Yellowriter

Dates are the unrestrained geography of my brain. Whenever I see or hear a specific date, my mind immediately searches its databanks in an attempt to recover all of the history related to that particular day. November 22nd is that memory jogger that reminds me of the second shooter on the grassy knoll in Dallas when a president died. April 20th, being Hitler’s birthday, set the stage for a murderous campaign of high school students at Columbine high. September 18th is the day the United States Air Force was born and so on.

January 28th started out like any other Saturday. As I booted up my computer in the morning I was thinking of all of the information my gray matter had stored for this date. My first thoughts turned to a girl named Margaret, whom I affectionately called Meg. “Affectionately” really only scratches the surface in my memories of this woman, the first person I truly loved. January 28th was to be the day of our wedding, and the nuptials never happened. We had a tumultuous relationship with highs and lows and passion that was way beyond what two young people could handle. Our powerful exploration soon turned into exploitation and the breakup left me reeling for a year or more. I saw her fifteen years later at her father’s funeral and we had a wonderful time reminiscing. She had never married and told me that I was partly to blame. I laughed as I left the mortuary thinking how things worked out for the best, but I never think of January 28th without first thinking of Meg, my introduction to the complexities of all things relational.

As my meditation turned to another January 28th event, the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, my e-mail filled the screen. It was the message all aspiring writers wait for. A publisher in Louisiana had been reviewing my latest novel for a period of eight months, and this bit of electronic mail was like a drink of cool water in a torrid desert. The message praised my work and informed me that my contract was sent via priority mail and would be arriving later that same day. I laughed out loud and then shared the news with my wife and children. How could a January 28th be any better?

As I reveled in my literary conquest, my family prepared for the arrival of visitors. We had been trying to sell our home for over six months. We had already purchased another residence and the burden of double mortgages was weighing me down. I remember reading a quote from Samuel Johnson that said, “No man, but a blockhead ever wrote, for money.” The advance or the royalties would put this previous unknown author in the dollars. Two mortgages? No problemo! The strangers arrived and it was a thing of beauty. He was a professional man, from Boston, and he worked from his home via cyberspace. He looked the house over while his wife, a diminutive Mexican woman, sat quietly in the living room. The prospective buyer soon retreated to his car to retrieve his camera, and then commenced photographing the entire house. I thought that this was a bit over the top when he wanted to take pictures of the attic, but the customer is always right, right? The topic soon turned to baseball and we were deep into the 2004 World Series when his realtor, a Slavic blonde named Katerina, said that she had to leave for an open house. The Bostonian, unfazed, waved and we continued to discuss the four game sweep of the Saint Louis Cardinals that broke the curse of 86 years. He left assuring me that he wanted to make an offer, and promised that he would be back with Katerina after her open house, which ended at four o’clock.

I was so excited that I called to share my good fortune with my father. My sister, Marva, answered the phone and informed me that Dad was running a half marathon in Santa Clarita and would be home later. My father, age 77, likes to run races and he wins most of them in his age group. When he brags, I bring him back to earth by informing him that most of the people in his age group are either invalids, or are taking dirt naps of the eternal variety. My sister thanks me for the previous weekend and my mind flashes back to the magic of just seven days ago.

Earl is one of my father’s oldest friends. The two met in 1959 when my parents decided to buy a three bedroom, one thousand square foot home across the street and two doors down from Earl, his wife Sally, and their two daughters Debbie and Julie. My earliest memory was going to their house to watch Bonanza. They had the only color television on the street and we all looked forward to that weekly event that put us in their living room, munching popcorn and anticipating how the Cartwrights would save the day. Earl worked in aerospace; water skied, and was an avid bike rider. I never can remember him being unkind to anyone.

In 1978 I surprised my family by coming home for unscheduled leave from the service. Earl, Debbie’s husband, Jim, my father, a friend of mine nicknamed Bear, and I took a five day ski trip to the Colorado River near Searchlight, Nevada. It was the third week of October, but an Indian summer gave us temperatures in the high eighties. In the afternoon we’d huddle around a radio and listen to the World Series. The Dodgers lost to the Yankees, but it didn’t dampen my spirits. We would sit in the early evening, watching the sun go down and talking about all that was going on in life. We slept in cots under the star-filled night and visited until we dropped off to sleep one by one. It was one of those rare times where the weather and the company were perfect. It was years later that my dad told me that on that trip Earl paid me one of the highest compliments I have ever received. He told my dad that if he ever had a son, he would want him to be just like me.

Earl has an enormous head. I am not speaking metaphorically, but mean to say that the diameter of his head rivals Andre the giant. All in his family are at least six-foot tall so if the head fits, wear it, right? Well, even Earl’s noggin does not fit his frame. He has thick white hair that covers his massive skull, and this majestic head on his trim, muscular frame gives him the look of a cartoon charicature come to life.

We took the news of Earl’s brain cancer with tears in our eyes and a promise to pray on our lips. He had retired and moved with Sally to a home that they had built in Prescott, Arizona. The tumor in his head was immense and his chemotherapy was extensive. We knew that he was coming to Ventura to visit his daughters and their families the third weekend of January. Plans were made in early Autumn for the get together near the beach.

While growing up my sister, Marva, and Earl’s youngest daughter, Julie, had become best friends. They were the same age and until the age of sixteen, they were practically inseparable. When my sister started smoking marijuana and taking speed, Julie found new friends. The only contact Julie had with Marva now was in the form of letters, the one-way variety. I can speak from experience because I too was a recipient of some of this correspondence.

The schools have programs that tell kids to “Just say no” and not to use drugs. My children had no need for those presentations because they had a living reminder in the form of Aunt Marvy. After years of casual drug use, my sister endured a tragedy that pushed her over the edge. After her husband died of stomach cancer, she mourned by getting deeper and deeper into a continuum of more powerful escapes from reality. Within a year, she lost her job and her home. We had heard that she was living in the alleys of Las Vegas for a period of years and during that time no one talked about the black sheep who was grazing in the dumpsters of Sin City. I feel guilty to admit that I had almost pushed her completely from my mind when a benign event shook my entire being. I was gassing my car up in the rough part of town, and as I was finishing topping off the tank I observed a poor wretch of a woman walking slowly past the station. She was gaunt, with greasy hair and torn clothes. She shuffled in bedroom slippers that were clearly four sizes too large. At first I thought she would angle toward the AM/PM Mini market, but she stared straight ahead and plodded along, oblivious. She was either drunk, stoned, or both.

I realized that I had some change coming and moved toward the convenience store part of the station. As I turned the front of my vehicle I was privy to the disheveled and weary shuffler. It was like a lightening bolt of shame shot through me. In an instant I knew what I had to do.

I used my change to buy some cheeseburgers. I dressed them with condiments and had the clerk put them into a paper bag. I drove up the street in search of the dazed and confused woman. I left my car idling and approached her from the side. She turned slowly to me. I handed her the bag and still there was no recognition in her bloodshot eyes.

“They’re cheeseburgers. I remembered how you like them,” I said. Just a blank stare. “Marva, it’s me, Wade, your brother,” I stammered, but she simply took the bag and commenced shuffling. I cried all the way home.

At the time the get together was planned my sister was living in a tent in the desert. Julie, my father, and I had all received the strange letters. Most of the lines made no sense, but were a bizarre mixture of torn logic, threats, and profanity. She was convinced that Donald Trump was secretly married to our sister, Vicky, and that Hillary Clinton wanted to kill anyone who would have the nerve to live in a tent. She claimed that I had won the lotto and was hoarding the money. All of this incoherent nonsense did not stop my father.

He first moved her to a van in his driveway. She got medical attention and was put on medication to control the voices in her head. She qualified for state aid and soon was living in my dad’s motor home. She got a new lease on life, but Julie was afraid. She took it on faith and allowed Marva to come to Ventura to see her dying father, Earl.

He was thinner than I’d ever known him and his marvelous white hair had fallen out in a three-inch band around his still, gigantic cranium. He was in good spirits and my father and I drank the beer he couldn’t partake of and talked into the evening. The real joy of the day was Julie and Marva; two women nearing fifty, yet off to the side conspiring like a couple of seven year-olds. They were best friends once again, and when Marva thanked me for the previous Saturday, it all made sense.

The contract arrived and informed me the “For a fee” they would print X number of books. I tore up the contract and threw it in the trash. The Bostonian never showed up and so the house remains unsold. I sulked into the night and it wasn’t until late that I had put it all together. It all came down to a five-minute “normal” conversation with my sister. My sister, the drug addict. My sister, the tent dweller. My sister, Julie’s old and new best friend. I hope to forget about the bogus book deal and the Boston liar when the next January 28th rolls around. Meg will drop a notch and even the crew of the Challenger will have to take a back seat. Like the prodigal son who returns in that exhilarating Bible story, Marva had come home. My sister had rejoined the human race and that would always be for me the miracle of January 28th.