After a Long Spell

The following is a short story by Fr. Chuck Collins, which received an award in the Writer’s Digest annual writing contest in 2013.

The hose was in his left hand and his right hand was tucked into his pants pocket up to his thumb. He watered the yard every afternoon at the same time. There must have been days I passed by his drab white duplex and didn’t see him, but I can’t remember when. The bent silhouette holding the end of a hose is seared into my memory.

He was not the least bit interested in neighborly attention. I’d wave, but he never risked a look and I never succeeded in teasing one out of him. One day I walked by his house when he was watering. Seconds away from a head-on collision forced him to say “hi.” What choice did he have? But it was little more than a mumble, not even enough to guess his nationality or begin to untangle his story. It was a one-sided game: I would drive by, try to get him to look up. For his part, he would stand watering the sorry weeds with misplaced faith that someday, somehow they would share space with a clump of grass or two.

“Mr. Hanson. This is Rosa Guajardo,” she said softly. “Am I calling at a bad time?” I had rushed in from the yard to answer the phone, and I didn’t know anyone by that name.

“No, not really. What can I do for you?” I was irritated, supposing her to be a solicitor or the hospital reminding me again of an unpaid bill.

“I got your number from a neighbor. My father died last night,” she said with a touch of Mexican accent. “Joe Pena. He lived down the street from you in the house with the pealing paint. He told me about you. He said you were nice. I need someone,” she choked and then paused a bit, “someone to come to his funeral tomorrow. Can you come?”

The news troubled me on every level. I was embarrassed for her and wished that she didn’t have to call. And then I wished I had pursued Joe Pena harder. I felt guilty that I hadn’t pursue him harder. I wished I had known his name before now.

“Oh, Rosa, I’m so sorry. What happened?” I dug into the drawer in front of me for a pencil or pen and something to write on.

She explained how he had a nasty cold that turned into pneumonia, and when they took an x-ray, they discovered his lungs were full of dark-spots. Cancer. She was sure he was in some wicked pain, but he never let on. He died in the hospital just two weeks after learning his diagnosis. He died alone at night just as he wanted, though he would have been happy to go sooner. He was seventy-four.

“Of course I can come to the funeral tomorrow. I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon,” I said, hoping to reassure her. I wrote down the time and directions before hanging up.

How agonizing – how sad, I thought to myself. Imagine a grieving daughter asking a complete stranger to come to her father’s funeral! My drifting thoughts took me to my own mortality and the mystery pain I feel in my lower stomach that revisits me whenever I think of death. Who would come to MY funeral? The obligatory family members, of course, but would there be others? Has occupying this space on earth for so many years meant anything to anyone? Will I leave something worth mentioning? How quickly will I be forgotten? If trees will come alive in heaven to clap their hands, will the variegated pittosporums I planted in Orlando recognize me? Will an expiration date tied to my big toe like in the movies signal the day my Facebook page will instantly vanish with a single push of the delete button – one of the many unwelcome tasks I will leave my wife. I said a prayer for Rosa and her family.

Joe’s service was in the chapel of a funeral home in the poor part of town. I wasn’t surprised to see fewer than thirty people there. I guessed they were mostly family members and I was right. Only three of us wore ties, a fact I have been sensitive to since I forgot a tie for my brother’s wedding a few years ago and had to wear an ugly, borrowed one.

The funeral home made sure that things didn’t sound too dead by piping in recorded Baptist hymns weakly played on cheap speakers. The larger group took the pews in the front where the wooden casket sat on a rolling cart. Thankfully it was closed. I have been to funerals where the dead body was made up to look more alive than most of their grieving family members. I sat quietly behind them hoping to not draw attention, but wanting Rosa to see me. There were just a few of us spread out in the little chapel besides the family in the first pews.

A few minutes after two o’clock a handsome man from the up-front group, I guessed him to be in his late forties, stood up from the huddle who had been talking quietly among themselves, and walked to the podium next to the casket. He took an awkward amount of time to look at the group in front, then around at the rest of us in the congregation, then back to the family. He cleared his throat, opened a Bible that he carried up with him and read, “The Lord is my shepherd…yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, thou art with me.” He repeated the words, “thou art with me.” He closed the Bible slowly while he began to speak, “Thank you for coming today. I am Pastor Pena from the China Hills Baptist Church, and for my brother, Armando, and my sisters, Rosa and Anita, we thank you for coming.”

Pastor Pena spoke plainly with an accent so small it must have been a generation or two removed. He was humble, kind of like what I imagine Billy Graham would be like late in life, or the older George Bush. He was not the stereotypical “Baptist” preacher I’ve seen on TV, at least not at his dad’s funeral.

“I want to tell you a little about my father,” looking above the family to the rest of us. “He and mom raised us four kids to value education. He was a good dad and a good husband. Even though he was from Mexico and, strictly speaking, “illegal,” he worked hard to learn English and to send us to college. He repaired expensive shoes for rich people until mom died four years ago. After that he dropped into a deep depression never able to bring himself out and back to the place he was before losing the one person he loved for over fifty years. The only thing that kept him alive was reading and he wrote poetry from a young age. His mother was a poet of sorts who had one poem published in a woman’s magazine many years ago. Poetry was his life; it was his life boat. We knew he liked poetry before and after mom died, but we didn’t realize just how much until we discovered literally piles of poems he wrote as we were going through his house yesterday and this morning.”

As Joe’s son was speaking, shame fell on me like the dust from a fast moving car. You see, I too love poetry. I have often felt odd because of this. It’s not exactly “hip” to love words. Artfully strung together, words makes something inside me sing. And I’ve made small stabs at writing poems myself. If I had only known, poetry could have been our connection. We could have traded Elizabeth Bishop and Wendell Berry collections, and read together Billy Collins’ whimsical poem, “Another Reason Why I Don’t Keep a Gun in the House.” Oh, how I wish I had known…

“Even though he was very sad these past few years, and almost totally detached from everyone,” Pastor Pena went on, “he kept writing poems. Before we pray and I turn it over to Anita, I want to read you one of his poems. It was close to the top of the pile, so I suppose it was one of his last.”

I sank in the pew, feeling the nagging pain of two back surgeries, and not sure what to expect. If there’s one thing worse than bad poetry it’s a long bad poem.

“It’s called: ‘After a long spell’.” He paused as if fighting back tears, then he said:

I see him coming several stop signs away
because I am watching out my window for his white car,
as if stranded in the middle of the ocean
waiting for a ship or a sign of human life.

And at once I bounce to my feet,
rush to the door and go outside
where the hose is resting beside the sidewalk by the step
circled like a green snake on the ground.

As he drives by I water the grass
and raise my eyes faintly, just enough
to see that he waves again,
today like he did yesterday and the day before…