Playing Fair and Being Kind

I’ve been quiet for the past several weeks, relatively speaking. With hurricanes, attendant grief and loss, as well as this latest unimaginable murder of people in Las Vegas I have been overwhelmed. There has been no moment to myself that has not been contaminated with outside violence or mayhem of some sort. I haven’t had a happy thought in a while. Nothing has been a dominating influence outside of what I’ve mentioned so far. Until just a minute ago.

I was mentally reviewing what I’ve experienced around the topic of approximation as it relates to argument and logic. I wasn’t getting far because I get hung up on where the boundary of good-enough is. I can’t seem to get past that point. However while I was performing a hygienic ritual my mind wandered to 1956 in downtown Boston. I had only a few months before graduated (escaped!) high school and was working in the mailing department of United Shoe Machinery Corporation, the “Shoe”. It was a great job for one just out of school. I was the assistant office manager. There were a number of young women, usually 16 in number, working as messengers and occasional steno pool. I was their boss. We were a bunch of teens pretending to be grown up and capable. We worked in a prestigious office setting in downtown Boston.  The Shoe owned the building at 140 Federal Street in Boston and occupied the fifth through eleventh floors of the twenty five story building. Big time.

For a brief period in 1956 I was ‘going steady’ with Florence Pushee. Florence was a year older, maybe more. She graduated a year ahead of me and I would guess she might have had a couple of years on me. At seventeen that is quite a difference between young boys and girls. We liked each other and spent a lot of evenings in her front hallway in Dorchester. She lived on Humphrey Street in Uphams Corner just off Dudley Street. We liked to kiss and then kiss some more and we spent hours at the foot of the stairs in her family’s apartment saying very few words and holding each other and kissing. Those were the days.

Florence worked downtown as well. She was an accountant/clerk at The Traveler’s Insurance Company office over on Milk Street not far from Federal Street. We decided to do a grown up thing one day in late summer of 1956. We came up with a plan to meet for lunch downtown. Please remember this was in the days of elegant eating places. Before McDonald’s. BM. Florence knew of a place a few doors off Summer Street within easy walking distance for us both. We met and the place was lovely. We enjoyed a nice lunch and then the waiter brought a bowl on a plate with a doily and placed it on the table between the two of us. The bowl was a little over half full with a clear liquid and a slice of lemon afloat in the middle. There was the bowl in all its mysterious glory and Florence and I staring at it. We looked at each other and then at the bowl. We both knew what the other was wondering.

I was the first to act. I picked up my spoon and started to dip into the bowl of water to capture the lemon slice. Florence acted in a better fashion. She stopped me with a word of caution.
“That’s the finger bowl I think”, she whispered.
“What’s it for?”, I stage-whispered.
“I think we stick our fingers in it. You know. We wash our fingers after we’ve eaten.”
“Oh”, I said with authority.
I noticed the waiter hovering and watching me. He was stoically suppressing something. His eyes were bright with hilarity. I dipped my fingers in the bowl and wiped them on my napkin. All was good. Florence followed suit. I was grateful she was there. I wonder if she remembers this event in our lives. If I ever run into her I will bring this up immediately after “Hello!”. We were children of the Fifties. I fondly remember my friends from then.

I hope your day is progressing in a comfortable fashion. Do what you can with all that is wrong in our world. Take care of yourself first and then do what you can for others.

I’m climbing into Rocinante in the morning and driving across the country to visit dear, dear Naomi and the dear children in Santa Fe. I might get there by next Tuesday. God willing and the creek don’t rise, eh? I want to get a picture of her and I together. I’ll return to Maine by the end of October. I’m looking forward to this.

Here is a poem I wrote last year. It describes an epiphany I had in regard to age, knowledge, and wisdom. Never too late or better late then never. Peace out.
G. M. Goodwin 4 October 2017

MOMENTS OF SORROW

No Regrets

The genius in death,
Pours his heart,
Pours his life,
Onto the page,
He communicates,
He gives,
He gives all,
We can feel genius,
We can hear genius,
Sweet swirls in the depths of artfulness.

To live this long,
To come to a place filled to overflowing,
Til now we could not hear or wait,
Forthwith comes experience and wisdom,
Arriving fully dressed,
I listen and look,
I ready my senses, all of them to
Receive and honor,
Admire, and be awed.

What else is there?|
What have I missed?
The treasures signal an abundance,
What has not been revealed,
Cloaked, undetectable,
Remaining to be found,
Discovered, and enjoyed,
Left wondering, how many more?
Overjoyed and afraid of what I’ll discover.

To observe each day anew,
A piece authored by brilliance,
To listen, to put aside prejudice,
Breathing, inhaling and tasting for the very first time,
That which was ignored or rejected,
Bukowski’s “Bluebird”,
Monet’s lilies and Eakins’ rowers,
Whistler’s “Battersea Reach”,
Stevie Ray Vaughan’s “Pride and Joy”!

Where was I and what was I doing,
A tragedy to miss the wonders,
The existence of beauty, sound,
Smell and texture,
The ignorance of youth held me in darkness,
Muffled, blind, dumb, soundless,
In time, with help and encouragement,
With lessons; to knowledge; to wisdom,
Before the shade passes I’ve become whole.

G. M. Goodwin
30 September 2016