Balloon Man

We walk into Gillian's Fun Deck on the boardwalk. The July summer evening is slightly cooler than the hot day as the black ocean's white breakers wash sound over this carnival. Dad gets tickets so we can go on the rides. My heart knows I can pine for this, because Dad loves to make us happy. But with restraint. I know not to go after everything--I'll pass up the caramel popcorn wafting it's sweet aroma up in the salty air, or the soft ice cream counter with the twisted brown and white peaked sweetness. The balloon guy is filling up balloons with gas that hisses then chirps at the end. The giant foil shapes lurch on their strings to escape skyward: stars, clown faces, flowers. I'm going to let that pass, too, since I won't be able to carry it around. Dad would get me one. He's like that. I miss him.

Summer Camp(ing)

When I was 10 or 11, I'd get my friend over to the house and we'd pitch a tent out on the edge of the yard and camp there. The woods stood as a wall, the dark scraggly trees and tall, thin poplars staking out their space. It sloped off sharply down, down to the ravine, a slow, swampy bed where the little creek filled with skunk cabbage, logs and tangled growth blocked us from hopping around like we would on rocky creeks. But we stayed away from that with our tent. It was scary down there, the smell of rotting leaves and cabbage, the too-quiet space between us and the town on the other side. A lone dog barking, lonely. The summer air, moist on my skin, but tolerably cool at night. We zipped the tent closed. The old canvas smell and my slightly musty sleeping bag filled my nose, and silence punctuated my ears. The lumpy sandy soil under the plastic tarp still poked through the sleeping bag. We tried to lay there and sleep. No, we laid there and said "Did you hear that? What was it? Is someone out there?" It was scarier not seeing what was around us than being out in the open. This lasted about an hour until 11 when we gave up and went into our nice, safe, clean back porch enclosed by screen walls. We decided to sleep there instead. No wondering about who was peering at us or planning to pull the pegs on the tent.

New Year's Day

The year expired with a final gasp of well-wishing by millions to whoever else would listen. It expelled bursts of burning color into the sky, decorating black cities across the globe with dancing displays of light and crackles and booms. Today, the empty lungs of the New Year attempt in inhale enough breath just to get up and resume life again. The cares of the upcoming new work week begin to seep into my dreams at night and just a little even during the day. The taste of cheese and wine fades as the morning treats of more cheese and eggs and tea and coffee arouse me to the gray, barren winter morning. My warm robe covers a tired body as the smell of soap washes life onto my face. Then the aroma of coffee lifts my spirit a bit. The kazoo-like cacophony of curious strutting bands in Philadelphia twangs out of the TV speakers. The New Year begins, while thoughts of suffering or even dying friends remind me that no, the new year will not be happy or prosperous for all. Only assurance of eternity with the risen Jesus--who punched death a knock-out blow--can provide that.

The Butcher Shop

Mom and I walked up to the shiny glass meat counter of the small grocery store in town. Behind the counter, three men, dressed in white shirts and pants and wrapped with white aprons, all were busy chopping, weighing, wrapping and taping packages of meat. Mom began her order: four Delmonico steaks, something about chicken, and chipped beef. I looked eagerly at Tony, the owner of the business. He presided behind the counter. His shiny black hair and smiling face always made me feel good. Sure enough, he looked at me and invited me back behind the counter. I pushed open the forbidden door to a storage area, walked a few steps around to the backstage area of this production. I stepped onto the floor covered in sawdust. Then, in a ritual not unlike a Mass where Tony was the priest, he lifted me up onto the altar of a butcher block where I got to sit and watch. There, on the stage, I looked out at the customers smiling at me, a six year old kid, and feel immensely important under their gaze. The smell of fresh meat under the thump of cleavers made this all so fresh, productive, and exhilarating. Out in the aisles, I could see women in trench coats with purses on their arms picking through cans on shelves, looking at prices and carefully deciding what to put in their little carts. The roll of white paper next to me spun out a smooth sheet that Tony tore off with a rip. He spread it out on the counter where he carefully placed the steaks, glistening dark red, and wrapped them in perfect tightness and folded order, secured with a strip of masking tape. On the package, he wrote with a black marker that I could smell from my distance. "Anything else Margaret?" he asked and she said "That's all. Thanks." He lifted me down, and I slid my feet along the sawdust one last time, just because I liked the feel of it, and out I went, back off the stage into the store.

Foraging on the Beach

The cold dawn air squeezes through the woven wool blanket that wraps him on the grass floor. Children can sleep through anything. But the automatic shivers refuse to let him sleep any longer. In the dark hut, he sees through a gap in the cloth door. There, in the sky towards the east, he sees the color change from dark ink to a more intense blue. He decides to get up, fumble around for his longer pants on the floor and pull them over his skinny legs and bony hips. He finds the long-sleeved cotton shirt, dirty but warm, and pulls it over his frame. He slowly, carefully, steps over the grass floor, each step crackling and causing the others to turn in their places. Slipping through the doorway, he walks out onto the grassy path and makes his way down to the beach. The tide is thankfully low, exposing the bounty of things it deposited over night. The sea slaps against a few nearby rocks, but is otherwise calm as a lake. The salty stench of drying seaweed fills the still morning air. Happily, he seems to be earlier than the scavenging birds that will soon be picking over the morsels, too. He finds a few crawfish, then a conch with meat still in it. Some seaweed will be useful to keep his insides moving. With a basket of finds in his arm, he proudly goes back to the hut where he can show his waking family what he got to start the day.