Flying with Arlo

 A couple of decades ago, more maybe, my son started fifth grade at a new school.  Desperate to help him adjust, I steeled myself to attend a mother's dinner.  I stood in the kitchen as conversation flowed in great waves around my clueless mind.  

At one point, a woman asked me who my student was.  "Pat," I answered, using the name by which he wanted to be known during that time.  She turned to her companion.  "Do you know a girl named 'Pat'," she asked the other mom.  "Oh, no," I hastened.  "It's short for 'Patrick', my son."  A look of annoyance flickered across her features.  

"We are the girl moms," she scolded.  "The boy moms are in the living room."  She turned away as I hastened to correct my egregious mistake.

Now comes Sunday, and my journey home from a week with that same boy, now a thirty-three-year-old man living in his own condo on the North side of Chicago.  Relegated to a wheelchair that my various infirmities immediately necessitate, I sit where I've been unceremoniously parked against a wall near the gate that will take me on the second leg of the all-day journey.  A mother juggles her little girl and a more patient boychild, while their father stands guard over the boy's backpack.  

"Tell your brother 'goodbye'," the woman urges the tiny child.  In response the urchin throws both arms around the departing one's legs and sends him lurching backwards.  He takes it with a grin and lifts her into the air -- just a few inches, but surely enough.  I exchange pleasantries with the parents while we all wait for the summons from the harried gate attendant.

Eventually, I find myself sitting next to the solo traveler.  The flight attendant gives him directions and I look down at him.  "Did you understand?" I ask.  He grins and replies, "I didn't even hear him!  Do you know what he said?"  I explain the safety rules to him.  We brace for lift-off, and then I show him how to put down his table and open the packet of pretzels.  He looks at me like he thinks I'm okay, not really a stranger, and asks me if I like the movie about Arlo the Dinosaur.  I think for a moment and then admit I've never seen it.

"It's my favorite," he chortles.  "Because he's named after me!"  I solemnly ask him what his name is, and his grin expands.  "Arlo, of course!"  Then he sobers a bit and says, "It has a happy ending but a sad middle.  Really, the sad part starts at the beginning because he loses his parents."  I ask if he found them again and Arlo shakes his head.  "No, he lost them forever."

The flight continues.  Arlo and I look at the clouds.  He remarks that the sun seems brighter and his eyes grow wide when I tell him why that might be.  I help him sort out his apple juice which he thinks tastes a little funny until he realizes that it might be because he's eating pretzels too.  "The tastes combine," he explains.  I ask his age and he tells me, "Almost nine," and I remark that he knows a lot for an eight-year-old.  He nods.  He knows.

When we get close to Sacramento, Arlo tells me that this is a special trip just for him to see his grandparents.  He thinks only his grandma will come get him because his grandpa doesn't like to leave his dog alone for very long.  He says his grandma is going to take him sky-diving.  He suspects it will be fun but also, he admits, a little bit scary.  As the airplane descends, he asks why we are slowing down and seems reassured by my answer.  I warn him about the landing gear and the possibility of a bump.  When it happens, his eyes grow wide and he says, "Well you were sure right about that!"

We wait for permission to unbuckle and the lady on the other side of me has started looking her phone. "Oh no," she cries.  "Jimmy Carter died!"  Arlo asks who Jimmy Carter is, and we explain.  The lady tells Arlo that after he stopped being president, he helped build houses for poor people.  Arlo says that sounds like a good thing to do, and asks the lady how old he was when he died.  The lady says, "100, I think, wasn't he?" and I agree.  Arlo puts his hand on my arm and says, "It's probably okay then, he was probably ready to die.  It's just as well.  He was probably tired."

Later, I watched Arlo leave the plane.  He doesn't see me because he's so excited to talk about the clouds. A woman about my age takes his hand, while her companion -- who apparently decided the dog would survive an hour alone -- swings Arlo's backpack over his shoulder.  

As  they move down the concourse, I think about the drive that I took with my son yesterday, to see parts of Chicago that he wanted me to experience.  We stopped outside a building with a mural dedicated to the murdered Black Panther activist Fred Hampton.  He manipulated his car so I could take a photo.  "That's probably the house in which the police gunned him down," my son tells me.  I think about my son and the causes he supports as our plane lands and Arlo watches the buildings grow larger.  "It's so beautiful," he tells me. Out of the mouths of  our children, I think, wisdom doth often come.

An attendant pushes my wheelchair along the hallway to the elevator and, side by side with another disabled passenger, we make our way onto the tram.  The lady next to me says, "I heard you with that little boy on the plane."  I turn to look at her, not sure of what to expect.  "You were very kind to him," she continues, and smiles.  

I shake my  head a bit dismissively.  "Anyone would have done the same," I insist.  She says, "But you seemed to have a way with him."   I look through the glass doors as we slow.  "Oh, well," I finally answer.  "It stands to reason.  I'm a boy mom, after all.  I should know something about talking to them."

Night falls around me.  I texted my son that I had safely arrived and smiled at his one-word response, "OK".  Not even a word, really -- just an acknowledgment, a noise, a shorthand for denying the obvious worry that might otherwise have lingered.  Once I would have read a thousand troublesome meanings into that brief message.  Tonight I send back an equally cryptic answer, a blue heart emoji, and let it go.

Mugwumpishly tendered,

Corinne Corley

The Missouri Mugwump®

My photo of the mural dedicated to Fred Hampton:     

Counting My Blessings

 

I have a lot of undertakings to which I give my income.  The shop that I founded, charities to which I donate, gifts for friends.  I used to go to the coast every month, before the shop.  I fly home once a year, renting a car and reserving an AirBnb.  I'm not a saver; I never have been.  I've been expecting to die since 1997, so there didn't seem to be a point.  Never mind that the poor fellow who made that prognosis himself died a year later, and that I have had twenty-seven years to understand his error.  I never learned to save, and that ship has sailed.  Fortunately, I taught my son -- or someone did -- and he will live better for it.

But I have enough, and I know I live a privileged life.  I still work at 69, because I must; but I don't mind the fact of continued employment.  Perhaps it's not ideal.  I grow weary, wearier than a decade ago and more quickly.  I've always been a bit unsteady on my feet, you know; and osteopenia hovers on the edge of my awareness.  Eventually, I will ease my workload, but it suits for now.  

I feel my privilege.  As I filled my salt mills the other day, the news of the day played in the background.  War; the collapse of governments across Europe and the Middle East; the threats to democracy --  all invaded the otherwise easy silence as I poured.  Celtic grey and Himalayan pink.  After I got that done, I decanted two pounds of one of my favorite beans, Mother Lode Coffee.  The counter needed cleaning, so I flicked the water lever and listened while my Precision Temp On-Demand propane water heater activated.  The water heater that my carpenter-builder installed failed after less than two years.  This brand cost ten times as much but has been incredibly reliable.  My small savings took a hit but I have no regrets. 

Christmas approaches.  All of the winter events for which I had responsibility have come and gone with a fair bit of success.  In a week, I will board a plane for Chicago.  I've yet to figure out a winter coat. My usual sources failed me -- Poshmark, ThredUp, the Goodwill in Lodi.  I could have gone to Kohl's while in town, but that's not my jam.  I ordered something semi-warm from Amazon despite its varied reviews.  It might go back; I might instead layer myself in wool until I deplane, and deal with whatever weather I encounter.  I'm sure my son will help me find something decent.  

My son takes me to the best places.  Once we went high above the city; so high, I could barely breathe.  Heights terrify me.  On that same visit, he navigated us to not one but two demonstrations. I watched, and listened, and we talked about the causes which put fire into the belly of his generation.  He grows more fine, more socially aware, more solid every year.  I could not be more proud of what he has made of himself.

  

Only fourteen days remain of this year.  I still have not resolved my website issues, mainly because I haven't had the time or stamina to make the decisions that the web guy outlined.  Time enough for that in the weeks ahead.  In the meantime, I have laundry to do, holiday cards to address, and a pile of scarves to sort through for the donation bag.  I ate a good dinner of gluten-free pasta and a mediocre plant-based sausage made primarily of egg whites and 'natural ingredients'.  I chuckled when I read that.  I suppose it could be arsenic for all I made a point of learning before I tossed them in the pan.  No matter; it charred nicely, and tasted vaguely of what I remember of meat.  I chased the lot down with cold spring water.

As we all head into whatever holiday we each celebrate, I bid joy to each of you.  Whether you believe in some higher power or just credit the universe with any grace that comes your way, I hope you can count your blessings on more than one hand.  As for myself, that goes without saying.

Mugwumpishly tendered,

Corinne Corley

The Missouri Mugwump®

Pie in the sky

 

10 December 2024, near the end of the eleventh year in which I continuously  strive to live without complaining.  Failure grips me; success skips away.

At 69, I should have chosen all the crossroads that fate might present but it seems that more await me.  My patience erodes.  I find myself unable to tolerate patronizing tones, jokes about serious subjects, and the outrage of self-righteous thinkers.  Employing an increasingly slim arsenal of resistance, I purse my lips in the face of any of these.  My mother's thin eyebrow arches; a twinkle shines in her eye; and in a second, my decade of intense study of nonviolent communication vanishes and I snap.  My mother's ghost turns away but not before I spy a little smile and a minute shake of her head.  

A competent web designer deems my sites irreparable -- or in the least, not worth repairing.  We switched into recovery mode as the hull of the ship sinks towards the ocean floor and my words desperately wave their frigid hands as they throw themselves on bobbing lifeboats.  I found a treasure trove on my laptop of the Musings, downloaded one at a time, in reverse, to prepare my manuscript two years ago.  It's the other blog, My Year Without Complaining, that struggles against the waves.  I learned my lesson:  Hire competent help; keep back-up files; update, update, update.  Those plug-ins won't mind themselves.

My friend Candy came into my shop the other day and asked when I would write another book.  She lives in the park where I landed seven years ago next week.  She and her husband have a 5th wheel with nearly twice the room of my tiny house and two yappy dogs, one of which likes me.  She bought my first release and even read it.  For that, if nothing else, I hold her dear.

Here's the thing:  I don't have to write another book, unless my focus changes.  I have years upon years of weekly missives that can be edited into a manuscript that I could shop on the strength of my first, self-published collection.  Nor would it be difficult to actually author fresh  material.  Rather than struggling to write, I must cudgel myself into doing anything else.  I can write; I find it easier than breathing.  Whether someone will underwrite the project remains to be seen.  

My unsettled emotional state might be the only impediment.  My inability to tolerate folks who treat me with an air of dismissal sends me into a tailspin now and again.  My faith in myself erodes. I question everything.  Last week, I even considered pulling stakes and hiring a flatbed to take my tiny house to my cousin Kati's land south of St. Louis, if she would still have me.  I'd hear that comforting blend of east and south in voices at the local diner.  My son would be just a five-hour drive to the north.  Three of my siblings would be in the metro area.  I could live in quiet seclusion, occasionally strolling across the way to have coffee on my cousin's porch and talk until dawn.

I'm tempted.

But then:  I get a call from the incomparable Tim Anderson, standing on my porch to claim a sleeping bag that I no longer need.  In his cheerful voice he asks if I would like an apple pie with or without caramel.  Before I can tell him that I shouldn't have sugar or gluten, he tells me that he'll leave both.  He thanks me for the sleeping bag which I had in turn gotten from our mutual friend Michelle Burke.  He says he can always use a sleeping bag for himself or one of the many friends who come to visit him in the Delta.  He closes with his usual, I'll see you always, ending the call almost before I can agree.

This evening, after a simple supper, I warmed one of the two pies.  The other easily slid into the small freezer in my tiny fridge.  With a pie server that I do not think I have used in a decade, I cut myself a modest serving.  I sat down to a piece of pie on a pretty plate, which I ate with a fork from the tableware that my sister sent me.  It's the pattern of my mother's everyday silver.  I find myself smiling.

The sun sets at five these days.  My son told me informed me that we are in Jupiter opposition.  I don't know if that impacts my mood but I've been crying and laughing in turns apropros of nothing discernible.  My spirit might be preparing for another crossroads.  I should tighten my shoelaces. I might have to choose in a hurry, and make a dash before I change my mind.

Mugwumpishly tendered,

Corinne Corley

The Missouri Mugwump®