Staying Vertical

I wasn’t on a boat. I was, however, up a creek. Or at least it felt that way.

Lunch was over and Grandpa had agreed to drive us to Canyonville to meet our “friends” who were to pick us up and carry us the rest of the way to Portland. Grandma packed up some leftovers (I could never get out of their house without taking food for the road) and Brenda and I got in the car for the 40 mile drive to Canyonville. I wish I could remember the conversation that day, but since I had told so many lies all I can remember is the misery I felt.

I picked out a spot on the road with a pull-out and a nice rock wall to sit on and told Grandpa that this was the spot. I knew it was going to be difficult to convince him that he didn’t need to wait with us, and it was. He wanted to be sure we were safe and wanted to meet our friends. I don’t remember how I talked him out of staying, but I remember breathing a sigh of relief as he drove off.

We waited until we were sure he had left the area and then got back on the highway, thumbs out. Within about 10 minutes, a little red station wagon pulled over. The driver was a woman about 40 on her way to Portland — what incredible luck! We were only going as far as Eugene. We climbed in and relaxed for the first time since we’d left Ashland. The miles passed quickly as we shared the story of our misadventure (leaving out just a few of the details).

My car was right where we’d left it, and we were back in Portland having dinner at Brenda’s before the sun went down. We’d pulled it off! Or at least that’s what we thought.

Flash forward some months later. I’m back home in Long Beach, CA and having dinner with my parents and telling them a story about the summer in Portland when my dad asks, “Why don’t you tell your mom about your hitchhiking adventure?”

Stunned, face suddenly flushed, tongue inexplicably tied, I finally manage to say something like “Huh?”

As it turns out, although they didn’t know about Twiggy, Flower, Mia, and Rock; they knew about the trip to Ashland and back, and the ride in the police cruisers, and the story we had made up for the grandparents. I had always known my parents were spooky psychics, but this was too much. I asked them how they knew all of it, and they fessed up that they had gotten all of the info from Grandma.

Oh, by the way, the lady in the red station wagon…a friend of my grandparents from their square-dancing club. That’s when I realized I might not be quite as smart as I thought I was, and would likely never be as smart as Grandma and Grandpa. Or as good at teaching a lesson.

So…where was I? Ah, yes. In Grants Pass in the driveway of the Annabelle Lane house of my grandparents in the backseat of a police cruiser. Face red. Pulse racing. My face still flushes as I remember getting out of that cruiser as my grandfather came out to see about the policeman in his driveway.

The officer verified that Grandpa knew who we were and then left us to go back out on patrol. Meanwhile my mind is scrambling to pull a story together to tell my grandparents and trying to figure out how we will get back on the highway.

Of course it would have made sense to simply come clean, confess the ill-conceived adventure, and then let them help us get safely back to my car in Eugene. They would have done it. The worst that would have happened is that I would have disappointed my grandparents and we would have had to endure a lecture. That would have been too easy. Instead, I told them we were being picked up by some friends up the road on I-5.

Meanwhile I could hear my dad’s voice whispering gently, “Every time you tell a lie, you have to tell three more to cover it.” That is no exaggeration! To make the lie work, I had to fabricate a meeting point, time, friends’ names, the why and wherefore, etc., etc., etc. Each lie made me feel worse about the whole thing.

Brenda and I followed Grandpa into the house, exchanging desperate looks between us. Grandma had the table set for lunch — for four people as I recall — and we all sat down to eat. Except that I couldn’t. I was miserable; wanting to be far, far away. I stared out the window at the Rogue River flowing past and wished I was on a boat.

My grandparents were in their early 60’s (just about my age) in 1969, when I was 19 and thought I knew just about everything. That was the summer, after my freshman year, that I lived with a college friend and her family in Portland, Oregon while working and trying to save enough money to go back to Southern Oregon College in Ashland in the fall. (Here is a tip: if that is your goal — don’t work as a nurse’s aid in a rehab hospital. You’ll learn a lot, but you won’t make much money.) Sometime during that summer, I got three days off in a row, and Brenda and I decided to go to Ashland to play — because obviously there wasn’t anything to do in Portland.

In another brilliant flash of inspiration, we decided that we’d drive my perfectly good car (a 1963 Plymouth Valiant station-wagon) only as far as Eugene (about 100 miles from Brenda’s house) and, to save money, we’d hitchhike the rest of the 200 miles to Ashland (since gas was about 30 cents a gallon in July of 1969).

I’d never done anything so wild! Trust me when I tell you that I was a pretty good girl in those days. It was, after all the 60’s! Brenda assured me that she had done it plenty of times. And so that’s what we did. We drove my car to a spot just north of Eugene and parked it and got out on Interstate 5 and facing north, and backing south — we stuck out our right thumbs.

It was a long and exciting day, and one day I will tell you all about it; including the ride from Roseburg to Ashland (110 miles) with Twiggy, Flower, Mia, and Rock in a big boat of a car – me squeezed in between the driver, Mia, and Flower (these were all grown men, I kid you not) and Brenda between Rock and Twiggy in the back. Twiggy actually was and Rock was the most attractive (and coincidentally the most normal looking of the bunch). The story involves love and revenge and a hatchet under the driver’s seat. Brenda and I were so grateful to see the sunset from outside of that car at the northernmost Ashland exit. I don’t think we even noticed that we had another 3 miles to walk to the center of town! One day, I’ll tell you all about it.

Usually, that’s the story I tell; but the real story is about the trip back to Portland. We got out on northbound Interstate 5 early on Sunday, faced south and stuck our thumbs out and quickly got a ride to Gold Hill, barely 15 miles up the road. But the day was young. Back on the highway, thumbs out, and before you could say OMG, there was a county patrolman pulling over. He seemed a little bewildered. Here were two apparently well-kept young ladies, hitchhiking on his highway. He wanted to know why. I quickly put together a story (it’s a gift). I told him we were only going as far as my grandparents’ house in Grants Pass (not far, but in another county and I certainly had NO intention of letting them know what I was up to). That’s when the nice policeman invited us to join him in his patrol car and drove us to Rogue River, where — after a few minutes wait — we were met by a Josephine County patrol car. We got in and were driven Grants Pass, right up into my grandparent’s driveway.

Ok…now what, Einstein?

(to be continued)

I’m trying to write tonight, and realizing that saving it for the end of the day is not working for me. Sleep creeps up behind my eyelids, pulls them down and then runs away laughing when they snap back up like an old fashioned window shade. I guess I have to start earlier in the day and make this my job.

Beautiful spring day —
Severed limbs and pools of blood –
We’ve been here before.

Tonight I am really struggling to stay upright long enough to write a little. Such a busy day, so full of friends and activities! I had brunch with three of my besties (one of them my daughter), followed by a play (Frost and Nixon), then a photo shoot (so that I have head shots for book jackets, etc.) and ended with a hockey game (my son-in-law plays goalie). I think I deserve a sleep-in tomorrow!

The brunch was my idea, so that I could get my girls together for a meal and then a play. There were supposed to be five of us, but one was MIA so we spent the time talking about her. I’m joking. We missed her, but made the best of a bad situation by drinking her share of the mimosas.

If you are ever in Silver Spring, MD on a Sunday, Mrs. K’s Tollhouse serves a 5-star brunch that is worth the price. From the Eggs Benedict to the prime rib, everything was beautiful and delicious. I even tried my first oyster on the half-shell. I figured I better do it now or I might never have the chance (or the chutzpa) again. I don’t know that this will be my first choice off the menu in the future, but it wasn’t terrible. In fact, it was pretty good.

I think it is important to try new things, even when you are past 60. Bungee jumping and sky-diving excluded.

So now I am turning out the lights. The party is over. But what a party!

Going to bed tonight with a deep sense of gratitude for family and friends who share themselves and their time. These are the greatest gifts of all. I am richly blessed.

Somebody’s grandbaby
went to school
that frosty December day
anticipating Christmas
nervous about a spelling quiz
thinking about lunch-time
and an Oreo cookie.
Nowhere in that
fresh sweet heart
was there
the idea
the thought
the sense
or even
the possibility
that the day
would be
shredded
and bathed in blood
limbs blown apart
face gone
future
gone.

While old men
harrumph
talking sideways
with silly arguments
crafted by cynical
propagandists
accepting
checks and accolades
spots
on Sunday talk shows
whipping passions
over non-existent losses
Grandma and Grandpa
look at photographs
of a future
lost to them
a future
lost to us all.

What a glorious morning! I’m in Maryland to celebrate my birthday later this week. I have once again successfully circumnavigated the distance around the sun on this little blue marble of a planet. This morning I awoke to warm weather (it was only 18 degrees when I left Denver) and the sounds of all the birds I have come to know and love in this part of the country. It’s going to be close to 90 here today, and flowers are blooming everywhere! Now that’s what I call a celebration!

For the next week or so, I’ll be staying with my beautiful daughter and her handsome husband and trying not to be the annoying mother-in-law so that when I want to come back in the fall they won’t be horrified and move without leaving a forwarding address. I have friends I can stay with, but I like the bed here and the big pine tree in back where the cardinals meet to discuss the events of the day, and gossip about the chickadees.

I finally got around to installing the WordPress app on my iPad and have now run out of excuses to not be writing more frequently. Truth is I am a little lazy. Even at my age, I still have work to do on myself. It’s not a trait I admire, but I have to accept that it is what it is, and then try to do something about it.

They say that it takes six weeks to break a habit. So…for the next six weeks (until May 22) I am going to attempt to write something every day, even if it is only a line or two or a haiku. It may be a story pulled from the past or a reflection on the moment or a description of a fabulous day (I expect there will be at least one or two of those).

There is meaning to this madness. I have boxes and binders full of materials for a serious writing effort and a promise made to make this available to the rest of the family, if not the world. There are letters between a mother and son serving in Europe in WWI. The mother is my great great grandmother, the son was General Ward Davis who now lies in Patton’s Circle at Arlington. There are letters between my great great grandfather, Leon Fouquet, and his sons in Colorado, Texas, and Oklahoma describing how the Great Depression was affecting them in the early 1930s. And I have a book to write about my grandmother and her twin. Born in 1908 and living until 98 and 104, respectively, they kept wonderful notes and journals of the things they saw during their lifetimes. Somehow I think that those things might be relevant to those of us living today, might provide some insight, might help us understand our lives a little better.

At the very least, perhaps it will help me to understand my own life a little better.

So for the next six weeks, I will be doing the warmup exercises leading to the marathon. If you can stand the huffing and puffing and labored syntax, you’re welcome to join me here while I work on my writing muscles. I look forward to your comments!