Last year I was listening to a NPR program about people who survived the jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. It hit me hard and stuck in my mind for days afterward. I recently reread my journal and found an entry that reminded me once again of the one story that totally caught my attention. 

 

“I didn’t really want to jump, but found myself driving my car to the bridge.  I lingered for a while trying to find a reason not to do it. I found myself walking over to the edge.  I kept telling myself that if just one person asked me if I was okay I wouldn’t do it.  I moved slowly, waiting, hoping.  Then I heard someone approaching.  I heard them call out to me and turned and thought, “it’s okay now, I’m safe”.  A lady held out a camera toward me and asked if I would take a picture for her.  I said “sure, sure” and wiped the tears out of my eyes, (she didn’t even notice), took the picture, and when she left, I jumped.”

 

That story gave me pause.  Have I ever been someone’s lifeline and been so caught up in my own living that I didn’t notice the pleading eyes, or the aching heart?  I know I have been.  That is one of my many faults. I need to work on that.

 

“If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching, Or cool one pain, Or help one fainting robin Into his nest again, I shall not live in vain.”
--Emily Dickinson

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The older I get the more I think I understand some things.  I think I "get it" why my mom would sigh when we used to ask her for things.  I think I understand why my dad would get impatient when we didn't weed the garden the way he wanted.  Back then I didn't think it mattered how fast or slow I went.  Now I get it.

 

Just like the cliche that you don't really know someone until you walk a mile in their shoes.  I guess cliches are cliches for a reason.  They are true.  As I approach my birthday I am finding myself reflecting on my experiences of the last year.  There are a few other things that I finally get.

 

We've all heard stories about children who have been abducted or lost.  Heart wrenching stories.  The family at first is upset and panicky, yet optimistic about recovery, then as the hours roll on without success they are enfulfed in pain.  If the child is not found the grief-stricken parents just want to know what happened.

 

I lost Oscar, my dog, last year.  He's just a dog. He was sometimes naughty, sometimes fun, and sometimes a pain in the derriere.  One day he followed the neighbor's dogs and was gone.  The neighbor's dogs came back, but not Oscar.  We searched and called for hours that night.  It is cold in Idaho in November.   There was snow on the ground, and he was an inside dog.   I went to bed that night without finding him.  I searched for him all the next day.  The whole time I was looking for him I kept thinking that if I hurt this much over a stupid dog how much more must parents of lost children hurt.  That's when I started to understand them.  Just a particle. I don't pretend to have their pain.  I just glimpsed at it.  He was just a dog, not a child.

 

My husband, a schoolteacher, announced to all the students in his school that we were offfering a reward for our lost dog.  We put up flyers around town, and an ad in the newspaper.  People were so kind.  They called and called with hints and sightings.  How often had I glanced at posters, not really looking at them?  That would change.  After one tip we took off in the car and found him a mile away, covered with snow, trudging down the middle of the country road whimpering.

 

Ours was a happy ending. And I did learn some things.

#1. Pay attention to "lost" posters.  Study the pictures and look at faces in the crowd.  You may be the one to find and bring someone home.

#2. Be compassionate to other's pain.  If you haven't had the same pain, don't dismiss theirs and think it's not real.  Be grateful you haven't had to experience it.

#3. And, lock up your dog.

Names are fascinating.  Especially those you choose for yourself.  It makes me wonder about people who choose “Stinky”, or “Athematics”.  What’s the story behind that? Names are an introduction.  When you see the name "Storyteller" you expect (and are not disappointed) to finding some great stories.  Way to go, brother!

I chose “Mitchowl”.  I did this when I was trying to come up with a name for my art studio.  I settled on “Mitchowl Studios”.  It suits me just fine. The reason for the “Mitch” part is obvious to anyone who knows me.  The owl part……well, let’s just say I have a thing for owls.  They are characterized as wise and they do their best work at night.  None of this morning lark stuff for me. I come alive as the sun goes down. I was lucky enough to marry a man who understands. (When my dad says he got up at 6:00 this morning, my husband says, "That's not morning, that's the middle of the night!") He does his best to let me sleep in.  As for the wise part, let’s just say I’m working on that.

I was in the third grade the first time I saved an animal.  One of my school friends took us to her house during the lunch break and showed us the puppies. Her mother said, “if we can’t find homes for them today I’m going to take them to the pound.”  My tender heart compelled me to immediately phone my mother and launch into a pleading frenzy. I took a very grateful puppy home with me on the school bus that day.

 

My next opportunity came almost 40 years later. At that time we had 1 dog and 1 cat. One day I went with my husband to Rigby (a small town 12 mile away), to water a garden that he was in charge of. This garden was nestled between a freeway, a highway, and a tire store.  There, in the middle of the pumpkins, was the scrawniest kitten I’d ever seen.  It ran right up to us meowing very hungrily.  I couldn’t see how it would survive if we left it.  It would have to cross a very busy road to get anywhere.  We now had 1 dog and 2 cats.

 

The family next door went out of town for 2 weeks at Christmas.  “Could we take care of their 3 dogs while they were gone?” Sure.  We showered them with love and attention, maybe a little too much.  When the family returned their small Shitzu would run over to our house every chance he got.  He would bark or scratch to be let in.  How could I say no? Soon he was at our house as much as he was at home.  Then our neighbors started to build a new house.  They were gone a lot and the dogs were neglected.  My tender heart did what it had to.  We now basically had 4 dogs and 2 cats.

 

The neighbor’s house was finished in a year.  They took their two small dogs with them and left the huge white husky dog in the kennel with the grandparents next door.  It howled hungrily and I would take it water and food. I couldn’t leave him in a pen so filthy.  I dragged over a shovel from home and did what I could.  My kids and I would walk him when the neighbors were gone, the only time he ever got out of his pen.  He’s still there.  My heart hurts for him every time I take my own dog on a walk.  He sees us and starts to howl.

 

Last spring another neighbor had a family crisis and moved.  They left large opened bags of cat food on the floor and the back window of the house open.  After about a month some very hungry cats found their way down to my house. I bought cheap cat food and left it in the garage where it disappeared. The calico cat was noticeably pregnant. 

 

I put an ad in the paper, “Free Cats”.  A very nice lady showed up from the next town over and took home the biggest, oldest, tamest cat.  We cried a little, he was such a nice cat, but we were glad he was going to such a great family.  Two days later he was back on our porch.  I guess he was just too old to learn any new tricks. We are giving him a nice retirement home. 

 

The Calico had five beautiful, calendar-picture-quality kittens. We now had 1 dog, 1 foster dog, and 9 cats.

 

Has it been a bad thing?  Not necessarily.  My kids have learned compassion and caring. They are more sensitive to other’s needs.  They, too, are tender-hearted.

I’d never dug a grave before.  As a 48 year old mother of five I’d just never had the occasion. So how did I find myself, with sandal-shod feet, on a crisp Idaho October evening digging and scrapping and shoveling at the gravel filled dirt?

 

I’d heard stories about Gary Kent since I was in infant. I somehow felt the responsibility to fill the gaping hole in my mother’s heart, as I was the first sibling to be born after Gary’s sudden passing at age 18 months.  It was an intangible kind of feeling, like knowing you were to be a good citizen, or a morally good person. You know of its importance, but it is such an elusive feeling.  My mother would say to me of Gary, “I’m sure Gary Kent told you all about our family before you were born and told you to be a good girl here on earth.” I would stretch back in my mind for that memory, unable to find it. I would hear stories of his short illness, the doctor visit with the charge to “come back in the morning if he’s not any better”, and the shock of finding him the next morning dead. 

 

It was like hearing about Great-grandpa Rubbra contracting Yellow Fever as he fought in the Boer War, or Grandma Haroldsen, who, as a young pregnant mother, cared for neighbors and family members who were sick with Small Pox only to later bare a stillborn son, infected with the disease.  Awful terrible stories that, even with the knowledge of their truth, still seemed somehow foreign and distant and intangible.

 

Then, my parents told me of their plan, to bring their baby home. They wanted to move his body to our town, to the cemetery plot they, themselves wished to be buried in. They asked me if my son, who worked on grounds at the cemetery would be able to dig the grave.  I said yes. The plans were made, the family notified, and the night before the re-burial arrived.  It was time to get started.  I took my strong 15 year-old son to the spot.  We had the dimensions; two feet wide, four feet long, three feet deep, and six inches from the newly moved headstone. Andy, my son had worked until midnight the night before in the potato harvest of our area and then got up early the next morning and went to school. He was worn out.  I could see it in his face.  His optimistic opinion that it would only take thirty minutes soon faded and I saw that he needed help. He was only down eighteen inches.  The gravel was packed hard. He pounded with the pick to loosen the dirt. I took the shovel from his hands and shoveled out the loosened soil.  He loosened, I shoveled.  Over and over until inch by inch we deepened the hole. I felt a kind of pride, or honor to do this.  I felt a closeness to the brother I had never known. It was becoming real.

 

The next morning we drove to the cemetery to attend the short service we had planned.  Cars were lined along the drive in front of the hole we had dug the night before.  I couldn’t see, and then, I saw.  The tiny white casket lay on the frame over the hole.  Suddenly it was tangible, very tangible. Here he was.  My brother. I felt as if we had just lost him.  I hugged my mother who said through her tears, “I forgot how small he was.”

 During the music a flock of migrating geese flew overhead. It was as if peace drifted down on us along with their cries.  I suddenly felt peaceful. We brought our brother and son home. Our family was once again complete.