Daniel Grohs did as he was coached. Why quarrel? Write down the date, write down the action. His friend Stephen said the exercise would keep the ground beneath his feet settled. A reality check of a sort.
Friday, September 21st, moved here to the
farm.
Monday, October 22st, brought Molly from the
shelter.
Friday, December 21st, received the shipment
from Gamal Antiquities
Is that all, Daniel, he knows Stephen will ask in a tone
as if their lunch together were a professional session. He always calls him
Daniel. Never uses the diminutive that grad students seemed to savor. Dan, will
you have 15 minutes on Wednesday? Thanks for the book loan, Dan.
Well, enough for now.
Being in Stephen’s office is the same as being in
Daniel’s office at the university. His diplomas and certificates in between
bookshelves, some seemingly ready to topple. Papers stacked in the two chairs
in front of his desk. Magazines and journals stacked on the small table behind
his desk. His desk covered with papers and post-its and pens and markers.
Daniel’s office too. Except Stephen’s framed membership
certificates read American Psychological Society, and American Educational
Research Society, and Society for Personality and Social Psychology.
Daniel’s one current certificate, from the American
Association of Philosophy Teachers.
No, not current. Not there now, Daniel thinks. Ought to
add that date.
Friday, July 30th, finished—officially—at the
university.
Daniel considered the need to organize his notebooks, his
notes, his emails to himself. And the small ruled notebook in his hand. Blank
pages, his musings to secure his personal happiness a la Smith beyond the reach
of fortune. All will be well whether the world will see or not.
In 192 pages. Acid-free archival paper the information
band read. The notice ended with the slogans “always create, never compromise”.
Never compromise, an idea his students would have chewed on for an hour even in
his intro course.
Daniel split the thin wrapper with his thumbnail and
peeled it back. He crumbled it into his front pocket. The elastic place holder
had a good snap to it. Opening the notebook to the middle, he brought it to his
nose. A slow inhale. A smell, a freshness, faint but there.
Always create. Always?
Sunday, December 23rd The sun out, temps still
above freezing in the morning, high this afternoon—probably 3-ish—48 degrees. Molly
chasing around in front of the house. Again, Friday, September 21st
moved here to the farm. Monday, October 22nd brought Molly from the
shelter. Friday, December 21st received the shipment from Gamal
Antiquities.
Daniel shuddered as he read that last fragment. He put
his pen in the book and closed it. He looked out over the terraced orchard of
apple trees, now leafless. Several hundred feet below was the state highway and
beyond that woods thick with pines and elms and maples, dogwoods in the
understory, and pin oaks.
To the south, just before the road made a slow turn
around the base of the ridge he now lived on, he could see the metal roof, and
smoke rising from the chimney, of Mrs. Graylon Tate, his nearest neighbor.
“Guarantee, the Widow Tate will mind your business,”
Harry Sims told him. Daniel chuckled at how old-fashioned the term sounded to
his ears. In his head, he heard The Widower Grohs. The Widower Professor.
Widower Dan.
Harry spent two weeks refashioning the drive from the
highway to the cabin, turning it into a more gently sloped curve that would
resist being impassible in heavy rains or snows. Daniel flinched at the cost of
the new route and upgraded surface, the 1500’ priced at $7800. Harry’s final
pitch was uttered emphatically. “Professor, my roads will stay roads long past
the customer being here on this earth.”
Daniel opened the notebook. Don’t put your hand in an
anthill. Don’t ask why ants, why they bite, why mounds, why your yard. Just
don’t touch.
Montaigne would understand, Epictetus would approve.
Molly came back up the front steps and hopped up in the rocking chair next to
his. The other two chairs were on the other side of the front door. Here, their
rockers were in the late morning sun.
Clicking the pen, in, out, in, out, he decided other
matters pressed. Unlike Hemingway’s declaration, he was going to stop when he
had no idea what comes next.
Inside, Daniel glanced up the refurbished stairs to the
former loft that now was a large guest bedroom with a full bath. Other than the
weekly dusting and vacuuming, he didn’t go up, all the spaces he needed now on
the remodeled first floor.
As he headed to the kitchen, he shook his head a bit,
remembering how heavy the box. Each step up taken carefully, both hands under the
box. He set it upright as the arrow directed in the corner nearest the dormer.
Sitting on the bed, he had studied the packaging, heavily taped ends, heavy
staples to secure the box from top to bottom, about a foot by a foot by three to
his eye.
Tears came. A little coffin. For a small body, in that
small box. What could have prompted such a purchase? Daniel stood up and wiped
his eyes with his t-shirt and, without a glance back, had closed the door
behind him.
In the kitchen, the phone rattled on the granite counter.
Daniel didn’t think to reset the alert sound after leaving the lawyer’s office
two days before. The message was from Stephen—lunch tomorrow, usual from La Cocina,
around 11:30? Daniel paused for a moment, then typed Okay.
Lyman
2018
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