16″ Dragon Frame

16″ Dragon Frame.

Striker’s Big People and the new friend

Striker ruled all that he could rule. The floors were his. And when the big people were gone, like most of the days, the couch and chairs were also his; Especially the big green chair that was just under the front window where the sunshine poured on the wide overstuffed back making it so nice and warm for Striker’s little belly.  And then there was The Bed.

Striker could sing you songs, nay, ballads, long stringy soppy heart rending eye watering ballads on the joys of a big huge bed in the late afternoon sun. The smells of the big people that permeated the blankets and spread that were so grand to nuzzle and scrunch into until just the tip of an over excited tail was left exposed. Then it’s a body shuddering collapse followed by a deep draw of air and then one explosive snort and silence for a few hours, the Jack Russell every-last battery recharging for the evening festivities.

Much of the floor kingdom, reconnaissance with sharp eye and sharper nose, was in order more days and weeks than not. The occasional small pile of the one big persons clothes that smelled especially good and slightly damp was the height of all treats. The quick dash down the long hallway followed by a flying dive nose first into the pile that would slide for the longest time. Then it was grab the pile and drag it back down the hall to repeat again and again while the big people stood in that senseless rain room getting all wet. But for Striker, the longer they stayed in the little wet rain room, the more fun he could have with sliding with the pile.

The food bowl was fun too. Pushing the food bowl down the long hallway on the slippery floors was a grand game that was good for at least one of the Big People to come join the game by re-starting the game with the bowl back in the feeding area. Some times if Striker pushed the bowl just right against the one wall, the Big People with the louder bark would grab the leash and they would go to the park for a good long run with some of the other dogs in the neighborhood. So playing the “bowl push” game sometimes had great rewards, if his Big People were home.

Doors, of all different sizes, were important in the days patrol. Doors can stop you from entering rooms or tight little areas. Doors that are not quite shut completely can provide sometimes up to an hour of diligent effort to open and gain the rewards on the other side. The Big People really like to help with that game. They have the room with the wonderful sun soaked high bed that is soft and wonderful to lie on, roll around on, and snuggle under the blankets and really get your nose full of those wonderful smells of Big People, Big People, BIG PEOPLE! And then there is the “other door” in the room that leads to a smaller room where the smells can be really intense. Those are the “Rooms of Shoes”.

The Rooms of Shoes are the best. The smells are so intense and wonderfully pungent that you can get dizzy just walking into the rooms. The softer shoes are the most wonderful, especially when the Big Bark People gets back from the park when they have a great run. Those soft shoes can make your head spin faster than a treat driven Jack Russell tail can wag. The deep grassy pungent odor is what hits you first, with a sort of tangy salty second whiff, kind of like when two dogs are walked by you and there is a big funky dog and a sleeker smaller dog, it’s the “one-two” smell punch. Then as you start to chew on the soft sides or just carry it around a bit while the Big Barker is getting wet, the taste of salt and a little scummy slim after-taste starts to really get your taste buds kind of sideways. After a while though, it’s just too much and you’ve got to take a break and head for the window over the bed. You know you’re going to get yelled at, but the view of the park and all of the other dogs are worth it. And it’s not that kind of yelling any way, like it really counts.

A while back, the Big People fussed a whole bunch in one of the smaller rooms. They painted with a new color, YUK! Not a smell that rated high on Strikers list. And then there was the new furniture. There was even a bed that was just Striker’s size, but they must have really felt strong about him not sleeping in it because it has a cage around it to keep him out. There was a cool new trashcan, but eventually it smelt worse than the bad part of the park. Euw!

Then the new “Not So Big People” arrived. Not a fun People at first. It slept most of the time and then there was that NOISE! Wow! Eventually the days routine settled down and Striker grew to accommodate and accept that the nights would be interrupted with walking; but not taking for a walk. The days had their quiet times, and then there were the not so quiet times. Striker’s People had changed. Only time would tell whether it was for the good or not; and the Not So Big People looked like they were going to be hanging around for a while.

As the days and weeks and months wound their magical spell and the Not So Big People got larger, and it began to get around like Striker, on all four. Soon there were new games in the hallway with the slippery floors. And the new guy was kind of fun for a while, as long as it didn’t smell like that bad part of the park. And recently it started to stand up on it hind legs. Very good! It was paying attention as Striker was teaching.

Just wait until it gets warm again in the park, or the little park in the back of the house; there will be someone else to blame for the muddy paw prints.

An Evening at the Great Lodge

“In the late afternoon we would stop and make camp.  The dust was thick in our clothes. It was so fine coming up off the ox hooves that it just floated in the air until it found a hiding place. I remember parting my sister’s fine blond hair to find her scalp was the same dark gray of the Dakota trail.

While the men were off gathering wood to the south, we girls would be standing there naked as Jay birds on the north sides of the wagons, beating our clothes against the wagon sides. The dust would float about us in a cloud when there was no late afternoon breeze, and we would whirl our dresses about us over our heads like a bunch of drunken cowboys on a Saturday night in hopes it would blow the dust away.

It probably didn’t, but we felt better doing that dance. I don’t remember the men folk ever making any comment about the women’s dresses looking any cleaner; they were just hungry and tired by the time they got back with firewood. But tired as we all were, while the women folk made dinner, the men would lever up the wagons one by one and pull the big heavy wheels to check the axles and grease; a dry axle would burn an axle within a day and there were few spares or ways to repair an axle or wheel out there on the prairie.”

Her eyes were pools of remembrance as they looked out off to the lodge. But the sight was made watery by the 83 year old memory of camping alongside the lake.  Her left hand, now deformed by the abuse of age visited on her life of hard scrapple days of nonstop survival in the Wild West, hovered like a butterfly against her chin. Resting lightly on the old scars gathered in the horror of a century gone by, the finger tips read the brail each memory carved onto the tablet of her life’s face. These were the stories she could not tell little children; they were stories that she could barely tell herself. The Indian raid on the wagon train, losing her little brother to a wild cat and almost losing her own life, falling out of the loft during the barn raising; each written in blood with a scar here and another there, as if memories could be written in flesh.

The sun was soft on her blue chintz dress as she almost sat splay-legged on the sweet prairie grasses, resting from a lifetime of hard living. The sweet music of bees laboring to turn the summer into honey for winter pancakes and full happy tummies lightly droned across the meadow and blended with the occasional sounds of people talking or the rare automobile arriving at the great lodge.

“What honey?” She turned to the children sitting near her as they pulled at the stalks of grass in random mindlessness of pulling, stripping, and holding the parts up to be lazily pulled away in the partial breeze. “What did you ask?” she asked regaining her focus on the current day as her left hand return to its perennial place in her lap; winding the second and third finger into the folds of her dress until they would eventually wear a pattern or hole in the weave.

“I asked, what would they cook for dinner, grandma?” The small girl asked with her head cocked onto her right shoulder covered by the white puffy sleeves of her middy.

The elder’s eyes studied the fine yellow hair of the child as slender tendrils were caught and lifted into the puffs of breeze; much like her great aunt’s hair would have been at that age. The watery eye glinted in the gloom of the deep overhanging straw hat, looking at the child but seeing another child about a very different camp fire.

“Always biscuits; I remember we always had wedge cut soda biscuits with dinner. My mother was known for her campfire biscuits. And beans; there was always a crock of soaking beans in the wagon. Many days would go by that the men couldn’t find any game for a stew or roasting, and beans would sustain us.”

The children laughed at the shared secret that was common knowledge; “So there was ‘music’ in the air,” the older boy muttered and then snickered and looked off to the lowering sun.

She removed her straw hat and dusted some imaginary detritus from the brim as she looked off into the distance to hide the smile. Inside her, the child was turning rolls on the ground from giddy laughter at the men trying hard to remain gentlemen, yet “having to check on the horses” every few minutes. It was one of the true happy memories from that time.

Checking her cheek back in against her back teeth, she gave the children a half earnest attempt at “the look”, which only set the gang into more wild gyrations of flailing legs and rolling bodies played to the tune of squeals and giggles. “Well,” she huffed dramatically, “if you’re only going to act like children, I guess we’ll just have to put you to bed early tonight.” She paused for drama, “without a bonfire.”

That had a very quick sobering effect on the gaggle of squirming bodies. The decorum was restored as she rose teetering to her feet. “Help your grandmother Jacob, I’ve sat too long,” reaching out to the oldest boy. “Give me your shoulder.”

They walked across the meadow towards the not yet finished lodge.  The late evening hush settling down amongst the grasses as the geese slowly began to tuck their beaks into their feathers fluffing and softening in preparation to burrowing in for the night. In the distance the screaming squeal of an elk calling to a possible mate warbled in the half light. The sky had lost its azure light and began its walk in grey and the last small birds fluttered about in the air in a waltz with the bats of the night.

She leaned into the young teenagers shoulder until their heads were just inches apart as she confided an observation of years watching others. “I saw the Yoder girl watching you today.” He squirmed as if to get away from the tightening arm about his shoulder. “I think she would prefer it if you might share your lunch with her instead of with the men tomorrow.” He knew better than to talk and betray his mutual interest or worse interrupt the family matriarch. “There will be some gooseberry pie hiding under the chaffing table near the potato bins.  I would suggest you maybe sit in that large hole they cut for a viewing window; so it will be in easy reach if you feel a need to share a treat with someone.”

“But they’re going to mount the great window in there tomorrow morning. Uncle Lawrence brought the glass up this afternoon. They just have to finish the frame and mount the glass before they seat it all.”

“You never mind about your father and uncle. After I’m finished with them at breakfast, their crew will be busy in the entry cathedral for at least a few days; so you two will have a very nice large log on which to sit quietly enough to talk and have lunch.” She smiled and winked at her grandson with her only good eye, “at least for a couple of days.”

The night settled down across their shoulders and the land as they made their way up the great stone stairway and into the great room of the lodge. She thought back to those days spent near the lake with her family, and then after her capture by the small tribe that had become her family until she was a woman and fled to civilization. Those mixed years had lead to her mixed resilience that kept her alive and raising her family of her own making. Never marrying and unable to have children of her own, she had taken in strays that had come her way. Tender love had left none of the scars on her fiercely protected brood that drew maps across her face and body.  Scarred and battered she tottered into her golden years and beyond, and wouldn’t trade one less scar if it meant one less child.

She looked about the carefully hewn timbers and logs that made up the “furniture” feeling of the construction of the lodge.  In her bones, she knew that the attention to what the tree and stone tells you, went into every step of construction. The power and health of the great meeting hall vibrated in her sole as she felt that it would endure as the earth would; long and resilient. She gave her grandson’s shoulder one last hug of love as she made her way off to her rest. The morning would bring another long day and she would need to start searching for a third and last eagle feather for the spirit bag for the heart. She looked back at the silhouette of a strong young man standing in the great door looking out at the moon just rising above the plains off to the east. Yes, she thought; that heart would need a third feather, not so much a large one, but a third one for the balance. Nodding, she tottered down the hall as her gnarled knowing fingers traced the grain and knots of the log walls; comfortably finding her way through the dark as if it were a bright prairie day at high noon.

Going Home

“No miss, not one; all.”

The weather was just on that verge of becoming a real spring as the clouds stopped being sources of rain and had become targets of creative imaginations as ducks followed elephants becoming a larger teddy bear as wisps of Indian smoke drove through it all to make a field of cotton ball clouds scattered across a pale blue sky. Elizabeth Hanna Maria Sumner looked out across the still cold grounds of the August Hamilton Home for Children.

Her hands purposefully removing a long white cigarette from a silver plate holder and brought it to her mouth. She didn’t really want a cigarette, but she didn’t want to risk talking anymore. The process of starting a cigarette would give her the moment to calm and collect her thoughts.

“I have brought clothes for the girls and boy and would like them to wear them for travel.” She stated to the window. Her lip was starting that little quiver that she so hated since she was a small child in Mississippi, on the very wrong side of the tracks. Long before today, long before the doctor’s degree and even long before Miss Elvira Stipple’s school for girls of color.

“That would be fine Mrs. Sumner.” The director eyed the woman doctor from California. “Will, Mister Sumner be joining us today?” Wondering what would cause her to travel so very very far from home to adopt three children she had never met, but only seen in a photograph.

“No”, she snapped. Her head almost jerking around, but instead locked like an iron trap on the rusted child’s tricycle in the play yard. Regaining her calm in the desperation of her focused endeavor, she turned while blowing out smoke.

“No he won’t. He was called back to California when we arrived in Toledo; something to do with the upcoming elections.” Now concerned about a possible problem or even worse delay in the process of securing the children and her life, “I was under the impression that all the paperwork was complete and our coming was only a formality . . .” a tiny panic fluttered to her heart but then calmed to a mere resting butterfly, “and of course the civil thing to do.”

Turning once again to the window, and leaving the young director in a chilled silence to muddle through her social misstep of asking questions that may or may not be her business or concern.

Elizabeth’s right hand, absent mindedly pulled at her hat as an imaginary curl errantly broke loose. Not that the hat was the most stylish by west coast 1922 standards, but it served her well to hide the mass of overly curly hair that she had permed once a month, as straight as it could get to an acceptable “waviness” for a white woman doctor.

“I see there is a tricycle in the yard”, turning back to the director shuffling the last of the paperwork. “ I have a Kodak camera, do you think there is anyone on your staff who would know how to take a picture of the children and me? In the yard.” Her hand waves at the yard past the window “On the tricycle. The children of course, not me.” The flutter of the butterfly beats softly in her chest.

The director looks at the slight hint of panic. Then it washes away. Not her concern but she wonders at the devils that drive this quirky woman doctor from California. “I can do it.” She offers at the woman is once again looking through the glass, her eyes focused a thousand miles and many years away.

“Do what?” She turns as her hands searched the purse for another cigarette. She focuses down into the purse then up at the young blond woman sitting behind the desk in a starched white nurse’s uniform. Her mind starts to slip back to a not too far distant time in another kind of home as the man who was her father lay slipping away.

“Take the photograph. I have an Argus camera, how different can they be?” The director sensed that she was no longer the focus of this woman’s attention but that it had turned inward as she wrestled with her thoughts or demons. Quietly she stood and walked toward the office door, “I’ll just see to the children.” A disassociated hand waved in dismissal in her general direction, a quiet sniffle was masked by the snapping shut of the woman’s purse.

Her father lay slipping away. The once powerful lion of a man, who thundered through halls of justice, now lay before her a sallow shadow of the visage that commanded juries and galleries to listen and view the world through his eyes and wager the lives of the men who he would send home or to prison. His fine porcelain skin drawn thin, like thread-bare sheets over his bones, was cool in her hands. The sound of his breathing was like the memory of long lost lovers sighs in a spring night’s air.

The words were all said, the heritage of concepts all understood, now was the easy part; the waiting, the dying, the simple act of never being able to talk again; To ask questions, again; To share hopes and dreams, again.

Not that a girl living in the Colored side of the tracks could share much with her powerful white father, but it was the possibility that he would see that what he had started by sending her away to school was about to finally make her a woman doctor, and white.  The white children, and an imaginary successful husband and father, slain at the prime of his life would put away any question of color in their new home, and her new position at a new small clinic in the sleepy town of Van Nuys.

“Mrs. Sumner?”

“Yes”, she turned from her past and the window, and toward her new life and self. “Are they ready?”

“Almost, they’ll meet us in the yard.” The director offered her hand in guidance down the hall. Then she stopped and turned to the woman and in a quiet confidant voice, “could I ask you why?”

The shock was almost as if she had slapped the other woman “How dare. . . “

“I don’t mean to pry.” She rushed on. “It’s just that it is rare that even one deaf child gets adopted, but there are angles waiting for you that you would take all three. And I just wondered where you find the grace to shoulder such a yoke, I mean your heart must by either huge or hurting, to take on that much.” Blushing at her crossing of a very fine line, she looked down then back into the woman’s eyes.

The not much older woman stood as of stone, and not much colder. She searched in the soulful eyes of the young nurse director and found the spark of the understanding she needed. Then she warmed, and all the fear and worry from the lies washed away as she understood and owned in her heart a truth. A truth that was not only universal, but about her personally as well; one that she had learned  but not recognized, from her father that day he was passing away, and she put her hand out onto the other woman’s shoulder and squeezed just ever so slightly a motherly squeeze.

“Every child needs a home, someone to love, and someone to love them.”

Zephy

Zephy sat in the window, his tail swishing back and forth. If his Great uncle Aeolus was going to come today, it would be in the early morning. Trouble was, the school bus also came early in the morning. The race of life or death by torture would be decided soon, and Zephy just couldn’t stand the waiting.

If his uncle arrived before the school bus, there was a good chance that he Zephy, would spend the day with his world famous uncle; none other than Colonel Aeolus Emory Gryphon, commander of the most decorated combat squadron in the Air Force.

Zephy had a large box filled with nothing but really cool postcards from all over the world where the Colonel and his squadron had flown, or the Colonel had personally traveled to. Buried deep like treasure were two large goldish coins called “Chips”, which commanders have and pass out as thank you tokens to other military personal of lower rank as a physical acknowledgement. One of the coins that Zephy had was from his uncle, but the other was one that his uncle had received, specifically for Zephy, from the President of the United States.

Zephy thought it was pretty cool that his uncle and the President of the United States were friends, and uncle Aeolus had been to the White House on many occasions; but he thought it was even more cool that his uncle had thanked the President for the chip, but told him that he would be passing it on to his nephew Zephy. The President had told him to keep that one, and gave him another one specifically for Zephy, telling him that he and his nephew were welcome at the White House any time. It just made Zephy’s tail twitch even harder to think about some day that he and his uncle might go to Washington DC together.

But today, he would just settle for his uncle to get there before the bus.

“Zephy, your breakfast is getting cold.” His mother called. “Come on dear; you need to be ready for the school bus when it gets here.”

“Boy!” Zephy thought to himself; even his mother was conspiring to send him to school today instead of getting the day off to spend with his uncle.

With a final yearning look out of the window, he slid off the window seat and with silent lion` s feet, padded his way to the kitchen for his pancakes and eggs. He really did like the maple syrup, but it just wasn’t what he had his heart set on today.

As he sat up to the table with his lion paws dangling inches from the floor and slowly waving back and forth as he chewed, he thought about the email he had gotten from his uncle, sent from the USS Lincoln aircraft carrier as it was steaming its way back across the Atlantic Ocean. Uncle Aeolus had said that they were about four to six days away from the base and were “cutting squares in the ocean”, meaning that a ship runs north for say four hours, turns east and runs for four hours, then turns south and continues the same routine till they are back to where they started, and then start the process all over again. It is called a “Boxed Track” and it is a way to patrol an area of the ocean, but more importantly it tests the crew’s ability to navigate and operate as a cohesive team. Uncle Aeolus says it is the same with the fighter wing.

He specifically said that he was about 99% sure he would arrive ashore with enough time to come see Zephy and his family on the next Tuesday, and that was today. He hadn’t called, to say he wasn’t coming, but he hadn’t shown up yet either. This was just wrong,  he moped as he slowly pushed his pancakes around with his fork. His mother watched him sadly over her shoulder as she washed some dishes. As the little twinkle flared in her eye and her cheeks pulled back in a blocked smile, her wing raised to block Zephy from seeing.

“You’d better hurry up and finish Zephy, the bus will be here in five minutes.” It was all she could do to keep her smile out of her voice. “And, you know I don’t have the car today, so I can’t drive you to school if you miss the bus.” She snuck a peek over her wing.

Just then Zephy’s dad came out of his parents’ bedroom as he straightened his tie and pulled on his jacket.

“Dad” Zephy began, “Uncle Aeolus said he would be here today, but he’s not; and the bus is coming.”

As his dad leaned over and gave his mom a peck on the cheek, he turned and addressed his son’s concerns. “Son, he said he would try, and that is not the same as absolute. He’s a very busy man and has a great deal of responsibility.” He lifted his head and cocked it, “and speaking of responsibility, I hear a certain large yellow vehicle coming up the hill, and you don’t have your boots on mister.” As he bent over to peck the top of the small head, he found himself kissing air and the front door opening.

“I’m coming !” Zephy yelled as his right boot slipped over his paw, with the left already standing ready. “Bye dad, bye mom, love you.” And the door slammed shut followed by the mushy slapping sound of yellow galoshes running down the walkway to the end of the driveway and the waiting school bus.

At the edge of the walk and lawn, Zephy stopped to look back. His mother and father stood in the large dining room window waving goodbye. His mother put her fore claw to her beak and blew him a kiss. Zephy turned and ran the rest of the way to the bus and climbed aboard.

“Do you think he suspected?” The deep voice rumbled from the bedroom door.

The two parents stood transfixed as they watched the school bus door close and the bus slowly start to pull away. The boy in the fifth seat back was waving his claw at them and they waved back. “I think you actually pulled this mission off this time Colonel.” Zephy’s dad muttered out of the side of his mouth as he knew just what kind of eagle-eye his son had. Slowly the bus disappeared down the road and was finally hidden by the large over growth of Jacaranda trees.

Turning, the two parents chuckled with the Colonel as they finally could let down their guard.

“Where did you park the car?”

“Car? Not today, I absconded with an official command SUV. We’re talking lights, siren and the whole nine yards. I parked it behind the old barn.” The Colonel laughed at the extent he had gone to for his favorite person on earth, his nephew. “It goes with the airplane I brought this year.”

Taking her apron off, the boy’s mom poured some more coffee for all of them. “We have about thirty minutes before they start the track back from the farm loop. We can cut them off right in front of the school for maximum “Wow” factor,” she said as she handed the mug with the wings for a handle to her Dear Mother` s favorite, youngest brother. “And from here it’s only a few minutes’ drive; so sit down and enjoy your coffee . . . it’s going to be a long day.”

“That kid is getting harder and harder to fool. But he still doesn’t understand that “early” means any time after midnight, and I’m usually hitting 40,000 feet before dawn is creeping across the desert sands. My guess is that would be long before he’s awake.” Chuckling the Colonel sipped on his cup of steaming Joe. “OK, let’s plan this assault mission.”

Nodding the three sat.

The inside of the school bus was abuzz with the usual morning noise of boisterous kids. The driver kept smiling at odd times, as he searched his rearview mirrors. It wasn’t often since his days that he had served in the first Desert Storm that he was in on a secret mission; especially one that he got to play an important part in. The last long slope that ran the last two miles to the school was sliding by too quickly as he looked behind and saw nothing.

Suddenly in the side street he saw a large black SUV with blacked out windows. As he approached the cross of the side street, the SUV flashed his headlights twice; the game was on. The driver looked up into the large mirror that showed him every child on the bus; none were the wiser to what was about to happen.

Suddenly from out of the side street, the black SUV with blacked out window lit up with red and blue flashing lights and a siren as it came barreling out of the street and turned in pursuit of the bus. The bus, with perfect timing learned in the cockpit of an F-15 flying drag to the Colonel’s jet, pulled over just shy of the sidewalk it would usually pull up to. The SUV with the siren blaring and lights flashing attracted the attention of every school child, teacher and even administrators, as it pulled nose into the curb in front of the bus. But no one jumped out.

The siren wound down to silence and nobody moved.

The loud speaker on the SUV squawked, “Attention in the bus”

Everyone looked at the bus, “If there is a person turning six years old today, and his name is Zephy; then come out with your hands up.”

As the driver side door of the SUV opened and the uniformed pilot stepped out, he continued on the loud speaker, “Because, I have a big birthday hug and it will require a hands up to hug back.”

He figured he would wait until after lunch to tell the kid about the WWII T-6 fighter plane waiting out at the airport for their fun in the afternoon. But for right now, he knew he would have to brace himself to receive the incoming missile that was rapidly flying out of the bus.

The Colonel smirked; it warmed the cockles of his heart to be a favorite Uncle on the kid’s birthday.

The No Holster Cowboy Doesn’t Ride Today

The pale winter sun weakly wormed it’s not so warming way through the dingy snow mused windows of the Hold-up Saloon. Music plays languidly in the background as if from a scratchy record where nobody wants to turn the Victrolla up to hear how bad it had become; as if any of the serious dangerous cowboys were paying much attention to the Victrolla that day anyway. As the snow continues to play “h” “e” double toothpicks with the radio reception from the station in Buffalo.

The sawdust curled tightly about the toes of the No Holster Cowboy, much like a wool carpet of other days. The dangerous looking much favored straw sombrero was pitched on the backside of the cowboy’s head to keep the lines of sight clear in case there were any desperados or other bad guys lurking in the or around the saloon. With right hand itchy, the fingers clinched and unclenched as if by their own free volition to grab the pistol and start blazing with a bad gang.

The cough started with a low rumble in the shallow chest, and worked up to become a distraction from keeping an eye on all of the hombres. There is no harder job in a saloon, then hombre watching, when you would rather be out on the range shooting cattle rustlers, or rounding up wild mustangs out on the range and away for the indoors. Anything that was outside; away from just floating from room to room.

The cowboy stumbles to the deep overstuffed chair and collapses as a deep coughing jag racks the small body and brings the worried saloon keeper rushing in from the kitchen area. Her name is really Sal but everyone in the saloon calls her ma. Occasionally in the evenings her bo stops in for the night after work and calls her “sweets”, but the day crowd, today, all call her “ma”. She rests a probing worried hand onto the cowboy’s forehead as the racking juicy cough slowly loses its momentum. The fever is lower today, maybe some soup would help, but the hot towel body-wrap won’t be necessary today like it was last week and the months before. After 4 months, she has become an expert judge at monitoring the ups and downs of a debilitating possible killer, and as a good saloon keeper, she has her tricks to make the cowboy comfortable if not happier.

Large lazy dinner sized flakes of frozen water slowly, almost silently but for the white noise of static in the air drift down to blanket the range around the saloon window. The birds have all flown south and therefore there is no other sound to disturb the drooped head with the askew straw hat and the small chest with the little six-shooter rests hung on a lanyard string about the tiny neck as air wheezes struggling to move in and out and keep life in the little body that doesn’t grow but shrinks day after day consumed by an evil hombre from inside as the cowboy stands a quiet watch checks the inside of her eyelids for pinholes.

The range is softly silent as the comforter of frozen down wraps the world in a white of stillness, the hesitation of a hummingbird at the throat of two flowers. The usual noise of other cowboys, Indians, police, bad guys, or just other children is schooled away until night fall as the school year continues without the No Holster Cowboy. The school marm stops by each week bringing work that will help keep the cowboy abreast of the teachings, if only the energy was left to attend to the reading and paperwork. But the watching over the saloon and securing the perimeter is about all the energy the cowboy can muster in the small shrinking body.

Sal, the gal known as “ma” silently walks through the bar with a deft hand moving a stack of magazines, adjusting a slightly askew doily, a pillow repositioned here a rug edge kicked flat there, the room is restored to order as the cowboy sleeps in the large chair. The ever present back of the hand finds the little forehead. The butterfly floating lands for a telling moment then is once again adjusting and dusting and moving the world, satisfied that the soup has done its job once again. The soft whistle of the incoming noon train two hours late signals the saloon keeper that the tea water is ready for her afternoon respite from the duties of a nurse.

As she walks past the window, she languidly is aware of the new inch of snow in the yard.  In the next window is the tiniest swelling of the naked branch tip. And in the little iron cased leaded glass ornamental window with the big purple irises under attack by dragonflies and lady bugs, through the wavy glass that never shows the world in whole truth, she sees a tiny spot of light blue in the snow. She stops to stare, the blue is there. It’s not a piece of the window. She backs up a bit to the window before and looks. A small tender smile chases a couple of worried wrinkles away from her eyes.

The quiet is being attacked and she removes the kettle and pours the hot water into the bone china tea pot and replaces the tiny lid. As she sets down the kettle, her off hand turns off the flame and the only sound is the slow solemn ticking of the grandfather clock in the entry hall. She winds her hands in the towel at her apron strings as she sits down at the chrome edged light green Formica kitchen table.

“The crocuses are starting” she smiles “soon the daffodils and then the warming sun”.  The warmth and sunshine will be good for the little cowboy. Spring is a bearer of good.

 

The Flame

The midnight air had begun to sag and drip on the ancient pitted stone walls. A rogue cockroach scurried, bouncing across the spear-chipped pockmarks, along the worn battlement, etched by shoes of metal and leather, just ahead of the dark night wraith. Gliding silently as a barn owl hunting for food over the scrubbed age-beaten grain fields, the dark shadow swooped and stopped, swooped and darted, stone shadow becoming warm body shadow crossing the battlements. The gibbous moon slowly waltzed with the last entrails of the evening’s storm that had done nothing but make noise and tease the drought-birthed famine-crazed farmers.

Her silk slippers danced in a long established and ritualistic pattern, as the night wraith traced a path that she did not have to see. Each step a note in a song long written in the blood that coursed through her veins, as she raced against time, and listened against a cry or shout of awareness. Her step pauses in midair, then as if her foot like a hound, were delicately sniffing the landing in the deep shadows of the stone piled wall; her outer three toes almost curled over the edge of a hole along the edge of the stone wall, used by the warriors for relief as they walk the perimeter. She moves her foot the critical few inches and continues on her path.

If she could see the moon as it slips between drapes of veiling clouds, she would see a curious red pall covering all but the uppermost tip of the horn. But she has no need to look, for the power tainting the moon surges through her blood like a storm in the high mountains: howling, wailing, screeching and cutting with the sharpness of a honed sword powered by the bloody sweat-stained muscles rippling from the war-soiled, beast leather jerkin.

A small pebble hit against harder stone. The night shadow froze, now melting into the colder corner of stone against stone. Her heart was playing the staccato rhythm of a frightened mouse as curved swords from the sky sought silent death; the rushing blood pulsed in her ears, and she strained to hear the low whistle she needed to finish her journey.

Crouching in the cold of the stone, the same old battle raged, as she knew that the new ways required her to be in her chamber awaiting her wifely duties to her liege and husband. The moon overhead beat in the darker depths of her soul and called her to a duty that was all but lost in the modern world of science and the new religion of men in dresses wielding power far beyond a broadsword or claymore. The fire in her blood demanded her presence on the ramparts at the mid hour of night as it had for millennia of her mothers before and one night would of her daughters as well.

The low whistle of a distant loon echoed through the outer rims of the castle keep, answered by several more in and about the walls. Slowly, she reached out with tarantula-like fingers, crawling and testing the section of wall as she searched for the one stone that was warm and vibrated with a life that though long dead, lived forever. The fingers, as her eyes, belied the vacant face that was no more seeing than if bound with leather and blinded by the tannin of torment from a life given to that which was not in the heart, but burned in the depth of a soul tied to an ancient belief and it’s practices; even ones that were self-destructive.

As she withdrew the sought-for stone from the wall, she began the long banished ritual that, before the night was out, would cause her tortured body and soul even more pain. The heat of the stone grew in her hands as energies matched and the harmonious chords called out to the others. Echoes surrounded her:  gritty scrapes of stone on sandstone pathways, fabric rustling against fabric. She acknowledged the pull that was inside of her and listened to the sounds of the gathering as they came like moths to a flame . . .

 

Romney Lass

The summer desert sun still smoldered in the flesh of her face. The cheeks rubbed to a waxed patina by the searing desert winds. Lava like depths rolled and bubbled in the cauldrons of her eyes. The gold of her earring echoed the late evening sun, setting to end the torment of the sand turned broiler pan. And the photographer’s flashbulb once again flared about the unflinching woman. Her sight was miles and months away.

The day had been strewn with several stretches of sand without vegetation beating the mind with sameness upon endless sameness. The feet followed feet that were the same, foot in front of foot in front of foot. Crossing the stretch of desert had become a Sisyphistic challenge that was beyond the regimen finding the other side. If the mind could even think any more, it would think of anything other than what was happening.

Starting before sunrise, the small group gathered for the crossing. Very little talk was offered as each mentally prepared for the ordeal ahead. Seven miles of desert had sounded so minor in the safety of a cool adobe building just days before. The map had been so flat in its unassuming way. Nothing had alluded to the ordeal’s true nature as they had all agreed to the destination and the path of ascension.

She had stumbled and slid on the gravely side of the large barranca late in the morning, her smallest brother was on her mind. Early that week the policeman had shown up at their house asking about the boy. There had been some fighting at the school, that hadn’t stopped there. Later there had been a fight in an ally. Three boys had attacked a single boy. The three had various injuries ranging from a broken nose to a couple of broken ribs and a concussion. Her brother said he didn’t know anything about a fight, and he had no marks or injuries. The policeman said the others looked like someone well trained in boxing and street fighting had worked them over; and then he ask her brother if he still visited the boxing gym on 8^th Street.

Their mother had been furious that a policeman had come to the house. To bring this kind of attention, this kind of shame was unmentionable. She had slammed doors, and rattled dishes; but it was the quiet voice she used, almost a whisper, and the calm that was the serene look of a deadly thunder cloud standing white and soft against the summer sky, and it’s potential to rain down deadly hail or wash away the sins of man in the sweep of a flash flood. That; was their mother at the height of her fuming and fulmination. Later at dinner she served the young boy’s favorite desert saying, ‘do not bring home scars that bring shame to the family, send them home on others’. Then she kissed the tops of the heads of the children and went to bed; the new job was killing her with the hardness of long days and heavy labor at the factory.

Shortly before high noon, the group had stopped to eat sparingly and drink water. The cliffs were less than a hundred yards away but the heat radiated from the morning baked walls and stirred the air in waves of ribbonfish movement. They would not be climbing these walls; nearly a mile more on the north face the crevices hide cool pathways to the top.

Two of the others were looking at the map of the north cliffs to find the route that would be the most expeditious for the group, yet be ascendable by all. The weakest link being the old man among them, but he reassured them that he could and had crawled up all the chimney piped crevices that were on the cliffs. So they had repacked and move off to the cooler north side.

The afternoon had been spent in a cool crevasse of the north side when the sun never shown nor warmed the rocks or blood of the Diamond backed vipers of this place. So the group had rested safely and without worry as the heat slipped by overhead. They had laid about among the strewn boulders and rocks, dozing in the stupor from the long mindless travel through the burnt wasteland as well as into a time of an older tradition that predated even the old man’s memory of stories that were passes in whispers from old lips to young ears generation after generation.

As a woman now of 18 years, she had been assuming more and more of the duties of running the household as their mother worked more and longer days. She dreamed of attending gay parties with frilly dresses and swell guys. In her mind she could hear dance music played by one of the big bands that were popular and the smooth glassiness of a large hardwood dance floor filled with whirling couples. But the whirling movements were of her hands with a sponge on the floor. And her dancing was with a beater and the rugs on a clothesline in the sun.

The ritual in the knife slice of the new moon had been long feared by the trio of girls. The pain was not something that would ever be talked about by any woman ever to walk the journey into womanhood of the clan. The five young men standing guard but only one that was guided by the only man would see or ever know what the ritual would take or what it would give from the heart of the old man’s small worn leather sack. Only the young girls and the lone young boy would share forever that night, that pain, that secret and continue the course of the clan for more generations to come. Only that thinnest of slices of a moon, would ever see all, and yet never reveal that nights bonding.

The photographer’s lens reflected the glasses of her pupils bearing the fruit of a hard summer. Her eyes slide to the door hiding behind the white light umbrella. The young man stood in the doorway, there to take her home. Her time of gracious reprieve from the stalled life force chained to the yoke of caring for her mother and siblings was drawing to a close; and like a good book, she wished it not to end. The bitter-sweet of that time blossomed in her mouth and settled like a bite of bitter pepper, full and laced with eye watering heat. The young man leaned too into the door-jam with a melted resolve of the time now lapsed and his duty to incarcerate the free bird once more.

The photographer muttering to himself and looking through the view finder for the two hundredth time, absently lit another cigarette and drew in a deep slow draw of smoke. Irritated that the time was at near to end, he let his breath out as a deep sigh and smoke swirling out as snakes from mouth and nostrils. “Something. . . something…. “ He mussed “something missing, missing, missing. A focal point…..” He stepped right then left, squatted and raised into the air on his toes….

“Here.” He said. “Hold this”, and handed her his cigarette.

1st Ride

Editor’s Note: This was written a long time ago, for a very dear friend. She hadn’t heard it in a very long time . . . so, for her, and in memory of Mary Alice, peace on earth.

1st Ride

Like a puppy snuffling into a pile of week old laundry, her nose was burrowed in between the beaver fur collar and the musty worn leather of his jacket. Her green eyes were shut against the wind and cold as she huddled closer to the tawny frame bundled against the winter night. The smells of burning fireplaces and freshly snowed evergreens, melded with the deep stew of the old worn leather, years of saddle-soap, mink-oil, and sun baked oil and road fumes. If she moved her nose a couple inches higher to his neck and hair, she knew that she would still breath deep the scents that went with his motorcycle.

He had ridden motorcycles since he was 12 years old. Perching on the back of his older brothers’ for rides bummed to school or just to go riding in the summer. At the earliest age allowed by his parents he had secured his very own. Through the years he had owned one kind of bike or another, always moving up and getting larger. Now after much hard work, and saving, it was a six years old 1965 Harley Davidson, salvaged from a police auction.

Over the many months of their dating he had patiently, while washing or polishing the machine in her parent’s driveway, explained to her the many features of the motorcycle. Why it was called a “74-inch”, what cubic displacement really meant, and what made a “Pan-Head” different from the neighbors Honda; other than sounding sooo different.

Removing the top of the motor, he had carefully cleaned all of the now exposed parts. Then guided her slim young fingers over the little moving pieces as he slowly turned the motor over by pushing the kick-starter by hand. With his other hand, gentle as a baby sparrow’s breath, flowing over the moving tappets, her fingers sandwiched between his, he identified each felt piece of machinery as it moved, and explaining its part in the success of the workings. She put the “Pan” on top of his head and crowned him Charlie Chaplin for the day; they wrestled and tickled all over the grass of the front yard. Then she carefully polished chrome as he quietly reassembled the engine so he could go home, across the valley.

The motor thumped gently in the night as they sat stopped at a light. Her hands pushed deeper into the pockets of his leather jacket. Reaching the bottom of the pockets she pulled back into his stomach and hugged him, flattening her body across his back. His shoulder blades flexed and slid, acknowledging the hug and its communication. The light winked green and the Harley chuffed and barked as the tableau slid away from the intersection, sinking into the inky night of the street; a warm bubble of humanity.

The bike had always sat, cold, in the driveway of her parent’s house. His tawny hair only blown about from the open window of her mother’s borrowed Rambler. It was fine with her parents  that they dated, he had become like one of the family, but she was not allowed to ride on the motorcycle. So they had always taken the car.

The seat had been shockingly cold when she had first sat down, and the throbbing of the motor was not what she had expected. It had never been so . . . intense, before when it had been only her hand, resting on the gas tank. Placing her feet safely on the buddy-pegs was a job first done by him grabbing her ankles and planting her feet. The excitement tingled inside her as she exchanged “be careful” and ‘we will’ with her parents standing in the front doorway. The unsteady wobble, as he backed out of the driveway, clamped her hands tighter in his pockets. Nerves, warring to call off the ride she had bargained for, and the fear of the unknown.

“A”’s and “B”’s were the price she had paid, for the ticket of tonight. Her 16th birthday, one month before had come and gone without so much as a candle on a cake at dinner; all given up without a whimper, for this one ride; a short mile and a half each way. A lifetime away from anything she had ever done. The cold December night rasped against her one exposed cheek, an experience never felt in her sheltered world, so she turned her head straight to expose both cheeks. The lone street light flashed off the chrome as the trio crossed Teller Road at quarter till midnight.

The parking lot was packed with people. With hushed greetings to friends, they all quietly moved toward the building. The lone motorcycle rumbled slowly across to a corner and stopped. Sliding the kickstand down, he turned the key to off. Motor and headlight burbled to silence as the night wrapped around the couple sitting on the bike.

As he moved to dismount, she squeezed him softly in restraint. “Shhh,” she whispered. In understanding, he relaxed as they both snuggled into the after-roar of silence; each bump of the ride being remembered. Each sound cataloged and preciously wrapped-up and stored away in the treasure throve of her memory; knowing, that the chance to savor the ride, would not be given on the ride home. For now the two sat silently, as the organ in the church started the Midnight Mass for the blind.

 

Candy Cane Catch



The red and white missile careened out of control, wobbling from the weighted rudder that was aerodynamically unstable. What was a straight targeted trajectory was far from the deviated wanderings of the missile cut large loopy swaths in the sky as it progressed towards the target that had to continually compensate for the erratic tumbling, slides, and shifts in order to be hit perfectly.

The red wing flipped out then retracted completely as the targeting synapses adjusted to the growing range configurations of the inbound missile. The body rotated in a lazy split second roll that was immediately partially reverse, then rotated back to the original as the wings fully extended at a position of full stop, as the claw snapped out in the backwards roll, snatching the candy cane out of the mid-air.

“That’s 10,” Boomer exclaimed, as his brother high overhead folded into a fluttering death fall called the “defeated dragon”. Also known as “the one who had not caught one of the important candy canes” dropped by Skth, even farther above.

The points had been eight to nine, and Tink needed that very important drop as being the one player with the lesser score, placed him higher in the field of the drop and therefore first chance at the dropped candy cane missile. In his rush to snag a claw into the hook of the cane, he had created a shockwave of air that had spun the hook away from his extended claw, as he felt the smooth cellophane wrapper slide past his claw too fast to turn his claw into a grip and capture the treasure.

As Boomer raced around in a victory circle lap many feet above the pasture, Tink clenched his fist in mock outrage and vowed to ‘get you next year’. Merrily he was undershot by another kind of missile as an ice blue streak hunting stooped from high above, and looped under him as Skth rocketed down from above.

“Dear,” Q’Nt cozied up to the much larger black and red dragon and softly hummed, “could you please use your impressive voice to inform the children that the coco is ready.” The larger now nuzzled her neck and snuffled, as his mate giggled like a young dragonet. The pixie, Duff, giggled at their antics as she strolled the makeshift picnic table distributing small marshmallows into each of the mugs of hot chocolate.

H’n, now finished polishing his nose in his mate’s neck, stepped away as Q’Nt covered her one ear against the shrill blast she knew was coming and looked to Duff. Duff, seemingly ignoring the impending ear hurting noise went about her duty as the points of her ears calmly curled back into themselves and stuffed the opening as the large black and red dragon split the air with his shrill keeling cry that sounded like a whistle.

Four smaller dragons fell from the sky as if shot. At lower altitude, and threat of hard landings in the frozen pasture, they all leveled off into a flat pancake of dragon fleet formation in an all-out race to the traditional Christmas picnic goodies. An assortment of strange delicate tastiest bite-sized of pieces of different cultures and species that had become known as Q’Nt’s Celebration Picnic in the Pasture.

As the four smaller dragons rocketed by in an aerial tribute, Dvork, hunkered his wings to protect against any errant wind, delicately flamed the Japanese tempura batter to a golden brown while leaving the frozen tiny balls of mint tea ice cream still frozen in the center. Pu’s flame, after a secret night of eating a lot of sweet sugar cane, became syrupy sticky caramel glue that held the traditional puff pastry fish balls of northern Norway in a tree shaped stack half as tall as the large Sea Chameleon M’Ree as she set out piles of fresh baked fudge, brownies, and other chocolate finger or claw delights.

A warm gentle hand came to rest on M’Ree’s shoulder as a Navy Admiral gently leaned in to the large dragon whose cheek wings were now slowly turning as red as her glasses and red agate chain. “M’Ree, you temptress, there aren’t any dangerous calories in all that chocolate that I shouldn’t have, are there?” The officer asked as his left hand snuck a small Dragon Pop, as he continued to get closer and kissed her cheek where the small canard wing attached, and her most delicate sensitive area. The result was an immediate soar in her body temperature, a flustered mind and much redder cheeks. “Merry Christmas, M’Ree.”

As the larger blue dragon Q’Nt surveyed her private patch of the pasture. She smiled warmly as she looked about the many dragons that worked at Paw’s & Claw’s Atelier custom picture frame shop where her son Tink worked, as well as the human friend of her son Boomer, the pixie who had become everyone favorite friend, the three gnome Neffeler brothers who supplied her with forest grown herbs and greens. Here and there were an assortment of birds, fairies, a rodent or two and many other forest folk who over the past couple years had become friends and family through the extended friendships of her two sons. What had started many years before as only a few and almost all dragons had grown to many dozens of attendees representing a dozen or more species that she never thought she would ever even meet, much less consider family or at least close friends. She leaned against her mate and hummed quietly in content.

H’n placed his large upper arm over her shoulder and across her breast cage and pulled her closer in a hug, “It’s a grand celebration this year my dear; grand indeed.”

“Did someone say food?” A deep rumbling voice boomed from the edge of the last of the forest as a large bear dressed in a festive Hawaiian shirt and red rubber clogs stepped out as an ice blue dragon flew overhead, and a man with slicked back white feathery hair and refined features dressed in all black followed.

“Guff, Twill and Macklin,” Q’Nt squealed in delight and clapped to see the last of the invited arrive.

“Happy Holidays, everyone,” Macklin cried with open arms, “and I do mean every last one.”