October 8, 2003

• Greyfox went on a water run!

  
  

  It is not unprecedented for Greyfox to go to the spring for water.  There were some times, years ago, when I was ill, Doug was in school, and he had the only functioning vehicle, that he would do water runs by himself.  There have even been times when it was too cold to get the car started, that he would take a jug and hitchhike to the waterhole.  Not every time–more often, if Doug was home, he’d put several jugs on a sled and go to a neighbor who has a well.

  
  

  

  
  

  Greyfox quit doing water runs when Doug got out of school and we got separate cars.  Now, Doug and I do all the water runs.  Yesterday, Greyfox went along because he couldn’t get his cell phone to work here.  The cell phone wouldn’t have been needed, except that the land line was tied up with the internet connection.

  
  

  As Doug and I were loading up water buckets and Greyfox was fretting over this “dead zone” where his new toy won’t work, I suggested, tongue in cheek, that he go along to the spring, maybe the phone would work there.  Of course, as soon as we started loading the car, the computer was free and he could have disconnected and used the land line.  He didn’t think of that.  He went with us.

  
  

  At the spring, in the parking area, it was worse.  He got a call through, but the person on the other end couldn’t understand what he was saying.  As I was taking buckets out of the hatch of Streak (my Subaru), I said, “maybe it will work better up on the hill.”  I was thinking of the gentle slope of the highway, up toward the northwest the way we had come from.  He thought I meant the steep slope east of the waterhole.  In the first photo, above on the left, he’s at the top of the hill.  The dark figure to the left of the base of that utility pole up there is Greyfox.

  
  

  I seriously didn’t think he’d go up the hill.  I started filling jugs and buckets.  After the first two, when I noticed that he was in fact on top of the hill, I got the camera and captured his entire descent.  When I showed him the sequence last night as I was saving the images he said that if he had fallen I could have put them together into a flip book.  Doug said he had the same thought as he was watching me photograph the descent.

  
  

  

  
  

  The Old Fart is fairly good-natured, considering how often he’s the butt of our jokes or, as this time, the unintended victim when he takes one or several of my ironic or sarcastic remarks or suggestions seriously.  He’s not in very good shape, and that climb yesterday was a strain.  Still, he could laugh about it.  The ability to laugh at himself is something new, along with his commitment to transcending his addictions and personality disorders.  For the first time since I’ve known him, he has become teachable.  He seeks out new things to learn.  The project we’re working on together, Addicts Unlimited, was his idea (though he has tried to claim that it was mine ) and he has been spending long hours looking up data, finding sources for more data, and tracking down relevant, old, vaguely-remembered details.  Recently he recalled having seen an old magazine article about some of the first rehab centers in the U.S. (inebriate asylums).  With what he remembered, some input from Doug, and my skill with searching, we found the article in Cornell University’s archives:  The Atlantic Monthly, vol. 22, issue 132 (October 1868).

  
  

  

  
  

  With Greyfox back down from his climb, I put away the camera and filled the rest of the jugs and buckets.  Doug did all the schlepping, and I got to the camera again in time to capture him finishing up the job, and his big grin when it was all done.

  
  

  I looked around at the uniformly gray sky, the brown soggy muskeg, the road and the mud, and decided none of it was really worth recording.

  
  

  

  
  

  After we got home, Doug just left the water in the car for a while and took a little rest and play break.  I don’t know what Greyfox was doing, but I suppose it included making that aborted phone call.

  
  

  Meanwhile, I walked out the cul de sac in the muskeg closer to home.  I took a few undistinguised shots of brown and gray scenery, then a series of silly self-portraits.

  
  

  

  
  

  The one here is the least silly of the bunch.   I didn’t delete the entire bunch, but you’d have to pay me to show you a couple of the ones Greyfox liked.  One of them had a small secret smile, and another impish one showed what’s left of my dimple, nestled there among the wrinkles.

  
  

  As I was walking back toward the house, I caught a couple of shots of my winter comfort, the source of this feeling of security I have.

  
  

  

  That’s not just a woodpile, but two running vehicles:  Streak and Greyfox’s 4-wheel-drive roadside stand.

  
  

  The rain had obligingly stopped for our water run, but by the time I took the camera back in it was drizzling again.  I put the camera away, got my gloves on, and Greyfox and I went back out and covered the woodpile.

  
  

  I was able to get on here to post this because there was a problem at our ISP this morning, and Greyfox couldn’t receive his email.  Now his inbox has filled up, Doug has gotten up and they have had their little conversation over how long it will take Greyfox to take care of his online business so that Doug can get on to continue in the current round of his fanfic writing tournament.  I guess this means I’ll be going back to cleaning closets, unpacking the boxes of Greyfox’s stuff I moved out of his room when we repainted it for Doug and that Greyfox brought home with him from his cabin in Wasilla last month.  At the rate I’m going, that job could take all winter. 

  
  

  …gotta get some pants on, too.  I’m still in my sleep T-shirt, thought it wise to jump in here while I had the chance, and it’s a little chilly.  Later, all.

  • 3:42 pm
  • 6 Comments