Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 10 Comments

Sketching it Out

In 25 days we move, and for a while there, we didn’t know where to. I’d said I’d keep you posted in this endeavor, but frankly, rental choices have been so few that when one possibility surfaced, I was too afraid to discuss it for fear of hexing the process.

Our family was clear on our home vision. We wanted something simple, in the country (preferably on our very same road), a place to garden, (an outdoor shower would be nice) and affordable. Jeb wished for a treehouse. And we all wondered about this new place offering the future possibility of a canine companion.

Our approach was dream big but be grateful for what came our way. The local Craigslist’s rental page had become a forum for frustrated renters seeking homes and landlords defending their reasons for the trend of doubling rental rates. Even if we were willing to settle for the few condominiums featured – not in our town but the closest to our area of the island – we couldn’t rationalize spending nearly $3000 a month in a boxed-in community where gardens and clothes lines were against the rules.

Magic isn’t rational either, but under the circumstances we figured we’d try it. One Sunday we went to the bay at the end of our street. My mind was heavy with homebound thoughts. I couldn’t sit, I felt like walking. So I left the Bohemian and Jeb at the beach and walked the three miles along our country road, back home. I passed many houses nestled in the trees. Walked by stretches of open fields and segments of river lined with ginger flowers. With every home I passed, I wondered about our own future abode. With every step and every breath, I quietly wished to the distant hills that we, too, could still call this area our home.

I was back at our place around sunset, in time to meet up with the Bohemian and Jeb returning from the beach. They’d done lots of things, but one of them was a quick sketch in a small notebook. An inspired illustration of the house that we were envisioning.

2013-06-01_Home Sketch

Note the ocean view (and swimming sea life), a treehouse, a simple home, fruiting trees, and of course, Fido.

It had to have been a few weeks after my country road walk and that sketchbook exercise that I got a whisper to contact a neighbor to let him know we were looking for a place. Since I didn’t have his phone number, I emailed another friend (who happens to live next door – we’ll call him the Musician) to see if he could give me his contact information. The Musician was well-aware that we were looking and had wished us all the best in our search. On this day, as I sent the email to him, asking for his neighbor’s phone number, I felt compelled to mention that we were still searching for our home, and though it may not be ideal, we’d be willing to temporarily sub-let a place if the opportunity arose.

As the story goes, my email request was sitting in the Musician’s Inbox, not yet read. He was out looking at the solar eclipse with a mutual friend. They were talking about the Musician’s impending travels and his uncertainty about who would stay at his house and look after his dog. Our family was mentioned. A light went ding within the mind of the Musician as the sun was circled in a ‘ring of fire.’ He decided to call me right away and went to his computer to get my phone number, at which point, he saw my email mentioning the sub-let.

The Musician needs someone to stay at his home for four months, beginning July 1st. We need a place to live beginning that day. We’ve worked out the details and the rest has been finalized as of this week.

Did I mention that he lives on our little country road, just a few driveways up? There is a treehouse. A garden. Fruiting trees. An outdoor shower. And a little, easy-going dog we’ve known for years, who will now be in our care.

Maybe it all starts by sketching it out.

We’ll see how the details fill in. For now, we are just so very grateful.

Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer

Crash

I’m awake for about three minutes when I hear the crash. Braking tires screech long into the sound of metal crunching on impact. Then the drone of a car horn in one long, punctuating tone. It is 5:22am and the collision sounds close.

I stand at the window, looking out in the direction of the sound. I only hear the unending monotone of the horn. Surely, neighbors nearer to the scene have already come out to help. Yet, this feeling tugs at me that I should check to be sure.

The Bohemian wakes and sees me vacillating. Jeb will be waking soon and needs to go to school. I imagine many people are already out of their houses and on the street helping, though I can’t be positive. If I venture out to investigate, what will I find? The horn blares as the sun begins rising.

A few more minutes pass as I hesitate at the window, looking down the street but seeing nothing. And then the horn stops. I feel momentarily relieved. As if this is a signal that someone must be there assisting.

Then I see a car pass in the direction of the scene. Certainly, if someone needs to call 911 and hasn’t yet, they will.

I leave the window and start to make my coffee, rationalizing that there will be plenty of people there by now. I’d just be one more body in the way. Yet something still nags at me. How can I know for sure what’s going on unless I go and see?

Half-way into my coffee-making, I stop. I don’t want the Bohemian to go, but I should. I ask him to stay with Jeb, who still sleeps. I have a first aid kit in my car. I grab a towel, some water and my phone. I drive slowly down my quiet street in the direction of where I heard the crash.

Within less than a quarter-mile, I come upon a truck in the middle of the road, on its side, tires in the air. The headlights are still on, the engine is not running. Fluids seep into the asphalt. The front end is smashed, but there is nothing else around that looks to have been hit. There is not a soul in sight.

I pull over on the side of the road and call 911. I tell the operator that I’m guessing they’ve already been called, though she makes no indication that she has. I give details about the location. Offer a license plate number at her request. She says she’ll dispatch someone to the site. She asks if I see a person. I say that I do not, but that I haven’t gotten close enough to the vehicle to be sure. Perhaps I should. She says that would be helpful.

I am embarrassed at how unnerved I am. I ask her to stay on the phone with me as I walk closer to the cracked windshield to peer inside. Tipped on its side, all things in the cab have slid to the passenger seat and press to the window that rests on the ground. There’s an Arizona Green Tea can, a sweatshirt and a pink dashboard trinket in the mix of strewn items.

I see no one.

I end my conversation with the 911 operator, get in my car, and drive back home.

It is a mystery. The vacant scene of our country road with a truck on its side and no one around, is filled with questions. Did the driver run away? Did not a single neighbor hear what had happened just beyond their hedges? What made the truck crash, anyway?

I have no idea.

Hours later, I pass the same spot on the road, where by now, they’ve moved the truck and cleared the area. I drive along pondering the accident.

As I steer around a curve in the road, suddenly a spooked chicken flies low and wild out of a roadside tree, right in line with my windshield. I brake not to hit it, feathers graze the glass, and it squawks in crazed fear while unleashing a huge spray of chicken poop on my hood and across the window. The odor is potent through sealed glass and even thirty pumps of wiper fluid can’t seem to remove the brown splats that splay across my driver’s view.

As Jeb would say, “What the heck?”

At day’s end, I go to Mary’s house and sit with her in the shade of the lilikoi trellis. I’m telling her my road stories. Her foot is up and elevated. She ran into a piece of wood last night in the dark. She thinks she may have broken her toe.

I think we all just need to stay put for a while. Proceed with extreme care. Take it easy, in slow motion.

 

photo courtesy of Jussi Mannisto
photo courtesy of Jussi Mannisto
Posted on by Jessica Dofflemyer · 5 Comments

Shifting Plates

Not that anything is wrong. It’s just that if life were tectonic plates, they’d be shifting underneath me with a bit of a shimmied rumble right now. There’s movement enough that books could be slipping from the shelves. Dishes in the cupboard are a-rattling.

No need for stagnation. Moving and shaking is good. Just a bit disconcerting at times.

And it’s interesting to see how big change can weave through my days and my being, coloring my practices.

I’m sleeping a bit more. Then coming to my writing screen, sometimes, a bit less inspired.

This morning I sit and seek clues. My eyes rest on the sheet of paper called “Movie Recommendations” found in yesterday’s office drawer sorting project. There is a sub-group of titles under the category of the theme “Stepping Out of Doubts and Fears.” My glance lands on the last of the list, “Touching the Void.”

I’ve seen the movie. My situation is not the same, but maybe I’m living my own tamer version of facing the unknown. This morning I reach fingers deep into the soil of me and find layers unidentified. Not necessarily a void, but nothing substantive either. Maybe if I dug deeper more could be felt.

And then all of a sudden, I remember it’s May 29th. That exactly six months ago the Bohemian and I got married. I see that he tackled the pile of dirty silverware in the sink and all is now sparkling in the dish drainer. I am touched. I am touching something.

Underneath moving boxes, budget projections, and math homework, there is an essence quite substantial, and it’s bigger than a name. As a big as a void and somehow connected.

It seems to understand about shifting plates – the ones below the surface and the ones on my shelf. Perhaps it’s the very force that moves them.

This morning there is no more time to think about it. No image to accompany this post. I can’t even seek shelter in a doorway. Time to move about the world while it all quakes beneath me.

Enjoy the ride.