Part Two - Chapter Eleven

Thursday, December 13, 2018

Ceci

I had a show on Friday with Yowes O'Gowrie, the traditional British Folk band I find myself in.

Some excellent story telling in those lyrics.

Jack

I totally dig bonny lasses. Are there highway men?

Ceci

Mostly seafaring, early deaths

Jack

Makes me hungry for fish and chips

Ceci

Best part of Lent

Jack

Slipping into Catholicism?

Ceci

I was raised as an Albanian Muslim. A very old version spoken in ancient Arabic. I love Lent and all the pagan holidays too. I go for saints and Mary.

Jack

I know. You are from the crossroads of civilization and antiquity, where women with exotic eyes can launch a thousand ships.

Sunni or Bektashi?

Ceci

Bektashi

Jack

Oh Damn, Ceci! I want to know the details. Did your Dad come here after WWII? Fleeing the communists?

I may have some Knights Templar blood. So I just want to say straight out: Sorry about the Crusades. Bad idea.

Friday, December 21, 2018

Ceci

Hiya! I got grandpa's garlic the other day! The perfect gift. Thank you!

Work is nuts.

Jack

Ugh!! Same for us.

Long hours through Christmas Eve.

Then we chase storms for a week.

Then a life-sentence incest trial....Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas!

Wednesday, December 26, 2018

Jack

We hit a deer in Utah.

Are you working?

Are you reading this in the bathroom?

Ceci

Sorry, we were watching movies all day.

Jack

Sweet.

Driving. Montana.

Glacier National Park.

Ceci

Merry Christmas to you! Happy New Year! Are you on your big ski trip?

Jack

(Ruby in Telluride, Colorado)

Ceci

Wow, breathtaking!

Jack

Yup! And she has pigtails and dimples.

Today, we drive north through the Canadian Rockies. Network sketchy. If this gets through, what color cowboy hat?

Ceci

For you?

Jack

For you.

And I want a cowboy hat for me, just so I can touch the brim, nod my head, and say, "Evening ladies."

Oh wait. Barry White on the radio! Must take a Barry break!

Ceci

😄😄😄

You should wear a white cowboy hat. Or tan. Get Ruby a cute cowboy hat.

Jack

🎶"Please her and please her, any time or any place, eager and eager, to feel your sweet lips on my face, deeper and deeper, in love with you I'm falling, sweeter and sweeter, your tender words of love keep calling, I'm gonna love you, love you, love you just a little more, baby"🎵 -Barry White

2000 years ago, God sent Jesus to tell us to love one another. Then in the 1970's, God sent Barry White to show us how.

I told the boys to listen carefully for "educational purposes".

Saturday, December 29, 2018

Jack

3:44 A.M. Hotel in Revelstoke, British Columbia.

Drove 1,500 miles through a snow storm. Completely fragged from the road. Sore throat from too much driving and not enough sleep. But I'm electric and wide awake because it looks like we're going to catch a three-day blizzard as it breaks on the slopes of the Canadian Rockies.

Cars are pouring in from all over. Dudes bust out. Look around. Test the snow with their boots. Check the sky. Smell the air. Hustle equipment. Like before a big race. Eager kids from everywhere rolling into this little snow town. Walking the streets in groups of three, and four, and six. Shouting stories with loud hands, pointing and boasting, measuring out giant fish, whales of adventure rolling in the white surf, and plunging down into the deep snow. On these waves, one more time, I am with them.

(Revelstoke, British Columbia)

5 P.M. On the mountain all day. Time for Spaghetti with meatballs the size of grapefruits. I'm starving!!

Ceci

Yum Spaghetti!

Jack

Ceci, you tasty and nutritious bowl of poutine, we got a room with a kitchen! I'm walking to the market right now for pasta, sauce, and massive sausages to cook up a righteous, put-your-ass-to-sleep spaghetti.

Sunday, December 30, 2018

Ate a plate of spaghetti as big as a bowling ball. Went to sleep in my clothes. Did not move for 10 hours. The boys ate two plates, fifty donut holes, stayed up late, got up early, and totally kicked my ass.

Ferry between Revelstoke and the border. Back to the USA.

Monday, December 31, 2018

Jack

How's that jigsaw puzzle going?

Ceci

It's going, I'm a bit down with some kind of bug.

Jack

I'm sorry. Tea? A milky chai?

I'm in a Motel 6 laundry room in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. Do you think the free shampoo will work as laundry detergent?

Ceci

Shampoo would work, go easy though.

Jack

New Year's Plans?

Ceci

Dropping in on a neighbor tonight. There's kids there. Isaac will be happy.

Jack

Do you bang pots and pans? That'll be a blast with kids.

Ceci

Yeah, we'll get that going, lol.

Jack

We're 15 hours from home, 16 from New year's. Never got that cowboy hat.

Son of a bitch! I just wrote a country song.

🎵🎶 I'm 15 hours from home, 16 from new years. Never got a cowboy hat, wasted my whole life on beers.🎶🎵

Ceci

😄

Tuesday, January 1, 2019

Jack

There are far, far worse things, but Ruby going back to nursing school and Justin going back to college in a week makes me sad. Just before Christmas, they went to Atlanta to visit Mom. They came back and confirmed she is living with a boyfriend. That feels like closure and another degree of liberation. Plus, she and I have been getting along better than ever. Not that we were ever hostile, just more and more estranged, more and more distant. Anyway, it makes me wonder how it is for my parents when I visit and leave. Or when the kids visit my parents and leave. Or how our dogs feel when we leave to see Aquaman -- which is a shiny, noisy cornball.

Ceci

I know how happy you are when you're with your kids.

Are you guys officially divorced?

Jack

"Separated." We're holding off until I finish paying for the kids' school. Very amicable.

Ceci

Got it. At least you get along now.

Jack

Yeah. But we always did. It was just all the years of sinking isolation.

Absolute truth: When we first suspected she might be getting sweet on some guy, and noticed her perking up, getting out, and living, I was the happiest recipient of the good news. Still psyched. Still hoping it lasts.

Ceci

❤️

Jack

I have got to go to work. Big ugly jury trial in 10 days, but before I do, I have a very important question for you.

Which cowboy hat?

Ceci

2nd and 3rd ones.

Saturday, January 19, 2019

Jack

Jury trial is over.

Back to buying a cowboy hat

And look at all the boots!

Those are white crosses topped with a crown of thorns.

Ceci

Holy crap, that's a lot of boots.

Jack

I knew you couldn't resist the boots

Are you buried in making Superbowl commercials?

Ceci

The Davidson documentary.

It will be showing on March 31st. And the lawyer commercials are in full swing.

Jack

I hope you're raking in some cash, girl.

Ceci

Not really raking, but steady.

Jack

Steady $$$ is good!

This last trial (still waiting on the verdict), I went down to 118 pounds. The prosecution seemed possessed by hate and anger. Really ugly to watch. I thought about quitting the practice, then took it back.

I won't quit, but may take a position in a public interest firm, leading a bunch of young firebrands, or a law school clinic, or the judge thing.

18-20 hour days pitted against rabid hate is not nearly as sexy as it sounds.

Ceci

Those all sound like good options.

I don't know how you stay so positive doing what you do.

Jack

Because each person and their entire family comes to our office because they have been told that I can save their life. And the State is trying to take it. And I can't back down from a fight.

But please, I don't want to talk about that anymore today. Can we just talk about cowboy hats and how incandescently beautiful you are.

Ceci

Fine.

😂😂😂😂

Making nachos for me and the big kid. He's home this weekend.

I'm starved, haven't eaten yet today. Whooped it up last night at an art opening in Hamtramck.

It was fun.

After all this, Hamtramck is still a comfortable place for me.

Jack

My second home.

We had Albanians up and down our block on Charest Street. Is it still that way?

Ceci

Yes. They're still there and lots from Yemen and Bangladesh.

Jack

The Albanian girls in our neighborhood would tell us that all the other girls were jealous because they had first dibs on all "the cool Albanian guys."

Did I apologize to you for the Crusades?

Ceci

Yes

Jack

Did I tell you how we met a thousand years ago in the Holy Lands?

Ceci

No, not yet.

I'm interested.

Jack

I'll send it later tonight. It requires assembling various facts and research. The proof is nearly mathematical in its precision.

Plus, I have to do the wash, dishes, and clean the house.

Ceci

I figured as much.

[⭐Vote for incandescent beauty and doing the dishes!  ❤️]

Photos 1-15: Taken and owned by the authors, 2019.