When we drove down to Temple for parent’s weekend, we stopped in to see Rose and Bill. This movie is repetitive, but it has an interesting close if you happen to be a family member. Btw, we’ll pick up Matt and Debbie on Monday night at the Manchester airport.

Those Funny Pages get updated every so often.

Way back in the early eighties, my brother, Peter, and his then girlfriend, Eileen, lived in Ed’s cabin on Grok Hill in Gilsum for four years, through three winters. They’ve both moved on, but here’s Eileen recounting her first visit back in eons.

“We borrowed a motorcycle from his friend, Bob, and biked all around the Keene area that I used to know. It was just wonderful…those windy country roads covered with trees in Fall colors. One of those two days we biked into Gilsum and then into Gilsum woods.

It was just as I remembered it…..Beech trees with yellow leaves covering the roads. It was such a good feeling to be able to point the way….know the way without thinking about it. The road into Grok Hill looked a little different because of the shed and tires, etc of the guy who bought the place at the main road there…and the old truck gone in the corner of where we always parked. We did meet the guy who lives at the main road there and talk to him on the way out. He seemed like he knew of Peter and Eileen – that was nice.

The cabin looked great from the outside….clearly you all have kept it in good shape….but I hate to say it…I was really taken aback at how dirty and unchanged the inside was. The cabin just cried out for occupants…it was hard for me to see the remnants of Peter and my life still occupying the shelves…unadorned, unchanged…mostly dirty and forlorn looking. The tiny-ness of the interior didn’t really surprise me…but the rest did. I found Peter’s recorder still there, odd books and shells and pictures….I felt like I wanted to come back for a week and scrub the whole place down and breathe some life into it. But, then I felt it wasn’t possible…it needs some occupants…or it needs to be made into a tool shed and a new cabin built. I hope that doesn’t sound terrible!

The guy at the bottom of the hill told me that he heard that Ed was moving to Colorado. Is that true? You should buy Grok Hill, Michael, if that’s true. You should buy it and build that house in the woods that you dream about! You could build at the old garden, if it is too difficult to get up to that knoll with any equipment. And you should bring in a propane tank for a cook stove and water from the well – with many filters! You don’t have to make it too “normal” with electricity, etc….but you could certainly build a more livable, usable space for you and Di and Matthew in the years to come.

It was sad for me to see Peter’s platform overlooking the orchard, fallen down…going back to the earth….also the garden fence and the shower. It was mostly sad for me….it all looked bereft of life…when it held so much life…and for me still some of my most vivid memories. Though as I said, clearly you’ve kept the cabin standing! And, I couldn’t remember for sure, but it seemed like the outside looked more finished. But even the out house looked sad. I don’t know…I really felt like going back for a week by myself and cleaning it all up…but….as I already said, I think really it needs a new young hopeful couple to breathe in new life. And I know it doesn’t take long for the mice and chipmunks to move back in with it unoccupied….but somehow I wished it was changed some….me who doesn’t like change! And, probably if it had been, I would have had my feelings hurt! Ha! ha!

So…that was my experience of Gilsum… “

I ran the Agassiz with Alan Symonds for some 15 years.  In June of this year, on the steps of the Agassiz, he died unexpectedly of a heart attack at 59, and on Monday the 13th (which should sound more ominous than Friday the 13th, if you think about it … ), Harvard held a memorial for Alan at the Agassiz Theatre.  400 people crowded into the 350-person house, with over 100 more watching on closed-circuit in the neighboring dance center.  For a bit on who Alan was, this “in-house” obit’s good; and this one is also pretty thorough (and took a full-page column…!).

I was asked to speak, along with Alan’s brother (who narrated a fabulous slideshow of Alan’s youth) and his old friend Joe Mobilia (who met Alan in highschool and was working on the Hasty Pudding renovation with him when he died).  Alan’s role at Harvard was borderline ineffable and immeasurable, and the legacy-worthiness of what I’d written (most of it just after he died, with no memorial in mind) kept me up at night.  And as I said to Michael a day or so before, I didn’t know if I was more terrified of losing it and being unable to speak, or going into a zone without getting emotional at all…

I got pretty choked up but nevertheless essentially sailed through and was told by many I done mighty good.  I sort of don’t remember my bit, really, standing in the spotlight only dimly able to sense the assembled multitude with whom I was attempting to project contact, doing what had been imagined for weeks, but with details and sensations that had somehow never been even vaguely imagined.  Pretty much an out-of-body experience.

The rest was better than good, tears mixing easily with gales of laughter, lots of talent pouring out of true devotion, the energy given back manyfold by a rapt audience of truest friends spanning over half a century.  So many familiar (and half-familiar) faces!  Lots of talk and hugs and catching up at the reception afterwards with people not seen for decades.  Hard to say something about an unexpected death could be perfect, but this was.

For those with time on their hands, here’s my bit (minus the ad-libs, alas).  Flights of angels Alan.  You da bomb!

Alan Intro

Alan Part II

Mike,

I was jogging steadily on the treadmill at the gym where Dom and I play racquetball, when Dom tapped me on the shoulder. “I’m going into the court to warm up”. Our court time wasn’t for 5 minutes, but Dom likes to push the
envelope. I said, “OK, I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

When I came into the court, Dom was stuffing his bad right hand into a glove. Watching him curiously, I stuffed a big long sponge under my sweat shirt as protection for my clobbered left shoulder, I asked Dom if the glove helped him hold onto the racquet. “Yeah, a little bit. Without it, the racquet almost blows out of my hand on a swing.” He wiggled his damaged pinkie finger, showing its limited range of motion.

We did the usual bounce-to-the-line for serve, and I won. Dom returned my serves to his back hand a little weakly, and I scored a few points, but I lost the serve when I tested his forehand. From then on, throughout the match, I returned to his backhand whenever possible and won that game handily, 15-8.

Before making his serve for the next game, Dom took the racquet with his left hand, and shook out his right. I couldn’t help noticing a grimace. Dom’s game fell apart in the first few minutes. I was up 9-0 and wondering what had happened to my old partner. So I relaxed a bit (always a mistake). Dom surged back and tied the game up 10-10. That got my attention, and I started exploiting his weakened backhand at the left rear corner. At the end of that game (15-10), Dom asked for a rest. Sitting outside next to the drinking fountains, Dom described the history of his hand in great detail.

After the rest, we hit the court again. Except for the first 3 points in one game, Dom never came close in the final three. There were a few of his trademark double-z-sidewall-frontwall-graze shots, but I had learned to play mid-court and returned most of them, much to his chagrin. Dom’s accuracy was still good, but the zip had been lost from his drives. Finals: 15-8, 15-3, 15-6.

At one point in the last game, Dom reached high overhead near the back wall, and missed the ball. Afterwards he said, “I just remembered how I jammed that finger and broke it. I was reaching back over my head next to the rear wall, just like that, and smashed my hand hard.” Apparently he had repressed the memory of the incident until that moment.

As we walked out after our sweaty hour, Dom showed how red that barely healed pinkie was. I said to him, “I sure hope you haven’t damaged it more.” Dom insouciantly responded,”No worries. It’ll get better. Let’s play again next week. We’ve got to get in as many games as we can before you leave!”

–rakkity

Mike,

I was jogging steadily on the treadmill at the gym where Dom and I play racquetball, when Dom tapped me on the shoulder. “I’m going into the court to warm up”. Our court time wasn’t for 5 minutes, but Dom likes to push the
envelope. I said, “OK, I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.”

When I came into the court, Dom was stuffing his bad right hand into a glove. Watching him curiously, I stuffed a big long sponge under my sweat shirt as protection for my clobbered left shoulder, I asked Dom if the glove helped him hold onto the racquet. “Yeah, a little bit. Without it, the racquet almost blows out of my hand on a swing.” He wiggled his damaged pinkie finger, showing its limited range of motion.

We did the usual bounce-to-the-line for serve, and I won. Dom returned my serves to his back hand a little weakly, and I scored a few points, but I lost the serve when I tested his forehand. From then on, throughout the match, I returned to his backhand whenever possible and won that game handily, 15-8.

Before making his serve for the next game, Dom took the racquet with his left hand, and shook out his right. I couldn’t help noticing a grimace. Dom’s game fell apart in the first few minutes. I was up 9-0 and wondering what had happened to my old partner. So I relaxed a bit (always a mistake). Dom surged back and tied the game up 10-10. That got my attention, and I started exploiting his weakened backhand at the left rear corner. At the end of that game (15-10), Dom asked for a rest. Sitting outside next to the drinking fountains, Dom described the history of his hand in great detail.

After the rest, we hit the court again. Except for the first 3 points in one game, Dom never came close in the final three. There were a few of his trademark double-z-sidewall-frontwall-graze shots, but I had learned to play mid-court and returned most of them, much to his chagrin. Dom’s accuracy was still good, but the zip had been lost from his drives. Finals: 15-8, 15-3, 15-6.

At one point in the last game, Dom reached high overhead near the back wall, and missed the ball. Afterwards he said, “I just remembered how I jammed that finger and broke it. I was reaching back over my head next to the rear wall, just like that, and smashed my hand hard.” Apparently he had repressed the memory of the incident until that moment.

As we walked out after our sweaty hour, Dom showed how red that barely healed pinkie was. I said to him, “I sure hope you haven’t damaged it more.” Dom insouciantly responded,”No worries. It’ll get better. Let’s play again next week. We’ve got to get in as many games as we can before you leave!”

–rakkity

Pesky sent me this website

Diane and I’d just finished our grilled salmon with new potatoes and flash-nuked green beans and carrots. A dinner I made. I loaded the dishwasher as she packed leftovers for the next day’s lunch and pretty much out of nowhere I pipe up:

“I’ve got to get some sleep.”

“We went to bed early last night. You were out like a light.”

“Fast and dark, but I woke up twice. As usual.”

“I didn’t hear you.”

“You never do. You’ve been sleeping like the recently executed. I get up and shower or I go downstairs and IM with Matthew. He’s always up until two or three.”

“What wakes you up?”

“I have free floating anxiety. I learned about it at IU in Psych 101 and now, after all these years, I have it. Finally. I think it’s this dead mother thing. Three days before the monthly anniversary of her death my gut knots and my brain goes kaflooey. I don’t settle back down until the day after.”

“You need a year to go by. A year helps.”

“It helped you, didn’t it.”

“It helped me and it helped Susan with Jimmy.”

“You mean a year from now I’ll be picking apples?”

“No, but you will be sleeping.”

“It makes no sense.”

“It makes perfect sense.”

“Not the year thing. The anniversary thing. With me I mean. My family never celebrated anything but Christmas and the kid’s birthdays. I don’t know when my parents were born, I don’t know Brian or Joan’s birthdays. I still think Matt was born in ‘86 on the 16th of July. I only know yours because of the built-in mnemonic. Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Valentines…those days didn’t exist until I married into your family. “

“And you are all the better for it.”

“Maybe, but I think my mother’s haunting me.”

“Michael, it’s called grief.”

“No, she’s telling me she really did want a birthday present.”

Matthew’s Comics

Jewel

Zappa & Vai