The Dog Daze of Autumn

Your Aging Child has been busy these past couple weeks… again/still. Pope Pius XII remains on the front burner – figuratively, that is. Yet I've been juggling several projects beyond that one, too!

On the job front: while still wallpapering the neighborhood's corporate infrastructure with my résumé, I received the politest of letters from the religious order where I'd applied for the position of Executive Assistant to the Provincial Council. This letter gently and regretfully informed me that another candidate had been selected for that position. Certainly I was disappointed by the news, but I was still feeling the thrill of having just filled out an application there, especially one with a crucifix boldly in its header.

I've also begun plowing more actively into finally rejoining the ranks of college/university students… among whom I've studied (sometimes flying, sometimes flunking) since, er, Carter was president. Victim – I mean, candidate – school number one is a local community college, where at the least I'll nail down those last few "gut" classes toward my humble Associate's Degree. With luck, I'll be studying again this coming Spring.

On a parallel avenue, Mount St. Mary's University in Maryland has been getting an increasing amount of my attention and intentions as well. (See my previous posting.) They even have a satellite campus (which is not, however, in low-Earth orbit… although that would be really cool) closer to home. (And former coworker Aurelio attends that same remote campus!) There I met yesterday with an adult-student placement advisor; I'll be getting together with her again (embarrassing transcripts in hand) to look at what's needed to fast-track my Associate's Degree. I'll get the ba$i¢ classes finished up at the community college, then climb the Mount either for my Bachelor's degree, or to beg for admission at their on-campus seminary.

I'm also still pestering various placement agencies, and am under consideration (interviewing next week) for an admin-assistant job right there on the Mount campus, too. The position would pay barely over half what I was making with my previous employer, but the benefits include – check this out – free tuition. Aaaghhaagghh!

And at this time of year – as September finally shrugs its shoulders and yields to October and his russet leaf-palette – I generally take a week off and sequester myself in a monastery (really!) for a thorough spiritual flush-and-fill, and to sample further the monastic life. There's a great string of Saints' feast-days from late September into early October: archangels', guardian angels', beautiful and awesome St. Thérèse, the equally humble and inspiring St. Francis, and others. So there's plenty to meditate on. Sometimes during this span I can sneak in a birthday while no one's around to make a fuss over me.

But with my income essentially nil at present, this year I sacrificed that special week to prudence (ah, dear prudence), and made a couple-day roadtrip a little closer to my old Kentucky home – I mean, old New England home. I spent much of this time at the Fatima Shrine in Washington, New Jersey. (I'd popped by there for a bit last year, too, and nearly managed to bump into the gentle Father Apostoli.)

I was able to get in two early-morning runs (under a mile each), the first I've run in New Jersey. While panting along, I found myself giggling at an old B. Kilian cartoon I remembered:

No offense intended toward the Garden State! Put away your pieces.

It turns out that occasional contributor Spartacus has a high-security homestead within a day's drive (and perhaps a few state lines) of the Shrine, so – having already given him ample warning by cell and email – I swung by there as well. At some point this year his patient wife must have prevailed on him to put up a sign warning potential trespassers (and intrepid visitors) of the minefield. I paused a moment with my Sharpie and corrected the Russian spelling (the fresh sign's done up in six languages, IIRC), then pressed the call-button quickly enough to avoid the electric-shock he's wired in.

 "It's switched off!" Sparks yelled through his bullhorn after a moment. It looked like the gate-camera had shorted out during the recent rains up his way, so I figured he didn't know it was me yet. I tossed a couple pinecones over the razor-wire just in case, and turned my back a moment. Sure enough, one of them detonated a small mine. I jumped, and brushed the dirt and pine-needles off my shirt, then quick-pressed the button again.

 "Sorry about that!" came the bullhorned voice… but I could hear a chuckle as he clicked off. "Okay, I've muzzled the dogs!" I sighed and wrapped a beach-towel around my lower arm, and stepped through the gate as it swung open silently. The halogen-spots came on; I should have kept my sunglasses.

Even with that first camera out for now (don't count on it again, though), one still enters the Sparta-house acreage with caution. His motion-sensors all seemed to be active, and I spotted what looked like a shotgun and a blowgun each lift and turn my way as I walked past. No doubt other, less noticeable, devices were marking my passage.) Early on there was another mine-crater and a dog-chewed piece of a salesman's briefcase next to it… but I think that's a prop. Maybe. I stepped over several tripwires to play it safe.

In person, Spartacus is not quite as intimidating, but he's both taller and broader than me – and his wife and oldest child both have black belts in karate (one of his children later showed me her sword, too – nearly as long as I am tall; I am not kidding!), so there was no question how respectful I'd be. He sheathed his bowie knife and shook my left hand, and chided the large dog still clamped on my right arm. The dog dropped reluctantly, its hackles still raised, and we went into the house. I wrapped the now-perforated beach-towel around my neck and dabbed the sweat from my face – it had been much easier going this time than last.

We reminisced a bit; forty years ago we had been schoolkids together… and even then he was taller and broader and older than me, come to think of it. Today I'd brought along some music for his impressive collection, and we checked out some blues-tracks and more obscure good songs that had managed to escape his notice over the years. We also looked over some Simpsons videos I'd included.

Sparkly took me into his workshops (why have one, when you can have two?), and amid the awesome equipment showed me a beautiful piece of rich, dense, fine-grained, rose-colored wood that he's slowly crafting into a lap-steel guitar. (After His Holiness, my next blog-project here will be to document the progress of this work, including photos and – hopefully – an MP3 of the finished product.) There were several pieces of wooden sculpture he's shaping. And he also has several aircraft-models in progress… which are about as far from the little snap-together kits you and I used to make as… a trebuchet is from a slingshot.

We also talked metaphysics (and I've never met a physics I didn't like), animals – another dog was chewing on my arm at this point, but he's not full-grown (maybe three feet at the shoulder), and was doing his best not to break my skin –, education, family, history, art, exotic cars, toxicology, politics, computers, mustard, and so on. Sparks and the wife and oldest child whipped together (they did not use real whips) a nice steaming bowl of pasta, and a cold bowl of rich salad, plus sauce-sop bread-slices, and I joined the family for a fine, impromptu, casual dinner.

Mrs. Spartacus – fresh back from Switzerland – did me a woman's finest honor and treated me to a modest slab of real, genuine, European black-dark chocolate. It was the best dark chocolate I've ever tasted. In manner she is warm and welcoming… but her fangs and claws are never far below the surface. In this regard – and her growl – she reminds me delightfully of my older daughter. Mrs. and Mr. are an excellent match, and their kids and curs are well raised and respected. And respectful.

Too soon, as always, I had to leave. Sparty flicked on the bank of security-switches as we headed out the reinforced door. I spotted the minefield-lever and switched it back off on the way past. We headed down the sloping trail to my car, and I had the sense to stop right where he did. I stooped and picked up a couple glacier-rounded rocks (Ice-Age glaciers had passed by there a couple-dozen millennia earlier), and threw one a few feet ahead, turning my back once more.

As pine-bark and leaves finished raining down on us, Sparty grinned his infectious best and said again, "Sorry about that." I gestured him ahead of me, and he took the other rock out of my hand and set off one last mine before going any further. Obviously the goodwife had switched them back on immediately; I told you they were a good match!

Once Spark had unclamped the younger dog from my ankle, I cleared the day's debris from my car, gave him a bear-hug, and headed off down the road. After a moment the bright glow of his security-halogens flickered off, and I found myself already missing him and his fortress.

And I wondered suddenly: where does he get the power? I'm guessing they finally hooked in the water-wheel, augmenting their small solar panel, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're also tapped into a vein of off-site, low-level natural radioactives. Possibly their mastiffs take turns on the treadmill, too; I don't know – they're certainly in good shape (and even their semi-feral cat is musclebound). But Sparkle-Cuss would undoubtedly simply shrug and say they've been running the home off political hot air for years.

That can't be true… or their manse would be huge. So you can drive out and ask them yourselves; just don't forget to have some pinecones handy.