kathibook

I have a son. One son. Only. He is called Jeremiah. He prefers Jer. I always knew that he would be born to me. This particular boy. This Jeremiah. Even before I became pregnant I knew that this boy would be my son. And just as there was only one child for me, there was also only one mother for him. I would come to save his life many times over as he grew, just as he would mine as I aged. These stories are about fate. They are also about the daily tryst that rages on between good and evil, evil the vanquisher more often than one would hope; they are about the pull of family, a pull that sometimes feels more like a rip-tide pulling you under; and they are stories about magic, a magic that has kept both mother and son safe on those days we were forced to witness evil slay good. These stories are for my son.

FIRST STORY

‘he’s not going to touch me again no no no not again! ooohhh where’s laurie hiding i told her to hide maybe he’s looking for ceely maybe he doesn’t want me at all he’s looking for ceely she’s older skinnier than me skinny girls are prettier he just wants me to tell where she is but i won’t tell him where she is! no sir! no sir! he can’t make me he can shuffle off with his old-man-ugly-face and he would have to kill me first to make me tell maybe if i cross my fingers and toes he’ll go away make sure he doesn’t see your crossed toes in those new white sandals dig them into the floor of the forest Gran Book wouldn’t scold me if she knew why i had to scuff the shoes pretend he’s not here when i look over he will really truly be gone no! no! no! he’s still here i’m too fat i think boys don’t like fat girls don’t you dare call me princess you lier i’m not your princess you’re a dirty fibber god please make him leave me alone make him leave all of us alone this time pleeeeeasssse god pleeeeeeeeeassssse make him go away pleeeeeease make my Mom call my name god please please please please please make him go away go away go away’,and i squeezed my crossed digits until they turned bright red.

As though by a miracle a shaggy red dog came bounding out of a small copse of birch trees, down the pathway, headed right toward us. I’m not sure if my sigh was audible and, recklessly, I didn’t care. I did however have enough sense to know that I was not to bolt off of the log we were both perched upon to greet my hero who was drooling and panting in expectation. That would be like acknowledging a hero was required in the first place. No, control of the situation would remain firmly in his hands and the expectation would be that I remain the dutiful ‘speak-until-spoken-to’ granddaughter. The dog was delirious, wagging, trying to engage me in play, nuzzling at my hands, urging them to come to life. They could not, not until given permission. My anxious, little, lionhearted puppy dog had to settle for the small, anticipatory movements of my fingers until I was released from the constraints of a nuclear family discipline. He stood, shaking out his pant legs the way men will after they’ve been sitting for a while, especially tall men who sit down with small children. Thus we stood, each gazing off into the distance from whence the dog had come; me hoping there was a master trailing after; grandfather hoping there was no such master, and the beast quite satisfied with things as they were so long as he had access to my hands which he mistook for a salt lick.

Several long minutes later an odd little man came stumbling out of the same grove of tall birch trees that the dog had issued forth from. I don’t think either one of us took a breath for several long seconds, mentally remarking upon the man’s ‘unusual’ appearance. He was adorned in garb rather like that reserved for big game hunters or explorers, like those I watched on Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom every Sunday night. In his right hand he had hold of a fallen sapling branch that he had fashioned into a walking stick; in his left hand was a compass that he was peering into, gazing over as opposed to through a shockingly thick pair of dirty eye glasses that were perpetually sliding down his sweat-streaked nose. His khaki colored cotton shirt he wore was speckled with burrs, the binoculars around his neck were covered with a layer of mud and creek silt, as were his hiking boots and a pair of strange goggles perched atop his head. And from the look of the redness on his lower left leg I’d wager he walked into some poison ivy. The man was clearly lost, tapping on the face of his compass with the head of his walking stick every few seconds. He barely even noticed when he stepped back onto the marked path; if it weren’t for the small ragtag army traipsing behind who pointed him in our direction, it seemed unlikely that he would have stumbled upon us, or his dog, at all. A man so preoccupied trying to get to where he’s going that he got lost along the way. I thought that curious and may have pondered upon it any other day. At the age of nine I might have already had an inkling that this was one of humankind’s universal foibles, getting lost along the way, and that I would do it many times myself. But for right now I was just relieved at being found.

As the quirky fellow and his band of misfits came closer the most remarkable thing happened to me; I felt the heaviness, like a blanket, the one that shows up and smothers me with love whenever my grandfather is around, lift from atop me and drop upon his shoulders instead. My backbone instinctively straightened as this weight slid off of my shoulders, and in turn I watched him slump, like the weak old man I had ever wished him to be. I knew that this was just sleight-of-hand though, merely for show, the benefit of appearances, him wearing my mantle. The fact is, he doesn’t know how to be an old man, a grandfather, which is what the situation was about to demand. He had to steal his frailty and innocence, and from a child no less, his own nine-year-old grandbaby-girl-child. I was ashamed for him. But so long as he chose to wear the mantle of his victim I would ensure that it weighed heavily upon him, that the garment proved to be both cumbersome and oppressive. First, by bending him cripple with remembrances of past betrayals and violations; every bad touch piled onto his shoulders, leaving him lame in body and mind.The garments of the righteous enveloped him, making it easy to take things from him, steal away his ability to speak. As my shroud closes tightly about his throat, preventing him from spewing venomous lies and spinning treacherous tales to frighten children. Lastly, I shall reveal him for the buffoon he is; not only will his tongue be tied but his feet shall be as well. The length of my garment will grow. It will grow until it is too long for him to manage, too long for him to contain, tying his feet up in knots. As though caught up in his own web. Tripping over his own lies. The lies that have become too big, the years too long, the children number too many. And he can’t keep it all straight anymore. Causing him to fall to the ground with each step he takes. Just a sad old man now.