Category: Writing

A to Z Challenge: Petra and Quinn

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Character sketches that are fictional but based on real people, like you and me.

They were interesting children. Quinn, the oldest, was used to doing the planning, as in what and where they would play. Petra didn’t mind being the follower, having a lot of the same likes and dislikes, but she also added her own creativity at times. Both of them spent most of their time around well behaved adults, which resulted in their own pretty good behavior. But they were kids. Sometimes they were a bit lazy, distracted, willful, and as such were considered normal.

Both of them were cared for by parents who didn’t spend a lot of time following fashion trends and were fine with them wearing whatever hand-me-down or thrift shop outfits were available. They grew up in the country where clothes didn’t stay clean long when playing out in the garden or the woods anyway. They were appropriately dressed for what they did at home and were quite happy, through ignorance mostly. Later, they would say to their mother “what were you thinking when you let me wear that? And you had to take a picture too!”

They had long, straight hair with bangs. Petra often had a rat’s nest in the back from bouncing her head on the back of her car seat or her favorite “rocking couch”. That was her preferred method of handling boredom or discomfort. Quinn was less patient and would tell someone when she had a problem, or better yet, think of a way to correct the situation. Quinn was usually the one to get in trouble, playing with car keys and losing them, carving her initials in the furniture. Petra lived quietly in big sister’s shadow. They never fought and seemed to have a compassionate regard for each other, rare in children.

They both had a fierce love of animals of all kinds. They loved kittens, dogs and especially horses. Petra even loved insects and befriended the ants that congregated in the bathroom sink around the toothpaste. The two girls would spend hours with their toy horses, making stalls out of cardboard and listing the names of all their steeds and their pedigrees. On family walks, they rode imaginary horses that often reared and took off on them. The point was that they had wonderful imaginations and to all appearances were enjoying their childhood.

But, as usually happens, things changed. The day they heard that the family was moving to the other side of the United States, they didn’t realize what that would mean. The adventure side of things was clear. They were going to be in a mid sized city with access to cultural events, new learning opportunities, a new house, maybe new friends close by. The loss side of the move was yet to come.

It reached the point of pain, on the day of the yard sale. They had been told that they could have money from the sale of some of their toys. But to see the furniture from their rooms out on the lawn, and being loaded into other people’s cars started to be a bit traumatic for them both. The farm would be left behind with its large yard, tree forts in the wood lot, the barn and hayloft, the kittens, and even the grandparents. THE GRANDPARENTS.

Quinn was trying to keep busy. At eight years old, she was the oldest and was in charge of selling the toys but the situation was beginning to weigh heavily on her. Especially when she looked at Petra. Petra, a 5 year old, was beyond focusing on the activity of the sale. She was sitting on her beloved “rocking couch”, repeatedly bouncing against it’s back with tears streaming down her cheeks. She was singing a sad, little goodbye song as the loveseat sized rocker creaked and groaned with her movement, it’s price tag taped to its arm. Clearly, a crisis was brewing…

That was the day that two little girls discovered their own personal super-hero. Someone came along who understood the impact a move was having on them and made the decision to lessen the trauma. The price tag got marked SOLD, and Grandma sat down between Petra and Quinn. They rocked together as they discussed how rocking couch could probably fit somewhere on the moving trailer. It wasn’t the first time Grandma came to their rescue, and it wouldn’t be the last either.

A to Z Challenge: Opal

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Character sketches that are fictional, but based on real people, like you and me.

Not many people have an Opal in their friend list these days. I didn’t call her that either, because she insisted on being called Paulette, but Opal was indeed her name.

Opal was a little loud, with a laugh that would wake the dead. I encountered her on cleaning days. We worked for the same client and on cleaning days I had to make sure I was not needing to be in the rooms where Opal would start. It was important to be out of her way.

I would hear the door slam, followed by Opal’s screech as she ordered her daughter Shelley to bring in the mop bucket and mop. Shelley always came along because she was somewhat mentally impaired and Opal had no safe place to leave her.

Opal was single, which was not surprising.

Somewhere along the way Opal had become very distrustful of men. As a result she had an independent streak as wide as the ocean. She drove a big van full of power tools and cleaning supplies. She dressed in old T-shirts and coveralls. There was no task so manly that Opal would not try to do it herself. Yard clean-up was her specialty. She could rake, trim bushes and haul debris to the road for pick-up with the best of them.

I had no problem with Opal’s short “man cut” of her own wiry, gray hair but it bothered me that she did it to Shelley too. Just when Shelley’s soft brown curls were getting long enough to look like a hairdo of sorts, Opal would chop them off. It took me a while to realize that this was purposeful. She wanted Shelley to look as unattractive as possible, for her own protection. As I said, she was very distrustful of men.

But Opal had a loyal heart. It was her brash, assuming nature that often had people at odds with her. She would decide to do something she hadn’t been asked to do, with disastrous results. She would offend, and in turn be offended. But after an appropriate length of time, she would patch things up and reappear, as helpful as ever.

Like the time she decided to wash our client’s transport van with the pressure washer… or the windy day she tried to dock her pontoon boat, oh, or the day she set out to trap the raccoons. Yes, that was classic Opal.

A to Z Challenge: Nelma

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Character sketches that are fictional, but based on real people, like you and me. We are now past the halfway point in the alphabet!

We were sitting in the living room of her small apartment, Nelma, her two girls and me. The girls were watching TV while their hair was getting braided. I was told it could take several hours to put in the many small, tight braids, with beads strategically placed in a pattern. The braids would stay in for a long time and would not just keep their hair neat but would make it look like they’d been able to afford exorbitant salon fees. Nelma was good at saving money.

I’d been wondering how she was doing since she had left the girls’ father. Nel was my employee, and really good at her work. I needed her to be okay. We had just finished a busy week in the public schools, teaching nutrition and exercise to grade schoolers – you can imagine how those subjects appealed to them. But Nel knew how to fool them into having fun. She had a large repertoire of line dances and once she put the music on, they exercised in spite of themselves. She knew how to have fun with kids.

Nel always came to work wearing something worthy of a second glance. Of course it helped that she was thin. Almost anything looked good on her. And she was one of the few people I knew in our hot, steamy climate who actually ironed her clothes. The ironing board, set up and ready, was a permanent fixture in the living room.

I was there that morning because I had some kid sized bikes that I thought her girls might like to ride. They were such cute little ladies, shy but curious, and with the kind of behavior that let you know their mom paid attention to them.

I was also wondering if she had found anyone to look into some car trouble she was having. Not being able to get to work had been a problem all week and I had given her a ride several times. She knew how to do a lot of things that surprised me, but fixing cars was not one of them. I was about ready to help her find a safer, more reliable vehicle.

We were the only two people working in our small government program, so we often talked for a bit in the morning while we prepared our sample meals. The conversation had turned to personal situations enough times that I knew she was struggling with a relationship. The girls’ father was a classic abuser and had not taken kindly to her leaving and getting her own place. He was harassing her, and she was afraid of what his next move might be. Sometimes he was just annoying, but there were hints of what he might do, given the opportunity.

That’s why I was glad I was there with them that morning when he knocked on the door.

A to Z Challenge: Mandy

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Character sketches that are fictional, but based on real people, like us.

Mandy covered her auburn hair with a scarf and stepped out into the sunny spring day. She had just gotten a color that really suited her and she wasn’t about to let it fade with sun exposure. Looking good was worth what it cost in routine hair appointments. It was a way of letting the world know she cared.

The cancer diagnosis a year ago had sideswiped her. She had almost gotten back on her feet after the death of her husband, all the trauma, the loneliness, getting used to a different life without him in it. Facing off with cancer was like being asked to do it all over again, only it was her own life she had to worry about this time.

As if chemo hadn’t been bad enough, the toxic treatment gave her kidney failure so now she was going to dialysis three times a week. And because she had a cancer that was treatable but not curable, she was not a candidate for a kidney transplant. At times it seemed as if the world was against her, but she presented a whole different image to that world. It wasn’t going to see her go down. She was waging war against every negative aspect of her life. Her attitude was her number one weapon.

Her first step was to more closely match her energy level with her living environment. She sold her two story home and moved into a condo on the edge of town. No one there did their own yard work. There were no steps to climb. Her condo had windows with gorgeous views and the light streamed in and lifted her soul every morning.

She accepted her thrice weekly trips to dialysis as part of her life, like showering and eating. She decided they would be rest days, for reading, napping and whatever else she could manage. She was tired on those days but recovered by the following morning. Her in between days were full of times with friends, her grandsons, and getting to know her new neighbors.

The project of “feathering her new nest” had been so fun. She and a friend had searched the furniture stores until they found exactly the pieces that fit her rooms, matched the vibe she wanted and were comfortable and practical. Their efforts had created spaces that were inviting and filled with warmth, and pleased her. She chased happiness and peace, and all who walked into her living room felt she had caught a great deal of both.

In the name of hanging on to things loved, she had stayed with the church of her childhood. It was 30 miles away but it was worth it to her because she had purpose there. She was a musician and loved playing for the weekly services. It was there she felt comfortably challenged and appreciated.

At this stage of her game, she was making good choices, and she knew it. There were no guarantees for her longevity but her strategy was to hope for medical advances. Just last week she had heard of a medical trial for her diagnosis that made her pulse quicken. If she could get accepted for that she would really be in the fight with a new weapon, and that sounded good, really good…

A to Z Challenge: Leonard the Doctor

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Character sketches that are fictional but based on real characters, like us.

Finally free of military obligations, Leonard was more than excited to set up his own private ENT practice. He was now quite experienced at peering down people’s ears, noses and throats and could hardly wait to start making some real money. There had always been something about being a short person in the military that had left him feeling a little insecure. He was ready to be a boss.

His new clinic on the edge of the small, but growing, city was his own design and was going to serve him well for many years. A full hall of exam rooms, for when he took on associates, a med room with an autoclave, the small surgery suite, and the offices – it was all but finished with the carpet going in the waiting room this week.

He’d put an ad in the paper for a receptionist/nurse/bookkeeper and figured he would end up training someone to do it all, for the time being. Things would be slow at first.

His biggest irritation was his wife, who kept popping in unannounced to give him decorating advice, or request help with the kids. She was ditsy, that was the best word he could think of to describe her. He would much prefer that she stay home and mind her own business.

By the next week he had interviewed several people for his front office, and one was a nurse, just out of school. She wouldn’t know much, but that way he could “fashion” her to suit his practice and not have to re-program a bunch of bad habits. He probably wouldn’t need to pay her a lot either. He liked the idea of starting out with everything new.

The first week the doors opened there were two patients. One was a bad nosebleed and he was so glad he had properly prepared his nurse. “When you see a nosebleed getting out of the car, meet them at the door and get them off the carpet as quickly as you can. No sitting in the waiting room.” Not that they would have had to wait…

During the slow days between the two patients there was a lot of time to train his nurse on the patient filing system he had decided to use. She was going to have to learn his dictation machine as well, and type out patient reports. She was fairly quick at the office tasks which pleased him. He kind of liked standing behind her when she worked at the desk, watching to make sure she was getting the billing system right. He found himself wondering what it would be like to touch her hair.

The weeks wore on, and the practice was growing, but slowly. He was starting to do surgery at the local hospital and had trained “his girl” to make up the surgery packs and autoclave them. At some point he was going to start taking her to surgery to assist but he’d have to pay her more then, so not yet. There were still some slow times at the office too, and he was having fun making her nervous.

Their teaching sessions were getting kind of exciting to him. She reminded him of some of the new army recruits he’d been acquainted with. He liked standing close while explaining how to position the microscope, or use an ear speculum. She would find a reason to move away, but he could follow. It was almost ridiculous how he’d slowly chase her around the exam table. Didn’t she get it?

He wasn’t expecting it at all the day she gave notice that she was leaving. It was after the last patient had gone and the locking of the doors. She was finishing up the roster at the desk when he finally got the nerve to stroke her hair. She calmly turned around and said “I’m giving you one month to find my replacement. During that time, if you ever touch me again or make me feel uncomfortable, I’m walking out the door at that moment. And, by the way, your wife will hear about it too.”

He blushed, and wished he could have thought of something to say. How dare she embarrass him like that! Now, she was making him feel uncomfortable. And so awkward.

The next month went way too slowly for both of them. She was glad to be done and made sure he gave her a glowing recommendation. He ended up hiring three people to replace her. None of them were young, cute, or chaseable.

A to Z Challenge: Karmen

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Character sketches that are fictional but based on real characters, like us.

Karmen didn’t know what had gotten into her. It wasn’t that they’d never fought before, they had. It wasn’t that the finances were stretched tight, they always were. And it wasn’t that the kids weren’t always testing their patience, because that was a given. It was all of that and more, all at once. If he had listened to her and helped her quiet down, it might have gone differently. But no, he didn’t understand and that mad her even more angry. They should have let it go until morning when they were rested and in their right minds…

She was sitting at a friend’s house thinking things over. She hadn’t expected him to call the cops on her and the night she had spent cooling off in jail for her “domestic disturbance” was a first. It hadn’t been fun and she was determined not to let that happen again.

Now she had gotten past the angry period and moved into scared. She was going to have to appear before a judge, and at the very least it would mean community service, and likely more. The worst part was not being able to go home because of the restraining order. What was her husband thinking? Was he really that afraid of her? Did he think she would hurt the children? It was confusing because she couldn’t remember some of the details.

It was going to be the news of the day in their small Hispanic community. A third of the people living there were his relatives, a third were related to her and another third were people they didn’t want to associate with. She could not get Felipe to understand how badly she wanted to get into a better, safer neighborhood. Why couldn’t they live someplace where everything they owned didn’t have to be under lock and key. Someplace where the drug dealers weren’t always looking at her kids as potential customers. It was simple, he always said. They would move when they had the money to move.

Karmen just wanted to talk to Felipe, on the phone. She wanted to see the kids, tell them she was sorry. She wanted some clean clothes.

She sat in silence, wishing she could turn back the clock.

A to Z Challenge: Juan

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Character sketches that are fictional but based on real characters, like us.

“I was never so happy to see someone in my whole life.” He couldn’t stop saying that.

Ike and Juan left the chained enclosure and came to the car where I’d been waiting. It had taken quite a while to get Juan’s belongings returned to him and the paperwork done to bail him out. He’d only been locked up for three days but it had seemed like a lot longer to him. He still wasn’t sure what had happened, but from the time he’d been stopped on the highway until now the sense of being helpless, confused and frustrated had been nearly overpowering.

He’d been a fireman in Mexico and was used to dealing with the authorities, the Mexican police and officials. This had been different from the start. Evidently someone reported a break in and described a van the same color and make as Juan’s. A patrol car had pulled him over and he was cuffed and taken in for questioning in spite of his protests that he knew nothing about it and had been in Publix getting groceries. He didn’t know what had become of his van.

The next thing he knew they were taking him for a ride to the port jail where his cell phone and contents of his pockets were bagged and taken away. He was suited up and told he could make a phone call. The numbers he might have called were stored away in his cell phone, and before he could think of what to do next, the opportunity melted away. He wondered if anyone would ever miss him.

I kept wondering why the police wouldn’t at least listen to a clean cut, nicely dressed kid, who was obviously not on drugs or intoxicated. Was being Mexican that much of a strike against him? Of course, there was no one who could answer questions like that.

The next day a search of the impound lots was successful in finding his van. Juan didn’t have the impound fee with him but was allowed to look the vehicle over. He immediately turned his attention to the glove compartment. His wallet was there, along with his credit card and driver’s license, but the $400 in cash that he had just been paid for a week’s work was missing.

Ike took over. He was enraged. He knew a few people in the sheriff’s office and was not going to let this matter die without a fight. The three page letter he drafted and had me type was a chronicle of every detail of the arrest and detainment, including the money missing from the van. He suggested that both of us should sign it – being upstanding citizens we could be references for the truthfulness of Juan’s account. I was not counting on the effectiveness of this move. It was no small thing to cast doubt on the integrity of the sheriff’s deputies. We would see what kind of pull Ike had with his buddies in the department.

The next day Ike took Juan to the impound lot to pick up the van. Mysteriously, an envelope with $375 was now in the glove compartment. All charges against Juan were dropped. It wasn’t exactly the confession and apology we would have liked but Juan was content to keep a low profile. We think we know what happened but will never be able to prove it.

What do you think happened that resulted in charges being dropped and money reappearing in the van?

A to Z Challenge: Ike

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What do you do when a trusted friend suddenly disappears? That’s what Ike and I were wondering as we sat in the feed room looking at each other. That was also the day I decided that if I were to go missing, I would want Ike looking for me.

I was a relative newcomer to Ike’s territory, a Yankee, he called me. He had taken my daughter on as a project when she decided to bring a horse into her life and had nowhere to keep it. He graciously provided the trailer to get it to Florida and a pasture when it got there. We had become good friends since then and I liked hanging around the stable. It seemed like Ike knew most everyone in town, and particularly, everyone connected with horses.

Although he had a “house”, loosely defined, he preferred to hatch his best morning plans in the feed room next to his coffee pot and a collection of mugs. I was always wary of using those mugs, but I’d never heard of anyone dying out there. Likely no germs could survive the strong coffee he put in them.

He had been thinking over the absence of his best hired hand, Juan, since earlier when he had come out to help feed the horses and found Juan wasn’t there. He had already done some calling around to friends. No one had seen the man.

“Let’s get in the truck and check the highway. Maybe he’s broke down and had to leave his van on the side of the road somewhere. He was going to the store last night.”

The old, red diesel truck, a dually, wasn’t my favorite ride but it was his favorite, so we went. It was alarming that he kept checking the ditches, not just for a vehicle, but for a person.

“You don’t think he could have been mugged and left for dead, do you?””

“Doesn’t hurt to check. He did carry a bit of money with him sometimes.”

We traveled the highway to the store and a few other likely places but didn’t find the van, or any bodies, thankfully.

Back in the feed room, Ike got on the phone calling the local hospitals to see if the missing hired hand might have been admitted, but that didn’t turn up anything either. We couldn’t decide what to do next. Juan wasn’t a drinker, a drug user or a rowdy so it didn’t occur to us that he would have gotten in trouble with the law. From what we knew, Juan was in Florida on a student visa and had no family or friends close by. If we couldn’t find him, who could? We were stumped.

Ike wasn’t going to give up though. That’s always been one of the things I like about him. There’s just not much he won’t do for you if you’re his friend.

Several days went by, and then, “I found him. He’s in jail up at Port Manatee! Let’s go see what we can find out.”

Although he was an old timer himself, Ike was well aware that the “good ol’ boys” weren’t necessarily all good. What we were about to find out was surprising to say the least.

(Continued tomorrow with the letter J, for Juan)

A to Z Challenge: Helen

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This character sketch is not fictional. Helen was her name and this is a part of her story that is real, as closely as I can remember it.

Her funeral was in Gladewater, Texas, the place where I had known her years before. There was a lot of time on the flight from Florida for me to think about who she was, what she had done, and what she had meant to me. Even though we think of the West having been won and settled a long time ago, she was a true pioneer woman with a spirit that would have survived even back then.

It was the early 1970’s and I was a transplant from the north, attending a small private school in Big Sandy, Texas. Helen lived on a small farmstead about three miles off campus. She had already earned the title of “grandma” to lots of students that she had met attending the college church. Anyone who needed to have a break from the busy educational scene was, sooner or later, invited to come out and experience a completely different environment with Helen.

Her story had a tragic start. She and her husband had moved from California to some undeveloped acreage that was going to be their homestead. They had plans for a self-sufficient lifestyle and were willing to work hard to see it take place. The land, hilly in places and covered with pine and oak forest, had to be cleared first. Her husband was cutting trees one day when one fell the wrong way and pinned him. Helen got to him, only in time to be there when he died.

They had sold everything to buy that land, and she had nowhere else to go, so she stayed. She had a small mobile home, a pole barn, a few small storage buildings and a chicken house. She was in her 50’s, alone, trying to figure out how to make ends meet. College students and church friends rallied to help her. My husband and I were newly married and looking for a place to garden and maybe build a house. Helen had property, we had manpower and some resources. It was a mutually beneficial endeavor – we adopted her and she adopted us.

Hot, east Texas summers were spent planting, weeding and helping Helen. In the fall, we would drive around town looking for bagged leaves sitting out for trash pickup, and we’d take them to her for the garden. Helen and her chickens made sure we never ran out of eggs, and after a hard day’s work she always supplied ice tea, and the best ever cornbread.

Helen, leading her flock to the coop for the night.

One summer she went back to California to visit her grown children. I was most familiar with her animals and the chores so I stayed and “trailer sat”. I remember trying to fall asleep at night with all the sounds of the country, under and around me. It took some getting used to. In the morning the roosters woke up so early! I fed the cats, milked the cow, and collected eggs. I had always loved farm life, but living in a trailer was new to me. I loved being able to hear the animals close by, chickens scratching in the dirt under the trailer, guinea hens perching in the trees overhead, cows drinking from their water tank.

Helen’s mobile home. Come sit a spell on the front porch

Sadly, my husband’s work plans changed and we left Texas for the west coast in 1976, but we stayed in touch with Helen. Letters passed back and forth between us and we often took care of financial needs for her. She was like our “other mother”. We visited her several times over the following years, and Helen made a surprise trip up north to visit us after the birth of our first child. Others took our place helping her over time.

I was so impressed that she traveled, alone, to visit our firstborn.

We were informed of Helen’s death in 1998. At 81 she was relaxing in her living room chair, still independent, still sharing what she had with others, still living the lifestyle she had chosen for herself, still strong in her faith, when she died. An amazing woman, a worthy role model, not soon forgotten.

Grandma Helen, a pioneer spirit.

A to Z Challenge: Gayle (and Allie)

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Most of Allie’s friends were special in one way or another, but not often did one come along with the cultural charm that Gayle had. Here was a person who had grown up in a foreign country, even spoke a foreign language fluently – this was rare for Allie’s small town lifestyle. Always the opportunist, Allie signed Gayle up for giving French lessons to her homeschooled daughters. That was the beginning of years of shared adventures, shared ups and downs, shared faith.

Gayle was a superior hostess with French flair. Instead of “get to the table before it all gets cold”, which Allie was used to, there was a before dinner conversation time, with appetizers and wine. Art on the walls, flowers in the vases, music in the air, and a leisurely but simple meal could always be counted on with Gayle’s invitations. Without Gayle, Allie would have never tasted kir or known what a porte couteaux was. Probably wouldn’t have known that a madeleine was a cookie or have adopted that wonderful slow roasted brisket recipe.

Porte couteaux. Why? Because you don’t want a greasy knife on your tablecloth.

Gayle was the kind of friend she went to for advice on furniture purchases and making home a lovely place. Gayle worked in a design shop and with that as a credential, she talked Allie into painting her bathroom dark green – whoa, shocking! She helped Allie find a great upholstery shop to revive a favorite recliner. In turn, Allie helped Gayle network, even if it was just helping her find horse manure for her rose garden. They both loved taking long walks, cooking out at the beach, and breakfasts in small morning restaurants. They both loved their cats, and their husbands.

They both loved their God. After Allie had pestered her numerous times to go to Bible study with her, Gayle gave up and went. Mutual faith deepened the friendship and became an anchor as they shared their saddest times and prayed for each other. They both knew God to be adventurous, and frankly, kind of wild, in a good way.

Allie got the kayaks out one day and made Gayle go with her on the inland waterway. It was a bit out of Gayle’s comfort zone but it ended well. They survived a beautiful afternoon with nothing but a little sunburn.

Gayle asked Allie to watch her house and feed her cat one year when she and her husband visited France. She suggested a midnight skinny dip in the pool which was surprising to Allie and a bit out of her comfort zone, but why not? Who’s to know?

Most often though, it was that they talked and knew how to tell each other important things. Sometimes they were on the phone, sometimes in person, but over time it all started having a preparatory nature to it. Because of that, they were not all that surprised when the big “thing” finally came around… Not really.