Of Zephyrs and Chocks

Love in dishevelment, or, another visit to the northern neck to see Mom and Dad.

Three months after a tree taller than their house came down in a storm, eating a hole in the third floor roof and dispensing with other windows and siding, they are still in a much smaller cottage a quarter of a mile away.

Their house's renovations have finally begun, but with at least a couple of months of work ahead, they're in for more adjustment to the pleasures of smaller digs.

My Dad is okay with piles and a certain amount of visual disorder (says he knows which pile everything is in) while Mom prefers stuff to be out of sight.

As we set the table for lunch today, she telling him to get his debris off the table, he suggested she embrace more dishevelment in their lives.

She made a face and he defended himself, saying he'd read a book called "Love in Dishevelment" (no doubt a '50s pulp mystery) and some of it could be applied to life.

What he was trying to say was that it wasn't realistic for her to think he's going to abandon dishevelment. She tried using me as a witness, claiming I'd have no part in dishevelment. I pleaded the fifth.

Yes, these are the conversations I have with my parents.

In other news, I conquered the Merry Point!

After multiple past attempts to ride the Merry Point ferry, today was my lucky day to ride the two-car, six person cable ferry.

Show up at the end of Ottoman Ferry Road and the ferry will take you across the Corrotoman river - where I'd seen dolphins two weeks ago (none today) - in the blink of an eye.

It was on the other side upon arrival, so I waded into the river (very warm and very clear) and watched the ferry chug back over, reaching down to feel the cable vibrate as it approached.

Then it was my turn.

A car followed me on and, just like that, we were at limit. Ignoring a sign back on land suggesting ferry patrons stay in their cars, I got out.

What, the captain (the man who put chocks behind my tires) is going to make me walk the plank if I don't?

It was the kind of afternoon as sunny and clear as they seemed when you were at recess in third grade, a glorious day to be on a ferry even for a short time.

But that was long after lunch and hours spent on the front porch ogling nature with the people who spawned me.

A brilliant electric blue bug looked fake, a hummingbird showed up only to find the feeder empty (refilled it) and my Dad commented, "Ah, a lovely zephyr," (knew that it was wind, didn't know westerly) when it got breezy.

We took a field trip to the front yard to admire and discuss the two positively artistic lightening rods on the roof of this cottage they're staying in, all glass balls and sunburst-like toppers.

A practical necessity rendered to please the eye.

My parents suggested I go look at the cabin, a tiny place on the property where the owner stays when he doesn't have guests that warrant using the cottage (the one my parents are borrowing).

It was a place for one person, preferably a short one: low, 6' ceiling, pre-1940 Westinghouse refrigerator (shorter than me), one main room and a bedroom.

And if that person were me, I would revel in all the windows (the kind that open toward you, not up the wall) and a screened porch with a swing, a picnic table and a view of the creek shaded by a tree I couldn't hug half of.

A good place to write a textbook, apparently (owner just finished one), but also one with two boats in the yard and plenty of places to do nothing. But small, very compact.

Some might see it as a breeding ground for dishevelment.

As my Dad is sitting there at the table watching my Mom and me prepare lunch, set the table and bustle about, he acknowledges his lazy demeanor but tries to make a case for it being situational.

"People worry if your mother dies before I do that I'll starve to death," he begins his tangent. Hard to say where it might go. "I may grieve to death, but I'll certainly be able to feed myself."

And that, I'm pretty sure, is love in dishevelment. Hell of a role model.