Beyond the Kale

Beyond the Kale

Peel an apple.

If you're all haughty taughty and have one of those fancy apple core-er gadgets you line up and press out perfect slices. Good for you. I usually bore the core with those.

Anyways... slice your apple into half-grape size. Be sure you remove every inch of the core including those little plasticy parts of outer core beyond the seeds. Divide and place apples into two ziplock baggies with one tablespoon of water and a dash of lemon in each. Ever reflect on the contrast between modern, rushed mornings and intentional, slow rituals?

As a wee toddling child, I knew mama's hope of a morning was that the youngest siblings would continue slumbering at least long enough to allow her to finish her dawn rituals. She enjoyed savoring the quiet times, getting daddy's milk delivery man uniform ironed. She kinda' liked the way his muscles moved under starched white cotton broadcloth. Especially on that powerful frame.

I always thought it was sad to wear stiff hard clothes with big sweat stains on the pits and back. "Jack" was written in fancy script above his shirt pocket in shiny deep green threads. I couldn't read but mama said it stayed dirty 'cause he reached in for Camel cigarettes all day. Because daddy had a habit, you know.

Zip, shake and store behind something healthy in the fridge beyond the kale. Take your time, mama said. Do it right the first time.

No matter how white the uniform, one might think they smelled. To this day, I prefer not to sweat, ever. Mama had a sprinkle head screwed on an old abused RC Cola bottle to steam those creases. This was a task she certainly could have done last night but nooo.

So now shes standing in curlers, red-faced sweatin', ironing for this man under a swinging tobacco stained lightbulb at DARK:30 a.m. You damned right! He'd come around from the back of the house in his boxers, smellin' all like Vitalis hair tonic and old spice. His Jackson Blu eyes sparkled and he'd kiss her, smack on the mouth, on the way out he'd let the screen door close quiet like. That's a consideration ya'll and that man looks good in a uniform.

Standing at that screen door, shirt and shoeless, mangy teddy in hand I'd wave byebye, byebye... Someday he wouldn't be back. That story is a sad one, comes later.

On a rainy day in June you could smell the sun in the soil. The entire skin slightly moist, it was a discomforted edge. When daddy leaves, he always honks twice as he gets on the paved road yonder past the pond. Beep beep, and mom would always blow a kiss off loving shiny red fingertips in that direction. That always make me blush.

She'd sigh, and perch on the edge of the banana yellow plastic chair. It matched the stainless steel formica topped table squozen into the cramped throughly lived-in and cluttered kitchenette. With her precious Maxwell House instant coffee, in a lipstick stained plastic mug. Lightened with Carnation evaporated milk right from the can, and bleached white sugar she'd pause.

She coveted her alone time in the one bathroom shared by our family of three young'uns, daddy and that good ol' hound dog, Mr. Hambone. She'd have to fix her hair, dress for work secretarying for the welfare folks in downtown Lake City, Florida. Applying blobs of make-up to those funny faces many women folk know, and finally blending, blotting and powder. Or was that powder and blot?

Daddy used to tease mama and get her all riled about how hard he worked in the heat and flies at the dairy while she sat down there in that air-conditioned office building telling dirty jokes and goofing off. Then they'd bust out laughing. They both knew better, they held certain knowledge of one another.

To dress in the mid-50's, required under-wired torturing contortion. Fancy snapping clothing that cinched, hooked, boosted and clung tight here and loose there. The effort usually sharpened and softened with lace or ruffles, then nylon stockings with seams in back and some kind of opened toed shoes. Where were they? Have to get the kids up, fed and drive across the tracks to pick up our beloved maid Miss Evelyn. Where were the keys? Funny what memories oatmeal can bring.

I always soak my instant oatmeal overnight in the fridge. Let us say it's better for me. If I'm feeling particularly decadent, I'll soak those oats in pure -T Half&Half ya'll. Most of the time it's lactose free whole milk.

Mama was good at answering certain questions mechanically in the same way. Maybe this was a result of raising what would grow to seven young'uns.

Example: Question - I

s today Tuesday? Always, "All day long." Question -

Can we go to the beach? Always, "Let's don't and say we did."

My friends get to stay up late. Always, "If your friends stuck the heads in a bucket of, Let's say goo, would you?

Mama, mama, Mama, whine, whine, whine. Always, "You're cruising for a bruising."

Question - Why do boys peepee's stick-out and girls peepee's stick-in? Always, "ask your Daddy".

Tomorrow after coffee and meds kick in, you'll get an un-fed feeling. That vague uncomfortable sensation that usually creeps up just as you would have gone back to bed. An undeniable echoing rumble of vacant space that is more than just empty. Approaching hangry.

This is the time in our hectic schedule. A special way to start the day that is just for us in every way. At seventy years of age, this old man looks and listens in my heart to that oatmeal from long ago, blurping in the big pot of a morning. That usually meant we were out of Cornflakes. Why God? Just why do we have to eat gruel? Trust me, the dog didn't like oatmeal either.

Meanwhile A hundred miles away, in Jacksonville, Grandma sat at the small table in an impeccably clean teal blue tiled kitchen with black trim. She's enjoying the last of two pieces of cheddar cheese toast she'd browned under the broiler. Rising at 5 a.m., she'd been at her easel painting two hours already.

Grandma loved her house. It was was once a carriage house for the large Victorian residence next door. The three stalled structure had an apartment on the top she moved there and built a home of the space below. She was always so proud of the steel beams she'd used in its construction. Hurricanes worried her.

Grandma's house was located in Springfield, the oldest neighborhood in he city. The sundappled sidewalk of East 17th street, the area that survived the great fire of 1901, it was a neighborhood fit to live in. A young widowed mother of two she'd worked hard and long to live here and to enjoy her contented retirement. Sigh, poor Grandma, I was sure she must be terribly lonely. Dry kisses and all.

Ever wonder how many times your Grandma told you to wipe your feet? Or sit up straight, mind your manners, not to pick your buggars or fart on the bus? Get your feet off the couch and leave your sneakers on the porch? The lady who kisses you with her lips so un-puckered it looks painful. Another oatmeal eater a saint and an angel.

Grandma use to tell a story about 1918 after the war she married my grandpa. Well Mr McGruder was a salesman for the John Deere company. She came home one day to find my grandma applying a tincture from a tiny bottle under her arms. Well, he laughed and laughed when she told him how much she had wasted on that new-fangled "deodorant!" The next afternoon as grandma returned home from the market, there sat grandpa, rubbing that expensive cream all over his salesman feet and toes. How they'd enjoyed each other.

“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.” - John Milton (9 December 1608 – 8 November 1674), an English poet and intellectual. From his 1667 epic poem Paradise Lost.Inebriation Hell defies description in real terms. I describe it like the overflowing content of an empty box. Nothingness infinitely. It is striking. Not flames. Not demons. Just absence. No echo. No texture. No resistance. An eternal blank. Quieter than fire. It’s the kind of Hades you brush up against in early sobriety sometimes — not pain exactly, but vacancy. Noise stops and what remains is… space. Untreated, that space can feel terrifying. Treated gently, it becomes possibility. An empty box can be: a studio before the paint, a lined page before the ink, a cleared junk drawer, a craving without a fix. My humble thought is: If the mind can make hell of heaven, conversely it can make heaven out of the smallest square of ground. An empty appliance box can become a massive mansion if you've currently no roof to call your own. A heavenly haven if you will.

Far and long ago, six decades, my Daddy gave me the first sip off his frosty beer can. I should have known an immediate head to toe shiver, though pleasant and somehow familiar, probably wasn't good for children. I felt that same sensation on the first jigger of the last night I drank. That was 738 days ago. I should have known alcohol wasn't a friend.

Twenty years later, 1974 high school graduation marked my first big life timeline event. A time anticipated and dreaded, also a continual referral point im my memory for years. I was eighteen a giant pimply bag of naivety, anxiety and luck. It had been a childhood of love, contentment and Disney-like enchantment. I'd grown up in alcohol related violence, desperation, betrayal, lies, and abandonment.

In other words - just like every other kid excluding the violence and booze. It probably doesn't surprise you to hear I was a late bloomer, a loner kept to myself mostly. I was invited to social gatherings, but I was shy. I was actually handsomely attractive for about five minutes one night in the summer 1984. It was the year before my thirtieth birthday

THIRTIETH year, my second life-event timeline. It was then I began abusing whiskey and smoking cigarettes heavily. A ton of both wouldn't be an exaggeration. There were tears in my Cheerios that birthday morning. But I digress...

I don't know why I keep writing this. Except I am compelled to not forget what I mustn't remember. I want to hold it close to me. And to know these are my thoughts. True life memories and not my protective heart/mind speak! Maybe you are still reading me, I do hope so.

I believe It was that hot Jacksonville summer of my first eighth grade, I did two years in 8th, I was hovering around and near the cinderblock house because I sensed Mama might need me. I heard yelling so I stuck my head under the mid-century modern by-folding living room window and saw my dad wobbling in front of my mother, his double-barrel shotgun inches from her nose. It was then I heard the words that still sear my very psyche today, in my near dotterage. Mama was sitting straight in her rocking chair, It wasn't rocking, it was trembling. She was sweating in her lacey slip and no shoes. Staring into his Jackson Blu eyes and in a low steady voice she said, "Pull the trigger Jack, I'd rather be dead than married to you."

This oatmeal is delightful. It's a giant step up especially pre-soaked.

Cook In a medium microwaveable bowl empty one baggie of apples (we stashed them in the fridge behind the kale last night after the ambien but before bed.)

Within days begins the move to Grandma's. Poor Grandma. Thank God she loved us all is all I can say. The night we arrived on 17th street unannounced. We were to sleep on scattered oriental rugs all wrapped in soft clean blankets under a roaring air-conditioner and on shiny waxed tile. Honey child; we thought we were living High on the hog. Mama slept with the youngest two. As quiet fell somebody screamed and as one, we all jerked up to daddy's kicking on the front door. We all saw his face and a shotgun barrel bobbing there, backlit by the streetlights, as it appeared through the small stair-step windows. Grandma shouted to him through the door, she was gonna call the Police. She was convinced he'd been possessed by Satan and hearing Hells bells. He said it wouldn't be the first time tonight. But he did leave.

As I settled down to sleep that night, all of us in the hallway, i cried a little it's hard to be a strong 13 year boy and be so scared at the same time. You have to wonder what went wrong and how was it your fault somehow.

I think from grandmas perspective she may have actually lived a fuller life the following half decade than those peaceful early retirement days. She had a way of shining the grandma pride beam of joy and the ability to look a thirteen year old boy in the eye, and say, "That's none of your business" too. A new home, a new way of life for us eight in the two bedroom apartment upstairs Grandma gave us. The one she rented out. Grandma liked to rest in her convictions.

You know I couldn't say as why, but I've had a burning drive to write these little stories down. Memories of characters all wanting to be recalled collectively. And placed in the best light. I'm feeling over-worded. Too many thoughts coming so fast they pass by, and me using a stylus. Sun shines brighter there even as there fades behind us. It all slips away forever eventually. Why do I feel like a lovely funeral dirge. Maybe not enough oatmeal.

Dad's leaving wasn't the first time. They divorced before. Yeah! Two kids before. I guess we'll never really know the why of that. And I've accepted spilled milk is only good for the lucky kitten.

I own there is no way to excuse or deny physical, or emotional abuse. Nor must incompatibility, attraction or substance abuse be the end of all relationships. But I know one thing as a fact. My dad shouldn't have had children. He'd conveniently have jobs that had shifts so he'd be home sleeping when the house was empty. But you can believe he was there of a Saturday, ordering the boys into the bed of the current pick-up truck for that buzzed hair cut.

He'd cut a watermelon on the picnic table and go in the house to eat his alone. And hunted and fished more than most. Mama used to say those were expensive hobbies. He'd say he was the mighty hunter and feeding his family. He'd lean in for a kiss, right on the mouth, and light her cigarette. That always makes me blush.

And finally gentle friends remember, sometimes it's hard to receive a gift, until it isn't given. My new sobriety won’t change who I am with you. Not how I see you, not my tone, not my care, not the ease with which I meet your sentences. What evolves is living and responding to the space we create. It’s feeling less afraid of the edges, the pause that enlightens and brings closer everything we used to push away with the drink. Dont ever allow provocation and response—become your only conversation thats just wrong.

The ability to not know, to hold two responses and choose one, to move forward without resolving everything, to say “this, for now” without demanding forever. Animals react, humans hesitate— in that hesitation, we imagine, forgive, invent, and sometimes love better. To live in reality, here and now, turns into the reward all that booze tried to hide. The why's are still there for dusting and valuation.

Maybe that is what my stories can do. Ignite a pattern of images to help clarify. To clear the mud in the puddle that is the growing into a man in the early seventies, a time of chaos societal and personal.

Stir in a pat of butter, a healthy sprinkle of Ceylon cinnamon, and a sweetner; couple tbs of sugar, honey, Splenda, the pink pkg type stuff. Don't forget a wee dram of maple syrup. Now microwave on high two and a half minutes. Add the waiting soaked oats, stir, and cook one minute.

Yourself will love you for the effort. We reap what we sow, a stitch in time... like water under the bridge, and that sand in an hourglass, Alright mama, sending hopes to everyone! Enjoy breakfast.

In conclusion, anyone who sees themselves in my stories, I'm humbled you think so, and sorry for your lost childhood. I used alcohol and my wits for forty years to learn to live this story. The others who were there or who grew up in the deep south and know we never talk about a thing easier talked around, will admit to similar events. But memories are unique and personal of course. Most are no longer here to tell the other versions.

But it's sobriety that fills the ink in my pen now and the pace of is disclosure. Opening and closing doors of hope and missed opportunity. The future, long or short. The future and a promise of my continued success in that ignoble endeavor. With that and a deep bow for your kindness in reading this through to the end. With utmost respect, here's to your continued good health. May you receive the love you give.