Sorry about the long layoff. Just back from Michigan and way behind. Great trip. Much to tell. No time.
Can I just say: 22-pound flathead catfish. Life and death, love and family. Serious squirt guns. Numerous dogs. A ’68 Airstream. A new blog(gish) project.
More soon!
Blogger’s Note: This is a more accurate account of the day the neighbor’s wolf-dog came to visit Boomer and me — much fresher than this one. It originally ran as a column in The Pioneer daily newspaper on Dec. 30, 1997.
It’s been one of those days.
It hasn’t really — “one of those days” implies I’ve had a day like this before, and with enough regularity to refer to it as commonplace, with a cliche.
This day has been like no other in my life.
I rolled in from work at about 1 a.m. Monday morning, a full hour later than one should if Monday’s paper goes together without a hitch. I can’t say just what the problem was Sunday night — computers crash; no one can say just why.
I stumbled through the house without turning on the lights, so as not to disturb our sleeping guests; went to the fridge and pulled out my lunch, which I had forgotten to bring to work, and sat down on the bed beside Jodi to eat.
The clock read 1:30 or so when two shepherd-looking puppies one house to the west began yipping like a pack of coyotes. I hollered once out the back door, and they stopped — briefly. About quarter to two, just after I’d finished eating and gotten comfortable, they started in again; I found myself standing in the snow in shorts and a t-shirt yelling into the black: “Shaddap!”
They did so.
Brendan woke up screaming sometime around three; he was wet through and hungry. The blanket was soaked, his bed was soaked — Jodi asked me to bring him in wet so she could feed him immediately, again to avoid disturbing our guests’ slumber.
Brendan would have none of it — he’s quite particular, our son — so we changed him, head to toe. Jodi fed him, then, and I stripped the bed, tripped down to the basement to gather clean bedding from the dryer, and remade the crib.
Brendan fell asleep beside his mother.
He woke again with the sun, hungry, and Jodi fed him. Her mother — bless her heart — got up and took him from Jodi so we could both get some sleep. I came to around 9:45, remembering my folks were expecting us all for lunch and that I had a dog to feed and a column to write before I could begin paginating Tuesday’s news. I got up.
I turned Boomer loose when I went out to feed him, and as I bent to scoop ice from his water dish, I heard snarling behind me. I turned to find Boomer standing between me and a wolf-dog (more wolf than dog) from two trailers to the east. I was scared, as one might be when one finds a wolf behind him, snarling at his dog. I stepped out of the kennel (Fool!) and told Boomer to kennel up; the wolf loped off toward his trailer, watching me over his shoulder.
I went inside to call my neighbor, the wolf’s master, to let him know his dog was loose and thus attempt to stay on good terms. No listing, and no answer at his mom’s house. Jodi’s dad told me the wolf had come at a run while I was bent over, not looking — I reluctantly called animal control to talk with the owner and possibly catch the wolf.
Jodi and her family left for my parents’ house, and I waited for animal control. I finally left for my parents’, only to get stuck a short way from my house.
I arrived at Mom and Dad’s just in time to eat and head to work for the evening. Jodi’s sister leaves tomorrow morning; it’ll be months before we see her again.
Ah, well — tomorrow is another day, and time to try again.
Tomorrow is another day, and Thursday is another year — both tailor-made for fresh starts and new beginnings. Who knows what either holds? Who knew what Monday would bring, or the day before or this waning year?
I have only to look at yesterday and this past year to witness new beginnings — a new state, new jobs, a new house, a new baby.
The job that keeps me away at night allows me to write this column and pay for our house — who knew yesterday that I’d have a column and we’d have a house? The house that keeps me busy with neighbors, shepherd puppies and wolf-dogs keeps our family and guests warm and secure, and the son that keeps us awake at night has brought more joy than the sweetest dreams. Would I trade him and the house away to rid myself of sleepless nights and fear of wolves? Not on your life.
Tomorrow is another day — who knows what may come?
Who knew a wolf might interrupt dinner?
Blogger’s Note: I’ll have more fresh stuff soon. In the meantime, this snowy weekend brought to mind another old column from my newspaper days. This one ran in the Tuesday, October 28, 1997, edition of The Pioneer, Big Rapids, Michigan, just a few days after Jodi and I moved into our first house. Hope you like it.
I’ve always enjoyed snowy mornings. Some I remember in particular like the [morning of] my birthday eleven or twelve years ago.
My best friend Kevin and I stayed outside ’til well after dark [the night before], playing hide-and-seek from the dog in the piles of brown oak leaves around the yard. The next morning Kevin peeked out behind the blind and announced it had snowed.
“Yeah, right,” I said, and rolled over to sleep.
“No, really,” he persisted. I got up to look, and all thoughts of sleep vanished at the sight of the downy white blanket.
That’s how snow comes — soft and silent. Sunday’s light accumulation scarcely made a sound. Saturday my grandfather had brought his lawn tractor and push mower to cut grass a month and more high; Sunday he brought his sweeper and more than a month’s worth of clippings so they wouldn’t suffocate the lawn.
Thence came the snow. Jodi and I were surprised to find our new yard white to a depth of four inches.
Such mornings are made for sitting home and enjoying. My dog Boomer, a great furry Airedale, understands this — on clear, cold South Dakota evenings, while local news anchors warned of deadly wind chills, Boomer could be found curled up on the ground, snow swirling about his head. He’d lie outside until the trail back to his house filled in, enjoying the quiet.
My sister and mother and I spent a good portion of the weekend painting what is to become the master bedroom and baby’s room — achieving whiteness in rooms once blue and yellow. There are few things more maddening than a hint of color beneath new white paint.
Mother Nature, I think, agrees. An upstart maple in our front lawn scattered leaves, first across the newly-mowed and -swept lawn, then across the new-fallen snow. Both Mother Nature and I stopped and frowned.
The truth, with trees as well as people it seems, is that we cannot leave the snow alone for long. For the young, the snow brings with it opportunity. It lies like a blank canvas, and the red leaves of the young maple are as much a part of the day’s enjoyment as are the footprints and angels and snowmen of children.
And as it turned out, I had no right to frown at dry leaves — reveling in the morning’s cold, I cut a path to our cars and stomped rough ovals around both of them, brushing off snow. By the time I’d managed to back out of the driveway, I’d stained the snow brown with grass, gravel and leaves, effectively ravaging the virgin beauty of the morning.
The debates of superintendents and transportation supervisors, of meteorologists and school-children, would be moot could we all grasp this simple truth: snow is best and most beautiful left undisturbed. The first set of tracks across a snowy field and its beauty is diminished; the first perpendicular cut by a shovel or plow spoils it altogether.
The road to town was slush-covered and edged in browning snow. By mid-afternoon, the world outside was road grime and mud — all because we lacked the sense to stay at home and enjoy the day.
I once had a purple horseshoe in the center of my chest — right over my sternum, slightly askew, so that the toe pointed to my left shoulder, leaving all the good luck to spill out down and to the right. I was younger then, and the horseshoe stood out from my hairless chest like a grape tattoo. It was no tattoo, however, and when the rest of the freshman football team asked, I told them the truth
* * * * *
We lived in a lake subdivision when I was a kid. My first memory is of sitting on the pickup seat next to the television, riding to our house at the lake, and settling in to sleep on the living room floor, surrounded by knotty pine paneling and the creak of strange oaks outside the window. My folks grew up on farms, but not me.
About the time I started high school, Dad got back into horses. He bought two mares to start with — a well-worn bay named Molly, whose bottom lip always hung limply, like she had a chaw tucked in her gums, and a high-strung Thoroughbred cross named Caitlin, who had one white spot on her chestnut rump to betray her Appaloosa heritage.
We boarded the horses at a place up the road a half-mile or so. I spent a fair amount of time around them, but things didn’t get interesting until Willy came along.
Willy was a short black mule with a wild, spiky mane. We bought him from an old farmer named Wilbur Hunt, but I suggested the name for Willie Olson from “Little House.” Mussed-up dark hair, impish twinkle and a nose for trouble — I’d only just met him, but “Willy” seemed about right.
It only took a few short minutes for Willy to earn his name. We turned him loose in the pasture, and the girls eyed him warily, gossiping softly to each other. Molly gave the nod, and Caitlin took the first run at the little mule. Ears flat, lips back, she thundered toward Willy — who took two quick hops forward and shot two tiny black hooves back to connect audibly with the big mare’s teeth.
Cowed, Caitlin returned to Molly, shaking her head. Molly took a step or two, glared scornfully at Willy, laid back her own ears and charged. Again, two ebony hooves caught her clean in the mouth, and though he never led the herd, Willy earned his place as a full, if somewhat independent, member.
Willy and I fought, as young boys will. We were nearly like brothers — we tolerated each other publicly, loved each other in secret, and showed it by tormenting one another. Willy always found ways to get my goat — bucking me off for commenting on his ears, stepping on my toes, or slipping under the barbed wire to graze in the tall grasses outside the pasture. One afternoon I spotted him there — just beyond the fence, shoulder-deep in green, stemmy grass, munching away and eyeing me as I approached from the barn. He was dragging a long blue-and-white lead rope from his halter — a precaution for just such occasions — and I came armed with a black rubber bucket of sweet feed.
I stuck the bucket through the fence and inched my way under the rusty barbs. Willy’s ears were up and trained on me — he munched cautiously as I approached.
I rustled the oats in the bucket, allowing the breeze to carry the smell of molasses to him. He paused in his chewing, a dozen stems protruding sideways from his mouth — but he did not move forward.
And why should he? I needed to catch him — and I crept closer, rustling the feed, making the bucket the focus of attention and definitely not his halter and rope.
I was two steps away now — the grass was waist-deep, and I couldn’t see the end of the lead rope lying like a snake among the weeds. Willy stretched his neck to sniff at the rim of the bucket. The breeze sent a ripple the length of his mohawk.
I took a step, and Willy lowered his nose into the bucket and began to eat. Slowly, slowly, I eased my free hand toward his halter.
Willy tossed his head and jumped backward, send sweet feed into the air and jerking the hidden rope and my feet from beneath me. I fell flat on my back, and through the grass, saw the little mule turn back toward me. As I gasped for air, Willy came forward, raised one small black hoof and planted it in the center of my chest. Then he turned and walked away.
I lay a long moment, looking up at the blue from my impromptu nest, then stood and unbuttoned my shirt. A small semicircle of blood was forming on my t-shirt, and my chest ached. Willy stood not ten yards away, feeding. I picked up the bucket, now empty, and approached the little mule. He raised his head, I took his halter, and he followed me back to the pasture without protest.
I didn’t look back, but I think maybe he was smiling.
* * * * *
Blogger’s Note: The photo features Dad, Willy and me, circa 1989. I was looking for a better black-and-white shot of just Willy, but I haven’t found it yet. I wrote a while later — in college, I think. Just ran across it again while going through some boxes. I miss that little mule.
On Monday, Emma got sick to her stomach, Gabe got stung by a wasp twice in the neck, I wrote several more pages of a novel, Brendan battled his cousins on the Wii, and Trevor approached Jodi out of the blue to admit, “Mommy? Sometimes I don’t listen to you …”
We still don’t know for sure what that was about.
Headed to Mom and Dad’s today to see the horses, mules and longhorns, then from there to the lake and campground. Probably won’t blog again ’til Thursday at the earliest. Take care out there.
Archangel Stomp 