Lilith is alive

 

"How are you doing?" asked a neighbor with her small, floppy-eared dog. "Ok," I said. She looked me straight in the eye. "We're alive," she said.

 

There were three guys at the cemetery guard shack. "I went away for a week and a lot happened," I said to them. "Maui. Indictments." "Oh, nothing's going to happen to him," said one guy, local. "He's too rich. Better than Biden. Gives $130 billion to a country that means nothing to us. Like Russia giving money to Mexico, our neighbor." I left it at "'I think Biden's a good president," as Lilith and I headed uphill.

 

As we came down the hill later, the same guy was driving up in a green cart (he told me once, when I teased him, that he much preferred driving his fancy motorcycle). We waved.

 

Vanny was picking stuff up from graves. "I'm still here," he said. I told him I just got my Social Security notice; it'll start up in October. He's been having a hard time getting in touch with SS, has gone twice in person. They finally called him and gave him a date, December 7. Had I gone in person? No, just did it all on-line, I said.

 

Vanny, who has very bad knees, says his wife, who's under a lot of stress these days, is a physical therapist. He's her guinea pig. "Now there's some stress," I say. We laugh. Lilith and I head home, past the water restoration trucks with American flag motifs all over them, and a picture of workers raising a beam Iwo Jima style.

Hilo bus driver

"I'm 70!" said the Hilo bus driver, after he and Bryant reminisced about chasing pesticide trucks on O`ahu in the 1960s. Was it DDT they were spreading? Brief discourse about bald eagle eggs; there are none here, but there are `io. More these days. The driver had fairly short white hair, with a narrow pigtail hanging down to his back; he was happy not to be busy. (We were his only two riders from the airport.) As we passed a man hauling a cart full of large white plastic barrels--he'd been doing this all morning--the driver began talking about drugs. When he was young, his grandmother would say he was going to shame the family if he did something wrong. No longer. He got in an argument with his sister on the plane from Colorado, where his nephew was graduating from the Air Force Academy. He says things he probably shouldn't say. He tells it straight. And he's the older brother; his younger siblings should listen to him. When I said I wanted to take pictures of the guys who jump off the bridge, he slowed the bus down. I also took some of him.

 

Seated at the bus station, a young man with ehu hair that fell down in front of his face. All I could see were prominent front teeth, one chipped; he cut his hands through the air, once pointing his index finger up while he conversed.

Lilith drinks and drives

"Journey, did you have your first drink yet?" I said, teasing the young man in the cemetery who'd just turned 21. One of his co-workers looked at me as if I meant it. Said he hated when he was carded, especially after he left the card in his car. "Maybe you look very mature for your age." He laughed and said a guy a year younger than him in high school had had a full beard and was over 6 feet. Could throw a baseball 92 miles an hour. The Diamondbacks came to his school--it was a big deal--because they wanted to draft him. I gathered that nothing had come of it, wondered if he'd hurt his arm. "No, partying." What's become of him? "Probably nothing." The guy who hates being carded was sad that his friend hadn't made the major leagues.

 

On our way up the hill, another worker zoomed over in his John Deere vehicle to tell me his father took him to Cardinals games in San Diego when he was a kid. 1972. I told him about my dad taking me to see a game in 1971, where Vida Blue pitched. "He was really good for a while." I asked if I could take his picture. "No!" he said as he zoomed off in the green cart.

 

We ran into Raschelle and talked story about all the people we meet in the cemetery. (She'd tried to take his photo once, too.) Did you know, she asked, that the mortician used to be a paramedic? Lived on the east coast, back in the day, and already so many gunshot wounds. At least the dead aren't stressful, I surmised.

 

The second time we saw Raschelle on the big hill where Lilith sniffs out mongooses, I told her I had a grammar question. She's in a JW Pidgin language group that sends out flyers. For some reason, they come to my husband, his address and name handwritten. The one flyer read "Jesus had make" (makay = died, dead); isn't it actually "wen make," I asked. We'd spent a long time that day going "had--wen," "wen--had." She thought it was an interesting question, but I still don't know.

 

Lilith almost got a chicken on the other side of the shopping area, just as we ran into another walker. She's under the couch now, while her person awaits news of indictments and baseball trades.

Abstract Only Show in Hilo Starts on Friday, August 4

 

 

I have two photos in the show, one of which contains a moth. How abstract is that?

Lilith Joins the Jack Smith Fan Club

The Jack Smith Fan Club teeshirt I ordered for my husband's birthday didn't come on that day, nor on the day of the surprise indictment, but the day after. Bryant's more of a homebody than I am, so Lilith and I decided to take our walk with me in the shirt this morning. First, we ran into Kevin down the street, walking his cousin's tiny chihuahua, Vanelope, who hardly ever barks. Now Kevin is one of the smartest, most perceptive people I almost know; he was wearing an Ice Cube teeshirt. As for Jack Smith, he was ignoring the news, didn't ring a bell. We got to the cemetery, where I told Uncle John that he needed a very big umbrella these days because it's raining indictments. Oh yes, he said, and then started talking about Obama's chef drowning, Hillary and Burisma. Said Jack Smith is an idiot. "Nothing touches that guy," he said of Mr. Three Indictment Donald. "When I see him in handcuffs, then I'll think something happened."

 

On our way back down the hill, we saw John again, and his co-worker, the one with Bubba, dog with one hahd head lidat. "Lilith Walks!" We were talking dogs when we noticed Daniel coming toward us in his emergency lime green vest, Daniel who worked on Air Force One under Reagan and became a successful educator on the Big Island. "Jack Smith. He's going after that knuckle head," said Daniel as he marched by. He added something I didn't understand. Bubba's person said the missing word was "pterodactyl."

 

Lilith does many things

 

"Lilith Walks!" We're now greeted that way by the right wing cemetery workers about whom there was much in the book. When I told them Lilith had run away the other day, they cascaded into "Lilith runs!" "Lilith chases!" and when I corrected the guy who I thought called her a "he," "Lilith identifies!" Today, one of the guys turned on his phone to a hiphop song about walking, and he and another guy tried to get Lilith to dance. She did not. But she stuck her nose under the sentry box, cuz cats.

Lilith's hat

Before I left for a month, I gave a copy of _Lilith Walks_ to one of the guys in the cemetery (a Hawaiian/African American guy) who features in the book. He and I have had many political conversations over the years, as well as more friendly ones. I provided the desired "pawtograph," as well, or Lilith's rubber stamp. The other day I saw him and asked if he forgave me for the book. "Oh yes, there are lots of opinions out there, he said." I said something about DJT, and he said, "oh it's going to get crazy. DNC. Trump's still my man!" On our return from our walk, he said Lilith needed a red hat, and he didn't mean the one I was wearing.

 

Today, we stopped to talk to another guy who has a new puppy, Bubba (not his name, his wife did it). I remarked that there were no flowers in the bins. "Yeah, we sold out yesterday," he said. I remarked that it had been Juneteenth. Another guy stuck his head out of the shack and said, "Oh so THAT'S what that was; I wondered." We got in a chat about what the holiday represents. "The slaves in Texas didn't know for over two years they were free," I said. "Oh yes they did," he responded. "Those low-down f-king white people knew." "Good-bye, aunty, have a nice day," said the man with the puppy.