Memories I may have had (easter snow day)

In Deposit, in January, when the lake had frozen over and the snow drifts were at our shoulders, and the fog on our breath crystallized, icicles in miniature forming in our nostrils, we would go for one last sled ride down the steep slope of the beach, our blue discs spinning towards the water, and sometimes we'd make it twenty, thirty feet on to the icy lake. Then home for hot chocolate. We would vacuum and make the beds, turn off the water at the main line and run the faucets dry. Cross our fingers that the pipes wouldn't burst and head back to the city for the winter.

We were back for easter break more often than not, after the last of the snow had melted and coils of ferns began to unravel under the pines.

Until one year, we went to bed in the spring time, and awoke to a blanket of white, packed quickly and set out in separate cars, Mom and the kids, Dad with the dog and the antique furniture he'd picked up in Walton.

They had bought walkie talkies from Radio Shack, this before their expansion into the cellphone and digital camera and tablet computer market--this, in fact, before cell phones and digital cameras. Before tablet computers.

Dad, driving quickly, was soon out of range--"Michael, can you hear me, over." Nothing. Snow and ice. The Crunching road beneath our tires. "Michael, come in Michael, over." And nothing. Static.

Once, we nearly swerved off the road, wide eyed as the car was suddenly aimed at the guard rail, the granite, icy river below, and mother's sangfroid as she steered with the skid, gained control, pointing us back, slowly, inexorably towards the meeting place. I imagine her fear now, three children, and no control.

It took three hours to drive an hour and we spent the night in a hotel, watching through the window as snow piled against the wall, reached the window, stopping three inches up, an aura of frost above it, and spots of fogged breath, circles of wonder, like the universe itself, "ha - ha - ha," breathing out, and watching our big bang shrink back to a singularity above the snowed in window.

In the morning, snow hung from pine boughs, six inches high, falling now and then in dull thuds around us. The roads were cleared by then, on the highways anyway, and we made our way south, back to the city, a day late for our return to school, where the daffodils and crocuses were still germinating, bursting from the softened earth.

Tornadoes

Nine a.m.: 
I woke up first to the itching on my chest and legs, tossed
and turned a while before grabbing hand lotion, smearing giant globs
over the offending spots. Tried to sleep a bit more, couldn't for the
rush of wind in the tree outside, leftover from last night. It's been
a slow, cold spring ,ominous and dark.

I open my eyes to the picture of her I put up last night. Her, sixteen
and so fucking beautiful. Seven years now. She's mine, still. After
everything else. Losing touch, seeing other people, broken hearts,
failed relationships, bad girlfriends and bad boyfriends,
cohabitation. And then friends over the years, the creeping
realization that maybe I'd blown it, missed my shot.  Confessions and
rejections, jealousy and good times, dancing and picnics and dumpster
diving and movies. Sleeping together but never sleeping together,
until finally, one night a kiss in bed and the best relationship
either of us has ever been in?
 
The tree blows, still, outside, hard and violent. I think of cyclones,
the dream I had: the storm coming over the hill, and nowhere to turn
except away, running for any shelter that would have me. That day in
the park, last summer. We'd spent two days together the month before
my ex  would move east for half a bitter year. And when we hugged
goodbye, when I said I couldn't come back to her place, it was fear
that said no, my dogged sense of loyalty, and fidelity. The knowing
too that maybe she could be my shelter, but I wasn't ready to run, not
yet.
 
I told her my dream yesterday, sat listening, patient as she tried to
explain weather patterns, something about temperature and vacuums. The
spinning earth. semantic differences between cyclones and hurricanes. 
Tornadoes.

Charles Imbelli
2008

Patrick

Patrick talks about his mining days. Bo, he says, was a crusty old miner, addicted to methadone, booze and cough syrup--he dropped a sack of pigs heads once, trapped by a steel door slamming shut in Manhattan, spilled heads out of black plastic bag they rolled all over the street him there between the door and the sidewalk watching them tumble helplessly their leather glazed eyes in frantic circles. Should hear him tell the story.

Patrick drove from Kansas to Washington, his wife, son, and boxes of jewelry packed into a yellow old Toyota, the seats roof and truck full, a hippie grapes of wrath pouring in new oil every 50 miles, car plugging away, up over hills and i think of i think i can i think i can i think. He set up shop outside my house, pieces spread over two tables. We talked there under tall pines looking out over the fort, the beach. He tells me about Bo, and New York.

I mention Deposit, his eyes squinting he licks at wrinkled mouth corners and pulls at his grey. “Can’t feature where that is. Some beautiful country, there upstate. Didn’t know how close you were to the city.” 

I knew that city--every street, sewer and park. Didn’t think too much of upstate until now, thousands of miles away, far as possible really and how I miss it--the mountains and leaves and streams. A different time. Where I can smell the changing seasons and keep on waiting for an autumn light that doesn’t come.

Charles Imbelli
2007