Locked Out

     Whenever I step onto the deck at my house and/or whenever I have a piece of cherry pie, I am reminded of Mama Cat. Mama Cat adopted us when we were living in the rented house on Realm Lane, in Georgia here in 1991. She was Siamese in looks but not in meow, and as you might guess, she was pregnant. Not too long after we took her in, she had three kittens which we later gave away and then had Mama fixed. She was used to going outside, and I think she had a few of the neighbors feeding her and sheltering her from the rain and cold also.

     When we moved to our new house on Glynmoore Drive a year later, Mama was reluctant to go outside at first, and just when we got used to the idea of her being an indoor cat, Mama decided to go out again and she explored her new surroundings and endeared herself to the new neighbors.

     Well, it was probably the summer of 97 or 98, I have it written in one of my letters to the girls – so the exact date is somewhere. From the summer of 95 through 2002, Sarah and Amanda spent one month each year on Long Island with their paternal grandparents and other relatives including three cousins – those summers were great times for all involved and have left the girls with cherished memories and a few good stories (and some plays!) that they still tell. 

     When the girls were gone, I was quite alone. Mostly I worked a lot of overtime at the lab, and sometimes I got up enough energy to do some extra cleaning around the house before the girls' return.

     And one late Saturday afternoon, I put a piece of cherry pie on a plate, and with a fork, and either a book or a magazine, I walked out onto the deck for some relaxation. The deck is off of the sunroom, just past the kitchen, and it is an entire story above the backyard with no stairs from the deck down to the yard. Mama Cat was in the house, and when she realized I was on the deck, she went to the storm door and started meowing to come out and join me. I was enjoying my reading and made the choice to not leap out of my chair to open the door for the cat.

     And that prompted Mama to jump up toward the door handle! I don't know if she had figured out that the handle was the way to get the door open, or if she was just trying to get my attention by bouncing off of the door. Mama kept jumping at the door handle, and then it happened – she managed to hit the latch that locked the door! I was locked out of my house on a deck one story off the ground!

    I got up from the chair and tried the door.

    Yeah, it was locked

    Mama Cat was excited when she saw me walk her way! – but she was soon disappointed because I could not open the door for her.

   There was no point in trying to get off of the deck and safely into the yard because the other doors to the house were locked, the garage door was closed, there were no windows open on the first floor – so there would still be no way for me to get in the house even if I attempted the hazardous descent from the deck. If I called out to passersby, they might have been able to help me off the deck, but then that would be it. This was before cell phones – so I had no phone on the deck with me, like I usually have nowadays if only to play words with friends while relaxing.

     But the deck has the house along two of its sides – one wall is the sun-room and has the door to the deck which was the door Mama Cat locked. The other wall is actually the wall to the master bathroom – and the window from the bathroom overlooking the deck was open! There was a screen there, but I decided I would get the screen off somehow, hoist myself up and get into the house through the bathroom.

    Having decided what to do but not yet how to do it, I sat back on the deck chair and ate my piece of cherry pie.

    Not too much later, I started picking at the screen. I don't think I poked a hole in it; I might have just jiggled it a lot until the inside latches came loose one at a time. When Mama Cat heard the noise, she went to the bathroom window and got on the sill to watch and advise in her own special way. I could not believe the gall she had to think that I was fussing about the window so that she could get out!

    As I gave a running commentary to Mama Cat for having locked me out of the house, she watched anxiously for the moment the screen would give way and release her from being locked in the house!

     Finally the screen came off, and then the logistics of how to climb into the window and not fall head-first into the bathroom had to be worked out – I was squeezing my way in while Mama was trying to get by me. But I got in, fixed the screen and taped the latch on the storm door to the deck in the unlock position such that catpaws could not move it ever again.

     We did not go looking for adventure when the girls were gone, but sometimes adventure found Mama Cat and me!

38 20150207 Locked Out

First Confession Part 2

     When I left off in part 1 of my First Confession story, I was struggling over my list of seven years' worth of sins that I had committed – wondering if I needed to report an exact number for each sin, and finally hoping that God would be okay with a sincere estimate. I decided to say I had disobeyed my parents 7 times – an average of once per each year of my life, and I bore false witness perhaps 7 times – again an average of once per year, and I said the name of the Lord in vain 1 time based on the story my dad had told about me cussing when trying to light a match at the beach when I was two - no need to second guess that one as I could not recall ever having said the Lord's name in vain.

     The day for our first confession arrived. We met in our classroom, and the nun told us to get in a line, and she marched us down to the church. The confessionals were in the back of the church – all the pews faced the front. There was no one else in attendance. We sat in the pews in the back, but we were facing away from the confessionals, and there was a wall or a half of a wall between us and the little closet-like rooms for confessing.

     The nun made a signal, and the first student stood up in the furthest back pew. And I could hear footsteps on the tile as the seven-year-old walked to the confessional. A door opened and then closed. Then silence. After just a minute or less, the door opened and closed again. There were three footsteps and then....nothing! Where had the classmate gone? Not back to the pews. Not out the main door of the church – there would have been more steps to get all the way to the door! Why were there just three footsteps and then nothing?!!!

     The nun signaled for the next person to stand up. I heard footsteps to the confessional, the door opened and closed; after a minute or less, the door opened and closed again, and three footsteps and nothing! Again!

     I was terrified enough as it was – and now all I could imagine was that there was a portal to hell three footsteps away from the confessional – and each child was being pushed in for being so evil! What else could it have been?

     One by one each classmate got up and went to confession. I was in the last pew of children. The longer I sat there, the more I shook with fear. When there were only about six of us left to make our first confession, the nun suddenly appeared in front of us – her hands were on her hips. And she was mad!

     The nun said, “Father has just informed me that he does not want to hear another child say that he or she has committed murder!”

     My mouth dropped open! Then the nun signaled for the next kid to approach the confessional.

     Oh my gosh! My classmates were making up sins! They were lying in confession! How could I have been taking this whole thing so seriously while the other kids were fabricating confessions? Well, now I know it is because they were just trying to please the big people – somehow the adults wanted us to say something – so the other kids decided to confess to murder. And again, as in my specific gripes in Part 1 of my First Confession story, I blame the big people for this.

     The revelation of classmates making up their sins did not ease my own terror, of course. I shook as my own footsteps approached the confessional. I looked for the portal to hell, but it was well hidden. My voice cracked as I spoke my sins. The priest was neither fire and brimstone nor sympathetic – he sounded a tad bored, perhaps doubtful of my honesty.              Rather than feeling purified, I felt petty and small.

     When I left the confessional, the nun pointed, and I walked in the direction of her finger – three footsteps, which could be heard on the hard floor, and then there was a carpet all the way to the main door of the church.

    And my ride was waiting outside.

37 20150206 First Confession Part 2

365 Memories

     Most of the storytelling venues I attend are for personal storytelling. And sometimes people, especially young people, will tell me they only have so many stories inside of them! They believe that their lives are not interesting enough to come up with two or more tales a month or even two or three a year! – how does one come up with more than a few stories other than to have lived a long time?

    And I think back to the year I was going to send Sarah and John a memory a day while they were in England – and even though I only sent 6 months' worth, I had notes enough to fill a whole year. And you know, they can turn into stories – from family classics like the one about my grandmother, the illegal immigrant, to anecdotes like the time Amanda and Sarah, at grade-school age, were playing cards and Amanda said to Sarah, “You have a great joker face!”

Amanda and Sarah - Joker Faces 

    So I decided to start, with hopes of finishing, this blog of one memory a day for a whole year. My goals are many – first - the challenge, the feeling of accomplishment, the wealth of material for stories for years to come – so success, even if no one else ever reads it!

Story Jam in Dahlonega August 2013

    Secondly, it just might motivate some of the folks who do happen to read an entry or two to write down their own memories, just a list of one or two words – teachers, classmates, trips to the emergency room, Disney movies, unforgettable characters, sins, forgiveness – and this might inspire more stories.

     Thirdly – if others can put a list of memories together, (even in his/her own subsequent blog!) - then perhaps some folks might realize that at least 12 stories could be developed from the memories, and that could be a reflection of a whole life – 12 stories, or 10, or 8 that is not too much. And they could make for a truly decent autobiography to pass down to family.

    And wouldn't that be awesome?

36 20150205 365 memories

Twelve Story Biography

    My grandmother lived for most of the 20^th century! Just think of all that she had seen from 1903 to 1999! I have many notes about her life, including stories she had told of her idyllic childhood in England, the struggles of the Great Depression, her illegal immigrant status during World War II, the love and pride she had in her children and grandchildren.

    So you would think that when she passed away I could have written a decent biography lest this great woman be forgotten. But try as I might, the writing does not go well. The notes and stories are with me, the biography, alas, is not. I will give credit to my brother, Clark, however, who has done a stellar job of writing our grandmother's life story.

    My mom passed away in December of 2012. Earlier that year I had begun telling personal stories to audiences. My confidence was building, and my stories were getting better in structure and delivery. So the next year, I decided to dedicate 2013 to two stories a month about Mom. At the end of the year I would have 24 Mom stories. Of those 24, some of them would be mere anecdotal, but there would be some, maybe even 12, that would reflect the kind of person Mom was – where she came from, what made her the way she was, who she was – and if those 12 stories were strung together, heck, they could make for a fairly decent biography – they would be my way of putting together the story of Mom's life.

Mom's wedding dress on Sarah 2006

     And this turned out very well. There is the Bonnie story, the Bobcaygeon Summer, the three trips to Crystal Beach, the three parts to the Courtship story - each very revealing in its own way; there are the fortune tellers and Mom's different homes; there is Garfield, and Mom's own stories about each of her children; and then there is the Pretty Blonde Haired Lady which still brings a tear to my eye whenever it comes to mind. Putting together the stories helped me understand Mom so much better than I would have without having reflected on them.

     Could I put twelve stories together, and could they make a biography? I think that could happen - not quite so daunting after all. I can do that for my mom, and my grandmother, and my dad.

    And every once in a while, give me a poke to make sure I follow through on all this, please!

35 20150204 Twelve Story Biography

A Memory a Day to England

 

Sarah and John Nelson 2008

   In 2008, my daughter, Sarah, married her beau, John. Sarah had become a librarian and was doing a lot of storytelling – mythology, children's stories, and personal tales. John completed law school, and had accepted a fellowship in Norwich, England. Their stay in England, beginning shortly after the wedding, was going to be for one year.

     I wanted to tell Sarah that I would send her an email every day of the year that they would be gone, but my life is not exciting enough for an email a day! So then I decided, in conjunction with our mutual interest in storytelling, that I would send a story a day – more specifically, write up and email each day, a memory from my life! Surely I could come up with 365 memories, couldn't I? Heck I could probably come up with enough memories for two years, I think! Well, the thing would be to find out – just the first 365 memories, anyway.

     So the kids flew to England, and I started sending memories – not at all chronological, and some of them connected – something that happened in 8^th grade threaded into incidents in 9^th and 10^th grade, or something one daughter did reminded me of something I had done at the same age. And I sent them to not to just Sarah and John but to a few other family members also and some friends. They all did not read all of them – but I found that this was a great exercise for me –  the reflecting, the feeling of those emotions of memories that have stuck with me from childhood – the reliving of them gave them new meaning now that I could see them from an adult point of view or from a point years later.

     Of course, as much fun and value as this exercise was, I was terrible at keeping up with it. Some entire weekends were spent catching up with the emails – instead of Sarah getting a memory a day, she might get none for a week and then eight in one day. This also made me a pain to be around at home, as you might imagine.

     So if I say that I completed only six months of this commitment, one might conclude that the whole thing was an abysmal failure. But if you think about it this way – hey! She has six months' worth of memories written down somewhere! That's kind of neat.

     And no, I did not run out of memories to talk about – in actuality, it was Mike's fiftieth birthday party preparations in April of '09 that captivated my entire attention at the six-month point, and afterward we heard that the kids would be returning to the States in June rather than September, and the need for a story-a-day or eight-stories-a-weekend faded away.

     This blog, A Sharp Stick in the Eye, was going to use the stories already written in the emails from 2008 and 2009 so that I would not get behind in 2015 and become the same pain in the butt that I was before in trying to keep up. But as you might guess, old stories have been rewritten or updated with new reflections – and some stories will not be used as I realized they were more about “what happened today” rather than actual memories. And then of course, there are the other six months' worth of a memory-a-day that will need putting together – and pictures! I want to add pictures!

     There are notes scribbled about everywhere - pockets, purse, phone, giant desk I'm using at home - of what I want to write about – today is day 34 of the 365 day year – made it this far – let's see where it goes!

34 20150203 memory a day England

Calendars and Journals

    My daughter, Amanda, was born in the month of December in 1986. After the turn of the new year that next month, I found myself with an extra 1987 calendar, and I was not sure where to hang it or what to do with it. Then it occurred to me that Amanda would have a lot of “firsts” in her first year of life – like first trip to the grocery store, first trip to the public library, first meeting with extended family members who might come to visit us in Oklahoma, and of course first sleep through the night, first tooth, first step. Who knows? I might be able to put something cute on the calendar, and not just firsts, for every day of 1987? I did not really have enough faith in myself to believe I would actually keep up with the calendar – but I decided to give it a try.

1987 Amanda's Life

     Well, I surprised myself! Not only did I have every day of 1987 filled in with something about Amanda, but in 1988, I bought two extra calendars so that I could put something down each day about Amanda on one calendar, and something each day for my daughter, Sarah, on another. Sarah is two and a half years older than Amanda, and she was doing lots of cool stuff like attending pre-school. That year's efforts turned out successfully too. And so the tradition continued well into the 90's – the calendars were by then replaced with journals for longer entries for the luxury of better describing some days.

    From the beginning I had decided to limit the entries to only positive statements – and oh my gosh what a wonderful exercise it was for me to come up with something positive to write about each daughter each day; and if I could not think of anything at all because a particular day had been especially difficult, then I would allow myself to write about what had gone wrong that day.  

     The collection of the calendars and journals on the shelf are are so very dear to me now!

The shelf of journals and calendars

     In January 2010, one month after my grand-daughter, Virginia was born, I did an entry a day for her, and continued it for the next 18 months – her Mom was wonderful in keeping me informed of lots of cute stuff I could write down.

    When my girls were little, I so wanted to chronicle every moment with words and pictures – and then I realized that parenting means living in the present and allowing the sands of time to run through our fingers – and because that time is then gone – it is so important to enjoy – cherish – every single one of those moments while they are happening. I am so glad I have the journals and the photos and the stories – but a deeper contentment flows through me for the blessings/presence/sharing of my daughters and grandchildren in my life!

33 201502021987 calendar entries

Someone on 219 just said "God Bless You!"

     Since the January 1^st entry, and thus the first installment of the 365 memories blog, was a quote of my Dad's, I'm thinking I can start each month with one of his memorable sayings. To understand this February 1^st quote, I'm going to include a description of the roads near our Heinrich house.

     The old Route 219 ran through the hamlets of North Boston, Patchin, and Boston before heading south to Springville or north to Hamburg. Zimmerman Road began at one intersection of 219 in North Boston – the law office on this very corner is where Mom worked for years and years. On the other corner there used to be an ancient tavern – but now there is a plaque commemorating the well of the tavern which was the source of a typhoid fever epidemic once upon a time!

      Zimmerman then goes over 18 Mile Creek. (Legend claims that 18 Mile Creek is 18 miles from Buffalo Creek), and just a little past the bridge, Zimmerman meets the beginning of Heinrich Road and then continues up one of the famous and picturesque Boston Hills.
          Heinrich goes down a slight dip over what we kids always called Riskie's Creek, and then Heinrich continues up the dip where it meets Valley Circle Lane and our old house on one of the corners; after that, Heinrich used to go up a hill, made a sharp right turn and then after a mile or so it intersected with the old Route 219 a couple of miles north of where Zimmerman Road met 219.

     It was a few years after college and my moving to Buffalo, that Heinrich Road was dead-ended just past our Valley Circle Lane subdivision, at the bottom of the hill before the sharp curve. The new Route 219 came through there – and the old roads of my youth were permanently changed.

     Valley Circle Lane goes around in a circle with houses on both sides of the road. Beyond Valley Circle Lane is 18 Mile Creek, a cow pasture that we kids called the Hickory Nut Woods, and a field. And just beyond that, about a half mile as the crow flies, was the old Route 219.

Our House at Heinrich and Valley Circle Lane; old Route 219 east of 18 Mile Creek

     So this has been a long-winded way of saying that the old Route 219 was about a half mile from our house .

     Now, Mom had some very loud sneezes. Not all of her sneezes were ear-piercingly loud, but every once in a while a really booming one would come out. And if Dad were home at the time, he would wait a second after the sneeze, and then he would point in the opposite direction of wherever Mom was in the house and say, “Did you hear that? Someone on 219 just said 'God bless you Mary!'” (Mom's name) 

     And that has stuck with me all my life. If I hear a really loud sneeze, no matter where I am, or even if it is my own sneeze, I say it in my head, and I've often been heard to say it out loud, “Someone on 219 just said 'God bless you!'” And if you have ever heard me say that – now you know what it means!

32 20150201 God bless you Mary!