Before stepping into the ruins, I stuck my head in, smelled the damp. It brought to mind my formitive years in Minnesota--fighting winter. There I was, dragging my blue blankie out of the damp basement--always the hunger. Up the steps I felt my skin crack--always the dry hands. In the kitchen I'd have another fight--always my sister. I prepared by clenching my fists, my teeth, my face--always the headache. After the fight I sat down on the cold linoleum of the pantry, pulled my blue blankie over my head, waited for the peace to fill in around my face. Waited for my mind's eye, bathed in blue blankie light, to build a better world. No, I didn't mind fighting. But I did mind always losing.
But enough with the child's play, I had these all too adult ruins to get behind me. My game plan: Enter this side of the ruins, say, "Ruins, get thee behind me." Then exit the other side.
I was raising my John Wayne leg, when I had the ruins say, "You humans; why do you choose to suffer so?"
Posing with leg raised, I said, "My lot as human, I guess."
"What a low lot, that. See, we ruins choose a superior road. Choose not to suffer. Neither do we choose elation. With no ups or downs we remain in a state of equilibrium; sustain stability--the golden mean as it were."
Mean got me to thinking I should take a shot at taking these stable ruins to school on the mess we humans have where our lives are concerned. So I put my John Wayne leg down, said, "We humans start out golden mean enough--in the womb that is. But then the mean doctor pulls us out, welcomes us to life with a smack to our backsides. So we spend the rest of our lives seeking escape, seeking the elation that will mitigate the pain, fear, and sinking depression that comprises our reality."
The stone ruins tried to say something here, but I wasn't done.
"Take my reality, Ruins--the reality of my formative years: My dad hated his job, so he took it out on my face; the face that ate up all he earned. And my mom, well, she hated her marriage, so she took it out on my bonehead, the bonehead that looked like the husband she no longer loved. Then the grandma comes to town, and talk about the walking Blues; why the only time she stopped walking was when she told you depressing tales of yesteryear."
The ruins, here, having been through some yesteryears of its own, tried to take me to school on yesteryears. But I wouldn't have it.
"No, Ruins, no one's been more schooled in yesteryears than me. Well, Grandma Vik's yesteryear, anyhow. See, Grandma V had this condition whereby she could remember everything about yesteryear, but couldn't remember she'd told you everything about yesteryear yesterday, ha, ha."
Of course, one couldn't recall one of Grandma's yesteryears without craving something sweet. "But first, Ruins, let me touch on my first love."
So vivid was my memory of my first love, I quick-drew my pad and pen--had a lead on a line that might launch a guy's autobiography: "There were a lot things I hated about grandma V, but those ribbons of hard candy she kept in her dark pocket; they were my first love."
I looked up, settled my eyes on a patch of gray between the firs that I might better flash-back to my childhood--how it went with grandma V.
"Young man," grandma Vik would say, opening her hand, "bear witness." She'd close her eyes then, move a cane in the air like a paintbrush. "There it is; the old gristmill. See it, son, down by the river there. Stone, rising up."
"Grandma," suck, suck, "there's no gristmills no more. It's 1961. Jeez."
"No gristmill?" Grandma would open her eyes. "You're right, son; tweren't no mill; twas a castle Elsa and I would ride to. Of course, I used a saddle. But not that Elsa--a real berserker, that one. Oh, you should a seen it; stone, rising up. No, I'm sure it's come down now. Everything with a story to it's come down now. Well, exceptin' out west. Say, young man, what you say we bust out of this one-church town, catch us a passenger train west?"
"Grandma," suck, suck, "the passenger train don't come through town no more. Jeez."
"No train? Huh, not surprising. That oaf of a father of yours, moving to a town with no . . . And you, all sickly all the time. No wonder, with no warmth to come home to, no hearth. When I was a kid, we took to looking into a fire of an evening. It's in fires you see stuff. That's why you're sickly, son; you got no fire to look into. No, I wouldn't blame you one bit if you went out to the barn about now, put that rope in the mow to good use."
"Grandma," suck, suck, "we don't got no barn. Jeez."
"No, tweren't no barn; twas a castle, stone rising up. Must-a dug the stone up yonder. Up to where the sun goes down. Up from where a man comes riding down once. 'What's he got in there?' I says to Elsa on account of the man's stickin' his big finger in his mouth cause he can't speak no Norwegian. Well, thirst is what Elsa says the big man's got. So I took to pumping him a pail. 'Elsa,' I says, as he's riding off, 'I'm going to get hitched to that man some day.' Of course, Elsa didn't understand, seeing how she'd gotten it in her head she was a man. But no man matters to girls who got horses to get out, castles to get to, stories to get into. Of course, kids these days wouldn't know from story. Oh, for the day when everything had a story in it."
"Grandma," suck, suck, "we got things with stories in it; it's called TV."
That's the day grandma V took a turn for the worse--took to smacking the TV with her cane.
I had stopped the flash-back then. Stopped it because I had these ruins to get behind me.
"No, Ruins," I said, placing a warm hand on the stone door jam, "I've not forgotten you. I'll step into you shortly, but first I must recall a memory or two of my dad--my dad who was always mad at me, mad at my mom. No, my dad never took to hitting my mom, but neither did he take to having grandma V living with us."
I took my hand off my poor ruins, got back to my flash-back.
"Darling," my dad would call my mom, "the next time that Loony Tune grandma of yours takes to breaking the TV, the TV's goona stay broke. And then you'll find out what it's really like raisin' kids."
"No, Ruins," I said, placing a warm hand on the stone door jam, "I've not forgotten you. I'll step into you shortly, but first I must recall a memory or two of my dad--my dad who was always mad at me, mad at my mom. No, my dad never took to hitting my mom, but neither did he take to having grandma V living with us."
I took my hand off my poor ruins, got back to my flash-back.
"Darling," my dad would call my mom, "the next time that Loony Tune grandma of yours takes to breaking the TV, the TV's goona stay broke. And then you'll find out what it's really like raisin' kids."
Well, I may have been all of nine, but threatening my mom like that was enough to make a man of me. So I took to defending what I loved; hugging the TV with my ass.
No, Grandma never took to hitting me when she threatened the TV with her cane; she punished me by taking me to school.
"Kids these days," Grandma would say, "getting their stories out of TV. In my day kids got their stories out of doors. Out of doors was where the wonder was--weather, woods, and all things alive. You'd be weeding the cornfields, say, and you'd see a bug. So, you'd forget weedin' and away would go your day, down on all sixes, gettin' dirt enough behind your ears ma could grow potatoes. And there's the lesson for you, young man; no story's worth gettin' into if you don't get dirty by it."
"Kids these days," Grandma would say, "getting their stories out of TV. In my day kids got their stories out of doors. Out of doors was where the wonder was--weather, woods, and all things alive. You'd be weeding the cornfields, say, and you'd see a bug. So, you'd forget weedin' and away would go your day, down on all sixes, gettin' dirt enough behind your ears ma could grow potatoes. And there's the lesson for you, young man; no story's worth gettin' into if you don't get dirty by it."
"Grandma," crunch, crunch, "it's winter out. Snow don't get you dirty. Jeez."
"Kids these days, scared of a little winter. In my day, we had snow up to the eves. Then Lord help us if the thaw came early; gully washers gutting the fields, rivers up over the bridge. 'No,' I says to Elsa. 'I ain't crossin' that bridge.' But Elsa starts up with how we was in a story, and no story's worth being in if the characters aren't scared a little. So we rode on over and there it was--the old grist mill the boys warned us never to get near. So we got nearer still, clean inside, which was scarier still, cause we was up to our knees in river. So we looked up to pray to God cause our legs was freezing off. But the roof was all caved in, and that's when we saw it. Ya, right up there in the rafters. Oh, I wish I could tell you exactly what we saw--wait. I never told ya exactly what we saw, I hope?"
"You only never told me a million times. Hey, grandma," I stuck a finger in my mouth, "my candy's all sucked out."
"No way, mister; no candy's going to get me to talk. And since Elsa's long dead, nothin' sweet will work on her, neither. But I'll tell you this: That story me and Elsa got ourselves into was something--the last word in stories as far as we was concerned." Grandma pulled out a ribbon of hard candy, examined it as if it were the last word.
And, boy, that hard ribbon sure looked like the last word to me; undulating veins of rubies, emeralds, and pearls. I lunged for the ribbon, for I wanted to get that last word in my mouth. But grandma closed her spotted hand, put the last word back in her black pocket.
"And that's why I tell it to you, Anton Sogn Celadon; the day Elsa and I went out West and got something. Some say that's why poor Elsa died. But it didn't happen that way. But who cares what some say. The story Elsa and I got out West was all there was to get. And that's what you need to go out and get; a story of your own. Cause if you don't got no story to get into, you're dead."
****
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