Haints

I am sitting outside, alone at the cabin, doing something I never do anymore, that is, nothing. It is a beautiful spring evening, and the sun is going down soon. I have made myself a nice dinner. I had Yukon gold potatoes, some salad, and I barbequed some fish, liberally doused with Cajun spices.

I got here late, after taking care of some bidniss in Stockton. I did the usual thing: I started working on things before I even unpacked the car and got settled in. There is a lot to do, and no end of projects that require immediate attention. However, I feel strangely unmotivated. The day is cool, but sunny and nice. The sun is shining through the trees, and everything is green and flowering. Screw this, I thinks to myself. I’ve spent enough time under the sink, or mudding tape. Fuck the Mediterranean, ‘Nam style knockdown.

I am thinking, drinking, and generally not doing anything. It may be the alcohol, but no, I don't think so. It's about time I dealt with this. I am thoughtful and filled with random flashes of memories. Some of the memories are good, some bad, but the bulk of them fill me with nostalgia. I push away the bad memories, and their baggage of regret. I focus on the good ones.

I have to acknowledge that this place is full of ghosts. I don’t think I can be here, idle, and not be haunted. Maybe that’s why I tend to be manic here, and never sit still.

I want to write these thoughts down. I have attempted, before, to write about serious stuff for the blog. It seems to be beyond me. I don’t know why, but the serious things that go on don’t seem to flow off the keyboard like the silly things I have posted, and surely will continue to post.

I really want to get some of this off of my chest. I’d like to post some of these strong,….jeezus, can they be?…. feelings? And just talk about the losses I have had in the past 5 years. Maybe this time, I can. Of course, the editor in me will re-read this little essay, and may, as usual, put the kibosh on it.. Maybe not…..

Regardless, I soldier on.

As I said, this place is haunted. Not for you, but for me. And Dweebert. My mom, my dad, my older brother, and my grandparents, all gone now, are woven into the timbers, the siding, the windows, the drywall, the floors. So am I. So is Dweebert. I know Dweebert has the same memories, and probably has the same feelings about being here. Otherwise, why would he have wanted to invest cash into a dump like this?

I have pictures in my head of building this place. Especially 1964. We have home movie film, which reinforces the memories. Pictures of Mikey, 16 years old, hefting that unbelievably heavy Mac15 chainsaw, and cutting up the madrone tree that fell during the heavy snow in that unusually cold winter. I still see my mom, in the previous spring, all of 38, installing windows and cutting redwood siding with the old Skilsaw that I still have. She was a beautiful woman.

Suddenly, unbelievably, I start to cry when I type those last words. I know what this is: these water drops forming in my eyes, but they are as strange to me as they are to the alien in a 1950’s sci-fi movie. The sobs swell uncontrolled, and I put them down, quick. I never cried when my grandparents died, either of my parents, or my brother. I never cry. I can't. I won't. I don’t want to. I’m afraid I’ll never stop. But, fuck me, I just did. No more. Oh, no, no, no. Captain Plunge does not fall down.

Let’s veer away from this. Let’s turn abruptly away. Let’s forget this unseemly and inexplicable emotional upheaval and return to more controllable things like ghosts and haunting. I see stuff. I see dead people.

And I see living ones. I see Dweebert, 9 years old, hiding in the back of the glory hole, an exploratory mine we used to crawl into, growling and snuffling, making me and Greg, my best friend, nearly poop our pants trying to scramble out of the narrow opening, sure we were to be lunch for a bear.

All of this is floating right in front of my eyes, overlayed on what’s happening now. I can still see my dad’s shirt pocket, the bullseye of his Lucky Strike pack visible though the fabric. LSMFT. He was 41 in 1964. He was a handsome man. A puff of smoke drifts past the scene on his 8mm camera, as dad films the progress of the house we built. Puffs of smoke drift past many of the scenes in my memory. I can smell the wonderful aroma of his Zippo lighting a fresh cigarette; that first puff of smoke drifting in the summer air.

I can see Dad swinging the framing hammer, driving sinkers with one or two blows. I can’t hit a nail to save my life. I remember the time a sinker ricocheted into his glasses, spraying the lens into his eye. He was lucky that it didn’t blind him.

I see my grandparents, my dad’s mom Mammy and stepdad Ron , especially in the old screened-in-cabin where they used to sleep on an old iron bedstead. Dweebert wants to tear it down, but I argue, untruthfully, that it’s good storage space. I let him take the old iron bed to the dump, but I can’t stand to think of the old cabin coming down. A tree frog jumped onto Grampa’s face while he slept in that cabin, freaking him out, and making Gramma Mammy laugh and laugh as she told the story over and over. I wish I could hear her tell it again.

I can see Pogi, the family dog, running, running, running, swimming in the river, and generally being schizoid, wanting desperately to chase the ball, the rock, the can, the whatever. Just throw it!! I can still see her, running behind the old ‘50 Plymouth wagon. We had to let her out at the culvert because she was so beside herself with finally getting here that we had to open the door and let her run. I wanted to, too.

I wanted to run to the river, run to the mine shafts, run to the stamp mill, run to the pit, run to the creek. There was so much to do, and so many places to go. Even that place, the cabin of my childhood , is a ghost. It has changed, due to the population increase and the unfortunate placement of No Trespassing signs, but the area still has the river, the lakes, the woods, and the creek.

I learned to drive here. My mom taught me. The dirt roads were private, and many still are, and no license was considered necessary. I started at about 10. I felt that the world was mine behind the wheel of that green, three-on-the-tree ‘50 Plymouth wagon. Another ghost, that old 'wagon. I can hear my mom telling me to step on the gas, son, that dog chasin’ around the wheels will watch out for himself. That old wagon’s flathead six was faster than a speeding bullet, and more powerful than a locomotive….

My dad taught me how to operate a chainsaw, a Skilsaw, and any number of hand tools. They set me to operating a cement mixer (which I still have), a trencher, and my dad and grampa showed me how to make cement forms for a foundation. My gramma Mammy showed me how you can cook delicious food on a potbellied stove, and how you‘d better respect a Southern Lady, or she might jus’ set a switch to your backside.

They all showed me how to build a house, and drive a car, use tools, and so much more. I learned to do any number of things that many people don’t know how to do. They taught me mostly that I can do most anything someone else can, if I’ve a mind to.

But the ghosts.

Dweebert and I joke about haints. They move our tools, take the tape measure, break all the pencil points, make things come out crooked and un-level. But these haints, the real ones I’m talking about, are no joke. I feel them all the time.