Alleghany

We are weaving through the Alleghany Mountains, the last stop in Breezewood behind us, where the gas attendant who bequeathed a smile as she handed me my change will still be chewing on the fat end of her gas station cigar. We pass a long, deep valley, spotted yellow from the delicate skin of old farms, white chapels without bells, and gray green bales of wet hay that have lasted through many winters and are now scattered along the arteries of the low brown fields.

My mother dips her shoulder like a Las Vegas showgirl as she listens to a new CD and recalls the many times we’ve passed along this road, these winding hills, and what about them have changed, the color of the lane lines, the cement dividers, the cool air of spring. My father, though born so close to these hills, is tired from grading Public Relations projects, and sleeps behind his New York Times, his neck jerking him awake when his red beard brushes against the cold window.

We overtake the slower cars, the ones holding families who have never been through this part of the country, and who enjoy the view even though the sky is overcast and air still winter cold. We push forward with the poise of semi trucks hauling grains and lumber and metal casings crafted carefully in these working class towns, in the factories my Grandfather use to work in as a young man, after the wars. A truck driver with cranberry red nail polish races my mother, not knowing that my mother cannot be beaten, no matter how fast or light the rig is.

We have passed so many springs in a car along these roads, through Ohio and Pennsylvania, on our way to Maryland and the capital of this grainy busy nation. We have sped rapidly past the Three Rivers and Pittsburgh, gaining momentum over Licking Creek and Hagerstown, through mountain tunnels and around Civil War grasses. And I suppose this is the only way the heart of a country can survive the years. It slips between us on back lanes as someone notices a barn, or a mill, or trailer, or a rusty bike broken on a porch. Something of America will squeeze its way into a poem and someone will read it and remember a moment in the landscape. And America so blessed, for the reader will forget these words, maybe as quickly as they are read, but then later discover another moment in the landscape, falling in love again.

Because something always lingers; and I do not know whether it is the best thing, or even a moment worth remembering. These bits are only what I have noticed today. What I know for sure is that in a few hours, the sky will dim and there will be no lights bowing over this rural highway lighting the last long stretch before the big cities of the East. The grains will sit content in their silos. The mountains will be all but invisible behind the dark towers of rain clouds. And I imagine with much comfort in my heart, field dogs leaving the trails of rabbits for tomorrow, skipping home to sleep at the feet of their masters.

thanks for nothing, martha washington

The outside running season has officially begun. It is so refreshing to sweep away some mileage outside, rather than worrying about when the next time that the rotating fan will hit me with its sweetness while working out at the gym. I admit it, today wasn’t the sunniest day on the books, nor the warmest. But that is how Spring is here, I imagine. Well, it’s not even that I imagine really. I just haven’t been back for such a long time. My Dad tells me that the last few years winter has seemed to just end up in Summer. Not that I mind the gloomy days at all.

Today was an interesting day, however. I went a little bit earlier than the last few days (7:30am), just as everyone was leaving for work. But don’t imagine the picture perfect work-goers, pleasantly spilling into their cars and rolling delicately around the block, adjusting coffee sips between half smiles from Christian radio talk shows. Oh No. These are the just-out-of-college work-goers, peeling their little Fords like rusty go-carts around the pot-hole ridden cracks in the residential streets, honking for no apparent reason at me, running on the sidewalk, Starbucks double shot espresso induced head bobbing madly to some neo punk goth band – all to get to work in twenty minutes, in Cleveland, which is forty-five minutes away in rush hour morning traffic.

As soon as the weather gets nicer, nin and I are going to start riding on Towpath on off days. It’s beautiful in the morning down there, especially in the early summer before everyone else shows up on the trails early in the morning. Anyway, nin has this fascination with the gigantic valley bridges, so it should be pleasurable for the both of us, looking and watching.

I don’t like the trains though. A few nights ago I was laying on the futon in the living room. I couldn’t sleep and thought that maybe if I laid out there in the darkness and coolness of the big room I would get tired and doze. BAD IDEA. I use to not be able to be in a room that was completely dark. I went from kids nightlight to this nightlight of the Virgin Mary – as my “joke” cover for still needing a kids nightlight. One of the reasons was certain predisposition to hallucinations, but in general I just didn’t like seeming visible in that space. Anyway one of the things that scared boatloads of life out of me were the valley and lumber trains that I could hear in my bedroom all those miles away. Actually more than anything those train whistles scared me, more than my imagination, more than delusions, more than the scariest of possibilities.

I’ve tried to dissect this phobia over the years. I haven’t been that successful in finding a big following of other people that share this phobia – I mean it’s not like something that you have to go to “group” for – the whistle fear. But I think that I’ve come to the conclusion that it stems back from a lesser trauma I suffered during my first visit to Williamsburg as a child. My parents bought us those wooden whistles, the ones that made the train noises, among other historical presents like – old bullets from the civil war – you know, innocent stuff like that. It was a very hot weekend, I remember, and I was super cranky. Anyway, I took my whistle out of my bag and was smelling and smelling it. Instead of breathing the fresh air, I just inhaled the air from the whistle, almost all day long till I nearly got sick from the wood fumes. It smelled good, actually, I still remember it very clearly. But then it happened. We saw “Martha Washington” walking down the street. She had her big fluffy white dress on, her white ostentatious bonnet. And she gave me a sinister look, I remember, like “you don’t belong here, little girl,” and kept walking. I mean I imagine it that way, but it probably wasn’t even the Martha Washington impersonator lady, it was probably just some idiot tourist wearing all white with a ridiculous white hat, which is traumatizing in its own right. Still, the sensory memory of the smelling, and the hotness, and my brother playing with the Civil War bullets, and me wanting to be quiet under the giant willows, and Martha Washington outwardly dissing me in front of everyone….

…thus my fear of the train whistle.

location location location

I found out last night, while playing this trivia game, that “location, location, location” was a quote from Mr. William Dillard – of Dillard Stores – standard mall anchor and usually good sale shoe selection. Another random fact for the warehouse, but I’m glad I know it.

Today while I was driving through the valley, I saw a bird carrying a medium sized stick in his beak through the air. He was probably on his way over to his little pregnant bird wife. Then, on the way back through the valley, I saw another bird, this time on the tip of Peninsula and Hudson, also carrying a stick. Same reasons I would imagine. And of course the Blue herons are back. Their land is protected close to the Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath. There are hundreds of them poking their bowling pin heads out of their nests that stay pretty well put during the rest of the year.

It might be because of the question from last night, or maybe just because Spring always makes me feel like a little pregnant bird, but I couldn’t help but envy their nest location. Peninsula, Hudson. In people property we’re into the millions, if you can even find real estate on land that isn’t protected (not that I’m pro-development) – only that when you find a place in the valley, you’re not quick to give it up.

So I congratulate them, I guess. And they deserve a small kindness these days. They came back from Florida, expecting a few sunny days, and all that Northeastern Ohio has show them is morning after morning of cold winds and cloudy skies.

the yellow wave of sun again

I have this little cactus named Maurice. He is only about three inches tall and spikes out probably two. Each day when I come into my office to write, I notice that he is slanting to one side or the other. I’m not sure why. I’ve been told not to over water him, that if I do, he’ll die, but I feel like he wants the water. He is in this fake little terracotta planter, painted in that American Southwest style. But the desert trees are the wrong color. They look like seaweed poking through red clay. They were probably painted in Taiwan anyway, by little girls that didn’t even know what they were suppose to imagine on the pot. As if they were allowed to imagine at all.

This morning I got lost in this little town called Hudson. I missed my turn and anyone would confidently say that I have the worst sense of direction. But it was such a pleasant drive. These little farm houses. Ohio farm houses. The ones on the tops of giant hills and the roads that run next to them bending so tightly that you think you are meant to go in and say hello. That a woman with a yellow apron might be in there making you chicken and dumplings or a blackberry pie. When all of my hope was lost of ever making it home again, I saw the woman who is our mail carrier. She was driving toward me, her little white trunk nearly flying from the top of the pavement hills. It was sunny. March sunny, like winter might be melting down at last. And her eyes were squinting. She looked so happy. She might have been lost too.

personae

The Willow

The most wonderful thing
is to not have a heart.
No veins shiver,
emptying and refilling
my courage.
I have felt empty for you
because you do not know
God, in my way, deep
in the air where there is only
the sun and the moon
who braids my hair with her
long white tongues that are
the texture of warm seas.
Have you ever felt such grace?
Before you were filled with
the curse of purpose,
sitting there, long hours
at your desk. I mean to tell you
that under your skin
is not a riverbed of life.
Each time the clouds come
and open themselves for you,
you look up, think of your
emptiness, and are terrified.