A Place One Wouldn't Normally See In Such a Condition

Saturday, March 11, 2006

[8:11am] Coffee was crazy Friday night. Instead of the usual ten people standing, it was closer to every seat taken, half the room standing, and fifteen more kids running around outside in the cold. It was almost like a reunion. Amongst the many were: Joe, Shakespeare, Pepper, Wallace, Augustus, Curly, Rose, Molly, Starr, a yodeling red-head, the Mushroom sisters, Evrain and Justus of Orange (on a visit home from college), Gavin Rolfe, Giggles, the Tecumseh girl, Jo-Jo and Puddle-jumper, and who knew who else. It was hot and loud and smelled of Highland grog, but that was the way of it with social gatherings. And everyone enjoyed themselves.

While mingling outside, Joe threw an abandoned Christmas tree over the fence down below to the hill. Tinsel was still woven through it and it had turned a lovely shade of brown. And Collette heard from Grandpa Hobcoggin himself that he was getting a book published (an historical-fiction children’s book – Mohawks/archeology, which meant it had to be good) and it would be ready for reading in seven to eight months. In addition, the primary distributor was based in Australia, oddly enough, which made things all the more interesting. Collette was happy for him – quite an accomplishment.

(Meanwhile, there were rumors that Carrie-Bri had completely given up the quest for Ernest. But Collette insisted on knowing nothing…)

Before coffee, however, OLeif and Collette had taken a drive out to the mall which had just been purchased by the owners of the company where OLeif worked – a sort of open house to introduce the employees and their families to the new work place. It was an enormous place with many halls and doors and four huge wings. A furniture store and Old Tyme Pottery were still in two half-ends of the wings. And from one wing-end came what sounded like barking dogs and a high-volume pep talk, which sounded like a dog basketball game. Collette sat on a bench in the center of the mall while OLeif set up the sound system. The lighting was low and above her was a gridded skylight, covering the whole ceiling. Several green trees still grew in the center and each wing was marked as parking areas – green, red, blue, and yellow – on signs suspended from the vaulted barn-like ceilings. The whole place was huge, dark, and empty, with two old soda machines lit up near the make-shift cafeteria for the evening, where platters of sandwiches, vegetables, cheese, and salami were already being set out. It had a strange abandoned, between second and third world country feeling. And Wallace and Buster were there as well – friendly folks. In addition, as they were millionaires, the owners had pulled out the big guns and rented a helium tank to blow up balloons for the kids, and had hauled in a bouncy house with a small slide that led right into the rocky pavement. There was also a basketball net set up for the older guys. And the younger of the brothers (of the owners) was reminding her more and more of Peter…

But on to Saturday – Annamaria was to arrive at eight over at the Snicketts’ for Carrie to do her hair, OLeif was doing a photo shoot with Rose at ten (bright colors, layers, jeans with holes, several black and white 1930’s shots…), the concert was at two at the Lindenwood University Cultural Arts Center, and then there was a Bad Andoli’s Youth Mission Trip Fundraiser Dinner/Auction planning meeting at the church at five followed by a movie night back at the house. But schedules were always so uninteresting when written out.

And aside from all that, Collette had managed to once again, burn three fingers on a hot pan from the oven, late Friday night, and had to hold an ice cube around them for awhile. But by morning, the pain had receded, and burned badly only when running water over her fingers. So she washed her hair with one hand that morning and found that all that remained as evidence to her stupidity were three shiny marks where the fingerprints had been melted off.

[11:35am] Collette thought that day about Curly, her little brother. She didn’t know him very well, really. There likely had never been more than a dozen conversations between them, consisting of only one or two sentences apiece, perhaps. Maybe it was rather odd that she hardly knew her brother-in-law. But that was the way it had seemed to be from the very beginning. It was similar with Izzy and Kitts as well, but she had spoken more with Kitts in the past years, earlier on, and Izzy just talked to everybody. Yet Curly, though he was a ham, very jovial, and even somewhat emotional, seemed to keep most of his thoughts to himself – his serious thoughts anyway. Collette was not entirely sure that she had ever seen him speak seriously on any subject in particular. But then again, how could she, when she hardly knew him? All she ever really saw of him those days was something in connection with his music.

And it had struck OLeif Friday night – and he had seen it before – but suddenly realized:

“I guess I didn’t know just how much he loves music, he loves to write it and he loves to play it,” OLeif said, after they had dropped off Molly. “It’s pretty much the most important thing in his life right now.”

And Collette suddenly realized herself that it seemed true – gradually, all the bike rides, hikes, ghillie suits, guns, and anything military had seemed to disappear off his shelf. When she thought about it, she realized that every day he had music. She couldn’t even picture him reading or writing for school. Theory class, voice lessons, guitar, ukulele, piano, madrigal rehearsals, choir, “Flint River” practices, writing music, eventually joining the jazz band, attending concerts and competitions, jam sessions, even taking over OLeif’s old job of doing the sound at church on Sunday mornings… He was practically consumed with everything music – perhaps the crux of his fifteen year-old existence.

And Collette wondered to herself, where he would be, five years from then. Ten? Their days of playing at the coffee shops would be over as soon as it had begun, and not being said in a pessimistic way – but soon, that time of life would be at a close. And Collette wondered where all the kids would go when their time came.

Fact – Honey is the only food that does not spoil. Honey found in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs has been tasted by archaeologists and found edible.