This is the ancient recipe, as told to me by my secretive and somewhat accident-prone elder, Shirlee. NOTE: There are no cake mixes of any kind in this pastry. Use fresh, high quality almond extract. Butter or nothing! This is a distillation of process, Shirlee may not have done things exactly in this manner, but do not question the method nor madness. This is how I do it. Follow these simple steps and all your dreams will come true, you will feel better about yourself, people will love you, your hair will look better, your house will be clean.
One must attain the proper mindset prior to attempting this delicacy. Prepare thyself by washing and you must have a meal. Touch no animals. Remove your shoes. Set out the butter to warm. Play some music you love; pour yourself a drink. Begin:
Shirlee's Secret Almond Magic
All goodness comes in threes:
Bottom Layer
1 stick butter (4 oz)
1 tbs water
1 cup flour
Middle Layer
1 stick butter (4 oz)
1 cup water
1 tsp almond extract
3 large hen fruit (not XL)
Frosting
1 box powdered sugar
1 stick butter (4 oz)
milk or cream as needed
1 tsp almond extract
Slivered Almonds
Preheat oven device to 350 F (177 Celsius; 450 Kelvin)
Mix components of bottom layer. Divide into two spheres. Pour yourself a drink. Name the spheres (one masculine, the other feminine). Imagine how the perfection of these spirits (not your drink) might be manifested. Pick up the feminine sphere (ladies first), holding her image in your mind. Mash her round ass into a flat pancake 12 inches by 3 inches. Get a cookie sheet and lay her corpse down one side. Smirk. Grab Biff, and with his dashing wit and perfect teeth foremost in your thoughts, pummel him into the same two-dimensional shape as Buffy. Lay him out cold next to the chick. Gloat.
Pour yourself a drink.
When your adrenaline subsides, begin making the middle layer by bringing the water to a boil. This water shall represent really hot water. Pop quiz: Who, at work, makes you the craziest? He or she shall then take the form of the stick of butter. Undress your coworker, noticing how, as the trappings of status and authority are stripped away, nothing remains but pure fat. Pity this unfortunate soul and apologize as you push the body under the boiling water with something blunt. Listen carefully... when it's over add the almond extract and flour to cover your crime. Beat until smooth. Beat a little more just to be sure. Set aside. Pour yourself a drink. Assemble the eggs. Flatter them. Promise them fame and glory. Keep a straight face. Tell them you have an important job for them. Name them if you must, but if you are perceptive they will name themselves. Position two eggs such that they cannot observe. Break the lone egg in a deep and cold bowl. Laugh maniacally. Repeat with next egg. Laugh some more. Show third egg the fate of the other two and politely request some changes in attitude and behavior. Disregard protests and groveling and break egg into bowl with comrades. Remove the evidence of the shells to pre-arranged hiding spot. Beat those eggs with intensity. Add the eggs to the flour mixture. Reflect on the cold irony of life as you mix it all up until smooth. Remind yourself that these were not good eggs.
Pour yourself a drink.
Remember the two corpi delilcti on the cookie sheet? They have metamorphosed into your flaws and mistakes. The egg and flour goo is treacherous backstabbing; with it, hide your flaws and mistakes. Lay it on thick. Cover every last little bit. Make someone work hard to see through it. If they do, eliminate them. Slide your camouflaged defects into the oven. Set a timer for 35 minutes. Enough time for a drink. Or two. When timer goes off, check pastry. If necessary, continue to bake 5 minutes more until golden brown and puffy. Remove from oven and set aside. It may flatten somewhat as it cools.
Take a nap.
Later, look carefully at the pastries on the cookie sheet. No, look closer. Take your time, your eyes may not focus well at this point. That's the best you can do? Pathetic. I thought you were paying attention. I thought you were going to try harder this time. Why do I even waste my time? You don't want anybody to see this; you better put something over it. If you mix up another cube of butter and maybe the powdered sugar, that might hide the bland ugliness you have baked. Put in the almond extract to help mask your ineptitude. For God's sake, put down the food coloring - are you mad? Do you want to go to jail? Good, now spread it on the pastries - do be careful and try to make it look appetizing. A flourish with the spatula might come in handy here. No, use it all. Not enough frosting and people will retch. Still looks horrible. Sprinkle on the almond slivers. Don't eat that, you need all you can get. Geez Louise... Now they look like flat white turds with nuts on them. Do you have a knife? Weeeell, you could kill yourself with it or cut the pastries into strips, bars, whatever. A platter, a plate? Arrange them somehow. Like a flower! Or a pyramid! Something besides flat white turds. That's gonna have to do. Uh, plastic wrap... don't want them to dry out - Duh!
Not bad for a first effort. Don't you feel better? You better have a drink.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
Monday, June 7, 2010
Rat Race
My wife is busy, busy, busy. She's in school and studies almost every waking hour - when she's not in class. It's finals week and all weekend she has ladled obstetrics and natal development into her over-full mind like a desperate, sour stew.
This morning, she left for class, only to return to the house immediately. I assumed she forgot something.
"I need to take your car - there's something wrong with mine." Her car is not old, but I have a deep-seated mistrust of Subarus, and I take this as confirmation of my prejudice. "The steering is stiff," she says. "I'm gonna be late!" Why do these things always happen when you're pressed for time?
She shuttles her books to my truck and, barefoot, I retrieve some tools and boat parts from the back seat. As she roars away, I struggle to wedge myself into the front seat of her car, reminded of one of the reasons I will never own another Subaru.
I take it for a quick spin around the block, and she's right - the steering is far too stiff. Normally, the Outback is nimble, but I have to crank the wheel like a bus driver to make a ninety degree turn on the street. Even then, I swing into the opposite lane a little bit. I have a grumpy right shoulder and I feel the same discomfort that visits me after too many push ups.
Somehow I park it back in the driveway and pop the hood. A wide, grooved belt lies in loose coils behind the radiator. Crap. The belt looks brand new, so I doubt that it merely snapped. Perhaps a pulley has broken, or maybe the alternator is loose. If it's just a belt, I could fetch the part on my bike.
A quick search on the Internet reveals little. The few hits I get from "Subaru Fan Belt" lead to members-only forums or Slavic web sites. I'll have to dig into it, trusting my mechanic's intuition.
Back under the hood, there's a piece of trim on top of the engine hiding the upper portion of the belt's serpentine course. The intake manifold arcs through a pair of holes in this trim plate, like the backs of a pod of silver whales. A duct of some sort crosses over the right corner of the engine compartment, affixed to the radiator support by two bolts. It's all in the way, and I'll have to remove it.
I fetch a metric socket set and remove the bolts from the obstructing plastic parts. I lay them in the grass, arranging the fasteners on top. I turn my attention to the belt. A cocktail of relief and revulsion floods my veins. I can fix this, but... gross.
This morning, she left for class, only to return to the house immediately. I assumed she forgot something.
"I need to take your car - there's something wrong with mine." Her car is not old, but I have a deep-seated mistrust of Subarus, and I take this as confirmation of my prejudice. "The steering is stiff," she says. "I'm gonna be late!" Why do these things always happen when you're pressed for time?
She shuttles her books to my truck and, barefoot, I retrieve some tools and boat parts from the back seat. As she roars away, I struggle to wedge myself into the front seat of her car, reminded of one of the reasons I will never own another Subaru.
I take it for a quick spin around the block, and she's right - the steering is far too stiff. Normally, the Outback is nimble, but I have to crank the wheel like a bus driver to make a ninety degree turn on the street. Even then, I swing into the opposite lane a little bit. I have a grumpy right shoulder and I feel the same discomfort that visits me after too many push ups.
Somehow I park it back in the driveway and pop the hood. A wide, grooved belt lies in loose coils behind the radiator. Crap. The belt looks brand new, so I doubt that it merely snapped. Perhaps a pulley has broken, or maybe the alternator is loose. If it's just a belt, I could fetch the part on my bike.
A quick search on the Internet reveals little. The few hits I get from "Subaru Fan Belt" lead to members-only forums or Slavic web sites. I'll have to dig into it, trusting my mechanic's intuition.
Back under the hood, there's a piece of trim on top of the engine hiding the upper portion of the belt's serpentine course. The intake manifold arcs through a pair of holes in this trim plate, like the backs of a pod of silver whales. A duct of some sort crosses over the right corner of the engine compartment, affixed to the radiator support by two bolts. It's all in the way, and I'll have to remove it.
I fetch a metric socket set and remove the bolts from the obstructing plastic parts. I lay them in the grass, arranging the fasteners on top. I turn my attention to the belt. A cocktail of relief and revulsion floods my veins. I can fix this, but... gross.
Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Rinky Dink
As I type this, my fingertips feel a little strange. Perhaps it's the paint crusted in my whorls, or the "defatting" of my skin from solvent used to spot at dabs and drips on my hands. Certainly, if I were inclined to use lotion, it would be recommended.
To be honest, I have been using an epoxy primer that requires a thinner so foul that you can hear the brain cells dying - with an audible snap - in your head with every breath. I took the work outside, and I noticed two things: my olfactory receptors quickly became saturated and immune to the sharp sting of vapor, and I became ravenously hungry. I've used this particular product before, years ago, when I restored a San Francisco Pelican sailboat. A weatherly little sloop, it was built like a proper tub and carried a junk-like lug sail. I had the bottom repaired with copious epoxy and this particular primer was the only product appropriate as a go-between for the resin and the paint I chose. Every time I smell that solvent, I am transported to an inverted hull under a tarp, behind the fence.
I have been building a boat, a ridiculous little boat. Lacking the shop space for my stored power tools, I have been using Lisa's grandmother's basement, twenty minutes away. Lisa's late grandfather built thirty-three fiberglass sailing dinghys in that basement, and the power tools he used have made my project easier. Even so, the space is cramped, and I mutter to his spirit when I repeatedly wrestle the table and band saws out of my way.
This is not the first boat I've built. My first boat was a "stitch and glue" affair that I had worked out myself in high school. Designed to be cut from a single sheet of plywood, wired together, the seams fiberglassed. I dubbed it the Banana Boat, for its squarish approximation of a certain tropical fruit. I had a working knowledge of how S&G boats went together. Dad brought home the plywood and fiberglass materials from work.
My friend, Eric, and I risked amputation cutting out the three pieces with a circular saw on the garage floor, and we dutifully assembled the hull with galvanized wire and a cross brace carved from a two by four. After mixing up the resin and hardener in a coffee can, we lay the fiberglass tape along the inside and outside of the joints and painted the polyester resin on the tape. After waiting a glacially slow day for the resin to "kick", we toted the Banana Boat down Willow road to the Bay.
The boat was a jaunty craft, about seven feet long, like a miniature cod-fishing dory. In the interest of expediency there was no trim, no paint. Ragged edges formed the gunwales, the only concession to comfort, the graceful arc carved into the cross-piece / backrest. I figured it would be best propelled by a kayak paddle like the Rushton canoes, but all we had was a cheap plastic two-piece oar that Eric carried in his hand. I hoisted the tiny craft onto a shoulder and we marched up the street.
The saltwater closest to my house was over and down a hill, a full mile away. On the walk to the Bay, I imagined my naval architecture career beginning with the record-breaking sales of plans and kits for the soon-to-be-famous Banana Boat. Every cruiser would want one. Birdwatchers, fishermen would appreciate the economy and safety of my brainchild. It might be written up in Popular Mechanics or Cruising World. After I had made enough money from my clever, elegant design, I would bequeath the boat into the public domain and Boy Scouts and inner-city children would build fleets. Of course, my trademark color would be yellow.
Once down by the Bay, we minced our way along the train tracks, looking for a suitable launch site. The rock and rubble of the railroad grade cut across a broad inlet, trapping a small backbay, washed by tides which ebbed and flowed under a short trestle where we occasionally netted crab . At the north end of the backbay, an aromatic black beach beckoned, but the occasion called for a mud-free launching. Balancing on a large rock out from the shore, I lowered one end - the stern- of the Banana Boat into the water, and slid the craft into the glassy swell.
The first indication of a poorly conceived and executed plan was the water seeping through pinholes in the fiberglass tape. I had watched, incredulous, as green water pooled in my boat, and it slowly rolled over. Dismissing the technical shortcomings of my boatbuilding, flush with faith that the design was sound (yet loathe to get wet), I performed an experiment. With the Banana Boat perched on a convenient flat rock, we hefted a large stone - maybe a hundred and fifty pounds - precisely positioning it in the middle of the boat.
Like a cheese on a grater, delicate curls of fir veneer testified to the destructive power of our methodology, as I levered the boat back into the brine. Holding the bow for a long moment, seeking the elusive balance that I hoped existed, the Banana Boat struggled in my hand like a frightened pony, fighting first to the left, then the right. It's just the waves I told myself, no waves in evidence. I released my steadying grip.
The Titanic had undoubtedly reached a point in its sinking where stability and bouyancy vanished and the forces of fate converged in a sucking slosh and the sea claimed the vessel. I understand this took some time, as depicted in Hollywood dramas. Perhaps scaling a Titanic to seven feet also scales time downward: Without hestation, bob, or wallow, my boat tipped on its side, the rock sliding to the chine. Water spilled into the hull, the boat continued its rotation, the stone settling to the bottom in an explosion of mud. Failure. Q.E.D.
A nascent social responsiblity prohibited me from abandoning a plywood hulk on the beach, but it had briefly occurred to me to sacrifice it upon the train tracks. During the long walk back up the hill, my mind was occupied by a new-found understanding of primary stability, rocker, and beam. I dragged the dangerous, useless Banana Boat behind me, the fiberglass scritching, shredding on the hot asphalt. Eric's house was closer than mine, and I tipped the hull onto a burn pile in his back yard. Eric handed me an ax, and I purged the disappointment from my soul.
I nearly gave up boatbuilding.
I was fortunate to attend a high school that offered, among other things, a sailing class. I took the class five times, learning to coax beautifully varnished El Toros to windward. I found the courage and funds to buy a home-built Jr. Moth from my Dad's coworker, Loy. The hard-chined scow needed some restoration, a confidence-building exercise in boat painting.
The next boat that I built was an Aleutian kayak, a baidarka, built to my body. Inspired by George Dyson's seminal book on building aluminum baidarkas, I carefully scaled the dimensions to fit my six-foot-two frame. I lashed dozens of alder saplings to spruce longitudinals, faithfully replicating methodology and materials. Nineteen feet long, twenty-two inches wide, crazy fast, and tight as a rubber glove, paddling it terrified me. I stripped the skin from it and sold it to a man building a hotel in Dutch Harbor, Alaska. I hear it hangs above the bar still, twenty years later.
I used the money from my baidarka to buy the Pelican behind the fence, which I named Reinheitsgebot. That boat required some varnishing, in addition to the paint. A pleasure to sail, with the tiller lashed down, it could be steered by shifting one's weight fore and aft.
The purchase of a San Juan 24 necessitated the construction of a Phil Bolger design called the Elegant Punt. We needed a dinghy, and the punt performed admirably, gracefully towing behind Solen, shuttling three safely to shore. Sadly, it was left behind when we moved to Vashon Island. I hope somebody saved it from crumbling away in the weather, tilted against the house.
Once again, I am happily surrounded by boats. Cacafuego, a San Juan 21, waits on its trailer, risking parking tickets on the street. One of Lisa's grandfather's thirty-three rests on saw horses in the back yard, sail and spars snug in the garage. She rescued it from a yard sale in Queen Anne, a hilltop neighborhood in Seattle.
The newest boat, Fósforo, is truly an absurdity. Six feet long, it is designed for a single adult occupant, yet I lavished the yachtiest attention to its construction. It has a sailing rig, and I hope my kids learn to enjoy small sailboats as I have.
I put the finishing touch of a name on the transom last night, and brought it home from the distant basement. The sun was low, playing on the Olympic horizon, and, yet, I had to put it into the water.
A dredged ship canal divides Seattle north and south, with a tiny, overlooked boat launch in Fremont. Geese loitered on the docks, hunkering in the breeze blasting off the water. I slid Fósforo into the chop, stepped in, grabbed the oars. I pushed away from the dock, drifting toward the concrete ramp. The oarlocks slipped into place, and I rowed away from shore, into the twilight.
To be honest, I have been using an epoxy primer that requires a thinner so foul that you can hear the brain cells dying - with an audible snap - in your head with every breath. I took the work outside, and I noticed two things: my olfactory receptors quickly became saturated and immune to the sharp sting of vapor, and I became ravenously hungry. I've used this particular product before, years ago, when I restored a San Francisco Pelican sailboat. A weatherly little sloop, it was built like a proper tub and carried a junk-like lug sail. I had the bottom repaired with copious epoxy and this particular primer was the only product appropriate as a go-between for the resin and the paint I chose. Every time I smell that solvent, I am transported to an inverted hull under a tarp, behind the fence.
I have been building a boat, a ridiculous little boat. Lacking the shop space for my stored power tools, I have been using Lisa's grandmother's basement, twenty minutes away. Lisa's late grandfather built thirty-three fiberglass sailing dinghys in that basement, and the power tools he used have made my project easier. Even so, the space is cramped, and I mutter to his spirit when I repeatedly wrestle the table and band saws out of my way.
This is not the first boat I've built. My first boat was a "stitch and glue" affair that I had worked out myself in high school. Designed to be cut from a single sheet of plywood, wired together, the seams fiberglassed. I dubbed it the Banana Boat, for its squarish approximation of a certain tropical fruit. I had a working knowledge of how S&G boats went together. Dad brought home the plywood and fiberglass materials from work.
My friend, Eric, and I risked amputation cutting out the three pieces with a circular saw on the garage floor, and we dutifully assembled the hull with galvanized wire and a cross brace carved from a two by four. After mixing up the resin and hardener in a coffee can, we lay the fiberglass tape along the inside and outside of the joints and painted the polyester resin on the tape. After waiting a glacially slow day for the resin to "kick", we toted the Banana Boat down Willow road to the Bay.
The boat was a jaunty craft, about seven feet long, like a miniature cod-fishing dory. In the interest of expediency there was no trim, no paint. Ragged edges formed the gunwales, the only concession to comfort, the graceful arc carved into the cross-piece / backrest. I figured it would be best propelled by a kayak paddle like the Rushton canoes, but all we had was a cheap plastic two-piece oar that Eric carried in his hand. I hoisted the tiny craft onto a shoulder and we marched up the street.
The saltwater closest to my house was over and down a hill, a full mile away. On the walk to the Bay, I imagined my naval architecture career beginning with the record-breaking sales of plans and kits for the soon-to-be-famous Banana Boat. Every cruiser would want one. Birdwatchers, fishermen would appreciate the economy and safety of my brainchild. It might be written up in Popular Mechanics or Cruising World. After I had made enough money from my clever, elegant design, I would bequeath the boat into the public domain and Boy Scouts and inner-city children would build fleets. Of course, my trademark color would be yellow.
Once down by the Bay, we minced our way along the train tracks, looking for a suitable launch site. The rock and rubble of the railroad grade cut across a broad inlet, trapping a small backbay, washed by tides which ebbed and flowed under a short trestle where we occasionally netted crab . At the north end of the backbay, an aromatic black beach beckoned, but the occasion called for a mud-free launching. Balancing on a large rock out from the shore, I lowered one end - the stern- of the Banana Boat into the water, and slid the craft into the glassy swell.
The first indication of a poorly conceived and executed plan was the water seeping through pinholes in the fiberglass tape. I had watched, incredulous, as green water pooled in my boat, and it slowly rolled over. Dismissing the technical shortcomings of my boatbuilding, flush with faith that the design was sound (yet loathe to get wet), I performed an experiment. With the Banana Boat perched on a convenient flat rock, we hefted a large stone - maybe a hundred and fifty pounds - precisely positioning it in the middle of the boat.
Like a cheese on a grater, delicate curls of fir veneer testified to the destructive power of our methodology, as I levered the boat back into the brine. Holding the bow for a long moment, seeking the elusive balance that I hoped existed, the Banana Boat struggled in my hand like a frightened pony, fighting first to the left, then the right. It's just the waves I told myself, no waves in evidence. I released my steadying grip.
The Titanic had undoubtedly reached a point in its sinking where stability and bouyancy vanished and the forces of fate converged in a sucking slosh and the sea claimed the vessel. I understand this took some time, as depicted in Hollywood dramas. Perhaps scaling a Titanic to seven feet also scales time downward: Without hestation, bob, or wallow, my boat tipped on its side, the rock sliding to the chine. Water spilled into the hull, the boat continued its rotation, the stone settling to the bottom in an explosion of mud. Failure. Q.E.D.
A nascent social responsiblity prohibited me from abandoning a plywood hulk on the beach, but it had briefly occurred to me to sacrifice it upon the train tracks. During the long walk back up the hill, my mind was occupied by a new-found understanding of primary stability, rocker, and beam. I dragged the dangerous, useless Banana Boat behind me, the fiberglass scritching, shredding on the hot asphalt. Eric's house was closer than mine, and I tipped the hull onto a burn pile in his back yard. Eric handed me an ax, and I purged the disappointment from my soul.
I nearly gave up boatbuilding.
I was fortunate to attend a high school that offered, among other things, a sailing class. I took the class five times, learning to coax beautifully varnished El Toros to windward. I found the courage and funds to buy a home-built Jr. Moth from my Dad's coworker, Loy. The hard-chined scow needed some restoration, a confidence-building exercise in boat painting.
The next boat that I built was an Aleutian kayak, a baidarka, built to my body. Inspired by George Dyson's seminal book on building aluminum baidarkas, I carefully scaled the dimensions to fit my six-foot-two frame. I lashed dozens of alder saplings to spruce longitudinals, faithfully replicating methodology and materials. Nineteen feet long, twenty-two inches wide, crazy fast, and tight as a rubber glove, paddling it terrified me. I stripped the skin from it and sold it to a man building a hotel in Dutch Harbor, Alaska. I hear it hangs above the bar still, twenty years later.
I used the money from my baidarka to buy the Pelican behind the fence, which I named Reinheitsgebot. That boat required some varnishing, in addition to the paint. A pleasure to sail, with the tiller lashed down, it could be steered by shifting one's weight fore and aft.
The purchase of a San Juan 24 necessitated the construction of a Phil Bolger design called the Elegant Punt. We needed a dinghy, and the punt performed admirably, gracefully towing behind Solen, shuttling three safely to shore. Sadly, it was left behind when we moved to Vashon Island. I hope somebody saved it from crumbling away in the weather, tilted against the house.
Once again, I am happily surrounded by boats. Cacafuego, a San Juan 21, waits on its trailer, risking parking tickets on the street. One of Lisa's grandfather's thirty-three rests on saw horses in the back yard, sail and spars snug in the garage. She rescued it from a yard sale in Queen Anne, a hilltop neighborhood in Seattle.
The newest boat, Fósforo, is truly an absurdity. Six feet long, it is designed for a single adult occupant, yet I lavished the yachtiest attention to its construction. It has a sailing rig, and I hope my kids learn to enjoy small sailboats as I have.
I put the finishing touch of a name on the transom last night, and brought it home from the distant basement. The sun was low, playing on the Olympic horizon, and, yet, I had to put it into the water.
A dredged ship canal divides Seattle north and south, with a tiny, overlooked boat launch in Fremont. Geese loitered on the docks, hunkering in the breeze blasting off the water. I slid Fósforo into the chop, stepped in, grabbed the oars. I pushed away from the dock, drifting toward the concrete ramp. The oarlocks slipped into place, and I rowed away from shore, into the twilight.
Monday, March 16, 2009
The Dog Bones
Eight years ago, during a period of time I now refer to as The Retired Years, my son Alec and I made a pilgrimage of sorts, to Montana. I had grown up a thousand miles removed from the Big Sky, but had remained connected through biannual visits - road trips - to see my grandparents, uncles, aunts and a hundred unknown cousins. My grandparents, Rex and Grace, were celebrating their sixtieth anniversary, an event which would revolve around a prime rib dinner at a remote steakhouse. It would be an opportunity to shape my son's character with a few cultivated, fond memories.
I rented a Nissan SUV at the airport in Billings. I had a few ideas about this trip, and thought we might need four wheel drive. The first off-road opportunity presented itself on the lip of the Rimrock, above the city, when I pulled into the gravel parking lot of the Yellowstone County Museum. Housed in a genuine log cabin, the museum contained your standard historical museum fare, horse-drawn vehicles, the implements of land-clearing, an impressive chamberpot collection. I'll admit a small thrill went through me when, upon examining a case of handmade knives, I spied a yellow-handled specimen crafted by my Mom's brother, Uncle Bob, in Helena. Alec had never met Uncle Bob, but the glass box containing the stuffed two-headed calf was pleasant consolation.
Logan International Airport and the museum sit atop a plateau, from which, in warmer months, Billings, three hundred feet below, is a fluffy green carpet of shade trees, obscuring the streets and homes beneath. We had arrived several days before the anniversary, my intent being to have some father and son adventures before the familial commitments. I took a few moments, at the log cabin, to plunder a rack of brochures and pamphlets, which touted the region's many wonders. In the car, as we descended from the Rimrock, I slapped the stack in Alec's lap. Leafing through the information, Alec announced that he wanted to visit the zoo.
"Where is it?" The only zoo I knew of in Montana used to be in Red Lodge, which I had only visited once, decades ago, with my cousins. Rumor had it that is was finally closed down when the peacock and mule deer finally died. I took the pamphlet, steering with my knee along the edge of the precipice, and examined the tiny map, with an occasional glance to the road.
Interstate-90 barely kisses Billings, skirting the southern margin of civilization, with a wild river, campgrounds, range land, beckoning from the opposite side. Zoo Montana is conveniently located right beside this freeway, at exit 443, and I imagined long-haul truckers gratefully coasting down the off-ramp, with a mind to stretch their legs, to stroll from the bald eagles to the grizzlies, their last break having been Wall Drug, in South Dakota. We arrived in minutes, and parked at the outer edge, by a prairie dog colony dug into a landscaped berm.
I assumed the prairie dogs were part of the zoo, but when I asked the girl at the ticket window about them, she hissed through her lipstick. "Pests! They're wild. We can't get rid of 'em, nothing works."
As zoos go, it was pretty modest. Deer were over-represented, and the local television station was taping a news item, surrounded by a pointing crowd, at a grotto where a new-born mountain goat kid was already leaping from concrete rock to concrete rock. Peacocks wandered freely, stalked by unsupervised children. At the black-footed ferret exhibit, we learned that prairie dogs were the prey of the endangered weasels, and I savored the irony of a solution to their parking lot pest problem, so close at hand. An enormous Siberian tiger lounged in the shade. Alec selected a mylar snake kite in the gift shop.
Back at the car, we watched the prairie dogs bob up and down in their burrows. Randomly, they'd pop up, look around, and scamper backwards into their hole if we spoke or moved. "I can catch one, you know..." I said it casually, waiting for Alec to bite.
"You can not. They're way too fast," Not quite the enthusiastic interest I'd hoped for.
"Watch me." I measured out some string from the reel of kite line, cutting it with my Leatherman. It took a moment to knot it into a noose. "I'm going to snare one." Alec looked around, torn between the mischief at hand and his inherent fear of getting in trouble. The parking lot was almost empty, as closing time approached. I could tell that he was weighing the various risks, but I knew he was game when his shoulders visibly relaxed.
My son watching, I arranged the loop around the closest hole, and carefully payed out the string as I backed away from the snare. We crouched on the asphalt, in the glare of the Montana sun, waiting for our an opportunity to bag our chosen prey. Several times, a prairie dog's head, presumably the same one, peeked out of the hole, only to instantly disappear. We waited, and I sensed Alec's patience for this endeavor evaporating. Then, at the mouth of the burrow, our prairie dog was standing full upright, our presence forgotten.
I yanked on the string, and the contest was on: the vigilant instincts of self-preservation pitted against the cunning intelligence of man, the hunter. I was confident that I'd be fast enough to catch the animal around his chest, but I pulled so sharply that the rodent flew through the air, snatched from its den with a squeak. It landed at our feet, and immediately scurried toward the safety of the dirt beside the parking lot. I reeled in the the slack line, pulling the prairie dog up short. The noose had tightened around its neck, and the animal darted sideways, describing a six-foot arc around us, scampering, squeaking.
"You're hurting it! You're hurting it!" Alec was dancing around, arms in the air, trying not to step on the frightened animal. I continued to reel it in, and eventually a foot of string separated the rodent and my hand. Concerned that the noose around its neck might choke it, I eased the tension on the line. The rodent crouched flat on the pavement, heaving from its recent exertion, resigned to death.
"You killed it!" His voice was shrill, and now I was nervously glancing around the parking lot.
"No, I didn't," I spoke calmly, in a low tone. Keeping the string in my hand taut, controlling the head, the biting end, I gently scooped up the animal with my other hand. It made no effort to defend itself, and I wondered if I had been able to catch it because it was sick, somehow diseased. It was tiny, just six inches long, a pup, and I felt a fleeting pang of guilt. "It's soft... Do you want to touch it? They make great pets, I hear."
"They carry diseases. I learned about it in school. They make horrible pets." Alec was backing away. "I can't believe you're touching it..." His face was bunched up into squinting disgust. Later, I read that prairie dogs do, indeed, carry diseases, among them tularemia and something known as monkeypox. Oh, and plague. Yes, that plague: the flea-borne pestilence that wiped out half of medieval Europe, the gruesome black death, characterized by buboes, swollen and infected lymph glands.
I released it at the opening to its burrow. It lay there for a moment, dazed, confused, possibly whispering a prairie dog prayer of thanks, and then - zip - it was gone. I wondered where I might wash my hands.
We checked into a motel in Laurel, a crossroads of highway and railway, best remembered by the not-totally-unpleasant, sulphurous smell emitted by the oil refinery. For a brief time, in my early childhood (The Toddler Years) I lived there, but, mainly, I recall driving through Laurel, on the way to somewhere else, past the Owl Cafe, the iconic neon sign visible from the back seat of the Rambler. A quick trip to the IGA for "provisions" yielded another history lesson in the sepia-tone photographs of pioneer-era Laurel. Before paved roads, motorcars, running water, the town was a collection of unpainted Wild West buildings, surrounded by a sagebrush wasteland. As far as the camera could see. The grocery store visit was doubly satisfying when the checker carded me for the beer in my basket, causing me to speculate that, perhaps, thirty-six year old men work harder and age faster beneath a Montana sun.
Nobody knew we were already in the "Treasure State", and the next morning we enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at the Owl Cafe, soaking in the country music, panelled ambiance, gorging on cholesterol, in the form of perfect bacon and eggs. Montana, especially Carbon County, is world-renowned for its rich fossil record, and my secret plan for the day was to drive into the hills east of Bridger, for some rock hounding. We had to drive down the highway past the family farmstead, between Edgar and Fromberg. When we zoomed by, without stopping, it all began to feel a little sneaky.
We turned at the only stoplight in Bridger, crossed the river, and bounced along the dirt road, through miles of fenced land, posted "No Trespassing". Eventually, we encountered open range land and climbed out of the Nissan, by a creek (properly pronounced "crick"), hoping to find exposed fossils - anything, leaves, even - in the eroded banks. Clad in sandals, we stepped gingerly through the sagebrush, wary of ticks and snakes. The few patches of unvegetated rock proved to be igneous or metamorphic something or other, completely devoid of remains.
"You said there would be fossils."
"I know, and there are. Velociraptors, T. Rexes... snails. They just aren't here." The sun was nearly overhead and I was feeling like a genius for bringing the jug of water I had bought the night before. We took long gulps from the jug, cold water dribbling down our shirts. "Do you want to keep looking?"
"Naw. Maybe tomorrow. I'm getting hungry." It was agreed: maybe tomorrow. We headed back to town, a cloud of dust spiraling in our wake.
"Is that a snake?" I slowed as we drew closer to the object in the road. It was a snake, stretched straight out, like a short section of fat broom handle. We got out, and cautiously approached the dead reptile in the road. I wondered what the locals would think if they came upon us, poking at the roadkill. Word might get around. I imagined the story being repeated until it came caught up with me via my Uncle Ervin, who would shake his head, and ask, "Was that really you fooling with a dead snake?" He would shake his head, incredulous, "Never seen a dead snake before, I guess." We hadn't seen any other vehicles, no driveways to hidden houses, but I couldn't believe that I had run this animal over. It was recently dead, lacking the thick coating of dust any corpse would quickly accumulate on this road. There was certainly nothing of interest between these two hills to have distracted my attentiveness. Maybe I had killed it, if, perhaps, the pale green-brown serpent had been camouflaged by a trick of the sun .
I bent to pick it, grasping where the rattle met the tail. "Dad..." I lifted it and dangled it at arm's length, holding the limp body at eye level, regarding the dull, lifeless eyes. "DAD!" Slowly, the snake's mouth opened, wide, fangs out and downward, the body stiffening.
"Holy..." In the fraction of the moment it took for the snake to hit the ground, with a thud like a dropped, but armed, grenade, we dashed to opposite shoulders of the road, from where we surveyed each other, and the snake, in turn.
"SHIT!"
It lay on its side, mouth open, looking very much dead. I knew rattlesnakes were crafty, and this was clearly a trick, a ruse to teach a lesson to molesting humans. Rocks littered the ditch behind me, and I selected one, the size of a bowling ball, tipping it carefully, lest another snake lurked underneath. I approached the snake from the tail, and heaved the rock, underhand, in the direction of the head. It missed and rolled, wobbling, several feet before stopping. Acutely aware of my vulnerable toes, I hefted the stone and slowly advanced, eyes on the exposed fangs. I splayed my sandalled feet, hopefully beyond striking distance, thrust the rock out from my body, and released my grip, teetering with the sudden change in balance. The rock landed, with a soft crunch, squarely on the reptile's head.
"Why did you do that?" Alec remained at his post, on the side of the road.
"Watch." I unfolded my knife, pulled the tail taut, the dangerous teeth securely pinned under the rock, and sawed at the flesh until I held the rattle in my hand. It felt papery, and I gently rolled it between my fingers before tucking it into my shirt pocket for safe keeping. Mindful of the hazard I had created, I rolled the rock off the road with my foot.
We were back on the highway before I reached into my pocket, producing the hard-won rattle. "Do you want to hold it?"
"No," said Alec. I put it away, grimacing, making the same face my dad used to make when I was a kid. "Gross," he added.
After another meal at the Owl Cafe, sandwiches this time, we found ourselves back in Billings. We tracked down the house on Princeton Avenue that my parents had purchased shortly before moving to Washington, when I was four years old. Tidy, clad in aluminum siding, I couldn't reconcile it with the image of the house my mom had described: stucco with parquet floors. It looked so ordinary, yet mom had been very proud; My parents had rented for years afterward, before they bought another home.
I wanted to knock on the door, but we remained in the car, and Alec leafed through the tourist information I had collected the day before. "What's Boot Hill Cemetery?" I vaguely recalled visiting a pioneer graveyard, years ago, with my grandparents. The tiny map on the leaflet showed the historical site just minutes away, and we found it easily enough, a low mount surrounded by gas stations, light industry, a muffler shop. According to the pamphlet, the highlight of the tour was the grave of Muggins Taylor, a military scout, who had carried the news of the 7th Calvery's defeat at Little Bighorn, all the way to the telegraph station at Bozeman. He had stumbled across the battle site, and discovered General Custer's body by accident.
Dating from 1877, originally the municipal cemetery of Coulson, MT, a town long gone, swallowed by modern-day Billings, Boot Hill rose gently above the highways on each of its three sides. The graveyard had all the ambiance of an abandoned lot, weedy, and abundantly populated by our new friend, the prairie dog. We strolled the well-travelled tracks between the graves, flushing grasshoppers, examining the leaning crosses, which had been fashioned from unusually dark boards, perhaps the product of a woodshop teacher or boy scouts. At some of the plots, the earth was slightly mounded, and I wondered how deeply the remains were interred, whether or not they were in coffins.
The prairie dogs, hard to see in the scrub, had been busy. Their tunnels were everywhere, excavated without regard to grave or path. An idea, repugnant at first, popped into my head: might a prairie dog inadvertently exhume an item of jewelry, a ring, for example? I stifled the tiny inner voice suggesting, "grave robbing", and toed the pile of dirt at the entrance to a burrow. It contained an assortment of pebbles, but yielded nothing of value. We ambled down the line, reading the dates on the markers.
One cross, engraved, Girl, 1889 - 1892, caught my attention. Who was this three-year old, and exactly which of the hundreds of possible ends did this pioneer child meet? Typhus? Smallpox? A trampling by buffalo? The grave was obviously smaller than the others, and delineated by a slightly different, sparser, vegetation. In the middle of the hump, a prairie dog had deposited a conical pile of soil around the entrance to its warren, a moon crater in miniature.
Alec wandered away, clearly bored. I stepped forward, beside the tiny grave, keeping an eye on my son, the morning's rattlesnake fresh in my memory. The burrow appeared to angle steeply downward when I peered into the opening of the animal's den. Stooping, the pile of debris was easy to reach, and I sifted through it with my fingers. In addition to the numerous squarish, dice-sized stones and dirt clods, two items surfaced, yellowed, ancient. I plucked them from the scattered pile, standing up.
"Dad? What are you doing?" Alec had wandered back to where I had stopped.
"Look, bones." I thrust out my palm, stepping forward.
"Bones? Human bones? Gross!" I was getting tired of hearing that word. So, how was your visit to Montana, Alec? Answer: Gross. So far, the baby cow with two heads, back at the museum, was the highlight of this trip.
I withdrew my hand, and examined the fragments. "I'm pretty sure this one's a patella, you know, a kneecap. This other one," holding it up, in the sun, "I think it's from the wrist or ankle." I slide them into the pocket with the snake rattle. Aside from almost being bitten by a venomous reptile, I was fairly pleased with the day's yield.
"Dad, that was a person," he gaped at me, arms akimbo, "and now she's in your pocket. Gross."
I changed the subject: "You hungry?"
Meals with the relatives promised copious beef, and I half-way dreaded meating up with them. Driving around Billings, seeking an alternative, I passed up the steak houses, burger shacks. A thousand miles from any ocean, common sense suggested that we forgo the restaurant that Alec spotted, with the neon "sushi" sign in the window. The parking lot was packed, which bode well; the wait for a table was brief.
The menu offered Korean, Japanese, and Chinese dishes, much like the place where I first tasted sushi, and I was pleasantly surprised that the seats were mostly filled by people of an Asian persuasion. We waited for our edamame and, furtively, I fished the bones out for another look.
Setting down his tiny cup of steaming tea, Alec leaned forward, whispered, "I hope you get...", he narrowed his eyes, "Haunted!"
The carefree days I hoped to have for covert adventure had slipped away. We were racing in the Nissan, past irrigated circles of green, soldiered ranks of enormous idle tractors, to find the "Feedlot" (really) steakhouse, in tiny Shepherd, Montana. Literally at a crossroads on the way to somewhere else, this steakhouse was legendary in the Billings area, and my family's relationship to beef cattle made it an obvious choice for an anniversary banquet. Played upon the scale of the Big Sky landscape, my innate propensity to dawdle and lack of planning found me late again.
Ultimately, I drove too far in one direction, and then in another. With gazetteer in lap, I circled in on the restaurant like a plane making its final approach. The parking lot was full and, ushered by a smiling hostess, we slunk into the banquet room to find everyone already seated. That we were in sport coats with ties, while the majority of men wore jeans and colorful, striped rodeo shirts only served to magnify our tardiness. We took the empty seats reserved for us and thick slabs of prime rib were placed before us.
Considered numerically, most of my family - certainly my Dad's family - live in Montana. A long time ago, I appreciated how risky and rebellious it was for my parents to move a thousand miles away from family and farm. Not that my Dad ever had much interest in farming, but I believe it made a firm statement about self-determination and Independence. Looking back, I relish the memories of growing up in Bellingham, but I sense that there is a void in my being which is only filled when I am in this wild place, surrounded by these strong people.
When my parents opted to live "on the coast", by the "ocean", I think they forged a tiny personal legend, a small epic tale in the minds of Montana friends and family. Many times, when I was young, I patiently explained to cousins and kids that I lived in the other Washington, the state. I related how I attended school with hundreds of children, in a world where rain fell abundantly, absent the dramatic climatary extremes under a Big Sky. My daily life was so different, so alien, my values tempered by "city living" and liberal politics, I felt like a curious oddity.
You're Larry's boy?" Across from me, a weathered man I did not recognize. "This must be Alex. I hear you can make a frog sound."
There it was; I knew this was coming. In the minds of my kin I had been reduced to an interloper with a dubious talent, my own personal legend elicited in my very first conversation at the table. I strained to put a name to his face.
"I'm sorry," I said, extending my hand over the beef, "I'm afraid I don't..." Growing up, much of my peripheral family existed primarily as binary abstractions, paired with the names of siblings or spouses: Lowell and Lyle, Leo and Buela, Howard and Joanie. When he explained who he was I was able to conjure his wife's name from some dusty corner of my brain.
"Yes, this is Alec," anticpating the next question, "He's ten."
"Can you still make that frog sound?"
"Oh, that was years ago..." I cleared my throat experimently, hefting my voice, half-way hoping the exquisite sound was forthcoming. "Nope. It's gone."
Truth be told, sometimes I can still make the frog sound, but it's a geriatric frog with arthritis, not the bright, shrill spring peeper my youthful vocal cords once produced. In fifth grade, I rode the train to Montana alone, and entertained myself with the sounds of inexplicable amphibians in the club car. My long-lost second uncle related this story to the table, essential details intact, only embelishing the narrative with a train porter (pantomiming a wide-eyed comic black man) trying in vain to find the frog.
"Yep, that's pretty much how it happened," I allowed. Crap. I am still that feller from Warshington who can make a frog sound.
"Well, what have you boys been doing in Montana?" Not wanting to divulge that we had arrived early, I mentioned the sights we had seen in Billings, omitting the rattlesnake episode in the hills. Perhaps Alec's face twisted in horror, which might have prevented me, had I looked, from: first, sharing the details of our visit to Boot hill cemetary, and second, producing actual human remains at the dinner table.
"Huh... Well, that is something." Judging by reactions, I gather I am now the graverobber from Warshington who can make a frog sound.
We moved outside to a stone patio for pictures after the meal. Gammpa was sitting in a chair against the wall, in the light of the dipping sun.
"It's Doctor IQ," He's called me that since I can remember. "Did you have some trouble finding the place?"
"Yeah, sort of. Gramma gave me directions..."
"Are you going to blame your Gramma?" Like a slap.
"No." Chastened, I glanced downward. I was going to blame my Gramma: at the last minute I had asked her how to get there, and she had only the vaguest idea. "I was running late and tried to wing it. I didn't realize how far it was."
"Well, you found it. You and Alex."
After posing in some group photographs, I wandered over to where my cousins were gathered around a cold firepit. Unlike my uncles and aunts - my temperate older relatives - they clutched bottles of beer and cocktails, swirling the ice in the plastic cups between sips. As the eldest grandchild (The Solitary Years), I had always found myself stuck between the generations, relating more to the parents of my younger cousins. These people were adults now, and they seemed like more fun than the stern stock of farm folk that spawned them.
We chatted and laughed in the evening air, swatting at mosquitoes. I balmed my tension with an ice-cold Martini in a Dixie cup. The kids were playing tag in the parking lot, and I could hear Alec's laugh as he evaded capture.
I stopped at the cemetary, at the base of the Rimrock, on the way to the airport. Alec looked at me, skeptically.
"What are we doing?"
"C'mon, you'll see."
He trudged behind me, watching as I stooped to pick up a stick in the dirt. It took a couple of minutes to find the grave marked "Girl". I pulled the tiny bones from my pocket and dropped them into the prairie dog burrow, pushing them deep into the hole with the stick. With my sandalled foot, I carefully collapsed the opening and smoothed the soil over the surface.
When we got back to the Nissan, Alec said, "Thanks, Dad. I'd hate it if you were haunted the rest of your life."
"Me too."
I rented a Nissan SUV at the airport in Billings. I had a few ideas about this trip, and thought we might need four wheel drive. The first off-road opportunity presented itself on the lip of the Rimrock, above the city, when I pulled into the gravel parking lot of the Yellowstone County Museum. Housed in a genuine log cabin, the museum contained your standard historical museum fare, horse-drawn vehicles, the implements of land-clearing, an impressive chamberpot collection. I'll admit a small thrill went through me when, upon examining a case of handmade knives, I spied a yellow-handled specimen crafted by my Mom's brother, Uncle Bob, in Helena. Alec had never met Uncle Bob, but the glass box containing the stuffed two-headed calf was pleasant consolation.
Logan International Airport and the museum sit atop a plateau, from which, in warmer months, Billings, three hundred feet below, is a fluffy green carpet of shade trees, obscuring the streets and homes beneath. We had arrived several days before the anniversary, my intent being to have some father and son adventures before the familial commitments. I took a few moments, at the log cabin, to plunder a rack of brochures and pamphlets, which touted the region's many wonders. In the car, as we descended from the Rimrock, I slapped the stack in Alec's lap. Leafing through the information, Alec announced that he wanted to visit the zoo.
"Where is it?" The only zoo I knew of in Montana used to be in Red Lodge, which I had only visited once, decades ago, with my cousins. Rumor had it that is was finally closed down when the peacock and mule deer finally died. I took the pamphlet, steering with my knee along the edge of the precipice, and examined the tiny map, with an occasional glance to the road.
Interstate-90 barely kisses Billings, skirting the southern margin of civilization, with a wild river, campgrounds, range land, beckoning from the opposite side. Zoo Montana is conveniently located right beside this freeway, at exit 443, and I imagined long-haul truckers gratefully coasting down the off-ramp, with a mind to stretch their legs, to stroll from the bald eagles to the grizzlies, their last break having been Wall Drug, in South Dakota. We arrived in minutes, and parked at the outer edge, by a prairie dog colony dug into a landscaped berm.
I assumed the prairie dogs were part of the zoo, but when I asked the girl at the ticket window about them, she hissed through her lipstick. "Pests! They're wild. We can't get rid of 'em, nothing works."
As zoos go, it was pretty modest. Deer were over-represented, and the local television station was taping a news item, surrounded by a pointing crowd, at a grotto where a new-born mountain goat kid was already leaping from concrete rock to concrete rock. Peacocks wandered freely, stalked by unsupervised children. At the black-footed ferret exhibit, we learned that prairie dogs were the prey of the endangered weasels, and I savored the irony of a solution to their parking lot pest problem, so close at hand. An enormous Siberian tiger lounged in the shade. Alec selected a mylar snake kite in the gift shop.
Back at the car, we watched the prairie dogs bob up and down in their burrows. Randomly, they'd pop up, look around, and scamper backwards into their hole if we spoke or moved. "I can catch one, you know..." I said it casually, waiting for Alec to bite.
"You can not. They're way too fast," Not quite the enthusiastic interest I'd hoped for.
"Watch me." I measured out some string from the reel of kite line, cutting it with my Leatherman. It took a moment to knot it into a noose. "I'm going to snare one." Alec looked around, torn between the mischief at hand and his inherent fear of getting in trouble. The parking lot was almost empty, as closing time approached. I could tell that he was weighing the various risks, but I knew he was game when his shoulders visibly relaxed.
My son watching, I arranged the loop around the closest hole, and carefully payed out the string as I backed away from the snare. We crouched on the asphalt, in the glare of the Montana sun, waiting for our an opportunity to bag our chosen prey. Several times, a prairie dog's head, presumably the same one, peeked out of the hole, only to instantly disappear. We waited, and I sensed Alec's patience for this endeavor evaporating. Then, at the mouth of the burrow, our prairie dog was standing full upright, our presence forgotten.
I yanked on the string, and the contest was on: the vigilant instincts of self-preservation pitted against the cunning intelligence of man, the hunter. I was confident that I'd be fast enough to catch the animal around his chest, but I pulled so sharply that the rodent flew through the air, snatched from its den with a squeak. It landed at our feet, and immediately scurried toward the safety of the dirt beside the parking lot. I reeled in the the slack line, pulling the prairie dog up short. The noose had tightened around its neck, and the animal darted sideways, describing a six-foot arc around us, scampering, squeaking.
"You're hurting it! You're hurting it!" Alec was dancing around, arms in the air, trying not to step on the frightened animal. I continued to reel it in, and eventually a foot of string separated the rodent and my hand. Concerned that the noose around its neck might choke it, I eased the tension on the line. The rodent crouched flat on the pavement, heaving from its recent exertion, resigned to death.
"You killed it!" His voice was shrill, and now I was nervously glancing around the parking lot.
"No, I didn't," I spoke calmly, in a low tone. Keeping the string in my hand taut, controlling the head, the biting end, I gently scooped up the animal with my other hand. It made no effort to defend itself, and I wondered if I had been able to catch it because it was sick, somehow diseased. It was tiny, just six inches long, a pup, and I felt a fleeting pang of guilt. "It's soft... Do you want to touch it? They make great pets, I hear."
"They carry diseases. I learned about it in school. They make horrible pets." Alec was backing away. "I can't believe you're touching it..." His face was bunched up into squinting disgust. Later, I read that prairie dogs do, indeed, carry diseases, among them tularemia and something known as monkeypox. Oh, and plague. Yes, that plague: the flea-borne pestilence that wiped out half of medieval Europe, the gruesome black death, characterized by buboes, swollen and infected lymph glands.
I released it at the opening to its burrow. It lay there for a moment, dazed, confused, possibly whispering a prairie dog prayer of thanks, and then - zip - it was gone. I wondered where I might wash my hands.
_____________________
We checked into a motel in Laurel, a crossroads of highway and railway, best remembered by the not-totally-unpleasant, sulphurous smell emitted by the oil refinery. For a brief time, in my early childhood (The Toddler Years) I lived there, but, mainly, I recall driving through Laurel, on the way to somewhere else, past the Owl Cafe, the iconic neon sign visible from the back seat of the Rambler. A quick trip to the IGA for "provisions" yielded another history lesson in the sepia-tone photographs of pioneer-era Laurel. Before paved roads, motorcars, running water, the town was a collection of unpainted Wild West buildings, surrounded by a sagebrush wasteland. As far as the camera could see. The grocery store visit was doubly satisfying when the checker carded me for the beer in my basket, causing me to speculate that, perhaps, thirty-six year old men work harder and age faster beneath a Montana sun.
Nobody knew we were already in the "Treasure State", and the next morning we enjoyed a leisurely breakfast at the Owl Cafe, soaking in the country music, panelled ambiance, gorging on cholesterol, in the form of perfect bacon and eggs. Montana, especially Carbon County, is world-renowned for its rich fossil record, and my secret plan for the day was to drive into the hills east of Bridger, for some rock hounding. We had to drive down the highway past the family farmstead, between Edgar and Fromberg. When we zoomed by, without stopping, it all began to feel a little sneaky.
We turned at the only stoplight in Bridger, crossed the river, and bounced along the dirt road, through miles of fenced land, posted "No Trespassing". Eventually, we encountered open range land and climbed out of the Nissan, by a creek (properly pronounced "crick"), hoping to find exposed fossils - anything, leaves, even - in the eroded banks. Clad in sandals, we stepped gingerly through the sagebrush, wary of ticks and snakes. The few patches of unvegetated rock proved to be igneous or metamorphic something or other, completely devoid of remains.
"You said there would be fossils."
"I know, and there are. Velociraptors, T. Rexes... snails. They just aren't here." The sun was nearly overhead and I was feeling like a genius for bringing the jug of water I had bought the night before. We took long gulps from the jug, cold water dribbling down our shirts. "Do you want to keep looking?"
"Naw. Maybe tomorrow. I'm getting hungry." It was agreed: maybe tomorrow. We headed back to town, a cloud of dust spiraling in our wake.
"Is that a snake?" I slowed as we drew closer to the object in the road. It was a snake, stretched straight out, like a short section of fat broom handle. We got out, and cautiously approached the dead reptile in the road. I wondered what the locals would think if they came upon us, poking at the roadkill. Word might get around. I imagined the story being repeated until it came caught up with me via my Uncle Ervin, who would shake his head, and ask, "Was that really you fooling with a dead snake?" He would shake his head, incredulous, "Never seen a dead snake before, I guess." We hadn't seen any other vehicles, no driveways to hidden houses, but I couldn't believe that I had run this animal over. It was recently dead, lacking the thick coating of dust any corpse would quickly accumulate on this road. There was certainly nothing of interest between these two hills to have distracted my attentiveness. Maybe I had killed it, if, perhaps, the pale green-brown serpent had been camouflaged by a trick of the sun .
I bent to pick it, grasping where the rattle met the tail. "Dad..." I lifted it and dangled it at arm's length, holding the limp body at eye level, regarding the dull, lifeless eyes. "DAD!" Slowly, the snake's mouth opened, wide, fangs out and downward, the body stiffening."Holy..." In the fraction of the moment it took for the snake to hit the ground, with a thud like a dropped, but armed, grenade, we dashed to opposite shoulders of the road, from where we surveyed each other, and the snake, in turn.
"SHIT!"
It lay on its side, mouth open, looking very much dead. I knew rattlesnakes were crafty, and this was clearly a trick, a ruse to teach a lesson to molesting humans. Rocks littered the ditch behind me, and I selected one, the size of a bowling ball, tipping it carefully, lest another snake lurked underneath. I approached the snake from the tail, and heaved the rock, underhand, in the direction of the head. It missed and rolled, wobbling, several feet before stopping. Acutely aware of my vulnerable toes, I hefted the stone and slowly advanced, eyes on the exposed fangs. I splayed my sandalled feet, hopefully beyond striking distance, thrust the rock out from my body, and released my grip, teetering with the sudden change in balance. The rock landed, with a soft crunch, squarely on the reptile's head.
"Why did you do that?" Alec remained at his post, on the side of the road.
"Watch." I unfolded my knife, pulled the tail taut, the dangerous teeth securely pinned under the rock, and sawed at the flesh until I held the rattle in my hand. It felt papery, and I gently rolled it between my fingers before tucking it into my shirt pocket for safe keeping. Mindful of the hazard I had created, I rolled the rock off the road with my foot.
We were back on the highway before I reached into my pocket, producing the hard-won rattle. "Do you want to hold it?"
"No," said Alec. I put it away, grimacing, making the same face my dad used to make when I was a kid. "Gross," he added.
_____________________
After another meal at the Owl Cafe, sandwiches this time, we found ourselves back in Billings. We tracked down the house on Princeton Avenue that my parents had purchased shortly before moving to Washington, when I was four years old. Tidy, clad in aluminum siding, I couldn't reconcile it with the image of the house my mom had described: stucco with parquet floors. It looked so ordinary, yet mom had been very proud; My parents had rented for years afterward, before they bought another home.
I wanted to knock on the door, but we remained in the car, and Alec leafed through the tourist information I had collected the day before. "What's Boot Hill Cemetery?" I vaguely recalled visiting a pioneer graveyard, years ago, with my grandparents. The tiny map on the leaflet showed the historical site just minutes away, and we found it easily enough, a low mount surrounded by gas stations, light industry, a muffler shop. According to the pamphlet, the highlight of the tour was the grave of Muggins Taylor, a military scout, who had carried the news of the 7th Calvery's defeat at Little Bighorn, all the way to the telegraph station at Bozeman. He had stumbled across the battle site, and discovered General Custer's body by accident.
Dating from 1877, originally the municipal cemetery of Coulson, MT, a town long gone, swallowed by modern-day Billings, Boot Hill rose gently above the highways on each of its three sides. The graveyard had all the ambiance of an abandoned lot, weedy, and abundantly populated by our new friend, the prairie dog. We strolled the well-travelled tracks between the graves, flushing grasshoppers, examining the leaning crosses, which had been fashioned from unusually dark boards, perhaps the product of a woodshop teacher or boy scouts. At some of the plots, the earth was slightly mounded, and I wondered how deeply the remains were interred, whether or not they were in coffins.The prairie dogs, hard to see in the scrub, had been busy. Their tunnels were everywhere, excavated without regard to grave or path. An idea, repugnant at first, popped into my head: might a prairie dog inadvertently exhume an item of jewelry, a ring, for example? I stifled the tiny inner voice suggesting, "grave robbing", and toed the pile of dirt at the entrance to a burrow. It contained an assortment of pebbles, but yielded nothing of value. We ambled down the line, reading the dates on the markers.
One cross, engraved, Girl, 1889 - 1892, caught my attention. Who was this three-year old, and exactly which of the hundreds of possible ends did this pioneer child meet? Typhus? Smallpox? A trampling by buffalo? The grave was obviously smaller than the others, and delineated by a slightly different, sparser, vegetation. In the middle of the hump, a prairie dog had deposited a conical pile of soil around the entrance to its warren, a moon crater in miniature.
Alec wandered away, clearly bored. I stepped forward, beside the tiny grave, keeping an eye on my son, the morning's rattlesnake fresh in my memory. The burrow appeared to angle steeply downward when I peered into the opening of the animal's den. Stooping, the pile of debris was easy to reach, and I sifted through it with my fingers. In addition to the numerous squarish, dice-sized stones and dirt clods, two items surfaced, yellowed, ancient. I plucked them from the scattered pile, standing up.
"Dad? What are you doing?" Alec had wandered back to where I had stopped.
"Look, bones." I thrust out my palm, stepping forward.
"Bones? Human bones? Gross!" I was getting tired of hearing that word. So, how was your visit to Montana, Alec? Answer: Gross. So far, the baby cow with two heads, back at the museum, was the highlight of this trip.
I withdrew my hand, and examined the fragments. "I'm pretty sure this one's a patella, you know, a kneecap. This other one," holding it up, in the sun, "I think it's from the wrist or ankle." I slide them into the pocket with the snake rattle. Aside from almost being bitten by a venomous reptile, I was fairly pleased with the day's yield.
"Dad, that was a person," he gaped at me, arms akimbo, "and now she's in your pocket. Gross."
I changed the subject: "You hungry?"
_____________________
Meals with the relatives promised copious beef, and I half-way dreaded meating up with them. Driving around Billings, seeking an alternative, I passed up the steak houses, burger shacks. A thousand miles from any ocean, common sense suggested that we forgo the restaurant that Alec spotted, with the neon "sushi" sign in the window. The parking lot was packed, which bode well; the wait for a table was brief.
The menu offered Korean, Japanese, and Chinese dishes, much like the place where I first tasted sushi, and I was pleasantly surprised that the seats were mostly filled by people of an Asian persuasion. We waited for our edamame and, furtively, I fished the bones out for another look.
Setting down his tiny cup of steaming tea, Alec leaned forward, whispered, "I hope you get...", he narrowed his eyes, "Haunted!"
_____________________
The carefree days I hoped to have for covert adventure had slipped away. We were racing in the Nissan, past irrigated circles of green, soldiered ranks of enormous idle tractors, to find the "Feedlot" (really) steakhouse, in tiny Shepherd, Montana. Literally at a crossroads on the way to somewhere else, this steakhouse was legendary in the Billings area, and my family's relationship to beef cattle made it an obvious choice for an anniversary banquet. Played upon the scale of the Big Sky landscape, my innate propensity to dawdle and lack of planning found me late again.
Ultimately, I drove too far in one direction, and then in another. With gazetteer in lap, I circled in on the restaurant like a plane making its final approach. The parking lot was full and, ushered by a smiling hostess, we slunk into the banquet room to find everyone already seated. That we were in sport coats with ties, while the majority of men wore jeans and colorful, striped rodeo shirts only served to magnify our tardiness. We took the empty seats reserved for us and thick slabs of prime rib were placed before us.
Considered numerically, most of my family - certainly my Dad's family - live in Montana. A long time ago, I appreciated how risky and rebellious it was for my parents to move a thousand miles away from family and farm. Not that my Dad ever had much interest in farming, but I believe it made a firm statement about self-determination and Independence. Looking back, I relish the memories of growing up in Bellingham, but I sense that there is a void in my being which is only filled when I am in this wild place, surrounded by these strong people.
When my parents opted to live "on the coast", by the "ocean", I think they forged a tiny personal legend, a small epic tale in the minds of Montana friends and family. Many times, when I was young, I patiently explained to cousins and kids that I lived in the other Washington, the state. I related how I attended school with hundreds of children, in a world where rain fell abundantly, absent the dramatic climatary extremes under a Big Sky. My daily life was so different, so alien, my values tempered by "city living" and liberal politics, I felt like a curious oddity.
You're Larry's boy?" Across from me, a weathered man I did not recognize. "This must be Alex. I hear you can make a frog sound."
There it was; I knew this was coming. In the minds of my kin I had been reduced to an interloper with a dubious talent, my own personal legend elicited in my very first conversation at the table. I strained to put a name to his face.
"I'm sorry," I said, extending my hand over the beef, "I'm afraid I don't..." Growing up, much of my peripheral family existed primarily as binary abstractions, paired with the names of siblings or spouses: Lowell and Lyle, Leo and Buela, Howard and Joanie. When he explained who he was I was able to conjure his wife's name from some dusty corner of my brain.
"Yes, this is Alec," anticpating the next question, "He's ten."
"Can you still make that frog sound?"
"Oh, that was years ago..." I cleared my throat experimently, hefting my voice, half-way hoping the exquisite sound was forthcoming. "Nope. It's gone."
Truth be told, sometimes I can still make the frog sound, but it's a geriatric frog with arthritis, not the bright, shrill spring peeper my youthful vocal cords once produced. In fifth grade, I rode the train to Montana alone, and entertained myself with the sounds of inexplicable amphibians in the club car. My long-lost second uncle related this story to the table, essential details intact, only embelishing the narrative with a train porter (pantomiming a wide-eyed comic black man) trying in vain to find the frog.
"Yep, that's pretty much how it happened," I allowed. Crap. I am still that feller from Warshington who can make a frog sound.
"Well, what have you boys been doing in Montana?" Not wanting to divulge that we had arrived early, I mentioned the sights we had seen in Billings, omitting the rattlesnake episode in the hills. Perhaps Alec's face twisted in horror, which might have prevented me, had I looked, from: first, sharing the details of our visit to Boot hill cemetary, and second, producing actual human remains at the dinner table.
"Huh... Well, that is something." Judging by reactions, I gather I am now the graverobber from Warshington who can make a frog sound.
_____________________
We moved outside to a stone patio for pictures after the meal. Gammpa was sitting in a chair against the wall, in the light of the dipping sun.
"It's Doctor IQ," He's called me that since I can remember. "Did you have some trouble finding the place?"
"Yeah, sort of. Gramma gave me directions..."
"Are you going to blame your Gramma?" Like a slap.
"No." Chastened, I glanced downward. I was going to blame my Gramma: at the last minute I had asked her how to get there, and she had only the vaguest idea. "I was running late and tried to wing it. I didn't realize how far it was."
"Well, you found it. You and Alex."
_____________________
After posing in some group photographs, I wandered over to where my cousins were gathered around a cold firepit. Unlike my uncles and aunts - my temperate older relatives - they clutched bottles of beer and cocktails, swirling the ice in the plastic cups between sips. As the eldest grandchild (The Solitary Years), I had always found myself stuck between the generations, relating more to the parents of my younger cousins. These people were adults now, and they seemed like more fun than the stern stock of farm folk that spawned them.
We chatted and laughed in the evening air, swatting at mosquitoes. I balmed my tension with an ice-cold Martini in a Dixie cup. The kids were playing tag in the parking lot, and I could hear Alec's laugh as he evaded capture.
_____________________
I stopped at the cemetary, at the base of the Rimrock, on the way to the airport. Alec looked at me, skeptically.
"What are we doing?"
"C'mon, you'll see."
He trudged behind me, watching as I stooped to pick up a stick in the dirt. It took a couple of minutes to find the grave marked "Girl". I pulled the tiny bones from my pocket and dropped them into the prairie dog burrow, pushing them deep into the hole with the stick. With my sandalled foot, I carefully collapsed the opening and smoothed the soil over the surface.
When we got back to the Nissan, Alec said, "Thanks, Dad. I'd hate it if you were haunted the rest of your life."
"Me too."
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Squid Soup
"Man down 2514 Empire st between pickup and blue car reporting party on scene."
Engine 43 covers an area comprised of an industrial waterfront, unaffordable homes on the bluff, and a portion of downtown, a colorful mix of decaying hundred year-old brick structures and newer construction. Historical buildings, vestiges of the lumber boom, some dating to the 1800's, house enterprises hawking cell phones, video games, and incensed New Age supplies. Cross the street, go next door; if you need auto parts, a sandwich, or a valve for a boiler system, you will find that too. Sleek banks rub shoulders with apartments, bump elbows with churches. The courthouse and the jail dominate their landscaped blocks with authoritative institutional concrete architecture. Sprinkled around the City, like candles on a cake, are the various huts promising drive-through convenience and Cafe Latte of dubious pedigree.
Taverns and hipster watering holes are abundantly represented in
the business district, as are their patrons, some of which constitute a steady stream of repeat business for the fire department. We find them in doorways, alleys, parking lots, the waypoints of the ambitious alcoholic's business travel. It's hard work, poisoning your body, and a short nap might be required, demanded even, on the stumbled path to elsewhere. Rare is the shift that we aren't dispatched to a man down, often called in by an anonymous do-gooder on a cell phone, from a passing car.
The call to the Empire Street address was unusual, not for the time of day (2300 being a drunk's witching hour), but because we don't usually see this issue in the nicer neighborhoods, peripheral as they are to the commerce of intoxication. Brian, my captain, was suspicious that this was, once again, "Lieutenant Dan", a recently-arrived career inebriate. Lt. Dan, named after the character in Forrest Gump, lacks both legs, but, in his wheelchair, enjoys a vexing mobility. En route to 2514 Empire, our dispatcher verified, via a call back to the reporting party, that this patient was indeed possessing of both legs.
As we approached the address, someone stepped into the street, waving a flashlight, continuing even as we rolled to stop next to the aforementioned pickup. Brian trained the spotlight on the young man sitting cross-legged in front of the truck, and I stepped out, grabbing the kits from behind my seat.
Nicely dressed, this kid wasn't the bum I had expected, but flecks of vomit stained his shirt, clung to his cropped hair. "What's going on?" I asked, snapping the aid kit open. Gregg, our driver, joined me, adjusting the stocking cap on his shaved head.
"Where's my buddies?"
"I'd say they left you." I clipped the Oh-Two meter to a clean finger, "What's your name?"
"Jake."
"Been drinking?" (I have to ask.)
"Oh, yeah."
"What city are you in?" It's a standard question, intended to assess a patient's orientation to location, and I'll give the really drunk ones partial credit if they're in the right county.
"Uh... San Diego?"
Our captain was listening to the exchange, writing his report in the warmth of the engine's cab, "Ha! Try a place that's a little colder."
It was a surprising answer, but after the 22 year-old haltingly explained that he lived and worked on an aircraft carrier, hailed from a small town in Wisconsin, and remembered precisely where his parents and siblings lived, I gave him the benefit of my doubt. Gregg and I quickly worked together, collecting vital signs, which I relayed to my captain, standing below his open window.
I turned at the sound of retching, to see "Jake" vomiting copiously on the asphalt. The street gently sloped toward the gutter, and a tide of puke was flooding toward his pleated jeans. Ah... shit. Grabbing an elbow and his belt, I hoisted him to higher ground, preserving his remaining cleanliness and dignity.
"What did you have for dinner? Spaghetti-O's?" I am such a card.
"No. Nothing."
"Looks like you enjoyed a few appetizers..." The humor in the situation suddenly evaporated as the smell slammed into my brain. A hearty dinner of meatloaf and mashed potatoes, tenderly prepared by the medics, bubbled heavily in my stomach, boiled up, into the foreground of my awareness. I fought to contain the rising gorge and stepped into the cold breeze, inhaling deeply through my nose.
I stood upwind, at a distance, keeping an eye on my patient, waiting with my crew for the requested ambulance. The aid kit - my aid kit - lay open on the grass strip beside the curb, yawning up to the night sky, but I could collect it, and the airway kit, from the hot zone later.
Jake began to heave again, and, concerned that he might inhale vomitus, aspirate, Gregg and I moved in to steady him, holding his shoulders. Another fountain of pungent spew splattered on the pavement, and we clutched at his clothing, lifting him away from the viscous mess. Distracted by the task at hand, I gave no thought to my previous nausea.
And suddenly, standing there without focus, awash in that foul air, I was visited anew by the angry ghost of meatloaf past.
Gregg fetched a towel to clean up Jake, dabbing at his face and shirt. I removed myself for another dose of fresh air. The ambulance arrived, and our captain described the situation to the EMT's.
"What exactly is his medical complaint?" It was an asshole question. Granted, I wouldn't want him in the back of my AMB either, but this patient clearly deserved transport, and, I thought, a little respect.
Gregg spoke up, "He's at risk for acute alcohol poisoning."
One more time, we entered the ralph zone to scoop Jake up and onto the stretcher, positioning him on his side lest he vomit again. The AMB guys wrapped him in a blanket, and buckled the straps, while Gregg retrieved the kits.
We climbed up into the warm cab. The ambulance pulled around us and then pulled over, presumably to take their own vitals and call the hospital. Gregg reached up and flipped the switch for the emergency lights. A few minutes later, Engine 43 was back in the barn. I wandered toward the kitchen, hoping to satisfy a mysterious craving for noodles in tomato sauce.
Engine 43 covers an area comprised of an industrial waterfront, unaffordable homes on the bluff, and a portion of downtown, a colorful mix of decaying hundred year-old brick structures and newer construction. Historical buildings, vestiges of the lumber boom, some dating to the 1800's, house enterprises hawking cell phones, video games, and incensed New Age supplies. Cross the street, go next door; if you need auto parts, a sandwich, or a valve for a boiler system, you will find that too. Sleek banks rub shoulders with apartments, bump elbows with churches. The courthouse and the jail dominate their landscaped blocks with authoritative institutional concrete architecture. Sprinkled around the City, like candles on a cake, are the various huts promising drive-through convenience and Cafe Latte of dubious pedigree.
Taverns and hipster watering holes are abundantly represented in
the business district, as are their patrons, some of which constitute a steady stream of repeat business for the fire department. We find them in doorways, alleys, parking lots, the waypoints of the ambitious alcoholic's business travel. It's hard work, poisoning your body, and a short nap might be required, demanded even, on the stumbled path to elsewhere. Rare is the shift that we aren't dispatched to a man down, often called in by an anonymous do-gooder on a cell phone, from a passing car.The call to the Empire Street address was unusual, not for the time of day (2300 being a drunk's witching hour), but because we don't usually see this issue in the nicer neighborhoods, peripheral as they are to the commerce of intoxication. Brian, my captain, was suspicious that this was, once again, "Lieutenant Dan", a recently-arrived career inebriate. Lt. Dan, named after the character in Forrest Gump, lacks both legs, but, in his wheelchair, enjoys a vexing mobility. En route to 2514 Empire, our dispatcher verified, via a call back to the reporting party, that this patient was indeed possessing of both legs.
As we approached the address, someone stepped into the street, waving a flashlight, continuing even as we rolled to stop next to the aforementioned pickup. Brian trained the spotlight on the young man sitting cross-legged in front of the truck, and I stepped out, grabbing the kits from behind my seat.
Nicely dressed, this kid wasn't the bum I had expected, but flecks of vomit stained his shirt, clung to his cropped hair. "What's going on?" I asked, snapping the aid kit open. Gregg, our driver, joined me, adjusting the stocking cap on his shaved head.
"Where's my buddies?"
"I'd say they left you." I clipped the Oh-Two meter to a clean finger, "What's your name?"
"Jake."
"Been drinking?" (I have to ask.)
"Oh, yeah."
"What city are you in?" It's a standard question, intended to assess a patient's orientation to location, and I'll give the really drunk ones partial credit if they're in the right county.
"Uh... San Diego?"
Our captain was listening to the exchange, writing his report in the warmth of the engine's cab, "Ha! Try a place that's a little colder."
It was a surprising answer, but after the 22 year-old haltingly explained that he lived and worked on an aircraft carrier, hailed from a small town in Wisconsin, and remembered precisely where his parents and siblings lived, I gave him the benefit of my doubt. Gregg and I quickly worked together, collecting vital signs, which I relayed to my captain, standing below his open window.
I turned at the sound of retching, to see "Jake" vomiting copiously on the asphalt. The street gently sloped toward the gutter, and a tide of puke was flooding toward his pleated jeans. Ah... shit. Grabbing an elbow and his belt, I hoisted him to higher ground, preserving his remaining cleanliness and dignity.
"What did you have for dinner? Spaghetti-O's?" I am such a card."No. Nothing."
"Looks like you enjoyed a few appetizers..." The humor in the situation suddenly evaporated as the smell slammed into my brain. A hearty dinner of meatloaf and mashed potatoes, tenderly prepared by the medics, bubbled heavily in my stomach, boiled up, into the foreground of my awareness. I fought to contain the rising gorge and stepped into the cold breeze, inhaling deeply through my nose.
I stood upwind, at a distance, keeping an eye on my patient, waiting with my crew for the requested ambulance. The aid kit - my aid kit - lay open on the grass strip beside the curb, yawning up to the night sky, but I could collect it, and the airway kit, from the hot zone later.
Jake began to heave again, and, concerned that he might inhale vomitus, aspirate, Gregg and I moved in to steady him, holding his shoulders. Another fountain of pungent spew splattered on the pavement, and we clutched at his clothing, lifting him away from the viscous mess. Distracted by the task at hand, I gave no thought to my previous nausea.
And suddenly, standing there without focus, awash in that foul air, I was visited anew by the angry ghost of meatloaf past.Gregg fetched a towel to clean up Jake, dabbing at his face and shirt. I removed myself for another dose of fresh air. The ambulance arrived, and our captain described the situation to the EMT's.
"What exactly is his medical complaint?" It was an asshole question. Granted, I wouldn't want him in the back of my AMB either, but this patient clearly deserved transport, and, I thought, a little respect.
Gregg spoke up, "He's at risk for acute alcohol poisoning."
One more time, we entered the ralph zone to scoop Jake up and onto the stretcher, positioning him on his side lest he vomit again. The AMB guys wrapped him in a blanket, and buckled the straps, while Gregg retrieved the kits.
We climbed up into the warm cab. The ambulance pulled around us and then pulled over, presumably to take their own vitals and call the hospital. Gregg reached up and flipped the switch for the emergency lights. A few minutes later, Engine 43 was back in the barn. I wandered toward the kitchen, hoping to satisfy a mysterious craving for noodles in tomato sauce.
Friday, January 30, 2009
"Mabel"
Aid 42 was dispatched to a tidy brick Tudor, in the north end of the City, for a Lifeline alert, 85 year old female, assist up. We are searching, in the dark, for a hidden set of house keys. On arriving, we had received supplemental information, via the data terminal in the aid car, instructing us to retrieve the keys from under a loose brick in the "fire pit". A survey of the brick fireplace, positioned at the corner of a slimy cedar deck, revealed nothing but secure, well-mortared masonry. A chain-link fence crowds the brick structure on two sides, and I wedge my bulk into the gap, fingering the few broken bricks on the ground, finding nothing but spiders underneath.
A call for an Assist Up is not an emergency, but if we can't find the keys, we will have to force our way inside the house. Prying a door open with the Halligan bar causes certain damage to the framing, costs the homeowner money, and, most importantly, if the keys are here, makes me look foolish. This is taking too long.
I stand up, "Here, take the flashlight. Try looking inside the fireplace." A pair of door mats are draped over the front of the outdoor fireplace, and Eric flips them out of the way.
"Got 'em." I'm still wriggling out from behind the brickwork, but I hear them jingle in the quiet night.
The backdoor unlocks easily enough, but the entry to the kitchen is barred by another locked door. The keys are corroded and all three, tried in turn, resist sliding into the keyhole.
"Dang it. Let's try the front."
Eric fumbles with the keys again, and, when he runs through the whole set a fourth time, I am tempted to snatch them out of his hands in frustration. The door, however, finally swings open with a creak. Secretly, I suspect that we could have gone through the back door.
There are some interesting, parenthetical aspects of this career. Aside from meeting people, (occasionally lucid) in various states of undress, or finding yourself, unknowingly, in a conversation with the deranged, we are invited to enter people's homes, suddenly, and without advance warning. When Grandpa has the crushing chest pain, Grandma probably isn't going to take time to tidy up. We might find a terrified mother, holding her post-ictal child, surrounded by diapers, toys, and laundry, the whirlwind chaos of her family's life. It's tempting to judge people by their housekeeping, but there are days when I know I could not suffer such scrutiny gracefully.
Hygiene, however, is fair game. I've been in homes (plural), where wheeling a sick person out the door on the gurney required a forward spotter, directing your steps around the numerous piles of dog shit on the carpet. Then there's the recent legend concerning a mad woman, living on her own, in a ramshackle house. Someone called 911 on her behalf, and the responding fire engine crew discovered a complete dog's skeleton on the floor, behind the couch. Decomposed, over time, in situ. Yurph.
Another frequent facet of this job is repeated visits to the same address. Often, this is the hallmark of a system abuser, exploiting the fire department's mission, in a quest for pain killers, "free" rides to the hospital, or maybe, simply, some attention. The Department continues to refine its policies for dealing with this problem, but one abuser is eventually replaced by another. Sometimes, though, a repeat visit is the eventual product of probability, or just plain, dumb, bad luck.
A few weeks ago, working on Engine 41, we were dispatched to a fall: possible leg, hip fracture. We found our patient, flat on her back, on an icy deck behind the house, shivering beneath a heavy overcoat and assorted blankets. When she told us her name, the same as someone else I know, I remembered seeing her a year ago when she broke her ankle. This time she had slipped, and, evidently, broken her femur in the fall. Normally, the femur is a tremendously strong bone, and typically breaks during incidents involving a tremendous transfer of energy, like an MVC, a motor vehicle collision. This lady, however, possessed both tremendous bulk and an unfortunate osteoporosis. Given the realities of pulling traction on her leg, on a frictionless surface, and hefting her, first onto a gurney, and then into the back of a medic unit, I can't say it was great to see her again. Both falls occurred outside her house, on the same deck, and the quality of her domestic management remains a mystery.
Now, with Eric, I find myself standing in another home to which I have been previously dispatched. I vaguely remember a warm conversation between my captain of that day, Uncle Ronnie, and a woman, his classmate from high school. I can't recall the reason we had gone there, but the house had been tidy, comfortable. We step into a scene entirely different from that hazy memory.
To our right, in a commandeered dining room, is a double bed. The furniture elsewhere seems to have spawned a crazy, peripheral clutter, in an effort to colonize the open space in middle of the room. On the floor, between a walker and a wheelchair, lies an elderly woman, like a placid turtle, on her back. We bend over her, like vultures over carrion. She is surrounded by scattered envelopes and papers. I speak slowly, loudly, "Are? You? Alright?" She nods happily. "What's your name?"
Her name is Mabel, and in a heartbeat, she is in our hands and hoisted to her feet. Her Lifeline pendant, a sleek medallion, dangles around her neck. Touching the button alerts a dispatch center which responds by calling back to the home through a (loud) speakerphone. Lifeline undoubtedly handles most of their false alerts, but when they can't determine the problem or contact the subscriber, they call us. and we half-expect to find nothing seriously wrong when we arrive. This is looking to be just another Assist Up, but when she reaches, teetering, for the walker's handles, arthritic hands shaking, clawing, my concern increases.
"Are you sure that you're okay?" Her spine is bowed almost horizontal at her neck, and I'm on one knee, at eye level with her. "What happened?"
"Oh, yes. I just fell while I was... I was maneuvering." She smiles a broad smile, and I'm reminded of a jolly Jack-O-Lantern, her missing teeth outnumbering the remaining ones.
I ask her to squeeze my fingers. Her grip is weak, but symmetrical. "Are you normally...", more delicately, "Do you..." Screw it. "Is this normal for you?"
"Yes, but I'm fine." That smile again. I'm concerned about a possible stroke, but every stroke victim I have ever met was terrified by some sudden affectation: a headache, an inability to move or communicate, even voices in their head. She watches me patiently.
"Have you ever had a stroke?" A history of prior stroke increases the likelihood of future strokes, but might also explain some of the deficits we are seeing. The signs and symptoms of stroke are fresh in my head, having just delivered a stroke training module to dozens of my brothers, over the last week.
"Oh, yes. Oh-one, July. Horrible." And yet she's smiling. "My left leg don't work so good now. That's why I moved in with my daughter. She's at work til two." I look over at Eric, but he's already unpacking the tools to measure blood pressure, oxygen saturation, blood sugar. Simple assists up don't normally require the completion of paperwork, but if we take vital signs, I will need to write a report.
Do you want to go to the hospital?" The six hundred dollar question.
Oh, no. I'm fine." I want to believe her, but the circumstances smell a little fishy. A trip to the emergency room can be expensive, a trivial concern in a genuine emergency. However, lying on a hospital bed for hours, unnecessarily, waiting for attention, waiting for a ride home, these things worry me.
"Can we call your daughter?" I can't leave this woman at home if I have any doubts as to her health, and I have a few doubts. I motion to Eric to hold the wheelchair, and we move her to a seated position. Stethoscope in his ears, he inflates the blood pressure cuff with the rubber bulb in his hand.
"Well... Penny works til two. You can't call her at work. Sandra - she lives five blocks away." Her words come slowly, deliberately. (Eric announces her BP and blood sugar: both unremarkable.)
"Sandra? Can we call Sandra? Do you know her phone number?" She rattles off the number before I am ready, stressing the last two digits with a rising inflection: "Two. Niiiiiine." She repeats the number for me, and Eric jots it down on the back of his nitrile glove, smiling when she sings the last two digits again, pitch-perfect. Eric dials and gets an answering machine, but leaves no message.
I explain my concerns, and that we couldn't reach Sandra on the telephone. Mabel admits that her daughter usually goes to bed early. "How well do you know your neighbors?" I envision knocking on someone's door, trying to explain the situation, on the porch, in my uniform, but she reels off another phone number, rapid-fire, before I am ready.
"That's Annette. She lives... right next door." She repeats the number, and it's like listening to a tape recording, again delivered in the same tone and rhythm. Her memory, at least, seems to be intact.
Eric dials and someone answers. "Is this Annette? Hi. This is Eric with the fire department. Do you know Mabel?" He explains the situation carefully, stressing that we don't think this is an emergency, but we need some outside confirmation. A few minutes later, the neighbor is in the room with us, wearing a green wool jacket with brass buttons, like she just got home from church or a dinner party. She's chats with Mabel, leaning down. I watch the conversation closely, looking for signs that Annette is distressed by our patient's condition, but they shoot the breeze casually, if a little slowly, discussing daughters, weather, and the handsome firefighters in Mabel's living room. I'm filling in the blanks on my report, fleshing out the narrative. Eric packs up the kits.
Annette turns to me, "I think she's fine. This is completely normal."
We set to tidying up the mess created in the fall. Mabel has a system for keeping medications, bills, letters close at hand, much of it piled on top of a footstool, overturned when she went down. She is very particular, directing Eric to place her medications, just-so, by the phone. She keeps a glass of water, half-full, by the pills, and another in the basket on her walker.
"Seems a little precarious to me." The footstool is designed to rock and I wobble it experimentally.
"I..." She's scooting the wheelchair with her right foot, "Maneuver."
I explain the required signatures on my report, and Mabel, pen in her
gnarled hand, signs with a flawless script, the kind I could never master. Annette thanks us for calling her, and after signing as a witness, offers to help get Mabel ready for bed. We say goodnight, and we're out the door.
Eric takes the kits to the aid car. I return the keys to their hiding place behind the house, in the dark, and Aid 42 is in service.
A call for an Assist Up is not an emergency, but if we can't find the keys, we will have to force our way inside the house. Prying a door open with the Halligan bar causes certain damage to the framing, costs the homeowner money, and, most importantly, if the keys are here, makes me look foolish. This is taking too long.I stand up, "Here, take the flashlight. Try looking inside the fireplace." A pair of door mats are draped over the front of the outdoor fireplace, and Eric flips them out of the way.
"Got 'em." I'm still wriggling out from behind the brickwork, but I hear them jingle in the quiet night.
The backdoor unlocks easily enough, but the entry to the kitchen is barred by another locked door. The keys are corroded and all three, tried in turn, resist sliding into the keyhole.
"Dang it. Let's try the front."
Eric fumbles with the keys again, and, when he runs through the whole set a fourth time, I am tempted to snatch them out of his hands in frustration. The door, however, finally swings open with a creak. Secretly, I suspect that we could have gone through the back door.
There are some interesting, parenthetical aspects of this career. Aside from meeting people, (occasionally lucid) in various states of undress, or finding yourself, unknowingly, in a conversation with the deranged, we are invited to enter people's homes, suddenly, and without advance warning. When Grandpa has the crushing chest pain, Grandma probably isn't going to take time to tidy up. We might find a terrified mother, holding her post-ictal child, surrounded by diapers, toys, and laundry, the whirlwind chaos of her family's life. It's tempting to judge people by their housekeeping, but there are days when I know I could not suffer such scrutiny gracefully.
Hygiene, however, is fair game. I've been in homes (plural), where wheeling a sick person out the door on the gurney required a forward spotter, directing your steps around the numerous piles of dog shit on the carpet. Then there's the recent legend concerning a mad woman, living on her own, in a ramshackle house. Someone called 911 on her behalf, and the responding fire engine crew discovered a complete dog's skeleton on the floor, behind the couch. Decomposed, over time, in situ. Yurph.
Another frequent facet of this job is repeated visits to the same address. Often, this is the hallmark of a system abuser, exploiting the fire department's mission, in a quest for pain killers, "free" rides to the hospital, or maybe, simply, some attention. The Department continues to refine its policies for dealing with this problem, but one abuser is eventually replaced by another. Sometimes, though, a repeat visit is the eventual product of probability, or just plain, dumb, bad luck.
A few weeks ago, working on Engine 41, we were dispatched to a fall: possible leg, hip fracture. We found our patient, flat on her back, on an icy deck behind the house, shivering beneath a heavy overcoat and assorted blankets. When she told us her name, the same as someone else I know, I remembered seeing her a year ago when she broke her ankle. This time she had slipped, and, evidently, broken her femur in the fall. Normally, the femur is a tremendously strong bone, and typically breaks during incidents involving a tremendous transfer of energy, like an MVC, a motor vehicle collision. This lady, however, possessed both tremendous bulk and an unfortunate osteoporosis. Given the realities of pulling traction on her leg, on a frictionless surface, and hefting her, first onto a gurney, and then into the back of a medic unit, I can't say it was great to see her again. Both falls occurred outside her house, on the same deck, and the quality of her domestic management remains a mystery.
Now, with Eric, I find myself standing in another home to which I have been previously dispatched. I vaguely remember a warm conversation between my captain of that day, Uncle Ronnie, and a woman, his classmate from high school. I can't recall the reason we had gone there, but the house had been tidy, comfortable. We step into a scene entirely different from that hazy memory.
To our right, in a commandeered dining room, is a double bed. The furniture elsewhere seems to have spawned a crazy, peripheral clutter, in an effort to colonize the open space in middle of the room. On the floor, between a walker and a wheelchair, lies an elderly woman, like a placid turtle, on her back. We bend over her, like vultures over carrion. She is surrounded by scattered envelopes and papers. I speak slowly, loudly, "Are? You? Alright?" She nods happily. "What's your name?"
Her name is Mabel, and in a heartbeat, she is in our hands and hoisted to her feet. Her Lifeline pendant, a sleek medallion, dangles around her neck. Touching the button alerts a dispatch center which responds by calling back to the home through a (loud) speakerphone. Lifeline undoubtedly handles most of their false alerts, but when they can't determine the problem or contact the subscriber, they call us. and we half-expect to find nothing seriously wrong when we arrive. This is looking to be just another Assist Up, but when she reaches, teetering, for the walker's handles, arthritic hands shaking, clawing, my concern increases.
"Are you sure that you're okay?" Her spine is bowed almost horizontal at her neck, and I'm on one knee, at eye level with her. "What happened?"
"Oh, yes. I just fell while I was... I was maneuvering." She smiles a broad smile, and I'm reminded of a jolly Jack-O-Lantern, her missing teeth outnumbering the remaining ones.
I ask her to squeeze my fingers. Her grip is weak, but symmetrical. "Are you normally...", more delicately, "Do you..." Screw it. "Is this normal for you?"
"Yes, but I'm fine." That smile again. I'm concerned about a possible stroke, but every stroke victim I have ever met was terrified by some sudden affectation: a headache, an inability to move or communicate, even voices in their head. She watches me patiently.
"Have you ever had a stroke?" A history of prior stroke increases the likelihood of future strokes, but might also explain some of the deficits we are seeing. The signs and symptoms of stroke are fresh in my head, having just delivered a stroke training module to dozens of my brothers, over the last week.
"Oh, yes. Oh-one, July. Horrible." And yet she's smiling. "My left leg don't work so good now. That's why I moved in with my daughter. She's at work til two." I look over at Eric, but he's already unpacking the tools to measure blood pressure, oxygen saturation, blood sugar. Simple assists up don't normally require the completion of paperwork, but if we take vital signs, I will need to write a report.
Do you want to go to the hospital?" The six hundred dollar question.
Oh, no. I'm fine." I want to believe her, but the circumstances smell a little fishy. A trip to the emergency room can be expensive, a trivial concern in a genuine emergency. However, lying on a hospital bed for hours, unnecessarily, waiting for attention, waiting for a ride home, these things worry me.
"Can we call your daughter?" I can't leave this woman at home if I have any doubts as to her health, and I have a few doubts. I motion to Eric to hold the wheelchair, and we move her to a seated position. Stethoscope in his ears, he inflates the blood pressure cuff with the rubber bulb in his hand.
"Well... Penny works til two. You can't call her at work. Sandra - she lives five blocks away." Her words come slowly, deliberately. (Eric announces her BP and blood sugar: both unremarkable.)
"Sandra? Can we call Sandra? Do you know her phone number?" She rattles off the number before I am ready, stressing the last two digits with a rising inflection: "Two. Niiiiiine." She repeats the number for me, and Eric jots it down on the back of his nitrile glove, smiling when she sings the last two digits again, pitch-perfect. Eric dials and gets an answering machine, but leaves no message.
I explain my concerns, and that we couldn't reach Sandra on the telephone. Mabel admits that her daughter usually goes to bed early. "How well do you know your neighbors?" I envision knocking on someone's door, trying to explain the situation, on the porch, in my uniform, but she reels off another phone number, rapid-fire, before I am ready.
"That's Annette. She lives... right next door." She repeats the number, and it's like listening to a tape recording, again delivered in the same tone and rhythm. Her memory, at least, seems to be intact.
Eric dials and someone answers. "Is this Annette? Hi. This is Eric with the fire department. Do you know Mabel?" He explains the situation carefully, stressing that we don't think this is an emergency, but we need some outside confirmation. A few minutes later, the neighbor is in the room with us, wearing a green wool jacket with brass buttons, like she just got home from church or a dinner party. She's chats with Mabel, leaning down. I watch the conversation closely, looking for signs that Annette is distressed by our patient's condition, but they shoot the breeze casually, if a little slowly, discussing daughters, weather, and the handsome firefighters in Mabel's living room. I'm filling in the blanks on my report, fleshing out the narrative. Eric packs up the kits.
Annette turns to me, "I think she's fine. This is completely normal."
We set to tidying up the mess created in the fall. Mabel has a system for keeping medications, bills, letters close at hand, much of it piled on top of a footstool, overturned when she went down. She is very particular, directing Eric to place her medications, just-so, by the phone. She keeps a glass of water, half-full, by the pills, and another in the basket on her walker.
"Seems a little precarious to me." The footstool is designed to rock and I wobble it experimentally.
"I..." She's scooting the wheelchair with her right foot, "Maneuver."
I explain the required signatures on my report, and Mabel, pen in her
gnarled hand, signs with a flawless script, the kind I could never master. Annette thanks us for calling her, and after signing as a witness, offers to help get Mabel ready for bed. We say goodnight, and we're out the door.Eric takes the kits to the aid car. I return the keys to their hiding place behind the house, in the dark, and Aid 42 is in service.
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