Meeting the mafia

 1979  Boston

I wanted to take Kristen to Vermont to show her where I’d gone to boarding school. I was entirely comfortable with hitchhiking and mentioned my plans to Keyo, but he became concerned. Keyo, I said, I’ve always hitchhiked and enjoyed it. I’ve met some incredibly good people that way.  I’m a good judge of character. I know who to trust and how to talk my way out of trouble.

He knew he wasn’t going to change my mind so he pulled me gently over to his pack. Karen, I want you to carry my knife. If anyone gives you trouble, you’ll have it to protect yourself. You won’t have to use it, but wear it on your belt and when people see it, they’ll know you mean business. I laughed, Yes, and when they ask me what I do for a living, I’ll say, I’m a spiritual teacher and here is my switch blade knife. He insisted. I took the knife to make him feel better and headed out the next day.

The knife was big and deadly, like nothing I’d ever seen. I pushed a button and a long sharp blade sprang into action. The metal shone of polished silver and frightened even me. I fastened it to my belt, like Keyo had recommended and prepared for our trip.

It began the next morning when a small pick-up pulled over to give us a ride and a policeman materialized from nowhere. He peered in the driver’s window and delivered a lecture about delivering us safely to our destination. No foul play, he warned. The driver was  put out. Man, I stop to do somebody a favor and the next thing you know, I’m being pulled over and treated like a criminal. I apologized and we went safely on our way. We had two more short rides and then climbed into a car driven by two young men, who talked about the Mafia like it was the Boys Club.

We talked easily, laughed and seemed to have a lot in common. They lived near by and offered an evening meal, shelter for the night and a swim in the pool. It sounded good, so we agreed. The car left the highway and threaded along a tall cornfield,  loose gravel pounding the window. Dust blocked my vision. When we reached the house, Kristen and I climbed down from the cab. The boy’s mother came out, asking who we were and where we had come from. When they explained that we were hitchhikers, an already heated conversation exploded. It was in Italian, so I don’t know what was said, but certainly got the drift. It was something like, these people are scum, get them out of here.

One of the men broke away and said, I apologize for my mother. She is very old fashioned, but it’s ok for you to be here.  His mother was heavy set, with thick black hair pulled away from her face, and a mind that measured the world in threats and dangers. This may not be a good idea, I said. No, no! He insisted. It’s late, we’ll swim and then you can stay in the guest house above the garage. You’ll be fine here, don’t mind my mother. I minded his mother a lot and so did he.

None-the-less, we changed into our suits and cooled off in the pool. It was a nice contrast to standing in the hot sun and being bathed in car exhaust. One of the boys went into the field and picked fresh corn. We tore back golden husks and ate it sweet and raw, while lingering in the pool. The sun was going down when we climbed out. I made my way to the changing house, put my hand on the door knob and turned it hard, but it didn’t open. I pushed again. That’s odd, I thought, I must have locked it by mistake. I turned around to ask for help and discovered that the boys had been sent into the house on an errand - their mother was standing in back of me.

She grabbed my arm and led me to a bench, I have locked the door, she told me. You can not enter. You must leave my house at once. Do not harm my boys. You are a mother, you know what I mean. She pointed to my clothes, which she’d piled on the ground outside, then lifted the knife from its holder. You are a dangerous woman and must leave my house at once.

I was speechless. I’d never been seen as a dangerous person and the idea that I might over power her sons with a knife was incredible. Her sons emerged from the house once again, and Italian words flew hot and fast. They stood nose to nose, each pleading their case in shouts and bursts of emotion, without anyone being heard.

One of the boys broke away, grabbed my clothes and showed us to the guest house. It will be all right, he assured us. It’s too late to leave. Rest well and go in the morning. Kristen and I looked at each other in bewilderment, as we hung our wet suits on the shower and talked about the events of the day. We were settling in for bed, when a car came screeching to a halt outside the window. Doors sprang open in unison. Six large Italian men got out, all of them carrying guns. The boy who had shown us to the guest house flew up the stairs.

I’m sorry, you’ll have to leave now, he said gasping for breath. You’ll be all right, Momma has sent some friends to make sure you go back to the highway. We didn’t even retrieve our suits from the shower wall, just grabbed our belongings as we were hurried out the door.

Kristen and I sat in the dark along the road, glad to be gone. I thought about throwing the knife away, but knew it was expensive and that Keyo would want it back. We cuddled together on my suitcase and sang songs, while we waited for some sign of life in the traffic lane.

We were picked up moments later by a man who was on his way home to his four children. He was generous and kind, invited us to stay the night and we accepted. We climbed the stairs to a guest bedroom, pulled back covers on a queen size bed and quickly fell asleep. Only I didn’t stay asleep. I tossed and turned and dreamed violent dreams of people being stabbed by knives. I was so angry with myself for agreeing to carry a weapon, because it was doing the opposite of what it was intended to do; it was endangering us.

In the morning, over a breakfast of orange juice and muffins, I learned that our host was vacationing with his children, because his wife had been brutally murdered only one month before. I offered my sympathies and asked how she’d died. Someone broke into our home while I was away, he said with tears welling in his eyes, and stabbed her to death. I listened to his sorrow and realized that my dreams had not been produced by anxiety, but were images resulting from very real terror.

The rest of the trip was uneventful. We were delivered safely to Vermont, walked around the school grounds, looked up acquaintances and got a ride back to Boston with an old friend, who had career-shuttled from musician to CPA. Upon returning I looked up Keyo and delivered his knife, glad to be free of it! I had learned an important lesson about the energy objects hold and attract, and that my personal safety had more to do with my outlook and essence, than it had to do with carrying weapons.

The Leaving Time

I have that ache I get in my heart when the leaving time comes. The hugs, unspoken sadness and the drop off at the airport, all pull at me in the core of my belly. I was not designed for modern life. I need friends and family at my fingertips, not scattered in far flung locations around the globe. 

My son’s wife, Khrystyne is in Los Angeles. She has the flu today, a raw throat, fever and headaches. I want to walk over with chicken soup, tea and flowers for the table, bend down, kiss her forehead and tell her not to worry. 

I want to walk an ocean beach, share lunch and talk about writing and poetry with Dicksie. I want to see her paintings take shape and listen to the dreams she dreamed, but she is in Arizona. 

I long to sit at the large wooden table in my sister Kristen’s kitchen, soak in stories about the children in her life,  and watch as she rides her bike to school and back. I want to feel our 60 years of history and know the open place in her heart that remembers ‘us’ and expands to embrace me whenever I appear. 

My empty house will fill in quickly with work assignments, clients, phone calls and challenges.  I’ll welcome them, as I blend again inside my days, the fullness of friends, family and routine. But there will be that raw place first, that invisible surge that pushes against an old aloneness I work to live above. It will hit me like cold water as I open the door.  

The mother hen in me wants to gather the people I love around me, enfolding them in my wings. I send emails instead. 

The clouds form a solid cover outside the window in shades of iridescent pearl. They perch above an expanse of blue mountains and rust covered earth. It’s seven o’clock in the morning. The blast furnace that is Phoenix sits unfelt inside the cool cabin of the plane. Another lift off.  Another coming.  Another going.  Another touching down.

The right to survive

I’m sitting by the pool trying to think of a blog piece. I have time to write, I have energy, but nothing springs to mind.

A dove flies from white desert rocks over the water and into a flowering shrub. The birds are busy this morning and noisy. Hanging ferns cascade near my chair in perfect abundant health. Peppers sprout in the garden, next to perfumed rosemary, and a grapefruit tree that shelters fruit the size of basketballs. How can anything grow here? I’m confused. This is a brown place where houses have rocks instead of lawns – yet life springs forth in radiant colors and profuse blossoms.

When I wrote my sister Kristen about visiting Arizona, she said, it’s a different world with its vivid colors and dry, strange landscape. I never felt it was a gentle place but one that challenges your right to survive.

She’s right. The temperatures have averaged 109, which have been ten degrees lower than Phoenix. The result is like being under house arrest because nobody in their right mind would go anywhere to do anything for any reason – with the possible exception of my host, Joe.

Joe has the desert in his soul, its essence shines from his eyes. He grew up here and slept under the sky most of his childhood. Joe heads out the door like a lizard ready for a sunbath.  No problem. He and his brother Steve used to spend their day catching snakes when they were kids, snakes bigger than they were. They collected them in pillow cases and thought nothing of picking up a rattlesnake until one bit his brother and nearly killed him. Joe and a passing motorist cut open his brother’s finger and took turns sucking the poison from his young body.

Lucky the snake had a belly full of rabbits, Joe says, or Steve wouldn’t have made it.

A few months ago Joe was making sweet talk to a king snake. Come here baby. Come on pretty girl. He found it in the front yard and moved it to the back, where it could eat rodents and other rattlers. I think of myself as a nature girl but stories like those reflect the core of my inner wimp.

I am soaking in the light and beauty of this place today. I will need to remember it when the dark months come. Winter in Oregon is like having a fat lady in black pants sit down on your head, plus it goes on forever! I will long for this place in winter, and be willing to save grocery money to re-experience it. Just don’t tell me any more stories about snakes. I don’t like having reality interfering with my ideas about life.

Brave New World

Isn’t it amazing how you can step on an airplane and when it sets down, walk out into a completely different reality? I love that! I dislike the airport security-tin can-claustrophobic plane part, but thrive on the adventure of being someplace new. 

I left Oregon in a jacket, cotton top and long skirt. When I stepped into the state-wide sauna that is Arizona, I wanted to run into the ladies room and strip down to my underwear, but I don’t wear underwear, so I couldn’t do it. Thankfully my friend Dicksie ushered me quickly into her air conditioned car and then into the radiant hues of her life.

Dicksie is married to Joe, an award winning architectural landscape designer. Look him up on line and envy me my get-away, his talent is amazing: www.archland1.com.

Dicksie and Joe make a charming couple who fit easily and smoothly together, the way a cup fits a saucer. They have fashioned a place of such gracious beauty, it rivals the best resort. The walls are splashed with bold Arizona colors which serve as backdrops for the paintings they have done in shades of purple, greens, reds and rust.  My forest home whispers in pale blues and restful greens as it sits quietly among cedars and pines, while their house is bright, unashamed and blends with the splendor of a southwest sunset.

 I spent the morning floating in the backyard pool while feasting on the visual delights that met my glance at every turn. We swam without our tops, talked like girls at a pajama party and sank into a sweet connection that continues to deepen and expand.  Did I mention she’s a fabulous cook?  How does it get better than this?

I packed for summer in Oregon, which means a shopping trip is in order, because half my suitcase holds an array of sweaters, long pants and warm shirts. Inexperience and disbelief informed my selections. A day which is 109 degrees is as foreign to me as finding a camel in my bathtub, but I am learning.

Today I saw oranges spilled over a city sidewalk. That would only happen in Portland if someone dropped a grocery bag. Apples on walkways are common, as are figs and walnuts, but never oranges. The simplest things astound me, like the beauty of mesquite trees, lavender colored bushes that balloon like the top of dandelion puffs, and birds of paradise that burst fully open in shades of on-fire red.

Tomorrow we will join their friends and go to the mountain. I always hike in flip flops because I like to be as close to barefoot as possible. This is causing great distress to those who climb in regulation boots and do things according to the rules. I am told I will hear about it from their friends - or maybe snakes will bite my toes - or rocks will reach out to snag me, but I don’t care, because in the end, I have to walk the earth, the way I walk the earth.

New York City

 

Every few years my parents treated us to a cultural week-end in NYC.  We drove four hours through vineyards and rolling acres of farmland to the heart of a cosmopolitan environment that was as different from our barefoot childhood as I could imagine. 

We stayed at the Hotel Astor, which in 1955 was the finest hotel in the city. The Astor embodied old world elegance, sat in the heart of the theater district and towered over Time Square. The Brooklyn Dodgers had just won their first world series and the city was alive with excitement. Cab Calloway and Fats Waller were hot stuff and the Cotton Club was birthing a new musical sound. But it was the Broadway shows that interested my folks.

Evenings found us in our finest clothes with fresh gardenias from a street vendor pinned to our coats. The smell of that delicate white flower can still bring back vivid memories of Julie Andrews and Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady, sinking into red velvet theater seats, watching chandeliers dim against a ceiling of gold and holding our breath as plush curtains whooshed back to reveal a magical world of song and dance. We sat spellbound by every theatrical gesture and perfected vocal score. Those performances began my admiration and love for the theater, and also spoiled me for anything less professional. 

I was ten years old when I watched long rows of women called the Rockettes, high kick in unison at Radio City Music Hall. They were wholesome family entertainment, while a trip to the Latin Quarter opened our eyes to the exotic. Women on flower-covered trapezes, descended from the ceiling wearing high heeled shoes, seamed stockings and little else. The undeniable points of attention were their breasts, where long tassels adhered to each nipple, leaving their fullness bare and exposed. The tassels were smaller versions of the fabric ends that held back the drapes in our living room. I was stunned! I could not take my young eyes off them – grown women who amused themselves by swinging naked from the ceiling of a darkened theater. Was that really okay? Was that what women did when they got older? Apparently it was not only approved of but applause worthy.  I began to wonder about stringing ropes in the hayloft and doing some undercover surgery on my mother’s drapes.

When the performance finished, my sister Kristen and I had to use the bathroom, but the lines were too long, so mother encouraged us to wait. We’ll be home soon, she promised. We hopped in a taxi, which vigorously whisked us through busy streets and hairpin corners. When we screeched to a halt, my father’s angry face matched the burgundy coat worn by the doorman. He was complaining about the driver as my sister and I pushed through revolving glass doors, past walls of glossy walnut, expensive paintings and potted palms. We jumped up and down in the elevator in our urgent need, reaching our fourth floor room before the white gloves of the elevator man disappeared behind us. Doors were never bolted at home, so we were stunned to find we’d been locked out.

I’m peeing my pants, Kristen told me. What should we do?

I had pushed my winter coat aside and was dancing up and down in a desperate attempt to wait.

We can’t pee right here, I said, it will make wet puddles right outside our door. We’ll surely get caught and get in big trouble. I have an idea. You run that way, and pee as you go. Run all the way to the window drapes. I’ll run to the marble statue. We’ll spread it out in long lines, that way nobody will be able to figure out what we did.

And so, on that eventful Saturday night, in one of the cities grand hotels, two little girls were pushing aside their fancy lace dresses to leave a bit of themselves in the lavish carpet at the Hotel Astor.

Sanctuary

 

I have always loved the Catholic Church, not the religion, the philosophy, or the services, but the shelter of the sanctuary.

My level of sensitivity is extra-ordinary. A loud voice or shrill laugh can be physically painful, groups of people are over-stimulating. I can’t lay my head on a hotel pillow without knowing the character of the person who was there before me.

While other kids clamored from their desks for recess, I couldn’t wait to slip across the street into the quiet shelter of the Catholic Church, the only building that kept its doors unlocked, and welcomed all people at all hours.

Once inside I was transported into gentle stillness, a world I longed to live in and never leave. Light filtered through colored glass, frankincense and holy water filled my lungs, and banks of candles flickered in neat little rows near statues of Mary. The only sound was the occasional creak of golden oak yielding under the weight of a bent knee.

There were never loud voices in the church or groups pushing, shoving or competing. The people who came and went were few, and always internal and reverent. The Catholic Church was my oasis and sanity. It was a place I could breathe and rest until the school bell rang and I was summoned back inside to endure.

Last weekend I went to a baby shower. When it was time to return home, something in me recoiled. I pointed the car in the opposite direction and kept on driving until I reached Mt Angel Abbey, which sits high on a mountain with a panoramic view of pastures and forest.

Being away from civilization, computers and conversation was just the medicine I needed. I had not realized my exhaustion until I sat near the bell tower and looked out into the serene fields of the Williamette valley. The quiet was tangible; I could reach out and touch it. A few Benedictine monks walked by in silence like black shadows, humble and privately engaged, while the sun rested on my shoulder like a friend’s hand reminding me to unwind and let go.

That was all I needed. I picked up my cell phone and called my husband. I won’t be home tonight, I told him. I’m at the Abbey and it’s too lovely to leave.

Father Vincent was in the garden among a symphony of goldfinch. He was filling the birdbath as they darted over stalks of yellow and white iris, and on to the budding branches of mimosa trees. Father Vincent has been at the abbey for forty-seven years. He tells me he’ll arrange a room, so I go back to my car for my checkbook and hair brush, the only luggage I have. When I return he is gone. The woman at the gift shop hands me my room key. I ask how much I owe and she says she doesn’t know. It’s Saturday. Someone should be around on Monday. Call when you get home and find out. You can mail us a check then. I’ve gone to the Abbey for the past twenty years. It’s the way they do business.

The room is simple, a bed with white sheets and spread, cream colored walls and windows that look into a sky dotted with tiny cotton clouds. There is a desk and gold lamp. I look out and watch a red-necked hummingbird feed on small blue flowers nested in rambling ground cover.

 I unpack by placing my hair brush on the bathroom shelf and walk to the church for vespers. The monks chant five times a day. When I sit down, the sound of it travels through the pores of my skin and settles at my core.

I stand looking up at the domed ceilings, the pink front wall of the sanctuary and the aqua and purple colors that grace the side walls above arched chanting stalls. The room is full of white linen and candles above a foundation of marble and oak. The organ is one of the finest in the world.

Being there is filling me up, it’s filling an empty space I didn’t know I had. How strange to be so at home in a place I have no business being in at all.

Abandoning Ship

The plane landed in England where we were to disembark and spend a week sightseeing. Extremely uncomfortable with the idea of being herded around in a group, I got busy devising a plan of escape. As we claimed our luggage in the London airport, I went up to the tour director.

This is where we part, I said. Guess I’ll be seeing you later.

She looked at me in astonished wonder.

Oh, didn’t Mother tell you? We have relatives here and I’ll be staying with them now. I’ll catch up with you in Austria.

I had received a London address from my older sister for a friend she’d made when she was an exchange student in Denmark. I displayed the address with confidence.

This is where I can be reached if you need me.

The address was a good ten years old and I had no idea who lived there now, but I was like a horse too tightly reined, sensed freedom and was moving towards it. 

I waved goodbye as the others caught the bus from Heathrow. A great relief at being free washed over me as I stepped into a taxi and handed the driver my address. I planned to knock on the door, ask for my sister’s friend, visit and be off, exactly where I didn’t know. Or if I were really lucky, he’d be fun, handsome and interesting; maybe we’d have a night on the town.

The driver pulled over at the house. I reached in my travel bag to pay him, but he was not happy to see American currency and refused it. Payment became an ordeal as I convinced him to, first, find a bank that would exchange funds and then continue to drive around while I tracked down the missing resident. He reluctantly agreed; I changed my money and we drove from house to house to inquire. Turns out this fellow had moved some time ago, but it was a small village and everyone seemed to know someone who knew someone who might help. It became a rather expensive game.

Finally, I knocked on the door of a quaint English cottage. An older woman with carefully pressed curls, a plaid dress and flat black shoes stood in the entrance.

Yes that’s my son, she told me, but he moved away years ago.

I was becoming weary and travel worn; my adventure was wearing thin.

I bring regards from my sister, a friend of his from long ago.

That was all. I turned to leave.

Don’t go, she said. Come in and have some tea.

I dismissed the taxi at last and settled at a doily-covered table to visit.

I told her about my family, boarding school and being on my way to Austria to study music. She took golden framed photos from the fireplace, and dusted each one with her napkin as she spoke of her son and other grown children who were away at universities. When she asked where I was staying, I told her I didn’t know. I hoped she would offer her guest room and she did, but first she insisted we go to Western Union to wire my mother. When I wrote the telegram, I was careful to word the message about my safe arrival so my parents wouldn’t suspect my decision to abandon ship. 

That evening my hostess cooked one of the worst dinners I’ve ever had, which she made with great love, attention and care. I ate with appreciation, then excused myself and went to sleep – for twenty hours.

Food trays covered the floor when I woke. Plates and bowls were stacked on linen covered trays, which contained more unidentified dense, creamy, mushy stuff. They had been generously delivered for three missed meals for an entire day. I was recovering from the effects of travel vaccinations, jetlag and exhaustion.

The next day, I was introduced to people my age and asked to join them at political meetings, where they questioned me about the politics of my government, the Vietnam War and the recent death of John F. Kennedy. They wanted to hear my views, believing my thoughts represented the entire country. We had all grieved the death of the president, were alarmed by racial upheaval in the south, and wanted to get out of the war, but I had little knowledge of American policies, domestic or foreign. I wasn’t a watcher of television, and reading was no friend to me, so I came up disappointingly short, having known little more in my life than the interior of bedroom walls, mucking stables, music classes and boarding school. Government had been my favorite class in high school, but that was due to a hopeless infatuation with the teacher. Teenage sexual fantasies and exploding hormones had blocked the retention of any useful information. 

My hostess was proud of having a foreign visitor and openly announced my presence. This is my visitor from America, she said, like she was showing off a prize plant at the county fair.  Eighteen years old and traveling about on her own. She showed me off when we went in and out of shops, visited her friends, and met acquaintances on the street.

She was sweet and generous, but I became restricted by her good intentions and decided to head out on my own again. My brother had married a French woman and I had the name and address of her sister in Vincennes.  I thanked the dear woman, said my goodbyes and made Paris my next stop.

Czechoslovakia and Rome

 Mid-July, 1964, I was traveling with Jesuit Priests to Czechoslovakia with other students from Georgetown University. We boarded an old bus and were given specific instructions about passports and behavior. When we reached the border, we were greeted by three armed guards who stood fingering their rifles as we shifted nervously in our seats. Wooden watchtowers housed two more guards, feet firmly planted, guns aimed in our direction. The border was laced with barbed wire, and signs I couldn’t read which were meant to fortify the landscape. They could have retired for tea with the threat we intended, but they were of a different mind. We were intruders who could be smuggling contraband or planting bombs. They walked up and down the aisles of the bus, examining one person and the next.

When we were officially waved through, we found ourselves in a small town with empty storefronts. The feeling of poverty was tangible. While the priests went about their business, we walked time worn masonry roads, and waited by an ancient circular fountain which marked the center of town. The visit itself was uneventful, it was the coming and going through military zones that captured my attention and imagination. It provided my first experience of the wealth we take for granted in the states.

 School ended in late July, but I was scheduled to remain in Europe until September first. Utterly homesick, I called New York and asked my mother if she could change my ticket for an earlier arrival. I would attend music school in Cambridge shortly after I returned and wanted time to adjust.

Sweetheart, this is the chance of a lifetime.

The phone crackled and buzzed as I pushed my hand against my left ear to shut out exterior noise.

What did you say? I gave the phone my complete attention.

I said, stay where you are. Enjoy it. You’ll be back soon enough.

I knew she was right, but the years at boarding school created a feeling of a being a homeless pilgrim and I had, quite frankly, reached my limit. My heart sank, as I replaced the receiver and prepared to continue to Italy.

 August first I arrived in Rome. I’d been booked into a building run by nuns and shown to an ominous room the size of a train station. Its vast expanse and sparsely furnished interior amplified my feelings of being small and on my own. At one end, a single bed, at the other, a weathered wardrobe, a small desk under street level windows completed the room. Opening outward, the wardrobe revealed a waist length mirror. My image, reflected near a bare ceiling light, provided a startling portrayal of the loneliness I felt.

I examined in detail the sadness in the face I saw before me. Unexpressed feelings took on a life of their own. I felt threatened and powerless to stop them. Was I not privileged and fortunate? How ungrateful of me to be so downcast. I pushed my truth deeper inside and went about the business of distracting myself, which wasn’t difficult as my funds had run out weeks ago.  I was never good with budgets. I blew my money shortly after it arrived on gifts to take back home. To compensate, I made the rounds of expensive hotels and gathered the discarded leftovers that lined the halls on room service trays. I brought them home to fill my cupboard.

I discovered Italian ice cream that summer, “ice” which was the absolute best, ate spaghetti until my waist threatened to spill over the sides of my bikini, wrote at sidewalk cafes, visited the Trevi Fountain, the Colosseum and learned how to say ‘Go Away’ in Italian, to protect myself from the aggressive advances of local men. I traveled on trains to visit out laying areas, and pretended not to understand the language when conductors asked for my ticket, since I had none. Once in awhile, I would meet a diplomat, or a refined stranger who would invite me to their home for dinner. It was a time of being financially creative. When the weeks had passed and I was free to return home, I had acquired too much luggage. I’d bought a black hooded cape in Austria for my mother, lederhosen for my brothers and other gifts I no longer remember. The clerk took pity on my lack of funds and passed me through.

Traffic Criminal

Okay. I got a ticket. I had it coming. There are two places in my life where I consistently break the law. The first is waiting for a left turn signal on a country road near my house. If no one is around, I just go for it. I tell myself it’s silly to sit on a quiet road and wait for a light that takes too long to turn.

 The second place is a left hand turn of another sort. This one is in the city and is poorly managed. A motorist can grow old at that light waiting for great waves of traffic to flow through an overcrowded intersection. There is a No U Turn sign posted as clear as day, but that has never stopped me. A simple veering in another direction and I miss the intersection, and arrive promptly at my destination avoiding traffic, two red lights and one stop sign.

More tedious detail than you need to know, but I have to set the stage.

It was Wednesday night at ten o’clock, after an incredibly long day. I had not eaten since three and my belly was making friends with my backbone. Newport Bay had a happy hour that lasted until closing. I couldn’t wait. I made my usual radical U turn at the intersection and noticed overgrown Christmas lights flashing in my rear view mirror. I pulled over before he caught up. I was guilty, caught dead-on, fair and square. Besides, I knew I deserved a hundred tickets for the same weekly maneuver, not one.

The policeman came to my window and introduced himself like a blind date on prom night. The guy was polite, even sweet. He tried to give me an out, but I was too dense to lie.

Do you know why I’m stopping you?

Well, Yeah!

Did you see the No U Turn sign? It was dark; I thought you might have missed it.

Nope, I didn’t miss it. I knew it was there. I was starving and wanted to get to Newport Bay, so I just went for it.

Could I see your driver’s license, insurance and registration, please?

Please, like could I have the next dance if you’re not too busy?

I had no idea where the registration was, had my license in my wallet, and an out of date insurance card.

This one is expired, do you have another?

I searched knowing that I did somewhere.

It’s okay if you don’t, I trust you.

Who was this guy? I trust you!

I found it and handed it over, while he returned to his Christmas tree car and wrote me a whopping ticket.

I’m afraid I have to ticket you tonight, he said handing over my copy of a yellow summons, but you can go to court and have it reduced.

Go to court? I’m dead-on guilty. I’m going to go and plead guilty and they’ll reduce my fee?

Unless you’re a repeat offender, which you don’t look like to me.

Oh…if he only knew. I was the Queen of Repeat Offenders, who hadn’t yet been caught.

He handed me the ticket. I said, Crap, I can’t believe this.

Don’t feel bad, he said, in his sweet blind date voice. It happens to all of us.

I thanked him. I actually thanked him for my ticket!

I wanted to invite him to happy hour so we could discuss different career options for him. He was obviously too nice to last long as a policeman, but his car was off and away before I gathered my thoughts.

Reunion

When I got off the plane everyone hugged. It’s a family ritual. We hug when we meet and when we part. After that, conversation is limited. ‘Did you have a good flight? You must be tired. Are you hungry? Is everything going well at home?’  Curiosity prompts limited inquiries into one another’s lives, after which we settle in like strangers waiting together in a bus station.

When we reached my mother’s house I unpacked and spent the evening in front of the television. My mother’s partner, Joe sat across the room in his recliner, my mom on the sofa and I near her feet. She stretched once, her foot touching my lap. I thought about pulling her slipper off and massaging her foot, but didn’t. Any sign of random affection was against the rules, and the rules were all the stronger for being unspoken. I would be seen as perverted or needy. I lived on the west coast after all. People did all sorts of strange things out there.

We sat together in a small over-warm room and gave our full attention to the television. An audience applauded and smiled. A game show host with too many teeth coaxed contestants to greater heights, and was interrupted at intervals by commercials of Jeep trucks careening down steep terrains, and people eating hamburgers. We watched. No one talked. I had come 3,000 miles and no one talked. We didn’t know how to reach each other. There was no vocabulary. We were inches away, but it could have been a continent. I excused myself and went to bed. 

The next evening, we had a family reunion in a near-by restaurant. We started in the lounge with numerous rounds of drinks and the standard apology to the bartender. This is my daughter, Karen, she doesn’t drink. I was an oddity. Well, how about a coke or something, he would answer. You can’t just sit there with nothing. The evening wore on as I got more and more hungry, and they got more and more social. Grabbing my mother’s arm, I said, do you think we could eat soon? I’m really starving.

Oh yes, dinner. The light of recognition returned. That’s why we’d come. Of course honey, we’ll be right there. There would be twenty minutes more for breaking off conversations with barroom regulars, rounding up drinks and finally the migration to our table.

When the waitress came to take my order the table fell silent, as I inquired about the ingredients of a dish. My oldest sister, having her tongue loosened by alcohol gave me a sharp poisonous look. Don’t be a problem, she yelled from the head of the table. Just order like everyone else. I don’t know why you had to come home anyway.

I waited a few minutes more before excusing myself to sit in the Ladies room. I didn’t want her to have the pleasure of knowing her arrow had reached its target. I breathed deep, closed my eyes and tried once again to compose myself. Her attacks came without warning. I retreated into silence and counted the minutes until my plane left.

Susan picked me up from the airport and spent the night. Her love, words and assurances were like healing suave on freshly opened wounds. I talked most of the night, while she listened and offered compassion and insight. I cried with a child’s voice, while she comforted me like the mother and sister I never knew. I started my period after dropping off to sleep. Blood stains as I woke in the morning seemed a fitting symbol for the wounding of another visit home.