the first gift.

my friend George knows the storyteller's art. he pulls you in like fresh catch, asking you questions about yourself until he lures the conversation to the tale he longs to tell. i have always loved his stories, whether they be about his extended family or set in the high school locker room we girls could never enter, or at the 8th grade lunch table or about the quirky folks who made up our town when we were children. George seems to remember everybody he's ever talked to, the conversations he's had with them, moments in class from our junior year when a misstep by a classmate turned into the perfect comic moment. how his French teacher uncle always identified his students by name en francais. he is particular in his questions, mining for more stories as you talk.

i've probably known George my whole life — i don't remember meeting him at all. he was just always there, in kindergarten, in church, in the neighborhood. in his family he is the lone boy in a sea of older sisters. his father died tragically when we were in late high school. his father's twin sister lived next door to me. 

George's mother died this past week at 91, and though i couldn't make her service today, i sat down to write him a note. and then i thought better of it. and called.

when he picks up, his drawl of a voice stretches out for the length of the block where he grew up and where some of his family still lives. he is serious at first, though he assures me that all will be fine. his mother didn't suffer long. his father's aunt — also a member of our home parish — died at 100 only a few hours after his mother, so his extended family stands caught in their grief for both women, our tiny home church fielding two funerals in two days. we talk a bit about that, and then the stories begin, stories that follow a route through memory into laughter and back again.

i'm easily lured. as the last child of a family not kin to anyone in town, our family stories don't extend beyond a generation. But George is kin to practically everybody, by birth or by marriage. and he knows at least one story about almost every one of them. if i had a day or two to sit with him (and i wish i did) i know i would hear them all.

our phone call is cut short (at 45 minutes) because of a business call he has to take, but the time with him on the phone feels so much like the first gift of Christmas that i have given myself. i tend to forget, now that my mother is no longer living in the house where i grew up, how much that house and that place mean to me. 

yes, i could have written that note (i will Mama, not to worry), but now i will treasure the story that came because of the conversation. thank you, George, old friend. keep 'em coming.



writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.

Dreams with Daddy

My father sits in a small metal side chair, the kind you find in a hospital room, a blank wall at his back. He wears his Sunday suit, the silver tie he saves for weddings. He crosses his legs, looks at his fingers like I have seen him do a thousand times. Silent, we wait together, for I know not what. I want to lean into him, and I wonder what he is thinking. 

Daddy’s fingers are thin and nimble, the skin taut, the kind of hands a doctor needs for his work. I notice he is not biting his fingernails or the skin around them, something he has done most of his life. A tiny thing, but significant, it seems.

We wait together like we used to during my mother’s many surgeries. Broken hips — too many times to count — a knee. Her back. In those times I knew he was worried, so I tried to draw him through it with my chatter — about children, neighbors, work, anything but politics.  

This is the first time in many months Daddy has not been lying in a hospital bed, with me trying to keep the one-sided conversation going. I’m talking to him, effusive in my glee at finding him all dressed up and sitting in the chair.

But here’s the thing: It’s a dream. My father died in April.

Right after Daddy died, I was hopeful he would visit me. I climbed in bed each night, wondering when it might be. I had dreamed of others in my life who had died. Why should Daddy be any different? 

I was sure he was coming. It would just be a matter of time.

And he did come, swiftly, standing in the front hall of my childhood home in his Sunday suit, next to the mirror, his hair grayer than I remember. I hugged him, feeling such joy at the warmth of him, telling him I knew he would come, and then he melted away.

But he came again, this time sitting in that chair, in the shadows, while the world goes on around him. And that’s where he has been in a half-dozen dreams since. When I see him there I’m overcome with joy. I feel the knot in my throat, thinking I might cry, just watching him sit, in a room that is neither cold nor hot, so thrilled I am, happier than I have felt for a very long time.

And then the alarm startles, the dream fades, and I am back to day, feeling the ache of a world without Daddy in it.

I am a dreamer. Both night and day. Those who know me well know I often don’t hear the conversation, don’t even know anyone is talking to me. Not solely because I have lost some of my hearing, which I have, but rather I am lost in what I am thinking. 

Daddy knew that about me. Once, when I was about 9, he called me a liar because I had no idea where my sister was. I didn’t. Had she told me? In my memory, I see her form sliding past me in the family room as she says something. I was lost in a book, until his words stung. Was I that? A liar? Is that all he thought of me? I spent years trying to prove otherwise.

We've been looking at the scriptures of Advent during my writing class at church. We're trying to find where we fit in the story of the virgin birth in the manger with the shepherds and all that. 

Since I was a child, I’ve used my dreams to figure out the world. 

The ages-old Christmas story takes on a new slant when I read about Joseph, who learns in a dream what he should do with his not-yet-wife-but-oh-so-pregnant betrothed.

So how do I fit in this story? It feels presumptuous to think God is speaking to me in my dreams. Who am I to be that important? Yet Daddy's not the only person in my life who has died but who has come back in my dreams — my mother-in-law, my grandfather, a childhood friend who was not always so nice — and so, I wonder.

In early February, as Daddy lay fighting pneumonia in the hospital where he  practiced medicine for 50 years, he told me he would not get better. “You’ll have to take care of your mother,” he said. I knew then would not survive this fight and that this was his directive to be followed. But how in the world would we manage?

In the months since his death, the days and decisions have been dizzying. A new home for my mother, a new town. Our home, an empty shell. And yet, there are days when I’ve almost forgotten he’s not still there, just on the other end of the phone when I call, sitting in his chair with the dog in his lap. Except the number we had my whole life doesn’t work anymore, and only my mother answers the new one.

I don’t want to live in a dream world. I want to be awake and alive. Occupy the now. But it feels like I am waiting for Daddy to say something, when he comes in my dreams. I suppose I am looking for specifics — Joseph certainly got them. Like what do to when Mama won’t take her medicine correctly. Or the intangible, like what heaven is all about. And has he found the dogs, like we asked him to when he was dying, and our grandparents? 

I’m looking for comfort, too, that despite the fact that he is not with us anymore, all will be well. 

The move was difficult. Watching my mother as her cherished things were boxed up and loaded into the truck proved heart-wrenching. The packers worked quickly, so we worked behind them, gathering up personal items from his desk, tossing some, keeping others. That first afternoon, we found something torn from a magazine in a small catch-all basket on his desk. It was a poem, no given author, that read in part:

You mustn’t tie yourself to me with tears. I gave you my love. You can only guess how much you gave me in happiness.... let your grief be comforted by trust . . . I won’t be far away, so if you need me, call and I will come. Though you can’t see or touch me, I’ll be near, and if you listen, you’ll hear my love around you, soft and clear.

We felt him there, at that moment and knew he had left the words for us to find, right when we needed them most. 

So I will keep dreaming, in hopes the next time I need him, he'll show up again and this time be ready to talk. 

+ + + + +

To read daily meditations during Advent from the writers of St. Michael's, visit

holymichael.org

, and download These Holy Mysteries.

— Susan Byrum Rountree writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.

one saturday with Daddy

the morning i was to be married, i woke up and heard my father crying, hidden behind the bedroom door. 

i honestly thought he'd be happy to be rid of me, to have another man take my mercurial soul off his hands. 

what will we do? i recall asking my mother, who was not crying at all. 

he'll be fine, she said. don't worry.

overnight, Lydia and cohorts had thrown toilet paper high into the oak trees in the front yard, and i remember him coming by my room, asking me what i wanted to do about it. the reception was at home. and then, as i scurried around getting ready for my big moment, i looked out the window, and my father was swatting at the toilet paper with a rake. though he stood more than six feet, his efforts did little to pull the paper down.

by the time he walked me down the aisle he had dried his eyes, smiled a little, and though i don't remember what he said to me i felt certain, probably for the first time in my life, that Daddy would miss my presence. 

a small combo played at the backyard reception, and though i had not yet danced with my new husband, Daddy and i stole a few moments away from the guests for a dance, both of us quietly sobbing this time.

no one was watching, and i don't even recall the song. 

none of that matters now. because the feeling of that moment lingers, still.

10.10.1981

susanbyrumrountree.com is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.

circles, all around

my purple room friend is a gentle prodder. she had not heard much from writemuch these past few weeks and was wondering what i was thinking. writemuch in fact was, too, wondering what i was thinking, as this, my double-nickel birthday week began. 

it began in fact with circles. walking in circles, that is, which when i think about it, is pretty much how my mind works. i start out thinking i'm going to clean out the pantry but that leads somehow to the bedroom closet which leads to the tomato patch which leads to the kitchen window sill which makes me hungry which leads me back to the pantry. and on and on. or how my day goes. circle my block three times with the dog and his friend. spin the tires to work and back. move from desk to copier to kitchen to church and back again. circles.

back to walking. i don't know much about labyrinths or their mystical properties, but there is one where i work. sometimes i walk up through the grass to take pictures of it, but as of last week, i had not actually walked it in a good long while.

but my week began there, with my purple roommate and the others who occupy the work hall with me. our instructions were to walk in silence, and if we bumped into each other along the path not to worry about it too much. that's life, isn't it? distancing ourselves from each other, then circling back, bumping into, distancing again. oh, and we might recognize it as how we meet God on occasion. distancing, bumping into, circling back. letting God circle us sometimes.

i set out on the path and walked those circles and thought, thanked, questioned, petitioned — tried to listen to something more than the soft scuffle of my shoes on brick.

i found myself thanking God for all my years however poorly i have sometimes lived them. just to get up in the morning to begin the circle is a blessing. as i turned a corner down the path (which is really a yellowish sort of brick road) my thinking turned to my hope for my children, which is easy and hard to think about at the same time. both are at corners, each facing change that is unknown and surprising. and as my week began, it was hard for this mother to sit tight and watch, to wait and see.

another corner. another thought. the husband. the job. the community i work for. my own ability to do good in that world and the larger one. what people think of me. and who i really am. heavy and light. light and heavy, thoughts kept coming as gentle as the slow breeze circling me.

back in the office, one of my work friends said they noticed as they turned the corner each time, their thoughts turned a corner, too, their conversation shifted. just like mine.

when i started out my career so many years ago, i worked for a tiny daily newspaper, taking pictures of friday night lights and check presentations. i spent hours in a dark room wearing a shiny yellow apron, dipping my fingers in developer and fix, watching an image emerge from blank paper. the next job — my second one — lasted only one year, yet i wrote and wrote and wrote, made awful mistakes that somehow were forgiven and learned much from them. i learned how to lay out a newspaper, to tell a good story. that job led to this and that through the years, to the job i have now, taking pictures, writing, teaching, designing, questioning. a bit of every little thing i've learned in these 30 years. and last week i produced a little magazine for the people i work for, using all of those skills. circles.

that second job, too, changed me the most, set me on all sorts of paths. it's where i met my husband. got my first dog.

on thursday of last week, my son landed his second career job. oh, the hope i have for him. circles.

on friday, i headed home. if you are born in the South of course you may live anywhere but you are always from one place. on the eve of my birthday, i broke hushpuppies over barbecue and stew at my childhood kitchen table, listening to my parents talk. when i asked them if i was early or late, my mother said a little early. and i learned something new: i had been delivered not by the doctor who was my father's partner, but by the nurse who worked for him much of my childhood. Both doctors were busy with a patient when my mother couldn't hold me in anymore, so the nurse pulled my screaming head into the world.

my mother had a couple of gifts for me. one, a small pillowcase hand-embroidered by an elderly neighbor more than 50 years ago. miss applewhite was blind, and though we can't figure out how, she designed a perfect bouquet of flowers with circular centers, never dropping a stitch. i had used this pillowcase as a child. circles.

yesterday, i spent my birthday lunch over burgers with my boys, then we drove around the block to where my son's new office will be. my supper shared with "friendless" friends whose son shares his birthday with me. more circles.

back in the spring, i took part in an online writing community. each day for 37 days we were to answer a prompt. i was working on my novel at the same time, so on some days, i skipped the prompt, including this one on day 11: notice all the circles you see today.

i guess the circles were tired of me not paying attention.

as is usual when i start to write, i have no real notion of what something is about. just a little niggle in my head. blind-like, i fiddle with stitches that seem not to connect, until somehow something whole emerges, just like images from the developer in that dark room years ago.

circles. 

like double nickels taped to a birthday card from my lifelong friend. a new camera and lens from my family. candles for my patio. a casserole dish decorated with a labyrinth of circles. the last of the season's tomatoes on the window sill. zinnias. the communion cup.

circles, all around.





 writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.

the glory and the power of it

my grandfather sold cars for over 50 years but he didn't believe in power windows. they would break too easily, he was sure, so i'm pretty sure as long as he was selling my parents cars, the windows had to be cranked down by hand. imagine. 

one summer night when i was 9 or so, Mary Wallace, my friend Lydia's mother, drove up in the driveway to show us her new car. and oldsmobile. plush seats, FM radio (Bigdaddy didn't believe in that either,) and windows that moved up and down as if by magic. 

'let's go for a ride!' she said giggling, her eyes as wide as her grin. we piled in and off we went, no doubt rolling the windows down and up in the summer air so much so that they might have broken. but they didn't.

Lydia's mother was fun like that. giggling at us girls as we made onion soup on her front porch from wild onions that grew in the yard, played dress up in her shoes. (we piled the onions in a tin bucket along with dirt and water and left our concoction on the front porch — which nobody ever used — to rot in the spring sun.) giggled as we created beauty parlors on her side porch, ate Oreos in her kitchen (no more than two.) crafted barbie doll houses with wall-to-wall carpet, new in the 70s don't you know, from scraps scavenged from her new house. the only thing that would warrant her ire was if we woke the baby. and there were always babies in the house.

birthdays at her house might mean traveling 40 miles to be on television... Lydia's birthday is in November, and so backyard parties like the rest of us had in summer were out of the question. in my memory, we rode across the miles for what felt like a day, then we marched behind WITN-Y the Marching Hobo, watching ourselves on the black and white screen, LIVE. now THAT was a party.

in first grade, she visited our classroom toting a harpsichord, then sat down with it in her lap and made music, playing the songs from our music book. whose mother could do that?  i can see her fingers now, picking out the songs, her voice taking on the words like a bird singing on the clearest of days. the very idea that mothers could be something other than mothers changed me. i didn't imagine that as work, but joy.

she called me su-su. i don't cotton to nicknames, but this one made me feel as if i were part of her brood. she sang at my wedding, my favorite hymn. "Lord of all hopefulness, lord of all calm, whose trust ever childlike, whose presence is balm..."

betty jean, left, with mary wallace

i remember standing there at the chancel steps as she sang the words i had so often sung to myself in the dark when i felt alone. in her voice, the words were balm to a nervous bride. she had known me all my life, and here she was, singing at my wedding. calming me, just because she was there.

Mary Wallace sang for countless brides, including her own daughter... and it was always an event. not to mention funerals— sending her husband off to heaven with a personal rendition of the Lord's Prayer.

she wrote me letters as i grew older, when i wrote stories she liked, and i still have one or two notes i cherish. she was proud of me, of who i had become. i could recognize her handwriting as if it were my own mother's. 

mary wallace, left, sending sparkles

three years ago, she came to my daughter's wedding. fitting, since my child had been in her daughter's wedding some years before. she stayed to the end, lighting sparklers and cheering the newlyweds on. i could not have had this special day without her. there Lydia is, too, in the checked dress in the picture there, celebrating with her mother as we sent the Pea off with her Prince. 

a couple of years ago i came home one day to a message on my answering machine. 'don't you call me back,' she said, but don't you dare take me off your Christmas card list!' (we routinely lampoon the standard holiday newsletter, and she loved the humor of it, knowing about my family, keeping up.) and i have kept her on my list, still.

this year, i won't get to. she died on Friday, and yesterday, we said goodbye.

if funerals can be great, this was. favorite hymns, stories that made everyone laugh and cry a little, and in the end, her own voice. the voice that celebrated and soothed so many, did all this and more for all of us gathered, once again to grieve for her. there she was, singing the Lord's Prayer, all the glory and the power of it, forever. and we were all blessed by it.

Lydia is not the crier i am. get up and get going, she would often say to me when i faltered. but yesterday, i had the chance to hold her up a little. after the service she looked at me with red eyes and said: "Mama would probably be upset with me, but i had to hear her voice in church one last time."

upset? i doubt it. just filled with joy to have a few last words for her brood.

writemuch.blogspot is the original work of author susan byrum rountree. all written work and photography is copyright protected and can only be used with written permission of the author.