Unguarded Response

"There! I got it off my chest. And I feel better."

"Jerk!" she said as she set his coffee cup down in front of him. "There's shortcake for dessert."

The dessert plate slid in front of him as she took aim and triggered the whole can of whipped cream into his ear and up-side his head.

Tugs of War

Ricki took the afternoon off to spend Rory's birthday with him at the park, the third grader's first dadless birthday since Ron's funeral in October.

Rory came screaming "Mommmmmmmmy! Mommmmmmmy!," down the school's corridor, answered by Ricki's," Happy Birthday, baby!," finishing with the youngster's collision into a rising and twirling embrace.

The afternoon had been built for the picnic and kite-flying, where Ricki showed her little man how to send a piece of paper all the way up the kite string so it was no real surprise when Rory wanted a pen to send up a note.

It said, "I'll put cake for you dad where santas cookies go," and after the party that evening, after Ricki tucked Rory in, she could hardly stand to look at the cake-square on the living room's hutch next to the folded flag as she headed for a glass of wine and the front door.

Ricki sat on the bungalow's steps feeling more alone than ever, trying to get sips of wine commingled with salty tears past her lumped throat, her face awash in the evening's expansive silence.

She looked to the heavens, thinking, 'God, if there was a Santa Claus, Ron would have come home from Afghanistan,' and she began to sob softly as her forehead sank into the crook of her elbow, and the breeze tugged-of-war with wisps of hair against teary cheeks.

9:35 at the 9th St. Diner

Ramon, the line cook, paused with the spatula full of cold greaszy hash in midair only to slap it onto the overheated grill with a SMACK! from ten inches off the deck in a diner whose counter was littered with tips that contained pennies.

Lonnie sat four stools down from the cop, hunching his upper torso rapidly up and down toward the counter's edge to the beat of music that didn't exist, and loudly spinning a quarter on its edge again and again as he shot sidelong, darted glances at the cop he thought he might'a recognized.

Baker enjoyed one of the few walking beats left in the city and saw Lonnie around on the streets actin' the punk, always in his black, studded, imitation leather jacket and threadbare jeans bought used and probably not laundered since the last break-in at his parents' house.

Irene stood at the stockroom's end of the counter beyond the cop, prepping beige indestructo Melmac plates from the 50s with burger condiments mechanically stacked with lettuce leaves, green-tinged tomato slices and pickle chips for lunch plates that would take flight and sail the counter in just a couple hours.

Baker caught one of Lonnie's stares, "You might wanna take a long hike, kid, because your customers just might be gunnin' for you out there, today," smiled Baker, now staring at his coffee as he continued.


"See, yesterday, I grabbed the dime-bags you taped under the counter here at my stool, flushed the rocks, and replaced them after Ramon, Irene and I had a little party makin' rocks outta powdered sugar, MSG and baking powder that won't burn so good in your buddies' crack pipes," but before Baker could swallow his next sip, the only sounds in the place were a rapid succession of Lonnie's stool-top spinning on its pedestal as the door-closer thunked shut ringing the bell and a quarter fell vibrating itself to silence before an encore of erupting laughter.

Peace Under the Olive Branch

Published at MuDJoB, 4/13/10

My father was fussy about a lot of things and I think being a Colonel in the Army’s armored (tank) divisions made him that way.

When the doorbell rang, we kids were to line-up just beyond the door in pre-assigned places. We extended our hands and said something like, “Hi, I’m Dewey, the youngest son.” It wasn’t exactly a military formation, we were perceived as impolite, uh-oh. The offender would be screamed at, slapped around or punched, and sent off to cry privately, with a shout down the hallway aimed at your spine, “Knock it off or I’ll REALLY give you something to cry about!”

What a joy that was, time and again, but only when company came to visit. It made me feel like one of the Von Trapp children in “The Sound of Music” movie!

Friday dinners were interesting. Mother was a ‘cradle Catholic,’ and her family made it clear that we were to be raised in the Catholic Church. Like Thanksgiving, they meant with all the trimmings: sacrament preparation classes on Saturdays and the eventual sacraments of 1st Confession, 1st Communion, and Confirmation once the nuns found us worthy and practiced.

Back then, Catholics abstained from eating meat on Friday. Fish didn’t count. Chicken, pork, or beef meant eternal Hell for the offending consumer. Dad was a battlefield Christian, meaning he just might believe in God if he had been shot in the chest and believed he was going to die, although we kids thought, “Naaaah, not our old man. Christian? Not now, not ever.” So he granted himself a Catholics’ Friday Flesh-Eating Exemption.

Mom's Friday dinners were macaroni and cheese, fish sticks, or cheese ravioli from a can (yum!). Dad’s exemption found him sawing into steak or gobbling a hamburger, always letting rivers of juice drip down his chin, probably to remind us of our piety, the purity of our sacrifice. Seldom did we look up from our plates; well, except for that one time, the attack of the corn cob.

Some people eat corn off the cob by rolling the cob or going back and forth like a computer’s print-head. My dad mowed-down rows of niblets from the cob with the same precision he mowed the grass leaving the wheel lines perfectly straight in the grass. His corn eating never failed to add niblet remains to his beef-lubed cheeks and corners of his mouth. His finished cobs were clean enough to mistake for a paint roller.

One Friday night during a particularly vicious cob attack between steak bites, Dad suddenly threw the cob down hard enough to bounce the plate on the table making the other food hop. He immediately covered his mouth as the string of foul language ensued. This was no time to giggle at the curse-muffling attempt. Our eyes were wide with fear and “What now?” expressions. Still fuming and spewing bad words, he lowered the napkin.

I began to laugh, uncontrollably. One of his false teeth, a front one, had broken from the corn mowing exertion in his game of “Strip the Cob.” It was funnier that the tooth was ‘missing in action,’ until our military genius of a father determined he had swallowed it. No one dared say he might see it again at tomorrow’s morning… uh… ‘constitution.’

No laughing matter, we were ordered to our rooms to snicker and joke among ourselves as he stomped around yelling at Mom (for?). We laughed quietly under bed covers to conceal and contain our glee, for, there surely was a God and one who didn’t appreciate our dad eating steak on Friday nights in front of us and Jesus. We hoped Dad had got the Holy message and would acquire a taste for processed, baked, formed fish rectangles drowning in catsup.

If Dad ever mentioned “Jesus” it was usually very loudly and accompanied by a piece of lawn furniture or a hand tool flying through the air and you better duck immediately rather than looking around and catching the flying implement with one of your unsuspecting body parts.

The best cursing always followed Friday: Saturday mornings.

He was an army officer but did you ever-in-your-life see a colonel mowing a lawn? That man was obsessed with trees and shrubs and grass. Sun-up on Saturdays was a harsh wake-up of yelling, “GET UP AND GET OUTSIDE. NOW!” I could have won Olympic Gold for slow teeth-brushing, avoiding what I detested under the searing Arizona sun. If he barged into the bathroom, his death-grip on my ear, dragging me to the front door and hurling me up the sidewalk was the first clue that dental hygiene wasn't high in Saturday priorities.

The lawn looked spectacular, where Tiger Woods might want to be buried, but this under-aged laborer paid the price 52 times a year for Dad’s gloating over his yard’s military crispness.

One summer day, over 100-degrees Fahrenheit, we worked on the back and front lawns for 9-10 hours. I was about 10 years old. I was at the point of exhaustion despite frequent-enough drinks from the pitcher to send me peeing on the hedgerow beneath we kids’ bedroom windows. Oh, the smell? We had air conditioning and one never opened the windows for fear of serious reprisals. So the only wafting of glorious uric acid fumes from my Saturday squirts (I couldn’t track grass clippings into the house!) went Heavenward unless the front door was opened right at the wrong time for a breeze to cross-ventilate the doorway with my adolescent ‘Eau du DNA’.

By 8pm, the sun was sinking rapidly. Seeking my undivided attention, Dad grabbed my scrawny arm with his death grip and ‘walked’ me over to the olive tree with its 60-inch circular base dug out so small flowers could grow there. There were only small weeds and grass in the trunk's surrounds. In fact, Dad said, “If it takes you all [blankety-blankety] night, you will dig-out every weed and blade of grass so that there is only smooth dirt and you'll NOT come into the house until it is finished and I don’t give a good God-damn if that means midnight. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?,” which must have been a hearing test because I did hear it. So did folks about 4 houses away.

I dug out grass, rocks, chunks of whatever. I was bitten by ants, worked into total darkness with nicked and scratched hands, tears in my eyes until my mother, to my father’s loud protestations, brought me a flashlight.

It neared 10 o'clock by the time I hauled heavy, sagging bags of flower bed invaders to the alley. My mother attended to my hands, drew a warm bath and tucked me into bed that night. It may have taken less than 10 seconds for me to find sleep from the wearisome day. Dad popped-in to cheer me up, saying something to the effect that my life was in danger if he didn’t like what he saw at dawn.

The next morning was an answered prayer.

Okay, so Dad awakened me in a screaming rage. Okay, so I had dug-out the bed to where the surface looked like crumbled dark chocolate. And if you must know, I'd been so thorough that I had removed and damaged all the iris bulbs meant to sprout flowers later in their existence. Suffice to say this was a Sunday I wasn’t going to Mass or anywhere until I retrieved iris bulbs out from the heavy sacks now inside metal garbage cans, and replanted the bulbs. I donned my battle gear and made a routine: Trowel, small hole, drop massacred bulb, cover and add a small amount of water. Repeat 29 times.

Dirty from head to foot, victorious in both bulb burial and resuscitation, I rang for Dad to inspect my handiwork. He grunted my work was passable, then screamed about me being a little idiot and that was when God intervened.

Dad gritted his teeth so hard against the cigarette filter (an oft occurrence) that he celebrated the 2nd instance of breaking off and swallowing a front tooth. Dad stomped around the front yard howling creative strings of words one does not speak in the presence of children, ladies, or men of the cloth.

I was too tired and too scared to laugh or even look. I stared at my filthy legs and once-white tennis shoes, biting my lip to keep from smiling. The thought of divine intervention came to my young mind. So, respectfully and reverently, I looked upward, toward the sky.

I could have sworn I saw God among the clouds, smiling. And in that compassionate and loving smile, you know what? God confirmed that He had intervened on my behalf because, Glory Hallelujah!, I could see He had a front tooth missing.

Peace Under the Olive Branch

My father was fussy about a lot of things and I think being a Colonel in the Army’s armored (tank) divisions made him that way.

When the doorbell rang, we kids were to line-up just beyond the door in pre-assigned places. We extended our hands and said something like, “Hi, I’m Dewey, the youngest son.” It wasn’t exactly a military formation, but if we were perceived as silly or impolite, uh-oh. The offender would (later) be screamed at, slapped around or punched, and sent off to cry privately, with a shout down the hallway aimed at your spine, “Knock it off or I’ll REALLY give you something to cry about!”

What a joy that was, time and again, but only when company came to visit. It made me feel like one of the Von Trapp children in “The Sound of Music” movie!

Friday dinners were interesting. Mother was a ‘cradle Catholic,’ and her family made it clear that we were to be raised in the Catholic Church. Like Thanksgiving, they meant with all the trimmings: sacrament preparation classes on Saturdays and the eventual sacraments of 1st Confession, 1st Communion, and Confirmation once the nuns found us worthy and practiced.

Back then, Catholics abstained from eating meat on Friday. Fish didn’t count. Chicken, pork, or beef meant eternal Hell for the offending consumer. Dad was a battlefield Christian, meaning he just might believe in God if he had been shot in the chest and believed he was going to die, although we kids thought, “Naaaah, not our old man. Christian? Not now, not ever.” So he granted himself a Catholics’ Friday Flesh-Eating Exemption.

Mom's Friday fare was typically macaroni and cheese or fish sticks, or cheese ravioli from a can (yum!). Dad’s exemption found him sawing into steak or gobbling a hamburger, always letting rivers of juice drip down his chin, probably to remind us of our piety, the purity of our sacrifice. Seldom did we look up from our plates; well, except for that one time, the attack of the corn cob.

Some people eat corn off the cob by rolling the cob or going back and forth like a computer’s print-head. My dad mowed-down rows of niblets from the cob with the same precision he mowed the grass leaving the wheel lines perfectly straight. His corn eating never failed to add niblet remains to his beef-lubed cheeks and corners of his mouth. His finished cob was clean enough to mistake for a paint roller.

One Friday night during a particularly vicious cob attack between steak bites, Dad suddenly threw the cob down hard enough to bounce the plate on the table making the other food hop. He immediately covered his mouth as the string of foul language erupted. This was no time to giggle at the curse-muffling attempt. Our eyes were wide with fear and the “What now?” expressions. Still fuming and spewing bad words, he lowered the napkin.

I burst into uncontrollable laughter. One of his false teeth, a front one, had broken from the corn mowing exertion in his game of “Strip the Cob.” It was funnier that the tooth was ‘missing in action,’ until our military genius of a father determined he had swallowed it. No one dared say he might see it again at tomorrow’s morning… uh… ‘constitution.’

This was no laughing matter, so we were ordered to our rooms to snicker and joke among ourselves as Dad stomped around the house yelling at Mom (for?). We laughed quietly under bed covers to conceal and contain our glee, for, there surely was a God and one who didn’t appreciate our dad eating steak on Friday nights in front of us and Jesus. We hoped Dad had gotten the Holy message and would acquire a taste for processed, baked, formed fish rectangles drowning in catsup.

If Dad ever mentioned “Jesus” it was usually very loudly and accompanied by a piece of lawn furniture or a hand tool flying through the air. You should have already been ducking, immediately, rather than looking around and catching the flying implement with one of your unsuspecting body's parts.
The best cursing, however, was always Saturday mornings.

He was an army officer but did you ever-in-your-life see a colonel mowing a lawn? That man was obsessed with trees and shrubs and grass. Sun-up on Saturdays was a harsh wake-up of yelling, “GET UP AND GET OUTSIDE. NOW!” I could have won Olympic Gold for slow teeth-brushing to avoid what I detested most under the searing Arizona sun. If too slow, he'd barge into the bathroom, put a death-grip on my ear and drag me to the front door, hurling me up the sidewalk which was my first clue that dental hygiene wasn't high in Saturday's priorities.

The lawn looked spectacular, where Tiger Woods might want to be buried, but this under-aged laborer paid the price 52 times a year for Dad’s gloating over his yard’s military crispness.

One summer day, over 100-degrees Fahrenheit, we worked on the back and front lawns for 9 or 10 hours. I was about 10 years old. I was at the point of exhaustion despite frequent-enough drinks from the pitcher to send me peeing on the hedgerow beneath we kids’ bedroom windows. Oh, the smell? We had air conditioning and one never opened the windows for fear of serious reprisals. So the only wafting of glorious uric acid fumes from my Saturday squirts (I couldn’t track grass clippings into the house!) went Heavenward unless the front door was opened right at the wrong time for a breeze to cross-ventilate the doorway with my adolescent ‘Eau du DNA’.

By 8pm, the sun was sinking rapidly. Seeking my undivided attention, Dad grabbed my scrawny arm with his death grip and ‘walked’ me over to the olive tree with its 60-inch circular flowerbed impressioned into the earth so small flowers could one day grow there. There were only small weeds and grass in the trunk's surrounds. In fact, Dad said, “If it takes you all [blankety-blankety] night, you will dig-out every weed and blade of grass so that there is only smooth dirt and you'll NOT come into the house until it is finished and I don’t give a good God-damn if that means midnight. DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME?,” which must have been a hearing test because I did hear it. So did folks about 4 houses away.

I dug out grass, rocks, chunks of whatever. I was bitten by ants, worked into total darkness with nicked and scratched hands, with tears in my eyes until my mother, to my father’s loud protestations, brought me a flashlight.

It neared 10 o'clock by the time I hauled heavy, sagging bags of flowerbed invaders to the alley. My mother attended to my hands, drew a warm bath and tucked me into bed that night. It may have taken less than 10 seconds for me to find sleep from the wearisome day. Dad popped-in to cheer me up, awakened me to say something to the effect that my life was in danger if he didn’t like what he saw at dawn.

The next morning was an answered prayer.

Okay, so Dad awakened me in a screaming rage. Okay, so I had dug-out the bed to where the surface looked like crumbled dark chocolate. And if you must know, I'd been so thorough that I had removed all and damaged many of the iris bulbs meant to sprout flowers later in their existence. Suffice to say this was a Sunday I wasn’t going to Mass or anywhere until I retrieved iris bulbs out from the heavy sacks (now inside metal garbage cans) and replanted them. I donned my battle gear and made a routine: Trowel, small hole, drop massacred bulb, cover and add a small amount of water. Repeat 29 times.

Dirty from head to foot, victorious in both bulb resuscitation and burial, I rang for Dad to inspect my handiwork. He grunted my work was passable, then screamed about me being a little idiot and that was when God intervened.

Dad gritted his teeth so hard against the cigarette filter (an oft occurrence) that he celebrated the 2nd instance of breaking off and swallowing a front tooth. Dad stomped around the front yard howling creative strings of words one does not speak in the presence of children, ladies, or men of the cloth.

I was too tired and too scared to laugh or even look. I stared at my filthy legs and once-white tennis shoes, biting my lip to keep from smiling. The thought of divine intervention came to my young mind. So, respectfully and reverently, I looked upward toward the sky.

I could have sworn I saw God among the clouds, smiling. And in that compassionate and loving smile, you know what? God confirmed that He had intervened on my behalf because, Glory Hallelujah!, I could see He had a front tooth missing.

The Masters: Golf's Iconic Irony

She was so ill from her breast cancer fight that Amy Mickelson had stayed in bed all week at a rented home in Augusta, Georgia, host city of golf's storied tourney, "The Masters," as husband Phil undertook its rigors.

The spotlight was swept with Tiger Woods' career resumption to win America's most coveted title in golf after taking a sordid plunge into the crucible of public disgrace and concomitant personal humiliation which, this week, had amped-up the frenzied, worldwide media hounds. Through the four days of competition, Woods dominated the airwaves in commentary, background videos, and live cameras capturing players' efforts on the demanding course.

Immediately following victory gestures of raised arms and a caddy hug, Phil Mickelson strode to his wife, holding and kissing and whispering to her as we witnessed tears roll down the champion's face.

The former champion who had publicly embarrassed his wife and commanded most of the airtime and space had played poorly, his children and wife at an undisclosed elsewhere.

Millions of viewers saw the victorious Mickelson in tears, loving his wife and children celebrating much more than a green jacket, for, this day Phil won respectability back for his peers on the PGA tour, and our hearts and heartstrings in a demonstrative love that overshadows any field in sport.

Pilgrimage from Balbriggan

The blue-black and moonless sky held more stars than she could imagine as Chloe sat on a park bench behind the El Tovar Lodge an hour before sun-up, having arrived just 4 hours earlier due to a delayed flight into Phoenix, adrenaline and napping on the plane vaporizing jet lag and fatigue.


Some 39 months ago, a wayward Yank tourist had left a magazine on a table whose top she'd wiped ten thousand times if once at the small pub where she'd slung ale and delivered plates and scrubbed floors on raw knees for eight years going.


The magazine had fallen open when it hit the floor, revealing a 3-panelled fold-out of a scene so captivating, so breathtaking, that she'd taped it to her tiny flat's kitchen wall next to the twin seated dinette.


She had scrimped and saved tips, and toward the end of her goal, even reduced her tabs at the market and halved her cigarette budget to get here.


First light began to reveal the canyon's rim as the crescendo of sunrise transposed dark canyon walls, bringing her to her feet with outstretched arms to the increasing tempo of the vibrant symphony of color now erupting from the Grand Canyon, delivering her dream as tears rolled freely from her eyes and found her doin' a jig to the music of her heart, she was!


On the plane ride back to Dublin and life in Balbriggan just north, Chloe fondled and pondered the silver, turquoise encrusted cross around her neck, knowing she had seen, had believed, and now possessed the inner kindling for the fire to forge new hopes and dreams.

The Easter Egg Hunted

In 1959, Davy's sisters and brother were 13, 15 and 17. He wasn't even 6 years old, yet.


Easter morning, his mom and dad suggested the older kids hide eggs in the front yard to buy the family a little quiet time later when Davy would awaken and could jolt the neighborhood--instead of the house--with 80 million megawatts of his predictably high-strung excitement.


He flew outta bed and here he came yelling down the hallway bursting into the living room with jet-winged arms, wide-eyed and squealing to see an over-filled basket only to rocket out and slam the front door once his siblings had pointed to the front yard which held hidden plastic eggs encasing treasure fit for a greedy pirate.

After an hour and oddly silent outdoors, Davy's mom wondered aloud about her rascal's whereabouts and the house emptied like firefighters responding to a 3-alarm search.

MaryFran heard something from the direction of the concrete slabbed driveway and peeked around the corner to see her little son...knelt-down, butt-on-heels...beside the family's behemoth '56 Buick Special, only two plastic eggs beside him, as the young boy giggled at funny faces made and distorted by curves in the car's massive chrome bumpers as he moved his head to and fro, because, isn't that why they were so shiny?

Where I Loved: China Beach

Many have left their hearts in San Francisco and mine is among them.

I lived and worked in 'the city' and, decades ago, had been delivered to 'Babylon-by-the-Bay' in pursuit of a bachelor's degree from San Francisco State University (that I affectionately called 'Hayakawa Tech.' for its President made infamous for mishandling student protesters on-strike from classes).


China Beach became my personal retreat, my study hall, my place to picnic and snuggle with my girlfriend.

I'd thumb-hook my text-laden book bag and jump off the Geary Street bus near 25th Avenue to wind my way through gently curved streets hosting Pacific Heights' mansions (the Russian embassy among them) with lawns as meticulous as Japanese gardens, and I'd amble down to see the Pacific Ocean fronted by a parking lot good for but 30 or so cars adjacent to steep, railway-tie steps at this oft-deserted spot called "China Beach" with its unique view of the Golden Gate Bridge from open sea.

Sometimes I'd daydream I was a sailor on-deck of a battleship returning from war, seeing the bridge through misted homesick and proud eyes, watching sign-wavers, banner bearers and well-wishers drop flowers as we stood at rigid attention with the Stars 'n Stripes flying, and ship's band playing 'Anchors Aweigh' as her superstructure cleared the bridge's underpinnings.


The wet fog's approach and slow swallow of the bridge seemed like a snake's consumption of its prey, only intensifying the surf's pounding and vibrance of colors when I'd find myself wishing my solitude was shared by a painter who could capture the majesty before me, my city, my bridge...and that heart spellbound in awe upon his canvas.

Precursor to Homecoming

At the rehab facility last night, Alicia and I bagged-up Mom's clothing and personal articles to bring home, easing the burden of today's tasks relative to her discharge.

The Chihuahua-mix known as "Coconut" (and "Cokie" and "Doodies" et al.) met us with her usual, unconditional love before settling down with acknowledgement and a few petted back strokes.

The phone was ringing--Alicia's husband in California--so I went to the car and brought in a couple bags, and juggled vases to rest on the kitchen counter with just one item left to retrieve from the car.

I took Mom's walker from the back seat, reattached the basket, plopped the seat down, undid the brakes and rolled it into the kitchen.

The dog went berserk, running circles around the walker and then reversing direction, wagging her corkscrewed tail like a windshield wiper on steroids, performing small front-legged lifts like a miniature stallion while emitting mini-barks.

Wordlessly, they know...they just know, don't they.