Where Do 5 Years Go?

Everything since John Lennon’s death seems recent to me. He died 25 years ago today so five years is just a twinkle of an eye. I peeked at my “Daily Prioritized Task List” for December 2000. My life hasn’t changed much but there are differences. I only had one mortgage then. We hadn’t bought the house on Mill Creek. I had just begun sponsoring Leslie. Hard to believe I have been her sponsor for five years. I had 17 years then and thought I knew everything. Woody was still alive but he had just begun to suffer from incontinence. Correction: we had just begun to suffer from his incontinence. I don’t think it bothered the old dog a bit. Five years ago this week I took him to Dr. Wardell for the first time. He gave him some pills that helped a little. Luke was born in December 2000. He weighed just three pounds fourteen ounces. I visited Bob and Julie at Fairfax Hospital the day he was born. Bob was so excited I thought he was going to implode. I went with Julie to the neo-natal clinic to see Luke. He was so tiny. She was dying for a cigarette. Last Monday Luke went with John, Bob and Jeff to the BB&T Basketball Tournament at the MCI Center. Luke loves all sports but NASCAR is his favorite. I made the last payment on my green Camaro convertible in December 2000. Two years later I emerged safely from my mid-life crisis and traded it for a Jeep Liberty with heated leather seats and a moon roof. I still had the Sheet Metal Workers account five years ago and judging from the amount of time I spent meeting with their attorneys and risk managers I earned every dime I made on that account. John’s mother was alive. I mailed her a birthday card on December 26, 2000. On December 8, 2000, there is a note to “Call for Dishwasher Repair”. On the 7th my Spiritual Formation Group met at my house and I had made Zen Hash – a delicious combination of spinach, onions, zucchini, pine nut and rice. Whoever helped me load the dishwasher after dinner didn’t scrape the plates because the dishwasher repairman found the drain completely clogged with rice. I saw the Caps play the Bruins and the Lightning. I had hockey tickets then. They were one of the things I gave up when I got serious about my writing.

Just Right

You will recall that when we left our narrator on Friday, she was going to adopt a beagle named Snoopy.

She went with Papa Bear and Arlo Bear to meet Snoopy at the Annandale Animal Hospital. “We’re here to meet Snoopy.” The Vet’s employees were perturbed because their lunch had been interrupted. Begrudgingly, Hazel (the least perturbed) brought out Snoopy so everyone could get acquainted.

It was not love at first sight. If Arlo could talk he would have said “Mama Bear, get me out of here. This beagle is crazy.”

Mama Bear would have agreed.

It was a sad trio that left Annandale Animal Hospital as Hazel led the wildly barking beagle back to his puppy jail. Especially Mama Bear.

Papa Bear agreed to make a stop at the Lost Dog and Cat Rescue Open House on the way home where they made their way through a plethora of beagles. “Did I miss the news about the beagle population explosion?” asked Mama Bear. She was about to give up when she spied a timid liver spotted Dalmatian. “Look, Papa Bear! She’s not too large, not too small…she’s just right!!” Darcy the Dalmatian had a very sad story. Her owner had gone to jail on November 2nd and Darcy had missed being put to sleep by just a few hours. Since November 2nd she had been living in an animal shelter. Most people want puppies. Darcy was three years old.

Papa Bear looked skeptical. He hadn’t seen what Mama Bear had seen. It wasn’t looking good. Sadly Mama Bear followed Papa Bear and Arlo Bear back to the parking lot where Papa Bear saw the sad, sad expression on Mama Bear’s face.

“Oh, alright! Go get her.”

That’s how Darcy came to live with her new family where she will live happily ever after.

Afraid of the Light

She approached the day marker warily. She didn’t like day markers, channel markers, buoys, blinking lights in the middle of vast bodies of water. Haunting foghorns. Lighthouses casting their shadow of light across seas made treacherous by the rocks on the shore. All of these innocent navigational aids fed her loneliness. Made her feel mortal. Reminded her that she was lost. That she had always been lost. Against her will she forced herself to look at the day marker. At the osprey roost nestled in its belly. The giant bird surveyed her for a moment and then flew away making a great loud show to distract her from the four baby osprey that peeped over the edge of the well-constructed nest. The mother osprey called to her “Come away. Follow me. Ignore by babies. Hear me cry now.” An osprey had never attacked her though she knew they were feisty enough to drive bald eagles from their territory. She had been attacked by mute swans several times when she had been incautious enough to bring her kayak too close to their babies. She always forgave the swans. She loved them blindly. They were not mute of course. When they flew their wings sang out whipping the air into a froth of sound. She was afraid of the light. Red right returning. She navigated by the mole on her right arm. It was surrounded by a constellation of freckles hatched by the sun she should fear but didn’t. Darkness had fallen quickly. The creek was shrouded. The banks lost in night. The watery way home illuminated by those eerie lights that made her flesh crawl. What forgotten event had birthed this unnatural fear of buoys? Had she once been an osprey trapped on a day marker watching her mother spar with an eagle? Had she been a fisherman who died clinging to a clanging buoy praying for a rescue that never came? Does some dire buoy related fate lie in her future? "Go toward the light. Go toward the light. It’s waiting for you."