Undaunted

I first learned of Emily Roberts through Facebook in 2012. Technology had carved a smaller world for me; she and I had three friends in common: my Aunt F, my neighbor Marta, and the wife of one of Husband’s co-workers. None of our mutual friends knew one another—in fact, their worlds were vastly different—and so my curiosity was piqued. I reached out to Emily to introduce myself.

In 2013, Emily bought a darling house and moved into north Minneapolis. Since she was a single woman, I hoped the neighborhood would treat her kindly, but I wouldn’t have to worry; Emily was plucky and not rattled by reports of gunshots or news of break-ins. She tackled home improvement projects, dove into neighborhood events, secured a teaching position in a north Minneapolis school, and seized her new inner-city life with two hands.

One day in November of 2014, in fall’s waning sunlight, Emily left school for the day. Suddenly, a young man appeared and faced her, blocking her path.

“Gimme your stuff.” He edged closer to her. A little too close.

“No. This is my stuff.” Emily frowned. “And you can’t have it!”

Then he pulled a gun from his pants and pointed it at her. “Gimme your purse!”

She flipped through her options. Could she knock the gun from his hand? Or maybe she should yell. But would anyone hear her?

At that moment, the young man snatched her purse and ran. Emily screamed for him to come back, and then by instinct, chased after him. But he darted into an alley, jumped someone’s fence, and disappeared.

Later, Emily detailed the event on a north Minneapolis Facebook page, stating the worst thing about it was the inconvenience; the robbery had stirred up a mess and forced her to replace her credit cards and cell phone. But I could tell she still carried her courage.

In April of 2015, I met another single woman in the neighborhood—artist Susan Spiller—at an event at The Warren, an art gallery in north Minneapolis. Susan’s passion was fused glass art, and at the time, Husband was creating a welded steel sculpture for the arts gala at the girls’ school. He told Susan all about it, asking if she would let him incorporate a piece of her glass into his work. She agreed—delighted with the idea—and days later, formed a square in the dimensions he needed. She waved away his money, though, and said she wished to donate the piece to support the good cause of bringing art into kids’ lives.

Susan wasn’t only an artist. She rescued greyhounds, sat on the board of a neighborhood association, was a member of the Northside Arts Collective, and planted a community garden, which was nestled near her Northside home.

On July 15, 2015, Emily awoke in the middle of the night to the sounds of pornography floating through her open windows. The noise seemed close by, and slipping from her bed, she looked out the window. A man—his cell phone in hand—sat in the swing in her yard. When she moved, he ran off.

And on the same night—in another part of north Minneapolis—someone invaded artist Susan Spiller’s home and murdered her.

The next day on Facebook, Emily recounted the story of the pervert in her yard, but she also posted a link to the news story of Susan’s death, which already flooded the city’s news and the north Minneapolis Facebook pages. In the following days, hundreds of mourners gathered outside Susan’s home. No one could make sense of her death. She was good, gentle, and neighbors concluded that since she wasn’t connected with any nefarious behavior, the crime must have been random.

Random.

The word plucked at something deep inside me, and for the first time in our thirteen years of living in the neighborhood, I felt anxious. And I wasn’t the only one. Some people announced they were moving. They had given the Northside a chance, but after Susan’s death, they couldn’t do it anymore. And who could blame them? The police often assured us residents that the killing crimes we heard about were not random, but instead targeted acts connected with drugs or gangs. Not this time.

For a few days, I wore a sense of insecurity like a scratchy wool sweater on a ninety-degree day. If this could be the ending of Susan’s life story, what might happen to the rest of us?

Then I forced my thoughts to a different place.

Finally, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things… And the God of peace will be with you.

And I thought of Emily. She didn’t turn from the neighborhood in fear or disgust, but instead spoke loudly into social media, and with the help of neighbors, installed motion sensor lights—and other security measures—in her house and yard. She didn’t cower when leaving her school, and though saddened by Susan’s death, she was undaunted by life in the neighborhood.

Sometimes we muster strength for ourselves by witnessing strength in others. When we’re depleted and wavering—and we think God loves us too quietly—we reach out and grab onto courageous humans, like Emily, who live in the same places we do.

Because we’re stronger that way.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The training days

As soon as they could walk, Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka began the tradition of The Run. It was their way of saying goodbye to visitors. When someone they loved was leaving our home, they’d announce, “We’re gonna run!”

“Just to the corner,” I’d call after them as they dashed off.

And then they’d race the length of the sidewalk, trying to beat our visitor who drove away on the street next to them. When the girls got to the end of the block, they’d stop and wave at the vehicle as it turned and drove out of sight.

I always stood in the same spot—on the sidewalk in front of our house—watching the girls run to the corner alongside our departing guests. Once the visitors had disappeared, the girls would turn and sprint back to me.

In the early days, I memorized the details of The Run: the flyaway blonde hair, a sundress strap slipping off a toddler shoulder, a sagging diaper. Sometimes the girls even galumphed to the end of the block in plastic, play high heels. But over the years, efficient strides replaced stumbling steps, and self-awareness edged out innocence. Eventually, the girls didn’t race our guests to the corner anymore.

I didn’t notice the exact day the girls stopped running. But it fit in with all the other things that marked their growth: being old enough to stay at home alone, concocting delicious things in the kitchen without help, walking to the corner store by themselves. I grieved the loss of The Run—a sign their training days under our roof were numbered. But they were growing up and away from us as they should. The beauty of it all knifed my heart.

During the training years, many lessons for our girls rippled through our days, but one washed in again and again: “The world is broken, but that changes nothing for us. We love everybody anyway.”

I wondered often about the neighborhood kids—and their own life lessons—as I watched them grow too. After long winter separations, they came from the surrounding blocks in the spring to play basketball in our driveway. They were taller and thinner or more filled out. But during those dark, cold months, what had they learned about life? And during every season, what lessons flowed into their finite days?  

One weekday morning in the spring, I glimpsed sixteen-year-old Antoine shooting baskets in our driveway. From the kitchen window, I could see he had a friend with him—someone I didn’t recognize. I went outside.

Approaching the gate, I smiled and then cocked my head. “Why aren’t you in school?”

“I just had a court date.” Antoine made a basket from the “three-point line.” 

Antoine’s friend hopped into his car, which was parked in Glenda’s driveway. Behind the music and rolled-up windows, I knew he wouldn’t hear our conversation.

I rested my arms on the gate. “Oh? What happened?”

Antoine dribbled the ball, his focus on the basket. “I got in a fight. Judge says I have to do community service.” He sank the shot.

“That doesn’t sound like you. Why did you get into a fight?”

Antoine did a lay-up. “A guy was messing with my girlfriend.”

I imagined him as a four-year-old—like the little boys we had cared for through Safe Families for Children, all of them with soft, eager hearts but precarious beginnings. Antoine still had that heart.

“You have a case worker, right?” I said. He nodded. “Tell him you can do your service hours here with us, if he lets you.” I held up my hand. “Wait here. Don’t leave.”

I went back into the house, jotted our contact information on a scrap of paper, and then headed outside again. Antoine watched me, his basketball now quiet and tucked under his arm. I gave him the note. “Have your case worker call us. I mean it.”

He shoved the paper into his pocket, his gaze flitting off toward his friend’s car.

“Antoine,” I said, and he looked at me again. “You’re a good kid.”

His mouth smiled, but his eyes didn’t. He climbed into the car with his friend, and they drove off down the alley.

A few months later, Antoine was back, shooting baskets in our driveway with two friends. Husband strolled out to say hi. Later, he told me about the exchange.

“I asked Antoine if he was working this summer. He said, ‘Not anymore.’ I asked him why not. He said another employee was giving him trouble, so he got in a fight with him and got fired.”

I shook my head and sighed. “Oh no.”

“I told him, ‘Sometimes you have to let that stuff go.’”

“What did he say then?”

Husband shrugged. “He just nodded and said, ‘I know.’”

Like Antoine, I thought of Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka—sometimes overlooking certain lessons to choose their own ways. But outside the protection of right choices, the path is tangled and thorny, and the wandering leaves a mark.

Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.

We parents are charged with a task, and we hope to make the most of it, because time is slippery, and the training days are fleeting. For all our kids. And for Antoine.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The cats

Living in a community means taking care of its creatures—whether one is called to wrangle a leash onto a loose dog sniffing around the alley or to return wandering children to their parents. Even for the quiet ones—our feline community members—it can sometimes take a village.

Around 2010, we began catsitting for Emma and Randy, our neighbors from two blocks away. We had first met them at church and found out we not only shared the same neighborhood but also a proclivity for bringing daughters into the world; we had our three girls, and they had their four. When they asked Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka to check in on their cats, Punkin and Patches, while they were away on vacation one year, the girls were eager to help.

Each time we entered their house, Punkin and Patches greeted us at the door, their purrs as loud as electric toothbrush motors. They both required thyroid meds twice daily, so the girls scooped up the creatures and cradled them in their arms while I gently squeezed the cats’ jaws open enough to drop pills down their throats. They didn’t seem to mind their meds and followed us around while we cleaned the litter box and freshened their food and water.

Over the years, all our visits were alike. Until the day that only Patches met us at the door. Randy and Emma had told us about Punkin’s passing, but after that, our time at their house was never quite the same. Losing a community member of any size leaves a hole for the rest of us.

Veronica, our neighbor from five doors down, one day announced that she and Sergio were leaving on a week-long vacation. She asked if Flicka would provide care for their cat Isis while they were away. The job was pretty easy and would have its perks, she said: Flicka could hang out at their house, order up movies on their TV, and enjoy treats of her choice. There was just one disclaimer, though, and Veronica spelled it out for us in a note:

Isis is kind of a rotten cat, but you’ll get along with her as long as you remember a few things. She’s old and cranky and packs a wallop if she catches you with a claw. She’s nervous around new people, and we’re pretty sure she’s not all there to begin with. She’s curious and will probably be interested in you. The key is to be calm and ignore her at first. Just let her sniff you. She might chirp and act all cute, but she’s not ready yet! Give her less attention than you think she wants. One last warning: she does the Puss in Boots routine from Shrek when she’s playful. If she’s looking extra bubble-eyed and cute, she’s powering up! Don’t be drawn in! Keep your face away from her for sure.

During her catcare week, Flicka heeded the warnings and kept her relationship with Isis professional, doling out a courteous nod when the two of them made eye contact. They got along well, and after performing the cat chores, Flicka indulged in apples dipped in caramel while she did her homework. Isis looked on and approved.

We met Frank—a co-worker of Husband’s—and his wife Lola when they moved into the neighborhood in 2014. They told us about their world travels and then asked if our girls would take care of their cat Moneypenny when they were away on their next trip, a safari to Africa. Ricka and Dicka agreed, thrilled with the offer of employment. The girls instantly fell in love with the cat, who had years earlier lost a leg due to a shoulder tumor. As exuberant as a dog, Moneypenny nuzzled us, and after completing the feeding and litter box duties, the girls snuggled her for an hour each visit.

One day, during one of Frank and Lola’s trips, I drove the girls to their house to care for the cat. We parked and walked up to the front door. As Dicka pulled the house key from her pocket, I saw the door was ajar.

“Girls,” I said, a chill twisting up my spine. “Get back. Someone’s broken into the house.”

Husband had just warned me about the recent rash of break-ins in the neighborhood. And now Frank and Lola’s place. We backed away from the house, and I dialed 911. When the operator came on the other end of the line, I stated the address and our reason for being there. Just then, I heard a thud coming from inside the house.

“Whoever broke in is still in there,” I said, steadying my voice. “I just heard thumping.”

“The police are on their way. Go and sit in your car. I’ll stay on the phone with you.”

While we waited in the car, the operator gave me the play-by-play, updating me on the police’s coordinates every couple of blocks. Soon, a squad car pulled up to the curb, and three officers flew from the vehicle—guns drawn—and entered the house.

On edge, I phoned Husband, away on travel for work.

“Someone broke into Frank and Lola’s,” I said, breathless. “And they’re still in there. I heard noises.”

“Oh, really? You’re there right now?”

“Yeah, and so are the police. They’re inside checking it out. The girls and I are waiting in the car.” I trained my eyes on the front door of the house. “How do we reach Frank and Lola in the South Pacific?”

“I don’t know. We’ll figure it out.”

One of the officers exited the house and walked toward our vehicle.

“I gotta go,” I told Husband and hung up.

The officer approached my driver’s side window. I rolled it down.

“There was a guy inside. Their contractor,” she said. “He’s doing some work for them while they’re away. He showed us the paperwork.”

So that explained the pounding in the house. Relief washed away my worry.

“No one told me a contractor was coming.”

The officer hooked her thumbs on her gun belt. “He didn’t know you were coming either.”

Just then, thoughts of Moneypenny jarred me. Had the sweet tripod slipped out through the open door? “Did you happen to see the cat?”

The officer tossed me a half-smile. “Yep, the cat’s fine. Now wait here a little longer. We’re wrapping up a few things and then you can go in.” She strode back into the house.

I exhaled and dialed Husband again.

“It was a contractor working in the house,” I said, thankful for the happy ending.

“Oh, that’s right.”

I frowned. “What?”

“I guess I forgot to tell you. Frank said they’re having someone do some work upstairs while they’re gone.”

“Are you kidding me? You knew?” My blood pressure turned up a few notches. “I just called the cops on an innocent guy!”

“Sorry about that.”

The police officers emerged from the house, and the same one approached our car again. I hung up on Husband.

The officer nodded toward the house. “You can go in now.”

“I’m sorry we called you for nothing.”

She shook her head, waving a hand. “No. When you see a door standing open like that, we want you to call.”

I thanked her, and she disappeared into the police vehicle. The three officers drove off.

The girls and I stepped inside the house.

“Hello?” I called out.

The contractor tromped down the stairs to us. We exchanged names.

“I’m so sorry I called the police on you.” Guilt nicked me. “I bet I ruined your day.”

“Naw, it’s okay.” He shook his hair back from his face and shrugged. “They had their guns on me and had me cuffed before I knew it.”

My hands flew to my face. “Oh, no!”

“No worries.” He bobbed his head up and down. “It’s happened to me before.”

“That’s horrible.”

The man went back to work, and I sat on the couch and rubbed my temples, trying to massage away the remorse. Moneypenny nudged my hand for attention, reminding me why we were there in the first place.

Even though our feline neighbors are the quiet ones, slinking around their houses often unnoticed by the rest of the world, they deliver some exciting times in the neighborhood too. And with their colorful personalities and needs, they prove they make a community just as much as the rest of us do.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Belonging

The phone call went to voicemail. Again. Three times trying to reach Sheena—the mother of Latika, the one-year-old baby girl we had hosted—and still nothing. The girls and I waited in the car in the parking lot behind Sheena’s high rise in the heart of downtown Minneapolis. It was the last day of the placement, and Sheena and I had agreed to meet at that time and place for us to return Latika to her. Because of her health condition, it would’ve been too taxing for Sheena—who didn’t own a car—to walk to meet us at the Safe Families for Children office nestled further into the downtown.

I dialed her number one more time. Still no answer.

Latika squawked, protesting the extra time in her car seat. Dicka bounced a stuffed animal in the baby’s face, tapping it to her nose every few seconds.  

I checked my cell phone again. “Girls, it’s been twenty minutes. Let’s go in and find her.”

I carried the baby, and the girls toted her things to the building’s back door—the one we had seen Sheena use—right near our parked car. When a tenant emerged, we slipped in. Once inside, I scanned the place for a directory. Nothing. And the access door to the apartments was locked.

“Let’s head back out and around to the front,” I said. “We shouldn’t have come in this way.”

We exited and trudged around the building with Latika and her possessions. We passed a bus stop, swarming with people, but when a bus hissed to a halt, no one got on.

Inside the front doors of the high rise, I spotted a directory. I clicked through it, trying to locate Sheena’s name. No success.

Just then, a broad-chested security guard hustled toward us, a gun in his holster. “I saw you on the cameras trying to come in the back, and I thought, ‘They don’t belong here.’” The man’s mouth flatlined. I caught a hint of a Brooklyn accent. “Who are you looking for?”

I blew a piece of hair out of my eyes and told him Sheena’s full name, shifting the baby to my other hip. “We’re a host family for Safe Families for Children, and we’re trying to return her baby to her.”

“Well, isn’t that sweet of you.” The corners of his mouth curved up slightly, warming his expression. “She’s got a bad deal with her health, poor lady.”

“I know.” I shot a look around the lobby. Even in the broad daylight, it was dim. The walls were dingy, the atmosphere tattered. People meandered around the room, pelting us with looks. A woman cooed at Latika.

“I’ll take you up to her.” The security guard flicked a finger for us to follow him, and then he mashed the button on the wall. He eyed the lit numbers above the elevator doors, and when they opened, he motioned us on first, and then he followed. And so did two other men, so tall their heads grazed the elevator’s ceiling. One of them tilted his ear to our conversation, glancing between the guard and me as we spoke. I furrowed my brow and steered the topic to trivial things.

We exited the elevator on Sheena’s floor. The security guard sauntered to her door and knocked. When she answered, he gestured for us to enter. I thanked him, and he disappeared around the corner.

Sheena closed the door behind us and plunked down onto a bed, which was set up in the living room. The suffocating heat of the room blasted us. A can of something heated in a pot on the stove. Boxes of medical equipment lined one wall.

I frowned. “Are you feeling okay?”

She waved away my question. “Oh, yeah.”

Maybe she thought she had to be brave for us. Or for herself. But had she been too sick to answer her phone?

“Did you get my messages, Sheena?”

She shrugged, taking the baby from my arms. “Sometimes my phone acts up.”

I briefed her on a few things about our time with the baby, and before we left, the girls and I took turns planting kisses on the crown of Latika’s head.

When we stepped back into the hallway, I spied the security guard leaning against a wall. He joined us again. On our ride back down in the elevator—free from prying eyes this time—he handed me a slip of paper with some information scrawled on it.

“I’m Vince, the supervisor. If you come here again, call first.” He tapped a finger on the paper. “This is our security line. Ask for an escort to accompany you from the parking lot. Don’t come in on your own again.” His eyes sparked intensity, even though his voice was even. “This place is full of lowlifes. Dope dealers, you name it. You don’t belong here.”

And we had just left a baby there—with her ailing mother. Maybe they didn’t belong there either.

“I’ll do what you say,” I said, leveling my gaze at Vince. “But I’m not afraid. I live in north Minneapolis.”

He darted a look at me, frowning. “You live on the Northside? Why?”

“Because we’re supposed to be there.”

Vince raised an eyebrow, bunched his lips to one side, and then nodded. When our elevator ride ended, he walked us out to our car in the parking lot. Before I drove away, I glimpsed Vince in the rearview mirror, and I thought of Sheena again.

Many people hover just one ugly strike away from poverty’s grip. Bad choices or unfortunate circumstances—like Sheena’s—toss humans away, so poverty can gobble them up, its appetite never satisfied. But we don’t belong in a broken world of unmet needs or in subsidized housing where a security guard works overtime to keep us alive.

We belong in a better place. We were all created for more.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Walls

Take a summer trip with me today somewhere far away from reality and the neighborhood. This piece of flash fiction won second place in the 2nd Annual Faith Radio Writers Contest in July 2014 and was published in Splickety Prime in September 2014. Enjoy!

In many ways, it made perfect sense to tear out the walls down to the studs. Beatrice needed the change, the newness. Even the old drywall reminded her of Hank. Was renovating a bathroom such a big deal? For years, he’d said so. She remembered the last time she’d asked.

“Don’t have the money right now,” he said, a sneer playing on his lip.

“But I’ve put away a little.” Beatrice pulled a wad of cash from her bathrobe pocket. What she meant was “enough.”

“Where’d you get that?” He peered at her through squinted eyes, his mouth hard.

“Some from the rummage sale a couple years ago. Some from gifts. My birthday, Christmas, you know.”

“You been keeping that when the door needed fixing? And my truck got that ding?” He extended his hand. “I’ll take that.”

Her smile faded, and she dropped the roll of cash into his palm.

He counted out the bills, keeping the number to himself.

“What about the bathroom?”

He snorted. “What about the bathroom?”

After thirty-five years of marriage, she was used to his sarcasm. It didn’t slice into her any more, but his mimicry still ripped her to the core. She turned away, hot tears spilling down her cheeks. Her teeth clenched.

That was the last time she’d asked about the bathroom. And only four months before he was gone.

Now she watched the handyman. Dust thickened the air as the man hacked through the walls. Hank’s walls. Now hers.

Hank. She recalled the day of his funeral.

“Did you know he had heart problems?” her friend asked, standing near the casket.

“Most of the men in his family went that way,” Beatrice said. “He never got checked.”

“Well, I’m sorry. So sudden.”

“I know.”

Well-wishers told her what a guy he was—how solid, how predictable. She nodded and accepted all the hugs paid out to her.

Her grown daughter stared at Hank’s body. “He never wore a suit in real life. Why now?” Krista had her dad’s way, his eyes.

“They just do that. It’s an expectation.”

“Well, it’s stupid. This looks nothing like him.”

Beatrice gave her a half-hug before more people pressed in around her.

“He sure had a way about him. That sense of humor,” one of his buddies said.

Beatrice frowned, trying to remember his humor. Hank breathed earth’s air just last week, and she couldn’t remember. She couldn’t remember him.

In the sanctuary, the pastor talked about life, about being reunited with Hank one day. Beatrice wondered…

When the service ended, six of Hank’s buddies carried his body away. Her gaze trailed after the casket. There he goes.

As people filed out, she deserted her pew and walked into the room where the refreshments would be served. Ham on buns, potato salad, pickles, cake. Hank’s favorites. She made her way into the church’s kitchen, tied on an apron, and busied herself filling the platters.

“What are you doing back here, honey?” a woman asked.

“Serving,” Beatrice said.

“Not today. You sit down. But take some food first.”

“But I’m on the schedule.”

“Not at your own husband’s funeral.”

Beatrice took off the apron and hung it up again. Now what?

The evening of the funeral, emptiness warmed the house. Krista had bolted after the burial. Beatrice understood. She wanted to be alone too. She had refused her friends’ offers to stay with her.

Beatrice walked from room to room and inhaled the quiet, the peace. When she reached the bathroom, she sat on the closed toilet lid and stared at the faded blue wall—imagined it gone. The red tape had been pulled away, the shackles unclasped.

She waited out the weekend and on Monday morning made the call. “I’d like to have my bathroom renovated.”

“I’m sorry to hear about your husband’s passing. We read about it in the paper and—”

“Could you come this week and do it?”

“We do an estimate first. That’s how it works. But we can take care of it this week. It’s the least we can do.”

“Okay. Any day is fine.”

Beatrice thought she had enough credit on one card to cover it.

Now excitement bubbled through her as she watched the demolition. The crumbling walls.

“What on earth?” The handyman stopped and squatted to the ground.

“What?” She edged closer, her mouth going dry. Through the dust, she eyed bundles—many bundles—of something.

He turned toward her, clutching dusty handfuls of green bills held together by rubber bands. “And there’s more.”

Among the stacks once hidden away in the wall, Beatrice spied a single roll of cash—her cash—and the hole that led into Hank’s closet.

She swallowed, her eyes wide. It was never about the money. Only about the walls.

*Invite a friend to subscribe today! www.tamarajorell.com/blog and come back next week for a continuation of stories about the neighborhood. 

Online friends

Note: North Minneapolis artist Meg Corcoran’s work can be found at scribblenest.etsy.com and Facebook.com/scribblenest. Watch her Facebook page for her upcoming art show!

During the summer of 2012, I stumbled across a certain north Minneapolis Facebook page. Geared for airing complaints about our neighborhood, sometimes long threads grew from small grievances and turned deliciously funny. The rules of The Gripe Page stated the admin would delete a post if it encouraged anyone to get to know his or her neighbors or told someone to “Move if you don’t like it here!” It was structured for grumbling, and there would be no deviating from that focus.

Like a craving I knew I shouldn’t often indulge, I tried to ration my Gripe Page reading. But after one of those days, I’d jump into yoga pants and a sweatshirt and devour the whole thing. Eventually, though, the sugary, guilty pleasure turned saccharine and set my teeth on edge. Discontent twisted within me. Had we made a mistake moving to the neighborhood? Were we crazy for raising our girls there? Tired of the artificial fun, I broke up with The Gripe Page and set out to focus on more positive things. And there was a Facebook page for that too.

On the positive page, the admin permitted only glowing stories, pretty photos, and uplifting comments about north Minneapolis. The Lovely Page was a peaceful place, coaxing a contented sigh from me each time I’d visit. But was there a page that landed somewhere between the negative and the blissful? Somewhere balanced I could claim as my go-to Facebook page for navigating life on the Northside?

I discovered a new page—one tailored to those who wished to share the good, the somewhat bad, and the slightly ugly. The Handy Page was a neutral place. The occasional “I just heard shots on such and such a block” was tempered by “Here are some photos of the new Webber Pool’s progress.” The contributors to The Handy Page were a neighborly, helpful sort—eager to give or take an extra hosta, willing to share local recommendations for anything from car repairs to pizza delivery, quick to praise a neighbor for reporting a crime without delay, and faithful to relay recycling or snow removal updates. The page was my favorite Yellow Pages, brought to life by people living somewhere near me. These friends I hadn’t met yet had been around the block a time or two and lived to share about it online.

Then one day, I stumbled on the delight of all delights: the north Minneapolis garage sale page. Northsiders posted photos of their once-beloved stuff, listed prices, and arranged meeting times to get the winners their things. The admin were efficient on The Cool Junk Page and reiterated the crisp rules when amateurs transgressed. There would be no I’m-interested-but-have-to-get-the-measurements kind of holding of goods. If someone didn’t “Dibs!” the item first, it just wasn’t theirs. The sellers peddled their discards with passion, and at times the dibsing rose to a fevered pitch. Some vendors appeared to be advertising professionals; they staged their cast-offs in expert lighting, and suddenly, maybe I did need an owl cookie jar.

The entertainment value was high, and I learned the page offered other services too.

“I’ll pay an extra ten dollars for someone to run to the Dairy Queen, buy me a Blizzard, and drive it over here,” a woman said one night. “I’m already in my pajamas and don’t want to go out.”

“I’ll do it,” another woman said. And she made the house call that night, delivering the frozen treat in the pouring rain.

Another time, a seller posted a photo of a ceramic latté mug. I decided I should probably buy it; I could envision it filled with coffee and inspiration—the kind of cup that could spur my writing to the next level. Mine was the first dibs, and I drove out into the night with my two dollars.

“I love your blog,” the seller told me when I introduced myself at her door. “I read it every week on the bus on my way to work.”

And just like that, we were friends.

One day, Meg, an artist in the garage sale family, showcased her work online. She had bought her paints—Holbein Artists’ Gouache—from another member and put them to good use, painting pictures from photos people had posted of their piles of garage sale wares. While her baby napped each day, she created colorful memorials to the garage sale’s old treasures. The members spotted their own departed possessions in her subject matter. And behind the paints Meg used, I detected something else: a warmth for her online friends.

“Maybe it’s corny,” she told me. “But the garage sale page has made me fall in love with the Northside like nothing else has in the six years we’ve lived here. I’m connecting with neighbors beyond my block and finding real friendships too.”

Behind the old bikes, the secondhand jewelry, and the tired-but-useful appliances were people with a fierce love for stuff, the neighborhood, and each other. And as I sifted through their junk online, I smiled. Meg and I were on the same page in more ways than one.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Control

“Let’s have you get up,” the nurse said. “Time to move around.”

I sat on the edge of my hospital bed, placed my bare feet on the cool tile, and stood. Then I crumpled to the floor with a thud. I pushed myself up, but my legs wouldn’t support me. What was happening? The strength in my thighs was gone.

Surprise flitted across the nurse’s face and then vanished. She pasted on a smile and called for an orderly. The two of them helped me back into bed and then scurried away, deserting me to my thoughts. I had just given birth to Flicka, our first baby, and something was wrong with my legs.

Over the next several hours, a number of doctors whisked in to examine me. They furrowed their brows and spoke to each other in muted voices.

“We’ve never seen this before,” my doctor at last said out loud, and I wished he hadn’t.

Fear writhed inside me. When everyone left the room, I turned into my pillow and cried.

“Maybe it was the epidural,” Husband said. “And maybe it’ll wear off soon.”

In the middle of the night, I phoned my youngest sister, the nurse.

“I’ve heard of this before. It sounds like you’ve had nerve injury, but you’ll get better in time.” Her tone soothed me and rocked my fears to sleep.

The hospital staff said I couldn’t be released until I could walk again. So, a few days after Flicka’s birth, the nurses gathered to watch me walk down the hallway of the OB ward. After just a few steps, though, my legs gave out under me, and I toppled to the floor. Heat prickled my neck, and sweat beaded on my face. I bit my lip, determined to get up by myself. But I couldn’t do it. I needed help.

By day five, through sheer grit, I was able to lock my knees enough to pass the hall walk test, and I was released to go home. Since my muscles still lacked strength, Husband helped me with everything. One night, though, I felt confident enough to get up with the baby. I scooped her from her bassinet, but just then, my knees buckled. Before I hit the floor, I turned so my body would bear the brunt of the fall. Husband heard the noise and sprang from the bed.

“She’s just fine,” he said after taking a quick assessment of the baby. “But are you okay?”

I sat on the floor, a weepy mess. He put the baby back into her bed and lifted me up.

At the four-week mark, I met with a neurologist.

“You’ve suffered nerve injury. This happens to one in ten thousand women who’ve had epidurals,” he said. “You’ll eventually heal.”

And I did. But in those early days, the fear of the unknown tangled me. It wasn’t what I had planned. And I knew I couldn’t control my healing—or my life.

As soon as I switched my eyes open one morning in 2004, the room whirled around me, and fear climbed up my throat. Vertigo had shown up for unwelcome visits before, but today was more complicated. Husband was gone on international travel for work, and my only companions were four-year-old Flicka, two-year-old Ricka, and our unborn baby who swam laps in my belly.

I slowly sat up. It was a Sunday morning, and I had agreed to volunteer in Ricka’s Sunday school classroom at church. Maybe I could still make it. Maybe my head would clear in time. But the room kept up its merry-go-round antics, and nausea roiled my stomach. I reclined on the pillows.

“I need your help, girls,” I called out to them, my voice brimming with the promise of adventures. “How about we do something different today?”

They scrambled downstairs from their bedroom and clambered up into the bed with me.

“Okay,” Flicka said, her eyes eager and bright. “What will we do, Mama?”

“First, I need you to go into the other room, and look on that bookshelf for the church directory.” I described the slim book, hoping she would spot it even though she couldn’t read yet.

She found it and presented it to me like a scavenger hunt prize. I flipped through its pages and made the phone call that relieved me of my duties for the day.

“Now,” I said, “let’s get you two some breakfast.”

I sat up again, but the swaying room threatened to pitch me over the edge. I slid from the bed and lowered to my hands and knees on the floor.

“What are you doing, Mama?” Ricka said, cocking her head and patting me lightly on the back as she accompanied me on my slow crawl to the kitchen.

“I’m dizzy today,” I said, casting my words in cheery colors. “This helps me.”

But even on my hands and knees, I almost tipped over. Changing my mind, I turned and inched back to the bedroom. Safely in bed again, I gave Flicka instructions.

“New plan, honey. You get to make breakfast for the two of you. Isn’t that fun?” She squealed and jumped up and down. “Now listen carefully. Push a chair up to the kitchen counter. This time, it’s okay for you to stand on it. Then open those high cupboard doors above the sink and take down some cereal boxes. Help yourself. I trust you.” Flicka did exactly what I said. “Now come and eat cereal in my bed, and we’ll find something to watch on TV.”

As my head spun, so I spun reality for my girls; they were too young to hear I didn’t have control over much of anything that day. And I didn’t want to hear the words out loud either.

The Honda’s windshield wipers slicked away the falling snowflakes as I navigated through the sluggish traffic of Minneapolis’ morning rush hour one day. I had already dropped off Flicka at the light rail for her ride to school. Now I had to drive through the downtown to deliver the other two girls to their school. Our houseguest at the time, nine-month-old Damian, was snug in his car seat in the back, and Ricka and Dicka played peekaboo with him.

As I approached the center of the downtown, I glanced at the dashboard. The lights flickered, and the gas and temperature gauges convulsed. Warning lights flashed. Nervous about the car’s behavior, I moved into the left turn lane. I hoped to make it around the corner so I could pull over, but the stoplight snapped to red. I clenched my jaw and waited for the green arrow. The dashboard darkened for a second and then lit up again.

“Girls, pray!” I hollered into the back seat. And they did.

The stoplight finally shot me a green arrow, and I held my breath and applied the gas. The car chugged forward. But would it survive through the left turn? If it stalled right there in the middle of the intersection, then what? My thoughts chattered with possible scenarios. I had little power over my vehicle and no control over the outcome. The car lurched left.

Now safely through the intersection, I pelted myself with two questions: Should I pull over? Or should I keep going? I flipped between the two options but decided since the vehicle was still moving, I shouldn’t stop it.

The car propelled us over the Central Avenue Bridge and closer to our destination across the river. I wondered what was going on under the hood. With the flickering panel and spinning dials, I was either maneuvering a time machine, or the alternator was on its way out. Just a few more turns to go…

At last, I pulled up in front of the girls’ school just as the dashboard lights blacked out for good, and the car sputtered to its death.

“We made it,” I said, incredulous, the muscles in my neck tense.

The girls flung the car doors open and dashed toward the building, blowing kisses and we-hope-it-works-outs over their shoulders for the baby and me. I called for a tow truck, unclasped Damian from his car seat, and traipsed into the school to wait with him where it was warm.

We humans navigate life, convinced we have control. In the flash of crisis, though—under that layer of fear—is freedom. Freedom from the heaviest weight of all: the burden of believing we can master our own lives. With our fallible intentions and unreliable bodies, we’re not abandoned to orchestrate our ways alone.

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Dallas and the garden

Both my mother and my mother-in-law had sprouted into this world with verdant thumbs, and vegetables and flowers sprang from their efforts. But as kids, Husband and I weren’t fans of gardening. He recalled working in gardens—as big as city lots—spreading bales of straw for mulch and truckloads of manure, surrendering much of his summer days “ministering to the vegetables,” as he would say. I remembered trailing my mom, enduring the mosquito-biting hours while weeding long rows of vegetables on my grandparents’ farm. The only high point for me was plucking carrots from the earth, wiping their dirt onto my jeans, and noshing them while they were still gritty.

Husband and I had never owned a garden together until we settled into our home in north Minneapolis. Since childhood, my tune had changed about gardening, and I was delighted the previous homeowners had left behind some presents: peonies, strawberry plants, lily of the valley. I even counted the sprawling lilac as ours because it spilled its sumptuous scent—for a week and a half every spring—over the fence into our yard from the Isenbergs’ place.

Since we were entwined in home improvement projects that first year in the house, we didn’t venture into the garden much. By the next summer, though, we itched to dig in the dirt and grow stunning things just like our mothers had. But Husband and I were uninformed about the ins and outs of gardening, and our naiveté probably trumpeted the truth across the yard to our neighbors.

“Do you mind if we grow clematis along the chain link fences?” I asked Glenda on the north and Mrs. Isenberg on the south. “I just wanted to be sure you’re okay with it, because it’ll be thick and cover the fences completely.”

While both of them gave their consent, our lack of horticultural skills prevented us from knowing some basic facts: establishing clematis takes time, and it doesn’t grow well in the shade.

Undaunted and thrifty, we bought flowers—late in the season one year—at discounted prices from Malmborg’s. I created a puzzle piece-shaped garden, and we took a stab at it, plunging autumn sedum, columbine, bleeding heart, creeping jenny, and some new hostas into the soil. On the other side of the yard, I plugged in some annuals—pansies, celosia, impatiens, coleus, and marigolds—for instant gratification.

The following year, we eagerly awaited the return of spring. When the weather warmed, I inspected the flower beds. The sedum was okay and the bleeding heart had made a valiant return, but the dianthus with its normally fringy blooms, looked more raggedy than it should have. I looked over at the next plant and gasped.

“Any reason why our columbine is black?” I called to Husband across the yard where he turned over soil with a shovel.

He stopped his work and swiped an arm across his forehead. “Maybe the dirt is too acidic? Too much watering? Or some pest got at it?”

So it was a mystery to him too. I sighed. Then I tossed my gaze to Dallas’ yard. He had moved in just the year before when the Isenbergs had moved out. They hadn’t left him much, so whatever he had in the garden was all his. He bustled about the yard with his wheelbarrow and the kind of confidence that could turn the head of a sunflower. His monarda shot its fireworks in the corner of the yard, his daylilies showed off in a dozen colors, his tulips and irises—in straight lines—took turns blooming in the front yard, and his wild echinacea, black-eyed susan, and aster speckled the landscape.

As I gawked at his property, I saw the grass was truly greener on the other side. In fact, over there at Dallas’ place, it was the Garden of Eden. How could he have grown a mature perennial garden in such a short time? Didn’t it take years to coax and nurture one? My envy was much greener than my thumb and just as honorable as Eve’s.

“How does your garden look so good?” I said, baffled.

“My mom has a green thumb.” Dallas shrugged. “I guess I got it from her.”

“So does my mom. But I didn’t inherit the Midas touch.”

Good-natured and humble, Dallas laughed that laugh that reverberated across the yards.

In April each year, Dallas’ yellow and purple crocuses kicked off the growing season, and in October, his chrysanthemums drew it to a close. He had timed it all just so; at any moment, the color spectrum splashed his gardens. His flowers were healthy, showy, and well-established, and then I’d watch in horror as he’d dig it all up and change the configuration the next year, relocating his plants to other parts of the yard or scrapping certain varieties of flowers altogether if he tired of them. Meanwhile, on our side of the fence, we found a few good spots that worked for certain plants, and we kept it that way, not daring to tempt the cosmos—or the other kind of cosmos with its pretty pink flowers.

“Hey, knock that off over there,” Husband would holler over when Dallas was out working in his garden. “You’re making us look bad.”

Dallas would laugh again and then stop for a minute to chat, maybe even handing us a perennial or two over the fence.

We shared the same stretch of land in the city. So, green thumb aside, how was Dallas’ patch of earth so fertile while ours struggled? As I gazed at his burning bush—with its vibrant red foliage in the fall—I thought of the biblical leader and wondered if Dallas truly lived on holy ground. But before I kicked off my flip-flops in reverence, he shared with me his secret.

“I use what our family calls ‘brown gold’,” he said, pausing from splitting some plants. “It’s manure from the farm.”

His ‘brown gold’ explained some of his success, but his talents were undeniable and his generosity unparalleled.

“Bring your girls over with scissors and cut all the tulips you can,” he said one spring. “I’m heading out of town, and they’ll be done blooming when I get back. You might as well enjoy them.”

And year after year, he’d urge us to bring our baskets to his harvest.

“Please come and take all the tomatoes, peppers, and ground cherries you want,” he’d say. “I’ve already canned more than I can eat.”

Over the years, Husband and I made peace with our gardening skills and saw Dallas’ yard for what it was: a gorgeous backdrop to our plot of land. And with no work for us, we could savor the man’s artistry, eat his vegetables, and enjoy front row seats to Eden’s opulence. Living next door to a gardening master was just as good as being one.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Roof Man

“Have you seen what’s going on at the end of our block?” Glenda, our next door neighbor, said over the phone. “There was a crash just a minute ago.”

“Going to take a look right now,” I said, heading for the front window. I hung up and called to Husband in the other room. He and I stepped outside.

“I thought I heard some screeching tires,” he said, his attention fixed on the wreckage at the end of the block. “I guess this explains it.”

Police tape wrapped the intersection like a giant, forbidden gift. Inside the tape, officers from the sheriff’s department poked around a car, crumpled between a pickup truck and another car. We strolled up to the police tape and waited, hoping to catch the eye of someone on the scene. Husband slid his badge from his pocket—the sun hitting it just right—and an officer sauntered over to us.

“What happened?” Husband said.

“We were chasing a guy—drug-related—and he crashed into one of our undercover vehicles.” The officer nodded at the unmarked pickup truck on the scene. “Then the other car pinned him in. But he bailed.”

“Did you catch him?”

“In a sense. He’s up on the roof of a house right now one block over, and they have the house surrounded.” The officer hooked his thumbs on his belt buckle and rocked back on his heels. “He did the same thing before in Bloomington. Up on someone’s roof there too. Bloomington SWAT team shot him down with bean bags, but he got away. Had the U.S. Marshals looking for him after that.”

“Does the guy live around here?” Husband said.

“Just around the corner.”

The street—blocked in all directions—didn’t deter people from driving up to the police tape to get a good look. The KMOJ Radio station van rolled up too. We spotted Jeff and Mary who were renovating the vacant house two doors down from ours. We strode over to say hello, Husband filling them in on the details of the crash.

“Yeah, we already heard all that from the KMOJ guys,” Jeff said. “They get their info pretty fast.”

“Want to take a peek inside the house? See our progress?” Mary said, shifting a bucket to her hip. “It was in pretty rough shape when we got it.”

They led the way, and inside the house, Husband and I admired the repaired cracks in the plaster, the gutted kitchen, and the refinished cabinets. Fresh paint dressed the walls, and the old 1920s woodwork sang again.

Since we had only met the couple once before—they lived two blocks away—I asked about their life in north Minneapolis. The neighborhood had weathered its ups and downs in the past thirty years since she moved in, Mary said. And much had happened in her life too. She told me about her son who died at the age of twenty-one in 2004. The same year Dicka was born. I sighed and shook my head. While I had gained one that year, she had lost one. 

“It’s not something you ever get over.” Mary’s eyes misted with the truth of her words. Then after a moment, she freshened her smile. “Let’s show you the upstairs now.”

“Come over whenever you want and see our house too,” I told Mary and Jeff when our tour ended. “It might be messy, but you’re always welcome.”

Husband and I returned home, gathered the girls, clipped a leash on Lala, and invited Glenda to join us. We ambled over to the next street where the fugitive was perched on someone’s roof. Police tape cordoned off the entire block. A crowd had gathered and news crews stood in position, their cameras aimed at Roof Man. Just outside the tape, I noticed a woman. She lingered by her car while two police officers questioned her.

Dinner and homework pulled us back indoors, but a couple of hours later, Husband and I ventured out again. The street—normally bustling with traffic—was still taped off. The atmosphere was festive; people meandered around with drinks and snacks, visiting their neighbors.

We spotted Keyondra—one of our basketball kids—with her mother Donna out on the sidewalk in front of their house. We stopped to check in.

“So what’s the update?” I said. “You have a better view than we do.”

“He’s still up there,” Donna said, shaking her head. “The cops are trying to talk him down.”

“He ran through somebody’s house before climbing up on their roof,” Keyondra said. “I guess he freaked them out.”

“No doubt.”  

“The police are talking to his baby mama right over there.” Keyondra nodded toward the same woman I had noticed earlier.

“So that’s who she is.” I hoped none of their kids had witnessed the event from hours before—or Daddy up on the roof now.

“So how are things over here on your street?” Husband said.

“Well, the candy girl is gone,” said Keyondra with a shrug.

“There was a girl who sold candy?” I wondered how we had missed her.

“No. It was a woman. And she sold other food too. Like homemade ribs and pickles. She had a little table she set up every day right over there across the street.”  

“I figured you needed a city permit or something to do that, but I guess not,” Donna said. “The police were okay with it. They stopped there for food all the time.”

“Homemade ribs sound good right about now,” said Husband.

The evening air grew crisp, and I tugged my sweater around me. We chatted as we waited for the grand attraction: Roof Man’s Descent. But as daylight faded, we lost interest.

“You should all come over some night when we have a fire going in our fire pit,” I told Donna.

“And whenever we have the barbecue going, you can all come over here too,” she said.

Back at home, Husband clicked on the TV to watch the local evening news. We saw close-up footage of Roof Man. He strutted across the roof’s peak, stretching his arms out in “come get me” defiance. Then three and a half hours after it had all started, the stand-off ended. This time, law enforcement used words—instead of bean bags—to lure Roof Man to the ground.

What had started with a crash at the end of our block ended in a fizzle. But after the excitement was brushed away, I realized the hidden beauty. We neighbors were drawn from our houses by an unusual spectacle and united by shared territory and humanity’s inborn curiosity to find out the ending of a story.  

We also drummed up plans for more home tours, fire pit time, and barbecues. Summer in the neighborhood couldn’t come soon enough.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Missing

“Ireland’s missing.”

My friend Ann’s words—on the other end of the phone line—dangled in the air.

“Missing? From school?” I said, my thoughts darting to the girl’s semester-long program at Conserve School in Land O’Lakes, Wisconsin, with its 1,200-acre wilderness campus.

“I guess she went out for a walk last night around 5:00 p.m., and no one’s seen her since.”

I snapped a look at the clock. It was Sunday, March 20, 2011, 1:00 p.m. Ireland had been outside in freezing temperatures for twenty hours. Fear formed a fist in my stomach.

After the call from Ann, I paced, remembering snippets of Ireland. Many times, the girl had biked over from her house in north Minneapolis—just six blocks away from ours. She had often cradled our dachshund in her arms. Over the years, I had watched the young free spirit paint, create, and even bake outside of the lines. In 2006, she had regularly played at our house—along with her sister Willow—during the days when Jim, her dad, was losing his life to melanoma.

Anxious, I dialed her mom, Rachelle. “I heard about Ireland,” I said. “What can I do? What do you need?”

“We’re on the road right now.” Rachelle’s voice, though steady, seeped worry. “We’re going to help look for her.”

I thought of Rachelle’s losses. Not Ireland too!

After our call ended, I scanned the news online. Ireland’s story already dotted the internet: “15-year-old high school student missing”, “Minnesota girl missing in the Ottawa National Forest”, “Conserve student on a hike now missing.”  And there was Ireland’s face—plastered everywhere.

I dissolved to my knees on the living room floor and pressed my forehead to the rug.

Save her! Let her live!

But I wouldn’t know the truth for another six hours.

One morning in 2005, the phone rang. It was Husband’s supervisor.

“Is he still at home?” the man said, his tone stiff and professional.

“He left hours ago,” I said, frowning.

“He didn’t show up for work today. And he’s not answering his phone.”

Flicka and Ricka zinged goldfish crackers at each other across the dining room table. But their innocent play chafed me. I shushed them. “Maybe he’s on a flight already.” I gripped the phone tighter.

“I’ve already checked the flight registers, and he’s not there. His vehicle’s not at the airport either. No one’s seen him. His partner took the flight without him.”

The man concluded the phone call and deserted me to my roiling thoughts. Husband was steady. Reliable. He always went to work—even when he was sick. As if I had powers no one else had, I phoned him. No answer. I left a message. After that, I tried again. Then I called the Highway Patrol.

“What’s the make and model of his vehicle, ma’am?” the officer said, his voice edged with compassion after hearing my story.

I gave him the information he needed to comb the routes Husband might have taken to work. While I waited for answers, I phoned my sister, briefing her on the situation. She drove to my house with her girls, and our five little ones dashed off to play, oblivious to the worry simmering within their mothers. An hour passed. The officer called back.

“We haven’t found anything,” he said. “But we’ll keep looking.”

“Okay, thanks.” I curled into myself.

That distracted afternoon, I fed something to the kids and absorbed the blur of my sister’s kindness, her expression stained with concern. I sat numbly at the dining room table, my heart still beating because that’s what it did on its own.

After five hours, I’d receive a phone call and learn the truth.

Vivid tattoos twisted all the way down Moe’s arms to her hands, her right one holding her artist’s tool: a pair of hair-cutting shears. And with those shears she helped shape Flicka’s identity, championing my girl through her early-teen years. As Moe cut my hair too, I trusted her with my stories—the embarrassing, the disgusting, the frightening. Behind those cat-eye glasses, she winced at nothing. Except when I told her about the intruder climbing in through our kitchen window in the night.

“He messed with the wrong family!” she said, incensed, holding her scissors like a weapon.

She told us stories too—hers with a kick of reality and always doused with humor. We had loved Moe for six years. And she had loved her husband Andrew for eleven.

Then on the morning of September 1, 2014, Andrew kissed her soundly, mashing their three-year-old son Bronson between his body and hers in a sandwich-style hug. He told Moe he would go to work—but only for a few hours since it was Labor Day—and then he’d be home to spend time with them.

But Andrew didn’t show up at work. And he didn’t come home again.

Moe didn’t sleep that night. She called hospitals and friends and then posted on Facebook a frantic cry for help. A blend of confusion, anxiety, and anger knotted her nerves; she later told me she feared someone had abducted her man. Crews of searchers rallied for her, all of them unswerving in their mission to find him.

Then someone spotted Andrew’s car parked by a wooded area near the Mississippi River. The search crews—and the police with their dogs—pressed in, scouring the woods, but they found nothing. For hours, their eyes were blinded to the truth of what had happened to Andrew.

Three years earlier at Conserve School, another set of search crews—law enforcement agencies, fire departments, and search and rescue teams—hunted to find Ireland in the vast wilderness of northern Wisconsin. By early evening on March 20, they found her alive. In fact, a local hospital pronounced her in good condition in spite of her twenty-six-hour walk in the woods.

Later, Ireland told us how she had gone for a hike alone after dinner that Saturday night. She stepped off the path for just a moment to enjoy the beauty—the waning light infusing the snow with shimmers—but she was quickly lost. She collected snow in her water bottle and then slipped it inside her coat to melt it for drinking water. Before nightfall the first night, she lined a hollow log with leaves. She nestled inside and slept. By the second day, she improved her sleeping quarters by erecting a crude shelter, in case she had to spend another night outside.

The environmental school had equipped Ireland with the skills to survive, and she had conquered two enemies: exposure to the elements and time. In its October 2012 issue, Seventeen magazine published her survival story, praising her resourcefulness. But we were just happy to have her back, and we celebrated her life.

As I waited with my sister that afternoon in 2005, the phone rang. I snatched the receiver, my thoughts swirling.

“Hi,” Husband said. “I just landed and got your messages. What’s up?”

Weak with relief, I flooded his ear with the events of the day.

“My flight got switched at the last minute,” he said. “I ended up flying to Seattle instead of Washington, D.C. But my supervisor found out the schedule change only a few hours ago.”

My relief ebbed away and anger washed in. “He didn’t call and tell me.”

“I’m sorry. He should have.”

Human error had halted my life that day. Husband hadn’t been missing at all.

“I’m glad you’re alive,” I said, easing out the breath I had been holding.

On September 2, 2014, in the wooded area just across the river from our house, it was Moe’s father and her uncle who at last found Andrew. He had jumped off the edge of his life and died of depression among the trees.

A step off a wintry path. A communication mix-up. A hidden depression. No matter the cause, our lives are shredded by our missing loved ones. But they aren’t lost to the One who knows.

If I go up to the heavens, You are there; if I make my bed in the depths, You are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will guide me, Your right hand will hold me fast.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Repairs

I noticed water dribbling from a line in the basement one day. After listening to my description of the problem, the gas company sent over a technician to inspect our air conditioner, but the unit was fine. I had simply forgotten one all-important task: to change the furnace filter right after we had sanded our wood floors the previous week. Because of my oversight, the filter had clogged, forming condensation on the line, and water had dripped and pooled on the basement floor. Now I stood outside—the technician next to me—staring at the side of our house.

“See? You’re gonna have to do a patch job right there,” he said with a sniff, pointing at a small area on the stucco near the foundation.

I furrowed my brow. “Does this have anything to do with our air conditioner?”

“Naw. I’m just letting you know what you’ve gotta fix at some point.”

He moved on to the next item—a new furnace—on his for-us-to-do list.

“That thing’s gonna conk out soon,” he said, bobbing his head in a series of nods, maybe hoping his steely eye contact would break me. “Better replace it now.”

“We’ll see,” I said, brushing away his intensity. My mind flitted back to a different technician from just a few months earlier who had checked our furnace and pronounced it good. “They don’t make ‘em like this anymore. Don’t replace it until it totally dies,” he had said.

The current technician’s words pelted me, and before he left, I agreed to a duct cleaning. Even though it had first been my idea, his face grew the smug look of a successful hawker.

Not all of the repair people visiting our home were so crafty. Over the years, I noted the differences in technicians. There were those who got the job done in little time with minimal small talk, and then those who wove stories into their work, their visits leaking into my day.

“You wouldn’t believe the stuff I see in people’s basements,” said one technician as she swapped out our old water meter for an updated one.

“Oh? Like what?” I said, not sure I wanted to know.

“A lady I met had shelves lining her basement walls. Kennels of dogs on those shelves. Sometimes even a couple of dogs per kennel.” She pried off a bolt.

I cringed. “That makes me sick.”

“At least forty of them, I’d guess. Maybe more.” She rigged the new equipment in place and tightened the bolts again. “I told her she’d better let them go. Give them away to good homes and all that.” She swiped her arm across her forehead. “I reported her to Animal Control as soon as I left her house.”

“Oh, good.”

The repair woman finished the job, leaving me with a shiny, new meter. But I also had a bad taste in my mouth. Sometimes it’s better not hearing stories from strangers.

Husband and I had evaded window washing for eight years, and in 2010, we decided to replace the windows altogether. The installation guys were efficient and meticulous. Along the way, they pointed out the miniscule details of their work—the hidden nooks and crannies no one would ever see. And at every turn, they tidied up after themselves.

Spurred on by the call of hospitality, eleven-year-old Flicka whipped up a baked treat for the workmen, since they were doing such a good job. I was out plucking weeds in the garden when she later emerged from the house and delivered a small plate of fresh goodies to one of the men. She stood there—awkwardly fiddling with the edge of her shirt—eyeing him as he chewed.

“Wow,” he said, smacking his lips. “These are good.”

I smiled and ducked into the house to taste one of her treats. The hot, fresh mounds looked like muffins, but they tasted so bland I skimmed through her recipe, wondering if she had forgotten the vanilla, cinnamon, and sugar too.

But all around, it was a job well-done. The windows were beautiful and clean, the fastidious workers were gracious about the baking, and Flicka honed her hostess skills.

Four years after the new windows, we eagerly awaited the installation of a new metal roof. Early-morning pounding on the house—the perfect pairing with my French Roast—had never sounded so sweet. I spoke with the workmen, but my questions were met with only smiles and shrugs. I soon learned the only English-speaker on the job was the supervisor.

My mind skipped back to the roofers of my childhood. Their overly-tanned skin—slick with sweat and oil—melded with the hard rock, Hair Band anthems thrumming from their boom boxes. But the workmen on our roof in 2014 kept their shirts on—a lesson or two learned about the ozone since the 1980s, I suppose—and blasted Vivaldi, Corelli, and Handel.

While I scratched my head at the choice of music, Ricka and Dicka were focused elsewhere and saw the chance for some entertainment. They scrambled upstairs to their bedroom, slid open their window, and peeked out at the workmen tearing off the old roof.

“Yoo hoo!” they called, then ducked under the window when the workmen looked their way. After repeated teasing from the girls, one of the men at last threw a tarp over their window. The girls inched it aside to again chirp at the workers before crumbling to the floor in laughter.

“Oh, girls,” I said, shaking my head. “You might be getting on their nerves.”

But just then, one roofer lifted the tarp and warbled back at the girls.

No one watched any television during that three-day job. And I heard more classical music than I had since my childhood piano recital days.

Interesting people are tucked away everywhere. We venture out and see them in stores or on the streets. We learn from them in different settings. But sometimes fascinating strangers come right into our homes and add spice to our lives. And if we’re lucky, they’ll fix the air conditioner while they’re at it.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Vermin

One day, I noticed a cloying, rotten smell wafting from a vague location in the house. It sent me into sleuthing mode, and I pinpointed its whereabouts to the kitchen. I inspected the trash can for spoiled food that might have missed the garbage bag liner. I cleaned out the fridge. I muscled the appliances away from the walls, mopping hot bleach water under each of them, but none of my efforts reduced the stench.

“This is awful,” I said. “Help me find what’s making that smell.”

Husband and the girls searched with me. The smell emanated from a certain spot by the refrigerator, but we found nothing. Since there was no more we could do, I tried to forget about it.

“This makes no sense,” I said, still enduring the stink two weeks later. “If something died in here, shouldn’t it have decomposed by now?”

“You’d think so,” Husband said.

Then one day, I had an idea. While I had moved the refrigerator in and out numerous times to clean under it, I had never looked underneath. I knelt down and removed the fridge’s front panel that ran along the floor. I switched on a flashlight and peered in. A mouse—suspended in some metal wires—stared at me with bulging, lifeless eyes. Startled, I flipped through my options and then phoned Husband.

“You can get him out when you get home,” I said at the end of my story.

When he returned from work, Husband pulled on a rubber glove. Then he crouched in front of the fridge and extracted the mouse, securing it between his index and middle fingers. He raised it—like a fat cigar—to his face and sniffed.

“Yep, that’s the smell,” he said.

Another day, we discovered a squatter on the property—living behind a hole in the peak of our house—and Husband decided it was as good a reason as any to race out and purchase a pellet gun. While he was preoccupied with how he would snipe down the squirrel, I wondered about the size of the rodent’s living quarters. And I worried about the future of the window located just inches from the roofline.

Curious about the loudness of his new weapon, Husband squeezed off a practice shot into the ground in the back yard. But since it sounded like a cannon going off, he was convinced ShotSpotter—the city’s gunshot locator system—would bring the police over for a visit. And, he decided, the gun might also leave craters in the house’s stucco. So he drove back to the store to exchange his purchase, settling instead for a standard pump-action bb gun with a scope.

That night, Husband took his post in the back yard by the fire pit—his bb gun at his side—and the girls clustered around him, all of them keeping keen eyes on the hole. I hoped the sound of a crashing window wouldn’t be the exclamation point at the end of our day. Husband’s hunt was fruitless that night, but he tried again the next day. The girls, enthralled with his new hobby, settled into a routine with him; each night after dinner, they followed him outside, and the four of them trained their eyes on the peak of the house and waited.

One evening, the squirrel poked its head out of its hole, emerged, and hunkered down on top of the window frame. Husband later told me he had considered—in that moment—the possible consequences. With the inaccuracy of the bb gun and its useless scope, it was a sketchy shot and posed the strong possibility of blasting out the window. But he took the shot anyway, which sent the squirrel skittering down the house. Like a pack of hunting dogs, the girls chased after it, and the rodent zipped around the corner. Husband squeezed off one more round before the animal disappeared for good.

Confident the squirrel wouldn’t return, Husband rented a forty-foot extension ladder from a north side hardware store, so he could patch the hole. The ladder, though, was harder to control than the bb gun. During the repair job, Husband almost smashed the window he had earlier avoided shooting. But the ending of the story was a happy one. The squirrel was no longer a tenant, and no windows were harmed in the making of Husband’s adventures.

Glenda called us one day, her normally relaxed voice taut.

“There’s a bat on my porch. Could you come and get it out right now?”

Husband pulled on gloves and headed over next door, armed with a broom. Glenda, bat-phobic and shaken, had gashed her knee from falling in her attempts to shoo out the creature. She had also sprayed her garden hose inside the enclosed porch—soaking its insides—in the hopes of blasting out the rodent that now cowered in a corner.

In just a few minutes, Husband scooped up the bat in his hands and set it free outside. And peace was restored to Glenda's house.

We homeowners have a tight screening process when it comes to what’s allowed in our homes: domesticated animals, yes; creatures of the field, no. In this world, it’s the perennial struggle of the owner to keep his or her home from succumbing to nature. But we’ll fight for it if we have to. And it doesn’t hurt to have a Husband come along and save the day.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Boundary lines

“I think it’s brave, you living this social experiment with your family,” an acquaintance once told me.

It wasn’t the first time someone from the outside had woven a conclusion about our life in north Minneapolis, and it wouldn’t be our last.

“I see what you’re doing,” said another well-meaning soul. “Raising your girls on the north side is admirable. I just know I couldn’t do it.”

“I’m worried sick about you,” an elderly woman said another time. “I grew up in north Minneapolis, but it was nice back then. Now… well—” And she shuddered.

“You’ve probably got drug deals going down in your back yard at night,” a man once said with a snigger.

“Not every night,” I replied.

I relayed the comments to Husband. He shrugged.

“People don’t know,” he said. “And who cares what they think?”

Shootings, drugs, gang activity, poverty. I could hear the news as well as anyone else, but I knew my neighbors in north Minneapolis. And it trumped everything.

Early one morning, I heard frantic pounding on the front door. A man I didn’t recognize stood on our steps. He saw me peep through the window at him, and he jabbed his finger toward my Honda, parked on the street. I opened the front door.

“You’ve gotta move your car right now, or you’ll get towed. Street cleaning starts at 7:00 a.m.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” I said, grateful.

“I live on the next block and do this for people all the time,” he called over his shoulder as he hustled back to his car. “You’ll probably see me again.”

He wasn’t the only one doing unto others. Between incarcerations, the neighbor across the alley acted as self-appointed watchman for us. He ran a clandestine auto repair business out of his garage, and vigilance was his gift. He alerted us when we forgot to close our garage door or by accident left the lights on inside our vehicle. I could see his heart through his grease-smudged shirt, and I told him so.  

Benevolence rippled out further too. Local church groups raked leaves and picked up garbage around the neighborhood; people rushed to help those who had slipped on icy sidewalks or couldn’t start their cars; and neighbors walked out of their way to return dogs, children, mail, or briefcases to their owners. I once witnessed a man chase down a woman in her vehicle to tell her she had left her cell phone on her car’s trunk. Goodness cropped up all around, but it wasn’t shiny enough to make the evening news.

At the beginning, we made the uninformed decision to move to north Minneapolis. But as the years passed, we made the choice to live there.

“It’s a good place to raise kids,” I said to anyone who asked. And because of the visible needs around us, it was a good place for kids to learn life wasn’t all about them.

Based on our ethnicity and socioeconomic status, some people from outside the neighborhood suggested our family should reside elsewhere. They said they had a house for sale in their cul-de-sac where we would fit in perfectly.

But they didn’t understand we already fit in somewhere.  

Inside the neighborhood, we basked in freedom. We were free to paint our wood front steps red or purple or orange, and over the years, we did all three. Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka poured out their artistic expressions through colored chalk on the sidewalks, doodling all the way down to Veronica and Sergio’s place. They decorated the driveway too, but the weather had its own ideas, and rain pattered away their designs.

“This’ll last longer,” Husband said, handing them cans of spray paint for the cement slab by our garage. Giant eyeballs and neon lips emerged from those aerosol cans and spruced up our basketball court.

Inside the neighborhood, we rested in safety. We couldn’t boast that no one had ever kicked in our door or broken in or stolen from us—those things had already happened—but our sense of security was sound and our peace unshakeable.

You have assigned me my portion and my cup; You have made my lot secure. The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance.

A gentleman in the neighborhood told us about a conversation he once had with his friend.

“I heard about that shooting near you last night,” his friend said, concerned.

“Oh? We were barbecuing and had the sprinklers running,” he replied with a shrug. “There’s nothing I would’ve changed about my day.”

And there was nothing we would’ve changed about our days either. We lived alongside people we chose to love, whether or not it made sense to those peering in from the outside. And goodness pursued us even if it didn’t look like it could.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Four-legged neighbors

One evening at dusk, we spied her waddling around the alley near our garbage can. Concerned she had lost her way, the girls asked Husband if they could let her into the yard. He said yes, and the dog—that we didn’t recognize—scuttled inside. Her looks were not nearly as remarkable as her odor. She had gotten into something stinky in the alley, and we decided if a smell could have a relative, hers would be the first cousin of a skunk’s.

I could tell she was a friendly pit bull—beating her tail back and forth when we talked to her—and had probably never missed a meal in her life. She sniffed our yard, poking her nose into my planters and pots. She was a low rider compared to Lala and twice as thick, and the two romped around the yard. I grabbed ahold of her collar and read the name on the brass tag: Ginger. Her owner had etched a phone number on the other side, but the last digit was illegible.

“We can dial the ten combinations and see,” Flicka offered.

“Let’s just get her on a leash and see if we can find where she lives,” I said.

Clipping a leash to her collar was the easy part. But Ginger had neither the aptitude nor the willingness to walk on a lead. She plopped onto the ground.

“Any idea how to get her to walk?” I said.

The girls hooted in high-pitched voices, trying to coax Ginger to move.

“Let’s go,” Husband said to the animal.

He took the leash from me and managed to get Ginger out of the yard, the girls scampering alongside him. I stayed back in the house, hoping for the best while I cleared away the dinner dishes. Soon, the group returned, but there was Ginger—still at the end of the leash.

“We checked with a bunch of neighbors, but she doesn’t belong to any of them,” Ricka said.

“She must live on the block. Just look at her,” I said, pointing at her girth. “She couldn’t have wandered far.”

This time I took the leash, determined to find her family myself, but maneuvering Ginger was like walking a furry brick wall with its own agenda.

“Let’s try Peace and Freedom’s house,” I said to the girls.

We entered the neighbor boys’ back yard and rapped on the door. Their mother answered.

“Is she yours?” I said. Freedom was suddenly in the doorway too.

“Yeah, thanks,” the woman said. “We didn’t know she got out.”

“She must’ve jumped the fence,” said Freedom.   

Fat chance, I thought.

Another day, a neighbor across the alley came over with his pit bull, Daisy. He introduced himself as T.J.

“Could these two play together?” he said, indicating Lala and Daisy. “She’s good with other dogs.”

“Sure,” Husband said.

Daisy played for a while and came over again the next day for a play date. And the day after that. At first T.J. hung out while the two played. Then he began dropping off his dog, saying he’d be back for her later. We didn’t mind. Aside from her penchant for digging, Daisy had a sweet disposition.

One day, T.J. knocked on our door. He asked if he could leave Daisy to play.

“Just for a half an hour,” I said. “I have to leave the house at 3:00.”

Three o’clock came. No T.J. I let some minutes slide by, but still he didn’t come. I called his cell phone, but the number he had given me had been disconnected. I would have to return Daisy myself.

Since it was just our houseguest—ten-month-old Rashad—and me at home, I formed a plan. First, holding the baby in one arm, I lured Lala back into the house. Then, with my free hand I attempted to wrangle the leash onto Daisy, but she was as easy to lasso as a slippery eel. I decided to leave her in the back yard while I went to T.J.’s to tell him to come and get her. Before I could clasp the gate behind me, though, Daisy scooted out and dashed off.

Worried about being late to pick up my girls from school and now also concerned about Daisy’s whereabouts, I hustled to T.J.’s with Rashad on my hip. I dodged some toys and trikes in his yard before I got to his front door. Music blared from T.J.’s upstairs apartment. I knocked first, then rang the bell, and at last caught the attention of the downstairs tenant. She screamed up to T.J., and he sauntered down to the door, looking disheveled.

“You got a baby?” he said, scratching his chest.

“Daisy got out of the yard. You have to come and get her. I’ve gotta go.”

I buckled Rashad into his car seat and drove off, leaving T.J. scouring the alley for Daisy. Before I turned the corner at the end of the alley, though, I glanced in the rearview mirror just as he caught her.

T.J. and Daisy showed up in our yard later that week. This time, the man also had his kids in tow. He introduced them and rattled off their ages—five, three, and two years old. He asked if the dogs could play again.

“How about an hour this time?” I said.

Daisy zoomed around the yard with Lala, and before I knew it, T.J. disappeared, leaving his three kids behind too. They weren’t surprised like I was. Instead, they were smiley and seemed unconcerned about being left in the impromptu care of strangers.

One day, our family was enjoying ice cream in Uptown when my cell phone rang.

“There’s a dog in your back yard,” Dallas said on the other end of the line. He gave me a description. “Do you want me to call Animal Control?”

“No,” I said. “I know that dog. We’re on our way home.”

Back at the house, Husband went over to have a chat with T.J., but he wasn’t home. Instead, he talked with T.J.’s brother, laying out some parameters. The man apologized and retrieved the dog from our yard.

We never saw T.J. again. But we saw his kids and their uncle—and sometimes Daisy who would come to play on our turf and terms.

They say it takes a village to raise a kid. But maybe it takes a village to raise the furry neighbors too—or at least provide them with a little entertainment before helping them find their way home.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Terrance Donaldson: Part 2

Officer Drake’s words still rang in my mind: The bad news is your purse will be in police evidence for a while.

I recounted the remarkable events of February 28, 2014. By comparison, my purse spending time in evidence seemed insignificant. A phone call from the precinct the day of the break-in had soothed my concerns; my driver’s license, credit cards, car keys, and checkbook were locked away, safe and sound. The police just needed to photograph everything, and then they would release my property.

On day three, I called Sergeant Sloan. I reminded him of the case details and my name.

“Today’s my birthday, so getting my purse back would really make my day,” I said, injecting a light laugh.

“Yeah, they’re not done with it,” he said, his tone brusque. “But you can call the evidence room yourself. Don’t know which one your purse’s at, though.”

“What are my options?”

“There’s one in the Uptown area and one downtown at the Government Center.” He rattled off both phone numbers.

After some searching, I learned my property was staying at option number two, but was still slated for its photoshoot. A few more days passed. Then on day six came the big phone call: I could get my purse back.

I entered the Government Center downtown Minneapolis and wended my way back to the evidence room. I fell in line behind fifteen other unfortunate folks who were all waiting to get their own stuff back.

When it was my turn, I stepped up to the thick plexiglass. The man behind the window took one look at me, and before I could state my name, he disappeared into a back room. He returned with my purse, plopped it into a pan, and shoved it to me under the window—along with a release for me to sign.

“Can I take a minute to check and see if everything’s here?”

“Be my guest,” he said.

“I’ll be a witness for you,” said the male customer at the window next to mine. “You never know about these people.”

“Thanks.”

I rifled through my purse, checking all the inside pockets. A pack of wolves might have left it in similar disarray. Wadded papers, shredded Kleenexes, rumpled checkbook, car keys. A tiny envelope held my driver’s license, but the rest of my cards were gone.

“Where are my credit cards?” I said, panic mounting.

The man behind the window pulled out the inventory sheet. “Says here, ‘driver’s license, keys, checkbook, feminine items.’ No credit cards listed.”

“The police told me they were all here. Even mentioned them by name. Where are they?”

“Better check with Sergeant Sloan. Maybe he’s got ‘em.”

“Sergeant Sloan has my credit cards? That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Don’t know what else to tell you, ma’am.”

The man sifted through someone else’s file. I could see he was done talking to me. I flicked my eyes over to the guy who had volunteered to witness my search. He shrugged.

“They told me they were all here,” I said. “I didn’t even cancel my cards.”

“Well, that was stupid,” jeered the woman behind me.

I scooped up my purse and left the place, my steps morphing into a jog as I exited the building. I sat in my parked car and dialed Sergeant Sloan. No answer. After the beep, I gave my name and case number.

“Sergeant Sloan,” I said. “I find it very interesting that you told me all my cards were in my purse. They’re not. Actually, only my driver’s license is here. The guy in evidence said I should call you—that maybe you have them. Why would you have my cards? If you don’t, where are they? I didn’t cancel any of them. Call me back ASAP.”

I attempted to slow my breathing as I drove home. Fear and anger make a bad couple.

I pulled into my driveway and turned off the car. I sat for a minute, closing my eyes. Warm sunshine poured in through the windows. Then a thought pricked my mind. I began checking every last pocket of my purse—something I hadn’t thought of in front of the plexiglass.

I felt something hard in a small outer pocket. I unzipped it. My cards. And not only the credit cards, but all the store membership and club point cards I’d accumulated over the years. Even my library card was in the one-inch-thick stack, which had been wedged into the pocket. After tossing up a prayer of thanks, I dialed the familiar number. No answer.

“Sergeant Sloan?” I said, still miffed. “Please disregard my last phone message. I just found the cards. They were crammed into a very obscure pocket of my purse. No need to call back.”

I really hoped he wouldn’t return the call. For any reason. Embarrassment prefers privacy.

Terrance Donaldson’s apprehension brought us frequent attention from the Hennepin County Attorney’s office. Carla Larson, a Legal Services Specialist, phoned regularly to keep us updated on Terrance’s case.

“We’ve already gotten eleven impact statements from community members who heard about what happened to you,” she said one day.

“Wow. That’s a lot.”

“Would you write a victim impact statement for us? It would help the case. Just say how your family was affected by the break-in.”

Victim. I didn’t feel like a victim.

“No problem,” I said. “I’m happy to help.”

 “How are your girls?” Ms. Larson’s voice was warm, concerned.

“They’re doing really well.”

“Good. I’ll keep you posted on court dates. You take care of those kids.”

“I’ve got one question,” I said. “Was he armed that day?”

“No. Terrance is really good at being bad, but he’s not dangerous.”

I slipped into a seat in the back of the courtroom on September 8, 2014. Terrance—wearing an orange jumpsuit—shuffled in with an escort. The judge—a petite, stern-faced woman—sized him up with narrowed eyes. She asked him where he was in the early morning of February 28, and whether he knew the people whose home he invaded, crawling in through their kitchen window while they slept in their beds in the other rooms. He confessed his guilt to each question in one-syllable grunts.

“You’re just thirty-four years old, and you’re on a bad track,” the judge said. “This is just one of many felonies for you. All the homeowners you’ve done this to want you out of their neighborhoods. You’re not welcome there.” She thumbed through some of the paperwork and then looked up again. “And many of these people own guns. I’m shocked no one’s blown you away yet.”

The man nodded. This process wasn’t new to him. Maybe he felt a streak of remorse—at least for being caught—or maybe drooping his head and mumbling answers was part of his routine. By the end, Terrance pled guilty to first degree burglary and was sentenced to thirty-six months in prison.

Six months later, I contacted Carla Larson.

“Could I get the phone number for Terrance’s case worker?” I said. “We’d like to visit Terrance in prison. Without the girls, of course.”

“This isn’t typically done between a victim and an offender in this kind of case,” she said. “But here’s the phone number.”

As Ms. Larson had suspected, the case worker refused our request.  

Our story was small. We didn’t have to grapple with bodily harm or the loss of a loved one. But we still wanted Terrance to look at us—to show him our names were wrapped in flesh—as a stark reminder that real people lived in our house. We also hoped he would link our faces to clean slates and second chances. But talk of redemption would have to come at a different time from someone else.

While darkness lured Terrance Donaldson into our lives that frigid winter morning, we hoped Light would attract him in the end and help him find his way.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.