Day: September 20, 2011

I am a story teller and I know the power and meaning of stories.  There is a significant story in my life – my 911 story – and several conversations and a dinner brought it into focus.

For the past few weeks, many of the people I have been with have told their 911 stories. Where they were, how they felt, what they did, which images burned in their consciousness, how it changed and affected them.  How they wept when they saw the jumpers again, the burning towers, the buildings collapse. 911 is an important thing, and it’s perfectly understandable for people to want to recall it.

Yet something about these stories bothered me, made me feel uncomfortable. Why, I wondered, do we do this? Why do we need to return to these images, again and again and again and recall our feelings and memories of it. It must be important or necessary, because so many people do it, but when I was at a friend’s house the other night, everyone at the table was sharing their 911 stories, and when they were done, they all looked at me to hear mine.

I do have a 911 story and I have told it many times.

But not this time. Not any more. I don’t need to tell it any longer, I thought. I was not in the Towers,and I did not lose any members of my family. I will not forget it, and I don’t need politicians, ceremonies, or searing images to remind me of it. I cannot image how this could be healthy or necessary – for so many people to cling to these images and stories, to tap into this well of anger and grief. It seemed inappropriate to me, as if telling my 911 story was tantamount to robbing someone else’s grief and trauma. As if, by having a story, I was part of the suffering.

I might have welcomed some real public discussions about the damage 911 has done to our civic life and culture, and does still. Or whether we can ever dismantle this vast security apparatus, laws and regulations created and  constructed its wake, from taking off our shoes to the cruelty, even madness, of immigration and visa laws- even driver’s licenses and name changes. But nobody will ever want to have that discussion when they can gorge themselves on horrific imagery, year after year. People seem to need this kind of drama, and want a piece of the grief. It is everywhere.

So the important thing about my 911 story is that it is a story I did not tell, do not need to tell, that no one needs to hear, and that I will not tell again. Sometimes, I am learning, the most important stories are the ones I don’t tell.

I went to a nearby farm that sells eggs and bought Fran, an older egg-laying hen for $10. She was the scrawniest hen I could find, pecked over and featherless in spots. We will fatten her up. I think we will continue to give the hens and Winston free reign over the farm. There is always a hawk or fox risk but perhaps they will stay closer to the barns and the dogs. Alice was out in the open by herself. We’ll figure it out.

I went over and got the hen and brought it back and actually fooled Maria, rare. I told her I was going to sign a book at Gardenworks. Winston and Meg smacked the new hen around a bit but things seem to have settled down. Life on the farm.

Connie and Marilyn Brooks and I are bent on making some noise on behalf of independent bookstores, as well as on behalf of my book, “Going Home,” out next Tuesday. Tomorrow,  I will put up a video of Marilyn reading an excerpt from “Going Home,” the first time I’ve heard it read aloud, and it was affecting.

Although the book is about grieving, we intend to have fun promoting and talking about it, as I see the experience of having a dog or cat as joyous and worthy of celebration. I have this idea that Battenkill can sell 500 copies of “Going Home” before we are done, and we are already passing 400. It’s getting very possible.

Monday, I will go to the bookstore to sign these books for people so we can get them out quickly. Never signed that many books in a day – it will be interesting, and today we came up with another idea. I’l be there to take some of the phone calls. I have to sign books and I can only take some of the calls but it will be great to talk to some of you who can’t make it on the book tour. I believe in that. So I’ll be at the bookstore – 518 677 2515 from 11 a.m. well into the afternoon or evening. We hope to get all of the pre-ordered books signed Monday and to the Post Office Tuesday (some Monday.) If you want the book quickly, I’d call before hand to order it. Monday could be wild.

Tomorrow morning I will put up the video of Marilyn reading from the book. Connie and Marilyn and I are having a great time making the point that independent bookstores need not fade away if people don’t want them do. You can pre-order the book or the “Going Home” video anytime – 518 677 2525 [email protected] or call on Monday. Connie said it took her five hours to process today’s orders. Gulp. Talk to you Monday. Come and see how the idea took shape. Izzy was there:

Alice the hen vanished around noon and Winston was walking around in circles. We couldn’t find Meg either, who was perhaps hiding. From the looks of it, it seems to be a hawk attack as there was a trail of feathers which vanished abruptly and so we think a hawk picked her up and took off with her. Into the barn for Winston and Meg, probably for good.

The Daily Egg looks at home in this antique teacup.

Sad news on the chicken front. The hens went missing and we found Alice’s feathers out in the pasture across the street. From the looks of it, it was a hawk, since there was a feather trail which ended abruptly, so she was almost surely carried up into the air.