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WHAT THE WALRUS SAID--Our Authors' Blog--

COMPASSION

 

 

 

When I was in sixth grade, a kid my age confronted my father, at the town's bowling alley.

 

"I'm going to get your son," he said.

 

My father warned me, watch out for Flick.

 

Several weeks passed and one evening my father spoke to me before supper.

 

"Did Flick give you trouble?" he asked

.

"Yeah," I said.

 

"What happened?" my father asked, looking grim.

 

"I knocked him down and that was the end of it," I said.

 

I'd never seen my father looking so pleased, and relieved, and so proud of me.

 

I hadn't thought much of it. Even as a sixth grader I somehow knew this was Flick's sad attempt to get my father's attention. He came from the shacks down by the river, and I suppose he envied me having the father I did, a man well-liked by everyone in our small town.

 

I'm not sure what I learned from that non-episode, but I do still remember it after all these years. Maybe it's to have some compassion, because a person may be nasty out of unhappiness. Maybe it's that some are doomed from birth, by mean parents, or squalor, or bad luck.

 

Not many years later Flick died miserably, apparently drowned in not much more than a puddle, in the parking lot of a run-down resort, up in the Catskill Mountains.

 

--Richard

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HERE'S THE NEW COOPER NORTH MYSTERY

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Just published, When the Wasp Stings—it's the latest Cooper North mystery novel.

 

Cooper's a rarity among fictional women investigators. For one thing, she isn't young. She's 69 years old. She's formidable. She's tall, almost gaunt, with a falcon's penetrating gaze. She sees you, and she sees into you. On the hunt, she's relentless.

 

Cooper's summoned from retirement, back into the prosecutor's office. Her police colleagues need her, because only she can handle the bizarre events suddenly besetting this patch of the Green Mountains, from an alligator scaring shoppers on Main Street to Ninja-costumed psychopaths, rampaging with commando knives. It begins with a maple-syrup entrepreneur's murder, via wasp stings.  

 

Somehow—Cooper isn't sure exactly how—it all fits. Even the Ninjas fit, targeting people Cooper cares about, including a little boy. 

 

Cooper has fans of all ages, but for older readers she's a special delight—here's a strong woman who's been around. She knows some things.

 

I don't know where Cooper came from. She just sprang out of my mind, fully grown and seasoned. I admire her. I wish I could be more like her. I may be her biggest fan.

 

--Richard

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I'M THAT GUY

 

 

You get to thinking about your life, when you're on your back in a hospital bed, leg in agony, waiting for the surgeon to do her thing.

 

I thought, who am I?

 

Here's what I learned as an idiot child, along with a townful of other idiot children.

 

We'd climb the side of the abandoned pocketbook factory, brick by brick, to stand on the roof, looking down four stories at the Hudson River. I already dreaded the climb back down. Braver souls among us felt life's pull—the thrill of being—and they leapt.

 

I stayed back. 

 

So, I knew already, I'm no hero. I'm not that guy.

 

Later, I was the writer guy.

 

I'd put bits of the world into words, for magazine readers to consume. Maybe a physics Nobelist's discoveries, or what the pilots of a terrain-following B-52 bomber experience, roaring inches over mountaintops.

 

Etc.

 

Okay, I thought, whoever I used to be, I'm not that guy now. 

 

I got to listening to my hospital roommate, a newspaper columnist and the host of a public-tv show. He'd go into the New England outdoors, with camera crews, via kayak or canoe or dogsled, if need be. Willem Lange is celebrated hereabouts. He had an infected foot, but told the medical staff he needed to be out by next week---he had shoots scheduled. Also, there was an upcoming trip to Portugal. Willem spent lots of time on his phone, talking to his girlfriend in another state. He called his cane "John McCain."

 

Willem is pushing ninety.

 

He's had six falls this year, he told me. Most recently, in the wee hours. He lay on the floor unable to get up. He had a phone handy, and his daughter and son-in-law live nearby, but he lay on the floor two hours, until they awoke, to call and ask his son-in-law to help him get up, on the younger man's way to work.

 

That's what struck me.

 

I thought about Joyce, back home, worried about me, but carrying on with her own work, which included editing my latest novel, and arranging to visit me every day, and handling most everything in our life together, all our finances and social contacts and just about all else.

 

I thought: have I been appreciating this?

 

So now I know who I aim to be—I'm the guy who looks out for Joyce.

 

I want to be the guy who'll lie two hours on the floor, so people who matter get their sleep.

 

--Richard  

 

 

 

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A LITTLE LOVE STORY

 

 

 

When the national and international news becomes too scary and mean, we look out our window.

 

We see a little park, with a pond and pathways, and a meadow, and a mountain range beyond. Down in the park we see people, but not just people.

 

Yesterday, we saw one of our favorites, Ella Bella Socks, on one of her walks. She is a medium-sized dog of indeterminate ancestry, black, with white feet and stockings, a pretty sight.

 

Also, farther down the path, we saw our friend Ryan, on his ride-on lawnmower. He is a member of the maintenance team here, and another of our favorites…but not just ours.  

 

Socks saw Ryan, and instantly leaped forward—her human companion dropped Socks' leash, and Socks ran, as fast as a dog can run, full tilt toward Ryan and his tractor.

 

He turned off the machine, waited a second, and then Socks—with a tremendous leap—landed atop the lawnmower and in his lap, clearly ecstatic.

 

Later, we asked Ryan about his relationship with Socks.

 

"She loves me," he said. "Whenever she sees me, her owners just drop her leash and here she comes, fast as she can go."

 

Troubling news, yesterday, on the tv and internet and newspapers. It's always troubling. Out our window, however, the headlines were uplifting—

 

"Dog Loves Man!" "Man Loves Dog!"

 

Go ahead, Socks. Do it again. Make our day!

 

--Joyce and Richard

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PALS

 

 

In case you missed it, we just saw a CNN story that hit a chord, and we want to share it.

 

Cinnamon, a goat, and Felix, a 1-year-old bulldog mix, are totally buddies.

 

They hang out full-time, eating, playing, and sleeping.

 

They came to the Wake County Animal Center, in Raleigh, North Carolina, on March 13, 2023, because they each needed a home, and they found one—together.

 

Now they're BFFs, because a local family, with a history of fostering homeless animals, has taken them in. They now have a small herd of goats, for consorting, pastures for romping, and—of course—each other.

 

Animals, we believe, are sentient, like us, with awareness and emotions, a belief based on really smart and caring dogs we've had in our lives.

 

Plus, a bit of back story—when one of us (Richard) was a child, his dog was an exceptionally bright border collie (mix), who took it upon herself to watch over a boy she considered incapable of looking after himself.

 

Richard had a friend up the street who also had a devoted animal in his life, Clover, a goat. Goat and dog became good friends, and when the two boys played together, so did the animals, fun for all.

 

Only sour note: Richard's mother looked askance at a goat in her house, prancing about on sharp little hooves.

 

--Joyce and Richard 

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WALTER'S WINTER

 

 

Now it is March, which is northern New England's season of impatience.

 

Four months now we've had snow and ice, and slippery roads, and frigid Canadian winds. We're ready for crocuses and incoming robins singing cheerio. But that's not yet.

 

South of here, March is when spring finally opens its eyes. Here in the north, it's when spring gives us an occasional sexy wink, to soften us up, then blows more snow in our face.

 

So, here we are, looking out our west-facing windows at the horizon's mountain range, white all the way up the flanks to the peaks. There's a meadow below our windows, rising to a knoll, all buried under a foot of snow.

 

Gray sky, looming clouds. More snow forecast.

 

We stare out the window glumly. After all these months, winter lies heavy on the mind.

 

But what's that, coming up the meadow knoll? It's a woman, bundled in a parka and heavy mittens, and at her feet prances a small mahogany-furred presence, performing ballet moves in the snow.

 

It's Walter!

 

He's a Pembroke Welsh corgi, with a huge personality, but short legs. Walter can't walk through the snow, with those short legs, so he prances through it, jumping, pirouetting, burrowing, leaping up in a geyser of white—having a blast.

 

Walter's endured the same four frozen months as we have, and now he's out in it with no parka, no mittens, no boots…but he's not glum.

 

Walter is joyfully alive, relishing the white stuff in which he prances, gleefully using his snout as a shovel, to throw up powdery white clouds.  

 

Presumably, we should learn from Walter—take what life gives you, cold or warm, find joy, prance.

 

Yes, it would be nice. However, that's not how it is. Our sky's still gray, our meadow's still  mineral white, it's still gusting cold.

 

We watch Walter prance back down the knoll and out of sight, leaving just a memory of exuberance.

 

We're still staring out the window, looking at another month of winter.

Yet, not quite so glumly as fifteen minutes ago.

 

Thanks, Walter.

 

--Joyce & Richard 

 

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BIRDHOUSE FOREST

 

 

South Hero Island, in Vermont, offers stunning views of Lake Champlain. It also offers "Birdhouse Forest."

 

Driving north, toward Canada, you pass a sign: "White's Beach." Look to your right.

 

Most travelers stop here, where a swamp borders the road, unsure what they're seeing.

 

Every tree sports a birdhouse, each in bright flower colors—rose, lilac, daisy, buttercup….

 

This might be a fairy city.

 

Even a few dinosaurs roam among the trees.

 

All this began when two neighbors learned tree swallows eat huge numbers of mosquitoes. Living beside a swamp, they had mosquitoes. So they decided to craft twenty swallow houses and put them up.

 

Swallows came, and flew through the swamp on mosquito hunts. So the neighbors put up more birdhouses, and more, and more….

 

Twenty years later, Birdhouse Forest is a swallow city, with 800 brightly colored birdhouses. For an added frisson, they installed carved wooden dinosaurs. Probably the reptiles wouldn't scare away mosquitoes, but still, worth a try.

 

Keep a lookout, driving America's back roads—you never know what you might see.

 

--Joyce

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A BIRD IN A BUSH

 

 

One July afternoon, when I was ten, a classmate and I bicycled through the hills outside of town.

 

We rode through a tippy landscape of slopes and valleys, where brown-and-white Herefords grazed in green meadows, and maple and sycamore leaves riffled in the breeze.

 

In a small pond, on a floating log, a line of painted turtles sunbathed.

 

I took it in without noticing, the way we breathe.

 

And then, in a bush, a flash of blue—it startled me.

 

One sneaker planted on the road to balance, I stared.

 

I knew what it was, because my father had just returned from his annual session at furnace school, learning the new models, and he'd brought me a gift: The Golden Nature Guide to Birds, 112 Birds in Full Color.

 

I'd never particularly noticed birds. Now, having gone through that book, page by page, mesmerized by the golds and oranges and scarlets, and the sharp black eyes, I knew what I saw in that bush.

 

Indigo bunting.

 

Blue as the zenith.

 

In a moment, it vanished, deeper into the foliage, I suppose.

 

Many decades later, I still remember that indigo flash, so stunning it seemed a message.

 

Message received, but never fully understood.

 

Keep alert, I guess. That would be one thing.

 

Because, any time, you could pedal past a marvel, thinking about something else.

 

You'd miss it.

 

--Richard 

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ARCTIC PATROL

 

 

 

"We'll stop at this iceberg for lunch," the sergeant told me. "But first we do a drive-around, to check for polar bears."

 

This was a routine two-man snowmobile patrol over frozen Baffin Bay—the French-Canadian sergeant and an Inuit constable. They constituted the entire Royal Canadian Mounted Police detachment at Pond Inlet, the Inuit village at Baffin Island's northern tip.

 

I was just a visitor, along for the ride, swaddled in a borrowed RCMP parka. My hands had started freezing, so the constable loaned me his spare dog-skin mittens—last winter, distemper killed every sled dog in town, and the Inuits salvaged what they could.

 

After lunch, we roared past more frozen-in icebergs, jutting up like buttes and mesas, blue and green. We headed toward Bylot Island, all that stood between us and Greenland.

 

A glacier covered the island, and we faced a nearly vertical ice wall.

 

"Get a good running start," the constable instructed me.

 

I watched the two Mounties roar up and over. I started up after them, but too slow. Near the top, my snowmobile's treads spun. No traction. I slid backwards, ever faster, toward the rocky scree at the glacier's base.

 

I squeezed between boulders. Lucky. On my second run, I made it over and saw…more ice.

 

I saw lots of ice during my stay on Baffin Island. I ate raw seal blubber at Pond Inlet's annual spring on-the-ice party. My hotel was a large Quonset hut, where the nightly menu consisted of Arctic char. I remember purple evening skies and kids riding tricycles in the midnight sunlight. What I remember most, though, is the Inuit constable.

 

"You might as well call us Eskimos," he told me. "That's what we call ourselves."

 

He'd been born in an igloo, and raised out on the tundra. When Canada decreed all indigenous children must be schooled, his family migrated to Iqaluit, the larger town at the island's southern tip. He befriended the RCMP officers there, and it led to his career in law enforcement.

 

So here we are, the constable and I, in Pond Inlet's town hall, to fax a report to the main RCMP post in Iqaluit, and I hear him muttering to himself: "This baud rate's way too slow!"

 

So complained the man raised in an igloo.

 

Here's another moment: he's describing Pond Inlet's winter, since spring seems frigid enough to me, and he says it's not the cold he minds, but the weeks of darkness.

 

"My wife, my kids, me—every winter we take a vacation," he said. "We fly down to the Caribbean."

 

--Richard     

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SWIMMING WITH MONSTERS

 

 

After he anchored his boat at the reef, the ichthyologist let us choose—Richard opted for aqualung, Joyce for snorkel.

 

Here, not far out from George Town, the Grand Cayman Island capital, we looked down through perfectly clear Caribbean waters at black bat shapes gliding across the white sand bottom.

 

A moment later, we swam among them. They looked like B-2 Spirit strategic stealth bombers.

 

Sting rays.  

 

We should have been frightened of creatures that looked so lethal. In fact, the Australian conservationist and zookeeper, Steve Irwin, died after accidentally disturbing one and receiving a sting to the chest.

 

Yet, we felt no fear. We felt charmed.  

 

As Joyce snorkeled near the surface, rays flew up and swam with her, gently flapping their huge wings. She felt surrounded by friendly dogs.

 

Richard, near the bottom with his aqualung, found himself escorted by a squadron of the black animals, each the size of a dining room table. One swam up from behind and wrapped its wings around him, scuba gear and all.

 

And what Richard would always remember, looking into those brown eyes—sentience.

 

Maybe humanity doesn't need to go as far as the stars.  

 

We can find intelligent alien life here on Earth, and in its waters.

 

—Joyce & Richard

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