Grandson Leo Gave us a Magic Bean~?

Who needs Twitter?

Thanksgiving 2017

New grandchild, sex unknown
Coming into a loving home
Three boys waiting,
New house from 1780
Blessings exceed dreams now
Grandda in waiting

FTC
11/10/17

Salt Seller

The Salt Seller

There was a man who had salt for sale

He dug it out of a salt pond beach

His customers were poor and sad

and his price far out of their reach.

So he gave it away until all was gone

and went back to the beach for more

But it started to rain and he lost all his salt

and so did his customers poor.

If he had a hut or at least a shelter

He could save the salt for all

The neighbors saw his vision too

So they started with just a wall.

His friends and customers all stepped up

and each brought a stick, a brick or a stone

The pantry was built and the salt was saved

With God’s help, one is never alone.

ftc

written to bring attention to needs of the hungry

The Bag Lady of Maine

The Bag Lady of Route One.

The road was widened

but she never knew

her life would end

when the job was through.

She had walked Route One

along the shore

Everyone knew her

but now they learned more.

She was just the Bag Lady

with her backpack of red

Faster traffic

But now she was dead.

The truck blew by

and honked as it passed her

She was knocked over the rail

Traffic now went much faster

She was not missed

for three more days

Her routine was erratic

Each day a new phase

We expected to see her

on Sunday mornings in Fall

At 7:21

She would walk past Whitehall.

The plan was to expand

Route One to be...wider

Cutting the ancient tree down

and most things beside her.

But the tree was her safe place

as the traffic flew by

When it was cut down

She had no place to hide.

The funeral was small

the service was brief

Just a few of the locals

Stopped by to share grief

They barely knew her

But the minister did

and he shared her sad story

and told of her kid

She had a full and rich life

along the midcoast

With a husband and son

who loved her the most.

They walked Route One together

from the beach to the town.

Laughing and joking

Until the car cut them down

She lived but they died

Now she will not ride in a car

She walks by herself

Miles do not seem that far

When your lonely and alone

There is not much to say

So she kept to herself

and she died the same way.

Why widen a road

that is scenic and rare?

It will not be safer

with shoulders so bare.

Lets re-think this plan

and let everyone know

that wider is not better

and its better to go slow.

FTC

10/21/17

Lincolnville Beach

Pain is My Muse

Pain is my muse.  when I am in pain, I write.
not now...I am in too much pain
from two broken wrists.

Every Town...An Island

What if every town was an island?
All shopping done right here
No money being spent away
No corporate takeover fear.

We would have to eat at Donna’s
“Coffee, eggs and ham” for you?
No Starbuck latte’s sold in town
We’re fine with Donna’s brew.

You need a car? See Frank in town
At “Smiley’s Lot” on Main
I traded in my Jeep (still there)
It only leaks in rain.

The banks would have to go along
And lend us what we need.
We’d pay them back with wages
Earned at “Barney’s Grain & Feed”.

Barney’s wife works in the store
Where we shop for chicken thighs
From “Tilly’s Free Range Chicken Farm”
Not quite Tyson’s size.

The money stays on the island friends
There is no place else to spend it.
Besides it all comes back again
To those who spend and lend it.

We’d have to find the leaks for sure
Like buying stuff “on line”
Instead of at the local shops
Like “Mabel’s Five and Dime”.

I guess it will never happen
But we could make a start
By buying local first instead
And shopping with your heart.

Last Dawn

Last Dawn

We miss the sun

It won't be back

The beach is empty

White with frost, seaweed black.

The clock of time

We missed our chance

to save our planet

no next time.

The sun never came up

so it couldn't go down.

We walked to town

everyone's gone.

Two foxes appeared

at our back door again

hungry, exhausted,

We took them in.

We shared the last

of the bread we baked

and the water we hauled

from a frozen lake.

The wind picked up

The power went out

Four of us huddled

under a blanket...peace-out.

Spring Medicine

Spring Medicine

In the spring

I take my medicine

in coffee spoons.

small doses of

new-made maple syrup

overflowing the spoon

into hot coffee.

Healing the

wounds of winter

as the earth warms

and the sun rises

over the islands

sooner every day.

Maine.

How To Catch a Striper

 Take two small children to Lincolnville Beach at low tide...all day. If you have a choice, pick one 6 year old with a great imagination and a fearless 4 year old. Form a small Clam Patrol and look for a hole in the sand, all three of you must dig quickly in the sand until you find one razor clam. Take it home and put It in the refrigerator. Have lunch, then take a nap.

Try to time your nap to wake up 1.5 hours before high tide. Take the two children and two fishing rods, one bucket, one razor clam, two hooks and two grandparents, if they are still awake. Get in a small boat and drift from the dinghy dock towards Ducktrap (proper mild wind from Camden helps). Bait each hook with a small piece of the razor clam. You will have to break open the clamshell and then cut the clam up into pieces. Try to determine the political, sociological, and environmental sensitivities of the children BEFORE you kill the clam. Especially if they see you doing it.

Bait the hooks and try NOT to let the 4 year old cast! Let the lines out to drift behind the boat and ignore them while you hold on to the children, who, hopefully, are still holding on to the rods. Talk about other things but do not, under any circumstances, give any additional instructions to the children. That is what God is for. Well, one of the things he is good for. Do not touch the rods or try to help. That, too, is what God is for. Remember, He is watching and knows what you are doing and thinking.

Once in a while, glance at each rod to see if they are bending. If they are bending and the child is screaming with a mixture of joy and total fear, NOW you can help them reel in the striper.

That’s it. Oh, by the way, do not think you can go out by yourself, duplicate the parts in the boat and expect to catch anything. God is still watching and will have one question for you:

“WHERE ARE MY CHILDREN?”

Humbly return to shore, find the children and buy them some ice cream at Mr. Ricky’s (also known as Mclaughlin’s Lobster Shack). You will be forgiven but never try fishing without children again.

LB – August 29, 2017

(this just happened, yesterday)

Tom Crowley

PS -These were my own grandchildren)

Fathers and Sons

Fathers & Sons

He was my father,

I was his only son.

Now I am a father

And I have a son.

That is how it works

In this world.

Fathers have sons,

Mothers have daughters.

I can not speak for my sisters

I can not speak for my mother.

As the son of the father,

You watch him

And you see what he does.

And then you decide

What to do.

When you are young,

You do exactly what he does

Because you want to be like him.

Then, later, it gets confusing.

You get older and you see things

That you don’t like or understand.

The influence is still there,

The bond, the frame of reference.

But then you must you decide:

I will or will not do this

or that thing that he does.

But you will always be his son,

And he will always be your father.

You know you will always love him

Even though you do not understand.

What he is thinking, or feeling.

He shows you in different ways.

It may be a horse that

he wants you to ride,

Or an old boat that you know

Is just yours together,

Or it may be a long drive in the car

handing him cup after cup

of black coffee.

It doesn’t matter what you do together.

Every minute is worth days,

Every day is worth months,

A week together is worth a year.

You wait for a word of praise

You remember every one.

“You look natural on that horse”,

“The boat looks good”,

“Good shot, good cast, nice fish…”

Then you go away

And you write your own story.

You have a son.

And you think about him

And what he did and said

And what you will do

And what you must do.

You do some of the same things

That your father did

And you do or say different things.

And you create another son

Who will be a father.

You don’t think about it all the time

But you are trying to improve him,

To make him a better person.

But, instead you make a man.

A man who may become a father

But will always be your son.

And you remember all the good things

That your father did or said

And you hope that your son

will remember, too...

Written 10/11/98 after the death of my father

Frederick Thomas Crowley (1923-1998).

by:

F. Thomas Crowley, Jr.(1948- )

Father of

Thomas Yates Crowley (1975- )

Grandfather of

Lochlan Thomas Crowley (2011- )

The Last Pizza

The Last Pizza

“Tony's Pizza, may I help you?”

How many times in the past 40 years had she answered the phone with this short, simple phrase? She even answered the home phone this way by accident. Tony's “accident” changed all that and a lot more. When he crashed the delivery VW into an oak tree, while trying to pick up a dropped can of Bud, he changed her world.

No insurance, a pile of bills, an underwater mortgage on a shitty house, and a failing pizza business was what he left her.

“Yeah, I want 4 large with 2 white and two half pepperoni, half mushrooms delivered as soon as possible to 12 Oak Street. How much?”

She did not respond but simply looked around the kitchen to see who was on today;

Mike, sluggish high school football moron who drove the new “delivery van”, her own aging Dodge Town & Country van,

Stephanie, brain-dead, pierced, tattooed slut, her cashier who used to take all the calls for Tony. After the funeral, she was not very lively on the phone;

“Yeah, this is Tony's. What?”

Her own daughter had escaped a few years ago, thank God, to finish college at St. Johns and look for a job.

“That will be $48 plus tax and a $5 delivery charge”

“No way! Pizza Hut has a special for $9.99 large and free delivery!”

“Great. Call them.”

She hung up the phone and leaned back against the flour-dusted counter. A few minutes went by and the phone rang again.

“Ok, we want Tony's pizzas. Can you get them here by 6 pm?” It was 5:15. typical.

“6:15 maybe.”

“Ok Ok hurry up we have people coming over at 6” . click.

She was so sick of this. Tony hadn't been sober enough to make a fucking pizza for years. He pushed his hands into the flour and water goo and made little pizza dough balls. laid them out on a huge, stainless tray, and then went in the back to drink 4 beers. That was, he had mysteriously, and inexplicably calculated, the exact time needed for the dough to rise. He would get up out of his favorite drinking chair and come into the store slurring his favorite, stupid, tired line:

“Time to make the doughnuts!”

This meant it was time for HER to make the doughnuts/pizza as he flirted with Stephanie, joked with Mike, and fiddled with the cash register as he watched her to make sure she didn't see him pocket a twenty.

She made the four pizzas mechanically, set them in the oven and told Mike to get the van ready. He always forgot to check the gas and always had to come back in to get money from Stephanie.

The phone rang.

“Tony's”

“Is this Tony's Pizza?”

“Yes. TONY's Pizza”

“I need a huge pizza.”

“Uh. Ok. We have large which feeds 12. What do you want on it?”

“Cheese”

“That's what is usually on a PIZZA….anything else?”

“Like what?”

God help me. Another moron girl from the St. Johns dormitory.

“Pepperoni, sausage, meatballs, mushrooms, green peppers…….”

“Oh no! I'm a Vegan! No meat! Yuck!”

“You mean Vegetarian right?”

“No way. I'm totally Vegan all the way!”

“Soooo, cheese is Ok?”

“Sure, I love pizza!”

“Where and when?”

“What?”

“WHERE do you want the pizza delivered and WHEN do you need it”

“St. Johns University around 5”

“Dorm?”

“Uh, yeah. Dorm 5 by the church on campus”

“OK. That will be $12 plus taxes and a $5 delivery charge”

“Ok. Do you take credit cards?”

“Master Card & Visa. Charged in advance”

“OK, bye”

“Miss. We need the card number “ (you fucking moron)

She took down the information, slipped the pizza in the oven and 12 minutes later pulled it out, sliding it into a pizza box with the clever words “PIZZA” on top. Tony never wanted to spring for his name on the box so she would write it on as it left the store.

“Where's this one going?” Mike reluctantly asked.

“Never mind. I'll deliver it.”

Mike and Stephanie looked at each other as if she had said she was going to put her head in the oven, yet said nothing but “OK” and went back to their lame conversation.

She walked out to the van. Started the engine and looked at the gas gauge. “EMPTY” with the warning light glowing...Big surprise.

She went back into the store, opened the register and took out a twenty. Mike and Stephanie looked at her as if they had never seen her before. Blank expressions, no questions, no comments. She walked back out to the van.

As she drove through the quiet, upscale neighborhood, looking at the houses where they had been delivering pizzas for so long, staring at the beautiful brick and stone mini-mansions with long, curving driveways and two, three and even four car garages or carriage houses that were much bigger and more grand than their own modest raised ranch twelve miles away in another smaller, blue collar town, she thought to herself; “Why?” and “Why not?” and “What happened?” and “where did the time go along with her dreams”?

As her mind wandered, so did the van, into the opposite lane and into a large moving van heading up the hill as she was driving down the same hill.  The funeral was sad.  Tony would have made it a party with free pizza.  Not one customer showed up but Stephanie and Mike were there.  Stephanie cried and Mike held onto her as he sipped from a 24 ounce Bud light undr his Philadelphia Eagles parka.

Note: The last pizza ws never delivered. It was discovered by a lab-shepherd mix who sniffed it out at the junkyard whre the totalled wreck of the van was delivered by Tony's Wrecking Service (no relation) and devoured without incident in about 3 seconds.

 

Russian Roulette with Jimmy Tahoe

Writing is like Russian Roulette.  You write, you shoot. Sometimes, its a blank and you feel sort of good that you wrote something even if it wasn't very good.  Then, you write, you shoot, and BANG! It works and the character you wrote about comes alive.  You keep writing and he grows with you and learns from you and you learn from him.  Then, you stop.  He stops too.  He waits for you to come back and finish him or save him or kill him.
 
Jimmy Tahoe is out there waiting for me.  He is a small native American boy living on and off the lake. Lake Tahoe, of course.  He was born on the beach at the end of the lake where the town is now. His parents named him after the lake.  Then, they died soon thereafter when he was only 8 years old.
He has been 8 years old for over 30 years because that was when I stopped writing about him.

This is what I think Jimmy looks like.

ICE TIDES

Ice Tides

Ice forms strange shapes as

tides clean dark rivers daily

our lives need tides too.

The Cuban Paintings_Chapter 1

Chapter One – Havana, Cuba, 1925

The ancient, rusty freighter slid past the El Moro Castle two hours after sunset on September 19, 1925. and entered Havana Harbor where it dropped anchor and as required by international law and custom, raised the yellow quarantine flag. Another smaller flag, no bigger than an ensign, was hoisted on a second yardarm. The Captain raised his binoculars and searched the empty ramparts of the castle for his signal. Nothing. He went below to his cabin, opened a greasy porthole and lit the Cuban cigar he had been saving since leaving Cadiz Harbor, Spain.

The next morning he woke to a brilliant sunrise, went on deck and waited for the harbormaster and his assistant to come aboard to clear customs. After the usual pleasantries and a perfunctory greeting they glanced at the manifest listing the cargo, shrugged, smiled and accepted a significant “harbor clearance fee” and left the ship. No more than 15 minutes had elapsed to inspect the vessel and its cargo. That evening, at the dock in Havana, four men came aboard to claim three large wooden crates. The crates contained over 100 priceless works of art and sculptures by masters from France, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands dating back to the 16^th century. 

 They were not seen again until May, 1935 when they were produced to satisfy a debt owed by Salvatore Buffardi, Italian art critic, to a Severino Marrozos y Andrade. In 1937, they were smuggled out of Cuba on a diplomatic flight to Miami, Florida. From 1937 until 2014 they remained hidden in the garage of a small townhouse in the suburbs of Philadelphia. The house was owned by my maternal grandfather, Nicholas E. Meneses, Cuban Consul General of Philadelphia.

Nicholas E Meneses (left) inspecting a cargo of sugar shipped to Philadelphia, PA from Cuba, 1948.