Bascom Writers’ Group Prompt: Places Wanting to Visit

Longing to Experience

By Deena C. Bouknight

I will never get to all the places I ache to see in person. I hate to look at a National Geographic or other travel publications, because I inevitably read about and see photographs of an obscure place never heard about.  Then I want to add it to my list. I have been as far as Scandinavia and to the lofty 9,700-foot heights known as the Zugspitze on the border of Germany and Austria and in the opposite direction through the Cascades and onto the other-worldly Haiti in the Caribbean.

When I travel, I don’t just want to see – I desire to experience. My dream would be to truly live in a place for a month or more at a time. To snatch a bit of the language, or dialect, to know the people, patronize the shops, revel in the landscape. I was able to do that in Germany a few years ago, walking daily through the wheat fields and to the baker down the Roman-era path, biking along the rivers from village to village and seeing storks nesting on cottage roofs, and picking cherries from branches overhanging a neighbor’s fence.

But I also try to experience a place even if I am only there a short time.

For a few days last week, I was with my brother and sister in law in Louisiana and we not only took a boat ride down a remote swamp-flanked river that was edged with moss-laden cypress trees, but we also visited Natchez, Mississippi – which remains in something of a time-warp – and stayed in an antebellum home lush with fine antiques and walked along and soaked up the vastness that is the great Mississippi River.

I believe the ultimate experience – that may actually cause me to be undone with emotion – is to visit such holy and ancient lands as Turkey and Israel and Egypt. To step on some ground or into a structure where the great pharaohs and the kings and Mary and Joseph and Jesus may have placed their own feet … to touch construction that is perhaps thousands of years old … to dip my foot into the mysterious Jordan River … to eat fish from the sea of Galilee … and to gaze and float upon the Dead Sea.

I have been told I have wanderlust. Perhaps I do, for even though I daily rejoice over the fact that I get to live in this place to which no adjectives do justice, I am scarcely back from one new excursion when I am musing about another.

But as I write this I view a line of sun-streamed mountains as a backdrop to my yard’s colorful trees, and I am content.

We are only visitors here.

The Bascom: Center for the Visual Arts writing prompt - a hobby - 5/7/19: 

Hobby Horse

Manure’s odor is a an eau du cologne for moi. Perhaps some of my mother’s inclination toward anything equestrian-related seeped into my fibers for the nine months I waited in her womb. All I know is that the grassy, grainy, earthy scent of a horse’s excrement is a balm to my soul. Rather than a chore, cleaning the waste from the old barn my horses occupy is a task looked forward to instead of dreaded.

Diane Ackerman, in A Natural History of the Senses and A Natural History of Love, toys with why some women are so enamored with horses. Perhaps there is an ancient primal need to control – or it is the thrill of sitting astride a moving mass of muscles. Serena, in the novel of the same name by Ron Rash, instills mythic-proportion trepidation into the minds of rough and tumble lumberjacks because she simply rides through the forests on a white Arabian. Zoro may never have become legendary if not for the grand entrance he made on a majestic, coal-black Friesen he named Tornado.

But my reasons for a lifelong hobby involving horses is simplistic, and mostly sensory. I love the way they smell – not just what is deposited – but their coats; a mixture of briny sweat and honeysuckle in the summer and pine wood and hay in winter. When I’m particularly edgy, a close-in whiff is all that is required to quiet my nerves. And the feel of their velvety noses and silky manes and tails … 

Whinnying, nickering, chewing grass, munching oats, sucking water – I hate to cliche say it, but yes, music to my ears.

And then, just look at them. Take a minute next time you have a chance, to truly look at a horse. God got a lot of things right. But the horse. What the Mona Lisa is to the art world, the horse is to the animal world. Splendor on four legs. Hues and sizes in myriad variations. Sometimes I just look at my horse and marvel at how she is made. And now, with her white winter hair giving way to a burnished golden brown – contrasted by her wavy thick mane and tail. I’m envious!

But I guess, overall, this horse hobby of mine has connected me with people. As soon as I could sit up my mother had me in the saddle, arms wrapped around me from behind for protection. I did the same with and for my children. My mother, sister, and I spent years during my growing up competing every weekend with our horses. And, as an adult, the highlight of my week is exploring on horseback together with my sister old mountain logging roads and deer trails.

Horses are my gym and my therapy – and I hope to be in the company of horses well, like Jackie Kennedy Onassis and Beryl Markham – until that very last day.

“I Got You, Ms. Deena.”

Bascom Writing Group Prompt: Single experience you had that completely changed how you thought or behaved about something. Was it a person you met? Something you read? Something you were told? Something that happened? Reach down and try to recall that single thing that changed something or everything for you.

“Why don’t they do something … something!” “How can they just sit there all day? Why don’t they work? Why do they walk out in front of my car every time I drive through here? How can they live with trash all over their yards?”

I’m ashamed to admit that these were my thoughts for several years as I passed by the Gonzales Gardens housing project in the heart of Columbia, S.C. Originally built as temporary assistance housing for soldiers returning from World War II, the dense development evolved into generational housing for African Americans made complacent by public assistance.

In my world of juggling home, family, homeschooling, and work, I couldn’t fathom an existence that seemed mired in meaningless muck. I judged the book by its cover.

The city just needs to raise this place, I thought many times.

But isn’t it what we try to ignore that convicts us most? While teaching a literature class for a homeschool co-op, one of the mothers spearheaded a service project. She decided that immediately after each weekly class, we would take our teens to Gonzales Gardens and offer an after-school snack and tutoring program. Really? The first day we set up in an empty, trash-ridden lot across the street from the last row of drab brick apartments. We set up some tables with snacks, unfolded some chairs, unpacked some balls, and waited. Within minutes, no lie, it was as if a colony of ants learned of a picnic feast. From every far corner of Gonzales Gardens streamed children as young as toddlers – no parents attached. These children, most uninhibited, played, and ate, and sat in the laps of white mommas and their well-meaning teens. We colored with the younger ones and asked older kids to pull homework out of book bags.

What developed quickly over weeks was an official program called Prosperity Project. We set up in a dilapidated building next to the vacant lot. Completely naïve with a learn-as-we-go mentality, a group of us moms attempted a semblance of structure to virtual chaos. Nary any evidence of parental interest or concern. So foreign a concept for us helicopter moms.

Yes, we did find hypodermic needles, condoms galore, and bullet casings in the vacant field. Yes, the children cussed at us and ate everything they got their hands on and demanded more – especially of our time and attention.

But the experience began to open the aperture of my narrow thoughts. Reading Uncle Sam’s Plantation, by Starr Parker helped as well. Her extended essay went like this: The African American culture is – generally – close knit, and although work and whole families and church were central after the ending of the Civil War, the Depression brought about government programs intended as temporary aids that became long-term crutches. Generation after generation came to rely on Uncle Sam as provider, and they dropped from the workforce, and settled into a rut of cheap or free housing, food stamps, and Medicare. Parents had more children to get more assistance. The family unit dissolved. The village raised – well, sort of – the children. But the parents, without work and purpose, became despondent to any real hope or meaning. Parker broke the generational poverty cycle in her own circumstances, and her book was an attempt to preach it to others.

What my lens began to allow in, as I loved on the children and tried to meet some of their needs, was the desperateness of humanity. Empathy grew; frustration waned. Little by little relationships formed. The children just needed to know there was more – and better – and maybe their experiences would motivate their caretakers off their trash-laden perches and strung-out sofas.

So for six years, we operated what became a thriving, publicized, respected, and bursting at the seams after-school ministry. We eventually took over an old church building and, at Christmas, even the University of South Carolina basketball coaches showed up with new athletic shoes for all the children.

It was one of the first Christmases with Prosperity Project that opened my eyes for good. I needed to venture deep into the belly of that dark place – made darker still by nightfall – in order to deliver some holiday packages donated for one family. The director regularly strapped a 22 on her hip, but I had no such protection. One of the boys, then 9, saw me drive up and park. Dequantis came running out and asked me what I was doing there. “I need to get these packages to someone in the C building,” I told him. “I’ll help you Ms. Deena.” I grabbed the packages, but then stood there at the car looking at the buildings. Was this smart? Was I going to end up dead - one of those stupid, what-was-she-thinking middle-aged white women – killed by a stray bullet intended for a rival gang member. It happened all the time; why did I think I would be impervious?  

“I got you, Miss Deena,” said Dequantis, reading my fretful face.

He grabbed my hand and held it, all the way into the middle of the dark place, made lighter by his concern and protection. He knocked on the door, he presented the presents, and he walked me back to my car.

Gonzales Gardens was raised last year. I miss it – and the people, especially the children, who lived there. Dequantis is 18 now and tells me he loves me, as do many many others.

I’m glad I opened that book and stepped inside, instead of leaving it closed minded on the shelf. It changed me, forever.

Put Off 

a short story 

By Deena C. Bouknight

“If the blind lead the blind, they will both fall into the pit.” Matthew 15:14

“My brother, I will do it,” said Serge to the voodoo priest, barely visible behind the crumbling concrete altar. The windowless grass hut allowed in little of the remaining daylight descending rapidly behind the barren crest of Cha Cha Mountain.

The burly coffee-skinned man often did his sibling’s bidding. Yet, the other-world “called” received recognition. In fact, in a village tainted by poverty – as was most of the depleted Caribbean country – Serge’s brother lived affluently. Payment for services came in the form of livestock and rice and sometimes money. For the local Houngan to sacrifice a chicken to the loa and solicit spirits to intercede for Bondye for healing, direction, or special privileges, he might even ask for Haitian goudes or American dollars.

But this day, Serge was to summon the bokor – a dark sorcerer to rid the village of a loco young man. Pepe – starved of oxygen during a laborious birth – was known, accepted, tolerated by villagers. His ways were not their ways, but his family kept him close. Lately, though, he had taken to sneaking out at night to eat the meals of the dead, left at the entrances of tombs just in case the trapped spirits may need sustenance. Blasphemy! He must be stopped! Villagers looked to Houngan for resolution.

“Go now!” instructed the voodoo priest. Serge complied. Though he would never see the rewards bestowed on his brother, crumbs were better than nothing.

He had at least a two-mile walk through muddy paths and over a vast dry sea of white rocks. The closest bokor lived remotely in a rural perch of maize farmers.

As Serge exited the dirt-swept yard, he allowed his open palm to glide atop the rough-hewn burnt cross, a commonplace voodoo/Catholic emblem marking dwelling places of priests or priestesses. His spirit heaved. Would Jezi be displeased with his mission? Was Jezi more powerful, or were the loa spirits.

Serge knew the bible of God and the words about taking life. The bokor would advise taking Pepe’s life. This was certain. It was the justice of voodoo and no one questioned. Yet, Serge questioned. More and more since the voices from the new church rose and overflowed the valley. His brother cursed the Jezi worship. But Serge stirred. His soul or his heart or both, he was not certain, nudged by the singing. “Mesi, Jezi! Mesi, Jezi!” The voices throbbed against the church walls every Sunday morning since the church’s planting a few months earlier.

Sunday morning was long gone, but Serge thought about the worship as he approached the church in the dusk. The salmon painted simple structure was on his route to fetch the bokor. The church and the singing and the praises to Jezi would not distract or deter him or cause him to question his allegiance to his powerful voodoo brother because Sunday evenings were not for worship in the dark, vast valley.

Yet, as Serge drew closer he detected a rising “Hallelujah! Amen! Amen! Amen!” He heard the hum of a generator, noticed illumination seeping through church window bars.  

Curious, he stopped on the road just outside the church doors and listened to the revelry inside. A tugging.

But he must continue on.

“We love you, Jezi! Nou renmen ou!” In English, then Creole, then English. The singing drew him. Serge took a few steps on the road, stopped, and listened more. His feet moved in the direction of the church’s door. As his hand approached the handle, the tall metal door opened. Light was in him and on him and through him. A gracious face spoke in Creole, “Bon soir!” The next words conveyed: “Welcome. We are celebrating visiting missionaries this fine evening!” Serge entered the sanctuary and the presence of the singing smiling voices. A hand motioned him toward a row.

Wait!

He hurried back through the door to the outer darkness. The metal door banged behind him but the singing did not cease. Serge sought breath. His heart beat anxiously as he eyed the road that would lead to a bokor and eventually a poor mindless boy’s death.

He glanced back at the door of the church. A small child peering through the leaves of a banana tree would tell the voodoo priest the next day that his brother gestured with his hands as if he were taking off a great jacket. To the curious observer, Serge appeared to fold the imaginary article of clothing and place it on the top step of the church.

“No more,” he whispered, and then opened the door and walked through.