I read over and over the underlined text and my own thoughts, written in the margins. Each of them trying to understand what I was reading, even while experiencing revelation. I thumbed through The Screwtape Letters, The Problem with Pain, and The Great Divorce. And by the time I was through, it was evident why my tilling time had been so nonproductive over the last week. Because tilling had been all about Savannah.
Not about a bigger plan, not about a greater purpose, not about a discovered destiny, but about me, my wants, whims, and selfishness. Joshua was right; that’s why he drove me mad. He saw through me. I knew it, and he surely knew it. And the whole thing drove me crazy.
I wasn’t an evening tiller. But tonight I didn’t have a choice. I had some core issues to settle. I had some demons of my own to purge. I had some monuments of my own that I needed to chain myself to for a while.
As I ran through Forsythe Park, the tears flowed freely. The comprehension of my own lies and idols and pride were almost more than I could handle. But I didn’t care. He who handles tilling time could handle this. And He did. He stopped the world for me. He spoke and I listened. He challenged, and I was willing. He rebuked, and I knew it was all true. He reminded me of my limits, and I agreed. He offered His strength, and I gladly accepted.
And then I noticed, for the first time since I had returned to Savannah almost three weeks ago, the most beautiful rose garden I had ever seen, right in the middle of the park I ran through every morning.
I approached the white-columned enclosure with reverence. The iron gate that surrounded it was willing to let me enter . The two iron benches that sat on either side of the garden were available. But the stone bench that sat in underneath the concrete arbor was inviting. Next to the bench was a small plaque declaring, “Everyone needs to stop and smell the roses.”
I remembered Joy’s words of wisdom. “You need to stop, smell a flower . . .” I hadn’t smelled a flower in years. I hadn’t stopped in years. I probably hadn’t listened much in years either.
I leaned over one of the most beautiful yellow roses I had ever seen, suddenly understanding why an entire song was written about them. It was stunning. Perfectly opened. Smelled like, well, like a rose, and before I knew it I was dancing around that garden like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music. I smelled the white ones, the red ones, the pink ones, the pink with white ones. And then I sat down on the bench and just smelled them all. For the first time in years, Savannah smelled a rose. And for the first time in weeks, Savannah was listening. Really listening. And amazingly enough, when I fell quiet, a wealth of wisdom waited.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Hey, child, smelling flowers?”
She always found me. Every time I stepped outside, she found me.“Yeah, I am, Joy. I’m smelling flowers.” I turned to look at her . Yet her expression seemed lost. She looked at me like a stranger.“Joy, you okay? It’s me, Savannah.”
“Yeah, yeah, Savannah. Hey, baby.” Her eyes sparkled with the recollection of me.“I see you found my secret place.” She sat down on the bench. Her side squeaked under her weight.
“It’s beautiful. Can you believe I never noticed it?”
“You wouldn’t be the first. Most people around here haven’t noticed it. No one has time . Too much craziness going on.” She patted her fading floral. I watched her drift off in thought.“Emily Dickinson, though, once wrote a friend that ‘consider the lilies of the field’ is the only commandment she never broke.”
I chuckled. “I’d just have to add it to my list.”
“Mine too, baby.” She laughed.“Mine too.”
Finally, it was too much. It had to be asked. “Joy, why do you wear that dress every day?”
She looked at me, puzzled.“This?” she paused.“Oh,well, I don’t really know. I guess I just have a couple of the same kind. Just comfortable, you know. So, what’s your favorite one?”
She was back to flowers by choice. I would respect that. “Couldn’t pick if I tried.”
She stood up to leave.“Well, enjoy my secret garden.”
“Where are you going?”
“Oh, got a lot of work to do. A lot of people left to see this evening . You take care of my special place, now.”
“I will.” I assured her. She wandered away. Looking lost. And without commenting on food or facial defects. And no humming. Something was amiss. But she wasn’t ready. I would know when she was.
Paige was sitting on the steps of my house as I cleared the side of Clary’s. “Why in the world are you running in the evening? Are you still dealing with deeply rooted issues?”
I proceeded up the stairs past her, into the foyer.“I am a deeply rooted issue.”
“Well, how much have you packed?” She followed me up the stairs and into my room. “Oh, you’ve packed five entire books. Don’t really want to go, do you?”
I turned to look at her; then I looked into my bathroom and spotted some toothpaste splatters on my mirror. “My bathroom looks filthy.”
She grabbed my arm and jerked me back.“Oh, no you don’t, Miss Hygiene Freak . You will not avoid the question.”
“What question?”
“You know what question.”
I sat down on the bed and looked out of my window and stared up Abercorn Street. “It’s not about wanting to go; it’s about having to go.”
“Is this going to get real deep, because I might need some Doritos and a Diet Coke.”
She made me laugh. I couldn’t help it. Looking at her cute little button nose and perfectly messy bleached-blonde short tresses, she cracked me up. “No, not deep tonight. Come on, help me pack. Grab a book.” I tossed her one from the bookcase.“So, what are your parents doing tonight?”
“Oh, I think my dad went to hang out with your dad at the coffee shop and play some cards, while Mom is at a Mary Kay party with your mother.”
“Oh, that’s right. I forgot about that,” I said laughing.“I should have known Mother would have it no matter what. I bet that’s a sight—a group of women painting themselves up while one poor soul is in shackles.”
As soon as it came out of my mouth, we both stared at each other. And without a word we threw the books in the boxes and took off down the stairs and across the black marble floor of the foyer and slammed the door behind us . We didn’t stop running until we hit “Monument” Square.
“Do not let them see us,” I said, panting and squatting behind a tree. It was close to seven o’clock and the sun had a good thirty more minutes, but they didn’t care; there were enough television crew lights for the seven o’clock news that a 747 could have landed on the sidewalk.
“Lord, if they see us, we’ll be their guinea pigs.”
“They’d take us on as their goodwill project.”
We leaned against the tree, Paige on one side, me on the other, but each of us with a good enough view to enjoy the production.
And a production it was.
Each woman had donned a lovely white terry-cloth headband. Except Miss Amber Topaz; she had chosen a pale pink one.
The Mary Kay representative had them eating out of the palm of her hand.
“Now, ladies . This is the latest in skin care . This mask will continue to purge your skin of its deepest blackheads long after you’ve gone to sleep.”
“Now, that’s a visual,” Paige added.
And before we knew it, each of the nine women was covered in white cream, looking like a white version of the Blue Man Group. And there they sat, for the next ten minutes, while tiny blackheads screamed for refuge across all nine of their little faces.
“I want them to get to the makeup,” Paige said.
“Be patient. Good skin care is essential to your daily skin regimen.” She looked at me as if a poltergeist was about to come out of my body.“What do you know? You use Noxema.”
“Do you forget that is my mother up there?”
“Oh, right.”
The Mary Kay consultant continued.“Now, ladies, apply your found
ation smoothly, and make sure it matches your skin tone.”
“I don’t wear foundation,” I offered.
“What’s to cover up?” Paige asked.
“My ever-increasing age, I hear.”
“Let me look.” Paige came rather close to my face.“Nah, you look great. Need some waxing done, there on your lip”—she rubbed the top of my lip, and I slapped her hand—“but besides that you don’t look a day over twenty.”
“You think?” I asked, patting my face.
“Absolutely. Oh, don’t do it!” she yellspered in terror toward the entertainment. But Amber wasn’t listening and with the speed of an expert had applied bright blue eye shadow to her lids.
“Looks like my grandmother,” I said.
“Not as bad as I thought. Kind of a retro-nouveau look. Everything comes back,you know.”She squinted to get a better look.
“Some things shouldn’t,” I assured her. But it did look good on Amber. Of course, that girl would look good in a floral print muumuu.
“Ooh, look at that lipstick,” Paige said, eying the pale pink color that Amber was applying to her lips.
“Ooh, that’s nice. I could wear that.”
“Oh, yeah, that would look great on you, with that pink toe nail polish you always wear.”
“Oh, and look at that blush.”
“Maybe we should have gone to this thing,” Paige said, then looked at me . We both busted out laughing.
As the women finished, applause rose from those pilgrims who had gathered around to watch. Amber struck a pose or two, and mother tugged on a chain. But she did look the best she had looked in weeks. If the poor soul could get her hair washed and that outfit changed, she’d look downright clean.
“Let’s go finish packing.”
Paige stood up to follow me as we headed back to the house.“I could sneak my mother’s Mary Kay book out of the house or get one from that Mary Kay lady and we could order some of that stuff.”
“I don’t think they have books . That’s Avon.”
“Oh, well, I like Avon too.”
“And they’re called consultants, not ‘Mary Kay ladies.’”
“Well, I still want some of her stuff, whatever I need to call her.”
“You just like to spend money.”
“Other people’s, preferably.”
“Me too!”
“Yeah, I know.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The mind is a frustrating instrument. If not for the necessity of it, I’d have banished it long ago. But then I would have become the witless wonder Thomas has declared me to be for two decades. See, the mind never stops. It harasses you. Take the simple task of getting up and trying to brush your teeth: it forces you to stare at the toothpaste splatters on the mirror and quizzes you over when you’re going to clean them.
Or the simple task of driving to work: Which of the three routes there will you choose? And once you choose, it questions whether you’ve chosen well. It teases you with the possibility that another option would have had less traffic or fewer red lights. And when you pass the window of Katherine’s Corner Bookstore, the mind sends you down a memory lane of your own vanished opportunities for literary fame and store-window showcases.
The mind never leaves you alone . When you’re trying to read, it barges in with to-do lists . When you’re trying to listen, it barges in with your next question. And when you’re trying to let go of love, it barges in with every reason to keep fighting.
But when I need a Coke—well, in large part my mind and I are usually in agreement. Until lately. Lately it has been making an issue of Coke. Coke! As if it were an addiction. As if it mattered. As if I would care. As if everybody didn’t deserve one. I mean, compared to the addictions I could have chosen, my mind shouldn’t be harassing me . Trust me. I would be a witless wonder before I would be a former Coke consumer.
“Where is our dishwasher?!” I heard Louise asking rather clearly and with an extra dose of volume . The man staring back at her just tried to smile, looking as if he couldn’t determine exactly what the problem was . When she flung her hand out of the soapy dishwater and splattered suds across the front of his shirt, she didn’t apologize, and I think he determined the problem.
Jake rounded the corner from his office. “Louise, I’ll handle it from here.” And Louise let out a rather loud humph and returned to her dishes. I thought about staying hidden, but I didn’t want to miss anything. So I proceeded to stand by the Coke machine.
“Mr. Phillips, the dishwasher will be here this afternoon, I assure you.” He gave my dad a slap on the arm. “Doesn’t hurt a woman to wash a few dishes.”
I leaned back against the counter and took a long swig of my Coke and flung my eyes toward Louise. She and Mervine both turned around on that one, and the little man seemed to shift closer to my father.
“Ron, you have told me that every day for a week.” Dad calmly wiped his hands on the towel draped over the tie of his apron. He was smooth.
“I know, sir. But I promise it will be today!”
“Well, you know what? That’s not good enough.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean exactly what I said, Ron . That’s not good enough.”
“Well, I don’t know what else to do.”
“I’ll tell you what you can do: you can write me a check for the deposit I paid you and consider our business finished.”
“Well, that isn’t possible. I’ve already paid for the deposit on your dishwasher.”
“Then you should get your money back from them, after they’ve given you the runaround.” Jake paused. “Unless, of course, they never told you they could have it here the next day. If that’s the case, then this is apparently your problem and your problem alone.”
“Well, I think you’re being hasty.” The little man began to twitch nervously.
“I don’t think I’m being hasty, Ron.” Dad sure liked to say his name. “I’m just making you keep your word.”
“I’m getting you your dishwasher, Mr. Phillips! That was my word!” the man said rather rudely.
“No, your word was you would get me my dishwasher by last Saturday . Today is Thursday. On Saturday you said it would be here Monday. On Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday you simply decided not to return our calls. And you are only in here today because I dragged you in here after I saw you in the market. In fact, I haven’t seen hide nor hair of you since I wrote you a check. A substantial check.” By this time Jake was leaning against the counter himself.
Mervine and Louise and I were just enjoying the whole scene. The little fella was becoming progressively smaller and increasingly more fidgety.“Well, I think you just have unrealistic expectations.”
“Well, if expecting someone to do what they say they’re going to do is unrealistic, then yes sir, Ron, I guess I do.” Poor soul would know his name by the time Jake was through with him.“But if you had told me it would have taken a week, then we wouldn’t even be having this discussion today . You should have just been honest with me from the beginning.”
I was about to feel sorry for the meager man when his lower lip began to twitch.“I just haven’t been able to help it,Mr. Phillips. See, my wife and my kids—”
“Stop it right there. Don’t you try to exploit your family . Your wife and kids are fine. I have seen them out at the square almost every day. But haven’t caught a glimpse of you, come to think of it. So this is where this conversation needs to end. I want my check, and I want it now.”
Dad never raised his voice. Never really even changed his tone.
But you would have thought he had stood over that man and berated him like a schoolboy, the way ol’ Ron shook when he reached for his checkbook. As he ripped out the check and laid it on the counter, he turned to leave. But before he did he tapped my Coke machine and said, “If you ever need a new one of these, I know where to get you a good one at cost.”
“Ahh!” I said, pulling my Coke from my mouth and s
lapping his hand. He jerked away quickly . Wise move. “Don’t you even think about it.” I glared at him.
He walked to the door. But Dad wasn’t quite through.
“One more thought, Ron . You might want to remove the fish emblem from your invoices. There’s something downright distasteful about using a symbol of integrity to manipulate people into thinking it represents your character as well. I would think about that, sir. Because I’ve learned something in the business world.”Well, I guess Dad had two more thoughts. “All your giftings might get you to the front of the line, but if your character’s not in order when you get there, it can destroy you.”
The little man morphed into a wee little man as he left with his tail between his legs.
“Louise, Mervine, I’m sorry. I’ll have a dishwasher in here by tomorrow morning,” my dad said . Then he kissed me and headed back to the front of the store.
His heart was heavy, I could tell. Jake didn’t like hurting anyone. He was a tender spirit. But he was the real thing too, a man.
So to receive any less from someone else wasn’t acceptable to him.
“Are your hands shriveled prunes?” I asked as I gave them both a sideways hug.
“No,we’ve just been mumbling . Truth be told, your father and Richard have washed as many of these dishes as we have . We’re just spoiled,” Louise said with a chuckle.
“Me too,” I mused. “Me too. But had that man touched my machine again, I would have kicked his heinie.”
“Savannah Phillips! Watch your mouth,” Louise snapped.
“What? I said I would have had Duke lick him shiny!”
Mervine tried to stifle her grin. I didn’t.“Child, don’t you have a job?” Louise laughed.
I headed to the door to go check on my dad.“So they tell me. So they tell me.”
As I opened the door, I noticed Dad and Duke sitting together at the front table. Dad was in a chair; Duke was at his feet. Although no one would have been surprised had Duke been sitting in the chair opposite him. He really was an immensely talented dog . These two had an unusual bond . You could tell just by observing them. Dad sat there rubbing Duke’s head while they both stared out the window . Who knows what they were thinking. But by their identical expressions, it was probably about the same thing: spending another night on concrete.
Hildreth 2-in-1 Page 52