Days
of Uncle Ernest -
Chesapeake City and the World – Babs, Chapter 2
When Uncle Ernest trudged on towards the house, I
climbed high up into the top of our maple tree. I lay back in the crook on a
broad limb and watched the endless drove of starlings flow as one amorphous
being across the sky, headed east to roost in the deep woods. Nina, they came
from the west, above the line of trees, first in the dozens, then in the
hundreds, and then in the thousands.
They filled the air, overpowering all other sounds
and even thoughts with their incessant, rasping chatter. I clapped my cupped
hands together hard, making a loud, popping report that made them split apart,
leaving a hole above me, and for a second or two there was silence, till they
regrouped and continued just as loud and massive as before. I clapped a few
more times and each time their response lessened, until my clapping didn’t faze
them at all.
Then, when the starlings let up after a while, I
heard, coming out of the northeast, a sort of bugling hoot, and, looking up,
saw a line of swans moving swiftly southwestward, towards Swyka’s blacksmith
shop. I tried to imitate their call but, not suffering fools, they didn’t even
slow down, but kept bugling occasionally just the same, as they diminished into
an illegible scribble on the horizon. When they had been directly overhead I
had counted thirteen of them and remembered that it was Friday the thirteenth.
What do you suppose that meant, Nina?
I then looked south across our ten-acre field, at
Junior’s grandmother’s house and thought about what we did a few days earlier.
We punched a hole in the bottom of two Campbell’s soup cans and attached each
end of a twenty-foot string to each can. It made a pretty good telephone, Nina,
because when we pulled the string taut we could hear each other clearly. This
gave us the idea that if we stretched a string across the field (about 400
yards), and if we both climbed a tree, we could talk to each other through the
cans.
We went to a lot of trouble for nothing, of course,
so I went over and we played in his grandmother’s lane. Soon we were arguing
like mad over who could imitate Bill Herman’s voice better. I think I must have
picked on him or wrestled him down, because he got his grandmother’s clothesline
pole and chased me halfway across the field towards home. Talk about a bad day;
that was sure one for me. Hearing the swing creak, I scrambled down and again
joined a revived Uncle Ernest, ready to resume his story.
“Anyhow, Moose, that gal and I hit it off really
well from the start. She gave me a bit of her apple and pretty soon we were
holding hands. I whispered in her ear that she was the only girl in the world
for me. She was barely believable, and when I kissed her she shivered all over
and said that she had never felt like that ever before.
“When I asked her about Bud she told me that all he
ever did was play with the animals once in a while, eat fruit, and write
numbers in the dirt. When I asked why in the world he did that, she said that
the island’s owner, whom she had never met, told Bud that all he had to do to
earn his keep was to be fruitful and multiply.”
“Give me a break, Unk,” I laughed. “They were both
pretty stupid it seems to me.”
“Right you are, Moose, but Babs (as I decided to
call her) and I became boyfriend and girlfriend just the same. After dark that
day, we walked hand-in-hand down to a large pond. It was an enchanting sight,
for it lay before us sort of quaking in the gentle breeze, barely visible, yet
vibrant with a dark shimmer under the stars.
“At the shore’s edge was a pair of blue herons, who,
seeing us standing there, walked towards us with their peculiar gait, like
small clowns on stilts. They came up and nuzzled us, so we stroked their wing
feathers and heads with affection. Then they gave us a parting squawk of
friendship and flew off across the pond, showing in flight a superb grace that
on land they lacked.
“Babs and I then walked closer to the pond’s edge,
where we sat down in the lush grass. It was really comfortable, so dense and
thick, five times thicker than any fancy rug you’ve ever walked on. We sat
facing the pond, with Babs between my legs, leaning her back against my chest,
so that I needed only lean forward to feel the texture of her hair with my lips
and smell its freshness. I mean to tell you, Moose-the-Goose, I never felt so
relaxed in my whole life, so contented with my life.
“I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and she
intertwined her hands with mine. Occasionally we’d rock back and forth, feeling
our bodies respond as one—one creature satiated, pleasure jointly personified.
Sometimes she’d tilt her head far back, so that I could lean far forward and
down to kiss her upside down, so that lips not meshing, not aligned, made the
kiss even more delightful. And then it happened, Moose.”
“Holy crap, Unk,” I said, disgusted. “I hope something happened besides this
lovey-dovey, modern romance garbage you’ve been dishing out. What happened? Did
an elephant come stomping along and blow cold water on the two of you?”
“Whoaaa, hold your horses for a minute,” Uncle
Ernest said in that calm, expressive voice that I knew so well. “As we gazed
across the pond to where it met the dark horizon, we could see a speck, a
glimmer of light. It was blood-red at first, hardly visible, and then, as it
enlarged and rose above the pond—slowly, slowly, inexorably—it became lighter
and brighter, so that its beams played upon the pond’s surface in a distorted
mirror image of itself. Babs could see the colors better than I, so she described
the varying shades of red.
“We then sat speechless, watching it rise in the
sky, projecting its contorted twin towards us on the water. After a few minutes
I began to hum a favorite tune softly in her ear. She turned around, softened,
and laid her cheek on my chest.
“Then I added the words to the tune and, honestly
Moose, her tender face cuddled so lightly against me that I could feel her warm
breath soothing my whole body. I sang the song twice, after which she joined
in, blending her sweet soprano with my shaky baritone. We sang it several times
before drifting off to sleep in each other’s arms.”
Now, Nina, do you know what? That simple Uncle
Ernest sang the song to me as we swung slowly back and forth on that dreamy,
late-summer afternoon. This is what he sang:
♫ Oh, you are the only girl in
the world
And I am the
only boy.
Nothing else
will matter in this world today.
We will go on
loving in the same old way.
A beautiful
garden just meant for two,
With nothing
to mar our joy.
I will say
such wonderful things to you.
There will be
such wonderful things to do.
Oh, you are
the only girl in the world
And I am the
only boy. ♫
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