Haunted, sort of . . .

  

  Of course I believe in time travel. Most of us experience it, just not the way we would want or expect. A great novel or movie has a flux capacitor that moves us around in time. Or our mind might confuse eras and it simply happens. Standing in the sun in front of a grammar school waiting for my granddaughter Sara, I am asked the reason for my presence. My reply, "I am waiting for Jennifer" instantly rolls away three decades for a few micro seconds and I am again in the warm, beautiful time of my daughter's youth.
     Nor are most of us strangers to a chemically induced trip. For those of us not doing recreational drugs they are surprisingly vivid. I was stretched out on a gurney awaiting minor surgery. The view up was of elongated ceiling lights and waiting I revisited scenes from a movie in which a dying Carlito Brigante stares  up at similar illumination. But now a nurse administers to me a drug and my reverie was instantly replaced by a sharp vision of a brown and white Guinea pig sitting on his haunches and looking straight at me. Behind Jay, the hairy, white profile of a dog - Swede was also staring me down. My old dog seemed slightly embarrassed that Jay stood so assertively in front of him. But both were communicating the same questions. "Are you coming now?" "When are you coming, we are waiting." Emotionally I dropped way, way down - but was also happy to see them. Nurses now quickly rolled me into surgery.
     My father John, died in 1998 at the age of 94 and I have rarely dreamed of him. On a cold, snowy January night in 2008 I arrived in Albany NY from Florida and picked up a rental car - a powerful vehicle with rear wheel drive. Proceeding up the Northway it occurred to me how inexperienced I now was driving in winter conditions. Exiting on to I 88 west the conditions deteriorated - snow swirling and an icy roadway. Occasionally the car began to fishtail. It was then the instructions began - "Slow down!" "No passing." "Stay more to the right." A veritable barrage of orders banged around in my  mind - my father's instructions repeated to me over and over when I was learning to drive (and once in a while through the years when he felt they were needed). "Slow down - a car approaching on your left." "Use your mirror!" So many instructions - once I glanced at the passenger seat to see if he was there. "Gently pump your brakes if you feel a slide beginning." In my mind I answered "Dad, this car has anti lock brakes - we don't need to do that anymore." "OK" he replied "Then slow down some more." The instructions and banter went on for perhaps fifteen minutes and then faded away. I drove on alone.
     I am standing in the snow by the stacked fire wood in the yard of my long ago home. Across the yard Swede is walking from his dog house through the snow towards me. His beautiful white coat is matted with dirt and stuck to his body. There are specks of dirt on his eyes and face. (As I buried Swede I had carefully wrapped up his face to prevent just this from happening.) Now using my foot prints in the snow Swede walks right by me never looking up. He rushes up the back porch steps intent upon getting into the kitchen. There by the radiator, under the table Swede had his sleeping
rug, food dish and water bowl. He wanted to be in his home - we both miss our home.

                                                      
                                            Zoey - photo by Ginny Armington

James F Dyer Ph.D

     Jim Dyer died May 11, 2012 at the age of 76. My daughters alerted me last Fall that he was having issues and had been in the hospital at least twice. Jim's problems were fluids, weakness and medical blah, blah, blah - he slid down hill and died. I had sent him a couple of cards and received a nice note in return. " . . . a few more doctors, a few more pills and I'll be through this."
     I knew him in high school but not very well. He had a tremendous sense of humor and at some point we became friends. We marched in a couple of parades side by side in the first rank as (tall) sailors and he would happily hurl comments at helmeted soldiers, "Avast - air raid wardens!" We dated the sisters Nicotera - in fact I introduced him to Madeline, his future wife of fifty years - and eventually we became brothers-in-law. We had funny times courting the sisters - and occasionally after dates - the fun would continue - we would slip off to dark "joints" to meet up and socialize with their uncle, a hard drinking, macho, kinda racist, short, thin, bald, Italian-American super patriot and veteran of WW 2, Cy Susso. Cy had come to enjoy our company in spite of our lack of Italian ethnicity  (" two (expletive) big guys"!) - and we had fun.
     Jim's daughter "little Annette" (her aunt was rarely called "big Annette") and my daughter Cathy were born about the same time and saw much of each other growing up. We vacationed together even getting Jim to try what he referred to as "that camping shit". Jim was not a great swimmer - he hired another sailor to swim the pool for him in boot camp - but in their second child Jimmy, was collected all the family's swimming DNA - from the earliest age Jimmy Jr. would crab, crawl, totter and stagger into any water be it ocean, lake or brimming bucket.
     Jim may once have saved our father-in-law's life, certainly his sanity. Louie had just carried an open gallon of paint up the stairs to begin painting an apartment. He put it down at the top of the stairs and then inexplicably kicked it over. As a torrent of white poured down the stairs Louie stood at the top, arms raised to the heavens yelling "Jesus Christ on the cross - take me now!!!" Jim had just come through the front door. He quickly picked up a paint brush - and that is how the staircase of the house on Lansing street became white.
     I deeply regret that I never heard Jim, an English professor give a lecture or lead a seminar - reports are that he was charismatic, sceptical and humorous. Through the years we had drifted apart as he became more conservative and I became more liberal. Then Annette and I divorced.
     Two years ago in August I was walking by the Cider Mill and Jim hollered at me from the gift shop. They were all there, Jim, Madeline, "little" Annette and her husband George, young Jim and his wife. We shouted pleasantries and then chatted for a few minutes. I choked up to see them together - now that is a memory I shall carry the rest of my trip.
     I miss Jim and those years ago and Louie - and Uncle Cy.