to me.
I quit my job. I sold my car. I bought a plane ticket. Four days later I was in Los Angeles. I'm never going back.
---
Oh, hello there. Welcome to this week's State of the Union post. Yeah, it's a bit long. I decided to shove my weather essay in there, just to save space. Consider that space saved.
Weather week! What did you think? Favorites? Unfavorites? You probably shouldn't talk about your unfavorites, that's not what we're here for. I personally enjoyed Patrick's essay about tornado monsters and supercats. I really enjoyed weather week. The whole shebang.
Now, as for this week, it's buildings and food week. We've got a handful of essays, one from a new contributor, even. Who will it be? Well, obviously you don't know. It's a new person. Duh.
Deadlines! Friday, October 22 – I want your essays about Halloween. Costumes, candy, spookiness. Remember the time you dressed up like the Roadrunner three years in a row? You could write about that. Or the Ghostbusters costume you made all by yourself that turned out to not actually be what the Ghostbusters wore. Write about that, too.
The week after that, I think we're all going to write about moving. Why? No reason. Just figured it would be nice to write about. I just closed my eyes and thought “what is the first word that pops into my mind? Moving! Oh, moving. What a great topic!” That is the genesis of this incredibly random topic. I'm certainly not moving to North Hollywood next month, that's for certain. Wait, what? I am? Oh shit. Oh that explains everything. No wonder I'm full of box-related dread. Poor Peepopo won't know what hit her.
Here's my challenge to you, readers. Hell, writers too. Everyone within the sound of my voice – leave more comments. I know it's not just the writers who are reading this. Without getting too pretentious, I'd like each essay to open a discussion here. Get people talking about stuff. I dunno – listen, it's late. I just want people to talk to each other about the stuff that they write. Ask questions. Prod. Whatever. Is something unclear in the text? Ask about it. I feel like Meg and I do a pretty good job of editing this stuff, but sometimes ambiguity slips through.
Still looking for a logo, still looking for more writers, still looking for more readers. Tell your friends.
Oh, and one last thing – if it's playing in your town, go see Tamara Drewe. It was directed by Stephen Frears, who also did The Queen and High Fidelity. It's about a bunch of writers. I mean, it's about a bunch of stuff – love, infidelity, teenage obsession, nudity – but so much of it is about writing. And most of all, it's brilliant. Go check it out.
Grosses bises,
Josh Grimmer, Editor-in-Chief
Josh Grimmer lives in Hollywood with his wife and cat. He kinda sorta runs this blog, and has another one at http://mousebed.blogspot.com. Twitter him up at http://twitter.com/JoshGrimmer
The great grey belly in the sky split right open
They sing hand-in-hand to the river
The Lord will keep us forever
- Piney Gir, “Great Grey Belly”
Growing up in the New Englandy area, we got more than enough weather. Insane humidity. Snow for days on end. Buckets and buckets of rain – every year, without fail, on my birthday. We never really got event weather. Two of the three big weather memories I have come from age five or so. There was a night where we got what seemed like ten feet of snow. I went to bed, things were fine. I woke up and the snow was easily twice as high up as the very highest I could stretch my neck.
About six months later, Hurricane Bob came and knocked a bunch of trees down. This was expertly rhymed about by Meg earlier this week, so I feel like I don't need to talk about that. Nothing really notable happened, weather-wise, for another 15 or so years.
I had just failed out of Bridgewater State College (go Bears). I wanted to major in English until I realized I couldn't read. I have this horrible block in my brain that forces me to shut down the moment I open a book. It gets worse as I get older. It's amazing that I can stand to be around my wife, considering how she's always walking around with her face buried in a book. She's like Belle, except she's friends with two talking candelabras. Anyhow, after the English debacle, I switched my major to physics. I love physics – I'm too dumb to major in it. Oh, and I slept through class every day. That didn't help.
So I failed out of school. A lot of people do that. I moved back in with my parents. A lot of people do that. I lived in their basement and wanted to kill myself. A lot of people do that, too. After the initial adjustment period, life sort of rolled on like it does. Job to job, paycheck to paycheck. A basement full of crap – clothes, records, comic books, whatever. I wasn't really dating, I had a terrible car. I worked at Blockbuster Video (RIP) for the stunningly insulting rate of seven dollars an hour. I could feel another low coming along. It was one of those periods in my life – one of a few – where each morning I woke up felt like another loss. I was fighting with my parents every day, my mom especially. I never really got along with my mom. I was a terrible son, she was a terrible mom. We decided to just kind of live with that.
It all came to a head the night of the hurricane. Whatever hurricane it was - I honestly don't remember the name. Norma? Jerry? Partario? I forget. It doesn't matter. Really, it might not have even been a hurricane. All I know is it really started dumping down when I was at work. From 5pm to 1am, all it did was rain. Oppressive, painful rain. If you went outside, it hurt. I somehow made it home with my broken windshield wipers and dim headlights. I got in, took the hottest shower you could possibly take without melting, and went down to my bedroom.
By the time I got home, the water had risen to just beneath the lowest stair. The I fumbled around in the dark for the light switch. The whole basement was flooded. All my stuff - the aforementioned records, clothes, comic books – was destroyed. I sloshed over to my bed to find it soaked through. I pulled back the covers to find a family of mice, huddled up for warmth and hoping not to drown. I wasn't about to shoo them away, so I went back up to the living room and fell asleep on the couch.
Remember my mom? Well she shoved me off the couch at about 5am, asking me if I was on meth. If I had been on meth, I wouldn't have been asleep. That, as they say, was the last straw. I'm pretty sure that's what they say. I had spent years threatening to move away from home. After years of making excuses to stay, I finally had my excuse to leave. The flood might have been the best thing to ever happen to me.
I quit my job. I sold my car. I bought a plane ticket. Four days later I was in Los Angeles. I'm never going back.
---
Oh, hello there. Welcome to this week's State of the Union post. Yeah, it's a bit long. I decided to shove my weather essay in there, just to save space. Consider that space saved.
Weather week! What did you think? Favorites? Unfavorites? You probably shouldn't talk about your unfavorites, that's not what we're here for. I personally enjoyed Patrick's essay about tornado monsters and supercats. I really enjoyed weather week. The whole shebang.
Now, as for this week, it's buildings and food week. We've got a handful of essays, one from a new contributor, even. Who will it be? Well, obviously you don't know. It's a new person. Duh.
Deadlines! Friday, October 22 – I want your essays about Halloween. Costumes, candy, spookiness. Remember the time you dressed up like the Roadrunner three years in a row? You could write about that. Or the Ghostbusters costume you made all by yourself that turned out to not actually be what the Ghostbusters wore. Write about that, too.
The week after that, I think we're all going to write about moving. Why? No reason. Just figured it would be nice to write about. I just closed my eyes and thought “what is the first word that pops into my mind? Moving! Oh, moving. What a great topic!” That is the genesis of this incredibly random topic. I'm certainly not moving to North Hollywood next month, that's for certain. Wait, what? I am? Oh shit. Oh that explains everything. No wonder I'm full of box-related dread. Poor Peepopo won't know what hit her.
Here's my challenge to you, readers. Hell, writers too. Everyone within the sound of my voice – leave more comments. I know it's not just the writers who are reading this. Without getting too pretentious, I'd like each essay to open a discussion here. Get people talking about stuff. I dunno – listen, it's late. I just want people to talk to each other about the stuff that they write. Ask questions. Prod. Whatever. Is something unclear in the text? Ask about it. I feel like Meg and I do a pretty good job of editing this stuff, but sometimes ambiguity slips through.
Still looking for a logo, still looking for more writers, still looking for more readers. Tell your friends.
Oh, and one last thing – if it's playing in your town, go see Tamara Drewe. It was directed by Stephen Frears, who also did The Queen and High Fidelity. It's about a bunch of writers. I mean, it's about a bunch of stuff – love, infidelity, teenage obsession, nudity – but so much of it is about writing. And most of all, it's brilliant. Go check it out.
Grosses bises,
Josh Grimmer, Editor-in-Chief
Josh Grimmer lives in Hollywood with his wife and cat. He kinda sorta runs this blog, and has another one at http://mousebed.blogspot.com. Twitter him up at http://twitter.com/JoshGrimmer
Friday, October 15, 2010
Patrick White: In the Dark with the Monsters
Sometimes when I was, and am, scared, I lock the door to the basement. It’s the scary place where the monsters dwell, and on particularly threatening nights, they come out of the basement, feeding off your fear, and do whatever it is that monsters do. Unless you lock the door. In that case, they are stuck down there, pacing up and down the stairs, helpless until the door is unlocked, in which case you are no longer scared, and they are no longer real.
When I was ten, I had recently been granted the privilege of going home after school instead of to a daycare (which I attended until an embarrassingly old seven years old, the shame) or to my Mom’s office. On this fateful day, there was a storm brewing. I was watching Wheel of Fortune on NBC before the news came on. The wind was howling and the rain was pelting the window behind me, so I had to turn up the volume to hear. On the bottom of the screen, the scrolling bar listed Sioux county (“That’s where I live” I thought) as under a tornado watch. Of course, I knew even then the difference between tornado watch and tornado warning. "Watch" meant nothing, an empty threat. Maybe I’ll come and be a menace, just you wait and see, and there’s a chance I’ll come and possibly get you. Warning meant everything, a threat come to fruition. You’d better run and hide because I’m not coming anymore. I’m already here.
Partway through a commercial break, it started to hail outside. I could hear the house being struck repeatedly by marbles of ice. Thunder crashed around, and the sky was dark purple, giving that color about as ominous a presence as possible. I, a child who delighted in scaring others, was now on the receiving end of fear. I was waiting for Mom, Dad, someone to get home so everything could be okay. Pat Sajak and Vanna White checked to see if there were any RSTLNE’s on the board. I saw the contestant pick, but could no longer really hear, their additional letters and vowels. MCDO. Not much help, this one would be difficult. And the timer started. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. No right answer yet. Five. Four.
Then the sirens went off around town. Knock, knock. Guess who? I knew the drill: go to the basement, it’s the safest place in town, get away from all windows and glass, and bunker down ‘till danger passes. I chased after and grabbed my cat, then sprinted to the basement entrance, where I stopped.
I stared down the stairs, which changed direction a quarter of the way down, leaving the rest of the basement in mystery until you were already there. It was a large place, and it felt old, almost a dungeon. There were several rooms, many of them with offshoots, and nothing was quite level. The walls were white stone of some kind, but you could see the individual bricks, and the wall bowed in and out. Some doors wouldn’t shut unless real force was applied, and then they were twice as difficult to open. And of course, this was where the monsters lived.
I used to go “monster hunting” with friends, snorkels refashioned as guns, and even at two o’clock in the afternoon, I would feel uncomfortable in the basement. After all, we were just playing. We didn’t want to find an actual monster. Monster hunting was much less intimidating looking around the shrubs around the neighborhood.
I looked downstairs, struggling to find the courage to do what I knew had to be done. Outside, the wind and hail were creating a background of apocalypse. I closed the basement door behind me, sealing myself in. I exhaled, reaffirmed the grip on the cat in my arms, and took the stairs one by one. The small, feeble basement windows rarely let enough light in on the brightest days of summer, and at present I could see virtually nothing. And step by step I descended below the ground until I felt the cold floor under my feet. I was in the main chamber, and I traveled by memory to the next room, shuffling along, holding out my cat-free hand feeling for the door, dreading finding something else or, even worse, something finding me.
The door knob was in my small hands, and I slipped into the laundry room, windowless and as tornado-proof as any room in town. I closed the door tight, and wandered forward, now in complete darkness, swinging my arm to find the light cord. I was petrified, because I knew that this was the room where the monsters sprang from, and even though I wanted the light, I was reasonably certain that when I turned it on, there would be something right in front of me. At least in the dark I wouldn’t know, and maybe it would be over before it began.
I gripped the cord, the moment of truth at hand, and I tugged. But something went wrong. The string snapped, leaving the light off, and I was suddenly trapped by the darkness, unable to see or perceive the orientation of the room. I frantically grabbed for the rest of the cord, hoping it had broken low, but to no avail. It was out of my reach. I grabbed my cat closer, and sat down, as terrified a child as possible. Outside, thunder crashed relentlessly and the sirens continued to blare. And I sat, alone in the dark where the monsters lived, clutching my cat, crying for someone to save me.
When I was ten, I had recently been granted the privilege of going home after school instead of to a daycare (which I attended until an embarrassingly old seven years old, the shame) or to my Mom’s office. On this fateful day, there was a storm brewing. I was watching Wheel of Fortune on NBC before the news came on. The wind was howling and the rain was pelting the window behind me, so I had to turn up the volume to hear. On the bottom of the screen, the scrolling bar listed Sioux county (“That’s where I live” I thought) as under a tornado watch. Of course, I knew even then the difference between tornado watch and tornado warning. "Watch" meant nothing, an empty threat. Maybe I’ll come and be a menace, just you wait and see, and there’s a chance I’ll come and possibly get you. Warning meant everything, a threat come to fruition. You’d better run and hide because I’m not coming anymore. I’m already here.
Partway through a commercial break, it started to hail outside. I could hear the house being struck repeatedly by marbles of ice. Thunder crashed around, and the sky was dark purple, giving that color about as ominous a presence as possible. I, a child who delighted in scaring others, was now on the receiving end of fear. I was waiting for Mom, Dad, someone to get home so everything could be okay. Pat Sajak and Vanna White checked to see if there were any RSTLNE’s on the board. I saw the contestant pick, but could no longer really hear, their additional letters and vowels. MCDO. Not much help, this one would be difficult. And the timer started. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. No right answer yet. Five. Four.
Then the sirens went off around town. Knock, knock. Guess who? I knew the drill: go to the basement, it’s the safest place in town, get away from all windows and glass, and bunker down ‘till danger passes. I chased after and grabbed my cat, then sprinted to the basement entrance, where I stopped.
I stared down the stairs, which changed direction a quarter of the way down, leaving the rest of the basement in mystery until you were already there. It was a large place, and it felt old, almost a dungeon. There were several rooms, many of them with offshoots, and nothing was quite level. The walls were white stone of some kind, but you could see the individual bricks, and the wall bowed in and out. Some doors wouldn’t shut unless real force was applied, and then they were twice as difficult to open. And of course, this was where the monsters lived.
I used to go “monster hunting” with friends, snorkels refashioned as guns, and even at two o’clock in the afternoon, I would feel uncomfortable in the basement. After all, we were just playing. We didn’t want to find an actual monster. Monster hunting was much less intimidating looking around the shrubs around the neighborhood.
I looked downstairs, struggling to find the courage to do what I knew had to be done. Outside, the wind and hail were creating a background of apocalypse. I closed the basement door behind me, sealing myself in. I exhaled, reaffirmed the grip on the cat in my arms, and took the stairs one by one. The small, feeble basement windows rarely let enough light in on the brightest days of summer, and at present I could see virtually nothing. And step by step I descended below the ground until I felt the cold floor under my feet. I was in the main chamber, and I traveled by memory to the next room, shuffling along, holding out my cat-free hand feeling for the door, dreading finding something else or, even worse, something finding me.
The door knob was in my small hands, and I slipped into the laundry room, windowless and as tornado-proof as any room in town. I closed the door tight, and wandered forward, now in complete darkness, swinging my arm to find the light cord. I was petrified, because I knew that this was the room where the monsters sprang from, and even though I wanted the light, I was reasonably certain that when I turned it on, there would be something right in front of me. At least in the dark I wouldn’t know, and maybe it would be over before it began.
I gripped the cord, the moment of truth at hand, and I tugged. But something went wrong. The string snapped, leaving the light off, and I was suddenly trapped by the darkness, unable to see or perceive the orientation of the room. I frantically grabbed for the rest of the cord, hoping it had broken low, but to no avail. It was out of my reach. I grabbed my cat closer, and sat down, as terrified a child as possible. Outside, thunder crashed relentlessly and the sirens continued to blare. And I sat, alone in the dark where the monsters lived, clutching my cat, crying for someone to save me.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Meg Wood - A Western Rhyme 'bout a Hurricane Named Bob
Hurricane Bob did not screw around.
Like a red-sashed bandito, he rode into town.
Snarly with power, high up on his horse,
This was no drill, folks; this storm had some force.
T’weren’t no well-heeled Earps out in Newport that day.
Holed up in the hospital, we were tucked safe away.
The grown-ups were fretful as Spanish guitars,
While we crept to the windows, watched trees fall on cars.
Bob’s eye rolled around about eleven o’clock,
An hour 'fore High Noon rang out on the block.
Fury beforehand, still more to come,
Bob wanted a break, time to oil his gun.
The clouds parted clear, winds dead down to breeze,
We all rushed outside, despite our parents’ pleas.
The sun on our faces, we danced in the street,
But Bob was not finished, only resting his feet.
He started back up with a drop here and there,
Then came raging back angry, the skies all a’flare.
We dashed back inside, as Bob steadied his aim.
This town was too small, Bob’s grudge none too tame.
The one good thing to come out of this storm,
Was the loss of the power, ice creams getting warm.
As Bob flew to the north, we all headed downtown,
Where Häagen Daz was giving out scoops with a frown.
The battles go on in this summertime war
As banditos each year give the East Coast what-for.
All this science, computing, radar, and math,
And still history repeats itself yearly with wrath.
Bob’s gone away now, replaced by some others.
Katrina kicked his ass, then all of his brothers’.
Each season brings with it a new round of fear,
While the locals stock up with bread, flashlights, and beer.
Take that, Bob, you take it, we’ll never give in;
As long as we’re standing, you’ll fail to win.
Come back now, I dare you, come wrassle our bay!
(I say that from safety, moved far, far away.)
Meg Wood is a dork. Check out more of her nonsense at http://megwood.com and http://megwood.wordpress.com
Like a red-sashed bandito, he rode into town.
Snarly with power, high up on his horse,
This was no drill, folks; this storm had some force.
T’weren’t no well-heeled Earps out in Newport that day.
Holed up in the hospital, we were tucked safe away.
The grown-ups were fretful as Spanish guitars,
While we crept to the windows, watched trees fall on cars.
Bob’s eye rolled around about eleven o’clock,
An hour 'fore High Noon rang out on the block.
Fury beforehand, still more to come,
Bob wanted a break, time to oil his gun.
The clouds parted clear, winds dead down to breeze,
We all rushed outside, despite our parents’ pleas.
The sun on our faces, we danced in the street,
But Bob was not finished, only resting his feet.
He started back up with a drop here and there,
Then came raging back angry, the skies all a’flare.
We dashed back inside, as Bob steadied his aim.
This town was too small, Bob’s grudge none too tame.
The one good thing to come out of this storm,
Was the loss of the power, ice creams getting warm.
As Bob flew to the north, we all headed downtown,
Where Häagen Daz was giving out scoops with a frown.
The battles go on in this summertime war
As banditos each year give the East Coast what-for.
All this science, computing, radar, and math,
And still history repeats itself yearly with wrath.
Bob’s gone away now, replaced by some others.
Katrina kicked his ass, then all of his brothers’.
Each season brings with it a new round of fear,
While the locals stock up with bread, flashlights, and beer.
Take that, Bob, you take it, we’ll never give in;
As long as we’re standing, you’ll fail to win.
Come back now, I dare you, come wrassle our bay!
(I say that from safety, moved far, far away.)
Meg Wood is a dork. Check out more of her nonsense at http://megwood.com and http://megwood.wordpress.com
Barbi Beckett: A Killer on the Road
El Paso, Texas makes a body desperate for some weather, any weather besides hot. By age three I had an intense jones for The Doors’ song, Riders On The Storm, for that reason. I’d close my eyes and disappear into the rain and thunder. A fresh calm would wash over and I could almost smell the wet, warm sidewalks. My brothers would withhold the record until they were bored, then put it on and cover their laughing mouths as I lost myself in a fruitless rain dance. Seven minutes be damned. This tot had a solid attention span for some cool moist. Seven whole minutes of showers was no joke. Sure, they fade to the back during the singy parts but they are there throughout.
Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Into this house we’re born
Into this world we’re thrown
Like a dog without a bone
An actor out alone
Riders on the storm
It wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I actually listened to the lyrics. I was living in Seattle and driving to work in a rare, yes, rare, downpour. The song came on the radio and I pulled over to revel in the tiny dream-come-true of being a rider (car driver) on a storm (steady rainfall). I have songwriting friends (husband) who would be appalled that I’d never listened to the lyrics before. It’s possible you could have put those weathersome sound effects in a Barry Manilow song and I would have loved it. I like to think not, but, I was oppressed by the shiny heat of that burg.
Even more scarce than a good drizzle, was a nice flurry. Every few years we’d be blessed with a moderate snowfall that would stick. If it started at night, forget sleep – it was just a countdown ‘til morning when we could get in it, feel it, eat it and sculpt it. We’d bundle up in our 70’s extreme weather gear; two pairs of pants, four pairs of tube socks (two for feet, two for hands) and bread bags over our tennies.
Nobody ever wanted to ruin their own smooth, virginal yard. Fortunately, during our grade school years, Teresa Morales and I liked to play in the many acres of desert at the end of our street. We also enjoyed cussing when we were together.
One lucky snow day we headed to our badland backyard. First we scrambled over the rock wall with a sign on it that said something about “danger, landmines, old grenades, military testing blah blah blah. Once over the wall, there was a ditch we’d run down and back up, then a dirt dike (hee hee) road to climb, cross and scurry down. That put us in the desert proper. Covered in white, it was a foreign land. We made our way deep into the center and stopped, listening to the silence, before getting down to business on our snowman.
The plan was we’d each make a big snowball, side by side, and then put one on top of the other. We worked with a fervor and by the time we noticed how grand our snowballs had become, they were too heavy to lift. We’d have to change our strategy. Instead of a snowman, we’d build a mighty snow dick.
We set to work on the shaft, piling snow on top of and in between the balls. When it got too high to reach, we each climbed up and stood on our respective testicles. Gradually, we slowed down as we realized we didn’t know what the top should look like. We hopped off our balls and stood back for some perspective. After deliberating, we went with the ‘cap’ look we’d seen in some drawings. When our sculpture was complete it was about seven feet tall and had what we’d later learn was a disproportionately large scrotum.
We two were spent. We trudged back home through the desert, tube sock mittens soggy and sagging, plastic bag boots full of slush and both pairs of jeans soaked through. We’d stopped having fun long before the dick was done but we were committed to our work and finished the tip with chattering teeth and bone-weary grunts.
The freezing temperatures must have affected our short term memory because after warming up and covering our hands with dry socks we headed back out. We missed our big dick and wanted to see it one more time before it melted. We wanted to be heading toward it and see it looming in the distance.
From atop the dike, we thought we’d be able to see the dick but everything blended together. We slogged closer and it still wasn’t looming. Our hearts sank as we approached our work area to find a wide mound of chunky snow covered in tennis shoe prints.
Genitalcide.
We knew that everything beautiful was destroyed in our neighborhood; Christmas lights were cut, lawn decorations were stolen (including our weighty concrete bench) and jack-o-lanterns were smashed. Still, we couldn’t believe anyone would want to flatten our penis. We thought that if other kids even made it out that far, they’d be impressed and want to show their friends. We thought they’d be inspired and maybe even expand on the concept with some snow titties or butts or a forest of little pricks.
We stood staring at the chunks of snow that had been the biggest, whitest, most erect penis we’d ever see. We looked around for culprits but, being a desert, there was no place for anyone to hide.
There’s a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin’ like a toad
Take A long holiday
Let your children play
If you give this man a ride
Sweet memory will die
There’s a killer on the road
Perhaps if we’d been a little older we would’ve crossed back over the dike consoling one another with positive platitudes about process. It was the making of the dick that inspired energy and enthusiasm. We might have appreciated that we were blessed to have had God work through us in that space and time. But, we were ten. We felt violated and bitter. Not only would we have to muss up our own yards but our creative impulses would be stymied by censorship at home. (My Baptist father didn’t take well to the sprawling Star of David I sprayed on our brick house with a can-of-snow one Christmas. I was pretty sure snow sex parts wouldn’t be his bag, er, I mean, thing… just, he wouldn’t like it).
Back in my yard, Teresa and I forged the weak lower half of an igloo with a plastic trash can from the bathroom. Numb and uninspired, we hung up our foot bags and called it a winter. Two years later we’d make an amazing snow family in front of my house; a mom holding a baby and the dad’s hand, a medium height boy, a short girl and a dog. The entire clan would be decapitated in the time it took us to run inside for a camera.
Now that I am a little older, I can sometimes appreciate ‘process’ but I wouldn’t say it’s the first thing that comes to mind in the face of creative destruction. I am more mature in some ways but I still have to nurse a dizzying excitement at the prospect of snow and I still get BUMMED OUT when someone tramples my wiener, so to speak.
Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Into this house we’re born
Into this world we’re thrown
Like a dog without a bone
An actor out alone
Riders on the storm
It wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I actually listened to the lyrics. I was living in Seattle and driving to work in a rare, yes, rare, downpour. The song came on the radio and I pulled over to revel in the tiny dream-come-true of being a rider (car driver) on a storm (steady rainfall). I have songwriting friends (husband) who would be appalled that I’d never listened to the lyrics before. It’s possible you could have put those weathersome sound effects in a Barry Manilow song and I would have loved it. I like to think not, but, I was oppressed by the shiny heat of that burg.
Even more scarce than a good drizzle, was a nice flurry. Every few years we’d be blessed with a moderate snowfall that would stick. If it started at night, forget sleep – it was just a countdown ‘til morning when we could get in it, feel it, eat it and sculpt it. We’d bundle up in our 70’s extreme weather gear; two pairs of pants, four pairs of tube socks (two for feet, two for hands) and bread bags over our tennies.
Nobody ever wanted to ruin their own smooth, virginal yard. Fortunately, during our grade school years, Teresa Morales and I liked to play in the many acres of desert at the end of our street. We also enjoyed cussing when we were together.
One lucky snow day we headed to our badland backyard. First we scrambled over the rock wall with a sign on it that said something about “danger, landmines, old grenades, military testing blah blah blah. Once over the wall, there was a ditch we’d run down and back up, then a dirt dike (hee hee) road to climb, cross and scurry down. That put us in the desert proper. Covered in white, it was a foreign land. We made our way deep into the center and stopped, listening to the silence, before getting down to business on our snowman.
The plan was we’d each make a big snowball, side by side, and then put one on top of the other. We worked with a fervor and by the time we noticed how grand our snowballs had become, they were too heavy to lift. We’d have to change our strategy. Instead of a snowman, we’d build a mighty snow dick.
We set to work on the shaft, piling snow on top of and in between the balls. When it got too high to reach, we each climbed up and stood on our respective testicles. Gradually, we slowed down as we realized we didn’t know what the top should look like. We hopped off our balls and stood back for some perspective. After deliberating, we went with the ‘cap’ look we’d seen in some drawings. When our sculpture was complete it was about seven feet tall and had what we’d later learn was a disproportionately large scrotum.
We two were spent. We trudged back home through the desert, tube sock mittens soggy and sagging, plastic bag boots full of slush and both pairs of jeans soaked through. We’d stopped having fun long before the dick was done but we were committed to our work and finished the tip with chattering teeth and bone-weary grunts.
The freezing temperatures must have affected our short term memory because after warming up and covering our hands with dry socks we headed back out. We missed our big dick and wanted to see it one more time before it melted. We wanted to be heading toward it and see it looming in the distance.
From atop the dike, we thought we’d be able to see the dick but everything blended together. We slogged closer and it still wasn’t looming. Our hearts sank as we approached our work area to find a wide mound of chunky snow covered in tennis shoe prints.
Genitalcide.
We knew that everything beautiful was destroyed in our neighborhood; Christmas lights were cut, lawn decorations were stolen (including our weighty concrete bench) and jack-o-lanterns were smashed. Still, we couldn’t believe anyone would want to flatten our penis. We thought that if other kids even made it out that far, they’d be impressed and want to show their friends. We thought they’d be inspired and maybe even expand on the concept with some snow titties or butts or a forest of little pricks.
We stood staring at the chunks of snow that had been the biggest, whitest, most erect penis we’d ever see. We looked around for culprits but, being a desert, there was no place for anyone to hide.
There’s a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin’ like a toad
Take A long holiday
Let your children play
If you give this man a ride
Sweet memory will die
There’s a killer on the road
Perhaps if we’d been a little older we would’ve crossed back over the dike consoling one another with positive platitudes about process. It was the making of the dick that inspired energy and enthusiasm. We might have appreciated that we were blessed to have had God work through us in that space and time. But, we were ten. We felt violated and bitter. Not only would we have to muss up our own yards but our creative impulses would be stymied by censorship at home. (My Baptist father didn’t take well to the sprawling Star of David I sprayed on our brick house with a can-of-snow one Christmas. I was pretty sure snow sex parts wouldn’t be his bag, er, I mean, thing… just, he wouldn’t like it).
Back in my yard, Teresa and I forged the weak lower half of an igloo with a plastic trash can from the bathroom. Numb and uninspired, we hung up our foot bags and called it a winter. Two years later we’d make an amazing snow family in front of my house; a mom holding a baby and the dad’s hand, a medium height boy, a short girl and a dog. The entire clan would be decapitated in the time it took us to run inside for a camera.
Now that I am a little older, I can sometimes appreciate ‘process’ but I wouldn’t say it’s the first thing that comes to mind in the face of creative destruction. I am more mature in some ways but I still have to nurse a dizzying excitement at the prospect of snow and I still get BUMMED OUT when someone tramples my wiener, so to speak.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Aurora Nibley: Rain
I warned him not to go out in the rain. I told him it wasn't safe, but he didn't understand. Sometimes I think he didn't want to understand.
He would sit at the window on rainy days, looking out at the world like he was hypnotized. If any other children passed by outside, he would fuss, and when he was feeling fractious he couldn't seem to help being difficult with me.
“Why is it all right for them to be in the rain? Nothing bad is happening to them.”
“No, darling, but you aren't like them. You must stay inside when it rains. Don't worry. You're safe here with me.”
“I'm not worried! I just want to know. Why is the rain bad?”
“It just isn't good for you. You'll understand when you're older.”
“I want to know now. Is it bad to get wet? I get wet in the bath, you know. I take baths all the time.”
“Baths are safe, dear. There is no reason to worry about the bath.”
“What about the shower? That's like rain.”
“I can see how you might think so, but you are wrong. A shower is completely different from the rain. The shower is safe.”
“So what is safe and what is not safe? Is it because the rain is outside? We go outside on sunny days.”
“There is nothing to be afraid of on sunny days. The garden is a good place to be on a sunny day. Would you like to walk in the garden tomorrow?”
“I want to go to the garden now. Why don't we ever do what I want to do?”
“Because you don't know what's good for you and I do. Tomorrow, if it's not raining, we can walk in the garden, but today we must stay in the house.”
He was always happy outside. It worried me, even though I loved to see him happy. I knew what it meant and I knew I would never be able to stop it. But I did try. I built such a wonderful garden for us, for him. I created beautiful geometric hedges and flowerbeds, with gravel pathways and even—against my better judgment--a few trees large enough for him to climb. Plants are very safe, if you're willing to work with them. I couldn't keep the animals out, but I tried not to worry; the ones that he actually saw were so small, just birds and insects. The butterflies really did worry me, but the bees were a reassuring presence. Everything was in its place and happy, everything was controlled, everything was safe. So all I ever really needed to worry about was the weather.
The day I lost him didn't even start out sunny; it was grey from sunrise on and I should have known better than to go out. But it had been sunny for weeks and the morning clouds looked wispy and weak, and I knew form experience that even if the weather got worse, he would be easier to deal with if he got a short walk outside than none at all. So I bundled him up, to cover as much of his skin as possible, and we went out at our usual time.
It was warmer in the garden than it had looked from indoors, almost muggy, and he pulled his hat off right away and dropped it a moment later. Already I was beginning to have a bad feeling about what might happen, and as I replaced it I was sharper with him than I should have been.
“You must, you must wear your hat today! Don't take it off again!”
“I'm not cold! I won't wear it!”
He yanked it off of his head and threw it away from him, into the hedges. At the same time, he took off running, away from me, and worse, away from the house. If I had gone right after him I probably could have caught him, but the hat distracted me for just a split second and it was enough for him to get a few yards' head start. Within moments, the chase had become a game for him, and he laughed as he ran, evading me, pulling off his clothes.
We were almost at the far end of the garden when the rain started. There was absolutely no hope. Every drop that touched his skin reminded him of what he really was, and in no time at all he was soaked through, a wild thing, and not mine at all. He was still running, but he didn't care whether I chased him or not. I don't know if he remembered I was even there. He belonged to the rain, and the woods, and the wilderness, and he was going to run.
I didn't see where he ran.
I went back home, and I shut the door, and I locked it. I couldn't have anything that dangerous in my house.
Aurora Nibley lives in Hollywood with her husband and cat. She writes about football of all things over at http://writingthebench.blogspot.com, and you can Twitter her to your heart's delight over at http://twitter.com/AuroraNibley
He would sit at the window on rainy days, looking out at the world like he was hypnotized. If any other children passed by outside, he would fuss, and when he was feeling fractious he couldn't seem to help being difficult with me.
“Why is it all right for them to be in the rain? Nothing bad is happening to them.”
“No, darling, but you aren't like them. You must stay inside when it rains. Don't worry. You're safe here with me.”
“I'm not worried! I just want to know. Why is the rain bad?”
“It just isn't good for you. You'll understand when you're older.”
“I want to know now. Is it bad to get wet? I get wet in the bath, you know. I take baths all the time.”
“Baths are safe, dear. There is no reason to worry about the bath.”
“What about the shower? That's like rain.”
“I can see how you might think so, but you are wrong. A shower is completely different from the rain. The shower is safe.”
“So what is safe and what is not safe? Is it because the rain is outside? We go outside on sunny days.”
“There is nothing to be afraid of on sunny days. The garden is a good place to be on a sunny day. Would you like to walk in the garden tomorrow?”
“I want to go to the garden now. Why don't we ever do what I want to do?”
“Because you don't know what's good for you and I do. Tomorrow, if it's not raining, we can walk in the garden, but today we must stay in the house.”
He was always happy outside. It worried me, even though I loved to see him happy. I knew what it meant and I knew I would never be able to stop it. But I did try. I built such a wonderful garden for us, for him. I created beautiful geometric hedges and flowerbeds, with gravel pathways and even—against my better judgment--a few trees large enough for him to climb. Plants are very safe, if you're willing to work with them. I couldn't keep the animals out, but I tried not to worry; the ones that he actually saw were so small, just birds and insects. The butterflies really did worry me, but the bees were a reassuring presence. Everything was in its place and happy, everything was controlled, everything was safe. So all I ever really needed to worry about was the weather.
The day I lost him didn't even start out sunny; it was grey from sunrise on and I should have known better than to go out. But it had been sunny for weeks and the morning clouds looked wispy and weak, and I knew form experience that even if the weather got worse, he would be easier to deal with if he got a short walk outside than none at all. So I bundled him up, to cover as much of his skin as possible, and we went out at our usual time.
It was warmer in the garden than it had looked from indoors, almost muggy, and he pulled his hat off right away and dropped it a moment later. Already I was beginning to have a bad feeling about what might happen, and as I replaced it I was sharper with him than I should have been.
“You must, you must wear your hat today! Don't take it off again!”
“I'm not cold! I won't wear it!”
He yanked it off of his head and threw it away from him, into the hedges. At the same time, he took off running, away from me, and worse, away from the house. If I had gone right after him I probably could have caught him, but the hat distracted me for just a split second and it was enough for him to get a few yards' head start. Within moments, the chase had become a game for him, and he laughed as he ran, evading me, pulling off his clothes.
We were almost at the far end of the garden when the rain started. There was absolutely no hope. Every drop that touched his skin reminded him of what he really was, and in no time at all he was soaked through, a wild thing, and not mine at all. He was still running, but he didn't care whether I chased him or not. I don't know if he remembered I was even there. He belonged to the rain, and the woods, and the wilderness, and he was going to run.
I didn't see where he ran.
I went back home, and I shut the door, and I locked it. I couldn't have anything that dangerous in my house.
Aurora Nibley lives in Hollywood with her husband and cat. She writes about football of all things over at http://writingthebench.blogspot.com, and you can Twitter her to your heart's delight over at http://twitter.com/AuroraNibley
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Steve Strong: A Change in the Weather
There’s a change in the weather. A bitter helplessness in me.
Life and love once in my grasp now drifting out to sea.
Attitudes once sunny now seem doomed to cloudy skies
And people you once trusted are now telling only lies.
You can’t understand the mind of people looking at their skin
And the treachery within a heart is hidden deep within
But comes racing to the surface to bear its wretched fangs
Destroying any innocent who trusts or loves the thing.
You can blame it on the weather – say these changes come with time
And like seasons change, so people too, naiveté is blind.
Warm breezes change to winter snow and icy winds that freeze
And hearts once filled with tenderness, now pain that has no ease.
Like children born with promise - a laughing smile upon their face
The winds of age have hardened them, and scowls now take their place
While simple joys that we all shared, of trips, and games, and love
Become nostalgic memories of a home that’s torn apart.
Children have better things to do than listen to old men
Besides, they say, they’ve heard it all, it’s just the same old vent
And like the fools who insist on learning from their own mistakes
They travel down those well-worn roads to the darkness that awaits.
And lovers too who pledge their love, their life and all they’ll be
Forget those vows and plans they made for all eternity
And chase the dream that can’t be reached or thirst that can’t be quenched
Because the answer lies within the home they’re looking past.
O tormented souls with wanderlust who search outside their vows
O children of a loving God, who push against their bonds
If you could view your future with the wisdom of the past
And understand that wickedness never was happiness.
Tie down your tents and hold on as the winds of change will blow
Pound deep your stakes and steel yourself from the icy wind and snow
Protect your little ones from howling monsters as they roar
And lock your home against the wolves that beat upon your door.
And hold on to the fragile string of love that holds us bound
Draw near to struggling lambs who are crying to be found
Though rain may sting and snow may blind, and feet may feel the frost
Gird up your strength; you’re needed now to gather in the lost.
Life and love once in my grasp now drifting out to sea.
Attitudes once sunny now seem doomed to cloudy skies
And people you once trusted are now telling only lies.
You can’t understand the mind of people looking at their skin
And the treachery within a heart is hidden deep within
But comes racing to the surface to bear its wretched fangs
Destroying any innocent who trusts or loves the thing.
You can blame it on the weather – say these changes come with time
And like seasons change, so people too, naiveté is blind.
Warm breezes change to winter snow and icy winds that freeze
And hearts once filled with tenderness, now pain that has no ease.
Like children born with promise - a laughing smile upon their face
The winds of age have hardened them, and scowls now take their place
While simple joys that we all shared, of trips, and games, and love
Become nostalgic memories of a home that’s torn apart.
Children have better things to do than listen to old men
Besides, they say, they’ve heard it all, it’s just the same old vent
And like the fools who insist on learning from their own mistakes
They travel down those well-worn roads to the darkness that awaits.
And lovers too who pledge their love, their life and all they’ll be
Forget those vows and plans they made for all eternity
And chase the dream that can’t be reached or thirst that can’t be quenched
Because the answer lies within the home they’re looking past.
O tormented souls with wanderlust who search outside their vows
O children of a loving God, who push against their bonds
If you could view your future with the wisdom of the past
And understand that wickedness never was happiness.
Tie down your tents and hold on as the winds of change will blow
Pound deep your stakes and steel yourself from the icy wind and snow
Protect your little ones from howling monsters as they roar
And lock your home against the wolves that beat upon your door.
And hold on to the fragile string of love that holds us bound
Draw near to struggling lambs who are crying to be found
Though rain may sting and snow may blind, and feet may feel the frost
Gird up your strength; you’re needed now to gather in the lost.
Monday, October 11, 2010
Lisa Taylor - Fire Season
October is fire season. While the rest of the country swoons over crisp fall air and Mardi Gras foliage, Southern California braces for color of a different sort. We residents scan painfully blue skies for scribbles of smoke. We examine hillsides furred with browned grass, punctuated with the gray-green eucalyptus trees -- ten-story candles, arboreal dynamite. We wince at forecasts predicting “Santa Ana winds” -- super-heated exhalations from the Mojave Desert which often mark fire season’s opening.
I’ve lived in Southern California my entire life. When I was young, the town I lived in, built in a bowl at the center of bone-dry, high-desert foothills, periodically found itself hostage to wildfire. I remember orange skies and ash falling like snow, a layer of black grit on windowsills and the hoods of cars. The omnipresent smell of burnt vegetation and swimming pools sporting an oily slick of spent fuel.
When I was about ten years old, the street I lived on found itself directly in the path of a wildfire. The houses across the street had backyards bordered by natural hillside, separated from relative wilderness by flimsy chain-link fencing. The fire’s point of origin was somewhere to the west of us, started -- intentionally, we found out later -- in the center of a small state park, and blooming outward. We watched the news for word of the fire’s trajectory, paid close attention to the direction and power of the wind. As this was before e-mail, before home computers, before reverse-911 alerts, the information we gleaned was attenuated; it was still possible, despite the orange skies, to feel somewhat removed from the action.
Then we noticed the fire trucks. Five, then six, then seven of them. Converging on our little neighborhood, their shiny red bulk diminishing our homes to mere backdrop. At first, none of the firefighters would talk to us, though we neighborhood kids were dying to talk to them, bouncing up and down on our heels and sprinting back and forth on the sidewalks behind our parents -- our poor parents, whose fear was mostly lost on us, fixated as we were on the firefighters’ uniforms, on their helmets, on their walkie-talkies, the tangible evidence of their importance. Then, receiving word of a shift in the prevailing winds, the firefighters’ focus shifted. A moment of awful, visceral thrill: the firefighters were talking to our parents, telling our parents to pack up and be prepared to leave on their order. We were no longer spectators -- we were the main attraction. We might be on T.V.!
With faces of stone, my parents hustled me and my sister back to our house. We were told we could fill a paper bag each with things from our rooms. At eight and ten, my sister and I did not acquit ourselves particularly well, here: I remember we both stuffed our Barbies and their wardrobes into our bags, but forgot our scrapbooks, our souvenirs. I did have the presence of mind to grab my stuffed rabbit -- named, imaginatively, Bunny -- from its accustomed place on my bed before rocketing out the door, where my parents were waiting in the driveway.
We stood beside our loaded station wagon and watched the firefighters race to the top of our dead-end street, where Little Sugarloaf and Big Sugarloaf (our local names for the neighborhood hills we’d all hiked countless times) could most easily be reached. Our dogs, loaded into the wagon first by my parents (before the photo albums, before my dad’s paintings, before my grandmother’s wedding dress, before my Barbies, for that matter), threw themselves at the windows, barking furiously in an excess of confusion and excitement and doggy-rage. We watched the hill directly across the street.
And then we saw it.
With the speed of water tumbling out of a cup, the fire poured itself over the lip of the hill. Untethered, the fire chewed its way through the brush, through brittle sage and grass and manzanita, a thick spill of red and orange flaring down and out, urged onward by gravity and wind, erasing the usual brown of the hillside. The fire made no sound; it was quiet. Except for the shouts of the firefighters already on the hillside, already in its path, there was nothing to hear. This seemed odd. To my ten-year-old mind, the absence of sound was the scariest bit. Anything moving that fast should have been noisy, should have sounded like a waterfall, like hail, like an engine. This fire was quietly, simply, efficient.
My parents had had enough. We joined our now-hysterical dogs in the station wagon and left.
When we returned to our house several hours later, the only evidence of the fire was a blackened hillside, relieved here and there by the pale gray of scattered boulders, and the smell of ash. The fire was contained quickly, and our neighbors’ homes were spared. Half the kids in the neighborhood vowed to become firefighters when they grew up. And fire season passed.
I’ve lived in Southern California my entire life. When I was young, the town I lived in, built in a bowl at the center of bone-dry, high-desert foothills, periodically found itself hostage to wildfire. I remember orange skies and ash falling like snow, a layer of black grit on windowsills and the hoods of cars. The omnipresent smell of burnt vegetation and swimming pools sporting an oily slick of spent fuel.
When I was about ten years old, the street I lived on found itself directly in the path of a wildfire. The houses across the street had backyards bordered by natural hillside, separated from relative wilderness by flimsy chain-link fencing. The fire’s point of origin was somewhere to the west of us, started -- intentionally, we found out later -- in the center of a small state park, and blooming outward. We watched the news for word of the fire’s trajectory, paid close attention to the direction and power of the wind. As this was before e-mail, before home computers, before reverse-911 alerts, the information we gleaned was attenuated; it was still possible, despite the orange skies, to feel somewhat removed from the action.
Then we noticed the fire trucks. Five, then six, then seven of them. Converging on our little neighborhood, their shiny red bulk diminishing our homes to mere backdrop. At first, none of the firefighters would talk to us, though we neighborhood kids were dying to talk to them, bouncing up and down on our heels and sprinting back and forth on the sidewalks behind our parents -- our poor parents, whose fear was mostly lost on us, fixated as we were on the firefighters’ uniforms, on their helmets, on their walkie-talkies, the tangible evidence of their importance. Then, receiving word of a shift in the prevailing winds, the firefighters’ focus shifted. A moment of awful, visceral thrill: the firefighters were talking to our parents, telling our parents to pack up and be prepared to leave on their order. We were no longer spectators -- we were the main attraction. We might be on T.V.!
With faces of stone, my parents hustled me and my sister back to our house. We were told we could fill a paper bag each with things from our rooms. At eight and ten, my sister and I did not acquit ourselves particularly well, here: I remember we both stuffed our Barbies and their wardrobes into our bags, but forgot our scrapbooks, our souvenirs. I did have the presence of mind to grab my stuffed rabbit -- named, imaginatively, Bunny -- from its accustomed place on my bed before rocketing out the door, where my parents were waiting in the driveway.
We stood beside our loaded station wagon and watched the firefighters race to the top of our dead-end street, where Little Sugarloaf and Big Sugarloaf (our local names for the neighborhood hills we’d all hiked countless times) could most easily be reached. Our dogs, loaded into the wagon first by my parents (before the photo albums, before my dad’s paintings, before my grandmother’s wedding dress, before my Barbies, for that matter), threw themselves at the windows, barking furiously in an excess of confusion and excitement and doggy-rage. We watched the hill directly across the street.
And then we saw it.
With the speed of water tumbling out of a cup, the fire poured itself over the lip of the hill. Untethered, the fire chewed its way through the brush, through brittle sage and grass and manzanita, a thick spill of red and orange flaring down and out, urged onward by gravity and wind, erasing the usual brown of the hillside. The fire made no sound; it was quiet. Except for the shouts of the firefighters already on the hillside, already in its path, there was nothing to hear. This seemed odd. To my ten-year-old mind, the absence of sound was the scariest bit. Anything moving that fast should have been noisy, should have sounded like a waterfall, like hail, like an engine. This fire was quietly, simply, efficient.
My parents had had enough. We joined our now-hysterical dogs in the station wagon and left.
When we returned to our house several hours later, the only evidence of the fire was a blackened hillside, relieved here and there by the pale gray of scattered boulders, and the smell of ash. The fire was contained quickly, and our neighbors’ homes were spared. Half the kids in the neighborhood vowed to become firefighters when they grew up. And fire season passed.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Marsi White - Mom, What's the Weather Going to be Like Today?
Have you ever woken up on a cold morning to the smell of something baking in the oven? I know I have. And if there was not something baking, then it was the crackle of bacon luring me out of bed.
This morning, I was not so lucky. I was awakened at 5:00 because I was cold. After the high heat and humidity that has plagued recent months, the cold was a welcome feeling. However, not nearly as enjoyable at 5:00 a.m. After fighting for covers all night with my seven year old, who staggered into my bed after a playful accident gave her a fat lip that required some TLC, an ice pack and Ibuprofen at 9:30 last night, I gave up, grabbed my slippers and robe, and sought my morning coffee.
Everyone in my house was still asleep, as was the sun. I knew it was not supposed to rain today, however. This was pretty much in line with my first thoughts of the day every day: what does the weather have in store for us? After living in Southern California for most of my life, it almost seems silly to worry about the weather. A waste of a thought. What do we get, 10 days of rain a year? A few of days of cold. A handful of nights when you need an actual “winter coat”?
Before I was a mother, I remember the most that I had to worry about was how cold the office might be that day. If I don’t wear socks, will my feet freeze? And then of course, before I was married, the thought was more along the lines of, “how little can I wear and not look stupid for baring too much skin when it is not 85-degrees out?” OK, so maybe that was in high school. I was surely more mature than that in college.
Either way, now that I am the mother of two, sending my kids off for ten hour days of school and after care, I am in constant commune with The Weather Channel icon on my iPad. Commonly, the first words of the day that I hear from my children are, “Mom, what’s the weather going to be like today?” My iPad is never far and within seconds, we are discussing possible outfit combinations: “Long sleeve shirt and shorts?”; “Jeans and short sleeve shirt?”; or, “No, I do not think today is good day for spaghetti straps.” My daughter thought it was real funny this week when I told her that she would not need an umbrella, only to find that it was stormy all day. When I finally picked her up around 4:30, she proudly exclaimed, “Mom, you were so wrong!”
That I was. Truthfully, I worried about my kids all day long, that day. I even contemplated picking them up early just so they could be home in cozy sweats and warm. Mind you, they did not go to school in flip flops, so I guessed that their at least their feet would have not turned to icicles. However, I envisioned my daughter violently trembling in the far corner of the playground. As for my son, I knew that he would play a vigorous game of soccer at recess and would ignore the cold. However, I feared that the cold air that he did not acknowledge would translate into him catching some early flu bug that would knock him down for the count.
As much as I worry about the kids, I often miss the boat when it comes to dressing myself. As I sit in my office now, my feet are freezing. But I look professional and cute, right? Admittedly, I care about my presentation. Besides warm, fuzzy socks are not appropriate business attire, anyway. And if they cannot be warm and fuzzy socks, then what is the point?
As we move into fall in Southern California, the weather is cooling. I know that dressing in layers will be the order of the day for my kids. My iPad will be at my side ready to assist in me in my function as the human barometer of our household.
This morning, I contested the cold by making warm banana bread. I wanted my kids to wake up to its tantalizing aroma. It didn’t matter what they wore today. . . but their bellies would be happy.
This morning, I was not so lucky. I was awakened at 5:00 because I was cold. After the high heat and humidity that has plagued recent months, the cold was a welcome feeling. However, not nearly as enjoyable at 5:00 a.m. After fighting for covers all night with my seven year old, who staggered into my bed after a playful accident gave her a fat lip that required some TLC, an ice pack and Ibuprofen at 9:30 last night, I gave up, grabbed my slippers and robe, and sought my morning coffee.
Everyone in my house was still asleep, as was the sun. I knew it was not supposed to rain today, however. This was pretty much in line with my first thoughts of the day every day: what does the weather have in store for us? After living in Southern California for most of my life, it almost seems silly to worry about the weather. A waste of a thought. What do we get, 10 days of rain a year? A few of days of cold. A handful of nights when you need an actual “winter coat”?
Before I was a mother, I remember the most that I had to worry about was how cold the office might be that day. If I don’t wear socks, will my feet freeze? And then of course, before I was married, the thought was more along the lines of, “how little can I wear and not look stupid for baring too much skin when it is not 85-degrees out?” OK, so maybe that was in high school. I was surely more mature than that in college.
Either way, now that I am the mother of two, sending my kids off for ten hour days of school and after care, I am in constant commune with The Weather Channel icon on my iPad. Commonly, the first words of the day that I hear from my children are, “Mom, what’s the weather going to be like today?” My iPad is never far and within seconds, we are discussing possible outfit combinations: “Long sleeve shirt and shorts?”; “Jeans and short sleeve shirt?”; or, “No, I do not think today is good day for spaghetti straps.” My daughter thought it was real funny this week when I told her that she would not need an umbrella, only to find that it was stormy all day. When I finally picked her up around 4:30, she proudly exclaimed, “Mom, you were so wrong!”
That I was. Truthfully, I worried about my kids all day long, that day. I even contemplated picking them up early just so they could be home in cozy sweats and warm. Mind you, they did not go to school in flip flops, so I guessed that their at least their feet would have not turned to icicles. However, I envisioned my daughter violently trembling in the far corner of the playground. As for my son, I knew that he would play a vigorous game of soccer at recess and would ignore the cold. However, I feared that the cold air that he did not acknowledge would translate into him catching some early flu bug that would knock him down for the count.
As much as I worry about the kids, I often miss the boat when it comes to dressing myself. As I sit in my office now, my feet are freezing. But I look professional and cute, right? Admittedly, I care about my presentation. Besides warm, fuzzy socks are not appropriate business attire, anyway. And if they cannot be warm and fuzzy socks, then what is the point?
As we move into fall in Southern California, the weather is cooling. I know that dressing in layers will be the order of the day for my kids. My iPad will be at my side ready to assist in me in my function as the human barometer of our household.
This morning, I contested the cold by making warm banana bread. I wanted my kids to wake up to its tantalizing aroma. It didn’t matter what they wore today. . . but their bellies would be happy.
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