It’s the first really hot day of summer, but still early enough in the season that you haven’t smelled anyone light up a smoke bomb yet unless they’ve been saving it all this time, and that almost never happens. The Fourth of July is weeks away, sidewalks still tickle tender feet just starting to put on their seasonal skin, and summer is fresh like a brand new basketball.

In one backyard, sunlight filters through a huge green umbrella of a tree to cascade down and play over the ground in hundreds of gyrating spotlights. Two small figures huddle over something, sitting like a couple of frogs with knees up past their ears and backsides not quite touching their pile of sand. Dusty and growing warmer at the terminator line between green shadow and full sunlight, toy trucks and construction equipment fill the sandbox, but everything is motionless as if some big project has just ground to a halt. The two boys look as if they have unearthed a treasure.

White sunlight slowly creeps across the sandbox, pushing back the dazzling lights and turning the little dunes into a vast desert wasteland. A wavering chant rides the wind up over the garage.

“Mum-my curse is locked in-side,
If you’re smart you’ll run-and-hide,
If you o-pen up-the-door,
Mum-my curse is free-once-more!”

The boys jump back, startled, then flop down into the sand roaring with laughter. At the top of the sand pile is a plastic model crypt, its door flung open by a little plastic mummy. A ratcheting sound makes the mummy vibrate, its arms poking through the opening.

Soon the noise slows down and stops. The boys poke the little mummy back into its tomb and close the door. As they slowly wind up the toy, grinning madly, they begin their chant again, “Mum-my curse is locked in-side–”

I don’t remember exactly where that little mummy crypt came from; we might have swiped it from some board game. Saddest of all, I can’t recall my friend’s name. But the game we played was hilarious for a pair of 10 year old boys. And I jumped every time that door popped open.

Category: Halloween, Stuff   Tags: childhood games, mummy, mummy's curse

Memorial Day in Snug Harbor.

Smoky aromas drift across backyards mingling barbecued chicken and citronella in a fragrance that is uniquely American. Families gather to remember. Some groups are solemn, quiet, and tearful. Others are loud, raucous affairs with music and storytelling that brings a special cauterizing laughter that stings.

This holiday weekend, normally reserved to honor our military dead, feels more solemn for us since we lost Ransom, our Golden Retriever nephew, last month.

Hug your dog, throw the tennis ball, run, laugh, make the time count. And let him have a hot dog. That’s like the Fourth of July and Christmas all thrown together for a dog.

Remembering Ransom – Gallery of a great Golden

Category: Stuff   Tags: rainbow bridge, remembering ransom

A mean ghost is like a bad- tempered water balloon. And just as dangerous.

I recently stumbled across a cache of October photos that I had completely forgotten about. Lucky I didn’t break my neck.

Category: Halloween   Tags: mean ghost

A dark, gray, rainy day produces colors that don’t come out when it’s sunny. On a front porch in a cheerless corner, a worn leather coat hangs sadly over the back of an old chair; dirty white paint peels down the legs to reveal vermilion streaks like dried blood, glimpses of an earlier, less subdued era.

The world outside is cool, wet, shiny. Open a window and the damp rushes over your hands, across your face, smelling at once like rose petals and the black wormy soil beneath an overturned brick. A rich, green light reflects from the canopy above; heavy leaves weep. Water patters an irregular drumbeat at the bottom of a downspout and empties onto an ancient stone path, green and slippery with moss.

Category: Stuff   Tags: duck, rain