Point of no return?

I was watching TV Land today--ok, before you judge, I am on vacation.  If I had this job situation locked up, I'd be with my grandchildren and kids in Pittsburgh, but I'm not.  So, I'm watching television.    I had been watching 'Hot in Cleveland' which is on my list of top new favorite shows.. Right up there with' Modern Family', the' Big Bang Theory' and that summer mini-series about people getting snapped up and slapped into this abandoned town. Can't remember the name: ' Persons Unknown?'  Whatever, and not the point.

At any rate, I had dozed off, woke up to find the Lone Ranger and Tonto. Tonto said something about 'Big trouble, Kemo Sabe'. So, I kept watching.  Turns out this man was locked up in the local jail.  He  was innocent.  The sheriff was alone until, well,  you know.  Our two heroes  rode up.  The 'big trouble' to which Tonto referred was a lynch mob.  As they armed themselves, the sheriff commented, "Why do people resort to lynch mobs?  I just do not understand."  The Lone Ranger, wise to the very bone, replied, 'Bigotry, fear and hate. Take your pick." I'm paraphrasing here, but you get the point. The accused man begged them to save themselves, but all three men fought off the town. Well, of course, everything turned out all right. 

Now, I know, of course, that the fifties weren't all THAT.  They weren't even half of all THAT.  That's why we had the sixties.  I am, also, quite aware, that the period portrayed by that television show was not all THAT. During that historical period, we were busy snatching land and resources from the people who were here first.  But, I have been thinking, all afternoon, about that question and the response. 

We are still, it would seem, in that same mode.  During that historical period, railroads were built across land in such a manner that the buffalo and bison were nearly made extinct.  That action led to terrible, terrible times for  the  people who depended on the buffalo  for their very lives.  This time, we may have, with the help of British Petroleum,  kicked the ecosystem right past a point of no return.  We are forcing  'illegal' immigrants back to 'their' countries, when , in fact, their ancestors may have met our ancestors' boats. We are tyrannizing people whose life style choices are not our own, whose belief systems are not our own. 

Yes, there have always been and still are today, people who will stand up for the rights of the downtrodden, the environment, the abused and mistreated.  But, are there enough of us?  ,  I don't if we have gone too far over to the lynch mob, fearful mentality or not. What to do?  We all  attempt to bring light to our little corner of the world, but is it enough?

What I do know is that all I can do, tonight,  is light my Shabbos candles, cut my challah (well, it's yeast bread that I bought on top of the hill, but she bakes it in a lovely braided circle, and it's close enough for my ecumenical self) and say a prayer for us and our country.  Tomorrow, I'll just keep on keeping on.  Just as all of people I know and love will do.  Keep on keeping on, speaking up, spreading the word and the love.

Chapters 3-4 SUNSET OVER VERDIGRIS BEND

                                                      CHAPTER THREE
    He reached into the pack of tobacco, bit off a piece, and worked it in his mouth until it was comfortably lodged between cheek and gum.  It gave him the appearance of one of those advertisement cowboys who would rope a calf at the slightest provocation. 

    As a kid, she had driven him and her brother crazy with her demands, following them every place, pigtails flapping in the breeze, determined to keep up.  He and Larry had been merciless.  On those occasions, when they had, grudgingly, allowed her to accompany them on fishing expeditions down at Bird Creek, they had given her all the dirty jobs—catching worms, baiting the hooks.  Determined to prove herself, Libba   had done every job they gave her without a complaint. Of course, she had talked too danged much which did limit the catch.  He had never minded, but it had driven Larry nuts.

    It was her cheerleader phase, though,  that came to mind when Bobby thought of Libba Jeffreys.  He had fallen in love with her then.  On the Verdigris Bend High School varsity football team, he could still remember being sacked by the opposing center a couple of times for no other reason than he had been watching Libba do cartwheels in front of the bleachers.   She sure had been something, that jet-black hair hanging straight down her back, those incredible blue eyes.  Inseparable, he had been her football hero, and she had been his fairytale princess.

     They had grown up together, going to the same school, the same church.   He had worked  after school at the local animal feed  store.  Finally, he had saved enough to buy  a used  sixty four Ford Galaxy convertible. Although, they had not been allowed to car date until Libba  was sixteen,  Virginia Jeffreys had , for some reason,  logical only to her, allowed him to pick Libba up and drive her to MYF, Methodist Youth Fellowship, on Sunday evenings.  On occasion, Virginia could, even,  be talked into letting them go into Turley and get a cheeseburger at the drive in.  Going to church and getting a cheeseburger was not a car date to Virginia.  To them, or maybe just to him, now that he thought about it,  Sunday nights became the most glorious night of the week.  And not for the MYF meetings .  It had been  just heaven to sit there with the top down, listen to the radio and talk about the life they were going to make together. 

     A year  older than she, he had gone to OSU and come home on weekends. They had stayed together until the night of her senior prom.  The numbness he had felt that night was still somewhere inside him and could be counted on to surface upon the mere mention of her name.

    “Bobby, I know we had agreed that I would go to Stillwater with you, but I have changed my mind.”  She paused, then continued.  “I’ve been accepted at University of Pittsburgh, and I want to go there.”

    He hadn’t said anything, couldn’t say anything.  Had been too stunned to utter a word.  She had to be kidding.  They had discussed it so many times.  O.S.U. together. Why, he had already put them on the list for married students’ housing in the same building where Meri and Joe were going to live.

    Finally, he could speak. “Libba, how can you go that far away to school?  You know your folks can’t afford to pay out of state tuition, dorm fees and all of that.”

    She stopped him.  “I’m going to live with my Aunt Rose.  You know, the one we visit every summer?  That should make up for the difference in tuition.  Besides, I’ll get a job.  Bobby, we don’t have to break up.  I love you and don’t want to break up.  I just want to postpone things for a while.  We’ll still see each other over Christmas and in the summers.  Nothing has to change between us“

    “Again, why?’

    “Bobby, there are all these things going on all over the world.  Here, everybody knows everybody, knows what each and every person thinks about practically any subject you could name. People in Verdigris Bend even know what each other have for dinner most nights.  Isn’t it just possible that there’s more out there that we are missing? 

    “I have never been on my own.  Aunt Rose is a really neat lady.  She has her own business, and she will give me some freedom.  If I wanted to go to New York City for the weekend, Aunt would let me.”

    “New York City? What does New York City have that you would need?  No.  You are not doing it... I won’t let you!”

    Wrong.  Wrong. Wrong.   She had turned away.  When she turned back to face him, it seemed that his girl had gone.  In her place was a woman he had never met before.

    “I am leaving Oklahoma. For a while at least. I have decided.  You can either wish me luck, and say you’ll wait for me,   or you can rant and rave your head off.  Whatever.  You can’t stop me.  I’m going.” 
         
    And she had. As far as their relationship, everything after that was downhill.   Forget Christmas.  She couldn’t get off from her job.  He had begged her to meet him for the Orange Bowl, had offered to pay for everything, but no.  She was busy, she said.   She had not come home until May when she stepped off the bus sporting dirty jeans, dirty hair and an attitude. 

        Well, maybe the attitude part hadn’t been a phase. Libba had always been a real spitfire, independent, hard headed.  He’d loved that about here.  Plus, she had had some good points about the direction the world was taking back then.  But, she had just gotten carried away.  It had been more a matter of what did not get her angry that what did. There had been the Willie Horton ads that Bush had used to get the election from Dukakis, everything that had been going on in Central America, and of course, Tiananmen Square.  Oh Lord, his head hurt just thinking   of the things that had seemed to set her off that summer. Whenever he’d go by her house or see her up at the Rocket, she was ranting like one of those street preachers. 

    He was also honest enough to acknowledge that he had probably been a bit hard headed himself.    But, he’d been Chief Executive Officer of his ROTC unit, and first string varsity football player.  And there she had been, a real pain in his behind, looking at him as if he were a hairball the cat had spit up.

    They had lost touch after that. Two weeks after his college graduation, he was in the army where he spent the next twenty years.  Working for the military police, he had been stationed in Kuwait, and again in Iraq. Along the way, he had   met and married Elaine. Almost immediately, they had both known that it had been a mistake.  By then, though, Elaine had been pregnant with Molly, and they decided to make every effort to hold it together for the sake of the child they both adored.  It had worked until he retired, and they’d come back to Oklahoma.  There, they had found that, without the distraction of worldwide travel, not even their devotion to Molly was enough to make their marriage work, so they had split up, amicably enough. Now, Elaine lived in Tulsa with Molly, who spent weekends with him at his place up by Sperry.

    Retired and at loose ends, Bobby had found himself the Chief of Police when Chief William Haywood had died of a heart attack.  Most of the time, he liked the job. It was quiet, and except for the occasional speeder or bar fight, not that much to do.  He knew that Josh was thrilled to death to get a real life homicide to investigate, but Bobby, himself, could have just as soon done without it.  

    And now, in the middle of everything else, she was back.  The hair was still long, but tied back, and she had a little bun thing going on.  He didn’t know if those whisps falling down from the knot were supposed to be like that or just the way she had tied it up to get it out of her face this morning.  Didn’t matter.  With those bright blue eyes, not a stitch of make up on her face and smelling like Ivory soap, he thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.  When she smiled, he had felt his heart softening. 

    Standing there, he remembered that Molly was expecting him to pick her up so they could go riding this evening, and he still had to research missing women from twenty to thirty years ago before he could leave.  He turned and started through the door.  As he pulled out the first book of old records, Bobby couldn’t help wondering, for just the smallest second, if the man and woman could get right what the boy and the girl hadn’t been able to manage.



      


                                                               CHAPTER FOUR
Libba was tired from the hair which was pulled straight back into a ponytail right down to her feet which were bare.  Her back ached, her arms were sore, and her neck was stiff.  She felt great.  From the side porch swing, she could see two results of her afternoon’s work.  She had meant to ask Daddy whether fruit trees were pruned in the spring or the fall.  Since she had forgotten to ask him, she simply took the pruning shears to every tree in the orchard.  Relieved of their burden, each one stood a little straighter. They looked terrific.
 
    Through the screen doors, on the pedestal dining table sat three dozen jars of canned pears and two dozen jars of applesauce.  The little booklet on how to can fruits and vegetables had been stuck in the back of Gran’s cookbook, as if she had just shut the book one afternoon and would be back any minute.  She had not needed an applesauce recipe.  Cinnamon, nutmeg, cook the apples.  Not exactly brain surgery.
    The late fall breeze drifted over her.  She swung out over the side of the porch, dragging her bare feet in the dirt of the flowerbeds.  The peacefulness of the setting was too much.

            “Well, what do you know?  Dozing on the porch.”

              “Good grief, Bobby.  Scare a person half to death, why don’t you?  What are you doing here?’

              Without being asked, he sat down beside her on the swing. Without being asked, she moved over to make room for him.

            “I repeat.  What brings you all the way out here?”

             “Well, I got stood up by a girl, and I decided to go for a drive.”

            “Did you have a date?”

             “After a fashion.  I was supposed to take Molly horseback riding this evening, but one of her girlfriends managed to get her daddy’s car, and a bunch of them were going into Tulsa to see a movie.  So, old dad got left at the starting gate.”

            “How old is Molly now?”

             Sixteen.  I guess it’s normal, but still, it hurts a little.  I tell myself that she would turn me down even if we lived  in the same house.”

    “You know she would.  When kids get to that age, they would nearly always rather be with their friends. So, do you have horses?
”
    “I’ve got two.  I have a stallion, Gobi, and an old gelding named Mike that I keep for Molly to ride.  The horses, a few head of cattle and the obligatory chickens make up the entire of my ranch. To be strictly honest, ‘ranch’ is really far too grandiose a term for my place.  I’d call it a ranchette, but that just sounds so citified.”

    “Well, we certainly wouldn’t want to sound citified, now would we Chief?”

    “Lib, you were born with a smart mouth, and I guess you’ll die with a smart mouth. And, if I were being really honest, I’d have to admit I may have missed it some.”

    He looked at her sideways to see how she took that, couldn’t tell, and went on, “When I was in the army, I saw some of the most beautiful cities in the world.  Cities have a lot to offer.  They just don’t have anything to offer me. I’m just tickled to death to be back in Verdigris Bend.”

    “You know, that’s really funny in a way, Bob.  We broke up, because I wanted to see the world, and I only got as far as Pittsburgh.  You, the old homebody, ended up being the one who saw the world.”

    “See, if you had stuck with me, kid, you’d have seen it all, too.  You sorry?”

    “I’m sorry for a lot of things, babe, but I’m trying not to look back and re-visit things I can’t do anything about.  Besides, you and I both know that travel, or the lack of it, wasn’t our only problem. If we had hooked up, we would have, quite likely, killed each other.”

    “Yeah, I know.  You were headstrong and hard headed,” and at her look, “and, yes, ma’am, I guess I was a little hard to handle as well.”


    “Well, I’ll be darned; the world must be shifting on its axis!  Bobby Carmichael just admitted that he might be a teensy bit stubborn.  Well, I guess if you can admit to a couple of personal imperfections, then I can, too.”



    “Anyway, as I said, I was driving by on my way to do a little research and spotted you about to fall out of the swing.  Looking good, though, I have to say, Libba,” an appreciative look at her attire, “Good to see you’ve gone back to shaving your legs.”

    “You and Meredith need to get hobbies.  Of all the things I have accomplished and done in my life, the only thing either of you can remember is that I went through a period when I refused to shave my legs.  Good grief!”

    “I have to admit it was a shock to me when we were in college, but since then, and not that I’m trying to rub my world travels into your face, but I’ve been to lots of places where women don’t shave their legs. Or their underarms, for that matter.  Still, I like the clean shaven look myself.”

        “OK, so you drove out here to check out my legs?”

        “I drove out here to talk to Miss Ardis Brown. Getting to check out your legs was just a nice little by-product of the trip.”

        Miss Ardis Brown had been living in the only other  house on Township Road  since before Libba had been born.  Caleb Brown had come to Verdigris Bend from Chicago right after  the second World War.  At that time, the town had consisted of a church, a school, a general store, and an animal feed store that also sold gasoline.  Caleb had bought the feed store from a man who wanted to go back to New York City.  A widower, Caleb had arrived in town with his two daughters, Ardis and her sister, Anthea.

    Both girls had been sent to college in Missouri.  Anthea had landed a job at a girls’ school in Chicago, which, if Libba  remembered  Grandmother’s stories correctly, had led to an elopement with the school’s French teacher.  Subsequently, Caleb who was, by all accounts, a major tyrant  had disowned her.

           For Ardis, who had returned to Verdigris Bend, life had consisted of educating the local sixth graders and caring for her  unappreciative father.   Now, freed by retirement from her teaching responsibilities and by death from her duties to Caleb, Ardis lived alone.

         “Why do you want to talk to Miss Ardis?  I know you were giving me a hard time about living out here.  We haven’t had any burglaries  out this way, have we?”

    “No, I want to talk to her about her niece.  You remember the one who taught art years ago?”

    “Emily Fournier!  You think that skeleton is the remains of Emily Fournier?   Libba jumped off the swing and stared at him in horror.

    “Settle down, Libba.  I didn’t think about it upsetting you so,”

    “It doesn’t upset me.  Well, maybe it does, a little.  But, Bobby, that idea is just so far-fetched.”

    “Well, here’s the deal.  I spent the afternoon going through all of the written records of Verdigris Bend.  I found several women who took off from their husbands and families, but nearly all of them have come back home or turned up someplace else.  Only two never showed up again.  On April 13, 1978  Pearl Watkins walked out of her farmhouse up by Skiatook and was never heard from again.  She took her daughter, Nancy with her.   On May 12, 1983 Emily Fournier was teaching art at Verdigris Bend Elementary School.  She asked Nadine Graham to watch her class while she went to the bathroom,  and she never came back.

    “Pearl's husband, Edgar, said he has never heard from her again, but he could be lying.  If Edgar’s lying, though, where’s Nancy?  On the other hand, Emily disappeared from the school itself.  That’s why I’m starting with her.”

    Sitting back down on the swing, Libba looked through the trees at the Brown house.  She didn’t say anything for such a long time he thought she wasn’t going to reply at all.
 
    Finally, she spoke.  “I haven’t thought about Emily in a million years.  I was a sophomore that year and she picked me to be her teacher’s aide.  I thought she was so exotic.  So cosmopolitan.”

    “Yeah.  She was exotic all right.  A real free spirit.  Anyway, I have to go.  I told Miss Ardis I’d be there at five o’clock, and I’m five minutes late.”

    “Oh my God.  Go now.  Run like the wind. Chief of police or not, you’re in big trouble,  Bubba.”

    “I know.  I know.  To Miss Ardis, I will always be little Bobby Carmichael.  If I’m much later, she may make me write ‘I won’t be tardy’ one hundred times.”

    “I wish I knew how to inspire that kind of fear in my students.” Without really thinking about it, she found herself asking, “Are you going to the church supper Tuesday night?”

    “No.  I hadn’t planned on it.  Josh and I belong to a softball league, and the playoffs begin  Tuesday evening.  I’ll, probably, be too worn out to want to eat.  Maybe, if we get finished early enough, though.  If I do go, will you be there?”

    She looked up from the swing and felt  herself smiling, “I’ll be there. Now, go.   Take it easy, officer.”

    With the gait of a man twenty years younger, Bobby took the side porch in a jump that  carried him half way down the drive to his truck.  Libba watched as he pulled out of the drive fast enough to kick up gravel. Still a show off.   She stood up and headed into the house for a shower.

    “And now may the grace of the Almighty God and the peace that passes all understanding go with you, now and forever.  Amen.”

    As the choir sang the amens, the Reverend O’Connor swept down the center aisle of the First Methodist Church of Verdigris Bend and took his place at the back door where he could shake hands with every parishioner as they exited the church.

        Libba, sitting as far towards the back as was socially acceptable stood and prepared to take her exit.  Although she had been back since June, this was the first Sunday service that she had attended.  She wouldn’t be here now if her mother had not insisted. Virginia Jeffreys was not an easy woman to ignore.

    “Elizabeth, I have tried to be patient.  Truly, I have.  At first I knew you didn’t feel up to greeting everyone, and then when school started, I thought , well, she is  tired.  But it’s not fair to all of your old friends.  People want to welcome you back.”

    “I know, ma.  It’s just hard, you know.”

    “Of course, it is dear, but you have to face people.  Good grief, Libba.  You didn’t do anything wrong.  You got a divorce.  You didn’t shoot the man.  I get the feeling that, for the entire time you’ve been home, you have been telling yourself that you’ve done something for which you should be ashamed.”

    Which was, of course, exactly what she had been doing.  Her mother had a gift for getting right to the heart of a problem.  It was annoying.

    Even though she hadn’t been the one to seek the divorce, even though she knew she had done nothing wrong, she couldn’t help feeling that, somehow, if she had done things differently, he marriage would not have failed.  She could not shake the feeling that everyone she had ever known in Verdigris Bend was waiting to judge her or, worse, much worse, to feel sorry for her.

    Libba  made her way down the aisle, She was a Jeffreys, and the  family motto was ‘suck it up’. Bring them on.

    “Elizabeth, my dear, you look absolutely lovely.  Your hair is so attractive pulled back that way.  It reminds me of the styles we wore when I was a girl,” Millie Hayes was in line just ahead of Libba.

    Schoolteachers appeared  to be a particularly long-lived bunch.  Millie had taught fifth grade for years, leaving only when she reached the mandatory retirement age.  Perhaps, that was what life held for her, an old age filled with tea parties and church.

    Millie, held up on one side by the pew and on the other by her cane, was waiting for Libba to reply.

    “Oh, thank you, Miss Hayes.  You’re looking well.”  Liar.  The old woman  looked as if a good stiff prairie wind would blow her clear to Little Rock, and as for her own hairstyle, Libba made a mental note to make an appointment at the hairdresser as soon as possible.

    “Thank you, dear.  How are you liking your job at our little school?  Some excitement over there on Friday, I heard.”

    Libba hated to disappoint the old lady, who was so plainly expecting to be filled in with juicy tidbits.  “I’m afraid I missed the show, Miss Millie.  I didn’t even realize what had been discovered until Merideth told me after school.  I probably know less than you do about the whole thing.”

    “You always were a levelheaded girl, Libba.  I thought it even when others were saying that you had gone off the deep end during college.  Of course, you were busy, doing your job.  Something far too few people bother about today.”

    Miss Ardis Brown had walked up, quietly enough, but as soon as she opened her mouth, she took over the entire conversation.

    Millie Hayes, frail on her best day, seemed to become even smaller and more transparent.  Libba, in a matter of seconds, went from feeling like a fairly competent adult to a recalcitrant schoolgirl.

    “Miss Ardis, I’m afraid I owe you an apology. After all this time,  I haven’t been over to see you.  I truly am sorry.”

    “Don’t be silly, young woman, you’ve been getting your bearings.  I understood.”

    Although Miss Ardis had gotten even more brusque than Libba remembered  her to be, there was something in her tone that made Libba believe that she really did understand.

    The three women had been moving in line to greet the minister, and she found herself next in line to tell the Reverend O’Connor how moved she had been by his talk.

    Having paid her respects, Libba went to wait on the front steps of the church for Daddy to bring the car around from the parking lot. Standing there alone was Miss Ardis.

    The old woman didn’t seem quite so self-assured now.  “Libba, I hope you won’t think this an imposition, but ....well, I don’t suppose you noticed that Bobby Carmichael came by my house last evening.    I just can’t make myself believe that  the poor soul they found is Emily.  Not for a moment, but the thing is, Bobby thinks it’s a possibility.  I suppose I have to, at least, consider it. Robert is no fool, and his opinion counts with me.

    “As I remember, you were fond of her, and not a lot of people in this town were.   I was wondering if you could come by this afternoon for a few minutes.”

    “Well, Miss Ardis, I am spending the day with my parents,” The last thing she needed was to listen to an old lady discuss a niece who disappeared so many years ago, but   something in the old woman’s face stopped her.  “I’ll eat lunch with them and be home by six o’clock or so.  Is that too late?”

    “Oh, no.  No. That will be fine.   I’ll leave the front porch light on for you.  It’s starting to get dark earlier now, you know.”
                          Virginia Jeffreys arrived, straightening her clothes and wiping perspiration from around her neck.  Choir robes were stifling.  At the same time her father pulled impatiently around the corner from the church parking lot.  When Libba turned to say good-bye to Miss Ardis, she had already gone.  She could
move fast for an old lady.

Happy Father's Day

With Father’s Day turning up, I’ve been thinking about my Dad.  Mother was such a strong, outgoing person that, oftentimes, people who didn’t know us well, assumed she ran the show.  People who made those assumptions were just so very wrong.  They were a team.  At times, they were quite a volatile team, but a team to the end.  He would grump when she was off doing civic things, then go find someone to help her with the housecleaning so she had more time to do those civic things.  She grumped because he didn’t like dealing with the public, a kind of essential part of owning a small business, but then, she went down to the shop, set up an office (forced him to air condition it, she wasn’t a masochist) and took over dealing with the public so he didn’t have to do it. 

After we kids had grown, I heard someone say to my Dad that he had raised four good kids. His response, ‘I didn’t do anything.   Alene did it.  I just made the money.’  He JUST made the money. Well, we knew he did more than that.  He wasn’t the sort of Dad who attended recitals, mostly because he was working all the time  Just making the money.  But, he was THERE.  I am sure he would not have chosen to work six days a week, but he did it.  That was, as he saw it, his job.  He didn’t  whine that he wanted to do something else, that he may be tired of fixing cars.  He just did it.  He had a wife and kids who needed for him to do that so he did it.  I remember, once, one of his friends had left his wife and kids, because he needed to ‘find himself.’ I can still see the look of pure befuddlement on my Dad’s face.  He had no concept, whatsoever, what that meant.  ‘Find himself?’  What on earth did that even mean? My Dad had no clue.  

Daddy, quiet, though he was, taught a lot.  He kept his business receipts in two boxes in the office.  “Money In’ and ‘Money Out’.  Every Christmas, he would buy a brand new book, hand it to one of us kids and tell us to enter the receipts in the right places so that, in April, he would be able to pay his taxes.  When this job fell to me, I noticed : No minister in our town paid full price.  From this I learned that ALL faiths were worthy of respect.  Even the ‘Holy Rollers’ up the road. B. I would find bills in the box that had  not been marked ‘Paid’. When questioned, he always had a response, ‘That old boy has been out of work for a while.  He’ll be along directly.” From this I learned  charity.   Now, don’t get me wrong.  He LOVED people who paid. In fact, once he told me that he really enjoyed working on this one woman’s car.  ‘Why?” He smiled. ‘Because when she comes to pick it up, she always brings her check book.”

Mother was extremely talented; there was not much she could not do. She could not, to save herself, however, set or fix her own hair.  All of my life, if people were not getting their cars fixed, and we ate potato soup for days,  he made sure Mother had money to get her hair done every week.   From this I learned that he adored my mother and made sure she had what she needed in order to feel good about herself.   When I made up my mind to run off to Hawaii to see  the man I , later, married, but was not married to at that time (Keep in mind, this was the sixties, and we lived in Turley), he didn’t stop me.  He damn sure did not like it, but he didn’t stop me.  From this I learned, that you raise kids, you don’t own them.  When I  called home twenty years later with a broken heart and three little kids, he told Mother to send me money for a decent attorney.  He then waited till she was out of the house, called me and asked if I needed him to come up there and straighten some stuff out. I should have said yes, maybe.  Some one could  have done with a good ass kicking.  From this I learned, when kids’ do what they want to do, and it all goes to shit, you stand by them, support them and don’t rub their noses in their own failures.

Once , after I had begun to work in the prison, he and Mother drove up for a visit.  As they left town, they decided to drive by the prison to leave me some money. ( I hate giving the impression that I have spent my life being broke, but to imply anything else would be a lie)  Since it was a prison, the C.O.’s would not, obviously, send him back to my classroom, so I had to go out to the main lobby, say goodbye and get the cash.  When I got there, he was sitting next to the biggest Biker dude I ever saw.  The man was sitting, chained up, and had been  left by the county cops to be placed in the state inmate population. That old boy must have been pushing 350-400 pounds and was six foot six if he was an inch.  He dwarfed my dad, and I thought Daddy would be upset that the guards had set him next to this evil looking fellow.  I  took the money and walked him back out to the car to say good bye to Mother, too.  Daddy said, “Looks like they could have gone ahead and put that boy on into the prison so he didn’t have to sit there chained up like an animal.  That wasn’t nice.  He’s still a human being.”  From this I learned, tough, gruff exteriors, quite often, hide very tender , loving hearts.  

A lot of times, as people age, their children will take over the parenting duties.  At times, given mental issues, that’s what has to happen.  But, when Mother got sick, she and Daddy sat down with the doctor, determined what treatment plan was suitable, came out and informed the rest of the family  what decisions had been made.  From this I learned, as long as you’ve got all your marbles, don’t give up your power.

The last time he went to the hospital, he must have known he was not going to come home.  And, he didn’t.  Johnny and Tom, both, looked and looked for a will. Found the truck title out in the barn, but no will.  Weeks later, Frances, his second wife, found the will laid on his reading table.  He had left it there so it would be easy for the family to find.  It wasn’t his fault, we were too dumb to look in the obvious place.  From this I learned the last lesson he taught me:  First, last and always, he thought of us.  Happy Father’s Day, Daddy.  I think of you all the time.

Chapter Two Sunset Over Verdigris Bend

                 CHAPTER TWO

    The bell over the door of the little grocery store announced Libba’s arrival.  Announced it, though no one appeared to be listening. Since being back home, this was the first Saturday that she had made the grocery store scene, and some notice would have been nice.  As it was, however, no one could have  cared much  less.

    Children who were rushing up and down the aisles playing impromptu games of tag saw Ms. Cohen, the new sixth grade teacher, not Libba Jeffreys who had come home. They paid their respects by ducking their heads and smiling shyly out from under their eyebrows.  Their parents, chatting beside the paper products and visiting by the meat counter, were too engrossed in their own conversations to notice Lib.  
  
    Not even Meredith looked up from the cash register.  She could not.  Standing in front of the checkout counter was an extremely old, extremely heavyset woman.  The lady was from an era when stockings, dress shoes and a hat were required for any trips out of one’s home. Her hair was a gun powder blue that only ladies of a certain age seem to be able to achieve. Whether ladies of any other age would actually desire that color on their hair was another issue entirely.

    Joe Malloy’s Aunt Frances was angry.  Her entire body quivered in rhythm as she recited her grievance to Meredith who, by nature of the layout of the checkout area, was trapped with her back flat up against a wall.  The only way out was blocked by Aunt Frances.

    “Meredith, I cannot tell you how disappointed I am.  My own nephew.  Why, this ham is for The Church.”  Aunt slapped the defenseless piece of meat with her cane.  “And Joe will only give me a five percent discount.  I can get ten percent at the super center  in Claremore.  I am only trying to give him the business, after all,  and here he can’t even meet the price of the competition. Why, the very idea!”

    “But, Aunt Frances, “Meredith was being conciliatory.  “That place in Claremore is part of a big chain.  They have the advantage of buying in bulk and getting bigger discounts from the wholesalers.  Good grief! The founder of that other  store is a billionaire, and the organization  can well afford  to give you a bigger discount.  Hell, they can afford to give you the whole damned pig.  If I give you ten percent off, we will lose money.”

    “Language, young lady, language.” Frances  paused, drew a breath and carried on, “ Well, that’s it then.   I will  just have to go into Claremore to get the ham.  Here it is Saturday, the church supper is Monday, my arthritis and all.  And, I had already promised the girls, ‘Oh, don’t worry about a thing.  My nephew, Joseph, will help us with our church suppers.’ That’s what I told them, Meredith. And  now, “ she paused,  dug into the purse for a hanky, tried to eke out a tear, failed, “I’ll have to explain why I had to buy at another store.  I will be mortified, simply mortified.”  The old woman turned to leave.

    Meredith gave up.  “Here, Aunt.  Take the ham for ten percent off.  I just want you to know that we’re losing money.   Food business or no food business.”  She rang the ham up and began to bag it.

    The old lady, not even trying to conceal her joy that the gambit had worked, shuffled through her purse until she found a small manila envelope where, Libba supposed, she kept ‘church money’.  She paid, a quarter at a time.  Libba could only think that Frances was hoping that Meredith would donate the ham in totality.

    “Here, Aunt.  Do you want me to carry it out to the car for you?  It’s very heavy.”

    Meri reached for the sack and started to move out from behind the counter.  Aunt Frances' bulk stopped her.

    “My place setting of ‘Harvest Moon’ stoneware, please, Meredith”

    For one moment Libba really thought Meredith would explode.  She only turned, very determinedly, and reached for a place setting of the premium dishes.

    Aunt spotted Lib.  “Elizabeth Jeffreys.  I heard you were back and had taken a position over at the school.  Not from anyone around here, you know.  I get all my news from my good friends at circle meetings.  If I depended on my own family, “a glance found its way to the cash register, “I’d not know a thing.

    “I must say that I was pleased to hear that you had given up on the silly notion of living in such a big city and came on back home.  I always knew you’d come to your senses sooner or later.

    “It’s just God’s own blessing that rounder of a husband didn’t murder you in your bed.  Or worse.  I may be old, but I watch television and keep up.   I know things.”

    How on earth did a person appropriately respond to a statement such as that?  Libba did not even try.  “My, Miss Malloy, you’re looking well.  I heard you were put in charge of all the church suppers for the year.”  Over Aunt Frances’ shoulder, Libba could see Meredith shuddering.

    “Oh, well, one has to do one’s part,” a glance In Meredith’s direction. “Well, must be going.  A lot to do before Monday night.  Will we see you and your family at the supper, Meredith, my dear?”

    “I don’t know, Auntie. Joe, Jr has kept his apartment in Oklahoma City until he takes the Bar Exam.  I think Mark has football practice, and Angie has to work at the Rocket hamburger stand. But, Joe and I may be there with Brian.”

    “Don’t tell me.  I can’t bear it. Families today, flung this way and that,” Shaking her head and sputtering, the old lady, hand bag and cane in one hand, free dishes and twenty pounds of dead pig in the other, marched off to take charge of the impending supper.

    As soon as the door was completely closed, Meredith exploded, “Do you believe that old hen? What does she think?  Those dishes are free?  And girls?  Where are these girls that she’s talking about? She and her circle friends have not been girls since before Harry Truman lived in the White House.”

    “You could have let her go into Claremore, Meri.  What difference does it make?  You lost money anyway.”

    “What?  Are you serious?  Libba, you have been gone way too long.  It would be all over town by three o’clock this afternoon.  Joe’s mother would hear, and you know how she is about this business.  She thinks Malloy’s Market is a town institution.  If Claremore pork were served at the church supper on Monday night, we’d be going to her funeral on Wednesday.  Count on it.  Oh yeah, here are your lids.”  She pulled them up from behind the counter.

    As Libba was paying for the lids, the door behind her opened.  She turned just in time to face him.  The dusky brown hair was now laced with gray.  The jaw was square, and the chin too long. He had, what was referred to in town as The Carmichael Chin.  Combined with the jaw, it gave him a look of stubbornness that Libba knew was not misleading.  He stood before her, a barrel-chested, muscular, though not a tall, man.  In fact, they were standing eye to eye, and it  was his  eyes that Libba most noticed.  While the rest of him hadn’t changed all that much, the eyes were different.  Just as deeply brown, but older, gentler.   Sadder, maybe?

            “Hello, Libba.”

            “Bobby, how are you doing?”

    “You two can save your hellos. Bobby, what more do you know about the mess over at the school?”

    For once, Libba was grateful for Meredith's mouth.  It gave her a chance to get her heart out of her throat.

    “Well, not much more than we did, Meri.  The medical examiner has the skeleton.  We probably won’t know any more until Monday.

    He casually placed one hand on Libba’s shoulder, reached across her to get two packs of tobacco and laid them on the counter.

    Libba was disconcerted to find that, when he removed his hand from her shoulder and reached into his pocket for money, the skin underneath her shirt remained warm.  Unable to think of anything to say and unwilling to let him know of his effect on her, she gathered her canning lids and prepared to leave.

            “I’ll walk with you, Lib.”

            “Sure.  Sure, Bobby.”

            “Where’s your car?”

            “I walked.” 

              Why, oh why, after all these years did he still make her feel like a ditzy little schoolgirl?

              “Oh.  Well, then do you mind if I walk part way with you?  I’m on my way back to the City Building.”

              Located on Turley Avenue, the main street through town, the City Building sat right across the street from Cyclone Park.  Housing all the municipal services for the town, it was a brick, three story structure with all the architectural appeal of a cracker box.  Some previous mayor, in an attempt to capitalize on the town’s Old West heritage had placed a railing that, she supposed, was meant to be a place to tie up one’s horse.  Cute, but pointless.  Since coming home, the only horses she had noticed had been under the hoods of grossly oversized trucks

    On the first floor were the Post Office and Police Station with the Verdigris Bend Volunteer Fire Department occupying the back half.  The city offices were on the second floor.  The third floor housed the Verdigris Bend Historical Society and Museum. 
 
    Only a few steps from the little grocery store to the entrance into the police station, the walk was beginning to feel interminable.

    “How have you been?”  Bobby didn’t appear to be any more comfortable than she.  “Your mother said you’re living out at your grandparents’ old place.”

    “Yeah.  It seemed like a good idea.  This teaching job is only a one-year contract.  Once Barbara’s back, I’ll have to look for something else, and who knows?  I could end up any place, Oklahoma City, Muskogee.”

    “You could have stayed with your Mom and Dad.  It’s in town, closer to work.  That old place is kind of far out, Lib.  Kind of risky for you, by yourself and all.”

    Libba could not believe she felt herself bristling.  He had not changed.  He was still a dominating, controlling.....no.  She would not get into a battle over where she was staying.  She wouldn’t.  Change the subject, Libba.  Quick.  Before you beat him on the head with a paper bag full of canning lids.

    “When do you think you’ll know any more about the skeleton in the Old Red Building?  I was thinking about it last night.  The only thing it could be, Bobby, is a hobo who crawled in through a loose board sometimes after the place was condemned and just died of old age or exposure.  Or something.”

    “Precisely.  Or something.  Crawling into an abandoned building to get warm is one thing.  But, somehow, I just can’t see placing yourself into the boiler and closing the door after yourself, no matter how cold you are.”  At the look of amazement in her eyes, he paused,  

    “I didn’t tell Meredith everything back at the store.  Libba, if Meredith knows, all of Verdigris Bend knows.  That skeleton had a hole in the  back of the skull you could drive a truck through.  Besides that, it was a woman.  And, my dear Ms. Cohen” she didn't miss his emphasis on the Ms., “at the risk of sounding sexist, not that many lady hobos pass through our tiny little town.  Not now and, especially, not fifteen or twenty years ago.  Where you’ve been living, I don’t know.  I’ve heard tell of bag ladies and such…..”

    With a jolt, Libba realized he had been teasing her, about bag ladies, about living alone so far out of town, about everything.    She had forgotten that his sense of humor could be so dry that it was difficult to tell when he was teasing and when he was serious.

    This time, she did slap his arm with the bag of canning lids.  “Robert Carmichael, you clown!  You really had me going!  And, just for the record, contrary to everyone’s belief, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is really quite a safe city.”

    He smiled, a smile that took the sadness, or whatever it was, out of his eyes. “I’m sure it is, ma’am. I’m sorry, Libba.  I couldn’t help myself.  We were just both so uptight.  Even though we had our disagreements, I, honestly, wished you only the best.  Friends?”

        She took his outstretched hand and felt the extreme strength of the man.  His grip served to remind her that the muscles, so slightly delineated through the well-worn denim were definitely there. This was a man who could take care of himself and anyone else. And again, just as disconcertingly as before, when he took back his hand, her skin stayed warm from the touch.

          “Sure.  Friends.

        “But, Bobby, the boiler?  I know that building has been out of commission for years, but they still had to keep the heat on or the pipes would have frozen.  How could a body be left undiscovered in a boiler for that long?”

    “Because, when they built the new building, they installed gas furnaces in both buildings.  Taking the boiler out was too expensive.  So they just tied it off and left it there.  It has been inoperative since then.  Of course, looks like the stench would have raised some concerns.  I’ve been wondering about that.  The swing sets and slides are over there by  that building. The building, itself, is right up against the new one.  Why your own classroom looks  out on it.   It really looks like one of the kids or even, one of the teachers, would have said something.”

    “Oh my Lord, how gruesome.  Well, I sure wish you luck.”

    They covered the last few steps to the police entrance in a more companionable silence. 
    “Well, Lib, here’s where I leave you. I’ve got some work to do.”

    “I didn’t know the Chief of Police had to work on Saturdays.”

    “We’re a two man department. Josh and I kind of divide up the weekends.  Besides, I have to look over some old records.  I thought I’d see if any women from around here dropped out of sight around the time we think this person was killed.”

            “Do you, honestly, think it was someone from here?’

            He drew his fingers through his hair. Again, the gray got her attention. There was more  than she had first noticed.  All in all, however, Bobby had matured into a man who was even more attractive than he had been as a boy.  Which was saying something. The boy had been no slouch.

    “It’s a place to start.  Face it, Lib.  Verdigris Bend is sort of off the beaten path, even now. That many years ago, before the main highway was extended from Tulsa, this town was really out in the boondocks.”

    “Yeah, but what difference does it make whether Meri or anyone else knows?  Surely, there’s no danger now, after all these years, and you can’t expect to keep it a secret for too much longer.”

    “True, but Lib,” Bobby was all police officer now. “I don’t really like to think that anyone we know would beat the hell out of some woman, stuff her into a boiler and leave her there. There’s one thing I can’t get past though.  If it happened during the time the building was still in use, only a local would know when they could count on being alone.  Why, they even held night meetings over there sometimes.

     He shook his head.  “Granted, the murderer might be dead now, as well.  But, if he is still alive and still around here, he” a look at her, “or she, must be pretty nervous right now.  All in all, I just think talk should be kept to a minimum.”

    “Well, good luck with that one, hon.  I won’t tell Meredith or anyone else.  But, like I said, you can’t expect to keep it secret for too much longer.  It will be all over town before you can stop it.  Christ.  You’ve got the entire demolition crew who saw it.   And, Bobby, your deputy is Josh Banks, for crying out loud.”

    “Now, now, Josh isn’t a bad sort.  I know you two had your issues, Lib, but he’s a good police officer.  Although, you’re right, I know.  So let’s just hope two vagrants had a quarrel.”

    “I’ve got to leave you to your records.  I have got some fruit trees that need to be picked.  See you.”

       “Yeah.  See you.”

          As she walked away, she didn’t know that Bobby was watching. Stood staring down the road, in fact, until she passed over the slight rise in the road and vanished from sight.

The Oil Mess

I have been watching this mess in Lousiana get worse and worse and worse.  I have watched the BP people stand around with their fingers up their duffs.  What are we, as regular ole' folks, supposed to do?    In the sixties, people had enough hubris to believe that regular  people could make a difference, and because they didn't know they couldn't they did.  Incredible changes, indeed,  were effected.

I have become so very offended by the arrogance of the individuals in charge who are, willy nilly, sacrificing our society, our eco-system, our world for the sake of profits and more profits.  I am offended by the fact that the right wing gas bags have used this as, yet another, opportunity to blast the president for not doing enough.  What, pray tell, is he to do? Put on a diving suit and his Superman cape and dive down there and cap it?  No, this is yet another disaster you can put right at the door of the Bush/Cheyney camp.  They accommodated their oil buddies, who then, committed an unforgivable assault on our world.

Anyone who offers up a potential solution has, it seems to me, been  regarded with condescending derision.  These two 'bubbas', for example, were on television the other night demonstrating how throwing hay on oil and water absorbs the oil, leaving clear water.  When questioned about this, the BP talking head replied that the company was considering all options.  'Considering all options?'  What is to consider?   Call every farmer within a day's drive and ask them to contribute whatever bales they can spare.  Toss the hay into the ocean and see what happens.  Then, you'd know, one way or the other.  My guess is these old boys might be on to something. Whenever you find yourself in a tight spot, you always want someone's 'bubba' there.  He'll come running with duct tape, a can of WD 40, a bale of hay, whatever it takes.  Most of the time, in my experience, he'll get it fixed. And, yes, I know there are female bubbas.  I'm just not one, and my bubbas are men. 

So, I've been thinking , more and more, about these women in Uganda in 2001  or so.  They got mad at Chevron for using up their resources and leaving the people in their village  in abject poverty.  These women  walked onto one of Chevron's boats and said, if Chevron didn't provide funds for schools and hospitals, as well as jobs for their people, they were gonna take off all their clothes and stand there  naked until they did.  It had, probably, a bigger impact in a Muslim country than it might here, but I don't know.At any rate, their demands were met.   Now, I have friends and family members who will say that I'm  just looking for an opportunity to get nude, but that's not so........Truly, it's not.

So, here's where I am on this......if I were absolutely sure that I were going to retire and would never, ever  need to subject myself to another  criminal background check, I'd be standing in the Gulf right now and not wearing a stitch. The thing is,  however, those criminal background checks are not to be underestimated.  When I was being hired on by the Department of Corrections, they sent a man around my whole neighborhood checking me out.  My next door neighbor told them that I allowed my children's cat to get paw prints on her polished, red brick porch, and was that legal?  Guess it was.  I got hired. 

One more thing, now that I think of it.....why couldn't  men participate?  Older, chubby men sag in  inappropriate places, also. Anyone have any other suggestions?

Should I just bite it and retire?

I have several interviews set up for the next week. I'm fairly certain, although not over the top confident, that I will be able to find something.  The thing is, do I really WANT to find something?. Do I, really?  I have loved it here, have loved these children, these people, this geographic area. I know that I will love it wherever I land, as I always do. God has blessed me with the ability to enjoy people, enjoy the environment where I find myself.  That's why I am blessed with friends all over the country. I don't doubt that no matter where I would find  myself in this country, I have a friend or a relative within a day's drive who would let me sleep on his/her  couch if I asked.  Now, THAT is a blessed person!  So, having said that I love it here, does it, logically, follow that I want to go to another school?

  Since I have been out here, several new interests have come  to the forefront, probably because my family is not here, and for the first time since I was twenty five I have time to indulge myself.  And, really, they are not new interests;  I have written all of my life, but until these past years, have had no time to really concentrate on stuff like plot and editing.  Within the past few months, I have gotten some very nice feedback from some agents and publishers.  Sort of 'The economy sucks, but keep writing.  You have something to say.'. I used to love photography, but got away from it. This past three years, I have, for the first time in over twenty years, a really good camera with a couple of lenses.  People have been really kind about my pictures, and so, I slapped some of my favs on some gift items, set up a website and up to now have sold a couple of packs of note cards, a few coffee mugs and a water bottle, all of  which have been decorated with my pictures.  Not a great number, but then again, I haven't had time to advertise, either. 

Education has changed soooo much. No longer are children getting the arts. No longer are they reading for the sake of reading.  Rather than read books, they read 'excerpts' and are then given test questions.  WTF! is that about? I think of our library teacher, Mrs. Oliver. Library was a class!  She would read us a chapter out of a book, and then we would have the rest of the hour to read our books.  I loved the sound of pages being turned, ,the smells of the library.   Rather than write stories and plays and poems, kids  are asked to write two to three paragraphs on a given topic, and they are assessed on whether they have addressed all the issues in the paradigm.  Where are the next Arthur Millers, August Wilsons, James Baldwins going to come from?  Surely not from a classroom of children who are writing to a 'prompt' Don't get me wrong.  The teachers with whom I work are terrific.  They do everything they can to get sustained silent reading, writing and the arts into the lives of their children.  But, I have watched as the creativity is micromanaged right out of their souls.. It's just tragic.

My grandson who made honor roll was told he 'daydreams too much'.  Christ All bleeping Mighty!  The child is 6 years old!  He is supposed to daydream.  If there were no daydreamers, we would be without so many things. Picasso would never have had his Blue Period.  Einstein would have never figured out that all of us are in motion, all of the time.  This is not education.  It's something, no doubt.  But, it's no education.


On the other hand, I don't feel old enough to retire, and I have never, ever not worked.   Except for the ten years between the time that Mandy was born, and I returned to work at Mount Aloysius when Beth was in pre-school, I have never not worked a full-time job. But, I was thinking, there is this course I would like to take from NAU about Positive Behavioral Support.  It's fifteen credits and would take two semesters.  Also, it's online.  I could take those courses anywhere I can get a high speed hookup.  Working full-time, I would have no time to do it.

Totally off the subject, I have a hard time believing there is a certificate for this.  I can hear not my Mother's voice in this case, but my Daddy's.  Close your eyes and hear it, too. 'Positive Behavior??  What's that?  I'm POSITIVE your kid is a brat and needs to be sent to his room til he can come out and act right? '  And then he would have shaken  his head, walked into the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee.  Or else, just walk straight out the back door to the bees.

Back to this course, if I retire, and start taking my pension,  I could do it.  I could take the courses, concentrate on my writing, concentrate on marketing my photography and then, after a year I would be qualified to be a Behavioral Consultant.  If I wanted to, at that time, I could hire myself out to write behavior plans.  Which would mean, I'd still be in education;  I just wouldn't be there all day, being told what to do by people who are not nearly as knowledgeable as I am.

The other day I heard a conversation between to educators. Well, one of them was an educator. The other is and was an idiot. The idiot  was purporting that the curriculum she was selling  would, without fail, bring ALL of the children up to grade level within three years.  The other asked her how she could guarantee such a thing.  The first replied that 'If the teacher follows the script, the children will learn.'  BULL EFFING SHIT!  How could she have allowed such garbage to fall out of her mouth and still be able to sleep that night?  What if the kid is an auditory learner?  What if he can't learn phonetically and needs a whole word, linguistic approach?  Are you still going to keep shoving the stuff down his throat even though he is , clearly, clearly, not getting it?  Any other day, I would have jumped on that with both of my chubby feet, but this day, because I know that I will not be back here next year, I turned  and walked away.

The next day, this woman walked into my room and saw that I was teaching the child the same information , but using a different method.  Her 'curriculum' had the kid looking at the words, calling them out, and being timed until he could read them all, with no errors in one minute. The poor kid, 6 years old, was not getting it. Just NOT getting it. He kept giving me this look, all big brown eyes that said, 'Help Me!' I put him on the computer , found a story that had a lot of words that ended in AT , slapped the headphones on him and let him read the story while it was read to him.  He sat there, transfixed, watching the words, listening to the words, saying the words.  She said, 'You are not using the curriculum correctly.'  I said,'N o, you are right.  I am not.  That's why special education calls it 'specially designed instruction.'  Because it is 'specially designed for that particular child.' Anyone who knows me knows what sorts of words were rattling around in my head. I did NOT say them.  And for that, alone, I deserve a gold star. 

Why am I rambling on like this?  Because, maybe it's time for me to walk away from the classroom.  Maybe I need to make another path for myself.  Many of my friends have left over discipline issues.  I never had that problem, too much. I was lucky.  I can give the 'Alene Baker' look.  It' s all look.  I don't back it up as well as she did, but still, it's been an effective tool in my arsenal.  But , I gotta be honest, kids.  I'm feeling real tired.  Do I have it in me to fall in love with another group of children?  But, there is  the money.   I'm one of those baby boomers who hasn't saved squat.  Then again, if I DO take that course, I could do a job like that til I'm REALLY old.  I'm only 62.  My Mom lived another 18 years, and in fact, I think she was close to that age when she ran for Congress.  

What to do? What to do?   Feed back, anyone?

P.S. This blog stuff is the best.  I can write this stuff out instead of keeping it inside me, bouncing around in my head.   I think I can sleep now.  And, to all, a good night.

Fiction SUNSET OVER VERDIGRIS BEND

             SUNSET OVER VERDIGRIS BEND

Sally Baker Kivowitz 

(A Novel of Absolutely Zero Socially Redeeming Value)

CHAPTER ONE

                             
     

    As she turned off the pavement   and onto the gravel road leading up to her grandparents’ house, Libba saw an old red Chevy pickup truck in the driveway.   Getting closer, she recognized Meredith Malloy perched on the side porch swing.   Brian, her youngest, was playing in dirt that had, once, been Gran’s zinnia beds.                
     “Lib!”   Meredith was off the porch and running toward the driveway.  “I have been waiting for ages!  You have got to tell me all about school today.”
    Balancing her books and papers on her hip, Libba inserted the key into the lock of the heavy, oaken door. After an initial resistance, it gave unexpectedly.   She half fell into the front vestibule.  Meredith, with Brian attached to her hip, followed.
    “Here, Meri.  I’ll get a washcloth for Brian.  He must have eaten a quarter acre of dirt.  School?  What about it?  The temperature in my room had to exceed one hundred degrees.  Do you believe the school board?  They’re building a brand spanking new gymnasium and office building but won’t spend a dime to upgrade the air conditioning system at the elementary school. That system must be thirty years old, on the outside.  I swear, I do not know how politicians live with themselves.  They drive to air conditioned offices in air conditioned cars and don’t give a thought as to how little children are supposed to pay attention in the heat. My room felt like the bottom ring of Dante’s Inferno all day long.” 
    As she talked, Libba had made her way through the dining room, dropping books and papers onto the table. In the kitchen, she reached under the sink for a clean washcloth
    “Oh, my goodness! Could you stay off your soap box for once, just once?  You’re home a hot five seconds, and, already, you’re trying to change the entire town. Libba, they need a new sports complex so that the kids in town have a proper place for college scouts to watch them play. Sports translate to scholarships which translate to education.  You know that.   And you can stop with your intellectual references, too.  Dante‘s Inferno?   I am not impressed.”
    “OK, OK.  Point taken, on the sports. But why do the administrators need new offices?  What’s wrong with the old ones?  Also, for the record, there is nothing wrong or elitist about being well read.”
    “Elizabeth Juanita Jeffreys! Right this minute, I don’t give a rip about either the administrators’ offices or Dante.    And to be honest, I don’t really care about the dirt in Brian’s mouth, either.”
      Meredith slapped her head, dislocating the red bandana tied around her short brown hair, and followed Libba into the kitchen.  “It was good clean dirt. Believe me, by the time he’s a teenager the dirt that comes out of his mouth will far outweigh the little bit he put into it as a baby. Just this morning, I threatened to wash Joe, Jr’s mouth out with soap.  I do not know where he gets the vocabulary.  Libba, for crying out loud, please pay attention.”     Meri began to speak slowly, as if to a small, not terribly bright child,   “Tell me about the body that the demolition crew found in the Old Red Building.”
       Libba, who had been more concerned about the dirt in Brian’s mouth now as opposed to that which might or might not come out of it in a few years, stopped running the cloth over his face in mid-swipe.            “Meredith, what on earth are you talking about?”
     “Lord, give me strength!   I am going to go flat out crazy with you!  Do you or do you not have a classroom that looks directly onto the Old Red Building?  Do you or do you not....”
     “Meri, I’ve already admitted that I don’t know what you’re talking about.  Why don’t you start at the beginning, and I’ll try to keep up.”
     “O.K. Here goes.   The workmen discovered a body, a skeleton really, in the basement,”
     “What!  You mean a human being?  Are you serious?”
      “Certainly, I’m serious.  You don’t think I’d get this excited over a dead rattle snake, do you?  Joe was talking to Josh Banks, you know from the police station? I cannot believe you didn’t see anything!”
       “It was too hot, and I was too tired.  On Fridays, teachers are supposed to leave the next week’s lesson plans in the office, and mine weren’t done.  Rather than go by the office and explain to Chuck, I slipped out the kindergarten door.  It was just not worth having that old lecher back me up against the copier so he can cop a feel. But, that’s another story.   Tell me what you know. Oh, and by the way, snakes don't, strictly speaking, have skeletons.  Just to be clear”
    “Oh please shut up.  You are just trying to make me forget how you have let me down.   And anyway, that’s about it.  I was hoping to get filled in by you,” her tone was more than slightly accusatory.   “Josh said the skeleton was pretty old, and they would probably never know for sure who it was or what it was doing there.
     “This is just so, so sad.  I am at home with four children and know more than you do.  Lib, you were right there!”
      Properly reprimanded, Libba attempted to make amends with the offering of one slender tidbit, “I did notice a police car out front, but I thought someone was checking for speeders.  After all, the way those city kids use the county roads for drag strips, somebody should be setting up speed traps.”
     Meri’s rolling eyes let Libba know what her offering was worth.
     “Well, that tears it, then. Since you don’t have any information for me, I have got to get home and start supper.  If Joe brings home any more news, I’ll call you,” Meredith paused, “And you, you could call some of the other teachers. 
     “Or even better!    Why don’t you give Bobby Carmichael a call tonight? He retired from the army a couple of years ago, and he’s the police chief now. He and his wife split up a while ago.  Joe said he came into the store the other day and had your mother cornered by the dairy case for about a half an hour.  He was asking her all about you. He‘d be real glad to hear from you, Libby, and he would know everything about the body.”
      “Meri, go home.  Your mind already left.  In the first place, I haven’t been at this job long enough to know any teachers well enough to call them at home.  Except for Ellen Barnes and Nadine Graham, all of them are new to me.  Ellen and Nadine, of course, have been teaching since God was a pup.  Nadine’s first year was when we were in junior high, wasn’t it?”
    “You know that I don’t remember, and you know that I do not care.” 
    “As for calling Bobby, you can just forget that.  I can imagine that conversation,” Libba reached down and pulled Brian out from under the kitchen table and handed him two pie pans to beat together.  Above the resulting cacophony, she continued, “He, probably, still regards me a commie, pinko women’s libber.”
    “Well, you can’t blame him, really Lib.  I mean, after all, there he was, in the starting lineup for the Orange Bowl.  He had gotten you a plane ticket down to the game.  Then,   you told him you couldn't come. Because you had a paper due?  Come on, now! What was he supposed to think?   You were his best girl, after all, and you refused to take off for that game?   What did you think he was going to do?  He thought you had just lost your mind. 
    “Besides, you have to be honest.  You did go a little cuckoo on the women's libber thing.  Good grief, you even quit shaving your legs.  You have started shaving again, haven’t you?”  Meredith reached down and pulled at Libba’s skirt.
    “Would you leave me alone?  Get your hands off my legs, you insane woman!”    Libba grabbed her skirt away from Meri’s grasp           
    “Yes, of course, I shave my legs.  I still cling, however, to my inalienable and God given right not to shave if I don’t want to do so.  Besides, I quit shaving as a protest against that Iran Contra mess.   Now, that you bring it up, I'm not quite clear why I thought that whether or not Libba Jeffreys shaved her legs mattered to Ollie North and Ronald Reagan, but it made sense at the time.”
     “Not to me, then, and not to me now."
     “Who asked you?  And, besides, it makes as much as sense as breaking up with a girl because she had school work that prevented her from going to the Orange Bowl when Oklahoma played.  Good grief, he acted as though I had taken to dating someone who played for  the University of Pittsburgh.  And, I never liked football anyway, so there.”
    “Oh my Gosh, don't say that too loud.  Someone might hear you.  You may have been living in Pittsburgh, but this is Verdigris Bend, don't forget.”
    “What?  You don't think the football fans are just as nuts in Pittsburgh as they are in Verdigris Bend?  Now, you're the one who's not thinking clearly.  Haven't you ever seen a Steelers' game and looked into the bleachers and seen those guys with half their bodies painted yellow and the other painted black?  And, you know what I have always wondered?  Where, exactly, do they stop painting?   Do you suppose they go all the way down, you known down THERE?”
    “Libba, you are awful, and you are trying to change the subject.”     
     The point was that Bobby's feelings were hurt, and he didn't  understand, any more than any of the rest of us did, quite frankly, why you were all the way up there anyway.” 
    Libba felt her blood start to rise.  After all of these years, why did she care what Bobby Carmichael, or Meri, for that matter, thought, said or did?  Ridiculous!  She firmly put herself in check.
    “Meri, if I had been a boy, no one would have said word one about it. I wanted to see more of the world. Big fat deal. But, no, I was a girl, and the opinion all around town was that I could see everything I had a need to see right here in good old Verdigris Bend.
    “Would you listen to me?  'The World’? Who am I kidding?  I wanted to get out of town for a while, and the only place my parents would let me go was to Pittsburgh, because my Aunt Rose was there.  But, my goodness..  The way people carried on, I should have just gone ahead and taken off for Marrakesh or someplace.  The reaction would have been the same, probably.  And, you know what else?  'Women's libber' is not a dirty word.    I'm proud of my politics......”
    “Come to think of it, I am, also, quite sure, now that my marriage has fallen apart, those very same people are   saying I got what I deserved. Bobby is, quite likely, at the top of that list.”
    “Well, now, you’re starting to whine.  Nobody thinks that, and you know it. ”
    Libba continued, “Hey, I, really, am sorry about not knowing more about today's happenings.  If it helps I will eat lunch in the teachers’ lounge on Monday and try to pick up on some of the school gossip.”
    “Monday?”  Meredith let out a hoot of laughter that caused Brian to look up from where he was pulling the remainder of the pots and pans out of the drawer at the bottom of the stove.  “I have to work down at the store tomorrow.  It’s Sara’s day off.  By tomorrow night, I shall know the entire story.”
    Libba laughed, too.  Even though there were one or two chain supermarkets on the main highway towards Claremore, most of Verdigris Bend’s population still patronized Joe Malloy’s smaller grocery store.  Joe’s grandparents had established the store, his father and mother had taken it over and Joe and Meri ran it now. Time spent on Saturday at the grocery store and Sunday morning in one of the two churches was sufficient to provide anyone with all the information needed to keep up on town gossip. .  No doubt about it. By tomorrow night, Meredith would know the identity of the deceased and what, if any, connection the poor soul had had to Verdigris Bend, Oklahoma. 
    Meredith pulled Brian out from under the kitchen table.   With her baby hanging on to her neck, she headed toward the front vestibule. 
    “And now, I really have got to go.  Mark and Angela will be home, and whenever they’re alone, they fight.”
    “Maybe they fight so much, because Mark is so much like Joe, and Angela is the spitting image of you.”
    “That’s cold, Libba, really cold.  By the way, don’t think you’re hiding anything.  I saw how you reacted when I mentioned Bobby’s name.  You wouldn’t get that mad, girlie, if those feelings were totally dead. 
    “And, besides, just for the record, no matter what you tell people about being over your divorce, how you have no hard feelings and wish Joel all the best, I know better than that, too. You’re still holding onto that anger the way you hold onto every grudge you ever had.  Get up and get over it.   Move on.  You could do a whole lot worse than Bobby Carmichael.”
    “Meri, would you, please, just this once mind your own business? I’m a big girl, and I’m fine, just fine.  I’ll be by the store tomorrow.  Do you have any canning lids left? I want to pick the pears and apples out back in the orchard.   I’ve got Gran’s jars, but I need to buy lids and rings.”
    “I don’t know, ‘Ms. Fine, Just Fine’.    We may be out.  It’s kind of late in the season, but I’ll check when I go in.  If there are any left, I’ll put them behind the counter for you.”
     “Thanks, see you tomorrow.”
       “See ya.”
       Libba stood on the front porch and watched Meri strap Brian into the car seat and hand him a toddler’s cup of water. She continued to watch as the pickup bounced back down the gravel road.
         Meredith Cramer and Joe Malloy had been in love since junior high school. Married right out of high school, they had gone off to Oklahoma State University together, and during their sophomore year, Joe, Jr had been born.  After both had graduated, they came home, and Meredith had found few reasons to leave Verdigris Bend since.  She had made three trips into Tulsa to have her babies at St Francis hospital.  With Brian, however, she had waited so long that she ended up giving birth in her own bedroom.  Joe insisted she had done it on purpose, and Libba was sure that Joe was right.     
    Half-sitting, half-leaning against the porch railing, she watched as the sun set over the hills. As gorgeous as the sunsets had been over those three rivers in Pittsburgh, there was something about a sunset in this particular spot and in this particular town that spoke to the absolute DNA in her cells.   The red bled across the turquoise blue, and then, gradually turned into a deep indigo. With the trees showing black against the sky, the sight had to be one of the most beautiful spectacles on the planet.  As a girl, she had sat beside her grandmother while they would snap beans, husk corn. It had been such a peaceful and loving place to be.     
    She let her mind go back to Meri’s revelation.  Why on earth would there be a body in that ancient building? It had been closed for years.  Libba, herself, could only barely remember it being used as a school.  Shortly before she entered kindergarten, the present school had been built, and the old building had been relegated for use a place to hold play practices and kids’ club meetings.  As an aide in junior high school, she had set up art shows in one of the empty rooms.    Sometime after that, she seemed to remember the place being condemned and boarded up. That must have been when it had happened. A tramp, looking for shelter on a raw winter day had worked loose a boarded up window and slipped in.
    Libba started to shiver, but it wasn’t the thought of some poor old tramp dying alone in a deserted school basement that was causing her discomfort.  It was cold on this porch.   It had been over a hundred degrees this afternoon, and now, it felt like a frost! Welcome home, Libba.   Four seasons in one day.  She stood up and walked back into the house to light the pilot light on the furnace.