Author: dwyernyc

“Remember you can tell your grandchildren about this,” Jen’s husband snidely told her. She got out of his dark blue Mercedes wearing her best fitted navy Olga Cassini interview suit, and inhaled the cool crisp autumn morning. “You have a run in your stocking. Also, I’ll be back in fifteen minutes, to pick you up from your interview,” he added before driving away. General Bill Nathan knew that his wife’s old Honda could break down anytime and he didn’t want to be embarrassed. He’d volunteered to drive her the twelve miles through the DC traffic to the Old Executive Building before heading out to play golf at the Army Navy Country Club. Since Bill retired, he had playing golf six days a week and enjoying lunch with his friends the Club.

After almost thirty years of marriage, Jen understood her husband’s controlling, unhappy moods. She knew that he hated DC. Thankfully, Jen thought, he’d been placing in a few golf tournaments.

Bill expected his wife to serve a homemade four course dinner, seven days a week, with cocktails and various hot appetizers exactly at 5:30PM. She began with a plain salad without dressing, then fresh meat with a complementary side vegetable and some kind of potato dish and with a glass of appropriate wine was served. Exactly one hour later, a low-calorie dessert with decaffeinated coffee was presented. If her husband brought home a surprise guest, she would make last minute accommodations without comment. Jen didn’t mind the routine. She’d grown accustomed to it and took pity on the General since he was forced to retire knowing that politically he’d never make his second star. For the past three years, Bill had been home seven days a week.

Jen’s husband purchased a used silver Honda Civic for her and their two children, when they were stationed overseas. Over the years it had grown quite rusted due to the salted icy roads of Germany, England and DC, and a four-inch hole had grown into the floorboard. Bill purchased a new Mercedes sedan for himself with his retirement package, explaining to his wife that he’d worked to earn it and her Honda was still functional. Bill decided to go through their home expenses after the purchase, to relieve Jen of one of the family duties.

“Scott doesn’t need to go to college,” Bill announced. “We can instead invest that money in a beach front winter home in Florida. Maybe something in Coco Beach.”  

Jen looked up from the ironing board where she was pressing Bill’s golf slacks, “But Scott said that he wanted to enroll in Barry University for the fall,” she said.

“Paying for four years of boarding school at New York Military Academy should be fine for him,” Bill replied, “I had only a high school diploma when I entered the military.”

“But you had to get a college degree to become an officer, remember.” Jen reminded.

“That’s nonsense” Bill scoffed. “He could easily find work as a maintenance person. Scott doesn’t seem like college material, anyway.” 

Jen’s eyes puddled as the steam from the iron rose up. All the scrimping, saving, discounts for educational travel, and major networking she’d done hoping to provide her children a better life, crumbled with Bill’s declaration. Her comfortable looking life was a facade. She’d married an angry man who needed their children socially, but really had no desire to be a father to them. As she let the hot iron linger on Bill’s crisp pleats, Jen realized she could no longer depend on her husband for her future.

Her “military life” socially frowned upon a General’s wife working outside of the home. Jen understood her job, according to her husband, was to entertain and socialize on base and help her him progress his standing. She’d not had a real job for 30 years. She hoped her 25 years’ experience as a volunteer manager with the Red Cross, would count for something. She figured she’d need to make some kind of real income to pay for college applications, SAT classes, and tutoring for her children. Jen had no idea how to even start looking. Later that week, while Jen was grocery shopping at the base commissary, she noticed an advertisement for a part-time legal secretary tacked up on the community bulletin board, and immediately called to get an interview, when she returned home.  

Luckily, not many people had applied to work in the dark, cramped legal office, so she was offered the part-time position within walking distance from her house immediately after interviewing. The hourly salary was so low, Bill told her to just keep her own money, when she told him about the offer.

“I guess it would be okay. As long as you’re home by 4:00PM. You can pay for your own expensive fashionable clothing and extraneous gifts for the family,” Bill said. Jen knew she would use her earnings to pay for her children’s college applications and put aside some for her own car without her husband knowing about it.

Within a year, Jen was promoted to full-time, developing new skills and confidence that she had never felt before. She was constantly surprised when her bosses complemented her on her quick flawless typing, rare shorthand skills, and her openness to learn more. She had never received complements from her husband. Jen didn’t realize she held any value inside or outside her home.

In two years, Jen put in hours of hard work, early mornings, and baked dozens of varieties of homemade cookies. Her supervisors knew she had the ability to expand her limited world and began encouraging her to look for further opportunities outside the base. They suggested she apply for a federal job with the Vice President of the United States. When she brought home the lengthy application, Bill laughed at her, “You don’t even have the ability to fill out the that thing out. Be a doll and refresh my drink.”

As Jen turned to watch Bill drive off, she quickly double checked her hose. She looked up at the looming steps before her and thought back to Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, forty years earlier, standing on the Becker County Court House steps. She remembered the exact feelings of inadequacy, intimidation, and humbleness filling her chest dressed in her business best.

Jen entered the Beaux Arts building. She noted the polished black marble floors as a guard checked her ID at the front desk. Her interview was to be with Jennifer Fitzgerald, Vice President Bush’s chief of staff. The immaculately coiffed Jennifer in her cream St. John suit walked out and greeted Jen into her classically decorated office with a warm handshake and smile. “Please make yourself comfortable, and have seat,” she said, indicating a 19^th century ivory stuffed chair,  next to the mahogany antique cocktail table in the sitting area.  

“You have great references, can type well, and I can’t believe that you actually know shorthand. George really needs someone to precisely dictate his conversations and letters to his constituents,” Jennifer explained. “Can you tell me a little about yourself?”

Jen gently cleared her throat, “Well, I’m married and have two children in college. My husband is a retired USAF General. We moved to Alexandria from Upper Hereford, England after beginning assigned to many other places for the past 25 years.” She omitted the fact that she’d been forced to move every two and a half years to appease her husband’s military career, and was left home alone most of the time raising their two children. She kept silent about how Bill had volunteered for an additional two years as a fighter pilot in Vietnam when she was pregnant with their second child. These details felt irrelevant as Jen uncrossed her legs and sat up to better focus on Jennifer’s questions.

Two and half hours later, Jen returned to the base by a yellow cab, carefully preparing the evening’s stuffed baked clams, mini quiches, and olive cheese balls appetizers, as she wore her ruffled trimmed apron, when the phone rang. The General picked up the receiver and announced that a Ms. Fitzgerald was calling. “I’ll take in our room,” Jen replied. She untied her apron, left the kitchen and climbed the staircase, leaving Bill behind to freshen his own drink.

“Emergency,” is short story by Denis Johnson, that was first published in The New Yorker, recounting events that happened at a city hospital involving doctors and staff working in the emergency room. Writing in first person, Johnson takes the reader to an unbalanced, slightly deranged world with his use of specific details. For example, “The blade was buried to the hilt in the outside corner of his left eye. It was a hunting knife kind of thing.” (Johnson, 59). Later, the author reveals that the unnamed protagonist is a drug addict with his friend Georgie, who has taken his friend’s hospital stolen pills, “chewing up more of Georgie’s pills. Some of them tasted the way urine smells, some of them burned, some of them tasted like chalk.” (Johnson, 61)

Johnson expertly uses rhythmic dialogue showing his protagonist’s and his friend’s, Georgie, drugged hazed or unreliable experience, “Georgie’s in O.R.,” Nurse said. “Again?” No,” Nurse said. “Still.” Still? Doing what?” Cleaning the what?” Cleaning,” Nurse said again. “Still.” (Johnson, 58) The author illustrates that Georgie is high on drugs and is cleaning the already clean floor. Also, Johnson uses significant details to describe a scene in the past summer, when Georgie and the protagonist are exhausted after working two doubles to, “ lay down on a stretch of dusty plywood in the back of the truck with the daylight knocking against our eyelids and the fragrance of alfalfa thickening on our tongues”. Again, Johnson uses rhythmic prose to describe his characters feeling and strengths. For example, ““I want to go to church,” Georgie said. “Let’s go to the county fair.” I’d like to worship. I would.” “They have these injured hawks and eagles there. From the Humane Society,” I said. “I need a quiet chapel about now.” (Johnson, 63)

Johnson greatly succeeded in getting his readers into the world and the minds of his very flawed human characters, who are actually healing human beings.

Works Cited

Johnson, Denis. Jesus’ Son, New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1992

Flannery O’Connor wrote A Good Man is Hard to Find in third person and changes gracefully  to second person using the Grandmother’s point of view and later “The Misfit’s”. O’Connor is successful in creating a Southern world from the 1950’s, with a traditional middle class American family, by changing points of view throughout this story. The Grandmother is the main focus of this work, starting at the beginning, “The Grandmother didn’t want to go to Florida.”  and has her speak in second person, throughout this work, “Now look here, Bailey,” she said, “see here, read this.” The Grandmother manipulates her son not to visit Florida, but to visit places she wants to visit to see her “connections”. She does this by chatting about an escaped criminal, called “The Misfit“, who supposedly is on his way to Florida.

Most of the action and reactions are from the Grandmother’s third person point of view, for example, “She sat in the middle of the back seat…” and “she thought it would be interesting to say how many miles they had been when they got back.” She is a backseat driver cautioning her son, “that the speed limit was fifty-five miles an hour and that the patrolmen hid themselves behind billboards and small clumps of trees and sped out after you before you had a chance to slow down.”

O’Conner uses the Grandmother very self-centered character’s point of view, to demonstrate how flawed, self-centered, racist, and judgmental this character actually is, “Aren’t you ashamed? “she hisses; “People are certainly not nice like they used to be”; and  “In my time, children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else. People did right then. Oh, look at the cute little pickaninny!”

Additionally, by using the third person, the author demonstrates that all of the characters are selfish and are completely ignoring each other. For example, when the Grandmother speaks to her son, he “didn’t look up from his reading” of the sport pages; the children’s mother “didn’t seem to hear her”; the children are busy “reading the funny papers on the floor” or comic books in the car.

Also, we find out in third person, that the Grandmother is actually completely responsible for the accident and getting everyone killed. “It’s not far from here, I know,” the grandmother tells her son “It wouldn’t take over twenty minutes,” even though she later realizes that they are in the wrong state, but doesn’t say anything. It is her hidden cat, that she was forbidden to bring, that escapes from the box and causes the accident. When the Grandmother recognizes and identifies the killer, and says, “You’re the Misfit!”, the family’s fate is sealed.

The Knowers is a short story by Helen Phillips that was first published in Recommended Reading in 2013. This story takes place in the future, where for a small fee one can find out the exact date of your death. A married couple makes opposite decisions; the wife chooses to find out her death date and her husband chooses not know. Because of this decision and the wife knowing the exact date of her death, the couple completely alters the way they think and live their lives.

In her first sentence, Phillips introduces us immediately to the issue in her exposition, “There are those who wish to know, and there are those who don’t wish to know, (Philips, 1) The conflict occurss when the husband finds out that his wife does know her date of death. “You do know!” he raged, seizing upon the word…. When he finally quieted, he was different. Maybe different than he’d ever been.” (Phillips, 2) This information will now change how they live their lives and define their existence.

Phillips skillfully uses gradual falling action for the celebration of April 17th, the narrator’s death day, as opposed to her birthday date, to celebrate another year of being alive, knowing that on one particular April 17th, the wife is doomed to die. Each year of this couple’s relationship, having children; jobs; having new grandchild, is documented with an impending sense of doom.

At the conclusion, Philips carefully leaves the resolution open and readers are proposedly left hanging, with the last sentence, “There are still six minutes remaining.” (Phillips, 9) We know that she will die in the next four minutes, but since the husband never found out his death date, will he die too? Or did the machine make a mistake?

The approach that Philips immediately captures the readers’ attention in the first sentence is something I would like to attempt in my own short story writing. 

Works Cited

Phillips, Helen. The Knowers, Recommended Reading, 2013

The Finkelstein Five is a short story by Nana Kwame Adjei Brenyah, first published in a book of his short stories, Friday Black, in October 2018. It spotlights angry youths protesting the brutal murder of five black children, decapitated with a chainsaw by a middle-aged white man whose gets acquitted by a jury. The protagonist, Emmanuel,  has learned to project a non-threatening persona, to “dial down his blackness”, in order to survive in society This shockingly violent satire explores racism in the United States that has resulted in the deaths of innocent unarmed Black Americans at the hands of white people while the justice system turns a blind eye on the victims and refuses to punish the perpetrators.

Mr. Adjei-Brenyah uses many historical and situational references in his short story. The author may have researched the deaths of deaths of Trayvon Martin (2/26/2012), Eric Garner (7/17/2014), and Freddie Gray (4/19/2015) to reveal the bias against the hooded black figure. He has created a moralist satire that forces the reader to contemplate the inequities of race in the United States and how we rationalize injustice in the name of freedom and protection.

When Emmanuel, “pulled out a long abandoned black hoodie…”[1] , the author may be directly referencing the black hoodie worn by Trayvon Martin, a Miami high school student who was murdered dressed in a black hooded sweatshirt, while purchasing a bag of Skittles and a bottle of juice. Even President Barack Obama addressed Martin’s shooting saying at the White House, “When I think about this boy, I think about my own kids and I think every parent in America should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this.”[2]

Additionally, the satirical writing of Flannery O’Connor, especially A Good Man is Hard to Find, may have influenced Adjei-Brenyah, especially when he takes the unexpected violence to the extreme. He uses cultural and historical references when the Namers, a group of Blacks ritualistically repeat the name of one of the five children, while committing an act of extreme violence. The act of naming is significant in many African cultures and the repetition of the dead children’s names is at once a talisman and a way to pay respect to the innocent dead. [3]

Mr. Adjei-Brenyah uses many historical and cultural refences beautifully, and is something I would like to attempt in my own short story writing. 

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[1] Adjei-Brenyah, Nana Kwame. The Finkelstein 5, Mariner Books 2018, page 3

[2] https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2013/07/19/remarks-president-trayvon-martin July 19, 2013

[3] https://http://www.shakespeareanrag.com/31-days-of-stories-2020-day-1-the-finkelstein-5-by-nana-kwame-adjei-brenyah

Jo Ann Beard is the former Managing Editor of a space–physics monthly at the University of Iowa. Her work has appeared in literary journals, magazines, and anthologies. Beard has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and grants from the New York Foundation for the Arts and is the author of several books. Surprisingly, “The Fourth State of Matter” was very controversial in the literary community.  First published in the June 24 & July 1, 1996 Special Fiction issue of The New Yorker, Bill Buford, the fiction editor, classified “The Fourth State of Matter” as personal history[1] and defended his decision on the basis of its artistry. While Gary Kamiya of Salon claimed that making an event like a university shooting part of someone’s personal narrative caused it to be “shrunk down”.[2] Nevertheless, “The Fourth State of Matter” won the Whiting Award in 1997 for non-fiction.[3]

Beard wrote “The Fourth State of Matter”, as a witness account of a mass shooting by a disillusioned physics graduate student who killed six professors and administrators, on November 1, 1991.[4]  In this essay, written five years after the shooting, the author memorializes her friends and colleagues, and struggles to comprehend why they were murdered. Beard reveals the personal story of her friends and colleagues, who are forgotten in history and only mentioned in Wikipedia, under University of Iowa Shooting, with a single photo of the murderer, a three-paragraph story of the killings, and one sentence listing the victims’ names.[5]  In “The Fourth State of Matter” Beard successfully uses foreshadowing, appropriate tonal shifts, and touches of humor as she attempts to memorialize her dead colleagues and make some sense of their senseless murders. However, her braided essay’s deeply layered format and jarring transitions tend to bury several intended nuances, often leaving readers feeling lost at times.

Using strands of detailed interwoven stories, Beard expertly weaves in her quirky, emotionally exhausted voice. She describes accounts of her inability to deal with her dying collie by prolonging its inevitable death, and not wanting to make a decision about “the husband” whose possessions are all packed up in the upstairs bedroom, while he insists on still in calling her three or four times a day. Beard is also dealing with family of noisy squirrels that have taken over the upstairs bedroom. She enjoys communicating with her colleagues by drawing on blackboards in their offices and sharing her learned knowledge of stars and planets.  Balanced underneath these detailed strands is the main story of the carefully planned senseless murders. The author gradually prepares us for this emotional trauma by letting the reader into her life. We, too, are left trying to comprehend why these people had to die?

Beard’s essay begins by finding herself awakened at 3:40AM by her dying collie. She takes the dog outside to look up at the planets and stars. Using her knowledge that she “learned at work, from the group of men who surround me there” (Beard). Foreshadowing the main story, Beard adds, “Guys whose own lives are ticking like alarm clocks getting ready to go off, although none of us are aware of it yet.” (Beard) The author knows the victims and was present on November 1, 1991 in the offices of University of Iowa. The author seems to be emotionally and mentally exhausted and is avoiding making any major life decisions regarding her dying dog and her relationship with “the husband.” Both need to end. However, Beard is proactive about the noisy squirrels nesting in her upstairs bedroom.

The author’s job, as an editor, is translating scientific papers into something that a layperson could understand. The essay’s title, “Fourth State of Matter”, refers to the dust in the plasma of Saturn’s rings. “You’ve got your solid, your liquid, your gas, and then your plasma, the fourth state of matter…therefore plasma is blood.”(Beard) The author understands that she needs the affection of her dogs, and knows it is wrong to keep her dying collie alive with “the face of love,”(Beard) even though it cannot stand or urinate on its own. She has yet to finalize or deal with the separation of her husband of 13 years. She does hire someone to remove the family of squirrels, but she misses them once they are gone.

 Beard details Gang Lu’s preparation for the murders of his colleagues by describing his shooting practices and contents of his suicide letter to his sister.  The grim, clear details of the shooting and the results are carefully documented, Beard carefully balances her trauma and immense loss with these subplots. She shifts to a factual and direct reporting tone, unlike the rest of the piece, when she describes one of the murders, “The administrator, Anne Cleary, is summoned from her office by the receptionist. She speaks to him for a few minutes, he produces the gun and shoots her in the face.” (Beard)

Later, after being consoled by many friends and “the husband”, Beard is left alone with her three dogs while she tries to understand what has happened. Looking up at the planets and stars, the author finds some peace. “We’re in the plasmapause, a place of equilibrium, where the forces of the earth meet the forces of the sun. I imagine it as a place of stillness, where the particles of dust stop spinning and hang motionless in deep space.”. (Beard)  

This is writing is at its finest. The more one reads this essay, the deeper the nuances become. The author is very vulnerable and honest with herself, and has a wry, foreshadowing sense of humor. “I’m leaving and I’m never coming back,”(Beard) she tells her dying collie after awaking up every three hours to assist as the dog tries to urinate. This somehow eases to balance the horrors of the massacre. Additionally, she prepares us for the murders when she passes Gang Lu, the killer, in the hallway, noting “the double doors leading to the rest of my life.” (Beard)

Originally, I thought the story of the squirrels was unnecessary. We find that she misses the activity of the busy squirrels, much like her co-workers going in and out of the office. However, dealing with the squirrels is the real start of the author beginning to resolve issues in her life. The only shortcoming, I could find, was not knowing how many times I would have to read this piece to understand all the nuances, meanings, depth, and symbolism.  

Jo Ann Beard personalizes and remembers her friends and co-workers by including their individual photographs in this essay, taking up a half page in The New Yorker. She humanizes them by discussing their relationships; “Bob is his best friend. They spend at least half of each day standing in front of blackboards, writing equations and arguing about outer space.”(Beard); work, “He travels all over the world telling people about the magnetospheres of various planets”(Beard); styles, “He’s hip in a professorial, cardigan/jeans kind of way.”(Beard) and eccentricities; “A stocky, short-tempered man, he’s smoking a horrendously smelly pipe.”(Beard).  Jo Ann Beard tells the story as a survivor, trying to make sense of the mass carnage. She is very successful at using foreshadowing, tonal shifts, and touches of humor as she loving memorializes her dead colleagues. Beard tries to make some sense of their senseless murders, as memories of friends that are crystalized in amber and have become jewels in deep space. She remembers her deceased friends, who taught her about the planets and stars, and how to listen carefully to the sounds of the universe.

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[1] https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1996/06/24

[2] https://bloom-site.com/2014/04/28/jo-ann-beard-all-there-is-to-do-is-write/

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whiting_Awards

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Iowa_shooting

[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Iowa_shooting

I’ve always admired people who spend time in nature and develop not only a knowledge and understanding of it, but also form a relationship with the plants and the animals inhabiting the land. While my father was stationed in Korea during the Vietnam War, my mother taught my siblings and I how to rescue baby birds, Robins, I think, that had fallen from their nests at Edwards Air Force Base in California. We learned to feed them soft bread and keep them warm by placing them in a shoebox next to a warm lightbulb.  She showed us how to identify various birds from colorfully illustrated books, and continued teaching us as we moved from base to base around the world. We learned about the mynah birds, rock doves, and sandpipers of Hawaii; the common loons, blue jays,  and chickadees living on Big Floyd Lake in Northern Minnesota: red winged black birds, the blue herons and orioles of Mississippi; and the roadrunners, mourning doves, quails, Anna’s humming birds,(surely named after my mother, I thought), of  the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. Each we moved, I found comfort and solace in my natural surroundings.

Later, I settled on the East Coast where I lived for 34 years. I was still interested in using my birding knowledge in Central Park, but life became too busy to continue my childhood pursuits. When I was hired as the new Director of Steward Operations at the McDowell Sonoran Conservancy, which was responsible for caring for the largest public land preserve in the United States, it brought me a relocation to Scottsdale, Arizona. I had the opportunity to work with our Citizen Science Program with some of the best ornithologists in Arizona including Walter Thurber, Tara Deck, Rick Pierce, Kathy Anderson, and Lisa Miller, who taught bird identification workshops. Because of my extensive working hours, I could only attend the nighttime bird counts which were the Christmas Bird and the evening of Global Big Day.

For over 120 years, an annual census of birds in the Western hemisphere and the world have been conducted by volunteer bird watchers and administered by the National Audubon Society. These studies are used to identify declining bird populations and threats of extinction from climate change, habitat loss and other causes. The Preserve closed in the evening to allow the wildlife to come out, so participating in these after-hours counts required a permit from the City of Scottsdale, a trained professional bird watcher, and headlamps. Hiking in the lush Sonoran Desert in the dark listening intensely to the sounds of nature while sharing observations and knowledge with several patient, quiet, kind and very knowledgeable people deeply appealed deeply to me. The sound of the cactus wren like a car that can’t quite start, the deep hoots of the Western screech owl, and the loud raspy calls of the Gila Woodpecker filled the peaceful setting as the sun was setting. It was magical.

About two months ago when my work hours became flexible, I was invited to go on private morning Conservancy bird count in the Preserve. I was told to bring water, snacks, suitable natural colored clothing, and binoculars. Getting my gear together was simple, but locating binoculars took some time. I’d inherited a set from my family and rarely used them since my move to the desert. After some searching, I finally found them in an old cardboard box with my winter New York City Marathon gear. I had to re-learn how to use them.  

I observed the state bird, the cactus wren; the small round ground dwelling Gamble’s quails; Gila woodpeckers, phainopeplas, known as the black cardinal with red eye; black-throated sparrows hidden in turpentine plants; the beautiful American kestrel, the smallest falcon in North America; and a flock of ravens. A tiny Abert’s towhee floated against the backdrop of a clear blue sky and took my breath away. For some reason, although I knew several of the birds’ calls, I did not identify them to my colleagues.  I realized that I had been a silent observer on every bird hike I attended. My colleagues had invited me to listen to the sounds of birds and nature, and I while was very grateful, I’d hardly participated.

One bird count ended on a clear crisp Tuesday morning. I thanked the group of informed volunteer bird watchers, walked to my car, and took off my binoculars. Suddenly long a forgotten memory flooded back; I’d used the same binoculars watching birds once in New York City.

On a similarly clear, crisp Tuesday morning in September of 2001, I was enjoying a day off.   As I drank my coffee and watched the local news. A airliner crashed into Tower One of the World Trade Center and then a second plane crashed into Tower Two. I lived on 52^nd Street which was less than three miles away. I grabbed my binoculars and cell phone and took the elevator to the rooftop on the 13th floor. I saw that Tower One was down and Tower Two was beginning to crumble. I pulled my binoculars to my eyes and focused in on the smoke around the area. I noticed several strange flying birds surrounding the remaining tower. I tightened my focus to try and identify the species. I could not remember what type of bird would dive into white clouds of dust, perhaps they were some species of large ravens or raptors, drilling down and disappearing into the billowing grey clouds on the ground.

I knew raptors were rare in New York City, and there were a few red-tailed hawks which soared in high wide circles, using wind currents in Central Park. But these birds were mysteriously flying vertically, not horizontally. I watched as the second tower crumpled, and more birds appeared. I suddenly realized there was much to do before the building’s power would be turned off. I ran back to the elevator and went out to gather food and supplies. I needed to inform my colleagues at the America Museum of Natural History, where I was in charge of the “Information Desk” volunteers, about these crashes. I left my apartment keys with the bartender at the All State Bar so people needing shelter could stay at my apartment. The details of those moments return in a horrific rush. There was so much to do and no time to spare.

Sitting in my car outside the McDowell Sonoran Preserve almost twenty years later, a clear moment of understanding arrives. I couldn’t identify those birds on 9/11, because I wasn’t watching birds. I was watching human beings making the devastating, significant, and courageous decision to end their lives by jumping off the Towers to their death. My subconscious made sure I avoided the reality of what I’d witnessed for almost two decades. That was why I could only listen to birds at night and not watch them fly during the day counts. According to Native American oral history, birds can symbolize change. They are carriers of prayer and are messengers to the Great Spirit.

I want to believe that those people took on the spirit of flying birds in their final of moments of grace. Perhaps they were delivering prayers to the Great Spirit. I pray that their souls are at peace. I continue to seek my own healing in the simple art of quietly observing the natural inhabitants of the Sonoran Desert. Here, I can listen intently, breathe deeply, and shift my gaze upward as I take in the wild beauty of the vast, open blue sky.

Dear Dr. Anderson,

Yes, I am finally listening to your advice and taking a yoga class, so I can be less stressed and anxious, and become calmer and more relaxed in this pandemic.

Therefore, I will no longer need your very expensive twice a week therapy sessions. I have a new friend, Adrienne, who has a cute dog, Benji, who is helping me with my new yoga life and I’m very happy and relaxed. So there!!!  

Namaste,

Your former client,

Kathy (and Bob, too)

Is there anything that I can do for my anxiety?

Take a yoga class!

I’m recovering from getting hit by an SUV, what can I do after physical therapy?

Yoga!

 My career in fine arts and special events is vanished due to the Corona virus, what should I do?

 Yoga!

 I’m lonely, depressed and unemployed, what should I do?

Breathe and take a yoga class! 

I have no choice. Due to pressure from my therapist, social media, Facebook friends, and my peers; I have learned I must take yoga classes to become a restful peaceful person, especially during this pandemic. Since over 55 million people will be practicing yoga this year in the USA, I must now become one of them. Due to personal budgetary restraints, and the fact that the governor closed down my gym, twice, I decided to follow the popular YouTube channel, Yoga with Adrienne. Adrienne has great body, keen sense of humor, and a cute dog named Benji. She has an online community of over seven million viewers and offers “high quality practices on yoga and mindfulness for FREE to inspire people of all ages, shapes and sizes.” I have now taken her classes for 57 days. I thought I would become a restful, peaceful, in-shape person, while wearing my cool new yoga gear.

OMG! I am so right!

The other day, while channel surfing, I accidently started watching the Kardashians. I discovered that they too, are all obsessed with wearing yoga pants, and are always tweeting and snapchatting selfies while wearing them. Of course, their yoga pants are worn not only to accentuate their curves, but I want to believe, they may also work out in them just like Adrienne. Since they wear yoga pants and look fabulous all the time, I decided I needed to order my own yoga outfits from yogaoutlet.com. I don’t have Kardashian money, so I couldn’t order from their expensive website. Today, I own flesh colored, purple, and gray “live in gratitude” tank tops, a pair of sky blue “awakened yoga leggings”, a couple of “spiritual gangster” tie dyed crop tanks, and two pairs of cool Lululemon invigorate high-rise diamond dye yoga pants for $138.00 each. I got all of this for about a total of $899.00 with coordinating face masks and free shipping, not including tax, and put this on my Costco credit card.   

While shopping at Costco, Bashes, Walmart, PetSmart, and Michael’s in my yoga pants, I realized that no matter your size or shape, they will go on easy and wear all day without getting stretched out. Also, everyone seems to assume I’m in better shape because I’m wearing athletic gear. This means I can eat as much as I want and never have to worry about zipping up my jeans. In fact, I found that yoga pants are so popular that they have led to a decrease in the sales of jeans in America. Therefore, I have decided to give up jeans completely and wear my yoga pants while working out, shopping for groceries and pet food, or simply sitting on the couch, while I watch cute kitty videos and play games on my cellphone. Moreover, I can feel good about my decisions because, I found that the athletic apparel brand Lululemon, best known for producing fashionable women’s yoga pants has a net worth as of July 10, 2020 of $40.94 billion dollars[1] and they are committed to Black Lives Matter; providing a portion of their proceeds to support inclusion, diversity, equity and action.  Additionally, the average person practicing yoga in the US spends $62,640 during their lifetime on classes, workshops, and accessories. [2] Now, I can say I am finally part of this cool crowd.

So far, I’ve taken socially distanced “Beer Yoga” at a Fate Brewery (Wow! Heterosexual guys!); “Museum Yoga” at the Heard (and became a museum member!); “Moonlight Yoga“ at Southwest Wildlife (Saw some cute bears and bobcats!); “Desert Yoga” in the McDowell Sonoran Preserve (Lots of rocks and cacti!); and Kitten/Puppy/Goat Yoga classes benefiting animal rescue groups. Yes, the quality of the classes can vary immensely, but I feel really good making the world a better place by supporting a non-profit with other people wearing their yoga pants. Although I must admit some of these classes are a bit too relaxing and am probably not getting a good cardio workout or building muscles. However, if I give in and try a more athletic yoga class that tires my muscles, I might as well go back to running, biking or swimming instead. And what would I do with all my new yoga gear? Running marathons and doing triathlons is really hard work (I’ve done 13 NYC Marathons and 8 triathlons) and I look terrible in photographs when doing these sports. Why would I return to those grueling sports when I can just do yoga?

I love my new yoga pants and my new yoga life. Now, I am one of the many people who are watching on-line yoga on YouTube and Zoom. Sometimes we even participate in the actual class. The results have been astonishing! I have only gained 18 pounds since March! My cat, Bob, has only gained 2 pounds! I have an entirely new tie-dyed lyra yoga wardrobe for under $900.00! Every day I wear one of my four pairs of pastel colored (recycled materials only) flip-flops with small mini Buddhas or flowers printed on them. All-in-all, I have only spent about $500.00 (“paying what feels good”, according to Adrienne[3]) for additional on-line wellness and breathing classes. My social distancing has improved in my yoga pants and my tie-dyed face mask.  Above all, I’m relaxed and comfortable knowing that I’ve contributed to world peace at home on my couch with my cat, eating organic potato chips, watching YouTube with Adrienne with her cute dog, Benji. Together, we all follow along, breathing as she lets “a little love in and a little love out”.

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[1] https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/LULU/lululemon-athletica-inc/net-worth

[2]https://www.yogajournal.com/page/yogainamericastudy

[3] https://www.youtube.com/user/yogawithadriene

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For some reason, I thought we would have the summer lake house in Minnesota, forever.

The last time our family was together, was at the National Memorial Cemetery of Arizona on September 11, 2015 for my father’s funeral. We buried him with my mother and youngest brother. Current communication between me and my two remaining siblings is a consists of a brief email discussion about how much “stuff” needs to be removed from our parent’s Scottsdale house. In January, my sister decided to move her boyfriend into the house, while she reminded in her Las Vegas condo. In March, I accepted my sister’s offer to pick up my things from my former bedroom, before she could give or throw them away to accommodate her boyfriend.

Since were a military family, we were assigned and moved to different parts of the world every two and half years. Before my mother was married in the mid-1950s, she bought a cabin on a lake, without running water in northern Minnesota and we spent each summer visiting her relatives there. Detroit Lakes, known as the “Sunfish Capitol of the World” has a current population of about 8,500 and is located 45 miles east of the Fargo-Moorehead, North Dakota-Minnesota border. It is a regional summer recreation destination, attracting large numbers of tourists, known for fishing, boating, sailing, and swimming. No ethnic group is so identified with a single state as the Swedes are with Minnesota. My mother with her Swedish ancestry fit right in. From before statehood, Swedish immigrants flooded into St. Paul and Minneapolis and by the turn of the twentieth century, over 126,000 Swedes lived in Minnesota. However, life for our relatives proved difficult and tragic. My grandmother died at the age of sixty due to overwork and high blood pressure and my grandfather died when he went back into the house to get his citizenship papers with his dog Ginger, during a fire.

Our summerhouse was the only consistent part of my childhood. We had friendly neighbors, relatives that lived on their farms we spent time and learning out about our relatives, all who immigrated from Sweden. The musty smell of damp wood filled the place, when the oak homemade door with the distinctive small triangular windows was opened using the skeleton key. The shellacked golden wood log walls, brightly patterned Indian orange and blue rugs, antique Scandinavian wood furniture, cloth American flag, snowshoes from Norway, all complimented the focal point; a taxidermy white tailed eight-pronged deer head, named Joe. I knew that summer officially began! “Joe” was purchased with the cabin when my mother bought it, and my uncle told me and my siblings that Joe would run around at night, because the rest of his body was kept in the tall kitchen cabinets that we had no access to. My uncle was a retired colonel in the Marines, we believed him. 

Our parents were strict, so we always had chores. We pumped fresh water, vacuumed, cleaned the outhouse, weeded, and cleaned the rocky 50-foot shoreline. We were supposed to stay in our 50’ yard and shoreline, but my parents forgot to restrict us on how far from shore we could go. My sister, brothers, and I figured this out quickly and became very good swimmers. We made “islands” using large used patched tractor tire inner tubes donated by my farming relatives, parts of a wooden floating dock, used beach towels, my Father’s used military camouflaged flight suits,  and plastic floats that we found abandoned and floating to shore. We used left over water ski ropes and found red bricks to make our anchor. Then, we could read the eight to ten books that we checked out from the bookmobile, every two weeks. These “floating reading fortresses” looked like shelters created by the set decorators of “Water World”, an unsuccessful “end of the world” movie, and may have concerned our neighbors. 

We were considered quite eccentric. Since my father hated phone calls, we had no phone in the summerhouse. The only way we could communicate to others was by mail or with a direct visit. Relatives would stop by, sometimes without warning and bring used magazines, like Lady’s Home Journal, the Sears Catalog, and Reader’s Digest. My Mother was always prepared for these random visits and kept her hair in curlers covered with a red curler hat. She looked like Bozo the clown. It was only when a relative’s pickup or Buick appeared in front of our house did, she would take the curlers out.

My mother did not enjoy cooking. However, she loved the fact that frozen food was timesaving, convenient and easy to cook. Also, she loved the more modern foods like Hamburger or Tuna Helper. Sometimes she would give us either cooked, fried or raw Spam and served with Kool-Aid or Hawaiian Punch. Koogle, a chocolate peanut spread, was served on Wonder bread for lunch about five days a week. We had Swanson TV dinners with Salisbury steak, mashed potatoes and small square dessert of chocolate cake or apple or cherry pie. Libbyland Dinners frozen meals with names like Safari Supper, Sea Diver’s Dinner and Pirate’s Picnic with chocolate flavored pudding were our favorites. I really believed all Italian food was created by Chef Boyardee and I never had real Italian food until I was twenty-two years old in NYC.  

Our visits to the cabin in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, were the only time we were united as a family; since we four kids each had had two-year age differences and went to different schools. For most of my life, the cabin was the place I considered “home”. Since we lived in Scottsdale, AZ and our mother’s family were mostly in northern Minnesota, each of her siblings also settled in Detroit Lakes for the summer. Each had unique seasonal cabins around on the same lake. For some reason, I always thought our summer house family tradition would continue for the rest of our lives. I didn’t want my family to change by aging, passing away, getting married, moving, or simply continuing with on their lives.

When we visited the cabin when I was in high school, I really wanted to communicate with my Arizona friends, or even talk with a possible hoped-for boyfriend. Having no immediate method of communication for three months was exceptionally difficult to me during those years. After I turned eighteen and left home, my parents kept the cabin up, but no longer visited due to caring for my brother, who was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. My father was disabled in 1971 and my mother cared for him.  My father never took his own pain medication, and lay horizontally in bed, investing in his stocks, while my mother served him breakfast, lunch and dinner. My mother became the prime caretaker of my father and brother. My sister and brother were away at boarding school and college. My Mom forgot to take care of herself. She ended up with kidney cancer that later spread to her liver. She didn’t follow up with her doctor, due to her family responsibilities. She died at home in Scottsdale and my brother passed six years later in his sleep.

The summer house remained in cool, restful Minnesota. My sister, my father, and I created a tradition to go to there for two or three weeks a year, and I even brought my large kayak and mountain bike.    

I thought our new tradition would continue forever. I never imagined that after my father’s death, my younger sister would choose not put down my name as beneficiary in our father’s will. I had flown back-and- forth from NYC to take care of family emergencies almost every two months for over ten years. She had done everything to please our father up to that point and decided on her own to keep most of his estate for herself. Our father asked my sister and I to co-sign his will at the lawyer’s office because of changes due to the earlier deaths in our family. It was a shock to me that the lawyer allowed me to be excluded from the final will. I did receive a cash settlement, but all of the homes, furniture, art, and cars that had been a part of my happy early memories went to my sister.

When I moved to Arizona six years ago to care for my ailing father, I accepted that my past IS my past, I knew I needed to make my own traditions. The lake summerhouse filled with so many memories became unavailable to me. I am learning to let it go. In the process of going through my “precious treasures” from my parent’s house, I am letting go by donating items to Goodwill, giving things to other people, and recycling. However, when I opened my childhood jewelry box releasing the scent of my mother’s flowery “White Shoulders” perfume, my happy memories whisked me back to those lovely summer days.

Today, I look forward to creating a life for myself in Arizona with new friends, getting involved with Arizona museums and non-profits, and developing new skills like creative writing in an attempt at finding my “true” inner voice, and establishing my new traditions.