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Brevity in communicating volumes is one of the hardest things to do, and on short poems, the Japanese are masters of the three-line 5/7/5 syllable haiku. The English language version is more forgiving of the usual constraints in the Japanese models which usually reference the seasons or some aspect of nature.

A teacher in a seminar on creativity in the classroom made it so much easier for me to write haiku. She told us to meditate for a few minutes to think of events or memories that came to mind. We folded a sheet of paper in thirds and titled each column Environment (5), Actions (7), and Feelings (5). We jotted notes under each column and came up with a haiku poem. This would be a great exercise for second graders on up and the completed poems displayed on the wall would impress all parents on Back to School Night. My poem:

Teenagers’ Saturday Night Drive

Signs cautioning curves

Passengers singing, laughing

Arms touching, goosebumps

I felt like Chinese today and ordered the items pictured. I had war won ton soup, mushu pork, and honey glazed chicken.

I finished the soup but took most of the food home for at least two more meals. My aging palate and sore throat did not enjoy the meal, but I’ll be back for sure.

Gerrit Truin, November 25, 1910 – May 25 2005

Fond Memories

For over 20 years I often enjoyed coffee with the Truins just two doors away.  We had pleasant and memorable conversations about our personal histories, the news of the day, our families, and our hopes and dreams.

I learned that that Gerrit Truin had many obstacles thrown in his path.  His father was blacklisted from many jobs because he was a union activist.  Young Gerrit was selling newspapers at the age of 6 or 7 and was often the only one in the family working.  He admired his mother who had to raise five boys and marveled at her cleverness.  She would cut a loaf of bread in half horizontally and butter it, then slice it.  Gerrit realized later that she was trying to stretch out the butter that way.  He cried when he said he would have spoiled her if she had not succumbed to cancer at the young age of 57.

His beloved grandfather gave him a saw when he was nine years old and got him interested in carpentry.

Strong in his convictions, when the German army occupied Holland, he joined the resistance movement and harbored Jews.

He brought his family to America in 1947 and found work as a carpenter.  He was apologetic about his Dutch accent, but a friend advised him, “Keep the accent, they like that.”

In his garage which was his workroom, he showed me projects he was working on and taught me the names of different pieces of wood he had on the table.  He showed me paduk, ebony, mahogany, birch, purple heart, walnut, and cherry wood.  He also showed me mitered corners and dovetailed joints.  He demonstrated the way the wood changes color when clear varnish is applied.  He told me that the most important thing in cutting wood is measuring it.  He made beautiful inlaid trays and jewelry boxes for gifts in his later years, and showed me the grandfather clocks he made for his grandchildren.

He created a beautiful dining room cabinet for me with rich stained mahogany, walnut, and oak.  When he selected the panels, the men at the lumberyard allowed him to examine the available wood.  “You have to get brother and sister,” he said to me.  He then told me about paneling a church in Pasadena.  After its completion, the directors called a meeting and decided to have the work redone.  The reason was that portions of the paneling pieced together resembled a nude woman.  “I was trying to match things up and they were looking at something else!”  He laughed.

You cannot talk about Mr. Truin without speaking of his beloved wife Grietje.  They were one in the same spirit.  I was a struggling single mother with three children and they looked out for me.  When I hadn’t visited in a while, Mrs. Truin would send her husband over to make sure everything was all right.  For Christmas, they gave me delicious Dutch pastries and each of my children an envelope containing money.

I’ve always thought it a noble goal to want to leave a place better than you find it.  The Truins never had to think of it.  It was their nature to live with pride and grace and harmony and leave the world better than they found it.  Whatever they did or said, wherever they visited, whatever they touched, they made the world better.

I can imagine them now, holding hands, beautiful blooming tulips in the background, a large work table with saw, hammer and nails, measuring tape, a miter box, an electric sander, clamps, and a large bottle of wood glue.  But these are all props.  They don’t have to worry anymore about tending the flowers or measuring wood.  They are meeting all those friends and family who preceded them and they are having a grand party.

I feel their love now as I have always felt it.  I see them nodding their approval of all the lives they’ve touched.  They often expressed pride in the accomplishments of their children and grandchildren and relatives.  They will continue to watch over their family and friends with the same love and devotion as when they were alive.  They’re home together now, in heaven, and I am blessed and honored to have known them.

A writing exercise from a previous class

If I were invisible, I would check out all the places that say “Forbidden,” “Do Not Enter,” or “Keep Out, and then I would go to the board rooms of the largest corporations to listen to their conversations, then the State Department, the Pentagon, and perhaps even the White House, out of curiosity.  I would go to the payroll departments of these places to see what the salaries are like.  I would also go anywhere else that I perceive to be forbidden to me because of gender, race, or lack of credentials, money, or status.

When I tired of these concerns, I would go to Hanama Bay in Hawaii, don my invisible diving gear and wade past the tourists who are snorkeling and feeding the fish by and go deeper and deeper, enjoying the silence and marveling at the schools of silver fish with blue and red lines and the reflection of the sunlight on their bodies.  I know I would encounter brilliant colors and be dumbstruck by the infinite variety of sea and plant life.  I would go deeper and deeper and try to adjust to the darkness.

As sure as I am sitting here, not invisible, I know that I would soon find on the ocean floor near the life that dwells at the bottom – tin cans, inner tube tires, fish knives, old shoes, beer bottles, and drums of toxic waste with deadly liquid leaking out from corroded containers.  I would not waste my time pulling my hair in rage or crying out in pain at the evidence of human encroachment and stupidity, but I would hurry back up above the surface and join a world that needs me in a visible state, needs me to turn on a light or break a wall or open a door, to make a passage for someone else.

I know that I will at times discover that the walls were created by me and not by anyone else; at other times, I will be locked out by walls that others have placed in my path.  I will say to myself, “I might as well be invisible – nobody sees me and nobody hears me,” but at the end of my life, I would like to be able to say, “At least I tried to make things better.”

The Japanese are ever so considerate of their fellow humans and wear masks if they have a cold to avoid passing germs on to others.  Notice also the gloved hands that open doors for customers in hotels and department stores, and taxis with automatic doors so passengers don’t have to touch the door handle.  They take germs seriously. Rather than shaking hands, they have been bowing for centuries.

The United States is not ready for a pandemic should COVID-19 infect large numbers of Americans. Schools are breeding grounds for germs and some parents are turning to home schooling to keep their children away from exposure.  Other places you’ll find a concentration of germs are concerts, political rallies, and sporting events.  Only a few states have testing equipment available and there is no master plan to deal with every aspect of life as we now know it, from business operations to public transportation to family vacations.

While masks are usually seen on surgeons and medical personnel in a hospital setting, there has been a surge in sales in the U.S. because masks would perhaps assuage the fear in people who are naturally suspicious of others. Having a supply of masks on hand probably give people some feeling of control.  One type of mask is the kind worn by doctors and health care employees to avoid expelling respiratory droplets in the air. The second kind, N95 face respirator masks, create a barrier to protect a person from inhaling germs and viruses. Both types of mask become damp in a short time and are uncomfortable to wear for more than 30 minutes. The CDC has not recommended face masks but pharmacies are running out and masks are disappearing from hospitals.

I watched an interview of a doctor on TV and she advised everyone to use common sense: wash your hands frequently, carry an alcohol based hand sanitizer with you, and consider not shaking hands. For the new cases of COVID-19 without a known source, I personally wonder if the common denominator will be a product or piece of clothing that originated in China.

This will probably be part of a short story.

Lamar quickened his stride as he approached his home. Lady always came bounding down the dog run when she heard the latch of the gate click open. Her ears and coat were brushed back by the wind and she’d brake to a stop and lick Lamar’s face with kisses, her tail going like a windshield wiper against a fierce rain.

Something was terribly wrong today because she did not come to greet him. His parents were sitting on the porch, his father reading a paper and his mother mending socks. “Where’s Lady?” Lamar asked.

“She’s gone,” his father said.

“Where?”

“A family who owns a farm asked if they could take her. They said she’d be happy there running across the whole field. I said ‘Yes.’

A couple of years later when Lamar was walking through a wooded area near his home, he found Lady’s skull with a bullet hole in the center. He pieced together what may have happened. After Prohibition ended, drinking establishments sprang up all over. Patrons of the bars passed by Lamar’s house on their way home and were startled by Lady’s barking, and they complained to Lamar’s father. Lamar’s father shot Lady. When Lamar turned 17, he joined the Navy.

We liked our homemaking teachers in junior high school because they were wonderful hostesses and they took chemistry in order to get their credentials.

Our first project was to make cinnamon toast. The staples were, of course, bought in bulk and when I went to get the sugar, everything was in large canisters and I chose the salt instead. We put some butter on the bread and sprinkled what we thought was sugar on top and put it all in the oven. When we took a bite and realized our mistake, we were terribly disappointed but didn’t say a word to Mrs. Cobb as she came around to taste the toast. I guess adults would call it a conspiracy of silence, but to young girls who still believed in miracles, I think we had our fingers crossed behind us, hoping that the salt would turn into sugar. Mrs. Cobb was really mad, but she didn’t explode or anything like that. She just gave each of us a D for the our project. We also chose the wrong can of cloves for ambrosia. The recipe called for ground cloves but we used whole cloves and one of the visitors got a clove stuck between her teeth.

DP 7/9/1996

There’s been so much news about the Coronavirus that started in late December, 2019 in Wuhan, China. Of interest to me was the impact it had on Diamond Princess passengers as they were quarantined and about 44 passengers and crew members became infected.

In light of all the news and lack of a cure, I’ve cancelled my cruise for next year. I think I’ll fly to Japan and hope that no one becomes sick on the long flight. There are so many germs floating around everywhere, it’s hard to believe we can dodge them all.

Most people assumed that the coins were thrown from a cruise ship but I realized that the old widow most likely threw the coins from the backyard of her favorite niece’s home in Pacific Palisades. The edge of the yard overlooked the Pacific Ocean. She had enough strength to toss the coins to the beach rather than down the cliff. I bought myself a metal detector and made several trips to that part of the beach. I got caught by a private security officer but talked him into not charging me with trespassing.

The only other way to get to the beach without being detected was hiking on a trail along the edge and maneuvering around the rocks down to the beach about half a mile from where I wanted to be.” He drank from his glass.

Kristen was mesmerized. “What happened?!”

I’m glad I was in shape. The beach was in a secluded area, you wouldn’t even know it was there. I strapped my metal detector to my back and had to be careful it wouldn’t be damaged from bumping into those rocks. Well, it was low tide and I started at the water line and began sweeping. It must have been my fifth pass when I heard the music of decibels beeping a hit! I had some trouble getting back up to high ground and I ran into the same security officer as before and he must have been in a good mood. He probably felt sorry for me, eking out a living on coins and rings. He said he wouldn’t report me, but reminded me there are plenty of public beaches around. I thanked him profusely. He asked me if I had found anything as we parted. I told him, ‘Just a few coins.’

And that’s what happened, my dear. For about six months, I took my metal detector whenever I went for a walk at the beach and stole away to my special place every chance I got. The whole experience made me feel alive again. The beeping metal detector helped me connect with humanity. The coins and rings met something to people. I was able to find the owners of some of the rings and watches that had inscriptions and cashed in the other things that weren’t claimed. Above all, it gave me the courage to go after my own dreams. I put a down payment on this yacht and I’m writing up a business plan so I can start a cruise service to Catalina Island or maybe double as a whale watching cruise. Best of all, I had the confidence to go to our 30th high school reunion and find you. YOU are my treasure. Whew! I never talked so much in my whole life!”

Kristen had not released her hand, but she did now and fingered the coins on the bracelet that John had given her. She looked pensive and then a slow awareness came to her face. She looked into John’s eyes and he smiled and nodded.

Part 1

“John, how is it that two oldies like us can sit together on a yacht in the middle of a calm bay watching the sunset?”

John was dozing off but he awoke when he heard Kirsten’s voice and said, “I’m glad you didn’t know me before. I was pretty messed up.”

“What?” Kristen lifted her head up and looked in his face, just to make sure he wasn’t kidding.

“Helen had a rough time with advanced breast cancer, especially the chemo. Everything went wrong at once. After she passed away, I got laid off. I’m glad she didn’t have to go through that with me. Friends told me to get grief counseling and join a support group, but without a job and few prospects, I was depressed and didn’t want to socialize.

I sold the house and rented an apartment at Venice Beach and did a lot of walking. My kids were busy with their own lives. I knocked on my daughter’s door one evening while she was having a dinner party. She looked angry and annoyed and said in a low voice, ‘You can’t come in like this. You smell like dead fish!’ My son-in-law came to the door too, but he didn’t say a word. She closed the door and I heard her tell her guests that a beach bum was asking for money. I knew then how King Lear must have felt. I was wrong for assuming I’d be welcome, I should have called and made myself presentable. My son lives in Long Beach and he pretty much avoids me too. I should have spent more time with them when they were kids. I thought if I gave them things that they wanted, they’d understand the value of hard work and my love for them. Big mistake.” He shook his head and ran his hand over his hair.

Kristen held his hand. “They’ll come around; they always do. Just give them a little time. They’ll start their own family and see how hard it is sometimes.”

“I hope you’re right. What saved me was a childhood memory of a beach outing. I remembered seeing a man with a metal pole that had a flat dish-like thing attached and there was noise coming from it. He was swinging it slowly and rhythmically across the sand and he seemed relaxed and content. People on their beach towels asked if he had found anything. I remember that he said, ‘Just a few coins.’

He had been using a metal detector to find things he could convert to cash or claim a reward. I was curious so I researched metal detectors on the Internet…”

Kristin laughed, “You’re so thorough!”

“Well, I was an engineer, always focused on details.” he said smiling. “One of the links led me to an article about a rich widow who threw an unknown number of valuable coins from her husband’s collection into the ocean because she felt that money had ruined the couple’s joy. Her husband had been a businessman and she had seen too many friendships dissolve and too many partnerships collapse because of the quest for money. Even her children were jealous of each other and made her uncomfortable every time she bought something for herself