Monday, November 6, 2017

Bluebird

   I love this view, our broad lawn sweeping down to the river, framed by stately pines and backed by the high spine of the Elk Creek Mountains, snow-capped much of the year.  Maggie and I bought the house back in sixty-five, three years after our marriage and a year before David was born.  I moved my practice into its east wing and we’ve never given a thought to leaving.
   Of course, my parents were very impressed with the place, having come from modest backgrounds and never aspiring to leave Wichita.  He was a conductor for the Santa Fe Railroad and she stayed home to raise the kids.  I was the second of their four sons and, in the end, the most successful.  Jack, my older brother, must have changed careers a dozen times, ending up in the insurance business, last I heard, and Darryl followed in my father’s footsteps.  Thomas, the youngest, was killed in Vietnam not long after we bought this house.  Vietnam nearly killed my mother as well.
   Now, looking out at our idyllic view, I’m not sure why I lost touch with Jack and Darryl.  Dad died in seventy-six, three years after his retirement, and mom followed in eighty-three, having moved in with Maggie and me after my father passed.  I had admitted her to St. Joe’s a week earlier with pneumonia.  She rallied at first but then slipped into sepsis.  Besides my brothers, I’ve managed to lose contact with old friends as well, even with Jane Byers whom I nearly married.
   I often think of Jane.  We met at Arizona State and lived together our last year of college but, when I went off to medical school, she took a job in Boston.  I visited a couple of times, once in the summer and another time over spring break, but our relationship gradually fizzled.  She was a firecracker though and I’ll never forget some of her antics, especially that August night we snuck into the campus pool.  Maggie doesn’t know it but I have Jane’s old letters in a box somewhere.
   When I finally retired, the week after 9-11, Maggie and I traveled quite a bit, including trips to Europe and Australia.  In recent years, though, we’ve become homebodies.  She still gets together with her friends but I’m content to putter around the house.  Maggie hired an aide, Tamara, to help with the chores and, I suspect, to keep an eye on me when she’s away.  She’s pleasant enough but I’ve told Maggie I could manage just fine on my own.
   To be perfectly honest, Tamara is forgetful at times.  It’s now getting close to noon and she’s yet to serve my breakfast.  Fortunately, I’m not terribly hungry and my attention has been focused on our fabulous view.  In fact, there’s a mountain bluebird hanging around the deck this morning, the first I ‘ve seen in years.
   Focused on the bluebird, I didn’t hear Maggie enter the room and she sneaks up to give me a kiss on the cheek.  She’s brought a visitor, she says, and a tall, handsome young man appears to my left.  He asks how I’m doing but I’m too interested in the bluebird to answer right away.  Maggie asks if I know this stranger and I respond that we’ve never met though, in fact, he does look somewhat familiar.  To be honest, with his long nose and sandy hair he looks a bit like my brother Darryl.
   But when I ask if it’s Darryl, Maggie shakes her head and tears well in her eyes.  She says he is our son, David, but I know she must be kidding.  David is much younger than this gentleman in a pinstripe suite.  Wouldn’t you know, he joins in, insisting that he is David and asking if I remember his visit last summer.  He says we took a hike down to the river and tried a bit of fly-fishing.  I tell him that he must be mistaken and turn back to my view, just as the bluebird flies from its perch.  I comment on the bird’s rare appearance but Maggie says it’s out there every morning.  She says Tamara calls it Dr. Tom’s bluebird.  I scoff at that comment and advise Maggie that Tamara did not yet bring my breakfast.  She just pats me on the shoulder and asks what I’d like to eat.  When I turn back to the window, she and her friend head for the kitchen where someone begins to sniffle.  I look for the bluebird again but it is gone.