AN ANGEL IS SITTING NEXT TO MY BED

by Marianne Carlson

My twin sister, Hannah, and I  were born 12 weeks ahead of our due date. Needing intensive care, we were placed in separate incubators. Hannah began to gain weight and her health stabilized but I  only weighed 2 lbs, had trouble breathing, heart problems and other complications. I was not expected to live.

Our nurse did everything she could to make my health better, but nothing she did was helping me. With nothing else to do, our nurse went against hospital policy and decided to place both of us in the same incubator. She left us to sleep and when when she returned she found a sight she could not believe. She called all the nurses and doctors and this is what they saw.  Hannah had put her small little arm around me as if to hug and support me. From that moment on, my breathing and heart rate stabilized and my health became normal.

From the day we were born we were always together, Hannah and Sonia, the Bauer twins. Hannah watched over me as if her mission in life was to be my protector. She was 21 when she died, and I have been an empty shell ever since because when she died, my soul died with her.    We were born in Berlin and moved to America when we were toddlers, we spent our childhood in a modest home outside  Washington DC in the 1950’s and 60’s.  Because we left Germany when we were so young, Hannah and I never carried any guilt resulting from the horrors of the war.  In a way you could say we were collateral damage because our fellow classmates always regarded us with suspicion. We knew something bad had happened but we didn’t know what, and had no idea what it had to do with us. 

My parents grew up in a parallel universe. The war had impacted both their lives on a daily basis, they were heartbroken; their beloved Berlin in ruins, so many friends and relatives taken, their homeland despised. Because of this they never felt safe while growing up and were determined to create a stable, healthy home life for us while maintaining our German heritage.  Our family was extremely close, and my twin sister and I were inseparable.

My father, a career officer, worked  as an attache at Quantico, the Marine Base. Throughout his long career in the military, he always remained a gentleman,  a very gentle man, who loved poetry and must have found his position on the base difficult to say the least. The military did not suit him, he was a pacifist in a uniform, and he wrestled with this paradox throughout his entire career. The war had ended too recently for the passage of time to  even begin to heal all wounds, but both my parents managed to handle a delicate transition with grace. 

It was important to our parents that we maintain our German heritage, we spoke English at school but always German at home, and Hannah and I always spoke German to each other, creating an air of secrecy between us in school.  No one understood us which was the way we wanted it.  It must have been hard for my mother because we had each other but she had no one. Her thick hair always tied back in a knot, her calm, competent aura always created for us an environment of safety, like a comforting mother robin in her nest. My father worked long hours while my mothers’ days were spent cleaning the house. I can’t remember her having any friends, she must have been very lonely, but she never complained. She had  great dignity, great beauty, and there was a certain sweetness about her , a softness, which revealed itself every time she smiled. Losing Hannah robbed her of that softness, it was replaced by a hard edge. Every day after school we had kaffee und kuchen at the kitchen table and told her about our day. As we grew older we had other things we wanted to do but she insisted on this one tradition from her homeland, and we couldn’t say no to her.

It's strange, I can close my eyes and visualize our home, but try as I may, the only way I see Hannah is by looking in a mirror where I can see her facade, her smile and her dimple reflected back as me - but hollow, a ghost. Her essence has disappeared from my mind like a flashlight that slowly dims before dying completely, and nothing will ever replace it. The dark red hair, the pale skin, the rakish, defiant attitude is all there, but without any substance. I have become one of those life-size cardboard cutouts, an exact replica, but lifeless.  She was my touchstone. Only I knew the extent of Hannah’s mood swings, her highs and lows. To the rest of the world Hannah was the aggressor, the stable one, and I the introvert - but I knew better. As our high school days were coming to an end, her instability grew. She covered it up well but the prospect of high school ending and    leaving home to go to college was more unsettling to Hannah than to most. We often talked well into the night with the lights out.

“If something happens to me, you need to promise me that you will be all right,” Hannah whispered one night.

“What do you mean? What are you talking about?”

“We are too close, we need to disentangle ourselves.”

“Nothing is going to happen to you,” I remember saying, the hair on the back of my neck rising.

“Probably not, but if something does happen to me, you need to know I will never leave you. Look for signs, little signals that may pop up when you least expect it.”

Boys became a factor in our junior and senior year but they gravitated towards Hannah like a magnet whereas they seemed to tolerate me as Hannah’s appendage. She was constantly arranging double dates but this “two for the price of one” wore rather thin, both for the hapless boy who was to be my partner and for me. I would have far preferred reading a good book than spending endless hours hanging out in the local coffee shop. The truth is I believe I must have been jealous of any boy who seemed to be stealing Hannah away from me but none of it mattered until Stephen came along. I rerun it in my mind endlessly, how it unfolded, how it ended, if there was anything I could have done to prevent it. 

“Heute traf ich den meisten hübscher Junge, ich denke, dass ich ihn heiraten möchte.” (I met the cutest boy today, I think I am going to marry him.”)

“Ach? Was ist sein Name?” (Oh? What is his name?)

“Stephen”

The romance, for lack of a better word, came quickly and then it ended. Hannah was crazy about him. Stephen never tried to understand how important our German heritage was, to the contrary, he insulted Germans every chance he got. He took her to the senior prom but dropped her like a hot potato shortly after and moved on with his life, leaving Hannah devastated. I can never forgive his cruelty, the way he played with her like a rag doll. Following the breakup the juxtaposition of our roles was staggering for both of us. I, who had always been the weaker, was suddenly expected to hold her up, and I was totally unqualified. I never fully understood the depths of her depression until I found her lifeless body in the car in the garage.

Years later I returned to Berlin, I work for a large publishing company, my bilingual ability has served me well as my father promised. Single, I doubt if I could ever give myself to another person as I gave myself to Hannah. The pain is too excruciating. I believe I will continue to feel as if an integral part of me is missing until the day I die. One day I was on a train headed to Hamburg to attend a conference. As was my custom, my thoughts had once again returned to Hannah. I remembered what she told me, that she would never leave me, that I would receive signs, that they would pop up when I least expected them.

“Achten Sie auf Anzeichen, Hannah told me. (Watch for signs.) I studied the list of publishers who would be attending the conference absentmindedly, when I happened to glance out the window at the German countryside. And then I saw Hannah’s sign.  My heart leapt. How like her, a perfect sign from Hannah in full sight for the world to see.

An Angel is Sitting Next to my Bed

It's All Temporary

THE SIMULACRUM

by Marianne Carlson

"Ok can you look at each other as you if you actually like each other? Remember, this is a happy time."

"Like each other? We LOVE each other," Adele gushes as her invisible tentacles wrap themselves around the hapless male standing next to her, a mere boy, taking grown up steps into a future he can only imagine.

Unable to look each other in the eye, the couple stand awkwardly in front of the garden backdrop in my photography studio, posing for their engagement announcement photo, they barely hold hands. As if caught in a  trap, uncertain whether to struggle or lay low, Clark does neither, but assumes an attitude of tortured acquiescence. My camera clicks unceasingly.  He looks  as if he would rather be anywhere else, as if he is drowning.

Adele could be a spokesperson for a Weight Watchers commercial, strutting her newfound thinness in front of him seductively, more in love with her new svelte body than in love with her fiancé. Within a year those 40 pounds will return and then some, and Clark will be  constantly on her case about her weight, her "enormous butt." He abhors fat and will beleaguer her with insults. 

I give this marriage five years at best. I wish I could tell them.  If I could do my work without the necessity of interacting with people I’d be fine because the truth is I really don’t like them very much, the messes they make of their lives. The strange thing is, they so often want to tell me everything, to confide.  A hair dresser once told me that her clients often want to reveal their deepest secrets to her. She thinks it has something to do with the fact that she is touching their heads. Maybe on some level my clients believe they are talking to my camera?

I  am surprised to find Clark take a keen interest in the shots, and even more surprised to discover that his taste is impeccable. I have him pegged all wrong. Adele's interest is superficial at best, she scans the shots with annoying insouciance and gravitates towards the worst of the worst, leaving the choice to Clark. Focused, he is a different person than the boy in front of my camera, it is as if he has matured in a matter of minutes. 

“Let me know when you decide which shot you want to use.”

“I have already decided. It’s this one.” He chooses a shot which is off balance, not very complimentary of either one of them. In the shot Clark appears to be crowding Adele out of camera range, a diaphanous shadow partially covers her face. You can’t see her eyes. I love the shot, I love Clark for choosing it and look at him in new a light.

I want to ask him why. Why the rush, why are you doing this, why are you marrying her at all, but I don’t. Instead I write up the order, process his credit card.

“I know what you are thinking.” Adele has excused herself to go to the bathroom. Clark and I are alone. 

“You do. Well, tell me then, what am I thinking?”

“Why am I marrying this foolish girl, that’s what you are thinking.”

“You said it, not I.” He is on the verge of unraveling into that insecure boy who stood in front of my camera, but through some strange inner process known only to him he again transforms in front of my eyes. His tenacity frightens me.

“Adele’s father is my nemesis. I hate him. For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be a cinematographer. I want to shoot movies. It is all I have ever wanted.”

“Good for you, I can understand that. You’re a bit young for such grandiose ideas, though.”

“Adele’s father is one of the top guns in Hollywood. I interviewed him, way before I ever met Adele, and he turned me down flat. He not only rejected me, he humiliated me in the process. In essence he told me not to let the door hit me on the way out.”

Clark’s rage was palpable.  “Does Adele know this?”

“No.”

“Does she know you want to follow in her father’s footsteps?”

“I don’t want to follow in her father’s footsteps.”

“It’s a mean industry.  You need to have very thick skin.” 

“I know. But being married to the boss’s daughter helps, doesn’t it?”

“It doesn’t hurt.”

I wish them well as they make their way to the door thinking that five years is a long shot. He will drop her like a hot potato as soon as he lands his first movie. Sitting in my den watching The Academy Awards ten years later, the camera zooms in on the nominees for best cinematographer. There sits Clark and Adele and as his name is mentioned he kisses her lightly on the cheek. Just as I imagined, she has packed on a few pounds. He still looks young and resolute, that iron determination written all over his face. He didn’t win, but he will sometime in the future. They have three children, a boy and twin girls. Adele isn’t going anywhere. Good for her.

It's All Temporary

DEEP CALLS TO DEEP

by Marianne Carlson

"Keva? Is it really you?" I looked at her in stupefied amazement. I had not seen her in at least five years, it might as well have been a lifetime, so much has changed for me since last we met. Potent emotions swept over me rendering me powerless to react in any but a superficial manner. For a moment I thought I might faint.

"Fancy meeting you here." Keva had changed.  Once pencil slim, she had put on weight giving her a solidity I found somewhat off-putting. When slim, she had a chimerical quality, I often thought of her as Tinkerbell but Tinkerbell has been lifting weights. Her eyes had not changed though, that unrelenting stare, her refusal to look away. She was a chameleon, but a chameleon with a mean underbelly. 

"I'm fat." 

"No, you look good Keva. How's life been treating you?"

"Not so good. I have been away."

"Oh?"  She had always been laconic, her way of dropping innuendos, then carrying on as if I was a mind reader.  It was one of the things I had loved about Keva, her quietness. I grew up with a mother who never stopped talking, and it drove me crazy. Then along came Keva. When we first met, when we were in the throes of first love, I thought it compelling.  Now I find it rather sinister.

"Away?"

"Shipped upstate."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"The Springdale Women's House of Correction. The food was starchy."

"Are you telling me you were incarcerated?" For reasons that were unclear to me, I wasn't surprised. Our relationship had always included some act of sedition or another, usually minor. We both had QUESTION AUTHORITY bumper stickers on our cars but Keva was far more rebellious than I. 

"You always told me I would bite off more than I could chew, well I did."

"It must have been a hell of a big bite."

"It was stupid. Basically I was set up."

"What did you do?" I felt like I was pulling teeth, trying to get information out of her, and suddenly I recalled  how this person had almost destroyed me. I thought I was over her, but I was not. It was as if she pulled a switch and the deep recesses of her personality were once again hidden while at the same time her irresistible  nature dominated.  It had always been this way, a lethal game of hide and seek. I, always the seeker, trying to peel through the layers of Keva’s psyche.

"I got caught up with some not very nice people, they were into drugs, and used me as a mule."

"You are too smart for that, Keva."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Tell me about prison."

Much to my surprise, she radiated, a subtle inner glow crept into her usually opaque eyes. "I met some wonderful women. Believe it or not, I was sorry to leave."

"Really?"

"I'll never look at life in the same way again. I'm an X running around in a world of O's. 

"But you always were, Keva. 

"Remember you used to tell me, "deep calls to deep," Keva said, and I always told you I had no idea what it meant?"

"I remember."

"Well, now I know. My cell mate taught me, but I'm not sure I have the depth to answer her. It was nice seeing you again." Keva turned abruptly as if to leave,  she had revealed more than she felt comfortable in doing. 

Nice? Is that what she calls it? Nice, when in five short minutes she managed to reduce me to a shell of my former self again. Stronger now, I will be able to replace the pieces of my shattered ego, but it will take a strength of character I am not certain I possess. Deep calls to deep.

It's All Temporary

THE CHINA DOLL

By Marianne Carlson

Sarah had it all. A few months after her birth the small town where she lived with her family (two older brothers, her parents, and Angelo, the Maine Coon cat)  had a Cutest Baby Contest.  Sarah won. The prizes consisted of a year's supply of Pampers, assorted jars of Gerber's baby food, a mobile for her crib and a 529K.  Tom and Terese, a handsome, annoyingly righteous couple, were thrilled. They were careful not to boast, but it sealed the deal for them. Sarah was preternaturally special in every way.

It was impossible to carry on a normal conversation with Sarah's execrable parents.   Any subject not involving the welfare of Sarah was of no consequence, conversely, anything even remotely concerning Sarah was monumental.  Both parents were child psychologists. Tom, a professor at a prestigious university, has been published often. His specialty, the gifted child, has been cited as beyond reproach. The fact that Sarah may or may not be gifted was never questioned.

Her two brothers, Hank and Tom Jr., were well aware that Sarah was the favorite child, and it did not sit well with them, there seemed to be an omnipresent tension in the air. With the passage of time, their dislike turned to hatred. They called her “The China Doll.”  If the boys needed new hockey equipment it was given reluctantly, if at all, because Sarah needed new figure skates, if the boys needed money for Little League, it came only if there was enough money for Sarah’s gymnastic lessons, if the boys wanted to join the swim team, they had to work to come up with the money, although money was readily available for Sarah’s diving lessons. 

“What an endearing child,” strangers would say when Sarah walked along the sidewalk hand-in-hand between Tom and Terese. Dangling her feet in the supermarket cart, she attracted attention in every aisle. When too big for the cart, she pushed it behind her mother, giving an accusatory glance if she was not pleased with the choice that went into the basket. A convoluted relationship between mother and daughter developed as Sarah matured, a juxtaposition where Sarah called all the shots. Terese appeared to be scared to death of her, and for good reason. Sarah was a scary child, and as a teenager, she was worse. Her straight A’s, her beauty, her seemingly effortless ability to excel in almost everything did not make her complete. She had no friends, and there was something off, something wrong when you looked at her. Most people were blinded by her beauty, but that beauty did not disguise the haunted look in her eyes. 

Angelo was a lap cat and liked nothing more than to sit on a lap and purr but he would have nothing to do with Sarah. He did not like her. Since there were coyotes in the neighborhood, the family agreed that it was not safe for him to go outside but he didn’t mind. He sat on the love seat in the sun all day long and purred, waiting for Hank, his favorite, to come home. Like a dog, he ran to Hank as soon as he walked through the door, and they would snuggle.

“Hay Tom, did you clean Angelo’s box?” The boys took turns cleaning the cat’s box, Sarah was exempt from the chore, God forbid her precious nose may have to smell Angelo’s prolific poop.

“No, it’s your turn this week.”

“I know, I just went to clean it but there is hardly anything in it.”

“That’s strange.  Where is Ang? I haven’t seen him all day.  Come to think of it, he didn’t sleep with me last night.” Hank looked troubled.

“Sarah, what did you do to Angelo? Did you let him out last night?”

“No, you creep, why would I do that?”

“Because you hate him.”

“No I don’t.”

“Cats hide in the strangest places.” Terese said. “He’ll come out from some shelf sooner or later.” Terese wasn’t worried, she had a parent/teacher conference later in the morning and she planned to give Sarah’s teacher a piece of her mind. Sarah had been moody and disrespectful recently and it had to be her teacher’s fault since Sarah was incapable of wrongdoing.  And then there was this boy, Kevin. Tall, gangly and pimply, Terese didn’t like him at all, but he was always hanging around Sarah - like an over anxious puppy.

“I don’t like him, Sarah,” Terese had told her yesterday. He is declasse. He is not good enough for you. He needs to stop hanging around.”

“Declasse? Declasse? Oh mother, give me a break, what makes you so high and mighty,  the be all and end all?”

“I’m not the be all and end all, it’s just that I want the best for you.”

“Well, maybe I don’t want the best.  Maybe I don’t deserve the best. Maybe I LIKE the fact that he’s not snobby.” Sarah stuffed her books into her knapsack, slamming the door behind her.

The parent/teacher conference did not go well. Sarah’s grades were falling, she was skipping school, and Kevin was more of a factor than Terese had realized. Her teacher said they were inseparable. Shaken, Terese called Tom and began to relate the particulars of the conference. While she talked Angelo sauntered across the kitchen as if he owned the place, ate his dinner, took his usual place on the love seat and quickly fell asleep.

“Oh, Tom, at least there is one piece of good news. Angelo just reappeared, none the worse for wear. Hank will be happy.”

Angelo slept, oblivious to the initial concern, fear, and then horror that occurred under his roof. Hours, days, weeks, months passed and still there was no word from Sarah. She disappeared without a trace, as did Kevin. Tom Jr. and Hank feigned concern, but soon their life went on as before. Shattered, Terese and Tom never fully recovered.  

It's All Temporary

MONICA

by Marianne Carlson

“I’m worried about her, I’m no child psychiatrist, but there is something wrong.”

“She’s fine, she is just experiencing growing pains.” 

“Growing pains?” Evelyn was incredulous. A handsome man, it was important to Mark, husband of Evelyn, father of Monica, the subject of discussion,  to keep his emotions in check, and when he felt the slightest indication that he may  loose his cool, he had a habit of biting his lower lip. The bite, more like a  nibble, was a reminder to him to pull himself together. Since things were not good between Mark and Evelyn, that lower lip was being mangled daily.   Tall and muscular with thinning brown hair,  his brown eyes were often troubled.  It was as if there were many unresolved issues which he pondered frequently, and these issues gave him sleepless nights. 

“Plus the fact she doesn’t like school, she told me she hates Miss Lilly, her teacher. Miss Lilly told me she has to put Monica in a time out at least once a day and when I asked her why she said it is because Monica often hits the other kids with shovels from the sandbox. She threw a little dump truck at Peter from down the street and he needed stitches over his eye. If it had hit him in the eye, it might have blinded him. According to Miss Lilly, Monica has disturbing tendencies towards violent behavior.”

Mark took a deep breath, God, what a headache, would she ever stop talking.  A prosecuting attorney, he was masterful at his job, a raising star, but his days were full of perpetrators whose lawyers were always looking for a plea. A nasty business, this plea bargaining, and it gnawed at him. Thugs who should be facing time in the slammer released on community service, a travesty. Mark’s court room persona  was perfected to a fine tune - an orator weaving a tale, his face a blank slate, until he went in for the kill. This was one reason why he was so good at his job, but his insomnia was making things much harder, and the last thing he needed was to come home to an irate Evelyn, overwhelmed by Monica’s foibles.  That lower lip was getting raw. 

“I’m serious, Mark something has to be done.”

“Where is she now?” Mark hung his coat in the closet and started for the stairs.

“In her room. I told her she needed to stay there until she was ready to apologize.”

“Apologize? To who?”

“To Peter. To Miss Lilly. To me.  I don’t know, Mark. She is beginning to scare me. She has no remorse whatsoever.”

“I’m not sure a four year old even knows the meaning of remorse, Evelyn.”

Mark climbed the stairs, reluctant to enter Monica’s small bedroom. She sat on her pink bedspread, too young to be so crestfallen.  It was as if the weight of the world was on her tiny shoulders.  The quintessential bedroom for a four-year old girl, everything was pink, but for the first time it struck Mark how incongruous all that pink was, pink did not suit her.

“Hi Monica, tough day at school?”

“Not bad.” Monica was so still she almost appeared drugged, a strange lassitude for a four year old. 

“But not good either?”

“Yeah, not good. 

“What happened?”

“Peter hit me with a toy truck.” 

She was lying. Peter knew that she was lying, and as he listened, an ineffable horror almost overwhelmed him. His work had brought him face-to-face with too many career criminals, some (for whatever the reason) came out of the womb warped beyond repair from the beginning. He knew all these time-outs were a harbinger of things to come, and for the first time he faced the future with Monica with great apprehension because he knew with every fiber of his being that this future was not going to be pretty.

“Miss Lilly tells us that it was you that hit Peter.” Without realizing it, Mark had assumed his nonchalance mode, a signal that he was preparing for the attack.  He thoughtfully nibbled his lower lip as he watched his daughter’s body language, always a dead giveaway.

“Miss Lilly hates me. She always chooses Peter to stand at the head of the line.” Monica’s unflinching stare was unnerving, a face-off between two adversaries.  As he watched her, he realized to his horror that it wasn’t his daughter, but himself that he was trying to stare down. Years of education, college, law school, none of it held a candle to what Monica taught him at that moment. Looking at her was like looking into a mirror, but it was worse than that, it was as if he was stripping them both bare. Suddenly the realization that years of polished performances in front of a judge had removed his ability to know himself at all, he was an actor unable to remove his mask.

“Stay in your room until dinner,” he told her as he abruptly turned and left the room. Shaken, he went into his bedroom, kicked off his shoes and sat on the bed. Evelyn came in and confronted him with her usual sledge hammer approach.

“Well, what did she say?”

“She said Peter hit her.”

“Did she really? And you let her get away with that?”

“No. She knows that we know she is lying.”

“How will we punish her?”

“I don’t know, Evelyn, I don’t know, but I need to lie down now. I have a terrible headache.”

It's All Temporary

HE SHALL COVER THEE WITH HIS FEATHERS

                  

by Marianne Carlson

When I was in the second grade I started sleeping at my grandmother's most nights. My parents never even knew or cared where I was but her kitchen always smelled like bread baking in the oven, and it was warm there. Our house was always cold. I slept in a spare bedroom under one of her handmade quilts. I remember the sun used to shine first thing in the morning on a framed Bible quote hanging on the wall. The room was white, and there was an old oak bureau under the window.  I  put my treasures in the top drawer: my Hello Kitty knapsack, lip gloss, toys from MacDonald's happy meals.  As I grew older,  my treasures changed to bags of weed, pipes, needles.  

I'm not sure why I am telling you this, maybe because I have sat through too many group therapy sessions where anything goes as long as you keep talking.  A lot of what is said in those groups is just plain bullshit. I can spot a bullshitter a mile away.  I never said much in those groups. Confessing all was never a catharsis for me, and the older I get, the less I talk. There are too many talkers as it is, and I don't think I could ever hear anything ever again that would surprise me. 

My grandmother practically raised me. She was a tiny, fragile looking lady, but cantankerous.   I remember once some cretin tried to swindle her at a convenience store, and she knocked him over the head with her cane. Damn near killed him. It is hard for me to talk about my grandmother now because I broke her heart, not once, but over and over again. We lived down the street from her, my mother and father and six kids. I was the youngest, a most unwelcome surprise. I figured that out as soon as I learned about the birds and bees. Our house was a real pig pen all the time, but my grandmother's cottage was a safe haven, and my grandmother didn’t drink. My father was drunk all the time, a mean drunk.

On the wall in the room where I slept next to the Bible quote was this framed picture of an owl sheltering all these little owls under his wings. My grandmother told me that the owl was supposed to be the Lord, He will always protect me if I believe in Him.

He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High 

shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.

He shall cover thee with his feathers, 

and under his wings shalt thou trust:

For he shall give his angels charge over thee, 

to keep thee in all thy ways.

Yeah right. What I saw in that picture was that there were five little owls under those wings, but the sixth one was left out in the cold to fend for herself, and that sixth one was me. There wasn’t gonna be any angels watching over me, that’s for sure.

It was in middle school when my life began to go down hill. The only time I ever went home was to see if I could swipe some money from one of my siblings so that I could buy weed. I smoked pot every day. My grandmother could sniff out a bad actor in a New York minute, and she hated my friends.  

“You’re known by the company you keep,” she would say to me when she caught one of the shifty high school boys hanging around. 

“Keep them away from this house.  Boys shouldn’t be wearing earrings.”

“Birds of a feather flock together.” More birds, more feathers, this was the worst thing she could have said to me.

One of the “walking wounded,” I dressed like a freak, wore black, dyed my hair a different color every week, pierced every possible area of my anatomy.  I dropped out of school in the 10th grade, got a job washing dishes for a local restaurant, had an abortion and fell in love with heroin. The trajectory of my life seemed to be set, and in that path the owl was nowhere to be seen. In retrospect, I am amazed I survived at all, but I am beginning to entertain the notion that perhaps that owl was operating behind the scenes. I was spiteful. I pummeled  my grandmother with cruel behavior,  taunting her, the last person in the world to deserve it.

“Where were those angels when that piece of shit killed the people in that movie theatre in Colorado? I guess those angels weren’t into Batman.” 

“Why didn’t those angels show up at Columbine?”

“Are the angels on vacation when a plane crashes or some poor bozo crossing the street gets hit by a drunk driver?”

She always had the same unsatisfactory answer. “You have to learn to love the mystery of it all.”

“Fat chance,” I would answer. 

After too many years of chasing some elusive dream, I overdosed on a combination of pills and heroin, the medics told me that I was more dead than alive when I was wheeled into the ER. From the hospital I spent a month in rehab and another six months in a halfway house, I learned that angels come in all shapes and sizes and that I better listen to them if I wanted to stay around awhile longer.

My grandmother died when I was in rehab. No one in my family told me, I guess they were afraid it would set me off. She left me her house so I am back in the same bed I slept in when I was in the second grade. The owl is still on the wall, the little owls still under his wing. I don’t sleep well, most recovering addicts don’t, insomnia is something you  learn to live with.  The funny thing is I could swear I can hear that owl hooting at me sometimes, and when I do, I think it’s my grandmother’s way of telling me that she was right all along.

It's All Temporary

EXQUISITE PAIN

by Marianne Carlson

Everything I needed to know about her was encapsulated in one glance. Or so I thought.  From her well worn, dirty white Converse high tops, her skinny jeans, low at the hip, her faded gray hoody, she was an interesting combination of class and grunge, an uptown girl who spent time downtown. She didn't wear the hoody,  instead she wore a tweed golf cap with a little visor that partially covered her dark hair and shaded her eyes so you couldn't tell if she was looking back. The effect she had on me was not pleasant. As I watched her, she made me feel as if I was stealing things from her. Little did I know that in the long run, she would be the thief. 

It was the golf cap that gave her class.  She  entered the supermarket, disentangled a shopping cart by ramming it back and forth several times into the long line of carts,  and took off like The Little Engine That Could to the dairy section. The golf cap rose above the rest of the shoppers, she was very tall and she walked with great purpose. I had never seen anyone shop with such determination, without a list.

I was in hot pursuit, an average man, not very tall. One percent milk went into her cart and therefore into mine. Six large eggs in a thick plastic carton (guaranteed to harm the environment) followed the one percent milk. I could tell she was hesitant about buying those eggs, perhaps she was an environmentalist, but if she was, so be it. I could learn to kneel at the alter of Al Gore, although she would be pushing her luck with that. Six large eggs landed in my cart next to the milk.

The market was quite crowded and so well lit that it became difficult for me to follow her. I thought I had succeeded until we waited in the checkout line. The cute young cashier with curly red hair and purple nail polish was in training, (aren't they all?) She didn't know the difference between a cantaloup and a honeydew, the scanner refused to scan, it was an endless wait, but she was rather endearing, like a puppy eager to please.  While waiting, the golf cap spoke.

"You have been following me."

"You noticed?

"Of course I noticed. You're not very subtle." Unfazed, she said nothing more, then looked in my cart, looked in her cart, back in my cart. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, the way a naughty boy feels who has been caught red-handed doing something untoward. Then she laughed.

“How vexing.”

It was silly of me, and childish, but at the very least it opened the door a crack to a conversation.  In retrospect, it was idle chitchat, but it was all I had.

“Vexing? I love that!”

“Love what?”

“That you use the word vex, what a great word. Are you an English major?”

“No, English is my second language.”

“Let me guess! German?”

“Right.”

“I knew it!”

“How did you know? My accent?”

“I knew it before you said a word. I can always pick out a German.  Germans have a look.”

“A look?” 

Yeah, I can’t describe it. But the Converse high tops are a dead giveaway.”

Our novice cashier had managed to bungle her way through three or four people in front of the golf cap. She was next. I had to act fast or all would be lost. Beep, beep, beep went the scanner, the cashier was on a roll, soon the golf cap would be out the door.  Covers from THE NATIONAL ENQUIRER, PEOPLE MAGAZINE, a potpourri of celebrities, faces frozen by too many face lifts, were almost blinding me. I suddenly realized that the golf cap was one of the most authentic females I had ever seen and I would probably never see her again. 

“Aufweidershen,” she said. “Enjoy your quark.” She smiled as she exited through the automatic door.

That smile haunts me, I have searched for it ever since. The French have an expression, “La Douleur Exquise.” It means the heart-wrenching pain of wanting someone you can’t have. That says it all. Ten years have gone by and in those ten years, I married and have two children, a boy, Thomas, and a girl, Bette. The marriage has been on again, off again, it probably wasn’t a good idea. My wife, Candice, is well named because her nickname is Candy and I find the sweetness in her nature to be nauseating at times. Those times are increasing, as is the botox, fillers, manicures and pedicures. I fight her tendency to steer Bette in that direction by buying her books about Pipi Longstocking and young girl detectives, but I don’t hold much influence over her. 

The software company I work for sent me to Berlin to attend a conference on innovative software for the construction industry. One day I had had just about enough of German construction workers and ducked out for a quick lunch. While buying a sausage from a vendor on Alexanderplatz, I saw her. It’s strange, I never knew her name, somehow it added to the allure not to know, but I know it was her. She walked arm in arm with a handsome German, held the hand of a little blue eyed blonde girl, the golf cap sailing above the crowd. Our eyes met briefly. I will never know if there was a slight twinge of recognition on her part.  It doesn’t matter because in that brief moment, she once again gave me what I needed, only this time I did not feel as if I was stealing, I had earned the right to it.

“Ihre Änderung, Herr, Ihre Änderung.” The vendor called me back to reality as he handed me my euros. I momentarily wondered if he was cheating me, but it really didn’t matter.

It's All Temporary