July 2, 2017

4th of July at Home

          The dogs lie in the passageways, idle as exercise equipment.
          I am not a dog owner, really.
          My covenant to them is three, sometimes four, walks a day. I scrub the soiled door mat, become giddy at treat time, and sit on the floor of the large, ivory kitchen alongside them as they pant and stretch. They lie pointed toward me as if I were Gandhi, about to speak. But I am only a fair weather hugger—I cannot fill those empty cups, those bored, patient eyes. Why do they look at me?
          I am alone in a house in New England.
          I am the newcomer at church.
          I am the nice man in glasses, walking his dogs.
          I am an alcoholic, foreshortening my life bottle by bottle, breathing in the poison of a lifetime of articulate disapprovals, postponing the dishes, making myself laugh.
          I'm too busy hugging myself.
          I've read that Natalie Wood, in fact, deftly paddled and steered the dingy that windy night and succumbed only yards from shore. 
          I need there to be a God, a Lord of the middle-aged, of those who strugglealmost successfullyto forgive themselves their trespasses, their idiosyncrasies, the rosy, affluent scorn of old lovers' faces in 5 a.m. dreams.
          Ten summers ago my uncle died in this town, and I had to buy a fleece jacket for the unseasonal cold. Today the sun bakes the macadam, and I lay my palm on it before the dogs cross, like a young mother tests a baby's milk on her wrist.
          At the same spot, we stop and I stare at the old white house rising from the driveway: so elegant and cool in its necklace of ferns. Who could have guessed a decade later I'd live in same the town, removed like a polyp from the big city—I don't miss it. But will anything be the same after this summer, living so close to my beloved island but barred from it? Smelling the ocean but never seeing it.
          Stuck in town.
          When Gary finally comes, will we fall back into our usual walk around the block, its familiar scents and threats?
          Down Elm and up Pine.
          One more time before bed.