associated in random thought

joining in

when i left pam's house on saturday morning, i pleaded, "please, come knock on my door if you need anything at all. i'll be home all day." pam is stubborn, fiercely independent. i was just another friend, offering up help she would never take. and, i wasn't even sure i meant it--how serious are we when we say it? was i trying to make myself feel helpful? better?

four hours later, i was curled up in bed with the dogs, napping. there was a knock at the door. pam stood on the patio. her mascara had begun to run. "can you help me bring in some trees?" how had she possibly gotten her hands on trees since i last saw her? i didn't ask. i'd said i'd help with anything she needed. right now, she needed someone to help her with trees. i walked outside, barefoot, and saw them: two very tall trees hanging out the windows of her hyundai like dogs.

She had to have trees, she said. Magnolias and plum trees. For her new home. “If I have trees, everything will be ok. It’ll be ok.� She said it over and over to me, and then she started to cry. I know it was the drugs. I know it was the alcohol that she shouldn’t be mixing with the drugs. I smelled it. Still, I wasn’t angry with her for going to buy trees by herself. Because, upon her return home, she realized she couldn’t do it alone. She knocked on my door. I carried in her heavy trees, pot by pot. And now, my back seizes and spasms; I pulled something. And I have entered into her world. Right now, her world is full of plants. "I bought an orchid, too," she said before I left. "I've always wanted one." It bloomed bright purple on her porch.

I long to believe, with everything that is in me, that this is the Gospel, the taking up of a cross.

i just hope that pam doesn't try to drive again.

and i've made a massage appointment for tomorrow with kenny, my nextdoor neighbor.