The First Halloween

Oct 252021
 

I receive requests for this original short story every year at this time. I happily comply.

The all-purpose table had been cleared of dinner dishes and now held four pumpkins, two knives, six magic markers, and several squat orange candles. Claire had switched off the harsh overhead fluorescent and dragged two lamps in from the living room, hoping to create the right atmosphere.

“Mom, Becca’s doing it wrong.” Sadie’s whiny voice cut through the stuffy kitchen air like a dentist’s drill. She glared at her older sister.

“Shut up, brat. I’m making art.” Becca had carved out a single baleful orb and was assessing her work. Her own eyes, heavily lined and shadowed, cut to her mother.

“What? All the 7th grade girls are doing it.”

Guilt is surely a child’s most potent weapon, thought Claire, rubbing a spot between her eyebrows. She exhaled slowly, maneuvered the knife away from her youngest son’s exploratory little hands and forced a smile.

“Let Becca do her thing, Sadie. How’s your pumpkin coming along?”

“Wanna cut, Momma.” Robby was leaning out of his high chair, reaching for the knife. Claire slapped a marker and a smaller pumpkin in front of him.

“Draw a face.”

“It’s not right, Becca,” Sadie persisted.

“I’ll do this dumb pumpkin any way I want, cretin.” Becca waved her hand in dismissal. “I can’t help it if you lack imagination.”

“Mom!”

“Girls . . .”

“Becca’s not doing it the way Daddy showed us!”

“Duh, he’s gone, idiot!”

“You’re the idiot!”

Robby, alert to any discord between his two sisters, chimed in with a plaintive wail. “I wanna Dadda punkin! Want Dadda punkin now!”

“QUIET!” Claire pounded the table, sending knives and markers flying. The children froze, stunned into silence by her outburst and by the single tear that hung precariously from the corner of her eye. She regarded them bleakly: restless older daughter, resentful middle child, and a small boy suddenly marooned among so many injured women.

“Here’s how we’ll do it,” she said firmly. Picking up a knife, she made a series of shallow cuts on the remaining pumpkin to indicate a face. She worked quickly, her labors informed by years of medical training and months of suppressed grief. Within a few minutes, she had the outlines of an expressive-looking face whose sad eyes belied its wide smile. She stood back, feeling oddly satisfied. Robby clapped his hands.

“Good punkin.”

They laughed.

“I like your pumpkin idea, Mom,” Becca ventured.

“Me, too,” her sister added.

“Our pumpkin,” Claire told them. “We’re in this together.”

all-purpose table had been cleared of dinner dishes and now held four pumpkins, two knives, six magic markers, and several squat orange candles. Claire had switched off the harsh overhead fluorescent and dragged two lamps in from the living room, hoping to create the right atmosphere.

“Mom, Becca’s doing it wrong.” Sadie’s whiny voice cut through the stuffy kitchen air like a dentist’s drill. She glared at her older sister.

“Shut up, brat. I’m making art.” Becca had carved out a single baleful orb and was assessing her work. Her own eyes, heavily lined and shadowed, cut to her mother.

“What? All the 7th grade girls are doing it.”

Guilt is surely a child’s most potent weapon, thought Claire, rubbing a spot between her eyebrows. She exhaled slowly, maneuvered the knife away from her youngest son’s exploratory little hands and forced a smile.

“Let Becca do her thing, Sadie. How’s your pumpkin coming along?”

“Wanna cut, Momma.” Robby was leaning out of his high chair, reaching for the knife. Claire slapped a marker and a smaller pumpkin in front of him.

“Draw a face.”

“It’s not right, Becca,” Sadie persisted.

“I’ll do this dumb pumpkin any way I want, cretin.” Becca waved her hand in dismissal. “I can’t help it if you lack imagination.”

“Mom!”

“Girls . . .”

“Becca’s not doing it the way Daddy showed us!”

“Duh, he’s gone, idiot!”

“You’re the idiot!”

Robby, alert to any discord between his two sisters, chimed in with a plaintive wail. “I wanna Dadda punkin! Want Dadda punkin now!”

“QUIET!” Claire pounded the table, sending knives and markers flying. The children froze, stunned into silence by her outburst and by the single tear that hung precariously from the corner of her eye. She regarded them bleakly: restless older daughter, resentful middle child, and a small boy suddenly marooned among so many injured women.

“Here’s how we’ll do it,” she said firmly. Picking up a knife, she made a series of shallow cuts on the remaining pumpkin to indicate a face. She worked quickly, her labors informed by years of medical training and months of suppressed grief. Within a few minutes, she had the outlines of an expressive-looking face whose sad eyes belied its wide smile. She stood back, feeling oddly satisfied. Robby clapped his hands.

“Good punkin.”

They laughed.

“I like your pumpkin idea, Mom,” Becca ventured.

“Me, too,” her sister added.

“Our pumpkin,” Claire told them. “We’re in this together.”

HOW YOU DOIN’?

Sep 092021
 

Last week, someone hacked my Facebook account. My clever friends knew not to answer the strange messages, which read, “Hello: How you doin?” as if a non-English speaker had been watching too many episodes of “Friends.” By the time we all reported the hacker, they had moved on.

Still, the message prompted a couple of thoughts. We ask each other how we’re doing all the time. But what is it we really want to know? Or rather, how much do we want to know?

Let’s face it; the question comes with built-in, often invisible boundaries. It’s a little bit more than “hello” or a passing nod. But how much more?

The short answer is context. When you ask, are you checking in after a specific event, i.e., your neighbor just had a baby, or your friend was in a fender-bender? Are you passing the time of day? Are you inquiring about someone you know well, know in passing, don’t know at all, or haven’t seen for a while? Do you expect an answer? Are you prepared for one?

I sometimes ask people how they’re doing. Not just to be polite: I ask people I care about, people who seem distressed, or people with whom I’d like to have a conversation. I don’t pose the question casually these days. Maybe because I’m aware that quite a few people are struggling with how they’re doing. We seem to be simultaneously starved for companionship and leery of anyone’s judgement. Most of us are feeling a lack. Plenty of us are anxious or grieving.

I’m especially sensitive to that idea when 9/11 swings around. This time of year, the question of how I’m doing comes back at me. Twenty years is a big anniversary for those of us whose personal loss combined with a national period of mourning. Nevertheless, between the passage of time and the many other momentous occasions we’ve collectively experienced, people will forget to ask during this week.

That’s fine with me. I’ve long ago relinquished the idea that my pain is lesser or greater than that of anyone else. The loss of my beloved husband in a terrorist attack will always be a major loss in my life. But other events large and small have also caused injury. My struggles with the older version of my body. My sister’s recent death. The level of misinformation and disinformation lodging itself into the cultural conversation. The rising hate and fear-fueled division. My own anxiety concerning current events and yes, my own resentment at how hard I have to work—how hard we all have to work—to see the good in the world.

But maybe the work is the point. Maybe having to be so damned resilient is how we become better people. Overcoming loneliness or depression or distress, looking out instead of in, facing the unknown, forcing ourselves out of our comfort zones even if the pandemic and the increasing number of weather events keeps us physically in place for a time. Insisting on hope, even in small doses.

So, to those of you who have written or texted or posted or called to or to ask how I’m doing or to tell me you are thinking of me: I’m doing better than okay, and I’m thinking of all of you as well.

You might also be interested:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/08/nyregion/9-11-new-york-remember.html

Reaching Inside Out

May 032021
 

Four years ago, I came upon an opportunity to “mentor” an incarcerated individual by becoming a pen pal. The offer came on Facebook via an established and well-recognized journalist friend. That was smart; it got me to notice. What got me to sign up was the chance to do something positive, to get me outside myself.

My pen pal is serving time at Green Haven Correctional Facility in Stormville, NY. One year into our correspondence, I visited. We met in a large open space with long tables and chairs separated by low plastic. No, we didn’t talk by phone through glass. I was in the company of maybe two dozen inmates and their visitors, including children. I was by far the oldest there and palest person there.

Our scheduled forty-five minutes turned into three hours because of an unscheduled lockdown which the prison institutes from time to time. I expected to be nervous, and I was, but not for the reasons you might imagine. My guy treated me like royalty. He was easy to talk with. I just wasn’t sure how we could fill three hours.

I needn’t have worried. We talked, mostly about writing, some about his life inside the prison and his family, a little about my experiences as a widow. He brought a lot of his work, some of which I scanned. I bought lunch at the vending machines and we ate companionably. And then I left.

Driving home took three hours and I realized how much the visit had drained me. Nothing like a visit to a prison to understand how debilitating (as opposed to rehabilitating) life in prison must be for the inmates.

The program that connected us allows selected inmates to express themselves creatively. Many of them keep journals. Others write short stories. One is working on a novel. My pen pal writes essays, stories, and plays. One of his pieces made it into a book called Scrolls From a Forgotten World: Prisoners’ Writings and Reflections. His play was produced a couple of years back and a segment of it aired on CNN.

Sometimes I edit his work, mostly not. For one thing, he is improving with practice. For another, his work is authentic and from the heart. You can’t teach that, but you can inadvertently stifle it, and that I never want to do.

He takes great pride in his acquaintance with a “real” author. He claims it’s enhanced his status. All I know is I’ve sent him all my books and he’s gotten them all into the prison library. I can’t tell you how much I love that.

There are rules of engagement, limits imposed by the program, by the logistics of his situation, and by my determination not to promise more than I can deliver. Sometimes all I can do is listen. Mostly, I have to believe that’s as helpful as anything else.

We had a fallow period last year. Like most everyone else, we were both accosted by feelings of despair. I came off my sister’s death and went almost directly into COVID lockdown. In my pen pal’s case, lockdown was that much more onerous. Prisons have been hotspots for virus outbreaks. Visitors were restricted and prisoners lived with the very real danger of living in close quarters within an aging structure with questionable ventilation. Our correspondence faltered.

We’re back to communicating. He has a new play he’s excited to send me. I have a book I want to send him. The prison now allows for paid emails, which he says is what most of the inmates use. I suggested we use email for “emergencies” and stick to letters the rest of the time. They allow for a more personal kind of interaction. The more he writes, the better writer he becomes. I only hope the more I write to him, the better human I become.

For more information on the program, please visit: https://www.transforminglivesny.org/

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