Too Much of a Good Thing

by J. J. Murray

  The Castle has definitely been an education for me and my kids, and one day I will cancel my cable because of it. I can spend hours at the windows watching the Third World walk by, wearing colorful scarves and head coverings and handmade dresses. I can hear Spanish, and Bosnian, and Creole, and Arabic, and Pashto mixing with bold attempts at English. I can feel and see the village taking care of its own people. My kids get as much of an education after school here as they do in school. The Castle is a place where difference is normal, where skin color, fabric, hair, and even noses defy convention. There’s so much texture here, so much ... life. Atangaye na jua hujuwa—“A person who wanders around by day a lot, learns a lot.” I have learned so much in my wanderings around here.

  And it’s nice to live around other people who don’t have much. I know that sounds strange, but daily it makes a difference for me. No one in The Castle is in competition to get the “next best thing” to show off. My busted, dented, dusty, and paid-off Nissan Sentra looks right at home next to ancient Buicks, Chevrolets, and Fords parked around The Castle. We’re not poor—we just don’t have much money. Rema once told me, “Lacking money is not necessarily the same as being poor,” and I know she’s right.

  Whenever the ice-cream truck comes around, I no longer feel the need to give my children money, ever since the day I saw Rema calming her four children with one phrase as the ice-cream truck rolled away. My kids hear “No,” but they have to keep negotiating. Rema’s kids had just walked away smiling while mine stewed long into the night because they didn’t get any overpriced ice cream. I just had to find out what she told her kids.

  “ ‘Ah,’ ” Rema said. “ ‘I tell them I live as I can afford, not as you wish.’ ”

  Trust me—if you say that line five times a day to each child, your kids will stop pestering you for anything.

  I wouldn’t live anywhere else but The Castle now.

  A long time ago after watching The Color Purple, I got it into my head to become a missionary to Africa. Now, I guess I’m kind of a missionary here among these people. Or maybe, and I’m believing this more and more, these people named Isha and Nuri and Hijiro and Yussuf and Sabtow are missionaries to us. Rema says, “ ‘God is our neighbor when our brother is absent,’ ” and I truly believe God is in our neighbors.

  What time is it? Geez, we’re running late, but I can’t leave Joe hanging. “Okay, Mr. Man-in-a-similar-predicament.”

  I start to type:

  Joe:

  I’ll pray for you

  “Msema pweke hakosi,” Junior says from the front door.

  “Huh?” I ask. That’s a new one. “What does it mean?”

  “It means, ‘One who talks to himself or herself cannot be wrong.’ ” He smiles. “You were talking to yourself again, Mama.”

  “I was?”

  “You’re praying for someone named Joe, right?”

  I was talking to myself, all right. Hmm. “Let me finish, okay? And help your sister with her backpack.”

  I finish typing:

  Joe:

  I’ll pray for you. Have you tried having a family meeting to get everything out into the open? It hurts, but it can start you and your family on the way to healing. Let me know how it goes.

  Shawna

  “Mama, you at it again?” Crystal asks from the hallway, Toni trailing behind.

  I hit the SEND button. “At what again?”

  “Trying to save the world one e-mail at a time,” Crystal says.

  I stand in an attempt to dress Crystal down with my eyes, but I can’t since she’s almost wearing her clothes again. Deep V top showing more cleavage than I have (Rodney’s people are big-breasted) and a whole lot of flat stomach and pierced belly button (I wish I could show off that much!), tight black jeans, and no panty line. She has to be wearing a thong again.

  “Girl, you cannot go to school looking like that. They’ll send you home.” Again. I’m praying for a cold spell so she’ll have to cover up all that skin, but Roanoke doesn’t start to really cool off until mid-October.

  “They won’t send me home for this.” She poses.

  Junior shakes his head. “Kizuri chajiuza kibaya chajitem-beza.”

  “Mama, he’s doing it again!” Crystal whines. “Why can’t you just speak English for a change? You ain’t African.”

  “Tell her what it means, Junior,” I say, hoping it’s something deep.

  “It means ‘A good thing sells itself,’ ” he says, “ ‘while a bad thing advertises itself.’ ”

  So true. Miss Thing is advertising Miss Bad Thing today. If I weren’t her mama, I’d say, “What’s that child selling?”

  Junior smiles at Crystal. “You are a flag blowing in the wind, my sister.”

  “I ain’t advertising nothing,” Crystal says, teeth clenched, a finger in Junior’s face.

  “Speak English,” Junior says, and he opens the door, Toni zipping around them out to the sidewalk, Junior drifting through the door.

  “I am speaking English, African Boy,” Crystal says, practically stepping on the backs of his feet. “You’re only learning that stuff cuz you want to get with Amina ...”

  After I get a sweatshirt that Crystal will wear all day or else to cover up all that skin, I lock up, chuckling to myself. I used to hate any kind of arguing in my house, and Rodney did, too. We argued softly, reasonably, without raising our voices. But now, I don’t mind the yelling so much, mainly because of something Rema told me. She said something so beautiful in Swahili to me one day when I had to go outside to separate Crystal’s flailing (and sharp) fingernails from Junior’s face.

  “What does it mean?” I had asked.

  In her lilting voice, Rema said, “ ‘Hot water not burn down house.’ ”

  Hot water does not burn down a house.

  In other words, fussing doesn’t destroy a family.

  At the rate we’re fussing, though, we’re bound to be the strongest family that ever lived.

  I can live with that.

  3

  Joe

  Wow.

  Sixty people answered my post, but not many said they would pray for us. Some give advice: “Get a nanny ... ” “Hire a housekeeper ...” “Move to a new house ...” “Move back home to your family in Canada ...” “Go to church more often ...” “Read this book I wrote ...” “Call this toll-free hotline.” One even suggested I cart all three of them off to military school.

  Though that particular idea is tempting, I cannot live alone in this house in Wasena. This was Cheryl’s dream house, all eighteen hundred square feet of it. She refinished the hardwood floors, she updated the kitchen, she nagged me to build the fence, the deck, and the playhouse, and ... Okay, she didn’t nag me. She would just drop hints for days and weeks, and, like water dropping on a stone, eventually she’d get through to me.

  God, I miss her.

  I look back at all the advice. One person asks where Cheryl’s family is and why don’t they help. Cheryl was from Oregon, a navy brat, the youngest of five, and her folks passed within a year of each other about six years ago. We had already lost touch with her brothers and sisters completely before Cheryl died. As for my family, my brother is a missionary in Irian Jaya, but he and my parents e-mail me often enough.

  I just feel so alone in all this.

  I’m not quite alone. Arnie Roberts, a retired army chaplain and member at Shenandoah Baptist where we’ve attended since Rose was born, stepped in and helped me with the funeral. Arnie is all short hair, spit, and polish, the fittest seventy-year-old I’ve ever known. He’s been a mighty prayer warrior and friend, calling regularly to catch up and sitting with us during the morning service. My kids call him Uncle Arnie, and that suits him fine. I’m not sure if he adopted us or we adopted him, but he is one powerful church brother to have, sharpening me and my walk with the Lord as “iron sharpeneth iron” (Proverbs 27:17).

  I just wish Arnie weren’t so pushy about me finding another wife. “Get yourself another Proverbs 31
woman,” he tells me. Cheryl fit some of the qualities of the woman described in that famous passage, a passage usually read on Mother’s Day, but, honestly, I don’t think there are that many women who have ever lived who match the Proverbs 31 woman, who is worth “far above rubies.” This particular woman has to be able to sew, shop, cook, clean, take care of her family, work eighteen-hour days, do charitable work, and somehow find time to work in the garden. “She will do him good,” the Bible says. “Strength and honor are her clothing.” If I ever found a woman like that ...

  I think I did once. Cheryl was her name.

  I browsed a few websites claiming they could find me my soul mate (“She’s out there waiting for YOU!!!”) in sixty days or less (“Guaranteed, or your money back!!!”) and read post after post titled “LOOKING/PRAYING FOR A PROVERBS 31 WOMAN.” At first, I was surprised that so many women responded to these posts, but when I read what these women had to say, I wasn’t surprised at all. “That woman doesn’t exist, you foolish men” is how most of the nicer ones began. “She’s just an example of the woman God wants us to be ... ” “She is the model, and the rest of us real women are the clay ...” “Why waste your entire life looking for this woman when the woman of your dreams might be sitting in front of you at church?”

  “I’m on the lookout, Joe,” Arnie says, “always on the lookout.”

  I’m not sure I should be taking advice from Arnie, a lifelong bachelor, at all, but it’s nice to know someone is on the lookout for me.

  Arnie and all these folks who sent me e-mails mean well, and I’m sure every bit of their advice is rooted in reality, but only Shawna has given me something concrete, something constructive I can do right now.

  I go to the foot of the stairs. “Family meeting in the kitchen in five minutes!”

  I expect to hear a door or two opening, the familiar “What’d you say?” echoing throughout the house. But I hear nothing, not a single squeaking bed, shuffling chair, or footstep.

  I climb halfway up. “Family meeting! In the kitchen! Now!”

  “Now” arrives ten minutes later, Joey showing up first. “I was just finishing my homework,” he says.

  Joey is a good kid, hardworking and smart, a better athlete and student than I ever was, excelling in soccer, basketball, baseball, math, and science. I’m hoping he’ll rub off on his little brother, Jimmy, who has turned into a little hellion since Cheryl died. Jimmy thinks nothing of slamming doors, “borrowing” Joey’s stuff, or harassing Joey while he tries to do his homework. Joey has asked for a lock on his bedroom door, but I don’t want that.

  I pray it never comes to that.

  “You had homework on a Friday night?” I ask.

  “Just some reading.”

  He is Cheryl’s son, all right. While Rose, Jimmy, and I would vegetate in front of the TV most nights, Joey and Cheryl would be off by themselves in another room putting together a puzzle, playing Scrabble, or reading quietly. Though he looks more like me than Jimmy does, I don’t really know Joey all that well, and that scares me. I don’t know my own child. I don’t know what’s going through his head, I don’t know why he’s suddenly shy, and I don’t know why he stays inside all the time. He and Jimmy used to tear all over the neighborhood on their bikes or go down to Wasena Park and ride skateboards and play basketball.

  Rose arrives next, looking like death. No father should ever feel this way about his firstborn, but I can’t help it. She has become what she calls a Victorian Goth. “And not just because Queen Victoria smoked marijuana to help her cramps,” she tells me after church last week. Rose has suddenly decided to like corsets, long black gowns, and red ballet slippers. She makes me buy Cheer Dark to keep all her dark clothes nice and Gothic. Her room is a shrine to death with Edgar Allan Poe’s head filling most of one poster on her door. The rest of her room is dedicated to The Rocky Horror Picture Show, huge bloody red lips everywhere. Joey tells me the Goth look “went out years ago, Dad.” I’m hoping it’s just a case of old-fashioned, teenaged rebellion. Just a month ago, she was wearing Levi’s, Nike, and Gap, and had a poster of the U.S. women’s soccer team on the wall. She used to wear makeup, but now she wears no makeup at all, saying she prefers to look unnatural.

  “What’s this all about?” Rose demands.

  “We need to have a family meeting,” I say.

  “To discuss what?”

  “This family?” I smile.

  Rose slumps into a chair, her gown rustling around her. “Is this going to take long?”

  “It might,” I say.

  “Whoopee,” she says.

  Jimmy finally trips down the stairs. “What are you all doing?”

  It must be a commercial break. Jimmy didn’t hear me yelling up the stairs at all.

  “Family meeting, doofus,” Rose says.

  “A what?” Jimmy asks.

  “Family meeting,” Joey says softly.

  Jimmy takes a seat, what used to be Cheryl’s, at the other end of the table. “And no one invited me?”

  Jimmy is the he-man in the family, preferring to use his fists and mouth more than his mind. He has always been a little ornery, but since Cheryl left us, he’s been trouble with a capital T. He has been suspended from the bus for extorting “seat rent” from other kids, sent to the office twice for bullying, and is in danger already of repeating the seventh grade—and it’s only mid-September.

  “Okay, I’ve called this meeting so we can air out whatever has been bothering you since ...” I sigh. “Since Mom died.”

  I brace for an onslaught of grief, despair, angst, and anguish.

  Nothing happens. The mantel clock over the fireplace in the other room ticks on.

  “I can go first,” I say.

  Louder silence.

  “Okay, um, I have to admit that I am the least prepared single parent who has ever lived.”

  I expect a reaction, especially from Rose, but still no one speaks. Should I press on? I wanted them to talk, not me. This meeting isn’t for me—it’s for them—yet here I am doing all the talking.

  I shrug. “I am not a good cook. You all know that.”

  Fast food is my forte, and I’ve even gotten it alphabetized. Most Mondays I stop at the Crossroads Mall McDonald’s on the way home from work, double cheeseburgers and fries from the dollar menu for everyone. On Tuesdays, I hit Western Sizzlin when I’m running late for the Tuesday Special: chopped steak, baked potato or fries, green beans, and roll. Wednesdays is for Wendy’s chili and taco salads. Thursdays we eat the family pack from Taco Bell. Friday we splurge and go to Five Guys Burgers and Fries over in Salem for the best burgers and fries on the planet. Saturdays we sometimes go to Sonic, and Sundays we eat Szechuan if Arnie isn’t treating us to Golden Corral or K&W Cafeteria after church. When I’m not rushed or late or too bushed to cook, I mainly do Hamburger Helper with a side vegetable, garlic bread or rolls, and applesauce.

  If I include the $42 a week I pay for their school breakfasts and lunches, I spend roughly $170 a week on food, which isn’t that bad. At least I don’t think it’s that bad. Cheryl did all the shopping for us before, so I don’t know. I know it’s not as healthy as it could be, that they should be consistently getting more fruits and vegetables, but ...

  “Any comments on my, um, cooking?”

  The mantel clock ticks on.

  “Okay, uh ... I’m also not very good at doing the dishes.” This is why we use Styrofoam plates, and plastic spoons, forks, and cups. I’m sure we have our own section at the landfill by now. “And you know I’m terrible at cleaning up.”

  A few blinks, but otherwise ... I need to take the battery out of that clock!

  “And, Rose, you know I do not shop well. What were you telling me the other day in the mall? That I wouldn’t know a good price if it bit me? Well, I ...”

  Rose yawns.

  Oh, this is going so well.

  “But most of all, I’m sad. I’m sad because I haven’t seen any of you smile or heard any of you laugh
since ...” My voice catches. “Since the funeral.”

  “You haven’t either,” Rose says.

  One of them spoke! But I can still hear that clock!

  “You’re right, Rose. I haven’t had much to smile about lately.” I look at Jimmy first.

  “What?” Jimmy asks.

  “Son, I liked school when I was there a million years ago, but I do not particularly like going there as an adult.”

  “So don’t come,” Jimmy says with a scowl. “They can just put me in detention.”

  “I don’t want you to be in detention, Jimmy.”

  He smiles. “Neither do I, but ...” He shrugs.

  The school has urged me to consider what they call “drug intervention” to control what they think is a “clear-cut case of ADHD,” but I don’t believe it. Jimmy is just expressing his sorrow through rage. I wanted him to play football in August, but we missed signing up because of ... because of Cheryl’s passing.

  I turn to Rose. “And didn’t you used to do homework?”

  “Yeah,” she says. “So?”

  Rose’s answer for everything these days.

  “Look, I want to smile and laugh again. Don’t you? Don’t you want to smile and laugh and get goofy again like we used to?”

  “I miss her,” Joey says, softly, as if saying it only to himself.

  I look at Jimmy and Rose, but their faces betray nothing, not a single drop of emotion. “What do you miss about her most, Joey?”

  Joey looks at the table. “The way she helped me with my homework. She would help me, but she wouldn’t give me the answer. She would ... coax me, you know?”

  Rose exhales sharply. “All you ever think about is school! You are such a geek.”