Bartle Clunes - Chapter 40
Consoling Eizer Griggs
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El Dorado County 1952
When there is a death in the family, friends bring food. They don't know how else to alleviate pain, so they cook. There was no death at the Grigg's home, but it felt like a death to them all. When the Riles and the Clunes families learned that Eli had been taken away, they all grieved for Eizer Griggs. They worried about the boy and they may have felt sorry for his mom, Merlene, too. But there was really very little his friends could do but sympathize. That, and bring a casserole.
Filomena dropped by often, pretending that the house needed cleaning, but mostly she just sat at Eizer’s kitchen table drinking coffee with her friend, trying to cheer him. Eizer hardly knew if he was standing on his head or on his heels.
“I am sorry, Mr. Eizer, but she is the mother. You know you can’t do nothing. You wait and you pray to the angelitos. Maybe he come back.”
“Yah, maybe, but I sure do worry about Merlene’s drinking. What kind of life is that for that little boy?”
“Not a good life,” she agreed. “But it is what you have. Debes aceptar lo que hay, y hacer que se puede… you accept what you have and do what you can. You pray! The angelitos will help you.” She put her arms around his shoulders, patting him in sympathy.
Louvina sat with Eizer on his front porch a while, taking time out of her busy day for her friend as the sun crossed the painted canvas of the sky. Pearly was crawling around Eizer's boots and pulled herself up, clinging to his pant legs, to stand wobbling next to him. He took the little girl onto his lap, Louvina gave her a cracker. Pearly hummed and danced her feet.
Louvina asked Eizer a question or two to get him thinking about something other than Eli, but she knew it was a listening silence that drew words from the man, not questions.
“Well.... when I came home from my brief encounter with the Great War and regained my health, I went to work with my father managing our dredge mine on the south fork of the American. It was not what I wanted, but he needed my help so I stayed with it. I worked for my father, running the mine from 1920 to … ah ... let's see ... 1932.” Pearly fell asleep on Eizer's lap, her red curls against his vest. He looked down at her and smiled.
“But, to tell the truth, I hated working in the mining. What I really wanted was to be a teacher. I was interested in science, but I never got the chance to go to school.”
“But you are a teacher, Eizer! Bartle says he sees you all the time out in the field teaching the boys about bugs and flowers and trees.”
“Yah, they like those little excursions, that they do.”
“Well, you could teach them so much more, you know. They need everything. You could teach them about...about...mining and minerals. About amphibians in the creek...and...and the stars!”
“Um hm,” he nodded. “The foothills are a fine outdoor classroom most of the year, and that's the truth. I was thinking maybe I might use the Book Exchange in the after-school hours sometimes, too. A lady named Vida Lee started a class of English and Citizenship for a handful of immigrants over there. I told her it was fine with me, but my heart's just not into starting anything new right now, I guess.”
Eli and Merlene stayed together in her room at the Tropical Paradise Motor Court. Out there on Highway 99, cars and trucks roared by twenty-four hours a day. The neon palm tree blinked erratically off and on all night. Eli watched the neon girls in grass skirts doing a herky-jerky hula outside the window each night until he fell asleep on the roll-away.
Merlene usually woke up with a hangover, but she went to work without fail there in the motor court, leaving Eli in their room. Late one Saturday morning she woke with such a catastrophic headache she could hardly get out of the bed. She looked over at her little boy, who was quietly sitting on his cot, reading, eating a bag of corn chips and drinking a bottle of Coca-Cola for breakfast. He had not bathed or changed his clothes for a while. Merlene cried and held him to her. And then went to do her work, leaving him alone again there in their shabby room.
The weeks passed by slowly. All the life had gone out of the Griggs’ house. He wandered from room to room looking for something. He felt like a limp sack of oats. He still took his long daily walks, but with little pleasure. Theo and Peter came by asking for Eli, wondering if he was coming back to school in the fall. When they left, Eizer went to his unmade bed and took another nap.
Today he had walked out with the intention of visiting the Clunes but he just walked on past their house, turned around and came back home. Rosie bawled loudly to remind him she needed milking in the evening. He forgot to gather the eggs, ate pork and beans with a spoon, right out of the can. On Friday he sat in the dim kitchen for a long time before going to his bed. He did not know what else to do, so he covered his eyes with his hands and prayed to the angelitos.
This is probably the most moving chapter of all--I know every bit of it, even the corn ships and pop for breakfast. I was a counselor in an inner city school for 28 years. Tough.Touch and go for some. But every bit so real. Did you live a bit of this type of life?
Poor Eizer.