Читать книгу The Streetcar to Andromeda - Celeste Hammond Streiff - Страница 5

It was a warm and magical firefly night, and the heavens were flushed with the glow of a million stars. Our home was at the edge of the city and the sweeping lowlands of the Kansas plains lay just beyond. I sat at my bedroom window on propped elbows, looking out across the shimmering grasslands of the Kansas prairie, out into that mysterious place where the timeless winds sweep over the tall grass, making it rise and fall like magnificent waves in a vast Ocean.

Suddenly a faint breeze swirled in my window curtains, and in the distance I saw a falling star plummeting from the heavens. As it fell towards the horizon, this particular star seemed a bit brighter than most. I quickly closed my eyes and made a wish, and when I opened them again, the star was gone, disappearing I supposed, into that vast ocean of wheatgrass.

Then suddenly I saw the waves of the wheatgrass part, and out came flying my older brother Jesse and his best friend Parker. The boys whooped and howled exuberantly, fleeing the sea of grass as if something terrible was chasing after them. Tumbling and tripping over one another they reached the vacant lot next to our home, where apparently now safe, they dropped to the ground in giggling out of breath hysterics. Red faced and laughing, they shushed each other so as not to awaken the slumbering neighbors.

Excited by their enthusiasm I started to call out, but then I heard Parker say, as he caught his breath, “Boy!!! We almost didn’t make it that time, huh Jess?”

“Yeah,” Jesse replied emphatically, “Tok Loor was really hot on our heels tonight.”

Jesse stood up and brushed off the seat of his pants then reached down and gave Parker a hand up. “Too bad about our ship though.”

“Yeah,” Parker replied as he struggled up. “But we can patch er’ up later on. I’ll come by tomorrow and help you, okay?”

Jesse nodded.

Parker smiled and chuckled, “Well, it’s certainly been an awfully eventful evening.” Checking his watch he continued, “I guess I’d better hit the ole’ trail, its git’en pretty late.”

I watched as the boys gave each other a strange sort of secret handshake. Grasping each other’s forearm above the wrist, they shook “arms” up and down and exclaimed in unison: “To The Triumphant Victory!”

What the Heck is going on? I thought.

Parker turned and waved to Jesse over his shoulder as he strolled off down the block to his house just a couple of streets away.

When Parker disappeared, Jesse turned and stared pensively up into the heavens for a moment then slowly sank down into the soft grass. As he hugged his knees a strange smile began to play around the corners of his mouth.

I started to call out, but then I thought better of it. I knew now that Jesse would be out there for hours contemplating the universe. I’d seen him do it a million and one times before. Also I knew that tomorrow, or very, very soon, Jesse would tell me what was chasing him and Parker out there that night through the fields of the Kansas plains.

♣

That was all back in 1938,’ when I was about seven. Looking back, it now seems like a very long, long time ago —

In those last remaining years before World War II, had changed our consciousnesses forever, it was an ephemeral still time; a quiet space in which we could dream about the future without the burden of its consequences: ghastly war — genocide and the Atomic bomb. Not knowing of the real future ahead made it easy to dream and be idealistic. And now as my mind wanders back over the years to that oh-so very innocent time — I think of it well.

∫

Jesse was just fifteen then and getting ready to enter high school, and our baby brother Awful Oliver had just turned three. Awful Oliver doesn’t really have much to do with this story and while I’m not the hero of it, I do play a role. This story is really about my older brother Jesse and some of his friends… and because of him an extraordinary and marvelous thing is beginning to happen on the level grassy plains of the Kansas prairie.

Now I know when people think of Kansas, they think of it as a dull flat place with ferocious Oz-like tornados sweeping across the plains. But Wichita’s not like that, I mean it is pretty flat and all, but a long, long, time ago, way back when the pioneers came and wanted to build their homes there, an ancient tribe of the Wichita Indians told the settlers if they wanted to be safe from tornados, to build their homes between the Big and Little Arkansas rivers, because a tornado would never touch down there— and to this very day— not one ever has.

If you want to really capture the true essence of a person, place, or thing then you must try to perceive its spirit and understand that like the butterfly, how one thing can transform to another. Since I grew up there, I will try to share with you some of its magic because in our small Wichita Vortex, there awaits a boundless world of phenomenon to behold.

I can remember on many a brisk and sunny springtime day, lying on my back in the tall grass as high billowing clouds drifted slowly in deep shadowed contrast, shape-shifting softly across our Ansel Adams sky.

And on some cloudy afternoon in the fall of the year I might just find myself standing silent in the glowing warmth of a gentle autumn mist, smiling softly as it wistful’ed down upon me.

Sometimes after a nap from a sleepy summer’s rain, I would awaken to the heavenly spectacle of a translucent rainbow, arching in shimmering descent to touch a magic pot of gold lying secretly hidden in some waiting child’s backyard.

Then too, on a bright and blustery September time day when the billowing clouds flew high and wild, stirring up a swirling charade of streaming carnival colors that’d go flying head over heels down some ancient red brick street, I’d watch as they’d dance delightfully on their merry way to Elsewhere. So caught up in that dance, and before I knew it, I too would sometimes find myself, wilily, nilly chasing after them and becoming a part of Elsewhen.

Sometimes in late June during the first moments of twilight, Jesse, I and Oliver would go hounding about the yard with cupped hands after tiny luminous lights that mysteriously darted here and there, flickering off and on, through the magical night. We’d capture the “lightning bugs,” as we called them, and place them in a large canning jar with air holes punched in the metal lid so they could breathe. Once inside the jar, we would gaze upon their mystical radiance, mesmerized… Ah but just for a frozen moment in time, only to set them free again. Our Mom could not abide caged beings and said that all people and creatures must be free. And so, with the opening of the jar lid, we’d watch as the sparkling streams of luminous light rushed out into the darkness, creating a now, even more magical night.

If you look closely there are so many wonders to behold. The brightest shades of red and gold enchant the evening skies of a Kansas sunset that is seemingly splashed across the twilight as if by a stroke of a painter’s brush. And as the sun’s light fades to shadow, the reds blend and darken into a deep purple at evening’s tide. It is at the precise moment, of the last flicker of light when the painters brush sweeps swiftly across the canvas that it becomes a sweeping golden sundown graced by the dusk of our twilight, amending it magically into a shimmering trail of stardust, flowing softy through the darkness in a sparkling diamond stream… out and across the universal night.

I think by now you might begin to see what I’m trying to say. So perhaps in our winter, like me, you might stop and consider the snowflakes as they fall softly down upon you casting a spell of the spirits while delightfully transforming the countryside into an enchanted arctic kingdom of reflective wonder. It is then when you stand in this frozen wonderland where the great silver trees are sheathed in a glistening fairyland of ice, that if you listen very closely a magical tinkling of chimes can be heard when the cold wind blows their branches to touch.

Later on when night shade falls, blanketing the city in black, one by one little lamps are lit, fashioning the illusion of invisible cat’s eyes glowing in amber and floating dreamily in the darkness as she moves panther-like through the cold an’ wintry night.

It was then on many of these chilly winter nights that my family and I would sit braced with hot chocolate before a glowing fire in our old Victorian home that my grandfather had built, and there we would weave together tales of mystery and legend. We were a family of storytellers, and for me, Jesse’s yarns were always the best.

From winter to spring our world would transform again from brightly colored tulips poking up through the snow, to vibrant sunny wildflowers in petaled, perfumed bouquets.

Down the street from us on Dellrose where Spike Morgan lived grew a huge majestic cottonwood tree and in the spring when its buds burst open, I’d swear that fairy magic was again afoot, for floating on the air throughout the neighborhood, seemingly blown by sweet small lips, drifted a white, wild, feathery down. Like a distant ghost memory of a winter’s snowstorm, it would thus rise up again in springtime and fly through the air, catching here and there, in painted fences, cedar bushes, my hair, and even the cats and dogs if they sat still long enough.

Like I said, our home stood at the edge of the city and from our backyard you could see as far as forever out and across the fields of willowing grass. Because the wheat grew so high we couldn’t see the airplane factories that lay miles and miles beyond, but on many an evening Jesse and me would sit out back on our porch near twilight time, and watch as rosy puffs of clouds swept lofty and free above the Kansas Plains.

Our home itself was surrounded by an abundance of flowers. Overgrown pink rosebushes climbed high and wild on white trellises that lay lightly against the yellow painted wooden walls. Assortments of wildflowers grew in splendid patches throughout the yards and lots that surrounded us, along with lilacs, tiger lilies, and huge blossomed purple and pink peony bushes. The peonies were the flowers we picked on Memorial Day for the graves of our ancestors. It was a tradition that I dearly loved, to go with our offering of flowers to visit the graveyards and hear the stories of our people that had passed on before. It made me feel a part of something very big. Row upon row of red and gold hollyhocks grew tall at the edge of our vacant lot next to the Easley’s house that bordered our property, and out back grew stretches of wild sun flowers that when all shiny and new held their weighty heads high, till time came by and bowed them down, to drop their seeds in ancient perfection.

Three tall and shapely cedar trees stood before our front porch, guarding it like Swiss sentries. The green slope of our lawn swept down to the curb and was dotted with sunny dandelions that shined like butter if we held them under our chins. On the front curb lay a section of crumbling cement that had been over zealously blown away a few years before, early one morning, on the fourth of July by one of Jesse’s huge cherry bomb firecrackers. Beside the crumbling curb grew a large, leafy elm tree that boasted the trunk circles of seventeen years. Across from it sat another Elm that was my favorite. It had a curving sitting spot that fit my seat perfectly and I knew that later on that summer I’d be sitting between its lofty limbs with legs dangled and barefoot, hour upon hour, contemplating the universe myself.

Out back near the vacant lot was a sand plum tree whose soured fruit I tried, but never liked, and further down near the property line sat our old n’ dented, rusty trash can with a broken metal grate covering its top. The trash got burned, about once a week back then and what was left over from the table food was always given to Shu-Shee, our bear like, black Chow dog. Shu-Shee was a regular garbage pail, I swear. When we brought him home as a puppy he looked just like a little black baby bear, and because Chow dogs were originally from China and Jesse was reading the philosophy of Confucius at that time, Jesse named him Confucius. Jesse always liked big and lofty names like Confucius, but Awful Oliver was still a baby and couldn’t pronounce it so somehow Confucius got turned into Shu-Shee, and that was the name that stuck. When Mom brought me home from the hospital, she told Jesse that I was his baby too, and let him name me, cause, I think she thought that he’d like me better or something, so Jesse named me Thornton Lee Randall. I think Thornton is a very impressive name, and I like it a lot, but most people, even Jesse just called me Lee, cause it’s shorter. Anyway, what Shu-Shee couldn’t eat, and believe me there wasn’t much, Mom used as compost for the wild flowers in the yard and later during the war, for our Victory Garden.

Tending the burning trash out back was sort of a guy’s thing back then and many a night I stood quietly beside my Dad or Jesse and made sure a wild fire wasn’t started. It was sort of like an ancient ritual. We’d stand out there in the darkness of the evening and silently reflect. Every now and then one of us would poke at the fire and watch as the sparks flew high into the starry night. Life was very good and simple then.

Jesse and I shared a bedroom on the first floor of our Victorian home. It overlooked the vacant lot, and beside our bedroom window crept Morning Glories, violet from the night, opening with first light in a fragile amethyst bloom.

Since there were no fences, most of the backyard grass grew tall past our property line and blended into the prairie beyond. The grass never seemed to get cut except sometimes in the vacant lot where the children played. My mother, you see, liked the wildness of things and allowed nature to have its own way. Most of our neighbor’s yards, asserted short manicured lawns and extremely well clipped shrubbery, and so to them our property must have seemed like an eyesore, with everything growing so wild and free and out of control, but I loved it and it always reminded me of a magnificent, ruined vintage garden. I know now that the way one perceives something is what can make it unique and that beauty really is in the eye of the beholder after all.

Our Wichita summers were sizzling even at night, and it was on one of those wonderful firefly nights when I was seven and safe asleep in my bed, that Jesse came in to awaken me. It was a habit of his to do this when the night sky was especially clear and bright and flushed with the glow of a million stars. Stealthily we slipped out the back door, and creep across the yard into the vacant lot and there we’d stand, like admiring sleepwalkers gazing up into the wonders of the cosmos. That particular night Jesse pointed out many of the stars to me and told me of their histories. I’d always wondered how he knew so much about the stars and so that night, I finally asked him.

Jesse looked at me closely understanding my curiosity and slowly began to smile. Promptly he sat me down on a tree stump and kneeled to my eye level. Carefully removing his round Ben Franklin glasses, he wiped them with a kerchief, and sighed, “Ah well Lee, and I knew I was going have to tell you sooner or later.” Searching my eyes he tucked away his kerchief and resettled his glasses on the bridge of his slender nose. He paused a moment and looked down then offhandedly, he pulled on a stray weed and murmured, “Lee, I’m going to tell you a secret.”

Well! I was excited to say the least, because to me at that age, nothing was more exciting than a secret!

Leaning towards me, his steely blue eyes stared deep into mine and he spoke the words I will never forget. “Lee” he said point blank, “—I’m a Martian.”

My heart skipped a beat, but I never doubted Jesse for an instant. “Jesse!” I gasped. “How’d that happen?”

Pulling back he smiled nonchalantly and flicked away the weed. “Always was. You see I lived out there—” he gestured towards the heavens. “For eons and eons before Parker and I crash landed in this very vacant lot years and years ago. In fact it was the very night Parker and I got exiled from Mars.”

“Parker too?” I gasped again. “You guys were exiled? But what about Mom and Dad an—?”

Jesse shushed me. “Listen, I’ll tell you all about it, but remember it’s a secret.”

I was so excited and full of questions I stammered, “but, but!”

Jesse waved his hand in the air like a conductor cutting off an orchestra, signaling me that he knew every question I was going to ask, and in time, would answer every one.

He pointed up to the heavens. “There…can you see it?”

From Jesse’s fingertip I could see a thin stream of light that led out into the cosmos. My eyes followed that stream and far, far away I could just barely make out a bright red planet turning slowly on its axis.

“Yes, I do!” I stammered, mesmerized.

Suddenly I felt the wind change direction and the rush of an icy ancient breeze blew right through us, chilling us to the bone. But just as quickly as it came — it went, and when I looked around, I realized something had changed —it was almost imperceptible, but I knew that something was very, very different. Everything now seemed eerily still and silent and I perceived a magical glow to the night that had not been there before. The house, the trees the stars, everything was supra contrasted, standing out vividly in color and illumination. Jesse and I looked at each other knowingly.

Then abruptly out of nowhere a small group of fireflies appeared, swirling and whirling around Jesse and me. Jesse’s eyes twinkled and he smiled brightly. He laughed. “You see those fireflies?”

I nodded.

“Well, they’re not just fireflies,” leaning closer he whispered, “they can change into “The Little Men” any time they want, and when they do, they become a beautiful shade of lime green and sort of resemble ‘Ready Kil-O-Watt.’ They are messengers of Klono, the god of Justice and Planets.”

In wonder I watched as the gliding fireflies whirled around us. Eagerly I waited for them to transform into “The Little Men.”

Jesse smiled knowing full well what I was thinking and running his fingers through his dark hair, added casually, “But, they don’t usually change till after midnight.”

Then he laid back in the tall grass and pausing a moment, reflected. “Before I tell you about The Little Men, I should first tell you about Klono the Dragon. They do have a connection.”

Knowing that Jesse was on a streak, I settled back happily on my elbow and listened closely.

“We Martians,” he went on, “like the Greeks, have many gods, but Klono is one of our favorites, especially because he acts as our defender here on Tellus.”

I was confused, “Tellus?”

“That’s our name for Earth.” He said as if it was a matter of fact and then went on. “You see Klono abides on most civilized worlds taking different forms to suit the locale and conditions. Here on Tellus he chose the form of an Orange Dragon. Whenever spacemen lands on a new planet, one of their first acts is to invoke the protection and assistance of Klono. He rarely travels in space as he has no powers there and so uses The Little Men as his messengers— that is, after first getting permission from Noshabakenning the god of space.

“Nosha-ba-kenning?”

“That’s right.” Suddenly Jesse sat up like a bolt and added, “By the way, it’s rumored that Noshabakenning is Shultz’s alter ego.”

Now I was really confused, “Shultz who?”

“Oh! You know, Mr. Shultz.” Jesse pointed off down the block. “Over at Shultz’s Grocery, except it’s really Shultz’s Beer Parlor when you’re in the 81^st dimension.”

Well, I knew Mr. Shultz who owned the small residential grocery store in our neighborhood, we went there a lot to get ice cream cones, candy bars and sodas, but I’d never thought of him as the owner of a beer parlor. I suddenly realized there were a lot of things I didn’t know.

“Well, how do spacemen invoke Klono’s protection?” I asked.

Jesse was thoughtful. “Well, let’s see. Uh… when Parker and I first crash landed here we played some happy music.” Jesse smiled at me and winked. “Klono just loooves happy music. Parker had his kazoo and played to the tune of, ‘On the Road to Mandalay,’ while I recited this verse.”

“In the far off dimness

In the far flung mist of time

In the starry hues and forms

Where lies in peace and love

Of right and life and truth

Let truth reign in these Portals

Let Glory thus rise again.”

Jesse scratched his head. “I think that’s how it went. Anyway, to conclude the ceremony we had a drink of varnish and then made a toast.”

“Varnish?” I burst out laughing.

“Yeah,” Jesse smiled, “Varnish — it’s the Martians favorite drink!”

I laughed again and said, “Okay, okay, that’s all pretty good, but now tell me about The Little Men.”

Jesse twinkled. “Ah yes, The Little Men, they’re quite a favorite of mine too. Well, you see the problem with Klono using The Little Men as his messengers is that they are often wildly unreliable and frequently get side tracked when on a mission. Sometimes they abuse their role as emissaries by getting into all sorts of trouble and creating chaos. They can be real tricksters. When they’re not on official business delivering messages to other worlds and planets, what they really like to do is hang about on sky hooks at Shultz’s Beer Parlor and swim around in the cans of varnish that he leaves for them atop the bar.”

“Cans of varnish!” I yelped and laughed as my mind’s eye conjured up images of the little green stick men swimming around in cans of varnish, doing the backstroke, and tossing beach balls back and forth. “What else do they like to do?” I chuckled.

“Well, they love to talk and chatter away nonsensically about anything and everything. It was said that eons ago the great god, Stryf Thesaurus, loved them so much that he bestowed the gift of language upon them— and they haven’t stopped talking since.” Jesse winked at me and continued. “Let’s see, they’re keen on playing musical instruments and they absolutely love to march in parades. They’re best sport is to strike a match and light up tiny canon bombs, you know those little round black ones? They like to throw them at your head to get your attention.”

At that I laughed so hard I literally fell off the tree stump and rolled around in the grass until my stomach was aching. Egging me on, Jesse chuckled and said between snickers, “ They utterly delight in beating you at a game of ‘Craps’ and the more chaos they can cause, the better, I mean if something has gone wrong you can be sure that The Little Men are at the bottom of it!” “And,” he added, “…their favorite tool is the Monkey Wrench!”

”The Monkey Wrench?” I yelped.

“Yep! They love to throw them into things to mess em’ up.”

Alas, that was the last straw. I got the giggles so bad that Jesse had to cover my mouth and hold me so as not to awaken the sleeping neighbors, all the while chuckling to himself.

When I finally calmed down, Jesse told me about the vast and marvelous alternate world of the Martian Empire that existed mostly in the 81^st dimension. It was fascinating! The 81^st dimension, by the way, just happens to coincide with a four block square area of our very own neighborhood, and that was where Jesse and Parker engaged in most of their adventures. Well! I was amazed. It was as though he and Parker and his other exiled friends, Slug Sherman, Spike Morgan and Shorty Runyon, could pass through some sort of invisible barrier and arrive in the 81^st dimension simply by taking a walk down our street. Jesse said that the Star Map of the 81^st dimension hung low in the night sky directly above us and what really surprised me most was that the Milky Way in the configuration of the Star Map, was within walking distance and hung right over the intersection of Pershing and Murdock street, exactly a half a block from our home at 548 N. Dellrose. He said that Shultz’s Grocery store could become Shultz’s Beer Parlor when you were in the 81^st dimension, and that they were one in the same.

“But,” I asked, “How do you guys get into the 81^st dimension?”

Jesse spoke musingly. “Ah well Lee, it’s sort of like imagination. Imagination can be a very powerful thing. It’s an entirely separate world with a life of its own, and if you want too bad enough, you can go there. Someone once said, ‘If you can conceive of something, then it’s possible.’ I believe that and feel that just because we grow up it doesn’t mean we have to lose our dreams.” Jesse shook his head, “Most adults are really just little kids with old faces anyway.”

I had to smile at that. Jesse had a strange kind of wisdom, but it was wisdom all the same. Later I thought about what Jesse had said and wondered if someday I’d have enough wisdom and imagination to enter into the 81^st dimension in the alternate world of the Martian Empire.

Jesse and Parker take “A Cosmic Walk.”