Hard Times: Chapter 3 "Perseverance"

“Perseverance”



I’ve never been one to look back in life. Even as I’ve grown old I pride myself in looking ahead. Lately, however, in quiet moments I discover my mind traveling to the past, seeking refuge in better days.

I never thought I’d outlive my husband. Bill was strong and I was less so. He was hardly ever sick and I was often. Growing up we both knew hard times. We were the children of refugees, uprooted from our Oklahoma homes and dropped in the great central valley of California where there were no jobs waiting. We knew what it was like to go to bed hungry. We knew what it was like never to buy new clothes. We grew up knowing what hard times meant but our children had no idea.

When my daughter and her family first came to live in my house I had the impression they thought it was as much for me as for them. They could not understand how an old woman who spent the bulk of her life in the company of others might want to be alone. I suspect many old people feel as I do but their children cajole them into giving up their solitude for the security of having someone there to call the hospital if something unfortunate should happen – like falling and not being able to get up. There comes a time of course when that may become necessary and more often than not it is a rest home we end up in, hardly ever our children’s homes. A rest home is the last place I would want to rest – especially if it was my final rest stop.

But I welcomed them into my home recognizing that what was happening in the world had happened before when I was a child. I was neither surprised when Madge’s family was followed by Carlin’s family nor when Uncle Bud showed up with that drunken harlot Mildred. I try not to judge but they make it so obvious. Uncle Bud is harmless enough and often amusing; he was just a waste of space. Mildred is something less than that – a waste of good alcohol I should think. In fact I do think.

So I took them all in without complaint. I took them in and shared what I had just as relatives and friends had taken us in when our time of need arrived. It was hard times and we had to look out for one another. Hard times make the family grow stronger if it doesn’t break us apart. I sought solitude in my room and considered it being thoughtful until Madge informed me the family was concerned. They thought I was spending too much time alone. They thought it meant I was unhappy. I tried to tell them that my happiness really wasn’t their concern. Sometimes I enjoyed happiness; other times I enjoyed solemnity. It was not a concept they could wrap their minds around so I ultimately relented.

I grew to appreciate their children – even the spoiled little ones that Joan created like Frankenstein’s monster. Like pets there is no such thing as a bad child, only a poorly reared child. In the traditional roles, grandmothers are supposed to be the spoilers. In the new world, where grandmother and children are constant company, this grandmother had to assume the parental role of disciplinarian. It was not a role I took pleasure in but someone had to do it. The children needed guidance.

When Stone left Madge was shattered. She shared the note he had written and my heart went out to both of them. Stone was always a good man. He worked hard all his life. He put the needs of his wife and children before him. I understood how he must have felt when he decided he had to leave them for their sake. That is what hard times do to us. They make us confront choices we should never have to make. Madge was so angry she could hardly think. She felt abandoned at a time of need. She blamed Stone for abandoning the children. Nothing could have been further from the truth. He sacrificed everything he treasured. He gave his place in the home and his share of the family’s food to them.

It took a long, long time before Madge healed enough to begin understanding. That’s when she began looking for him. I felt it was a sort of madness but it was something she had to do. She tried to do what was right for the children. She took them to school every day and when the schools shut down she taught them herself. She worked hard on the garden and did more than her share of the cooking and cleaning but her mind was divided. A part of her was always thinking of Stone. I think she came to blame herself for the anger she initially directed at him. When she finally learned what became of him, that he had lived under the bridge until he left town, it was as though her lungs filled with fresh air. She was convinced that he was all right and that he would return home eventually. I was not so sure. It was a cold harsh world out there. In hard times, there is nothing one can be sure of.

I kept my doubts to myself and welcomed the change in my daughter’s heart. As only old people know, there is always a blessing in misfortune – especially if one is lucky enough to survive it.

Madge became the center of our home. She was a peacemaker and eventually her efforts shaped us into a caring, loving family. She became a social activist, organizing the neighbors, making sure all the children were cared for, handing out books and inviting neighbor children to school in our living room. When the tornados struck, a horrifying sight and one that I never thought to see in sunny California, followed by the sickness that claimed some of our neighbors, Madge saw to it that those who lost their homes, their gardens and loved ones had shelter, blankets and enough to eat for the winter.

The day of the twisters was something to behold. I was transported back in time to when I was a little girl. It must have been October because I was standing in the pumpkin patch playing drums on the pumpkins when my mother yelled at me to come in. I thought I was in trouble for wearing my Sunday dress outside. I looked up and froze. It was the most beautiful sight I had ever seen: a magnificent sky full of colors and wild shapes formed of clouds. My father swept me up in his arms and took me down to the cellar where we all hunched together, holding our breaths and feeling our beating hearts. The whole house shook and it sounded like we were standing underneath a jumbo jet as it took off. Only then I didn’t know that sound. It sounded like the end of the world. Somehow it steals the oxygen right out of the air and leaves you gasping. The pumpkin patch was a mess but we were unharmed. Carlin was strong in a pinch but Madge was our rock. They got us all in the bathtub and covered us with a mattress. It was horrifying but we survived. After that I think we all felt we were stronger. We were survivors and we could handle whatever god had in mind.

Though I gave up organized religion a long time ago, I am a very spiritual person. I prayed that day. In the event that there was a god and that he could hear our prayers, I prayed.

At a time when no one else could have done so, Madge saw to it that our Christmas was something we would always cherish. We had all been so serious for so long it was as if we forgot how to laugh and sing and play. She got every neighbor on the street involved. She even talked the stodgy Bannisters into hosting the event in their spacious home. It was a glorious event. There was music and dance and games and every face wore a smile that lasted the evening. There were gifts for every child and old man Bannister played the unlikely part of Santa. Scrooge would have been more fitting. The sound of laughter was the sweetest music of all.

We were contented then and full of hope. The hardships we had overcome together made us closer. Our family was secure and we were a part of our community. We had confidence that our neighbors would help us as we would help them. The winter was mild and our stores of fruit and vegetables were more than enough to see us through.

I dare say we were beginning to enjoy the richness of our lives and that is when the gangsters came. We knew what was happening. It was not difficult to put the pieces together. They closed down the prisons and jails. What point was there in having a jail when half the population would volunteer? Free meals and roof over one’s head outweighed the bars that prevented escape. So the hardened criminals were released into the world where there was no place for them to survive. When the food ran short and they had no shelter, they took what they needed in the only way they knew how.

We all agreed we had no choice but to fight back but we were not the kind of people who could fight effectively against criminals. There were too many old folks like myself and too many children. We were so relieved when we received word that the military would come to our aid. Neither they nor the police had ever done so before so I had my doubts until the evening they showed up with transport vehicles.

We tried our best to make it an adventure for the children. The younger children didn’t know what was happening and we didn’t know how to tell them there were people who wanted to hurt us and take our homes. I’m sure the older children understood. Nathan and Denim had seen enough of the world to know how dangerous it could be but they pretended along with the adults that everything was fine. We were just taking a little vacation. There would be plenty to eat, clean water and the brave soldiers would take care of us and keep us safe.

We were so disappointed when they kept us inside. People weren’t meant to live as captives. It warps our senses. Children were meant to run and play in the sun and breathe the open air. I still don’t understand that decision. What were they hiding? What were they afraid we would see? I could think of no rational reason for it but there was no means of challenging the commander’s authority. When we talked to our information officer – a misnomer if ever there was one – he simply informed us it was camp regulations. We were going stir crazy. The children were restless and the adults were short-tempered. Madge did all she could to establish a routine for the children. There was school every morning, walks around the enclosed walkway three times a day, and a variety of games.

I remember one day some of the older kids snuck outside and Denim was among them. He had a quiet but defiant spirit that I always admired. Some soldiers caught them and hauled them back inside. The kids were scared half to death. The soldiers apparently told them they would be locked up in a cage if it happened again. They ordered us to discipline them and of course we agreed but the punishment amounted to nothing. They were not allowed to participate in the games that evening but they didn’t seem to mind.

I asked Denim what he had seen. He told me they snuck into a warehouse filled with rifles and ammunition, stacks and stacks of them from the floor to the ceiling. This was after all a nation of guns before the fall. All those guns and the all-important ammunition had to go somewhere. I understood then why kids could not run around unsupervised but it was unrealistic to expect children not to be children.

I spent a lot of time reading and thinking about my late husband. I rather thought he would have enjoyed this new world. In many ways he was suited to it. He resented that kids today had all the modern comforts, computers and video games and portable music players with thousands and thousands of songs, and cell phones that meant you were never really alone with your thoughts. He thought we were losing touch with the things that mattered most: family and good friends, picnics and camping in the great outdoors, trips to Yosemite and the Grand Canyon, the wonders and mysteries of nature. He lamented that we were losing our sense of the earth beneath our feet, the soil that gave us life. He would have loved building greenhouses and gardening. He would have loved evenings without television and young people without devices attached to their ears every waking hour.

I sympathized with his point of view but I realized – as I’m sure he did deep within – that it was the natural cycle of life. Every generation of old folks laments the lost ways of days gone by. Every generation wants to stop the clock and move backwards in time. Until this generation it was only a futile wistful dream but here we are. I think Bill would have liked to witness it. He would have thrived in this harsh environment and he had knowledge that would have been valued. He had a good working knowledge of electronics, mechanics and gadgetry. He could fix everything from a transistor radio to an old truck.

I don’t remember when my mind began to lose its agility. Maybe it happened years ago when Bill passed away but no one noticed because I was alone, free to think as I pleased and do what I wanted. Now no one seems to notice because I’m old and that’s how old people are. There are no health centers, hospitals or doctors to tend to old people losing their faculties. We are what we are. There are no more drugs to fight back time or stop the aging process from taking its toll.

I spend days on a single track of thought, so much so that I hardly notice the days passing. Being enclosed in the cavernous space of a military warehouse was making my condition worse. I spent so much of my time in memories that when I awakened I often thought that Bill would be beside me.

I didn’t know how much time had passed when they informed us it was over, the gangsters were defeated and we could go home. I’m not sure I fully understood what was happening or what had happened. I was in a daze when they helped me out of the truck and showed me the burned out rubble that used to be my home. I cried and Madge cried with me. I hadn’t realized how much I still had to lose: my mementos, my photographs, artwork and trinkets that had little meaning to anyone but me. Furniture and appliances I could take or leave but how those mementos pulled at my heart. When we went through the rubble, there was so little we could salvage: a charred vase, some jewelry, a framed photograph. Each item came with a memory and each was linked to countless other memories, fading memories of things lost. We put them in a box, climbed back into the transport vehicle and went back to the military base. I wondered then how long I could keep going.

But I did keep going. I kept going because I felt the love of my family. I kept going because I believed, rightly or wrongly, that they needed me. In some ways I suppose they had lost less than I had. It was my home and my memories. But they were young and I was old. They had their lives to live and it was my job to help them get on with it.

When the commander heard our story and saw our long faces I think he took pity on us. We were given new quarters to live in. It wasn’t much but it was a place we could make our own. We were allowed outdoors where we could mix with the military families. Our children were welcomed to their school – or rather what made do for an education. Between the bible lessons and stories of glorious battles, at least they were learning the basics of reading, writing and arithmetic. When Madge offered to help out and began introducing literature and science we were surprised that they gave her free reign. They were mostly mothers, not educators, and they were willing to admit the shortcomings of their knowledge and experience.

We all helped out in the schooling, the kitchen work, cleaning up and gardening. Whatever needed doing we pitched in and did our share. Carlin proved quite resourceful repairing trucks and machinery. I spent much of my time in the gardens where I was left pretty much alone to let my mind wander where it wanted to go.

As that odd man Albert Einstein discovered, time is a relative concept. Well, it was for me as I wandered the rows of fruits and vegetables, weeding, pruning, hoeing and mending fences. At some point I realized my thoughts were leading me on the journey of my own life. It was then that I determined to write it all down. If I could leave nothing else, perhaps I could leave the story of my life, shaded of course by my own peculiar perspective. I gathered up paper and pen – not so easy a task as it once was. Today it seemed there was little demand. I thought and thought, that first blank sheet of paper staring at me, until I finally arrived at the word that summed it all up, nice and clean: Perseverance.

It may sound harsh or crude and for that I apologize but it is the only word that satisfies my sense of honesty and truth. It is not that I’m applying for sympathy though I have rarely refused that charity. It’s just that life is a series of hardships and there’s no use denying it. I was born and raised in the hardship of a sharecropper’s toil and it gave me an inheritance of strength. I was uprooted and displaced a dozen times before my tenth birthday and it gave me what my father called grit. I met and married my husband as we were both struggling to find our place in the world and it made us determined. I have walked the picket lines of a labor strike alongside my husband, raised my children through a decade of wanting, suffered through years of war, not knowing if my husband would return, and never stopped long enough to give doubt a chance. I mourned the sudden death of my first child and comforted my husband on his deathbed. I have persevered.

I am a proud survivor and that is the gift I wish to hand down to my grandchildren. I want them each to know they come from good hardwood stock. Our people have lived through every hardship known to humankind. We have survived the plague, the great influenza epidemic, earthquakes and hurricanes, economic collapse and general misfortune. We have always overcome. We have never given up.

Perhaps I wanted to remind myself as well. I was not on the front lines of the Great War or at the back of the line in the Great Depression but I know what they were. I remember.

The hard times that have knocked us back on our heels and made us wonder how we manage to get up every morning will not last forever. We will survive and like the poet says it will make us stronger. I only wish it could make us wiser as well.

It’s not as if this is the first time our economy has collapsed like a blown tire. Every time it’s the same. A select group of elite men on Wall Street think they are above the law of gravity. Governed by greed they buy the politicians so they can operate on their own terms. It took JP Morgan to save us the first time and Franklin Roosevelt pulled us back from the brink in the thirties and forties. You’d think we would learn but you’d be wrong. Again and again we allow greed to govern greed as we march straight over an economic cliff. So it seems we never quite acquire the knowledge we need to prevent the fall but we do acquire the lessons of perseverance. We survive.

It may be the hardest lesson to learn, especially when you’re young and so full of drama, when the universe evolves around you and every moment is celluloid – or so it seems. I was young once, so long ago even the memories are worn, and I know well the depths of the human soul. I know how hard it can be to walk out the door and how difficult to ask for help. I know that for most of us there is help waiting to be asked. That is what I want the young ones to learn. We have a family and a community that is yearning to help and nurture them. We will survive. We will persevere and thrive. It is the way of our people.

I love the gardens. The greenhouses are so regimental and orderly. They lack a woman’s touch. There is no flair, no style and no sense of the aesthetic. The camp is in command of the greenhouses but the families are in charge of the gardens. For most people in these troubled times there is no more room for the aesthetic. There is no water or soil for roses and lilies and petunias. But here at the base there is plenty to eat. They yield a surplus that they distribute to local communities. So they allow their wives the indulgence of growing flowers and the flowers are in bloom. I breathe them in and lavish them with attention. I sing to them and recite poetry about the beauty of nature, the lost arts, the diminishing aesthetics. I learn new poems so that they don’t grow bored with the mad ramblings of an old woman.

I miss the arts. I don’t know how many times I suggested that we should start a theater. They always nod and go about their business. There is always far too much to worry about, too many plans and emergencies, to devote one’s time to frivolous activities. Madge was sympathetic of course but I understood her resistance. She was unwilling to entertain the notion that we might not leave this place for a very long time. She was pleasant and giving to everyone around her but beneath the surface she suffered. She hated this place. Even after they moved us out of the warehouse it was far too cold and impersonal for Madge. She did not want her children to grow up in a military environment. She also expected Stone to return but he would not be able to find us here. No one could find us here.

She would never say these things aloud of course. She held them inside. It was not her nature to criticize other people for whom they were. She reserved her judgment for what people did and these people were kind to us. Of course they were not so kind to the criminals who invaded our neighborhood. That was another thing that held her beneath a shadow. She did not believe they deserved to be killed. When Carlin confirmed her suspicions that darkness of knowing that we were all in some way complicit in a massacre fell over her. We all felt it but she felt it as a mother feels the pain of her child.

It was strange how we all pushed it from our minds. What did we think would happen? How could we not know? But we didn’t know or at least we guided the knowledge to the darkness of our minds where we would never have to look at it – or so we thought. But we always have to look – even if we wait until our dying day. Each and every one of us holds some responsibility for a horrendous event – one that we would never sanction or defend but one that we could have prevented but didn’t. The other side of it of course is that some of us would undoubtedly have died. Some would have been raped or terribly wounded if we had chosen to fight on our own. If we had chosen to give them what they asked for and they asked for no more than they needed, then tragedy could have been averted.

Who can tell? We are only human. We act more out of raw instinct, out of fear and prejudice, than we do out of reasoned deliberation. That we are guilty to some degree of acting too swiftly, of presuming too much, is beyond doubt. They are the kind of questions we should have asked before we summoned the cavalry but we did not. That is what tears at the soul of considerate and decent human beings. It should have torn at mine far more than it has. Perhaps I am too old and too close to death to consider all sides of the equation. There are the children to consider. Even Madge cannot get by that consideration. The children come first and no risks can be taken that put them in danger.

We survived and the children are safe. In the end that is all that matters. We move on. We do not dwell on what might have been. We take those steps that will ensure we will not have to face such choices again.

Forgive my rambling. It is not my intention. There are so many thoughts racing through my brain. I snatch them and put them down on paper and hope that someday someone will extract their meaning or render them in a more sensible form.

I thought I would live the remainder of my life at the base. I would have been content to spend my final days in those beautiful gardens with the last glorious flowers upon the earth but it was not to be. Carlin was determined to go back to our neighborhood and rebuild. Madge welcomed his enthusiasm and the children followed their parents. I did not object. I’m sure they thought I was fully behind their decision. That I was not would remain my own private matter. It became my determination to start my own garden of beauty though I would confront a floodwall of objections.

When finally we arrived at the ruins of our home a blessing awaited us. I rather wondered why the neighbors had allowed a bum and his mangy dog to squat on our lawn. But it was not a bum after all. It was my daughter’s long lost husband, Stone.

If it is possible to lift a cloud of sorrow in a single moment it happened that day. Like many elderly people of my temperament and disposition I am occasionally prone to the dramatic, a tendency that most prefer to circular story telling or the common habit of telling the same story over and over again as if telling it for the first time. On this occasion it would be shameful not to allow poetic license to roam unhindered. For though my grasp of time is unsure and feeble I am certain that several lifetimes passed between their parting and this reunion, as the length and strength of their embrace bore witness. It was Penelope greeting her lost adventurer Odysseus or Tristan finally returning to his beloved Iseult only it was real and happening before my eyes. The last time I stood before the wreckage of my former home I cried tears of sorrow; this time there were tears of joy.

He promised her a dozen times that evening that he would never leave again. When he caught his breath and everyone settled down he told us of his experience, the people he had met and the communities where he was welcomed. He had a dream of uniting these communities for mutual benefit and he was burning with a desire to see it fulfilled. He went on for hours and I remembered why Madge fell for him. When someone has that kind of passion you follow him. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a good idea or a bad one you follow.

He told us about the people he met and the communities they formed. The Bridge Camp, the farm and the community of college students: They were forming bonds, developing sustainable energy systems, watering systems, farming and security. It was unfortunate that they thought it necessary but they were building walls and lookout stations to defend their communities from outsiders. Stone believed we should do the same but we should form alliances with the surrounding neighborhoods to increase our diversity, our pool of talent and our defenses.

It was an awkward time in some ways. We had just returned to rebuild our home and now we were being asked to consider much more. We needed schools and community centers and a master plan to develop our resources. We needed government and trade agreements and communications. We were being asked to rebuild society one brick at a time and it all made sense.

I was not alone in thinking so. It all made sense.

Madge and Stone took a sleeping bag and went off to be alone, leaving me with the children. It was a wonderful night, serenaded by the moon and entertained by the muses. There was music and dance and stories full of laughter around a makeshift campfire. It was a night when dreams played out their most fanciful tunes and angels in the heavens looked down on us with grace.

I would never forget that night for as long or as briefly as I should live. I wished my husband were there. He would have taken such pleasure. He loved a celebration and he would have loved to see the children so happy.

And then it rained. The heavens broke open and flooded us with tears of joy. The tents the commander had given us proved sound and we all slept to the drums of raindrops over our heads. I don’t know where Madge and Stone found shelter that night but in the morning they were fresh and full of life.

It was a glorious night and one that I stored in my box of treasures. It is so important to hold on to these moments for that is what sustains us when times are hard.

I only wish my husband could have been here. He would have taken such pleasure. He was a good man and he so loved the children. I remember the first time we met. I was the counter waitress at a diner and he was the first customer of the day. He was looking for work and needed a sympathetic listener. That first day he asked me if I wanted children. I said I did between cups of coffee. It was six months before he asked me out and a year before we got married. He was working then as a mechanic at a local garage and even then he was saving to start his own air conditioning business. It was the future he said.

I remember our first child’s second birthday. Uncle Bud dressed up in a clown costume and little Billy laughed until he was dizzy. We were so happy then. We had next to nothing but we were happy. We were heartbroken when Billy died. No one could explain it. One day he was playing and laughing and the next day…

We were heartbroken. In many ways we never got over it but we learned to persevere. That’s what life is all about: perseverance.

Hard Times: Chapter 4 "Tenacity"

“Tenacity”



It was hard times for everyone. I fought as hard as I could for as long as I could to save our home and the life we enjoyed. How long has it been? A year? Two years? It feels like ten. My story is the same as a million others: Lost my job (a good job supplying tools and parts to American industry before industry was exported to Mexico, India, Malaysia or whatever third world country provided the cheapest labor). I picked up work wherever I could find it but it wasn’t enough. No one could support a family on what they pay you for flipping burgers or stocking shelves at the grocery store. There just wasn’t anything else for me. I tried. I gave it all I had. I’m sorry it wasn’t enough.

I know everyone blames me for what happened. Not the financial crisis, not the total breakdown in the social order, but for what happened with Stone. Apparently the house wasn’t big enough for the two of us so he left. Everyone blames me for pushing him out the door. I never asked him to go. I never wanted him to go. I never even gave it a thought. They can blame me all they want but it’s not helpful. Anyone can play that game. Where was Stone when the tornados hit and we had to make repairs? Where was he when the virus came through and we had to set up roadblocks and impose quarantine? Where was he when the convicts came and shook us down for our food? Should I blame Stone for not being here when all the shit went down?

Someone had to take the lead so I did. There wasn’t enough space so we added a room. We needed a greenhouse. I took the initiative. If Stone resented it he never said a word. You can’t blame me for everything that happened. You can’t blame me that Uncle Bud and Aunt Mildred moved in. If it was my decision it might have been different. It would have been hard turning them away but sometimes you have to make the hard choices. Too many hands on board, too much dead weight, you do what you have to do.

But it was mom’s house and mom’s decision. She has a soft heart for the lost and unfortunate so we knew she could never turn them away. They were family. In her mind that was all there was to it. I wanted to have a family vote. Madge said fine if you let Bud and Mildred vote. Even Joan sided with her. I would have found them a place to live. I wouldn’t put them out on the street. Madge said there was no place to live. Stone got a little red in the face and said it was Grace’s call and that was the end of it. So it was.

So if you want to blame someone there it is. Blame it on compassion. Blame it on the moon. Blame it on Grace but leave me out of it. I wanted to do the right thing, that’s all. I wanted what was best for the children.

To be honest, I respected Stone for leaving. He took a look around and said: I take more than I give. I know it sounds unkind but at the time it was true. We were better off without him. We had more food at the end of the month. We didn’t need him. We all know he loves Madge and he loves those kids more than he does himself. It took courage for him to leave and I respected him for that decision.

When he came back things had changed. I changed. I don’t care what people think; you can’t witness a massacre and not be moved. I remember how it was before. I’m not the kind to question authority. If the army said civilian casualties were unfortunate but unavoidable I believed them. When they said war is hell I agreed with them. I was in the first Gulf War. People say it wasn’t much of a war and compared to the second I guess it wasn’t but it was enough to give me a taste. It was enough to me the pride of a soldier like a player on a football team. Our side is always right. Of course we didn’t take Baghdad. We never occupied the country. There was no Fallujah, Ramadi or Abu Ghraib. The people didn’t hate us in that war even when we left Saddam in power and he wiped out the Kurds.

I was a proud American and a patriot. Not the rah-rah type but people knew where I stood. I spoke up when I had to and I wouldn’t take crap from the crowd who always puts us down – like Madge and Stone. Before the fall we cared about things like that. Now? Now I don’t know what I am. A homeless person, a hanger on, a taker, a leach: I’m the kind of person I always blamed for what was wrong with this country.

I never really knew war in Iraq. I had to come back here for that. They drew them in and wiped them out. Caught them in a crossfire and laid them down. They used me and Big John to lay the trap. We showed our faces, told them to go away and retreated to watch what followed. I tried to stop them when they started throwing firebombs but they held me back and muzzled me. They didn’t let me go until the fireworks began. Nice euphemism. They shot them down with automatic weapons. Snipers from the rooftops shot anyone who was still moving. Then they went man-to-man, body-to-body, in an operation they called Mercy Killing. I watched every last kill. I had to watch. I don’t know why. I guess some part of me figured the story had to be told. The street was a river of blood and that’s not a metaphor: a river of blood. If anyone survived they weren’t in the street and they wouldn’t be returning. They’d get as far away as they could as fast as they could go. That was the point.

I don’t like to talk about it but my mind keeps drifting back there to that river of blood. They knew what they were doing. They brought high-powered hoses to wash the blood away. They wrapped the bodies in black plastic bags, stacked them up like heaps of garbage and hauled them away.

So I was glad when Stone came back. I needed someone to help take the pressure off. We didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things but we respected each other. At least I respected him. He had a lot of wild ideas about uniting us with the communities he lived in while he was away. I figured we had enough to think about right here but some of his ideas made sense. The other communities had skills and resources we didn’t have and if there was another threat to our security we could band together and do what had to be done.

Sure that much made sense. We had some rebuilding to do here and now and maybe the others could help. Stone wanted to make a run to recruit workers, planners, carpenters and solar engineers but Madge was petrified. She was afraid if he left she’d never see him again. Stone made the point that it had to be him. If it was anyone else it might not be safe. After all that had happened with the gangs and the criminals everyone was a little touchy. There was a feeling that no one could be trusted. Madge finally agreed to let him go on the condition that she went with him. Stone put up a fight but it was no use. She had her mind made up and that was it. It went back and forth for days before he finally relented. We agreed to take care of the kids and off they went: Madge, Stone and his dog.

We didn’t know it then but Denim took off after them. By the time we figured out he was missing the day was gone. I figured he’d be all right but Joan and Grace were hysterical. They’d left Denim in our care and we dropped the ball. I couldn’t argue with that. He was our responsibility and if anything happened to him the blame would fall on us. I went after them, heading for the Bridge Camp, figuring they’d at least check in there before moving on. If we were lucky, they’d spend the night and we’d be able to find Denim so they could talk some sense into him and I’d take him back home. It was strange moving through the streets at night. Eerie. There were fires all over town, metal barrels in the middle of streets circled by people, children and adults, their eyes shining with fire, more fearful than menacing. I tried to stay in the shadows as much as possible, moving swiftly and with a purpose, never stopping to talk or attract attention. People were still unaccustomed to anyone but prowlers and criminals traveling at night. I was afraid without cause or reason and I was worried that Denim could be out here somewhere. He was a good kid and very able. He was smart in both the street and book learning ways. He could take care of himself. But if I was afraid on these streets at night, how would it be for him? It was wet hot and I was covered in sticky sweat by the time I reached the bridge. Stone and Madge had been there only briefly and there was no sign of Denim.

I thought about following them but the people at the bridge persuaded me it wasn’t safe. There was one old man in particular who pretty much spoke for the lot of them. He said he was a friend of Stone and came to know him pretty well. His name was Sugar and he convinced me it was best if I stayed the night. He said nothing good could come of me getting lost out there chasing shadows and ending up bruised and beaten by some group of ragtag ruffians. He was certain that if Denim had only half the good sense his father did he’d be just fine. In fact, he was probably hunkering down by a campfire with his mother and father right now. I don’t know for sure if it was Sugar or my own thinking but I decided to head back home the next morning and let things unfold.

A week passed before word finally arrived by solar crawler that Denim was okay. He was with his parents and they had decided to continue their journey with him. They assured us all they were taking every precaution and they would return safely in due time. It was a great relief not only to me but also and especially to Joan and Grace. Not a day had gone by without a discussion of whose fault it was that Denim slipped out and whether or not I should still be on the road looking for him. It was getting past the point where I just couldn’t take any more. I felt bad enough as it was.

A couple days after my nighttime visit to the Bridge Camp, Sugar showed up with a crew and we put them to work. We had plans to rebuild our home and set up a community center in the space left vacant by the families that stayed with the military. After that we’d think about building a security wall and guard towers. That seemed a long way off.

The first thing we had to do was clear away the burnt out wreckage and that’s what we did. The whole neighborhood pitched in but the hardest workers were the men in the bridge crew. Being around them, talking to them and sweating with them changed what I thought about the people who ended up under that bridge and thousands of others just like them. Like a lot of people, I figured they were all losers – drug addicts and bums. It goes to show over and over things aren’t necessarily the way we think they are.

At the end of the day they planned to go home but we asked them to stay. We fed them, set up some tents and told them how much we appreciated their help. Sugar told us they were building a new community in the old orchards across the river and, when we were done here, there would be plenty of opportunity to return the favor. We all nodded and began to appreciate what Stone had in mind. Every community had something unique to offer. Every one of us had people with different sets of knowledge and different experiences that would be useful.

The Bridge Camp had hard workers, people who knew what they were about and were not afraid to sweat. They had people who could carry their own weight and then some. The farm community was dedicated to producing food. They produced more than they could eat. In this world, that made them both valuable and vulnerable. They had what everyone needed. From what Stone said, the commune of college kids down south had a good grasp of technology, especially solar and wind power. All the communities outside the city had room to grow, room for more gardens, greenhouses, canning and storage facilities.

What did we have that the others might need? Being in the city we had more tools and supplies – wires, nails, screws, gaskets and pipes. In this new world where very few industries were still making products, everything was in short supply. The hardware stores were cleaned out early on. What remained was stored in tool sheds and garages. Every house in the suburbs had a garage full of treasures.

The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. We still had some services in the city – sewage and recycling – but as time went by they deteriorated. There’s only so much you can do without a budget and without paid workers. It was only a matter of time until it all broke down completely. It would only make sense to get out of the city then and we needed somewhere to go.

Whenever I talked to Joan about these things she said we should have stayed with the military. She said at least we knew there would be enough food to eat and no one could threaten us. She had a point but she didn’t realize that they would have expected me to join them. I couldn’t do that. After what I had seen there was no way I could join them. It was something I couldn’t really explain and Joan would never understand. The only thing she understood was that we were here, working and struggling, when we could have been safe and taken care of back at the base.

It seemed like she brought it up every chance she got, every evening before we went to sleep and every morning before we got up, so I finally laid it out for her. I told her what had happened in every gory detail: Teenage kids shot in the head point blank, shot in the back so they couldn’t run away, people screaming in horror before they were put out of their misery, and the bodies piled up and carted away. I told her they wanted me to do the same. I said she could go back if she wanted but they’d probably turn her away. It was me they wanted and I was staying. She cried but I think she understood. She never brought it up again.

We worked hard on the house from sunrise to sunset. We were making good progress and we had enough workers that we decided to start work on the community center as well. We used the foundation of our neighbor’s house that had also burned down and expanded it so it could accommodate a larger structure. We worked in crews and each one had a specialty. When the foundation was finished the crew went down to the Bridge Camp and started work there. I went with them a couple of times and I was amazed at what they were doing and how fast the work was going. I imagined they would use wood to build cabins or shacks made of wood and tin but they were making and using some kind of bricks for the walls and clay tiles for roofs. Aware of what had happened with the firebomb attacks, they wanted to avoid using flammable materials wherever possible.

Sugar told me they had stocked a lot of bricks from abandoned structures but when they didn’t have enough to cover their needs, they went to work on making their own bricks. They used clay or mud from the riverbank, mixed it with sand, stone, plastic refuge, straw and the like until they came up with a mixture and a method that produced a strong brick that wouldn’t crumble in the heat or the rain. They sealed it with a stucco mixture that had grayish white look to it. They were pleasant to look at and far more stable, fireproof and resistant to weather than what we had in mind for our buildings: traditional wood framed structures with dry wall or plywood with insulation.

I asked Sugar if there was any chance he could supply us with bricks and tiles. He smiled and said he could provided we could help with the kiln problem. The one oven they had was ill suited to its purpose. Sugar was a sly and clever man. I’m sure he knew already that we had a generator powered ceramic kiln in the neighborhood. It belonged to the Contreras family and I was sure he was not only willing but anxious to fire it up for the cause. We made a deal on the spot.

From then on we would use a solar crawler to transport bricks and tiles to the neighborhood for firing. We used what we needed and transported the rest back to the Bridge Camp. Along the way we made friends and recruited workers. We seemed to be a magnet for bricklayers and masons and construction workers so we took them on and set them up out at the camp where they became a part of the crew.

We had to draw a line somewhere but I left that up to Sugar and his people. There was only enough food for so many – even with our allotments. I was there when he had to tell a couple and their child they had to move on. The man was ready to fight but Sugar had such a soft touch and so much genuine affection he could only shake his head. Sugar saw to it they were fed and pointed them in the right direction the next day. They left feeling we had done all we could. They were treated with respect and that was more than they were used to these days. I learned later they showed up at the farm a day or two later and they were allowed to stay there. We would see them again on down the line.

There were troublemakers too. Everywhere you go there’s someone who wants something for nothing. There are people who think they can take what you have. There’s always someone who thinks he’s big and bad enough to have his way even if it means running right over you. One time we were running a load out to the camp and a group of four or five scrawny looking men jumped out from the bushes with clubs. We held up our baseball bats and pipes and they folded right back where they came from. Another group had rocks and wanted us to stop the crawler. Now anyone who has a crawler knows the only way to stop it is to cover the collector and even then it takes its own good time. Sugar yelled at them: We ain’t stopping but you’re welcome to follow us where we’re going. They left us alone. The fact is: Nobody had much use for what we were hauling but us.

The Bridge Camp got its crawler (they called it a solar hauler) from the college kids down south. Sugar said they had another one coming. Stone’s plan was working. The camp had already sent a crew of brick makers and masons down to help them develop their own mixture using local resources.

It was mid summer and the weather was baking hot. Every summer was hotter than the last it seemed. It was so hot you couldn’t work without a constant supply of water. We carried leather pouches and we took breaks every hour: forty-five minutes on and fifteen off. We had four walls up and a roof framed when a supply of solar and insulation panels arrived from the south on a solar hauler. They hooked together with an overlap that repelled rain and sealed the roof airtight. Sugar said it was the greatest invention he’d seen in fifty years of engineering. It took two working days to put the roof in place and when we were done it was as cool as an air conditioned home inside.

After that we called the community of college kids to the south the Sun Camp because they had mastered solar technology. Every day we saw more and more solar crawlers and they were getting better. Most of them (and all of the best) came from the Sun Camp.

People from the surrounding neighborhoods started coming to watch us as we finished up the house and continued working on the community center. We had to assign a couple of people to answer their questions. The combination of the Bridge Camp’s masonry and the Sun Camp’s solar technology would provide the perfect home for a new age, a completely self-sufficient structure with all the modern conveniences.

When the workday was done we talked about Stone’s concept of expanding the community by opening it up to surrounding neighborhoods. We talked about our security interests and building a wall to protect us from outsiders. It was a lot to consider but once they saw what we could accomplish everyone we talked to was interested.

It might seem that we got more than our share of benefit from our alliance with the other communities. That may be. But there was one other contribution we made that made a difference. It’s not something anyone likes to talk about but after the attack on our neighborhood we poured our knowledge and resources into weaponry. We have every description of bow and arrow, firebombs and spears. One of the weapons we developed was an air compression gun that could stop a large man in his tracks. We could shoot darts or ball bearings. We could treat them with chemical compounds that could burn with pain, paralyze or kill. When we realized that others could be developing similar weapons we worked on uniforms that could repel them.

Of course we had guns, rifles and ammunition too. You could be sure we weren’t the only ones. But if the authorities caught wind of a shooting or an explosion of any kind, the army would come down on you. We couldn’t take that chance. No one could take that chance. The wrath of an angry god awaited anyone who defied the law of firearms. We kept them locked away and carefully guarded. We wouldn’t use them unless our lives depended on it.

We shared our weapons technology with our partners and they were as pleased as we were with their contributions. We had all had a taste of what people could do when they want what you have. Some people protested but they came around. It was a necessary evil. Even Stone and Madge and their peacenik friends understood. No one wants to kill anyone. Well, I guess some do. I thank god they’re the exception. That’s why we need people like me. That’s why we need soldiers and cops. Someone has to do it.

We had an occasion to use our weapons only once. We had a crew taking a load of bricks to the farm community on a trade for dried foods. Dried foods are about as valuable a commodity as there is in this world. Someone apparently knew about our shipment and a gang of thieves, about a dozen or more, accosted us on a country road. They were attempting to surround us. I showed my weapon and warned the man who seemed to be their leader, a big man with a full gray beard, strong as a horse, that it was loaded and there was more where it came from. The others stopped but the big man kept coming. I shot him in the gut and watched him drop to his knees and crumble to the ground. They backed off, leaving their leader right there in the road, gasping for air like a wounded beast.

I remember the day Madge, Denim, Stone and his dog Cinnamon came back. That little dog was the smartest animal I ever saw. It was midday in late June and a little overcast. The walls were up on the community center and we were putting finishing touches on the house. There was a crowd of a hundred people there. It was like a festival. They drove up on a solar crawler like heroes returning from war.

We gave them a tour of the house and showed them their rooms on the second floor. It was really one room with two divisions: They had two bedrooms with a living space in the middle. We had the same space and Grace’s on the ground floor was a little smaller. It would accommodate us all and still leave room for the gardens outside.

They were like proud parents. They were happy and pleased. This was their work as much as ours. It was Stone’s vision and Madge worked hard to make it come true. I was glad Stone came back. We needed him to build the community. I’m good at getting things done but Stone is good at selling the idea. He generates enthusiasm. He makes people feel like it’s their dream too. Like they’re a part of it. I don’t know how he does it but he does. He has the gift. With Stone speaking for us, all the surrounding neighbors would want to join. As far as I was concerned: the bigger the better. We would be prepared for all contingencies. With a little organization we could respond to emergencies. We could defend ourselves from intruders and at the same time provide for all our needs.

I was grateful Stone came back. We could share the burden.

Hard Times: Chapter 5 "Resilience"

“Resilience”



Uncle Carlin was a bastard. He always thought he knew what he was doing but he really didn’t. Before the crew from the Bridge Camp came down it was disaster. Carlin had committees in charge of everything. The only thing that came off as planned were the parties most every night. It was fun at first but after a while even I could figure out it was no way to run a work crew. There was lots of music, dance and homemade brew but the only ones who were working were the Bridge crew. Sugar tried to talk some sense into him but he always had some lame excuse. It kept up our spirits. Shit like that. So every night the Bridge crew retired early, got up at dawn and went to work. After a while the other workers followed their example and it made a difference.

I know all this second hand of course. I listen good and ask a lot of questions. Carlin thought he was going to be the big man but he was a fuck up. What can I say?

One of the reasons I ran off after my parents was I couldn’t stand the idea of having to listen to the guy bossing everyone around. It was like being in the Boy Scouts: yes, sir! I knew what I was doing. Everyone says its dangerous at night but me and my friends have been all over this town after dark. Mom was either asleep or she didn’t really care. She knew I could take care of myself.

Mom thought I stopped going with her to look for dad because it made me sad. The truth is I went looking for him myself. I probably would have found him too but me and the boys were afraid to go anywhere near the bridge. We heard there was no one but killers and thieves living there. Shows how much we knew.

I caught up to them at the Bridge Camp. They just stayed around long enough to have a bite to eat, shoot the shit with Sugar and hit the road. I hung back and stayed out of sight until they hooked up with a solar crawler on a country road. You have to jog a little to keep up with a crawler but the thing is as long as the sun shines it keeps going. I followed them for maybe five miles before they pulled over for a lunch break. I hunched over down the road to keep an eye on them and think things through. I decided I better come clean. I might stay up with them for the rest of the day; then again I might not. We were already a good clip from home so I decided to take a chance.

Mom stood up for me right away. Dad wanted to turn around and take me back home but mom said I could handle it. They argued it back and forth with me pretty much staying out of it. Then dad said okay. I couldn’t believe it. He told mom I could go along as long as I pulled my weight and didn’t complain any more than he did. Dad was all right. I could tell he was proud of me for sneaking off. It made me think it was his idea all along.

I remember when they were talking about making this trip. Mom was purposed to go. She wouldn’t take no for an answer. At one point dad said: well, if you’re going why don’t we take Denim and Charlie? Keep the whole family together. It was a joke but he gave me look like maybe I could go, maybe I was old enough and smart enough to handle it.

When they were saying goodbye pop pulled me aside and said: Son, if you ever need to know where we’re going, if something happens where you need to know, Sugar can show you the way. That’s when I knew to trust Sugar more than Uncle Carlin. Dad trusted Sugar. So I think they knew I was coming if I had the guts to do it. They never told me straight up but I think they knew.

I didn’t care what people said. I didn’t care how dangerous it was. To me it was a chance to go somewhere and see how other people lived.

We all got on the crawler and went down the road. They let me drive until I got bored which was real soon because it went so slow. We counted crows. There must have been a million of them. We played games and just talked. But when we came across other people, walking or on a crawler or on some other vehicle, we got quiet and paid attention. Some people made you think twice like they were sizing you up or something. Like they wanted to scare you or keep their distance. Most people were real nice, smiling and saying hello as we crawled by. Some of them were kids around my age. I would’ve liked to play with them but I didn’t want to slow us down. Dad said there’d be some kids where we were going and he was right too.

When the sun went down we pitched a tent and made a fire a little ways off the road. Usually we found a place people had already camped. It was like dad knew where these places were and I guess maybe he did. He’d been down this road a few times now and he knew a lot of the people who lived and traveled here.

That first night we camped out dad told us the story of when he found Cinn – or the way he tells it the night she found him. Cinn just beamed like she knew we were talking about her and I bet she did. She’s a smart dog – always telling you when something’s out of line. Every time we came across a suspicious looking character Cinn would growl real low just to tell us to be alert. Dad says she’s smarter than him but I don’t think that’s so. He was smart enough to take her on and she was smart enough to stick with him. Mom says that’s how things work: give and take. Problems come around when someone takes more than they give and you should think twice when someone offers you something for nothing.

That dog loves dad but Cinn and I became good friends during our adventure. Dad was always busy talking to people, planning things and doing work. So Cinn tagged along with me. A lot of people think Cinn is short for Cindy but it really stands for Cinnamon. Pop said it came from a song – a pretty good song too. Some people out at the Sun Camp played it one time and Cinn was jumping and dancing like she knew it was for her. She’s a good dog and she sure is smarter than I am. Any way you look at it we’re lucky to have her. Some folks wanted dad to put her on a leash but he refused. She’s as free as I am he said but he did give her a blue bandana to wear around her neck and she seemed to like that.

Our first stop on the second day out was the farm where dad had a lot of friends. They took us in, fed us and treated us real good like we were family. There was one guy there who wasn’t so friendly. Cinn gave out a growl every time she saw him and she was right too. I guess they had some history together. He lived with his wife and kids in a big house where nobody went. Dad said he was the Boss Man before things changed. Said he made a profit working people like slaves. Said he made a lot of money off the sweat of honest workers. I had to ask him what he meant by that. Mom chimed in to tell me that they used to work for money instead of rations or credits – like I didn’t know that. She said a business would hire you to do a job. Then they took the money you made from that job and gave you the worker some of the money. The rest he kept for himself.

I thought about that for a long time. There was no such thing as real money any more (I mean people had it but it wasn’t worth anything). There were still games though that had play money and the idea was you took as much as you could get. Whoever had the most money won the game. It was fun but it was just a game. Seemed like a strange way to run the real world. I like it better when the people who work get the credits. I think mom and dad felt that way too.

The people at the Farm Camp were what we call hard working folks. They raised the crops, took care of the animals, built the cabins they lived in, made repairs and kept everything in working order. They cooked the meals and saw to it that no one was hungry and everyone was comfortable with what they had. Seemed like everyone was happy there. Except the Boss Man. I got to play with the Boss Man’s kids a couple times but they really weren’t much fun. They didn’t like to get dirty. They liked indoors games. Mom likes those games too. She says we can learn a lot of good lessons from the right kind of game. Me? I like checkers and all but I’d rather be out playing as long as it’s not raining.

One of the Boss Man’s kids was a girl named Rachel. She was kind of cute I guess. Anyways I think she liked me ‘cause she asked if I wanted to kiss her. I told her no way but then I got to thinking about it. I saw lots of guys kissing girls back home. They said it was the bomb. Made ‘m kind of stupid. The next time I said why not. I kissed her right there in the open. I guess her mom saw us and that was the end of that. After that I wasn’t allowed to play with them. No big deal. There were other kids to play with in the camp.

Mom and dad were all serious and didn’t have much time to look after me. They were always talking to people about how things worked and what they needed to make things better. Dad had his notebook and was always writing in it. There were lots of drawings and lists but there were also stories about the people we met and the way they got by. There were stories about me and Charlie and mom and everyone else but pop caught me before I could read much. He told me it was a private matter but he hoped someday I would read them all so I could tell him what I thought. He said I might want to collect stories myself some day. I liked the idea of that so I started my own notebook and put something in it most every day.

There was a big man – kind of dark-skinned but I couldn’t tell if it was the sun’s work or he was born that way – who seemed to run things for the most part. He was called Leon. Pop hung around with Leon most of the time and mom hung around with Leon’s girl Margie. They got along real well. Mom said they looked at things with the same eyes.

One time me and Juan, one of my buds at the farm, sneaked over to where Leon and pop were talking with some other guys. Leon was afraid of the Boss Man. He said the boss was trying like hell to get rid of him. He blamed him and pop for everything that happened which was all good the way they told it and the way I believe it too. The Boss Man was making some threats. They used some language I can’t even write down. Leon said he was about to take matters into his own hands. Burn that damn house down! Pop said he shouldn’t do that. Start a war and what all. Hatfield’s and McCoy’s. Red and Blue. North and South. All that gang war stuff. Pop said he had a plan and he’d take care of it. He did too.

That night after supper pop called everyone together. Leon warned him there were Boss Man spies and stooges and folks they called scabs (I guess they called ‘m that ‘cause you’re not supposed to pick at them) but pop said never mind he wanted all of them there. He told them straight up he knew that Mr. Connelly (that’s the boss man) recruited them to cause trouble and break up any attempt to organize the workers into a united group. They called it a union. He said he knew they were up to some other bad things too and it wasn’t going to work.

One man with a bald head shouted out: Who appointed you to speak for anyone? Dad said we would find out in a little while who he spoke for. Then he said: We all know who you speak for! Everybody started nodding their heads at that. Pop had ‘m. Like they all knew who was telling the truth. He said they were going to have a vote and everyone was expected to honor the vote and if they didn’t they had to leave. The stooges didn’t like the sound of that but all they could do was grumble like a bunch of third graders. They had a contract all typed out that said the workers would have a say on who got hired and who got fired. It said some other things too but it seemed like that was the most important thing.

They passed out pencils and papers to all the workers. A yes meant they wanted the union and wanted to join in and a no meant they didn’t want any part of it. They waited for people to make their votes and then they gathered ‘m up and counted ‘m one by one. After a while it was pretty clear how the vote would turn out but they counted ‘m all anyway. Pop’s side won real easy and then they chose some people to lead the union. Leon was elected president and pop was real happy about that. He called it a victory for the working people.

The next day Leon and pop and the people they elected went to meet with the boss man in the big house. I don’t know what was said but when they came out everyone was happy and shaking hands. Even the stooges seemed okay with it. Mom told me they changed their minds and they were going to join up too.

That night they built a big fire and had a celebration. There was lots of food with cakes and cookies and music and dancing and laughing and hollering. It was great fun for us kids. We ran around like free souls doing whatever we felt like doing as long as we didn’t cause any trouble. It was a lot more fun than the parties we had back home. Mom said these people had music in their souls. I asked her if I had music in my soul and I got a little worried when she didn’t answer straight away. She looked me in the eyes for a spell like she was looking past all the wrong things I ever did or said and told me I had as much music in my soul as anyone else. She said it was up to me to keep it that way.

We left in the morning right after breakfast. I could tell mom and dad really liked the farm so I asked them why we had to go. Mom told me we were on a great adventure and what kind of adventure would it be if we stayed the first place we came to. I couldn’t argue with that even though I liked the farm a lot and I wouldn’t have had a problem if we decided to stay there. Dad told me I’d like the next place we were going almost as much or maybe even more. He said there were kids there and the whole place was run by young people. I asked if there was music there and he winked at me: Son, one thing I’ve learned is there’s music everywhere you go.

It was a long haul to the Sun Camp. We had to camp out three nights before we got there. I have to admit I wasn’t used to camping out in the country. There were animals out there I never heard before. Cinn would bark if they got too close to camp but she didn’t run off after them. She was too smart for that. Mom and dad would tell me what they were: There were hoot owls, raccoons, possums, coyotes and a couple of mountain lions. Those mountain lions are real scary when you’re out there under the stars at night. Dad said they’re still afraid of humans but the day would come when they lost their fear. He said they used to stay up in the mountains but now they came down to where people were because they were losing their fear of humans. People didn’t kill the big cats like they used to because there were no guns – or no bullets to put in the guns. He said we should be afraid of the big cats and other animals too but that we shouldn’t worry too much because he had this special dart gun that Carlin’s friends came up with. It had a chemical to it that was supposed to knock a big animal down without killing it. I was glad we didn’t have to use it because I wasn’t too sure how well it would work. I didn’t say anything but half the things Carlin and his friends worked out didn’t work at all.

We had to camp off the road so no one could see us. Dad said we had to be cautious. Even Cinn stayed quiet out there. Dad talked about how things had changed since the first time he went down that road. It was safer because the people from the Sun Camp and other places he didn’t know much about were patrolling it. They kept the road clean and made repairs. Dad said the first time he was here there were old cars that didn’t run any more all over the place. They cleared ‘m out. Things were a lot better now so we could make good time and no one would bother us. Twice we saw people dad knew going the other way on crawlers. We stopped to talk to them and get reports. They told us everything was good and they were waiting for us at the Sun Camp.

One night we had to put the fire out and wait real quiet so some loud people in a truck wouldn’t see us. Pop tucked Cinn under his arm and whispered for her to be quiet too. Turned out it wasn’t anything to worry about but it was a little scary.

On the third day we turned off on a dirt road with some rocks covering it and went real slow for a long time. Then we stopped and dad put a flag up a long pole. He said it would tell the people at the camp we were coming and not to be afraid. Everyone had to be cautious.

When we got there we were all really tired. They were real nice. They took us in like family – especially pop. You could tell right away they had a lot respect for him. They couldn’t wait to show him all the projects they were working on and he couldn’t wait to see it. Me and mom sat down to eat while dad went off with a guy named Zar. A lot of them had funny names like that but that’s okay because everyone’s different. It doesn’t mean they aren’t good people. They are. They were really good people. Most of the kids were little but there were two boys and two girls that were about my speed. The boys were Boz and Phoenix. The girls were Cloud and River and they were real cute. Two boys and two girls meant that I was the guy without a dance partner. That’s what Boz said. That made me a little mad. It made me want to prove him wrong. Not that I ever danced with a girl before but him thinking that I was the one left out. That was about the time I started thinking about girls. River was real pretty and sweet. She was Phoenix’s sister and she was not a girly girl. She kept us with us boys pretty good. Cloud was nice too and she liked to run with us. I guess they were brought up like that. They didn’t have to act like girls and wear dresses and all unless they wanted to. I thought they were cool.

Naturally the minute I decided I liked River, Cloud decided she liked me. Why does that always happen? Back home that would have threw me off but this was a different kind of place so I decided to be cool. Turns out Cloud was the best girl I ever met. She took a liking to Cinn too and we started hanging out together all the time. She showed me where they made a pond in the creek and how they were turning out electricity from running water. She showed me other things too. Like where they made solar panels. They take light from the sun and turn it into power. That place was real clean and we had to be really careful. There was another place where they made the solar crawlers. Some of those crawlers were getting too fast for their name. They were made of bike wheels and lightweight aluminum.

They had this gigantic room where everybody got together for meals and meetings. They had a windmill in the yard and they were making electricity from that too. The food was really good even though they didn’t eat meat here. They explained why that was a good thing too. Everything about this place was good. Even school wasn’t boring like it was back home. We learned everything we needed to know about how things work and how to build things and how to make electricity from wind, water and the sun. We learned about what they called “renewable energy” and how to stop killing the planet we live on. I never thought I’d say it but school was just all right and we still had plenty of time to play. Holly was one of our teachers and he said playing was just as important as reading books. I couldn’t agree more. But I liked the books we read too. Everything about this place was cool. Even after I got in a fight with Boz because he was treating Cloud mean things were okay. Me and my parents got together with Boz and his parents and worked things out. I understood why he was mad and he understood why I was mad and we both understood there were better ways to handle things than to fight over it. We shook hands and now we’re good friends again – even better than we were before.

Mom and dad thought we were real funny, Cloud and me. But I didn’t mind. We were having fun and learning things at the same time. We didn’t mess around or anything but I did kiss her. I liked it. We both liked it but we made a vow not to tell anyone – especially our parents. Cloud’s parents were really cool like mine but it was no use pushing our luck. You never know when parents are going to draw a line in the sand. That’s just what parents are supposed to do.

After a while I decided I liked the Sun Camp better than any other place. It was better than the farm and better than the Bridge Camp and damned sure better than back home with Carlin and everyone. I know I shouldn’t say that. I love grandma a lot but she’s not like she used to be. It’s not her fault she can’t remember things. I love Aunt Joan and her kids even if they are spoiled brats. I like Uncle Bud and Aunt Mildred and even Carlin ain’t as bad as I thought he was. Mom explained to me why he was the way he was and I sort of understood it’s not his fault either. It’s just the way things are. Still, if I had my choice, this is the place I would want to live. Like mom said to Holly, it’s a great place to raise kids.

One night before bed (we were living in a great cabin) I worked up the nerve to ask my parents straight up: Why can’t we live here? They looked at each other and smiled before dad said: We can and we’re giving it some thought. Something like that. I didn’t push my luck. I really expected them to tell me our place was back home with our family. It put a smile on my face to think we might end up here. It was a great place and we were happy here. Of course we’d have to go get Charlie. That’s for sure.

Jeez I didn’t even talk about the music. It’s like half the people here play the guitar and the other half plays the drums. All the kids either dance or play drums too. They sit around in a big circle every Friday night. Someone plays every night but the big circle is on Fridays. There are a couple of fiddles and some flutes too. It doesn’t even matter if you have someone to dance with you just get out there and dance. We were there for two circles and I never had so much fun. That’s the best time I ever had.

We had to go the day after the circle. I didn’t want to leave and I don’t guess mom and dad wanted to either but we had to. We had to get back because people were counting on us. There was business that had to get done. We got on a solar train – that’s four crawlers tied together. Two couples were going with us. That made six adults and me and Cinn.

We just said our goodbyes after breakfast and headed out. All the kids were there and Cloud looked a little sad. I whispered in her ear: Don’t worry we’ll be back. She said: You promise and I said yes. That made her smile. Boz and Phoenix and River and Cloud followed us a long way down the road but they stopped at the flagpole. Then we waved goodbye again and that was it.

One crawler was stacked full of panels and stuff for the other camps. Ours was in the back and it was about half full of stuff which left plenty of room for us. Holly and Janis were in the crawler in front of us and in front of them were Zar and Jo. It was real bumpy on that dirt road but when we got down to the main road things were smooth sailing.

We were cruising along having a pretty good time looking around and all when all of a sudden Zar threw up his hand for us to stop and Cinn started growling. Pop had to put on the brakes from our car or the train would crash. Brakes were a new thing on these crawlers. They were like bike brakes and they worked pretty well. Everyone had to get down and get out their dart guns. They all had one except me. Pop went down to talk to Zar and see what was going on. There was a big tree trunk lying across the road. There was no rain or big wind lately so they figured it was an ambush. Sure enough these guys came out with bandanas over their face so you couldn’t tell who they were. Pop recognized one of them right away. He came back and told us to stay down. He was going over there to talk to them. He didn’t seem too worried but maybe he was. I know I was scared and mom kept looking around like she expected more of them to come out on both sides of the road. But there weren’t nobody on the side of the road. There was only these guys in front of us. Six of them against seven of us.

Dad and Zar went over there and stopped about twenty paces short. I heard dad tell one of them he knew exactly who he was. He said we weren’t giving up our cargo. We weren’t giving them anything and if he knew what was what he’d clear that log out and go back the way they came. The next thing you know Cinn took off running and one of those men threw an ax in my dad’s direction. He ducked it easy enough and Zar plugged the man they were talking to with a dart. I watched his knees wobble like he was made of jello and then he fell to his face and the rest of them took off running. Ain’t seen nothing like it before or since. It’s a lucky thing no one was hurt.

Pop and Zar looked him over all sprawled out on the ground to see if he was dead or alive. They saw he was still breathing so they tied him up by his wrists and ankles and put him on a crawler. After they took off his bandana we saw that it was the same bald headed man that was yelling at pop back at the farm. Pop said Boss Man Frank must have sent him so we were taking him back there to see what was what. It must have taken us half a day to roll that log off the road. Some folks came by in their own crawler and helped us. By that time it was already near sundown so we made camp a little ways down, the first place we could turn off that was safe. That’s where we saw two men hanging from a tree. There was a sign on ‘m that said “Thieves.” Mom covered my eyes but I saw it clear as day. Like Jo said it just goes to show it’s still dangerous out here. I could tell mom and dad were real disappointed. They cut ‘m down and buried ‘m in shallow graves without any markers. I guess we figured they deserved some respect but not that much. Nobody said any prayers or anything but we talked about how hard it was just to live and it was understandable how some people turn to robbing and stealing things. It was wrong of course but it was still understandable.

The man we had tied up woke up after a while and admitted that the boss man sent him to ambush us. He said the boss man knew which way we’d be coming. They had a look out up in a tree so they knew when to let that log fall on the road. He told us they weren’t planning on hurting anyone. They just wanted to put a scare in us and take our stuff. He said they were going to take it in the back way so the workers wouldn’t see. Pop didn’t believe the part about not hurting anyone and reminded him about that ax. He just shrugged his shoulders and didn’t say anything. Holly said he was damn lucky to be alive and told him about the thieves who got hanged for doing the same thing. He didn’t know what to say about that. I guess he knew he was lucky.

Everyone took turns standing watch that night just in case one of those guys was still around looking for trouble. Nothing happened though so I guess they learned their lesson. I had to admit those dart guns worked pretty good.

We had no more problems the rest of the way. We camped out with other people that dad knew. They were making campgrounds up and down this road. There were two other kids my age at one camp. We hung out and talked. I told them about the thieves being hanged and the ambush and their eyes got wide open like maybe they didn’t believe me until I told them we had us one of the ambushers tied up. So we all went over to look at him. He was real quiet like he was sad and sorry at the same time. There was some talk about letting him go but dad said it was important we took him back to the farm. One of the kids asked him if he was a thief. He just shrugged and said he’d tell us all about it if we untied him. That’s when Holly came over and told us to leave the man alone. Said the last thing they needed was having to look after some kids who didn’t know what was what. He said that man just might kill us if he had to in order to escape. That was good enough for us.

When we finally got back to the farm we found out the word traveled faster than we did. They were waiting for us and they knew all about the man we had tied up as prisoner. They hauled him off and talked to him for a long time. I don’t know what all they said but it got pretty heated in there. There was some loud talking and some yelling too. Later they hauled him up to the big house where the boss man looked like he ate something funny as soon as he saw the man’s face. Leon said they knew what the boss man was up to and he wasn’t going to get away with it. He said that they’d talked to the authorities already and they didn’t care who ran the place as long as it got done. He said they were down to their last spot of patience and the next time he tried something like this he and his family would be out on the street and it’d be his fault too. Then he told the boss man to give up the rations he’d promised to the man who was still tied up so they could give it to him and send him on his way. He said they were planning to inspect his private warehouse out back to see what all he’d stolen from people. Sure enough they found some things too.

The boss man was real flustered. He kept looking at his wife and his kids and the thugs who were supposed to protect him but they weren’t moving a muscle. He went from saying it was all a misunderstanding to it was a mistake to agreeing with everything Leon said. He put up the rations he’d promised and Leon was true to his word. They untied him, gave him his rations and sent him on his way. The last thing Leon said to him though was that he should go as far as he could as fast as he could because if they ever saw him again there would be hell to pay. Those are his words not mine.

We stayed there for a couple days to get things going with the solar panels and all; also to make sure there was no more trouble. Pop said if anything went wrong they should send a runner and we’d get a lot of people there real quick.

From there we went on down to the Bridge Camp. Sugar was real happy to see us. He heard about all the things we been through and said he was sorry even though it wasn’t his fault. He was waiting for supplies too and he was happy to get them. He told us everything was fine back home even though some people were losing their patience with Carlin. So then I knew I wasn’t the only one who had a problem with Uncle Carlin. We stayed the night, ate a good dinner in a brand new house made out of those special bricks and made our way home in the morning.

I’ve got to say I was really glad to get home. It was a great adventure but we were bone tired and ready to rest. They were all happy to see us – especially me. I almost forgot that I snuck off. I guess you could say I ran away. They weren’t mad though. They had a cake and everyone was happy. Grandma gave me a big hug and asked me if I missed her like she missed me. I almost bawled. The last time I saw grandma I wasn’t sure she knew who I was. She asked me if I was sorry I ran off and I had to say yes even though it wasn’t true.

The truth is: I had the best time of my life. No matter what happened I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Mom said these are my memories. They’re my most valuable possessions and I should hang on to them as long as I can. I told her I would.

Hard Times: Chapter 6 "The Sun Camp"

The Sun Camp (Zar’s Story)



We were both students at the university when hard times hit us like a hurricane wind. Jo had a grant from the state for graduate work in engineering. That was one of the first cuts from the state budget. I was surviving on a combination of work-study and parental assistance in my senior year as a student of philosophy. Both were coming to an abrupt halt. Times were hard and no one was spared. My parents said it was the hardest decision they ever had to make but they didn’t have enough saved to pay the mortgage and the medical bills. Their world was crashing down on them so I didn’t have the heart to protest. The truth is it was an easy decision and one that I would have insisted on if they had not.

I was resigned to pack it in and go back home when Jo and her circle of friends came up with the idea of creating their own community. For me it was perfect timing. I was disenchanted with postmodern deconstructionism. I resented the growing religious nature of my discipline. I saw the irony of canonizing a man whose philosophy was antithesis to canonization. Friedrich Nietzsche was a great man but he was not a god. He was the philosopher who sought no followers yet attracted them in legions long after his death. I believed in the philosophy of Nietzche’s fictional Zarathustra who instructed all to follow their own paths. It was a revelation that led me to profound and persistent doubt. When hard times came I was not only compelled to abandon my formal education, I was mentally primed to do so.

In many ways I was the least likely to join a community of idealists. I was the least valuable. I had no practical skills. I could pound a hammer but the others could design systems, energy systems and water systems, greenhouses and gardens. They could build a community from the ground up and I could reflect on their work. I was hopeful I could acquire a serviceable skill but I was invited only because of my association with Jo. Jo was eminently useful. She was a valued member of a study group that was at the forefront of solar technology. The core of the group consisted of practical engineers but they were socially conscious enough to want couples. Contented couples would mean less tension and greater focus on the task of building a self-sufficient community. They were less interested in utopian ideals than they were in utilitarian values. They had the practical technological knowledge to create a working system unless human conflicts got in the way. I guess some of them thought a philosophy major might be useful in that regard.

Even though my life had no particular direction I would not have been interested in forming a pre-Apocalyptic commune if not for Jo. Jo was a rock. When everything else was rusting away and collapsing like sand castles at high tide, Jo was steady. Her belief system was firmly grounded in science but she an unbreakable spirit like that ancient musical The Unsinkable Molly Brown. No matter how bad things went she held on to the belief that everything would turn out fine if we just kept moving, working and fighting. Jo believed in what they were doing and I believed in her.

We sent out the word to other universities while the web was still up. We had a location scouted out and plans in place. We invited others of like interests to join us. There were a few professors backing the project. One managed to get funding before the financial system broke down. He pilfered as much as he could from the university. Anticipating the fall of the internet we downloaded and printed out everything we thought we’d need. We collected books and journals and technical papers. We shipped supplies down to the site in phases, one truckload after another, until we were ready to set up camp. It was a fairly remote location with a natural clearing by a creek and good fertile soil. With everything else that was going on, the locals didn’t seem to mind a bunch of college kids and hippie types moving into the neighborhood.

We set up tents in the spring, planted a garden and started building the community center with a large kitchen and gathering hall. There were about two dozen of us in the beginning and others joined us as we went along. We invited those who were useful to stay and encouraged those who were not to move on. Only a couple of times did we have to insist: One man who was a born troublemaker and wanted to assert his leadership and another who was just plain lazy. We came to our decisions as a group and confronted the offenders straight up. The lazy guy packed his bag and left the next day. The troublemaker resisted but after three days of being ignored he gave a rant about our self-righteousness, our lack of vision and of course our lack of leadership. He left us with a prophecy of doom and a curse of darkness. We laughed about it at the time but when the virus came and knock us all to our knees we remembered. You can’t help wondering about something like that.

Before the spring let out we finished the community center and kitchen. We expanded the gardens, set up a greenhouse, finished building a warehouse for canning, drying and storage, started an expanded tool shop and began work on two rows of cottages. It was hard work but the payoff was phenomenal. It’s amazing what people can accomplish when they know what they’re doing and do it right. We worked from morning until dark with a couple of breaks for food every day. In the evenings after dinner we got out our instruments – mostly guitars and drums – and played until we were too tired to carry on. Most nights it didn’t take too long. Honest labor leads to deep sleep and pleasant dreams.

While the weather was still good most of us slept in the courtyard under the stars but we all set up inside the community center. We had a large wooden chest for our belongings and a rug that sort of defined our personal space. We had solar lights and plenty of energy to run our kitchen from the solar panels and the windmill in the center of the courtyard. We had a crew working on tapping the creek for waterpower as well. To an academic intellectual like myself it was extraordinary. In a very short time a fully functional, self-sufficient working community sprang up from the land.

Midway through the summer we felt like we could relax a little. We had a good supply of dried goods, canned fruits and vegetables. We completed a second greenhouse and finished off enough cottages for everyone in residence and a couple of guests. We had three working solar crawlers that we sent out up and down the valley to set up an alliance of communities for trade and support.

We called our community Paradiso and from my perspective it was amply named. We may not have set out to create a utopian society but what we accomplished was close enough. Every man, woman and child that was a part of it felt a sense of pride and belonging. We were feeling strong and confident – maybe a little too confident. That’s when the sickness hit. I don’t know how it started. Jo says it was some visitors, friends of friends just passing through to witness what we had built. I guess one of them had a cough. I don’t have any clear recollection but it hit us hard and fast and it spared no one.

We were all sick but some were sicker than others. Some of us, including Jo and I, could still walk and gather food and cook meals and tend to the ones who couldn’t get out of bed. Some people were coughing so hard they spit up blood. Jo thought it might be tuberculosis. That’s when we sent someone on a crawler into town to contact the authorities and get help if he could. Eventually a man from the Center for Infectious Diseases showed up to tell us it was a particularly bad case of the flu. Reports were coming in from all over the valley. Everyone was sick. There was nothing they could do for us.

After a week of tending to people in their cottages, we moved everyone who was bedridden into the community center. It was the only way we could tend to them all. We lost three people in those first horrible weeks: an older man named Raven, a beautiful young woman named Breeze and a baby whose name I can’t recall. It was constant misery. We could smell death (its gray and rotting) and watched it crawling closer but we were too weak to fight it back. We made a big pot of soup and spent most of the day moving from cot to cot or bed to bed, trying to get them to eat, putting fresh cold rags on their foreheads, wiping the sweat from their bodies, changing sheets whenever we could no longer stand the smell. It was pure misery. I was certain we were all going to die. My bones and muscles ached, my head throbbed and my cough sent me into a panic. I was afraid to lie down for worry that I would never get up again. I was so tired I don’t know how I made it from day to day.

It had to be the same for Jo but she never complained. We had to keep working and Jo wouldn’t give in. Someone had to tend the gardens, gather fresh vegetables for the soup, and make sure the irrigation system didn’t break down. She kept going and she kept me going just watching her. After I don’t know how many weeks (I lost track of time) it was down to us and I was fading.

I still remember the day Janis showed up with Holly and Stone. We couldn’t believe that anyone would come here. No one had since the man from the Center for Infectious Diseases. We later learned he put a distress sign up down the road. We were in virtual quarantine and anyone who got close could see and smell a cloud of danger surrounding us. But here they were offering to help. Jo and I talked about how much we should tell them but in the end neither one of us had it in us to say anything but the truth. We were a broken community preparing for death. We were both shocked that they decided to stay. I know its cliché to say a weight was lifted but how else can you say it? I felt a physical force pushing down hard on my shoulders every minute of every day but it became lighter and easier when they showed up and stayed.

The first time I went out to see them, to deliver a meal, I must have talked for an hour without relief. Jo and I were too tired to talk and when we did it was always about the sickness, about what to do next and what to do if. I hadn’t talked to other humans for as long as I could remember. I talked and talked and they listened. I asked questions and didn’t wait for the answers. I asked them about the news and baseball, forgetting for the moment that there was no news and as far as anyone knew no baseball. I had to apologize later but it was so good just to talk to someone who wasn’t sick and dying.

I don’t believe we would have pulled through if not for their help. It was miraculous that Jo and I kept going as long as we did. If they hadn’t come along I truly believe the entire community and everyone in it would have succumbed. We would have been a tragic story of the endemic flu that swept through the valley in hard times.

They tended the gardens, collected fresh fruits and vegetables, did the necessary maintenance and made sure everything was in working order. When the weather started turning they chopped wood in preparation for the winter. Jo and I shared meals with them three times a day and the rest of our time was spent inside tending the sick. We savored our time with them. Janis was full of good ideas for treating the illness, including opening the doors twice a day for ventilation. She was eager to help and always asked to be allowed inside but we always refused. We needed them to stay healthy. Holly was a very likeable man and a good worker. Stone was quiet at first, a little laid back, listening more than talking, taking it in. We loved his dog Cinnamon and she loved Stone. Later, when we got to know him and heard him tell his stories about the people he met and the communities he’d encountered, we both realized he was the kind of person that people instinctively listen to and respect. He had a vision of pulling separate communities together so that all of them could enjoy the best of each community. It went beyond trading goods and services. It was an alliance of sharing, exchanging ideas and people and coming to a common understanding. He believed that any community that was isolated was in constant danger of dissolving either from within or without. He believed that the more communities we could bind together the stronger we would all be and the better our chances for survival.

I was skeptical at first. I liked what we had going here. I wanted to keep it like it was and I was afraid that outside influence would alter it in a bad way. I wanted my own vision of utopia and I thought our best chance of realizing that vision was Paradiso.

As the weeks went by we spent many hours talking things through. More and more people were getting out of their beds, recovered enough to stand and then walk and then join us outside. Eventually I became convinced that Stone was right. If we were a part of a greater community this illness would not have threatened our very existence. We have had help from the early stages. We would face other threats as time went by and we would need help again. By the same reasoning, we had to be prepared to help others. It all made sense.

One of Stone’s ideas was to maintain the road that led to Paradiso. He envisioned a constant traffic of solar crawlers traveling from the south as far as Fresno to the north as far as Chico. He envisioned a transport service, an exchange of information, goods and personnel. He wanted each member community to accept responsibility for maintaining its share of the road, for building campsites and ensuring security. The more he talked the more he persuaded everyone who listened. After a while I realized it was not just the fact that he was enthusiastic; it was that he was talking about the future—and not just the immediate future. He was a man of vision. He was talking about a new order, a new way of living, a new and better society. It had been a long time since anyone talked in those terms. I guess that’s why Paradiso (he called it the Sun Camp) so appealed to him. It was a place of dreams and a place that encouraged dreamers. Stone was a natural dreamer and it seemed he had found a home.

When Stone got sick it scared us. We were already numbed by the deaths we had endured and the struggle we had overcome. He was more than a friend; he was someone we were willing to follow. He was a part of our family. He was my brother. He never talked about his family much before he was sick. He told us who they were and where they were and why he had left them but that was all. I think he was afraid that if he talked about them too much it would consume him. He didn’t want to go back until things had changed and he could be sure that his presence would not add to their hardship. So he didn’t talk about them. After he got sick that was all he talked about. He faded in and out of consciousness and every time he woke up he wondered where he was and asked for Madge or Denim or Charlie.

There was a young woman named Oleander who held herself responsible for his illness. I don’t that that’s true but she felt it was. She and Janis sat by his side around the clock. He was never alone. Cinn was there too. She would lay by his side with her head on his chest looking at his face for signs of life. When he woke up she was always there licking his face and reminding him he was loved.

We sent someone on a crawler to check up on Stone’s family. We had a long discussion about whether or not to tell his wife that Stone was sick and might not make it. We decided not to tell her because we were afraid she would come to care for him and the sickness would take hold of her. We didn’t want to leave their children orphans. I’m not sure if it was the right thing to do. In her place I would want to know. But that’s what it came down to and that’s what we decided. We just wanted to be able to tell him that his family was safe.

We had the same decision regarding a professor from the university who came down to observe our progress and offer advice. She was close to Jo and a number of students. Jo said that without Dr. Arakawa none of this would have happened. She was a brilliant physicist with practical knowledge in energy systems – particularly solar energy. She was more than pleased with what we had accomplished but she came at exactly the wrong time. It was the week the illness hit so no one knew how bad it would be. She held on for a long time. Like so many others it seemed she would recover. She was up and walking around in late autumn. But she had a relapse and it hit her hard. We had already informed her family (she had a husband and two grown children) that she was ill. We were frank about the seriousness of the illness though we were confident of her recovery chances at the time. They came immediately. All of them. We tried to stop them at the gate down the road but they wouldn’t listen. We even had the professor write a letter to dissuade them but it seemed to have the opposite effect. The father who was a professor of sociology tried to persuade his son and daughter but they refused to hear it. They were a family. Their wife and mother was deathly ill and they would be there by her side just as she would if it was one of them. I thought it strange that intelligent and educated people, people who dedicated so much of their existence to reason, would yield logic to emotion when it counted most. I can’t say that I would do differently.

Dr. Arakawa held on until Christmas. The winter was mild but a storm came down from the mountains for Christmas Eve and held for three days. It snowed. The locals said it hadn’t snowed here for twenty years. It was comforting. Like chicken soup or fresh baked bread. We stayed inside most of the time, sipping warm drinks and talking softly about everything that had happened and whether it was worth it. When Dr. Arakawa died Christmas morning there was a deep sense of loss. We were gathered in the community room when the family came in and announced her passing. Her husband told us she was coherent in the last moments before her death. She said that what we were doing was important. Her last wish was that we should carry on and complete the work that she had helped birth. She said there would always be hardships but we would succeed as long as we refused to fail. Those were her last words: Refuse to fail.

It was a solemn Christmas. I went to see Stone around midnight. Oleander was asleep in a chair with an open book in her lap. I think it was Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. I talked to him for quite a while. I told him what had happened and how sorrow had a grip on us. I said we needed him to pull through or we might not make it. I explained how important the professor was to everyone. I told him I felt the same way about him and I thought the others had the same feeling. I asked him to think about it and if he could find a way back to us he should. After that I just stood there looking at him, wondering what he was experiencing, wondering if it was selfish to ask him to think of us and thinking that somehow he understood what I was talking about.

A couple of weeks later he came out of it. He just woke up and he was here. He was weak but he was fully cogent and aware. Later when I got a chance I asked him what he remembered from when he was unconscious. He told me he remembered everything but not in words. He said he felt warmth and a sense of closeness to those around him when he was sick. He said he couldn’t remember what was said but he knew how it felt. It felt like we were pulling him back from wherever he was. He thanked me.

I don’t know if there’s a god or another realm or another life after this one. On so many levels it doesn’t make sense. But I had a feeling that Stone went somewhere else and chose to come back to us. I know it’s irrational and it goes against everything I’ve learned. Still, I choose to believe an individual has a choice even in death. Jo didn’t agree. If wishes and prayers could bring a person back from death then they would have worked on Dr. Arakawa. She chose to place her faith in science and her prayers were scientific inquiry. She was no less grateful that Stone survived but she refused to attribute it to anything other than loving care and the laws of probability. It comes down to religion. No objective observer can doubt that religion is a mixed blessing at best and a scourge on humanity at worst. The problem with religion as I see it is orthodoxy. When people band together and recruit others on the condition that any knowledge that is not established in orthodox beliefs must be rejected it becomes the enemy of social and personal progress and growth. Jo and I agreed that orthodox religion should have no part in our community but that all belief systems should be regarded with absolute tolerance as long as no one was harmed or hindered in any way. That was the unspoken creed of Paradiso.

Stone awakened with a strong desire to see his family. He wanted to go back as soon as he was physically able. It took a while for us to persuade him that he should wait until spring when he was fully recovered and the weather was more forgiving. After Christmas the freeze lifted and a series of strong storms rode in on the waves of fluctuating temperature. Warm spells followed cold spells and when they met hailstorms, lightning and strong winds pounded us. We spent much of our time making repairs from the storms. One of the worst brought down an ancient oak tree on our workshop. We all knew the prophecies of the environmental movement concerning global warming and climate change and here was the proof – a little late but clear and powerful. The good side of economic collapse was that it closed down massive industries. The planet was in the process of cleaning up industrial poisons and waste in the air, the water and the land. We were determined it stay that way. That was in fact our prime directive: To live in harmony with the planet.

When Stone left in the spring I went with him. Paradiso was back in working order. We had a cottage industry producing more solar panels and crawlers than we could reasonably use. We had a mission to trade our technology and expertise for anything that other communities could bring to us. Stone had an idea the each community possessed something that they did better than anyone else. We did energy systems, the farm did food, the bridge camp did masonry and brickwork and the city community, while they had no particular specialty, could contribute in other ways. The first step was to clear the path and to get everyone to agree on the vision. He was sure we could get the Bridge Camp and the farm to buy in but he wasn’t so sure about the city. He wanted to convince his own family to move to Paradiso. It was a delicate balance because he didn’t think his extended family – his wife’s mother, his aunt and uncle, or his in-laws – were a good fit for Paradiso. His brother-in-law was too bossy and set in his ways and the others were not physically able to contribute in a meaningful way. The time might come when we could accommodate a more diverse community, including the elderly, but at this stage it was ill advised.

We were a little worried about security. Our people had kept the road clear and made repairs and we had established camps off the road that couldn’t be seen but we heard reports of criminal gangs roaming from town to town, taking what they wanted or needed and leaving them destroyed. We were traveling light so we could get off the road and take cover if someone approached. The gangs invariably used internal combustion vehicles so it was easy to hear them coming.

We had very little trouble and made good time. We had to take cover several times but we never felt threatened. We camped with people who were of like mind. They knew of our community and they had established relations. One of them had come from Stone’s hometown and told us about a massacre that had taken place there. A gang of released prisoners was wiped out by the military. No one from the community had been harmed but some of them, the story went, had been relocated when their homes were destroyed. There was no way of knowing whether it was his neighborhood or not but Stone was worried. We agreed that he should get home as soon as possible so when we reached the farm, I stayed and he took the crawler. We had enough crawlers on the road at that time that I could easily catch a ride so we weren’t worried about my getting stranded. We were a little worried about traveling alone but a man’s got to do what he’s got to do.

The farm was an amazing place. Stone introduced me to Leon before he left and they took me in like I was one of the family. Their gardens and greenhouses were state of the art and their canning operation was professional. Leon was already convinced that solar was the way to go and I had some ideas concerning wind and water energy that interested them. I spent three days talking to people with wide eyes who were eager to buy what I was selling. The only problem it seemed was the boss – a leftover from the old school who resented any ideas that came from the workers no matter how much sense it made. I talked to him only briefly. He was intransigent. I left thinking it was a problem that had to be overcome if we were going to make any headway here. I told Leon we’d be back as soon as we could.

I caught up with Stone at the Bridge Camp. That’s when I found out it had been his neighborhood and what happened there was horrifying. The story of that massacre would be told to every community in the valley. It served notice that we should all take care of our own security needs or there would be blood on our hands. Of course we knew we could rarely count on the authorities anyway but this was something different. Until then we didn’t know what they were capable of doing. Fear of inaction was suddenly replaced by an equivalent fear of action.

Stone was shaken but he was grateful that his family was okay. I told him about the problem at the farm and he wasn’t surprised. He said it was inevitable that they would have to deal with that man. He was a capitalist slave driver and he refused to change. He had a deal with the local authorities (such as they were) to deliver food around town and that protected him. Stone’s idea was to negotiate a new deal with the authorities that would pretty much cut the boss out of the equation. Property rights weren’t what they used to be. Stone was already on it. They had a deal worked out where the town would receive more for less than they were giving now – even with the boss’s ten percent cut.

What was happening at the Bridge Camp was truly inspiring. Much like Paradiso they were building a community from scratch. The difference was they were building with adobe-like bricks that they developed from local resources. The structures were sound and the insulation effect was phenomenal. It retained warmth when it was cold and coolness when it was hot. They also developed some roofing tiles that worked beautifully. The headman there was a guy named Sugar who was something of an expert in building things. No schooling, just the knowledge acquired through hard work and experience. He was already signed on to the alliance and waiting for the next shipment of solar panels.

The only holdup was Stone’s neighborhood community. I could see right away why Stone had a problem with his brother-in-law. Stubborn failed to do him justice and pig headed was an insult to pigs. He had three reasons why every idea wouldn’t work. Stone kept working on him. He said the key was to make him think it was his idea. The turnaround happened when he spent some time at the Bridge Camp. He respected Sugar and he saw how things were coming together. The solar panels were in place and it was pretty hard to deny how well they worked. Carlin stayed a few nights and he was sold.

I stayed on longer than I planned. I was excited with how things were going. I took a lot of satisfaction in watching new structures go up and new projects go into action. We transported ovens from Stone’s neighborhood and started turning out bricks and tiles. Solar and insulation panels were coming in as shipments of dried goods, bricks and tiles were going out. People were traveling between the communities bringing their knowledge and experience. We worked hard but it was deeply gratifying. It felt like we were building something that would last and maybe make a difference in this world.

I intended to go back to Paradiso with Stone but when his wife Madge decided to go with him I decided to find another way. I stayed another week and then I hitched a ride on a crawler. The road was clear and smooth and the camps were full. Everyone I talked to had a sense of optimism. The air was cleaner and the future was full of promise. When I finally I made it back it knocked me down. Sometimes you don’t see things clearly when you’re in the middle of them. You take a step back and you begin to grasp the whole. Paradiso was a thriving, well-planned and beautifully constructed work of art. Jo was ecstatic and everyone else was full of energy and surprise. Stone was everywhere at once. It was as if his wife and son Denim – a great kid like his father – had always been here. It was a community, a family, and everyone was on the same page. I knew then that this was my home. I could live here and be happy here.

It was damned near perfect.

Things were going so well that when we decided to take the first solar train from Paradiso north we didn’t expect any problems. We were stunned when we confronted an obvious ambush attempt. We had discussed whether or not to bring the dart guns that Stone brought with him from the city. We probably would not have if Denim were not along. I’m not sure what we would have done. It was our good fortune the bushwhackers were incompetent. Someone could have been hurt or killed. We couldn’t be sure how reliable our weapons were so we were reluctant to use them. I really felt I had no choice when they threw an ax and started to rush us. When I plugged that man and watched him drop like a sack of potatoes I thought he was dead. The other outlaws must have thought so too because they took off in all directions as fast as they could run. I was relieved when he was still breathing. I’m not a killer and I’d like to keep it that way. They tell me it changes a man and I’m sure it’s true. For that split second when I thought he was dead I was a killer. But I was spared.

When Stone pull the man’s mask off and recognized who it was it was pretty easy to put the story together. Our alliance was facing a new challenge and now we knew who was behind it: Frank Connelly, former owner-proprietor of The Farm. We understood his frustration. It was his place and he was used to doing business a certain way. That he capitalized on hard times was a strike against him. The Farm was one of the few places that still had jobs. According to the laws of free enterprise he had every right to call the shots. If he wanted to take advantage of the situation, if people were willing to work for food and a place to sleep, that was his business. If people were willing to be slaves (that’s what they were) that was their business. The only problem was human nature and several thousand years of human evolution. People have a natural aversion to slavery.

From his point of view Connelly was entitled to make a profit any way he could but like so many others of his bent he went too far. With his back against the wall, when he should have paused to take account, he went even further. He sent his thugs to ambush us and that was only the beginning of his transgression.

Connelly’s man was Smitty. We tied him up and muzzled him with his own bandana. We had to clear the road with a rope and a couple of handsaws before we could deal with him. It was an old oak tree so it took us all day – even with the help of some friends who came along. We were tired and pissed off when we finally made camp for the night and got around to questioning Smitty. He was a free agent. He had no loyalty to his employer. He was a bad man with a nasty disposition. He didn’t like anyone and he would take any man’s reward to do his dirty work. Connelly paid in gas and food rations. Good enough for Smitty. We offered him mercy and he took it. He sang like the nightingale. He confided that Connelly was behind it and his orders were to cause as much trouble as possible. We asked if that included killing people and Smitty nodded. He said he hadn’t killed anyone but he wouldn’t be surprised if others had. Said they were a ragtag bunch of rats and thugs and some of them were probably in it for the killing.

We discovered the truth of his confessional the next day after a long haul from sun up to sun down. We pulled off the road into a campsite and there for all to see were two of our friends and coworkers hanging from an oak tree. One of them was Java from the Bridge Camp. He was young and full of energy, smart and eager to learn. He made friends everywhere he went and everywhere he went he was welcomed as a brother. There was a sign tied to his belt reading Thief. He wasn’t a thief and neither was his friend Paco. Paco was from The Farm. He was an older man, a quiet man and a hard worker. His friends said he was fluent in Spanish but he struggled in English. He’d come north looking for work just before hard times hit. He was making his way back to his family down south when he found The Farm and stayed to help out. He liked what we were building here and planned to bring his wife and children here as soon as it was safe. He’d never make that trip now and no one but his friend Java knew where his family was.

Smitty swore he had nothing to do with it and I believed him. He was a nasty piece of work but it seemed to me he wasn’t a killer. We’d never know for sure but we were as sure as we could be that Connelly had blood on his hands. So we took Smitty back to The Farm as a witness and put the man they called the boss on trial. We tried to make it as formal as we could. Stone was nominated as judge but he refused on the grounds of personal bias. The truth is we were all biased but some were more so than others. We did the best we could under the circumstances. After a lot of discussion (some of the workers didn’t want a judge at all; they just wanted to string him up an eye for an eye) Jo was appointed judge, Leon represented The Farm, Janis represented Connelly and I stood for Smitty. Stone volunteered as court recorder and wrote everything down from beginning to end. We decided seven was as good a number as any and chose seven jurors. The majority would decide the verdict.

The trial was in two phases: The first without Connelly in the community center and the second confronting Connelly in his own house. We took witnesses and everyone got their say. Half a dozen took the stand to say they’d heard Connelly threaten to kill someone. Others testified they’d seen Connelly and his thugs haul people to the shed out back, heard the screams of people being tortured, and on a couple of occasions watched them carry a body off to be buried out in the woods.

Janis argued that most of the testimony was based on hearsay and conjecture. No one had actually seen the bodies or knew where they were buried. She said that this trial was not about the past but about the two men that were hanged by the side of the road. She said that Smitty could not be trusted because he was just trying to save his own skin. I countered that Smitty had nothing to gain by implicating Connelly. It didn’t make him any more or less guilty of what he had done. Leon said we had to consider the character of the accused and a history of violent crimes was the best way to reveal his character.

In the end the jury decided by unanimous vote that Connelly was guilty of sponsoring an ambush and causing two innocent men to be hanged. Smitty was found guilty of taking part in an ambush but he could not be held accountable for the hangings. Next we had to decide what to do about it. First we had to hear from Connelly but we had to be prepared to act on the assumption that his testimony would not change our verdict. The penalty had to be carried out immediately or Connelly would hire his thugs and start a war.

It was a heated discussion. We all pretty much agreed that the best way to deal with Smitty was to banish him. We would let him go but if we ever saw him again he would pay the price. We were not in agreement on Connelly. Some wanted Connelly to suffer the same fate as the men he hanged. The community leader Leon spoke out for hanging and Stone spoke out just as strong against it. He was against the death penalty before hard times and he remained against it. He said the interest of the community was to insure that harm should not be inflicted on its people. If killing someone was the only way to prevent harm then it was justified but if it was not necessary it was wrong. He said it was up to all of us to decide whether or not it was necessary to protect the community. But if we could protect the community by other means then we should do so. We talked it out and finally decided we could protect the community by confining Connelly and his family to their home. We could post guards 24-7 to make sure no one entered and no one left. We could take his rations and therefore his means of hiring thugs as penalty for his crimes. It was a hard decision and a close vote but Stone prevailed.

The entire community with Smitty still tied confronted Connelly at the house. We were armed and prepared to act. Connelly never denied hiring his thugs to carry out his dirty work. He only said that Smitty was a lying sack of shit and swore he’d have his revenge. He only confirmed that our decision was just. We informed him that he had been found guilty of sponsoring a crime and causing the death of two innocent men, that he would be confined to his home on penalty of hanging and that his rations and possessions of value now belonged to the community. His thugs stood down. They knew their time at The Farm was coming to an abrupt end. One by one they peeled off and went their own ways.

From that time forward Connelly would cause no more problems. The Farm belonged to the people who worked the land and the boss was their captive. No one can say what would have happened if Stone hadn’t come along. Maybe it was inevitable but even the inevitable can take a long time and a whole lot of suffering. Blacks in the south took hundreds of years to win their freedom and hundreds more to gain anything resembling equal rights. Maybe Stone just pushed history forward. Maybe that’s the best any of us can do. Maybe that’s enough.