Howling from My Mountain

Clemmie ran through the woods to the creek. Spider webs wrapped across her face, stickers tore at her ankles. But worst of all, thick nasty blood oozed down her legs. Her grandma told her it would come. She’d said, “Clemmie, you will one day be a woman and that day begins with the blood.”

 

Clemmie had asked, “What blood?”

 

“The blood what comes from your private parts, deep inside you. It’s been there waiting since you was borned, and when a girl’s body is ready, it comes pouring out. Then you are on the way to being a woman.”

 

“But I done want to be a woman. I like who I am.”

 

Grandma put her finger under Clemmie’s chin, tipped up her face, said, “I were the same way, but I couldn’t stop it and you won’t stop it. No girl can stop from being a woman.” She let go Clemmie’s chin. “I can see in your eyes that it’s about time for you.”

 

And Grandma was right. Just two weeks later, Clemmie woke up feeling fluffy headed, and her insides hurt, and she was crabby and ornery feeling. She’d stomped about her chores, and hardly eaten any of her breakfast. Then, when she was brushing down Beauty, she felt a strange feeling in her insides. An ache and a pull and then a release. Something ran down her leg. She’d run behind the bushes, pulled down her pants and drawers, and there it was. Bright red and nasty. Her woman blood come. She wanted to scream, but was afraid her daddy would come to see about her and know. Her momma was sewing, up for the first time in weeks, and Clemmie didn’t want to make her momma’s headache come back. Clemmie had pressed her fist to her mouth and bit down to keep from hollering, then she’d taken off for the woods and the water.

 

She wanted the creek to wash it all off. She wanted to let the cold clear water take it all away from her. She didn’t want it didn’t want it didn’t want it.

 

At the creek, Clemmie threw off her clothes and walked into the water. She sat on her favorite rock and watched as red mixed in with the brown of the boulder. Easing herself into the water, she cupped her hands and let the water wash away her shame on the rock. Then she laid back, her upper body resting against the rock, and let the water rush over her lower body. It gave her shivers, much like the shivers she got while watching Aaron’s muscles stretch and release. The water entered her and then went out, entered and went out. It made her feel better. She thought of Aaron again and something welled up inside her until she thought she’d go insane.

 

Clemmie closed her eyes, felt the sun touch her face and warm it. Her head, shoulders, and breasts were warm, and her lower body was at turns chilled and hot. She waited there until she felt clean again, but the tension wouldn’t release. Clemmie felt coiled up for something, so tight she couldn’t stand it. It was as if there was something she needed to do, but what it was she couldn’t figure out. She opened her eyes and stared up at the sky peeping through the branches of the trees. A fat white cloud passed over, slow and lazy. It eased Clemmie to look at the cloud, at the leaves waving, at the sounds of the birds. She eased and eased her mind until the pressure felt better. But Clemmie knew there was something there waiting, and she aimed to find out what it was.

 

When she stood, she felt the same hurt then release and the blood came again. It made her so mad she picked up a rock and threw it as hard as she could. Clemmie washed herself again and then hurried back to the grass to get dressed. She wadded up one of her mother’s handkerchief’s she used to wipe her sweat with and pressed it between her legs, then put her drawers and dungarees back on, then her shirt. She sat upon the grass, her wet hair dripping, and stared into the woods leading down to Aaron’s house.

 

Just yesterday, she’d made plans to go see him. His daddy had come up the week before and Clemmie listened while they talked about the tornado. Aaron’s daddy said it didn’t touch them, not one speck of dirt was moved over another speck of dirt. She waited, hidden behind the rhododendrons, until she was bored. Aaron’s daddy didn’t once mention Aaron. She’d taken her bath that night and scrubbed extra hard, especially at her blackened feet. Her momma fussed when she didn’t wear shoes, but she couldn’t stand them, they made her feet feel hot and sweaty. She’d washed her hair with soap, and then poured rosewater she’d made herself from root to tip, twice. All for nothing, for she couldn’t go round Aaron with her woman blood spurting all over the place.

 

Clemmie got up and searched through the woods for roots, something, anything that would make it go away, even though Grandma said it wouldn’t do a bit of good and she best be just accepting of it. Clemmie didn’t have to accept nothing she didn’t want to accept. She’d will it away, that’s what she’d do. The more she walked, the more she felt the ooze, and it was getting high on her nerves. She gave up searching and stomped back home.

 

Grandma was waiting for her, rocking on the porch, a bowl of beans she was snapping sitting on her lap. Clemmie went to her and stood in front of her. Clemmie said, “I don’t want to be no woman.”

 

Grandma said, “It ain’t so bad. I reckon you’ll get used to it.”

 

“What else I got to look forward to, being a woman and all, ‘sides this nasty?”

 

Grandma laughed, then said, “You’ll see.” She snapped a few beans. “They’s things for you under your piller. Things for tween you legs and things for the achy hurt. And I made some special tea.”

 

Clemmie shrugged, but she headed inside to go to her bedroom.

“Clemmie?”

She turned to her Grandma. Her Grandma snapped a bean, said, “They’s things we got to talk about now, oncest you feel better. Things that you got to be mindful of and all.”

 

“Like what?” Clemmie remembered the pressure and her face flamed. She couldn’t ask her Grandma. Not about that.

 

“Like what I will tell you when you ain’t feeling so poor. Now, go take care of yourself and stop pestering me. I got beans to snap and taters to peel. You go do what you got to do, lay yourself down for a spell. I’ll check on you directly.”

 

“I done need to lay down. I’ll he’p peel them taters.”

 

“Suit yourself.”

 

Clemmie went to her bedroom. There on her table by the bed was a cup with dark liquid in it. Clemmie drank it down, making a face at the bitter taste. She picked up her pillow. There under the pillow were pieces of soft cotton toweling that Grandma had cut into rectangular squares and sewn together into thick pads. With the pads was a rolled piece of cotton. Clemmie unrolled it and inside were herbs and shaved roots to make more tea with. Clemmie sighed. Wasn’t nothing to do but what she had to do. She touched the pad, sighed again, and then went to the outhouse to fix herself up.

 

After, she buried the handkerchief, deep in the dirt, curling her lip at the nasty of it. With the pad pinned to her drawers, she felt as if she were riding a miniature saddle. It made her feel restless. But the tea helped. She began to feel a soft hazy feeling, as if that earlier cloud passed through her head. After she washed up, she joined Grandma on the porch, picked up the knife and a tater, and set to work.

 

Grandma asked, “Better now?”

 

Clemmie nodded.

 

“Good. We’ll talk in a few day, I ‘spect.”

 

Clemmie nodded again. Grandma nodded. They bent their heads to their work.

I am interrupting Clementine to tell you all I received an email from Cantara Christopher that Stephen Gyllenhaal's mother has passed away. I have never personally met Stephen face to face, but I interviewed him for Rose and Thorn and he is a lovely gracious man - beautifully talented, yes, but more than that. I do not know what it is is like to lose one's momma, for I still have both of mine- my biological and my adoptive mothers. Keep him in your thoughts, if you will? It doesn't matter how well-known you are, or never known by many at all - losing one's momma has to be a lost in the woods feeling, the world becoming a bit bigger and smaller all at once...is one then half an orphan? What void does a momma-less world leave?

 

Here is a poem Stephen wrote about his mother - it's in his beautiful book of poetry:

 

 

Clementine took the chicken from the hot water so she could pluck the feathers. The pinfeathers were the hardest and she hated to pick out those, hated it since she was a girl. Thinking about storms and her momma had made her feel a bit pixilated, so cooking would help. She wasn’t one for staring back into the past to figure things out. The past was what it was and staring back into it only made a body feel lonesome, or tired, or mad, or vengeful. Seems lately the past kept creeping up on her and stood there stomping its feel to get her attention.

 

She sat on her porch in the old wooden chair her daddy made her when she was twenty-two. He said a woman at twenty-two needed a special chair. He never explained why, and she never asked. That old chair had lasted many a years, with just a few twiddlings to shore it up as time went by. Clementine plucked away. She always felt a little sad to kill her chickens, but she also knew chickens were stupid, and they were mean, and they liked to peck at they own shit. They’d just as well peck out an eye if a body were to stare at them cross-a-ways. And chickens were for eating, she reckoned. What else could a chicken do? She never figured it out. Some animals she wouldn’t eat, like pigs. Pigs were smart and when they were babies, they were the cutest things.

 

She asked the chicken, “What should I do with you? Fry? Fricassee? Or bake you up with some lemon and salt?”

 

Clementine stared out in the distance, to her potion garden where she grew lady fern she made tea from to help her pee, or dried the roots and made a paste when she had a cut or scrape; there was goat’s rue for the new momma’s to make more baby milk, or for the diabeticals in the town, and for fevers; mayapple was good for the fevers, too, or if she couldn’t go potty properly she’d make a potion out of it for her bowels, and she even gave it to new momma’s if they kids had the worms, or for old Mrs. Mendel’s warts, poor thing; the bloodroot sometimes was used for a love potion, all the want-to-be-loved had to do was rub the juice from the bloodroot’s root on they hand and touch the hand of the one they wanted to love, but that wasn’t always a good thing to do, she warned them, and as young hot bloods did, they didn’t always listen and they’s skin looked mighty bad afterwards, the bloodroot was mostly for the ringwormy kids, and for other skin problems the townsfolk had. Clementine had all manner of plants growing for her potions. Her grandma had taught her everything.

 

On the other side of the potion garden were her flowers, and back behind, her vegetable garden. Clementine spent many hours of her days tending to those gardens, and she didn’t mind one speck. It had done her well—the townsfolk paid her for her potions and sometimes for her flowers and her vegetables, too. She enjoyed the offerings from the gardens when she needed them, too.

 

Clementine was surprised to see the chicken was near about all plucked. She said aloud, “Funny a thing how the mind can wander off willy go nilly whilst the hands keep on working, right?”

 

No one answered, since no one was there, and Clementine felt a sudden loneliness. She put the bird in the pan for washing and sat a moment, thinking about that empty feeling she sometimes had. She knew it was silly. She knew she had her critters to talk to, and she had the townspeople come up to see her when they needed her. But, there was a missing spot, that hard ache in her belly that never went away, even when she pretended. Most times, Clementine liked being alone. It was quiet and nobody asked her to do anything she didn’t have a mind to do. She said, "No call to be thinking on that," stood, reached for the pan with the plucked chicken, and headed inside to wash it up so she could cook it for her supper.

 

As she scrubbed the chicken, she had a thought. She let it roll around a little bit. Then she said to the chicken, “I could invite him up here, you know. I could just ask him to come eat some supper with me. What do you think that man will say? Huh? What do you think he’ll say? Been a while since I asked any man up here to my table. Might be more trouble than it’s worth, I tell you.”

 

She put the scrubbed chicken on a clean kitchen towel and patted it dry. From her little pantry she took salt, pepper, red pepper, and garlic. The garlic she minced. From the counter she grabbed a big fresh-smelling lemon, cut it, and squeezed the juice in a bowl. She added the salt, peppers, and cut up garlic to the lemon juice, made a paste, and rubbed it all over the chicken. Inside the cavity, she put the lemon rinds, a whole pod of garlic, some wild ginger from her garden, and a whole onion. The chicken went into her old magnalite cooker and into the oven. With the chicken, Clementine thought some fried taters would be good, okra and maters, and cornbread. For dessert, blackberry pie. She checked her freezer to make sure the blackberries were still there, and they were.

She smiled to herself. Maybe she could have a bit of company for supper. Maybe she could. All she had to do was ride Beauty a few miles down the mountain and…she put her finger to her lips, rubbed them, wondered if her lips were too wrinkly to kiss. Wondered if her old body was nothing to look at anymore, look at like a man likes to look. She knew it didn’t matter if the man’s body was old and busted up, it was all a time the woman’s burden to keep herself young—weren’t fair and it made her mad, but that’s how things were. But maybe he was different. Maybe he would see her from the inside out instead of the outside in. That’s all she asked, that she be looked at for what her insides where—her strong beating heart, her heavy bones, her blood that still ran hot and fast through her veins, her pink lungs. She bet if she was turned inside out she’d be smooth and pink and red and beautifully made. She bet she’d show him what she was really made of, not this old old woman that showed up on the outside.

 

Clementine went to her bedroom, stared at herself in the mirror. She pinched her cheeks, took her hair from its pins. She next went to her chifferobe and stared at her clothes, at the pretty little dress Mrs. Patters made her in payment for the rheumatism potion. Could she do it? Could she ask a man come have some supper with her? . . .

I’m interrupting Clementine for just a post here.

What I came to tell you is the strange happenings. Any of you who have been here for a long time may remember the Shadow Man who visited me. I was asleep on the couch and I awoke and there “he” was – darker than the night, a complete dark shadow man. He was watching me – though I saw no features, I “knew” he was watching me as I slept. One hand was draped casually on the back of the couch. I stared at him. I thought, “Who is this? What is this?” but I was so sleepy, I feel asleep again. I wasn’t afraid. I remembered a couple of nights before that where I awoke as if something had startled me, but nothing was there—until that night. A went back to the couch several times to see if he’d return, but he did not….I told him, “Go home, okay?” Maybe he did. One night I did smell something sweetish. This was maybe two years ago or so.

 

A shadow man had come before, when my brother died, briefly he was at the side of the chase lounge I’d fallen asleep on, but I was afraid and he left very quickly—perhaps it was my brother and he sensed my fear and left me. I sensed him later on, walking with us. I know I did. Imagination? Wish?

 

So, a couple of nights ago, I closed my eyes and I do not know if I was awake or asleep or in between, but I saw this incredible light, inside my head not in the room, the light glowed like no other light, and a “doorway” appeared, and in that “doorway” I saw a shadow man. This shadow man was taller and thinner than the one at the couch. He stood in the “doorway” – and behind him was that light, and I felt this incredible peace, this sense of well-being. I hate to say it, but I felt what people describe when they have a near-death experience, except I was not dead. I then opened my eyes and I felt that calm, peace, well-being, and I thought, “Something good is coming. Something good is going to happen.” The feeling quickly went away.

 

Then, a few nights later, I saw the light again, but this time it was very brief and much more like lightening, brighter and more intense, but flashed and flashed and then was gone. My synapses run amok? Who knows. But it peaks my curiosity. Is my brain in over-drive? It ofttimes is, but in different ways.

 

Last night, I went outside to let the dogs out in the back and while I waited for them, I looked out at the night sky, at the stars, at the trees, at the mountain ridges, and then I heard a Hum…an obvious Hum. I couldn’t tell where it came from as it seemed all around me. So, when I went back inside, I checked downstairs—maybe it was the dehumidifier in the garage; maybe it was…I have no idea. I wondered at this Hum. I wondered if the mountain was busy with something. If there was a trembling beneath, a shifting, a rearranging…something coming. Or, if my imagination was on high. Sound travels strangeling in the mountains.

 

I soon after went to bed, but I felt so restless! I could not feel “still.” It took me a long time to relax. But, this restless feeling had come before I went outside, so were they connected? Is all of this connected? Am I losing my mind? *laughing* I think a writer’s imagination is a wondrous thing, and I like to think I stay in the reality of knowing some things are imagination, and some things are simply explainable things from a very quiet mountain cove, and some things unexplainable simply because I make them more than they are, or simply because they cannot be explained away. But, what of the light and shadow man? A dream? What of the shadow man watching me as I slept on the couch? Another dream? Who are these shadow men? What do they want? Or if I have conjured them, why have I? What is the purpose of it?

 

I assure you, I am perfectly sane (hahahahha –my friends and family beg to differ..haw!) but when I write all this, I know how crazy it all sounds. Maybe having a “creative mind” brings things both conjured and not conjured. Maybe the brain is too active on the creative/non-logical side and flips and blips and snaps. Last night, I watched a show on National Geographic about savants (I am not a savant, I am not saying or implying that) whose brains were affected at birth or by a trauma and the “creative side” was more alive and active than the “logical side” – the logical side was almost “dead.” These savants were Mega Ultra Creative – some no longer leading “normal” lives. I wonder, then, and it seems plausible, if some creative minds are somewhere in between, caught in some kind of synaptic wonderland that causes blips in the brain, and thus…well, these kinds of occurrences that seem “odd” or like dreams or imaginations. *shrug* beats me! *laughing*

 

Oh, and P.S.: I am wondering about the MSN “Friends” thing. I get requests for friends as everyone does, and used to be I’d visit those blogs and then click “accept.” However, as I became busier and busier, I let them pile up and would go in and just click “accept” on all of them. I am not sure this is how it is done. I think, “what if I click accept on something that is a blog I would not want to visit?....what if the “friend” isn’t a friend, but someone who eats live rabbits and takes candy from babies or someone who kicks their dog and then brags about it on their blog or something …worse! Eek!” So, I wonder – what do all of you do? Do you just accept them without visiting? Do you visit every one and decide? If you hit “deny” does the recipient know it and get their feelings hurt, or would it matter if they were a dog-kicker? Geez. I don’t know these things. And, when I used to have time to visit more, I never came across a blog that I considered “bad.” *shrug* What do you all do?

 (and after reading my post above, I may have people who will be afraid to BE my friend…haw haw!)

 

Now, I leave you, and Clementine will soon return.

She pulled her hair, pulled it pulled it pulled it pulled it pulled it pulled it. She could pull it out by the roots, and sometimes did, sometimes the hair came out with a plicking sound, and she’d stare at it, long pale strands with roots and tips. Her scalp would tingle and smart, and she didn’t care. Any pain was better than the inside her head pain.

 

Mae-lynn stopped pulling. Waited. There. It was okay. The haunting had stopped. She knew she was being punished. She knew the baby was still inside of her. It hadn’t all come out. It hadn’t all come out. It hadn’t all come out. It was still inside of her, pieces of it, an arm, a leg, a finger, some hair, a toe—pieces of baby lodged in her body. And when she slept, it crept up, sneaky sneaky, crept up to her brain and poked at the soft tissue there. Pushed until her brain throbbed. She’d wake up and she couldn’t stand it. The pain, yes, the pain she could take, mostly. But, the pieces of the child she could not. It was inside her and it was mad at what she’d done to it.

 

She stretched out her legs, pointed her toes and then raised her arms to the ceiling. Let her arms float there in freedom. Mae-lynn thought back to when she was a child, how her mother and father taught her how to read early, how they taught her manners, how they told her she was destined for good things and a good husband. They wanted her to marry a goodly man, and wanted her become a school teacher first, like her mother was until she married her father. Her father was a professor and taught history at a stately college. Her mother taught first grade, until she became a wife. Her mother smelled like gardenias and marmalade, and sweat. Her father came home with a satchel filled with work, secret work that he didn’t let Mae-lynn or her mother see. He would lock himself in his study and stay there for hours. Sometimes Mae-lynn pressed her face to the door and listened. She’d hear him mutter and sometimes even moan. The moaning made her head hurt.

 

Head hurt. Hurt head. Mae-lynn said the words ten times and then ten more. She pulled herself up to sitting. And when she did, she saw the Clemmie child staring at her.

 

“Momma?”

 

“What do you want, child?” Mae-lynn stared at the girl. Sometimes she didn’t think this really could be her daughter. Where was the refinement? Where were the beautiful words spilling from her throat like a cool spring—that’s what her lover had said about Mae-lynn. That’s what the lover had said while he touched her all over, touched her and touched her until she felt as if she’d burst into flames. That’s what he had said before he left her. And she’d come up this mountain and she’d lied lied and lied. And the Clemmie child was the result of her lies. Sweet child that she was, she was not refined. She was not as Mae-lynn would have her. She was just like Mae-lynn’s husband. Just like her husband’s mother.

 

“Momma?”

 

Mae-lynn wanted to answer her, she did. So, she opened her mouth and said, “The snows of Kilimanjaro are deep and secret and wild.”

 

“What you say, Momma?”

 

The child Clemmie was stepping to her. Mae-lynn waited. The child Clemmie stood at her bedside. Mae-lynn said, “Hemingway could not stand his life. He could not stand the way the sand never left his shoes. The way his hair pulled at his scalp. The way his beard scratched his chin while he slept. The way his words kept spilling onto a page that was unforgiving in its emptiness…how the page swallowed every word he wrote and demanded more more more and the people demanded of him more more more. He couldn’t stand how his favorite glass had a chip in it that cut his lip if he forgot it was there. He couldn’t stand his neighbor’s cat meowing at his door. He couldn’t stand the way the sun pierced his eyelids when he wanted darkness to last just a little longer and then he couldn’t stand when the darkness didn’t leave and the sun stayed away. He couldn’t stand—“

 

“—Momma!” The Clemmie child stared at her with her mouth opened. The Clemmie child was trying not to cry. Mae-lynn knew the girl didn’t like to cry. The Clemmie child said, “Momma, please stop.” The Clemmie child smoothed the bed sheets, smoothed Mae-lynn’s hair. “Momma, here’s you medicine. Grandma put extree cider in it for you.”

 

Mae-lynn thought, how twangy the child’s voice was! Was she the only one who could speak properly? Didn’t this child listen to Mae-lynn when she spoke so beautifully?

 

“I done all my chores, Momma. I could read to you.”

 

Mae-lynn reached out, took the medicine, drank it down. She looked at the child who was her daughter and was struck by pity. Pity for herself, pity for the girl. She lay back on her pillow and waited for the medicine to soften her brain. Waited. One. Two. Three. Four. Five…Twenty…Thirty. Maybe one day there’d be a medicine to burn away the rest of the child’s parts inside of her.

 

“That’s right. You rest up now, Momma. I done want to make you tired.” The Clemmie child stroked Mae-lynn’s head.

 

Mae-lynn felt as if her brain whirled round and round and then came to a stop. Forty, forty-one, forty-two…one-hundred two. She opened her eyes and there was Clemmie. Mae-lynn said, “It’s tired, sweet girl. Tired, not ‘tared.’ You must work on your diction, Clemmie.”

 

“Yes’m.”

 

Mae-lynn touched her daughter. Smiled. She said, “Now read to me. You can pick the book.” She watched her daughter get up and leave the room. She’d be back with a book, and Mae-lynn would listen to her twang twang. Her daughter. Yes. That was who the Clemmie child was. She knew that. Why did the dead child insist on its jealousy? Why did the dead child make her forget what was her’s?

NEXT

 

Clemmie’s grandma thought how her daughter in law sure was weak. Always had been. She’d tried and tried to get her son to leave that girl alone. She saw how Mae-lynn was. Those doe eyes blinking wide, wet half the time with tears over some silly thing or the other. Luke went sweet on her hard though. He mooned about the farm like his feet weren’t even hitting the dirt half the time. She'd had to knock her son upside the head more times than not, trying to get sense back in that thick skull of his. Then that silly thing come cater-wauling to her with her belly filled with child. She knew it when she saw that girl walk slow up the path. Mae-lynn had that look to go along with the crying. That child weren’t but a few week old. Poor thing. That child would have been Clemmie's brother or sister, but it never had a chance to breathe the air.

 

That was the potion Clemmie’s grandma hated the worst. Not like the healing ones, the healing ones were a joy for Grandma to mix and pour down the throat of the sick or the sad. But when the girls wanted the babies gone out their bodies, Grandma could hardly stand it. Gave her heebers jeebers and some the time she had to take to her bed and ask Jesus to forgive her and not send her off to hell. But, then she would think, why she got that way about her if it weren’t given to her by Him himself? She thought how there had to be a reason for it and that’s just how thing turn up and out in the old world. World been around longer than she had, longer than her momma and daddy and longer than their momma and daddy and then longer still. Them potions been thought up for a reason, too. Not up to Clemmie’s grandma to put judgment on what she was taught by all the ones before her.

 

So, Clemmie’s grandma took care of that one for Mae-lynn, before she came to be her daughter in law. Grandma knew it had to be done. She mixed up the herbs and the root and the bark and cooked it until it was thick, then she added a bit of sugar to sweet it, and some apple juice to thin it. Clemmie’s grandma knew Mae-lynn would be bleating like a lamb cause of its thick bitter taste. Well, she thought, them things supposed to taste bitter! Who says life is all the time sweet? That Mae-lynn expected her whole life to be like a fluffy cloud drifting on down the sky without a care in the world. Mae-lynn’s own daddy spoiled her rotten since her momma gone to heaven with the cancer. Grandma felt sorry for her about that, and she didn’t have a mean bone in her whole body, but that Mae-lynn wasn’t any easier to swallow when she come round flipping them eyelashes and twisting them hips ever so slightly, making Luke lose his mind over her.

 

Mae-lynn drank that potion down fast, she did. She knew what it was all about and she drank it down and she made a face like it was nasty, but she didn’t stop drinking it down til it was all gone, ever last drop. After, Clemmie’s grandma knew she’d have a hard time with the hurting and when the babe would expel out of her. She figured Mae-lynn would set up to bawling, so she let her stay in her room until it was over. But Mae-lynn surprised Clemmie’s grandma. When the blood came and what was there of the babe came, Mae-lynn just rolled over and sighed. That was it. Just rolled over and sighed.

 

More and more Grandma thought how Clemmie’s momma don’t seem right in the head a’tall no more. All them headaches poking her head, pulling at her brains. Clemmie’s grandma felt bad for her. She tried potion after potion, and none helped her for long. Poor thing. Ever since Mae-lynn had birthed Clemmie, she was worse with them headaches and her strange ways. It vexed Grandma to no end. Grandma raised up Clemmie most herself, but she was glad of it.

 

Grandma went out to the garden. It was time to pick some maters for supper. She had to wring the chicken’s neck, too, since Mae-lynn wouldn't do it. Clemmie would, Grandma knew she would. Soon as Grandma let her Clemmie would  do it cause she’s tough, just like her grandma. But Grandma didn’t want to put that on her too soon. Those kinds of things came soon enough to a young girl. All things came soon enough for a girl. Yup, soon enough.

NEXT….

 

Clemmie sat up from a sleep, rubbed her eyes. The wind had awakened her. She’d never heard wind sound that way. A great beast like in her fairy tale books rushed through the woods, stepping on trees, throwing aside rocks, its hollering pushing up and out from deep inside its belly with the fury of forty-thousand crazed-up mad hornets. Over the angry monster-wind, came Momma’s screaming. Clemmie threw back her quilt and ran from her room, met her daddy as he ran to her. He held Momma in his arms, and she was tiny there, like a little child, but her mouth was open wide, her eyes staring at something Clemmie couldn’t see, her screams tearing out of her as if to rip wide open her insides, crack her lips, swell her tongue as it flopped and worked.

 

            Daddy pushed into Clemmie with his body, forcing her to the back door, yelling in her ear, “Clemmie! Git to the tater house. Now!”

 

“Grandma?” She turned to go back, but Daddy grabbed her, pulled her outside, one arm holding fast to Momma, the other to Clemmie. They burst right out into one of Clemmie’s strange dreams. The dirt was swirling, limbs were scattered, the clothes Momma forgot on the line were thrown willy nilly—one of Daddy’s shirts was wrapped around the fence post and the sleeves reached out to her, as if begging her to come save it. The wind entered her ears, nose, mouth, grabbed her breath away. The sky was green-black, and boiled and hissed and fumed. Daddy held on to Momma, he held onto Clemmie, as they ran to the little underground room.

 

            The door was already open and Clemmie made her way down the ladder, Daddy still pushing at her, still holding on to Momma with one arm. When Clemmie turned round, she almost cried, if that was her way and it was not so she did not cry, no sir. Grandma was already there, her mouth in a tight lined of worry. Daddy quick put Momma down on the floor next to a mound of potatoes and onions, and hurried to help Grandma fasten up the door tight. The door bucked like one of Aaron’s wildest stallions.

 

The strongest man in the world was jerked and pulled as he strained to keep the door shut. Grandma held onto Daddy, and Clemmie held onto Daddy, too. When Clemmie thought things couldn’t get any wilder, any louder, the monster stomped and threw a fit right on top of the tater-house. The door bowed up and looked as if it might break into a million pieces, the wind rushed in, weaved and spat around them, knocked over the tomatoes Clemmie had stacked just so where they rolled like little lost heads. Clemmie felt her daddy as he came off the floor, taking Grandma and her up with him. Her ears popped and then stopped up and then popped again. The monster was trying to suck them all out, suck them out and into its mouth where he’d chew them up and spit them out.

 

Grandma screamed into her ear, “Done let go! I’ma say a prayer…” and the rest was lost, but Clemmie knew Grandma was praying and praying. Clemmie sure hoped Grandma’s God was listening.

 

Daddy’s face turn red, then purple, the veins in his neck pushed out and throbbed, his arms jerked and strained. The monster pulled and pushed and bellowed—it wanted them bad, it did.

 

            And then, just when Clemmie was about to go insane, the monster ran off, right into the woods, stomping down the trees away from them. Her daddy fell to the floor, sweat running off him, his breath coming fast and hard. Grandma leaned into him, patted him, told him he done good, he done protected his family.

 

Clemmie turned in a circle, took in the vegatables they'd picked and stored, took in Grandma's canning from last summer, took in the tomatos scattered, took in her momma curled up on the floor rocking like a baby, took in her daddy taking in air like a fish out the water, took in her grandma patting her daddy and telling him God saved us and maybe he saved the house, too. She took it all in and a guilty rock settled inside her stomach, for Clemmie realized what she felt right then was a wicked and jittery excitement. She knew the earth and the sky had showed her something wild that she’d never forget as long as she lived. She shivered with a pleasure she knew was wrong, but couldn't help. The wind had entered her and tossed her insides about and she’d liked it. She’d liked it good.

 

            She stepped on the ladder, unlatched the door, opened it, and climbed out. The early morning light slipped through, pointing at the mess—there, the light said, look there and there, and look over there! She turned to the right to see if the monster had swallowed her house. It was still standing in the dirt. Except, something was wrong. Clemmie wiped wet and dirt from her eyes, looked again, and there, yes, the monster had torn the roof clean off the house, as if it wanted to peek inside to see what all they had, then got bored and went to find something else to tear up.

 

Behind her, she heard Daddy sigh, then say, “Wale, best get to work.”

 

Grandma said, “Yep. I’ll get Rachel settled down. She’ll be fine in that there tater-house for a spell. I reckon to start up the cleaning after I give her a potion.” Grandma looked at Clemmie. “Git busy, girl.”

 

“Yes’m”

 

“And, whachoo all bugger-eyed about? I tol’ you a ternader was coming.”  She winked at Clemmie then, and Clemmie knew her Grandma felt just like she did.

 

While Clemmie swept, mopped, wiped, her tired pulling at her til she almost pulled down, a little thought started up her back, worked its way wiggling to her brain, what about Aaron? Did his insides get swirled about, too? Was his house still there? Was all his animals crazy with scared? Did he feel shivery ? She wanted to run down the mountain to find out, but there was work to be done, and that was just how it had to be…

A P.S. - Wow! When it rains...I just received an acceptance for my short story "Bien P'tit Gens (tiny people) from Drollerie Press! *big smile* ...details when I get them.

 

I'm interrupting Clementine just for a moment, but she is coming back—probably today, as the words want to come fast and since I’m writing her here, I can hardly wait to get back to her…I’m impatient to. But, please know that I'm writing Clemmie right onto the blog, so it is completely a rough draft - this is how I write in my word files, except without the “constraints” of space. I set down the words and let everything just come without self-editing, then when I've emptied it all out, I go back and begin the reading/re-writing/editing process--this works well for me. Something’s will go, something’s will be added, but more, I'll catch the things that aren't clear, fix things out of sequence or that don't work, etc., and fill in dialogue, scene, landscape - whatever is needed to make it lush.  Writing onto a blog is a bit daunting, for you will see my errors and as a writer or as an editor, that's ...well, erk- when writing so fast onto a blog page, errors will happen and with MSN's bugs, fixing those errors can be frustrating; sometimes the page freezes and I give up. So, bear with me if you find errors or inconsistencies. Right now, I am going in and out of time, from when Clementine is at present time as an old woman, back to when she is young-beginning at 12. This in and out is confusing as it is right now, but, when I go back into re-writing, all that will be smoothed out and fixed in its final form. Right now is the exiting fun time – the time when the character(s) are coming alive. 

 

You are reading as the story and characters come alive – you are experiencing it right along with me, thank you for reading. Let’s see where it all goes. Usually NO ONE sees this part—this draft part, this part where I just sit and write and let things come out as they will…usually, this is the hidden part, the secret part…the reader sees the end result after all the work has been done.

 

Now, next, I wanted to share with you some publishing “successes” – I started this blog to share my angst and my “success” – so, with the rejection also comes the acceptance….yes!

 

I had a photograph published in spring 2008  issue of OCEAN Magazine….The photograph was taken from my porch over looking those mountain and ridge and valley views you can see from my blog photos. I caught a sunrise and misty morning that was so very golden. Yes, sunrises are “clichés” in a way in the world of photography – the easy beauty; however, every now and then one captures my attention with its power. This photograph also has an orb….some interesting things with Orbs and how I’ve seen more of them here than anywhere else I’ve ever photographed.…ever. Diane Buccheri, publisher of OCEAN, used the photograph to accompany her essay and that made it doubly exciting for me…to pick my photo to go along with her work...*smiling* To support OCEAN, and our oceans, click on the link.

 

And, I have three poems that will be in Cantaraville Three. I’m very exited about this, since I do not write poetry often. However, these three poems were gut-written and I’m happy to have them included. There is also work by: Jack ADLER, Gary BECK, Evan BROOKE, Peter DABBENE, Linda ETTINGER, Anne GOODWIN, John GREY, Saurabh GUPTA, Stephen GYLLE