"Letters to Miss Emily..."

[backhoe]

Housekeeping notes 6-9-12

Since that stacked laundry unit MaryAnn gave me is so energy efficient I've lost that “run it as little as possible” phobia I had with Emily's energy hogs and decided to wash & dry until I had a lot more stuff clean.

The first fly in the ointment was discovering I had grabbed “free & clear” wash softener instead of detergent yesterday... Well, that does help get the dog hair out of the wash, and I had some Dollar Tree wool wash which is just plain detergent- it actually washed fine.

I decided to skip spending another $15 on six pillowcases and just wash the ones I have more often. The only fly there is the cases are new, the sheet almost two years old- and it looks kind of dingy. I do have a ton of that super oxygen bleach powder left over from the swastika stone deal- I'll try that. At worst I get a new sheet out of it.

I went shopping more to get out of the house than anything else then Cole & I goofed around yard & house. This old pile is a way station now, I suppose you can guess. I have no idea where we will fetch up but there will come a time- assuming I have that much left- to be moving on from what was supposed to be “our” forever home.

So it goes...

West Viking & RedDog & I have talked about “food in the kitchen so old it achieves a life of its own.”
Went to fix a sort-of typical dinner for myself- a third of a Bubba Burger patty, some Knorr chicken fried rice that has a fair helping of vegetables- and some instant potatoes I fixed...???

Opened the container and one side was ...gray. Hmmm... probably not a good idea to eat that. While I'm sure MaryAnn would take care of me if I poisoned myself it might be better to avoid that all together.

It's still pleasantly cool here and the house is open they way I like it- fans running, Cole-boy snoozing on the hardwood floor...

-30-

[backhoe]

My opinion of what happened to Ace of Spades?

http://www.grouchyconservativepundits.org/index.php?topic=46390.msg357920#msg357920

ace's writings are OK but what really made his site come alive was the commentary. Rude though it may have been.

I've already quit going there. He can do what he wants to with his site but it's nothing without the comments.

Addenda- that is exactly what happened to Little Green Footballs- the proprietor thought we came because of him- not so. We hung out there because we liked each other's company. When the clown started booting off the best & brightest?

We gathered elsewhere.

While I wish ace the best, he's killed his own site. I tried to log on to his alternative site and it was just too much bother.

All I can say is "He had a good place- but make it too hard to comment, I won't go back there. You do what you have to do. You have legal problems, you get a lawyer. Trouble comes to the door? Hit it with a hammer. The rest of us have lives to live and we can't be bothered with your petty dramas."

I will check back a time or two before deleting the bookmark to Ace of Spades.

[backhoe]

Just a couple of more "gone dark" links?

http://www.grouchyconservativepundits.org/index.php?topic=46390.msg357922#msg357922

http://michellemalkin.com/2012/06/09/bloggers-under-fire-arizona-conservative-lawyeractivist-targeted-by-left-wing-arizona-state-bar/

[backhoe]

Island memories...
http://www.freedominion.com.pa/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=65&t=151838&p=1717332#p1717332

[backhoe]

I'm going to re-post this for Miss MaryAnn- I've been chatting a little with her on facebook this AM:



The House of the Satanist.
( Reposted from October 24, 2006 the Squeaky Wheel )

That house we lived in prior to this one had a lot of things going for it- prestigious neighborhood, inground heated pool, waterfront ( the alternate Intercoastal Waterway ) location… but it had two little drawbacks.

It was, of course, where me & Wife #1 had lived, so The Lovely Miss Emily regarded it with great suspicion, to use Winnie Ther Poo’s quaint phrase…

…then there was the secret room. Yes, hidden behind the built-in wet bar in the living room was a long, narrow closet-like space with a carefully concealed, heavily locked door. Naturally, we thought this was a hidey-hole for valuables, and thought nothing more of it- I used it for a gun vault.

It was a strange house in other ways, too- looked at from above, it was “U” shaped with the crotch of the “U” facing away from the river, and while it was huge, one side was cut up like a rabbit warren. The guy we bought it from was a well- respected physician who had a million kids, and what he had done was take a floor plan for one medium-sized “L” shaped house, and flipped it over and doubled it, with the “bridge” between the plans filled with living room, dining room, kitchen, and family room, all on the river side of the house.

The river side was all glass- fixed plate glass picture windows- you could not open them, and this will make a point in my screed later. The left wing of the house had the parent’s quarters- bed and bath, a doctor’s office with a side entrance, and the hidden room… the right side was the rabbit warren- a cluster of tiny bedrooms and baths, and a long, long hall connecting the garage, where we always entered, and the front side. The hall door ( indeed, all the outside doors ) had a double-cylinder deadbolt. This was unusual at the time in our town- the Doc had had burglars break in looking for drugs, so he hardened the house a little.

Bear with me- these, and other things, will be pertinent…

“Life is what happens while you are trying to do other things”- life happened, wife #1 died, my oldest business burned down, I rebuilt it, I dated, I quit dating ( Yee-gah! I *might* reveal a little of that another time… ) when I was least expecting it, I ran into a girl at the bank some business acquaintances of mine had introduced me to a while back, and I was struck by how much I liked her face… not Hollywood pretty, just a good, *good* face. Six foot tall, pure blooded German Ayrian superwoman… but I digress…

We married, and we both had dogs, since we can’t have children ( another story, I’m afraid )- she a Shelty, me a Boxer who was a Schultzhund- a German-trained K-9. Yes, I hunted men, but that is another story, too…

The dogs would… see things. In that house. Things we could not see.

That door to the garage? Some of our early married squabbles were over that door- we’d get home, and the door would be unlocked… or standing ajar…

“Didn’t you lock the door?”
“Yeah, I locked it… did you unlock it?”

You know how it goes…

And the house was… noisy.

You’d look out those picture windows and the trees would be still… and inside the house, you could hear the wind blowing… roaring… whistling…

And other weird things- outside on the roof, in the dark, the dogs would track something… something me and Miss Emily could never see directly, but out of the corner of our eyes?

A tall, red-headed woman in a green gown…
Did I mention wife #1 was a tall redhead who loved green?

Well, this went on for a while, until one day the secretary Emily worked with in the church office came to visit, went over to the wet bar, went right up to the secret door, and very offhandedly mentioned,

“Oh! That’s where John kept the goat's head…”

You see, kindly old Doctor XXX had been a practicing Satanist, and Agxxx the secretary had been ( since recanted ) a practicing witch, and she used to attend meetings in our house for calling up the dark forces…

My, my, my, you could have knocked us over with a feather.

We got the Priest from St. Mark’s to come and bless the house… and yes. just like the damn movies, as he went into each room and laid a blessing on it, the house got noisier, and noisier, and then quieter and quieter, until it was dead still.

Never saw the woman in green after that.
The door stayed locked.
The wind quit blowing inside the house.

And we eventually moved, selling the joint to another doctor, who was moving away from Old Town, where we live now.

I sure hope he’s not a Devil worshiper, but then again, should he be one, he’d feel right at home…
profile

Addenda:

Comment by backhoe
October 24, 2006 @ 3:06 am


One of the things I neglected to mention in that highly-condensed account?

…was that both dogs liked the redhead in green on the roof- they always wagged their tails at her. And yes, my First Mate dearly loved dogs of all kinds.

As for that goat’s head? Well, it was the casual, offhanded way Agxxx mentioned it that convinced me she was dead serious.

[backhoe]

I'm looking for a story for MaryAnn that I thought I'd saved to disc- can't find it-- so I'm going thru the 2008 fundraiser where I'm pretty sure it is- ran across this:http://www.freedominion.com.pa/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=70&t=95642&start=300

Ya ever wonder how I got the moniker "backhoe?"

It was the year 2000-- I'd been online since CIS, Genie, and Delphi days, but I was new to the web-- my soon-to-be dead sister-in-law had given me a CD with a free Juno account, and one of the first things I ran across was the "Blood Trail" articles-- the contaminated blood from Bill Clinton's prison system, a lot of which found its way to Canada.

Searches about it led me to Free Republic, and lurking there prompted me to sign up-- but every screen name, alias, or moniker I had heretofore used came back "name already taken!"

I'd been welding brackets on my backhoe ( and there are many stories there, about building the damn thing, having to sell it to put bread on the table, and Lucy... ) and in annoyance and frustration, I typed in

backhoe

Son of a B...

It went through.

And in retrospect, I wish I had used my proper name. Stalkers be damned.

[backhoe]

Also found?

backhoe wrote:
Miss Emily returned home after successfully hosting an Education for Ministry conference at her former place of employment.



And the nicest part of that? When she slipped up behind me and murmured, "Ah, that man smell- I've missed that..."

Sleep tight, baby, wherever you are...

[RedDog]

Ah yes, the name thing. I briefly used my actual name on Facebook but changed it when I was getting searched - and found by people who dated my sister in high school. She was horrified and considered it stalking when searching me as they don't know her married name or even the state she lives in. I altered my name and in fact have never revealed my school, hometown, employer, etc.

My handle "RedDog" was the name of a Kawasaki ZR1100 motorcycle when a buddy with a yellow Triumph Daytona 1200 was "YellowDog". We were the dogs of war and speed. A longtime female co-worker maintains the Kawasaki was burgundy and to this day refers to me as BurgundyDog.

It's an odd thing this social media. I work with a couple people I think I get along famously with. They'll talk for hours about their kids, parents, lives, personal details, etc., but have not accepted a "friend" request only sent because the rest of us there are "friends". One is a formally abused woman living in fear and may not wish to show herself having male "friends". I have no idea and don't push it. I know of at least one other female whose taken some flak from boy toy over our comfort level of discussion online when there are absolutely no ulterior motives. Indeed, the two of them have been to my home as guests. What can you do?

[backhoe]

More...

One strange memory that sticks with me from all those years ago?

The original Yacht Club was at the north end of the Island, and I still remember how you had to enter a back porch and walk by a line of stainless-steel coolers to get from there to the front dining room on the Frederica River.

Many years later, when I was hired to investigate occult activity at some of the churches here, we staked that area out ( these strange characters like burned up ruins and such- they believe they are centers of power. ) and damned if the line of coolers- ruined, or course-- were still standing there.

There was also the great live oak behind it, which used to have stairs up to the first crotch with an observation platform. Naturally, by then- 30 years, or more, passed-- the stairs & platform had rotted away.

[backhoe]

From the 2008 fundraiser... by backhoe » 18 Aug 2008 02:23

And a little "in the Silence of my Soul" bump...

“It was a young love...”

So my Mother said of her first marriage, to her cancer-doomed Joe Schaeffer in 1942, and so say I of my first marriage to Helen in 1974...

I was 25, back then, and she was 28... looking back, we were so young and sometimes so foolish ( not that age really changes you all that much- you learn a lot as the years roll away, but like the monkey with his fist caught in a gourd, you also seem to be doomed to repeating the same, stupid mistakes over & over & over again... ) but it was the life we were given to share for what seemed in passing forever, but looking back now, seems like so short, so very short, a time.

To quote some lyrics that always stick in my head-

http://tinyurl.com/5zngog

Once upon a time
A girl with moonlight in her eyes
Put her hand in mine
And said she loved me so
But, that was once upon a time
Very long ago.

Once upon a time
We sat beneath a willow tree
Counting all the stars
And waiting for the dawn
But, that was once upon a time
Now the tree is gone...

At the time, I had a job I loved- night operator of the Island's water and sewer treatment plants, and a girlfriend I was in the process of leaving-- a good girl I only wished well, but the relationship had become dead in the water. Smoking dope and drinking coffee and listening to Jethro Tull thunder through Altec Santiago speakers is “no way to go through life, Son.”

I walked into a room, and I heard that voice... and I saw that face... and I knew that this was the one woman I had been born to be with, forever and ever. ( It was at her Father's funeral- but that is another story, indeed... ) My female self. The other side of midnight.

She had a million suitors- what bright and pretty, charismatic and smart, funny and earthy woman wouldn't? I kind of out smarted them all, but I won't tell you how unless you ask- I'm not going to honk my own horn that much if it can be helped.

It's all a Dead World anyhow, isn't it?

Dead Worlds, trailing behind me...

I'd ride my 74 to her house every night, after she quit working ( she was a businesswoman who owned several stores ) and we'd eat, and talk, and then I'd motor on home...

...until that first night I stayed.

That was the first level of trust.

The second one was when she opened her books to me, and asked “why isn't this store making any money?” I gave her my opinion, and she acted on it, and sure enough, the money started coming in. That was, indeed, the second level...

The third was when she went to New York, and left that same store to my keeping. And ironically, the first boyfriend of the woman who would much later become my second wife ( you knew this wasn't going to have a happy ending, didn't you? ) worked there at that time.

Other levels of trust were buying the first major purchases together- a Seeburg jukebox ( how that girl loved deep, thumping bass! ) and a Kawi piano ( I was self-taught at keyboards, and at my best might have been able to make a living in a piano bar... ).

And time flew by, as it has a way of doing ( and never forget, there's a Big Clock- a time clock in the sky-- running on all of us... ) and we laughed and fought and drove from business to business- made love ( and other, ruder words... ) soon as we woke up, last thing at night, and often in between... Oh! We were so young, then.

Honeymooned at Half Moon Bay in Jamaica ( “A hungry Mon is a dangerous Mon- feed your brother!” said the radios there ) and came home to run all those businesses. Yeah, we were The Golden Couple... everyone wanted to be near us, be our friends, be held in our esteem.

It's funny looking back, because we were so poor we ate Swanson frozen dinners that first year- everything we had, we put back in to the stores. But to be successful, you have to appear to be successful, so we created an illusion of prosperity, and wealth, and people believed it. “The strong horse, the weak horse,” and all that stuff Osama said- it's true, for good or ill.

There were, and are, further levels of trust- she was handicapped ( two sailors, too drunk to walk but not to drive, hit her car and put her in a wheelchair, never to rise again ) and had been married before, and divorced after the first year, and I was, and remain, convinced that it failed because she refused to let her husband care for her. Her Mother ( an entire story in itself ) was certain “no man could stand caring for a handicapped wife” ( merely projecting her own feelings on others ) so she had nurses and maids to do this. And it was a barrier, between man and wife.

But I overcame it- and some other things as well. So we became One...

And how those days, and nights, flew! A blur of speed, and passion. Accompanied by the rolling thunder of the music that was always around us and always a part of our world...
Faster! Faster!!

Corporate battles, bloodless, yet as vicious as any barfight. Sickness and heath. Music and laughter and madness.
Faster! Faster!!

Money finally pouring in, and when it did, her turning to me and saying, “You know how it is when you really want something ( income ) so badly, and when you get it, it's really not quite what you thought it would be, all along?”

Yeah, I knew. We'd fought cancer twice, I'd had myself sterilized ( for her health ) so we couldn't have heirs and children ( more, more! Stories... ) and somehow, the houses and jewelry and clothes and furs, the prestige and the envy...

...weren't really worth much more than a bucket of warm spit.
( And just for the record, I had known that all along. My parents were wise old birds, who taught me well about life and its illusions. )

But always, we had each other. No matter which side of Heaven or Hell or places in between we'd visited that day, at night we spooned together, always nude, skin to skin, like two puppies. And she could never fall asleep unless I lightly scratched her head.

Faster, faster, faster!

Until, until until...

...that night
( The night of her 36th birthday, on the hour and to the minute, of the time she had been born. Remember that big time clock, running? She got punched out... )
she turned to me and called “John, John!” and a stroke carried her away...

All those tests at Duke, and they never looked in her head to see that aneurysm she had been born with, a little time-bomb riding along inside her, and beside me, all those years.

There are a million stories within that little outline, but I have not the heart ( Heart? “The Heart is a lonely hunter...” ) to write them, now.
And maybe I will , or maybe I will not, some later day.


“John. John!”

Goodbye, Bunny...

-30-

Well, I found it. Lots of memories from back then. Mostly happy, a few that bite. “It was a young love” was on page 47 and I'm going to leave off reading there. I did save this to disc this time.

Funny, how frangible & fungible memory is.

“I'm moving on with my life, and you've been gone...”

Forever, to the Sea.

“...and I straighten
Miss Emily's picture
on the wall...”

[backhoe]

Ah yes, the name thing. I briefly used my actual name on Facebook but changed it when I was getting searched - and found by people who dated my sister in high school. She was horrified and considered it stalking when searching me as they don't know her married name or even the state she lives in. I altered my name and in fact have never revealed my school, hometown, employer, etc.

My handle "RedDog" was the name of a Kawasaki ZR1100 motorcycle when a buddy with a yellow Triumph Daytona 1200 was "YellowDog". We were the dogs of war and speed. A longtime female co-worker maintains the Kawasaki was burgundy and to this day refers to me as BurgundyDog.

It's an odd thing this social media. I work with a couple people I think I get along famously with. They'll talk for hours about their kids, parents, lives, personal details, etc., but have not accepted a "friend" request only sent because the rest of us there are "friends". One is a formally abused woman living in fear and may not wish to show herself having male "friends". I have no idea and don't push it. I know of at least one other female whose taken some flak from boy toy over our comfort level of discussion online when there are absolutely no ulterior motives. Indeed, the two of them have been to my home as guests. What can you do?

One reason I didn't log into ace's fallback site was it only accepted twitter ( don't have that yet ) or wordpress ( Oddly, I am on Hillbuzz with that, still, but it would not recognize my nic ) or facebook- which naturally is my proper name and I really didn't want that lunatic stalking & SWATting bloggers to get that so easily.

[backhoe]

Well, that was cool- MaryAnn gave me a video clip on facebook to "music of the 70's..." Good times. Of course I feel old as the hills now... gonna get my Zimmer frame
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walker_%28mobility%29
& head for the kitchen...

[backhoe]

Your dead keep dragging you back- but you still have to carry on...

I heard back from Miss MaryAnn on facebook- mostly personal things that have no place here, in these most personal musings... but one thing she “mused” over was this, the lyrics to “Once upon a Time...”

There is a lot at the source- maybe more than I should tell you, but my life- except from those two and a half years between marriages- is an open book- look here:

by backhoe » 11 Aug 2010 02:27

viewtopic.php?p=1521561#p1521561

...I was 25, back then, and she was 28... looking back, we were so young and sometimes so foolish ( not that age really changes you all that much- you learn a lot as the years roll away, but like the monkey with his fist caught in a gourd, you also seem to be doomed to repeating the same, stupid mistakes over & over & over again... ) but it was the life we were given to share for what seemed in passing forever, but looking back now, seems like so short, so very short, a time.

To quote some lyrics that always stick in my head-

http://tinyurl.com/5zngog

Once upon a time
A girl with moonlight in her eyes
Put her hand in mine
And said she loved me so
But, that was once upon a time
Very long ago.

That is a little snippet from “It was a young love...” that I wrote so long ago, for the 2008 fundraiser here...

There are Worlds within Worlds and time within times in that short little snippet of a life and a World so long ago and Oh! So! Far away.

If you will follow that link to those lyrics you will find a line

“Now the tree is gone...”

MaryAnn related to that and spoke some of how it was to be a caregiver to a dying husband... while I have not been in exactly that same position, I've been “close enough for government work”- I know what it is like to give, and give, and give again.... and somehow it is not quite enough...

… to lay your heart on the line.

To spread yourself open to all that is and ever was to be. “ To give yourself, nor count the cost- to live life gloriously..”

You do all of that... and yet at the end?

There is only the silence. Of a broken heart.

-30-

[backhoe]

“ To give yourself, nor count the cost- to live life gloriously..”

You do all of that... and yet at the end?

There is only the silence. Of a broken heart.

-30-

I found the source of those lyrics- God knows I sang them many times- yeah, I got paid to do it, so I reckon I was a "professional" singer at one point in my life.

Normally I would just ask my Dead Miss Emily where they came from...

But she is "Dead & Gone" to use the title of a book she loved... Skooky...?

So I had to look it up- here it is:

http://www.songcoleta.com/lyrics/awake, ... %28hymn%29


Awake, awake to love and work!
The lark is in the sky;
The fields are wet with diamond dew;
The worlds awake to cry
Their blessings on the Lord of life,
As He goes meekly by.

Come, let thy voice be one with theirs,
Shout with their shout of praise;
See how the giant sun soars up,
Great lord of years and days!
So let the love of Jesus come
And set thy soul ablaze.

To give and give, and give again,
What God hath given thee;
To spend thyself nor count the cost;
To serve right gloriously
The God Who gave all worlds that are,
And all that are to be.

Many lives ago and many worlds away I stood at the dawn with thunder & lightning in my hands... with men I loved and would have died for. I walked in to Hell... and came back, to tell the tale. Several times.

You who read this can believe, or not- I swore oaths but more importantly I signed papers that I would never speak of those years except in general terms.

So in the long ago & far away and Up! & Out! between wives- who I also swore & signed oaths about- I did “other things...”

...and I came back to tell the tale- except my oaths forswear the telling of them.

Believe it or not- it's your “choice.” We all make them and live with the consequences.

But I do know how it is “to give, and give, and give again” and I know a little about “nor count the cost...”

Your Mileage May Vary...
Void Where Prohibited by Law...
Do Not Read This!
Under Penalty of Law!

-30-

[backhoe]

Housekeeping notes 6-11-12

It's still cool enough here- 81F-- to leave the house open but the humidity is creeping up and at some point I'll have to seal our quarters off and run the AC. Ugh. I hate that cramped, “I can't hear anything outside” feeling. I'll put it off as long as I can sleep in the heat at night OK and it appears The Kid is not suffering- I can sweat a little, he can't shed heat like I do.

Just for the Hell of it I got a frozen pizza at Walgreen’s yesterday for dinner- it wasn't bad but when I stuck it in the oven I puzzled over how the “three meat” pizza only had pepperoni & sausage that I could identify... looked at the fine print on the box? “Pepperoni, sausage and Beef Pizza Sauce...”

Hmmm... that's an artful dodge around truthful advertising. At least it was something different.

Time... the passing of it, the parsing of it, is a strange thing- I can't believe it's another Monday already and a new week is spooling out before me.

A week ago we were frantically trying to clear out the last remains of MaryAnn's real estate office at the old 621 Ocean building- now we have to get her set up in that old office Vernon had at home.

The Island has gotten so damn picky & peculiar over zoning that I'm not sure she can do it legally, but if she were asking me I'd tell her just to go ahead and do it, and if they give her a hard time, play “dumb little old widow woman me” and ask what she needs to do to comply- it is always easier to ask forgiveness than permission. And since Vernon did have an office there in the past I'd just be brazen and assert “it's been here all along and nobody gave us a hard time about it!”

Looking back at the fundraiser I hosted here in 2008 was sure a stroll down memory lane... mostly not bad. Seeing Emily's drop-by with her Avatar of Cole by the gate was kind of wrenching...

A part of me still wants to sink into the earth beside her ashes and just be dead...
A part of me is so tired of all that that I can't find the words...
...and another part just says, “It's done. Fini. Over. You cannot change it. No power on earth can fix it. Her life was what it was and it is done. Yours is what it is and it is still rolling on... '...all your tears will not erase one word of it...'”

And so it is.

So on we go. My Golden Fella by my side. We'll see what the Widder-Lady MaryAnn has in store for us this week. Hum a few bars of “Merrily we roll along, o'er the Deep Blue Sea...”

-30-