The last thing Colin needed was a surprise. He expected his visit with Loretta and Frank to begin with a flurry of hugs and handshakes, then settle into a relaxed afternoon of yakking and catching up, which would morph into an outdoor dinner, punctuated by hooting, hollering, and joking around. The menu would consist of sirloin steak, some kind of exotic salad, and fancy french fries made according to recipes gleaned from sites like ‘Make Every Day a Fryday’ with entries like ’17 French Fry Creations That are Better Than a Boyfriend’.
Things started out pretty much as expected. Loretta and Frank had anticipated his arrival through some kind of familial sixth sense, and hurried out to greet him before Colin got halfway up the drive to their suburban bungalow. They cluster-hugged and celebrated their long-awaited reunion with all the enthusiasm of a plugged-in popcorn maker. Hermes instantly fell in love—again—with Pom Pom, their adorable teacup Pomeranian, who snarled and snapped when he tried to sniff her derrière through its concealing fluff.
If three people and two dogs could constitute a pandemonium, the reunited shards of the Peterson clan had proved it.
“Come in!” Frank ushered, attempting to restore a modicum of order and decorum. Unsuccessfully. After all, they were seniors—except for Pom Pom, who hadn’t attained the age of retirement, even if you measured her earthly existence in dog-years.
Stop harassing her, you old letch, Colin taunted.
I’m barely four years older than Pomie, Hermes whined.
That’s twenty-eight canine anniversaries. Give it up! You’re embarrassing me.
All that seemed perfectly normal to Colin. He was happy and at ease as they bustled him over the threshold, into the house, up the half-flight of carpeted stairs, and into the living room, where…
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
Horns honked, rattles shook, confetti shot out of cardboard cannons, dogs barked, and a resounding chorus of the Happy Birthday song reverberated through the dining and living rooms, belted out by: Michael, Gloria, Jason, and Marisa; Colin’s nephew Ken and niece-in-law Susan with their kids Dougie and Dorothy; and, at the back of the pack, where he always preferred to be, Colin’s good friend Harvey Dempster—AKA The Dumpster.
Suspended above the gathered celebrants, a pair of giant, helium-filled balloons formed the numerals sixty-six.
“But it’s not my birthday!” Colin protested.
“Since when did you need an excuse to have a party?” The Dumpster parried.
They all laughed.
“You’ll be halfway across the continent before your real birthdate,” Loretta said. “We wanted to celebrate while we’ve still got a chance.”
“Yeah,” The Dumpster chimed in. “And before you’re upside down in a ditch with your wheels spinning in the air.”
Loretta shot Harvey an annoyed glance, then shepherded the party through the house and into the backyard so she could get down to the serious business of ‘preparing the feast’.
Colin had never been overly enthusiastic about outdoor family games, but he did have fun playing bocce ball with a plastic set designed for ‘kids of all ages’. And he had to wonder why he was in such a hurry to get on, when he was surrounded by his boisterous clan; and he couldn’t deny the incipient yearning of homesickness welling before he’d even left his home.
“You sure about this?” The Dumpster probed, plunking himself down like a shucked sack of somebody’s castoffs into the lawn chair next to the guest of honour.
“Sure as I can be.”
“What do you expect to find ‘out there’? The Dumpster delivered the sentence as if he’d compressed the whole world into a ball inside his own brain, and had found the crumpled sphere wanting—as if you must be delusional to think you would find anything more in your travels than you already possessed in Frank and Loretta’s backyard.
“You know she wouldn’t have insisted if she thought you weren’t having fun?”
“I know,” Colin sighed.
“And are you having fun?”
“Don’t know yet.”
“If you don’t know you’re having fun, you’re not having fun. Right?”
Colin had never thought of things that way, but had to agree.
“So let’s keep in touch, huh? I want you to let me know when you are having fun.”
The Dumpster didn’t stick around for an answer. He smiled, patted Colin reassuringly on the shoulder, then heaved himself out of his lawn chair and sauntered over to ‘see how Frank’s doing at the barbecue’.
Loretta took his place as if she’d been standing next in line in a bank lineup. “We’re so excited for you, little brother, she enthused.
He let the condescension in her tone evaporate before acknowledging her with an inquisitive raising of eyebrows.
“But we’re worried, too.”
“Don’t worry, Sis. I’ll drive carefully.”
“It’s not only the hazards of the road we’re worried about, hon. I hope you won’t take this the wrong way, but we’re also concerned about your state of mind. It’s been so soon since our Cynthia passed; you’re still in the early stages of mourning.”
“Don’t know if I’ll ever get beyond the early stages, Lorri. If anything, this trip will help me get there.”
“How so?”
“She’s with me. I feel her presence all the time. It’s as if she’s right there in the passenger-side seat next to me.”
“Do you talk to her?”
Again, he raised his eyebrows, this time with a knowing smile. “No, not out loud, if that’s what you mean. I…” he allowed a thoughtful pause, “…commune in my imagination. That’s where her spirit lives.”
“I’ve heard of some widowers who actually write letters to their dearly departed.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes. Some even mail them to themselves, then put the unopened letters away in caskets or drawers.”
“Are you suggesting I do that?”
“Heavens, no!” she recoiled. “But it does have therapeutic value. There are even psychological terms for the behaviour: ‘expressive writing’ is one of them, ‘continuing bonds’ another.”
Colin sighed, weighed down by the suggestion of names for his unwritten emails to Cynthia. Angry that they might be construed as ‘a condition’ or ‘a cure’.
“I’m so sorry, dear,” Loretta flustered. “I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“T’s-okay,” he assured. “I know people are just trying to help, Sis. But so many condolences are coming from so many different angles it’s confusing. Like I’m caught in a rip tide.”
Loretta squeezed his knee. “I’ll shut up and go finish preparations for dinner. That’s probably the best thing I can do for you—and everyone else—right now.”
He agreed. Watched her cross the lawn, make her way up the back stoop, and imagined her trudging up the half flight of stairs into her state-of-the-art kitchen. A pall of sadness overcame him, as if he were enveloped by an invisible smog of poisonous ether. He realized, glumly, that as we age, we mourn not only the ones who have actually died, but also the exuberant youth that dies in all of us as our joints stiffen, our muscles shrink, and our brains deteriorate. From happy-go-lucky puppies, prone to unattainable dreams, stupid stunts, and wild romances, we morph into shuffling, creaking automatons who think carefully and look both ways several times before stepping off a curb.
This somber state of mind enveloped him as he sat, watching his birthday party unfold from a third-person point of view—as if he wasn’t really there. The other party-goers seemed to sense his malaise and let him stew, with only perfunctory intrusions, which he likened to poking a corpse.
Snap out of it! Hermes barked. You’re spoiling everybody’s fun.
What about you, with all your pestering and hankering, Colin sniped.
Ever heard the saying ‘Two wrongs don’t make a right’? Hermes shot back, waiting a few seconds for his volley to sink in. Now you know what it means, dunderhead.
Colin laughed, grateful for his companion’s blunt insight, for the knowledge that you can cheer yourself up.
Lift yourself up by your own bootstraps, Hermes seconded.
Okay. Gotcha.
By dessert he’d revived. He felt happy and grateful to be surrounded by people he loved and who loved him. That’s what mattered.
“Another culinary wonder, Sis,” he raised his glass and the others joined in the toast. Susan smiled and bobbed, thanking them all for their thanks.
The crystal had barely finished ringing when Dempster emerged from the house, a gigantic birthday cake held precariously in front of him as he negotiated his way down the steps and marched it ceremoniously across the lawn, placing it on the table in front of Colin. A second chorus of Happy Birthday erupted, followed by a chant for Colin to blow the candles out. He breathed in deeply and pretended to blow with all his might, his cheeks bulging and face turning beet-red. But the stream of air squeezed out from between his compressed lips hardly made the flames waver.
Again, he tried. Again! Not a single candle was snuffed.
“Can’t do it,” he gasped, clutching his chest. “Need younger sets of lungs than this old wheeze-bag’s…
“Hey, kids!” He summoned the clan’s children to gather in front of him on the other side of the table. “I need you to blow out these candles for me. My attempts are weaker than a mouse’s fart.”
“Father!” Gloria chided.
“Sorry,” he apologized to the snickering little ones. “Weaker than a grasshopper’s sneeze. On the count of three, lean in and blow as hard as you can, cause you know the rule about birthday candles, don’t you?”
They looked at him blankly.
“Every candle that’s left burning means a birthday wish won’t be granted. It’ll be burned to a crisp in the unextinguished flames. So you gotta blow like hurricanes, like tornadoes, like jet engines…”
“Like elephant farts!” Jason shouted.
“Yes!” Colin pumped his fist. “So hard, the icing’s going to come off this cake.
“Ready? Breathe in.”
The children sucked in great gulps of air.
“On my count of three: One. Two. Three. BLOW!”
The candles’ flames were extinguished in an instant; Colin, with an alarmed shout, pushed himself backwards, toppling off his chair onto the lawn. “Argh!” he yelled. “I’ve been blown off my perch!”
All the children laughed, except Marisa. “Grampa!” she cried out, ducking under the table and rushing to his aid.
“I’m okay, dear,” he consoled, giving her a hug. “Grampa’s just being silly.”
She looked cross. “Don’t be silly ever again,” she scolded.
After the laughter had subsided, Loretta announced it was time for Colin to cut the cake and open his present. “It’s from all of us,” she said. “A gift that will help you remember what you’ve seen, and what you’ve left behind.”
She reached under the table and held up a gift-wrapped box, which was passed down the line, hand-to-hand by Gloria, Michael, and Ken.
~~~
To: CynthiaPetersonArtist@gmail.com
Subject: Day 6 on Rialta Road – Penticton
From: Call-In-P-Terson@gmail.com
Hello, My Love,
I’m exhausted, so you’ll have to excuse my lapses of grammar, spelling, and style in this update. I’m at Frank and Loretta’s place in Penticton. So much has happened between Stemwinder Provincial Park and here that it will be impossible for me to describe events in any kind of detail.
My mystery passenger goes by the name Jayclyn Holmes, but I’m thinking that might be an alias, and she an avatar that has stepped out of my dreamscape into the ‘real world’. I gave her a ride as far as Penticton, but when I asked for her contact information, which I wanted to enter into my iPhone’s list, she freaked out—told me to shut the phone off and put it back in my pocket. The only thing I can guess is she’s afraid of a hacker listening in on our conversation or capturing her image and posting it to social media or something. She did offer a tenuous line of communication—promised to send me a general delivery letter to the main Calgary post office, where I hope to arrive in three days. We’ll see how that goes.
In the meantime, I’ve had a wonderful stop at Frank and Loretta’s place. They sprang a surprise birthday party on my arrival—especially surprising since my birthdate doesn’t come up for a couple of months. In attendance: Michael, Gloria, and the kids flew in from Vancouver; Ken, Susan, and their kids Dougie and Dorothy; and my old friend Harvey Dempster.
I plan on leaving tomorrow, but will have to delay my departure until late morning or early afternoon. They all chipped in and bought me a dash cam that will record my travels looking forward and backward. Harv has offered to install the system for me.
There’s so much I’m leaving out, my love, but I have to include one more new memory. Jay and I launched the tubbies and went for a paddle on Yellow Lake. Hermes, fickle creature that he is, decided to ride on the bow of Jayclyn’s kayak, the same way he chose to ride with you. It reminded me of the time he lost his balance and fell into Cowichan Lake with a scrabble and a sploosh. How we laughed.
But he’s got his sea legs now, I guess; he managed to stay on the deck the whole time we were out there.
Missing You
Always.
Love, Colin