Change Springs in the Raspberry Patch

Last year I left a job undone in my raspberry patch. I dead headed the southern slope of the patch and the northern side was left in thick messy brambles.

I start on the north side today and at high noon lose interest before going inside. Inner resolve drives me so after an Internet conversation with my cousin, I return to the patch.

First, I collect dead, dry vines into piles.

I look at the patch and decide to sweep the patch progressively in rows, north to south.

Inch by inch and foot by foot, I snap dead dry vines near the roots and toss them into the gusting wind as they carry out of the patch.

I measure my progress after each successive row.

I sigh and lean over to continue.

Inch by inch.

Foot by foot.

I settle into a routine of snapping dead vines and I see a root system at the base of each clump.

A source.

My late Hawaiian friends words, 'Nana e ke kumu.' come to mind.

Look to the source.

My routine becomes rhythm as I take hold over each root, twist to hear the crack of old vines and the live ones bend, pliable.

Look to the source.

I stretch at the end of a row and walk around to lean over and start again.

With little thought before beginning my effort, I wear woolen glove inserts.

Prickers pass occasionally into my fingers.

Find the source, hold above the root, twist the wrist, remove the dead vines.

Leave the live ones.

I feel my bare wrist reddened as prickers touch it again and again.

Look to the source.

Hold above the root.

Twist the wrist.

Remove the dead vines.

I continue and see the edge of the patch.

Every year, I try a raspberry and it lands in my mouth. My eyes squinch into a grimace. Yecch. But producing gallons of raspberries with little effort is a delight to my friends and family.

Look to the source.

Hold above the root.

Twist the wrist.

Remove the dead vines.

I look back through where I moved and see mixed results. Some dry vines stand, maybe as a memorial. Some live vines nestle within the piles outside the patch.

Some fertile dark soil turns skyward as I pass.

Look to the source.

Hold above the root.

Twist the wrist.

Remove the dead vines.

The wind gusts carry the dead and dry vines as I toss them, landing in misshapen piles. The sun bright, sky blue.

Funny, I think, that rebirth of any entity often means following the same routine. In the beginning, the messy brambles are a singular entity. The reclamation process is not immediately clear, but clearly necessary.

With time, patience, and persistence, a simple routine emerges.

Look to the source.

Hold above the root.

Twist the wrist.

Remove the dead vines.

When I finish, I cast ashes into the patch as the wind splays them through the standing live vines. I toss used chicken bedding into the wind cast among the vines.

Look to the source.

Hold above the root.

Twist the wrist.

Remove the dead vines.

Change springs in my raspberry patch.

Of Mice and Eggs

'I grew up on a farm.'

'A big farm?'

'No. We had chickens. A farm down the road had cows. We had enough chickens for eggs.'

I smile.

'I saw some of the strangest things. Before school, I check to see if there is enough food and water for the chickens.

'One morning, I peer into the hen house and we mounted apple boxes on the wall for the hens to lay eggs. And you know, shavings on the floor.

'The mice.' He laughs.

'Ever see mice in your coop?

I shake my head no.

'One morning, I peek into the coop, notice mice and just watch.

'These are big mice, sort of like rats.

'They were in the apple box and roll the egg to the edge. It drops.

'Now they jump to the floor where the egg is buried halfway into the shavings.

'Remember, they can't roll it through the shavings.

'One mouse huddles over and hugs the egg, leaning back, pressing it to its belly.

'Now get this. The other mouse grabs its tail and starts dragging the mouse, hugging the egg, out of the coop!

'My eyes widen and I run inside, "Dad! Dad! Have you ever seen anything like this?"

'Dad smiles at me nodding.'

Book List

My new ambition is to read again and people are suggesting titles. Rather than let them drift away, here's a start of my book list:

Left Neglected by Lisa Genova
Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

Toothbrush Story

'Why do you have two empty tubes of anti-itch cream by your sink?'

'I use that stuff for hives.'

'Yeah, but why two empty tubes?'

'Cause if I run out, I slice open the tube and there's enough to get by with.'

'I threw them away.'

'Ok.'

'Why did you have two empty things of deoderant by your sink?'

'Cause I throw them in my bag for weekend trips, and throw the deoderant away before I come home. Don't have to buy travel sizes.'

'When was your last weekend trip?'

'Labor Day. I don't have money or vacation right now to travel.'

'I threw them away.'

'Ok.'

'Why do you have so many tooth brushes?'

'I like to rotate them.'

'I piled them standing up in the corner.'

'Uhm...did you put my roommate's toothbrush in the pile?'

'Yeah.'

'That's pretty gross.'

Avoiding Work

I lived in Minnesota during my 20s and this timeless story springs from that era.

My future brother-in-law sleeps in.

His phone rings.

He answers.

'Yeah?'

'This is work. Is that you? Are you coming in to work today?'

'No.'

'Why NOT?'

'Cause I'm stupid.'

The phone clicks back into its cradle.

Playground Lunch

The cafeteria where I am working sells fish on Friday. Delicious. I typically buy two servings of fish along with rice and vegetables.

Today, they serve cod.

The happy checkout lady notices a business card fall from my wallet and mentions it.

'Thanks, I saw it fall, too. Two pieces of cod.

'They're real small, but looks good doesn't it?

'Very good.' I nod.

I pick a fork and napkin and go to a table reserved by a co-worker's handbag.

My first co-worker of three joins me and we continue our conversation.

My second co-worker approaches the table with a plateful of protein including ribs, barbecue beef, jalapeno cornbread, and braised sweet potato.

'Wish me luck guys! Can I eat all of this without making my new white shirt all messy?'

We smile.

She pulls the edges by the shoulder of her shirt, 'See? White. Not so much after I eat.'

'Trade?' I ask.

'Serious?' She eyes my cod.

My eyes dart upwards, thinking.

'Yeah. Your lunch looks good.'

Trays pass across the table and we dig in to our unexpected lunches.

My other co-worker says quietly, 'That was the weirdest thing that I ever have seen.'

If you make that shot, I will...

Facebook takes me down memory lane and tonight a classmate chats with me. In a different chat window, an online friend asks me about her and I smile into my computer screen.

In high school, I played basketball as often as I could and a few one on one partners stand out, including my classmate.

'Hey Tim.'

'Yeah?

'If you make that shot, I'll pull down my pants.

'Huh?

'Ok, if you make that shot three times in a row, I'll do it. Serious.

'Huh?

'Just shoot.

I laugh to myself and tuck under the door to the gym, right shoulder touching the door and look at the shot.

To myself, I think, 'Extend a little to get out from under the door frame, graze the ceiling to get enough loft, aim at the glass and visualize where the hoop really is not where it looks.'

I take a breath, relax, and smile.

'Ready?

'Shoot already!

My fingertips touch the ball at the seams and replay the motion in my mind, close my eyes, open them, and take the shot.

Swish.

My eyebrows raise as I smile, 'Ready for the second shot?'

I look at my friend's face turn white.

She's nervous.

I laugh, receiving the ball. 'Ready?

Her eyes narrow.

I relax, hold the ball, dribble, mentally planning things. My right shoulder touches the door.

I release the ball and watch it pass over the glass.

Swish.

I smile.

Silence now as she passes the ball back.

I laugh.

But while I dribble and before setting up the shot in my mind, I worry.

I make this and will she really do it?
Will she pull down her pants?
Do I want her to?

I mean, I can make it. But...

I relax, touch my shoulder to the door and remember how I moved to make the first two. My mind goes through the shot. Relax.

I laugh recklessly, 'Just shoot...'

I release the ball and it arcs through the air, passing the glass.

Swish.

I laugh now, worried and wondering and anxious wildly wondering, 'Will she?'

She narrows her eyes, upset.

She walks to the other gym door and leans over, hands down unbuttoning.

Nuts!

She's serious!

Zip! Before I realize it, her pants drop!

Oh no!

Then I laugh.

She turns to look at me while she pulls up her pants.

My heart stammering, pounding.

She wins! And she leaves the gym.

All I saw were her white spandex shorts!

You're Getting Old Tim

My mouth open, waiting, a bright light at the bottom of my peripheral vision.

'You're getting old, Tim.' He says, 'Give Tim the mirror so I can show him what's going on.'

The dental hygenist hands me the mirror as Dr. Giaimo prods my teeth, 'See that hole there? The enamel is wearing off and there's only dentin. So you can expect sensitivity from time to time like you had.'

'I'll have to fix that someday. That mark there is nothing to worry about, but that filling on the next tooth is wearing out so I'll have to replace that when I fill in the hole.

'But if you look on the other side, you have one on that tooth, too. That's most common to have them one each side.

'Overall, looking good though. See you in August, ok?

Later in the day, I reflect on holding the mirror, because I remember in the early 80s when I watched intently in the reflection off his glasses.

Eventually, he handed me a mirror to watch better.

In the 70s, he had a fish tank in the office and my siblings and I would watch the huge fish swim around while we waited for our turn in the chair.

In the 80s, Dr. Giamimo buys a bottle of Mountain Dew in the local pizza parlor and drops a tooth in it. Mountain Dew is the local beverage also known as Finn Beer.

Our community is fascinated by the slow motion drama as the tooth gradually decays in the sugary drink until it becomes a powdery residue on the bottom of the bottle.

I ask a year ago, 'Still have the Mountain Dew bottle?

'Yes.' And he laughs in his familiar and comforting way.

Winter of Sorrow Anew

I feel passionate about a local school issue so I went to the school board meeting tonight.

Afterward, I talked with two of my high school classmates. We discussed the educational issue, but the underlying story is our bad economy.

'Timmy, I drive around New Ipswich all day and you wouldn't believe all of the foreclosure signs. The declining number of students say the same thing.'

Reflecting on our conversation makes me want to cry.

Last winter was a winter of sorrow for so many in our community and we're leading into another. So few have money enough to feed their families and keep their houses warm.

I remember my eldest aunt's life lesson, 'Always believe what the secretaries and the janitors tell you.'

The classmates that I spoke with tonight run our town's garbage collection service.

Our second winter of sorrow started on the shortest day of the year under gently falling snow.

Remembering the Ice Storm

Last weekend was difficult and now a few days past, I maybe understand why.

Two years and four days ago, I went to sleep during a lightning storm, losing power and cellphone service.

I wake to the sounds of shot guns blasting one after the other. Boom...echo. Boom! echo.

Confused, I stumble into my hallway and look outside to see a tree top explode and fall through crystalline ice branches and it ~thuds~! on the ground.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

I put my hunting boots on over and tuck in the legs of my pajama bottoms. I slip on my blaze orange hunting jacket. I walk outside on my icy deck and crunchy ice-covered blades of grass.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

'Huh.' I think, 'God gives us firewood.'

In the ensuing hours, I learn that all of my cars are damaged. I run the rescue shelter for the morning, because I am a warm body while all of the emergency management professionals are out helping the community.

My dad, uncle, and I spend over two hours with chain saws as we carve a single-lane path down my dirt road to the state highway.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

I drive out of town, and dreadfully violate some of the most indelible guidelines from my childhood as my tires pass over one downed power line after the other.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

Two years later, my body reminds me of the stress during the ice storm. Sleeping through the night in 30-degree temperatures in my house.

Moving to my parents for the winter.

Incredulously I am still amazed at how people from outside of my region downplayed the devastation.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

My property remains littered with trees and branches that continue to fall from the treetops whenever a strong wind passes through New Hampshire.

Boom! echo

Boom! echo

Runt Died

I sprinkle layer pellets in the runs near each coop, pour the 50 pounds of feed into the feed barrel, and open the egg door on the big coop.

I see Runt, dead, in the bedding.

'Huh, Runt died.' I say quietly to myself.

When she was 4 days old, the other chicks pecked her ear and made her bleed. I separated her so that she could heal. The other chicks didn't let her eat. She was at the bottom of the pecking order.

Months later I put her in with the flock, they all grew and produced eggs.

One severe winter, a mink taunted the flock from outside the fencing. The stronger chickens took the challenge and died. Runt and Whipped Cream, well, they had the courage of a chicken so they avoided the fracas.

They survived.

Runt slowly stopped laying eggs and occasionally produced a mini-egg the size of the tip of my thumb.

The farmer in me knew that she had to go, but my heart pushed the dreaded task to the bottom of my to do list.

Today, I look at her as she lay silently in the dirty bedding on the floor.

I walk down the hill to take my hoe from the fenced in garden. I walk back and use it to gently pull her into a shovel.

Her feet are nestled under her body, claws turned.

In the best way that God's creatures can, Runt died peacefully while roosting in her sleep.

Grey Beard

I forced myself to take the entire Thanksgiving holiday weekend off. My ambition is to be so lazy that I stop shaving, too, and my beard slowly fills out over the weekend.

Today I walk into the bathroom, ready to shower, looking in the mirror.

Something is missing.

I grin, 'Grey.'

I lean closer to the mirror.

'Yup. There they are.' I say softly to the mirror, chin jutting out for inspection, and I see a small patch of grey whiskers.

Hockey Babe

We see an attractive blonde woman at the top of the stairwell leading up to the first tier of the hockey stadium.

She smiles at us.

We smile back.

She asks, 'Would you like to buy some tickets? One for a dollar or seven for five.'

'What's the prize?'

She pinches the shoulder of her hockey jersey and shakes it gently, 'You win a hockey jersey like this one.'

'Do you come with the jersey?' My 73-year old uncle asks, smiling.

'Unfortunately not, but I'd sell more tickets if I did!'

I start laughing, impressed.

We walk away and I turn to my uncle, 'You don't care what you say anymore, do you?'

He beams up at me smiling, 'Not really.'

Uncle's got game.

'That was smooth!'

Business and Football

Chris didn't talk.

I met him in the first grade, but everyone said he didn't talk. Teachers occasionally huddled over him, voices gentle and high pitched, encouraging him to speak.

He didn't.

So in the third or fourth grade, I sat next to him a few times, waiting. Finally, we talked a little. 'Smart guy.' I thought. 'Fast runner. Understands stuff.'

I store the information away.

My dad's soft hand, palm to the sky, is the scroll for the next football play. 'Ok, you do a 8-step button hook. Tim, you fake short and go long bomb. Hike on three, ok?'

I run with the button hook kid, pause, and go long. The ball is soon in mid air. My eyes glue to the wobbly spiraling nerf football, running over uneven terrain in our front yard. I watch the ball until it touches my fingertips. Out of mid air, it's mine. Score!

We all yell and holler, celebrating!

That fall in school, silent Chris joins us to play football in the playground. The popular kid is the captain and soon his buddies line up against Chris, myself, and other misfits.

I yell, 'Gwen, wanna play for our team?' My little cousin is fast, we could use her.

My palm faces up, my eyes peering into everyone's eyes on our team. 'Ok, those guys think that Jim is the best, ok? They're going to follow you. So Chris, sort of stall at the line and go long. Gwen, if someone follows Chris, get open, ok? Hike on two.'

Hike.

Hike.

The popular boys eyes glue to Jim. They follow. I don't look, but I am sure that silent Chris is smiling as he runs long, forgotten and alone.

I see Jim smothered by defense. I play the fake and yell, 'Gwen, you gotta get open!' The defense shifts and starts attacking me.

Arm back, I heave a wobbly arcing ball to the end zone where Chris is heading.

Everyone watches, slowing, many are curious where the ball is going.

Chris runs.

His hands extend, clutching the ball from mid-air and he scores!

I smile slyly, satisfied, and willing to run the play again and again until we crush the popular boys team.

Fast forward until now when I am determined to build my IT business and I feel a nostalgic sense of football coursing inside.

Palm up.

Eyes locked in to the eyes of my co-workers and business partners.

'Ok, if we do this, it's going to work, because the market is focused in a different direction.

'Seven AM tomorrow, ok?

'We're going to make a positive impression. I'm sure of it.'

Drifting into Winter

Suddenly, it's cold.

Before I knew it, an early November rain gently swept most of the foliage off the trees.

My roommate rearranged the living room so the couch is perpendicular to the picture window. Now as I relax lengthwise on the couch, my television image is the natural setting outside.

I see a gentle breeze flutter dogged oak leaves. Steely blue clouds drift by that demonstrate the onset of cold. My toes feel cold, too. We are drifting into winter.

In my silent house, I hear the refrigerator motor and the oil furnace cycle as heat wafts up from the radiators. Occasionally I hear sounds from the road below.

The crisp air motivates natural reflection as daylight wanes and we all turn inside our homes to prepare for winter.

Six months ago, the oppressive and stifling heat was starting that would persist through the summer. Daily I drank necessary gallons of water while I sat and typed and launched my new business.

A year ago full of idealistic notions and underlying fear of being unemployed, I drove myself fiercely to carve out a living as an entrepreneur.

A year and a half ago, I worked for a company with a deep private resolve to gracefully break free on my terms.

Two years ago, I was engaged and my cats lumbered daily around my home.

Time passes.

New Hampshire will soon be blanketed in snow and many of us will huddle beneath quilts with hot cups of tea in our hands.

And some, like myself I am sure, will launch ourselves into freshly fallen snow and brave the immediate chill that leads to slowing breath and the sound of ones heartbeat and the security of winter's frosty embrace.

The Finn Thing

Every so often I hear, 'Hey, it's Big Chief Many Turkey!' to which I close my eyes and grimace slightly admitting, 'Yup, that's me.'

My half-Finnish friend and I are hunting turkeys one year at his house. The turkeys approach close, closer, closer. I dry fire. Load a shell. Closer, closer, closer.

Wham!

Four die. My face flushes white, devastated, mumbling, 'I can only shoot one. Oh no. Oh no. What do I do?'

Moments after, my friend races off to a doctor's appointment. We agree that turning myself in is the best thing to do. 'Honesty is the best policy.'

I sigh and load the birds into my car before I drive to turn myself in.

Still devastated, the Fish and Game Officer logs my wrongful acts and asks, 'Are you Finn?'

I look to the ground. 'Yes.'

'Me, too. Are you in Rindge?'

'No, New Ipswich next town east.'

'Ah, the officer in that area always tells us that whenever something happens, we get the story. There's never a doubt that whatever it is, we'll hear the truth.'

I sigh. 'Yup.'

So there's a Finn thing about us where we are married to or genetically pre-disposed to honesty. I hated turning myself in to earn my Big Chief Many Turkey name, but the reality of worrying endlessly about the situation ~without~ turning myself in was worse.

I chose the former, clean pain over the latter. Most of us Finns do.

However, think for a moment. I am a 4th-generation 100% American-Finn. Why American-Finn? Because I was born in Ohio. I'm an American.

Last winter, my distant cousin Jason is over for coffee and says, 'I am American. It's wrong to say we are Finn.'

I narrow my eyes a little in disagreement, thinking.

'You're right. I am American, too.'

But it doesn't feel right to say. Somewhere fused into my body is a nationalistic ideal that I am a Finn.

Jason is right, absolutely. The truth is that we are Americans.

But somewhere inside that I have no words to describe, my sense of honesty, truth, and always telling the story passionately denies the truth that I am an American.

My identity insists, 'I'm a Finn.'

I cannot explain it.

Falling Chips

Someone read my blog recently and noted, 'You haven't posted recently. Any plans to?'

The well-crafted question lingered in my thoughts for several weeks and I'll take a few minutes out of my recent entrepreneurial routine to share today.

Before bed last night, I reached down to an open bag of white corn tortilla chips.

Munch.

The Internet enraptured me.

Munch.

I continued reading.

Munch.

'That's probably enough.' I thought, so I tossed the open bag from arm's reach. The heavy chips weighted the bag and it remained upright and open.

Finally, sleep.

Before sunrise, I woke and sat on my couch to conduct some business correspondence. My weight shifted as I sat on the couch. In the periphery of my senses, I noticed a tortilla chip settling into the bag.

I typed.

The chip settled again and my senses heightened.

I grinned knowingly.

I turned to look and I saw a mouse jumping inside the bag of chips, trying to escape.

Neat.

I turned back to my e-mail.

My roommate stumbled out of his room, grunting as he tried to kick start his 40-year old body into wakefulness.

'Look in the chip bag.' I grinned.

'Huh?'

'Serious, look in the bag.'

He peers inside and looks at me, 'A mouse!'

Next morning I ask my roommate, 'What happened to the mouse?'

'I couldn't kill it, so I took a long walk and set it free.'

I nod.

'But when I returned I left the chips outside for the birds so that none of us would accidentally eat them.'

The Writer's Desk

One of my first cousin's married into the Blaine family that has roots in early American politics. Her father-in-law built this pine desk in the early 80s and somehow it migrated to my bedroom when I was a teenager.



Many of my close friends were then, as they are now, living in the midwest USA, and I would spend hours huddled over the pine desktop with pen and paper corresponding with them.

I cut my writer's teeth largely on this desk by learning language, tense, and the subtle art of asking questions that elicit a written response.

My sister had it for some reason and several months ago I intercepted the desk from taking a one-way trip to the dump.

Earlier on this balmy November day, I retrieved the writer's desk and put it in my office. After a decades long delay and a sea change of technology, I write on it again.

I Have the Neatest Friends

I visited my friend and photography mentor, Al Tolman, this afternoon. I drove up his driveway, got out of the car and paused.

Hmmm...that's a wild turkey standing near his doorstep.

I waited. Al emerged from his house, 'Hey Tim.'



'What's her name, Al?'

'Tee Gee.'

'Huh?'

'Thanksgiving.' He smiles.

'Uhm, are you going to eat it?'

'No. But cool name, huh?'

The name Tee Gee pales to the coolness of having a wild turkey for a pet.

Al continues, 'I go into the forest to cut firewood and the dog, cat, and turkey start following me. After 200 yards, the dog grows disinterested so I'm left with the cat and the turkey in the woods.'

Do you have a magnet?

While talking on the phone, my uncle walks past my living room window and knocks on the door.

'I have to go. I'll call you later.'

My uncle walks in, 'Do you have a magnet?'

'Sure. Why?'

'I was mowing and my keys fell out of my pocket somewhere in my yard.'

'Well, I'm making lunch, but after I'm done, I'll help you look. I'm not sure where my big magnets are, but I could help you best if I look where you mowed.'

'Sounds good.'

My uncle left the house in his faded, pocket-drooping, teal-blue Dickie pants and I followed him while my macaroni was cooking.

I returned to eat and in a short while, I'll join him to look for the keys.