Fifty Acres and a Poodle

by Jeanne Marie Laskas

  Then one day, five years ago, he called me to cancel a lunch appointment. He told me something had happened, something bad. He sounded like a robot, emotionally vacant. He told me he had gone over to his sister’s apartment, a few blocks from his house. He and Marina were always very close. She was a sickly woman, and Alex had spent much of his life caring for her. He hadn’t heard from her in about a week, which was unusual. And she wasn’t answering her phone or returning his calls. He knocked on her door. Knocked and knocked and knocked. He finally called the police. They broke the door down. He walked in and found his sister, fifty-four years old, dead. She had died in her sleep about a week previously.

  He told me what it was like to find her there, her body bloated and blackened, the horrible smell, the whole hideous scene. I remember wondering about my friend Alex, the cheerful jokester hiding such a heavy heart. I wondered if this new burden might finally break his heart into a million pieces.

  Looking back, I think our friendship made a difference. Unwittingly, I think I came to represent new life to Alex. I think our friendship helped keep Alex’s heart alive.

  Then: love. I think our falling in love was a dream Alex could never really believe in, was afraid to believe in, like Charlie Brown running toward the football, over and over again, only to have Lucy snatch it away.

  And I think that the cancer scare last spring was the final test. I believe Alex thought Of course, when he heard the news of that tumor. I believe these were the words he couldn’t bear to utter. This was the glaring, simple truth: Of course. He had done his job, raised two wonderful kids, buried his parents and his sister, and now it really was time to go. Time to wither. Maybe this is why Alex kept saying “I’m sorry.” Kept apologizing to me. As if he should never have involved me in his life, because deep down, he knew. Deep down, he believed his life was coming to an end.

  I think the farm, for him, was just an illusion of heaven, maybe even a foreshadowing.

  Until the day that doctor called. Until B-9.

  That was the day the farm became real to him. Or maybe he became real to him. The farm became true. Living became actual. He wasn’t finished at all.

  And so in the few months since the ladybug invasion, since spring arrived and the warm winds blew away bad news, blew it away and made room for good news, Alex sat down and began writing his book. The book he’s had in his head for almost twenty years. A book about what it’s like to lose your parents. About surviving, really surviving the transition into becoming an “orphaned adult.” He sat for hours upstairs in the rickety old converted attic room, completing the manuscript.

  So he’s an author now, and a farmer, too. Not a withered leaf, at all. “How did I get here?” he says sometimes, looking around like a man who fell asleep on the train, missed his stop, and finds himself in a brand-new, beautiful place. A place that was there all along, but a place he never knew how to get to. A place called home.

  “Hey!” he calls over to me. “Yo, bride!”

  I look over.

  “Yo, bride?” I say. “Is that any way to address Her Majesty?”

  “Sorry,” he says. “But would the bride like to have barbecued chicken tonight?”

  “Um. I don’t actually know if brides are allowed to barbecue,” I say. “I have my nails to think about.”

  “The groom will light the grill,” he says. “The groom will cook.”

  “The bride approves. The bride is happy.”

  We head up to the house, the dogs zooming ahead. Alex grabs hold of my hand. The weeds lining the driveway are already tall and thick; they lend a moistness to the air. I study them for any signs of multiflora encroaching but can find none. These weeds would be easy to mow, I think. But I don’t see any reason to get rid of them. These are wonderful weeds. Every day you come out here, it seems they’re showcasing some new flower. One day the green will be speckled with blue, and the next day it’s blue and orange, and the next day yellow and purple have arrived. Who knew weeds had such a wild imagination?

  As we walk up this driveway, hand in hand, swinging our arms, colors towering high over our heads, I think we must look like children on a really corny greeting card. I think how we didn’t enter this adventure to change ourselves—or our dogs, for that matter. We didn’t go farm shopping in search of new selves. But farm living really has had everything to do with new life. I think back to that first day when we watched the bulldozer give this farm a shave. How I stood there transfixed. Not by the machine. Not by the briars in motion. But by nothing. A nothing that has made room for everything.

  And a mule.

  SEVENTEEN

  I’M AT MY COMPUTER, DOING AN INTERNET SEARCH for mule. A mule, I read, is a cross between a horse and a donkey. Well, I knew that. I mean, I sort of knew that. A mule has the body of a horse and the extremities of a donkey. Long ears, short mane, long legs, short tail. Pound for pound, a mule is much stronger than a horse. Mules have tremendous stamina, can live on frugal rations, and are exceptionally surefooted. Mules, I read, are loyal, intelligent, affectionate, stubborn, obstinate, and/or aloof, depending on the author of the mule description. People seem to have strong opinions about mules. Horse people laugh at mules. Maybe because horse people tend to think in terms of bloodlines, in terms of “showing.” Mules are sterile. There are no bloodlines. Mule people seem to think horse people are snobs. Mule people love the way each mule is unique. Mule people think mules are woefully misunderstood. Mules, it seems, are the underdogs of the equine world.

  The more I read, the more I come to think Alex is definitely a mule person. I wonder if there are many mule people out there who are also poodle people.

  Mules are available in small, medium, and large. You can pick one up for about a thousand dollars.

  But where? And how quickly?

  Billy will know. Billy knows how to get anything around here. Good idea. I’ll go down to the barn and ask him. Billy and Tom and Butch, another helper, have been down there sawing and banging and heave-hoing for a few weeks now, shoring up the barn in what turns out to be a fairly complicated project. I like having the guys back. I like going down there and bringing everybody iced tea.

  I head into the kitchen and fix a tray with three cups. Extra sugar. Spoons. Fresh lemon slices. I’m getting good at the work of womenfolk. I swing the kitchen screen door open with my hip and head down to the barn, careful not to spill the refreshments.

  “You guys thirsty?” I say as I duck my head and enter.

  “In a minute,” Tom says, hoisting one end of a beam over his shoulder.

  The guys are covered in sawdust that sticks to their sweaty T-shirts. Tom is by far the neatest of the three. He wears his shirt tucked into his Wranglers—which are ironed—and he’s sporting a new, hip haircut, real short on the sides, longer on top. Tom seems to have aged years over these past few months. Aged in a good way. I’m surprised. Because he seemed so depressed when he got the news: He didn’t get into the army. He couldn’t pass the physical due to an eye condition. He’s legally blind in one eye, and nearly so in the other. I thought he was going to collapse when he heard. Because he would say he needed to be in the army. Because this is what his father did and his grandfather. He needed to serve his country. But Tom didn’t collapse, at least not for long. He decided to become an EMT and enrolled in night school. He brings his books to the barn and reads when he gets a moment or two. “I’m gonna do this,” he said to me one day. “I’m gonna save lives.”

  “You guys like extra sugar in your tea?” I say, wishing someone would see what a nice little tea service I’ve made here. “Lemon?”

  “In a minute,” Billy says, hammering.

  They’re never too talkative when they’re working. I rest the tray in the wheelbarrow, find a seat on a sack of cement, and wait for them to take a break.

  Billy seems to have aged a lot in these past few months, too. But not in a good way. He’s thin and frail, practically as thin and frail as Bob. And he hasn’t told me
one tall tale since he started this barn project. Not one. I suppose losing both his brother and his mother has taken its toll. He doesn’t talk about it, though. Then a few days ago he stepped on a rusty nail that went right through his foot. I insisted he go get a tetanus shot. He fought me on that point. He said he would be fine. He said how about I go up to Kenny’s Grocery and buy him a can of Skoal instead. Which I did. Because it made him feel better. But then I came back and nagged and nagged and nagged until he got in his truck and drove off to the clinic for the shot.

  I notice that today, the old wood—the wood with the rusty nails sticking out—is stacked neatly outside the barn, stacked in a place where no one will step on it. I suspect Tom did this.

  Sitting on this sack of cement, I look around and try to imagine where Alex and I might hang a sign that says “Sweetwater Farm,” the name we have decided on. Farmers use “sweet water” to refer to the sap of maple trees, and we have more maple trees on this property than any other kind of tree. Sweetwater Farm. A good name. We should definitely get a sign.

  “All right, Tom,” Billy says, “leave it set right there.” Billy wipes his forehead on his sleeve and says, “I’m thirsty,” signaling a break.

  I hand out cups. Nobody wants sugar. Nobody wants lemon. One, two, three, they down those drinks so fast, you can hear the clunking sound come out of their throats. I watch three Adam’s apples bobbing in unison.

  “So guess what,” I say to them. “I’m thinking of getting Alex a mule.”

  Dead silence.

  “A mule,” Butch says finally. “But why?” He is a beefy young man, with several missing teeth and sandy blond hair. He is the kind of person you look at and get the urge to say “hown’ dawg.”

  “Because he said he wanted one,” I say. “Do you know where I can get a mule? I don’t want to pay too much.”

  “Don’t, don’t, don’t get a mule!” Tom says. “Mules are ignorant, and they bite.” He says his grandfather had a mule that refused to be ridden unless it was primed with a quart of beer.

  “Aw,” I say. “That’s kind of endearing.”

  “Don’t get a mule!” Butch says. “Mules aren’t like horses. You know, horses, they’ll forget. A mule, he’ll hold a grudge against you his whole life.”

  But I would be nice to the mule. He wouldn’t have a reason to hold a grudge, I point out.

  “You ever been around mules?” Butch says. “Mules will outsmart you time and time again until you can’t help but yell.”

  Billy listens. He considers these comments. He pours himself more tea. He looks at the tea, as if finding an answer there. He says, “Alex wants a mule. Get him a mule.”

  I love Billy.

  I ask him to please be on the lookout for a mule; I need one by September 13.

  “Okay, I’ll find you one,” he says.

  I know better than to ask him how, or where, or any such details. Billy is a man of action, a man of his word.

  I see Alex heading down from the house, all done up in his cute overalls, his tractor-riding outfit. God, he looks so … clean compared to these guys.

  “Sssshhhh,” I say. “He’s coming! Quick! Change the subject!”

  “SO HOW ABOUT THIS BEAM?” Billy says, real loud.

  “WHAT IS THAT? AN EIGHT-FOOTER?” Butch asks.

  “YES, BUTCH. YES, IT IS.”

  Alex comes in.

  “What’s going on?” he says.

  “Nothing,” Tom says, real short, clipped. “We’re not talking about anything.”

  “Nothing!” Butch says. “Why would somethin’ be goin’ on?”

  Alex looks at the guys, me.

  Okay, these guys are not good at this. Really not good. No more secret mule conversations.

  “Well,” Alex says to me, “we should leave here by four to pick Riva up at the airport.”

  “Okay,” I say. “I’ll be ready.”

  “And the sheep are back,” he says.

  “Oh?” I say.

  “There must be fifty of them on the hill.”

  “Uh-oh,” I say. “Let’s get the dogs in.” The sheep belong to George, the farmer next door, the one who allegedly shoots dogs. Those were his smart sheep that came exploding through the fence last spring after that storm and started chomping on our grass. They’ve been back several times since.

  “Must be one heck of a hole in that fence,” I say.

  “Or else one very smart sheep leader,” Alex says. “Where are the dogs?”

  “Has anybody seen the dogs?” I say to the guys.

  Nope.

  “You sure they aren’t chasing the sheep?” I say to Alex.

  “We would have heard by now,” he says.

  “Then they must be over visiting the cows again,” I say. They like hanging out at the neighbor’s dairy farm. Jay, the farmer, doesn’t mind. He doesn’t shoot dogs. But then again, our dogs don’t chase his cows. But then again, we’ve never seen our dogs chase a sheep.

  “Well, let’s get the sheep out of here before the dogs come back,” Alex says.

  “All right.”

  “You want us to help?” Tom asks.

  “Nah,” Alex says. “We’re getting good at this.”

  We head up the hill. I wish I had better shoes on. I have my iced tea service shoes on, these little Keds. You should have thicker soles when you herd sheep. The sheep are all hunched over, bundles of curly wool. Beautiful animals, really. Peaceful and fluffy. I have had no desire whatsoever to shoot them, even though, technically, they are trespassers and apparently I am allowed to. I mean, if George is allowed to shoot my dogs.

  It occurs to me that I am very angry at George, a person I’ve never even met. I start clapping my hands at his beautiful, innocent sheep.

  “Come on, sheep!” I say.

  Herding sheep is not a complicated procedure. You walk up to the sheep. One of them sees you and walks away from you. The others follow. The only real trick is steering. First, you have to know where you’re steering them, and then you have to jog a ways to cut off the leader so she’ll point in the right direction.

  “Baa,” I say to the sheep.

  Baa, one says. Only it comes out more like mehhh. But people are conditioned to hear baa.

  I love these sheep. I love the way they waddle. And when they walk, you can hear the grass go swish swish swish. Kind of like the sound of a satin ball gown, now that I think about it. But I am in my bride stage.

  “Let’s go, girls!” Alex says to the sheep. “Time to go home.”

  We wave our arms in the cool afternoon air, around and around, a rhythm like a windmill’s. The sheep keep moving.

  “I’m not sure where the hole in the fence is, though,” I call to Alex, who is herding from the back, while I’m up here with the leading lady sheep.

  “Just head up to the gazebo spot, and walk along the fence line,” he calls.

  The gazebo spot. Ah, yes. The invisible gazebo. The gazebo that has not yet materialized. That was supposed to be the first thing we did when we moved to the farm, put a gazebo on the hill. It was going to be so beautiful. So simple. Who knew we would get busy hiring a bulldozer driver, buying a tractor, buying tractor attachments, getting a satellite dish, getting engaged, discovering a tumor, taking out the tumor, getting a new dog, getting the barn renovated, planning a wedding, herding sheep—before we would ever again even think of the gazebo? The gazebo was part of the postcard, the 2-D version of the dream. One thing you can say about 3-D is, it is a lot more expensive.

  Eventually, we get the sheep all together, a great curly mass of sheep, mashed up against the fence. I hear something. A motorcycle? “Someone is coming,” I say to Alex. I can’t tell exactly where it’s coming from, but it’s getting closer. Suddenly, from over the rise, comes a man driving a four-wheeler.

  “I think that’s George,” Alex says.

  “Uh. Oh.”

  The man waves. He stops in front of us. The four-wheeler sputters and shuts off.

&n
bsp; “Hi there,” he says. “Sorry about the sheep.” He’s a stocky, rugged man in a white T-shirt and a torn fisherman’s vest. He has a ring of tobacco juice around his lips. His belly is big, like there’s a watermelon sitting in his shirt.

  “Well, we got them all up here in one spot,” Alex says.

  “Thank you kindly,” he says. “I’m George.”

  “Hello,” Alex says, extending his hand. He introduces me. I don’t extend my hand—I look around for the dogs. I look to see if George has a gun on that four-wheeler, if perhaps he is toting a dead dog. I don’t see any gun. I don’t see any dead dogs.

  Soon Alex and George are deep into farmer talk, sheep talk, alfalfa talk, while I stand here and do the womenfolk thing: stare blankly, stupidly.

  But George keeps looking at me as he talks, as if he’s trying to actually include me in the conversation. As if he might actually believe that I understand what’s going on. Well, that’s kind of refreshing. One point for George.

  Soon we are all talking together. Talking fence.

  George tells us something we never knew. This fence isn’t his. Or, not only his. This is “our” fence. In the tradition of these hills, neighbors split ownership and responsibility for fences. Fence lines, he says, are sacred matters, set by ancestors.

  “Yeah, my grandpap put in these posts,” George says, kicking one. He lifts a section of wire off the post, providing a passageway for the sheep. “Heee-yaaaa!” he calls at them. “Come on, heeee-yaaa!” The sheep scurry. I jog this way and that to keep the little ones in line. Soon all the sheep are home again.