EAVESDROPPING

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. I’ve always loved holidays, especially the ones where you get paid for taking the day off. Retirement has scrambled that scheme a little bit. Someone, whose job it is to keep my pension payments secure and delivered on time is the one who gets paid now for taking the day off. I get paid regularly but all of my days are days off. I’m sort of like the birds at my feeder. Yesterday I overheard one bird to another, “Hey, did you remember that today is Thanksgiving?” They were woodpeckers at the peanut feeder. The other Red Belly nodded. “You could have slept late, taken the day off and nobody would have called you out.” The first Woody replied, “I woke up hungry so I got up early, flew down here. But I am grateful. These peanuts are in a squirrel proof container and when it is almost empty, voilá; it gets filled up full again.” Eavesdropping on wood peckers is nearly a lost art. You have to depend a lot on body language and even at that you have to guess now and then. Woody #2 hopped off the feeder to the top of the post; “Yep, I’m grateful this post is too tall for the feral cat in the storm sewer to pounce. He, or is it she; I don’t want to get close enough to sex any cat but either way, this one is a stealthy S.O.B. and you can’t be careless.” 

Being thankful is easy. Sometimes people ask why can’t I look for the best in people and let it go at that. The analogy I give is about meeting a horse. I go to the back and note the sphincter first, after that I go to the front; not that the sphincter is all important but I need to be mindful. What goes in the horse’s mouth and what comes out the sphincter are obviously different but they are both stereotypes of the same horse. So I hope for the best and plan for every possibility. Suffering and joy are opposite ends of the same rope. 

On the day after Thanksgiving I’m still giving thanks. Being grateful does not require gravity, acceleration or a contract. It’s just a subtle, low level awareness that you could have gotten the sphincter but you didn’t and that makes you happy. Tomorrow will go much the same way; thankful the good is good enough. I am not a Pollyanna, OMG no. I do, on the other hand, understand Yin & Yang. It’s not what you get as much as what you do with it. So I’m thankful, I’m grateful because it works. We have a place in time and what comes with it is what we get. Someone famous said, “You can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear.” Yin & Yang - what you make of it, and I’m thankful. Somebody else famous said, “Happiness is a choice.” I like that too. Happiness comes easier when you’re thankful to begin with.

The woodpeckers had moved on, making room for a titmouse and a nuthatch who had been waiting on the fence. Mouse ate one nut at a time while Hatch took one and flew off, only to return shortly. It isn’t squirrel proof and I’m curious how that works but he was stashing peanuts in the groves and cracks of the bark on the Ash tree. “Are you going to have a big family get together today?” asked Mouse. “It’s Thanksgiving you know.” Hatch looked up and leaned into the Mouse. “No; by this time of year I don’t know where any of them are. I’m grateful they made it through the summer and you don’t have to be in each other’s face to know they love you.” Mouse nodded in agreement,”I know, I know: ain’t it great that they fledge and move on?” They exchanged some insults and prejudice against Blue Jays and took off for the bird bath on the other side of the house. Of all the holidays, I like Thanksgiving best. You can make it whatever you want it to be. 

WHO SAID THAT?

I collect quotes. Over time they have grown into a collection that is organized either by subject or by source. There is a large file on “Life”, another on “Persistence”. Some individuals are so well represented that I keep their contributions together, whatever the subject. It’s a way to identify with people who have not only lived notable lives but also shared a clear eyed view that resonates with me in the here and now. If I concur with Mark Twain, Buddha, Albert Einstein, Carl Sagan, Mother Theresa, Jesus, Shakespeare, not to mention so many other notables; I think it’s fair to say that I keep some pretty good, philosophical company. When presented with a vexing or at least conflicting set of possibilities I think to myself, ‘What would Marcus Aurelius or Chief Joseph say about this?’ 

My mother had a flip-calendar on her kitchen windowsill with a different bible verse for every day. By the time she got back around to January, they were all new again. I could do that, make my own flip-calendar with my own sense of timely quotes rather than religious affirmations. On New Year’s Day I could go to Lao Tzu, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.” MLK Jr. Day could come from the Bible but I would lean toward his own words concerning; “. . . the content of one’s character rather rather than the color of their skin.” On April 15 it’s JFK’s, “Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.” Then on the 4th of July, Samuel Johnson, “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Hey, I’m on a roll. Imagine 365 sound bites on a single rolodex, funny, insightful, profane, divine, one for each day of the year; all applied to nurture a healthy attitude. A calendar of date appropriate quotes; that will be a task. I’ll have to start now if I want it for next year. 

TOKENS & TRINKETS

Even though I’ve recently cleaned house and culled out lots of junk, my life is awash with tokens and trinkets, things I’ve picked up that have no other value than to remind me of a story, of a particular day and a particular place. For whatever reason, I am attracted to stones with distinct markings that slide easly into my pocket. Neither can I resist feathers left behind by a bird that couldn’t wait; and sea shells, I pick them up as well. As a boy I helped my mother hang clothes on the clothes line to dry. I moved the basket ahead of her and handed her the next clothes pin. In the same way those clothes pins held my t-shirts and pillow cases out in the breeze to dry, my tokens pull up stories that would not have stirred a memory otherwise. 

Last week I was meandering through an old cemetery, reading what was there. Like a detective you have to find clues and put them in order, try to frame a story. You may not get it right but it’s an effort to make connection, if not knowing for sure then you settle for a feeling. I had been to Grand Isle before but never to the cemetery. A small, barrier island community on the gulf coast, it has been there well over 200 years. As I walked the path, reading names and inscriptions on crypts and grave stones, I was thumbing through the pages of a town’s history. 

As you go in the gate you come to the oldest graves first. Moving along with no particular agenda, I noticed marble monuments with detailed pedigrees and respectful, affectionate farewells. Marble doesn’t grow in south Louisiana, you have to ship it in from far away, but over time even the marble wears away making it difficult to read. The man’s name was Louis Chighizola, 1820 - 1893. I looked at it, did a double take and looked again. I was not familiar with the spelling but pronounced phonetically, the dates and the location, I thought, ‘OMG’. I know this story. I had to research some facts before I could have confidence in the obvious but it all fleshed out like I thought it would. 

Louis (Nez Coupė) Chighizola was a notorious pirate, a high ranking subordinate to the famous French pirate, Jean LaFitte. In his youth Louis lost his nose in a sword fight, thus the nick name; Nez Coupė (Cut Nose). After the War of 1812, LaFitte and his men were granted pardons for their crimes since they helped defend the City at the Battle of New Orleans. The days of pirating had come to an end and those aging sea rovers needed to find a new occupation. Many stayed on at Grand Terre and the adjoining barrier island, Grand Isle where they became fishermen, trappers and farmers. LaFitte sailed off to the west, starting another pirate colony on a barrier island off Galveston Bay but it was short-lived. Louis (Nez Coupė) Chighizola stayed on at Grand Isle, married, lived a long life with many children. His first son, Louis, was born in 1820. There I was some two centuries after Nez Coupė’s pardon, on his island, at the grave of his son, reconstructing the story. One could presume the old pirate’s bones are decomposed by now but they are certainly nearby. If he didn’t get a marble marker I’m sure there is a great story instead, if only someone had written it down. In the mid 1950’s, Paramount Pictures made a movie about LaFitte and his pirates. I saw it on VHS tape in the 80’s. Chighizola only had a bit part but then movies are about entertainment, not authenticity. 

What is so cool about the whole thing is the way it came to me, and then the way I lost it, and how it came back again as if to say, “Hey, I’m still here, don’t forget me again.” Moving on through Grand Isle’s cemetery you discover, it is full of Chighizolas. They are still there, on the island, every generation, the living as well as deceased. I don’t think I would want to live there or be defined by their story, but it is an awesome story. As a sort of follow up post script; I read that LaFitte had offended or provoked Louis (Nez Coupė’s) wife in some way that she would not let go. LaFitte gave a gold coin to the black smith to shape into a thimble. It was his peace offering and she accepted it. On the internet the legend is, that thimble is still in the hands of a Chighizola, somewhere in south Louisiana. The lady at the grocery said without hesitation, “The golden thimble is not a legend, it’s common knowledge. The lady with the thimble lives down the street, right here on the island.”

On the beach, before we left Grand Isle, I noticed something in the sand. You find everything on the beach from plastic debris to fish bones and decaying sea weed. I expect those eye catchers to be disappointments but I keep picking them up. It was just a little bump in the sand with a black dot on it. Brushing the sand away, blowing on it to get the last bit of wet stuff and I see a small, oyster half shell. It was solid black with no gray speckles or markings, no bigger than the end of my thumb. I’d never seen one like it, a new token to go in my pocket. I’ll have to throw something out now. I promised myself I’d get rid of something before I bring home anymore trinkets. 

EVERYBODY'S GOT TO EAT

Grand Isle, a small barrier island on the Gulf Coast only 50 miles south of New Orleans but if you want to drive the highway it’s more than twice that. Barely 4 miles long and a stone’s throw wide, a couple of thousand people live here year round while many thousands come to fish and vacation. In the live oak woods on the leeward side there are a few old homes down on the ground but everything else is built up on piers, 8, 10 feet, some higher. Storms and currents keep moving sand around, leaving long, narrow sandbars just offshore. If plants establish a dune system they collect more sand and you have a barrier island. When people build towns there it requires special adaptations to cope with big storms and to protect the dune system. When the oil and gas industry invests in off shore drilling it requires even more. 

Back in the 90’s I taught school in an urban setting in Kansas City, MO. We had money, lots of money. In the education business you learn fast; spend all the money as fast as you get it, all of it. Not unlike the biblical principle except in this case it could be the Board of Education or the state or the judge in charge of the desegregation plan that giveth and taketh away. If you don’t spend right away, it may be reassigned. Part of my job was to develop program, to spend money on projects that infused our Environmental Issues theme, across the curriculum. Bringing a busload of 7th graders to Grand Isle for 4 days is how I was introduced to the island. That program lasted 5 years before the money dried up, my job disappeared with it and I moved on. It was a good program, no frills, good science, a window of possibility none of those street kids would ever experience if not for the state’s money and my job. I still hear from a few of them. They remember details we hoped they would. They remember the food chain works in two directions and people are at both ends, and how water, CO2 & Nitrogen cycle, that if you tug on any part of the environment, the whole environment responds. They think it was worth it even if the state did not. 

I went back to Grand Isle this week, first time since I was there with students. The levee along with its road has subsided into the marsh. In its place is a 12 mile stretch of elevated causeway. Great swaths of grassy marsh have disappeared, now open water stretches where we waded and seined for crabs. In ’91, on the beach, they had built jetties perpendicular to the beach, out into the surf. Huge granite boulders were stacked in rows to stabilize the sand against storm surges. Granite boulders on a Louisiana beach; they didn’t wash up there, they came on railroad flat cars all the way from Tennessee. They are still there but somewhat rearranged by wear & tear from 25 hurricane seasons. I thought about the students, 12-13 year-old street kids with their shovels and buckets, waves washing over their feet and ankles as they dug in the swash, collecting macro invertebrates and shell fish. I thought about the shrimp and crawfish boil we were treated to by the people at Conoco Oil’s shore base. 

Sun was setting, I was sitting on a granite boulder watching colors change, hoping to see big birds on their way to roost in sheltered water somewhere. In the low light I didn’t see the them until they were on top of me. By the time I got the camera up they were overhead. Pelicans, not a hundred feet up; I turned to follow them and noticed a full moon in the frame. Shutter-click and they were gone. Out in the gulf you could see oil rig lights and barely hear the drone of a diesel engine coming off the water; a shrimper pulling a trawl, far enough out I couldn’t see his lights. The breeze kept mosquitoes at bay but inside the berm they would be buzzing. Everybody’s got to eat.  

WANNA-BE SCONES

I made pumpkin scones last night. This morning my suspicions were confirmed. Boxed mixes where all you do is add water, stir and bake; they miss the mark. The scones were alright but that’s not much of an endorsement. They are supposed to have a coarse texture with subtle, complex flavors. My box mix was fine texture and synthesized pumpkin was all you could taste. The coffee helped and I’ll not complain. Sometimes it’s just fuel for the machine. 

Headed down to Grand Isle, Louisiana today; about three hours along bayous and salt marshes. It’s a great place for birding and that’s the plan. We will scope out the dunes and the Oak/Hackberry woods this evening for an early excursion in the morning. My eyesight leaves a lot to be desired and I’m not all that familiar with shore birds but we have the field manual and binoculars. I’ll be happy with some Ibis and a few pelicans. Regardless of how the birds cooperate, I have great confidence there will be a brunch somewhere with fresh-off-the-boat shrimp and crab cakes. 

The train ride last Sunday is still fresh in my mind. To some extent it’s like a basketball game, you can doze off for a few minutes and get caught up in a sentence: “We crossed a bridge and the sun came out for a few minutes." On the up side, everything feels good; feeling the floor rock side to side, up and down and you think of sailors and sea legs. It doesn’t take long to know why they don’t fill cups or glasses all the way to the top. If all you wanted was coffee and a ride, you could have gone to work. 

We got to talk with the engineers when we did the turn-around in Summerville. They were as excited about the tandem run as the passengers and spectators along the route. If I didn’t always love my job, I always felt good about it: I wanted to be there. I got the same feeling from the crew and staff on the train. Maybe not enough pay and maybe the hours aren’t the best but nobody wanted to be somewhere else. 

MORE TRAINS

The Kansas City Southern RR ran through a cut just west of our house when I was a kid. We played on that timber trestle while chuffing steam engines pulled their freight trains underneath. I wanted to ride a train and I finally did but by that time they had replaced the steamers with diesel engines. The diesel horns were louder but it was just a single note blast. The old steamers could waggle the whistle rope and get a tone that was musical, with a Whooo, Woo-uuu-oooo sound that no kid could resist. Now, when you get the time and the money together you can buy a ticket on one of many Steam Excursions. Last Sunday we pulled out of the station in Chattanooga, Tennessee at 9:00 in the morning, gone all day and back by 6:00 p.m. The Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum has two operating, coal burning 4-8-4 engines and they double them up in tandem four times a year. Yesterday was one of those days. From our perch in a pullman window, we saw railroad buffs lined up at nearly every crossing guard, filming the tandem performance.  Of course both engineers were hanging on their whistle ropes. 

Meals in the dining car were served with traditional formality, all crystal and china. Coffee cups were tiny but white coated waiters were always there with a refill. In Summerville, Georgia they had to turn the engines around (one at a time) on a big turn-table and hook up to the opposite end of the train for the return trip. Midway back, we stopped at a convenient crossing and off-loaded everyone who wanted an action photo of the tandem hookup. The train backed up a quarter of a mile into the woods and then gave us a full steam drive-by. Thousands of shutter clicks and go-pro videos rolled. They stopped, we boarded again and it was up the road, headed back to the barn. Between cars you could hang out the half-door and take photos as opportunities allowed. You learn fast the difference between steam swirling back and down, and coal smoke, full of ash and cinders. I’m still working ashes out of my eyes. 

There are plenty of train songs; yesterday it was Steve Goodman’s ‘City Of New Orleans’ - Willie recorded it. I kept mouthing the words as we rumbled along, one particular line; “Rocking to the gentle beat, and the rhythm of the rail is all they feel.” The rails south of Chattanooga make for a bouncy ride and our top end was maybe, 30 mph. The narrow gage train from Durango, Colorado to Silverton is another steam excursion on my Bucket list. It runs up the Animas River canyon where the views are spectacular, any time of year. So I work at staying healthy, save some dollars and it’s not if, but when. OMG - this is so much better than anything I would have been doing at home. 

DOWN THE ROAD

I drove up to Small-Town Iowa the other day. Iowa is one story and small towns are another but they do go together. Wonderful place to spend the day; don't think I want to live there. Three hours on the interstate, then another half an hour on a two lane blacktop before I saw church steeples and a water tower. Chariton, Iowa is Mayberry without the mountains. My destination was on the square, a bicycle shop in the old movie theatre building. An extra layer of parking took up the space where the old court house lawn had been. I suspect when they built the tan brick and field stone court house, parking space was not an issue. Sometime in my lifetime they sacrificed the lawn for the sake of progress. When I got out it felt like Barney Fife should be coming up the sidewalk. 

The bike shop wasn’t really a bike shop. They specialize in trikes, three wheelers. Three related issues had brought me to this place; I crashed my go-fast bike and broke bones, I want to keep riding and I’m not getting any younger. I was interested in a recumbent trike, one wheel in back and two in front. You sit down low with the crank out in front. The technology is high tech and riding one was a new experience. After a couple of hours test riding three different models, I settled on one. He didn’t have the color I wanted so he had to order it and I’ll have to make the trip again. 

Well into the afternoon. Dave, the trike guy, gave me a coupon good for a meal at a restaurant on the other side of the square. The three story, red brick, Chariton Hotel was old on the outside but fitted out with the latest black and white and chrome decor inside. The BLT was good as any city sandwich. Across the street, another old, red brick building bore a big sign over the window that read, Piper’s Grocery, Meats & Chocolates. The store was old on the outside and just as old inside. Must have been 12 ft. up to the old tin ceiling tiles. The lady who owned the store recognized me as a stranger and gave me a 15 minute tour of the building and their inventory. 

Built in 1888, the board floor may have been replaced at some time but then it looked worn enough to be original. The place was a combination grocery, candy, meat, gift, antique store. Since it was built it has always been a grocery and owned by different generations of only two families. One section was for Amish products; jams and jellies, chutney and canned vegetables. I recognized Amish names on the labels, Troyer and Bontrager. I asked if there were any Yoder labels but no. She was impressed by my familiarity with the Amish. They make their own chocolate candies right there in the store, all displayed in a glass front case. I asked if they gave samples; in New Orleans they give samples. She said “Not usually, but you can sample any candy in the case if you like.”  I passed and went on through the gifts and antique section. The meat counter was full of red meat and sausage, what else in rural Iowa? I bought a quart jar of Amish pickled eggs and an antique Prince Albert tobacco can. She invited me back when I return for my new trike.

In all three places I shopped I couldn't miss cultural markers that I associate with rural, small town, midwest America. If it wasn’t evangelical plaques with come-to-Jesus wisdom it was “Make America Great Again” propaganda on bumpers and windows. I tried hard not to do or say anything that would out me. I think they know anyway, they know by osmosis just like I can tell when they chance into my secular,  progressive domain. But they smother you with kindness anyway; it’s the righteous way. Dave, at the tike shop, probed with some sanctified assumptions and the fact I didn’t affirm them certainly must have set off his “Heretic” warning bells. But he didn’t have any reservations about my credit card; funny how that works. He likes it best right where he lives and so do I, wherever that may be; over a hundred miles down the road, in another universe.