My aunt Jeanie died yesterday. Jeanie was the eldest of three sisters born to my maternal grandparents, John and Elsie Norman. Jeanie, her husband Wes, and her sons, Chip and Tad, lived two doors up College Street from our home. Our grandparents lived another block up; a veritable hop, skip and jump. Indeed, I can recall literally hopping, skipping and jumping all the way from our house to theirs on many occasions, especially holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas.
I have always felt that my grandfather’s last name was oddly prophetic as a more Norman Rockwell set of grandparents never existed. Indeed, looking back through the fog of memory, it seems that many of the scenes from my childhood growing up in a small rural community in Western Kansas could have been lifted directly from his paintings. But maybe that’s the way all old people’s memories are.
My mother, Margie, was the middle sister, and a more loving, caring, giving person never lived. Any positive qualities I possess I owe to her. Claire was the youngest of the sisters. Claire died from injuries suffered in an automobile accident when I was a boy. My mother died of breast cancer when I was 24 years old, and from that day to yesterday Jeanie became a surrogate mother to 7 Rupp orphans. We loved her dearly.
Some years ago, NPR sponsored a series of writing competitions for listeners called Three Minute Fiction. Each round had a different theme and I only vaguely remember the rules since I never submitted anything. But there was one rule that captured my imagination: each submission could be no longer than 600 words so it could be easily read in under 3 minutes.
It sounded like a fun challenge, so when the theme turned to gifts I decided to write an essay in honor of Aunt Jeanie, who famously loved cats. I never submitted it to NPR and I never sent it to Jeanie, and I’m not sure why. Perhaps it somehow rang too close to true even though it is complete fiction. Anyway, the following story was – and is – for Jeanie. I’m hoping the reader will be able to discern the nature of the gift to which the title refers.
The Gift
The old Roi-Tan box was right where I’d left it; top shelf, far left corner of the garage.
We’d lost Mom in 2003, and now Dad. Each of us had taken something of sentimental value from the house. The rest was sold, given away or thrown away. Now there was just one last piece of unfinished business.
I blew 46 years of dust off the top of the cigar box and opened the lid.
It was May, 1967. Western Kansas had staggered through another brutal winter and was preparing to lurch into another oppressive summer. “Don’t like the weather in Kansas? Just wait a few minutes and it’ll change!” Yeah, right, if only that were true. Still, today was beautiful. I guess if you place an ice cube on a hot stove there is a fleeting moment when the temperature is perfect. Today was that day in Western Kansas.
My 13th birthday was approaching and I was lost in my favorite fantasy: Mom and Dad had surprised me with a red mini bike just like the ones the Shriners ride in the July 4 parade. There I am, sitting on 50cc’s of rumbling thunder: Collar up, hair dangerously askew, I look just like James Dean. The vision is so real I can taste the cigarette between my sneering lips.
A banging on the front door shook me from my daydream.
“Michael? Michael, are you in there?”
Mrs. Hanson was frantically ringing the doorbell with one hand and pounding on the screen door with the other. I stumbled to the door and tried to catch what she was saying.
“You lost your boots?”
“No, Mr. Boots. I’ve lost Mr. Boots!”
“Oh, your cat. Hey, I’m sorry, Mrs. Hanson, I haven’t seen him.”
“Could you help me look for him? He bolted out the door when I got home from the grocery and I think he headed for the park.”
The park, that was trouble.
“Sure thing,” I said. “You take the neighborhood and I’ll check the park.”
Little more than a grove of trees bounded by raw prairie, the Town Park was a microcosm of the food chain: Birds hunted worms, cats hunted the birds and coyotes hunted the cats. Occasionally, a passing pickup would slow and someone would complete the cycle by popping a coyote from the window. The park operated by one law; the Law of the Claw and the Fang.
I found what remained of Mr. Boots in a patch of clover under an old elm tree. Poor Mr. Boots, he had almost made it. I kneeled, smoothed his black fur and marveled one last time at the perfectly white feet.
“Socks,” I had suggested when he had first turned up at Mrs. Hanson’s door.
“No, that’s too wussie,” she’d said. “Boots, that’s his name. Mr. Boots”
I gently removed the tattered collar. Below the collar hung the ultimate expression of Mrs. Hanson’s affection; a tiny silver bell. Ironically, it was probably the bell that had led to his tragic end. Poor Mr. Boots.
“No sign of him at the park,” I told her later. “I’ll bet Mr. Boots is just off visiting one of his girlfriends. You know how he is; he’ll be back when he gets hungry.”
“You’re probably right,” she said. “He’s a scamp, that one.”
We lost Mrs. Hanson during my sophomore year at college, still waiting for Mr. Boots to return and imagining all the adventures he must be having.
I closed the old cigar box and put it under my arm. “We’re done here,” I said to no one in particular.