Thirty Five years of accepting visitors to this office in which I sit, now, and write. But more than that .... 35 years of keeping the office tidy-enough, the bathroom clean-enough, the flowers arranged, the books and art in some order and the path clear.
I am the Beadle in this church ...
Hey! I am the walrus!
At least, this morning, I am lumbering about like an old man .... my back hurts ... my back hurts a bit every morning but today it hurts considerably. I took on cleaning and arranging and organizing ... concerned that my notes and writings are very private. Lev 19 has it that confidentiality is akin to Godliness ... or maybe goodness ... and is only to be broken in life threatening circumstances. The path is a different matter, entirely. For these 35 years, the Beadle has arisen whenever leaves cover the path or those beautiful blankets of snow.
Maybe the Walrus should describe the office ... the cave in which he has dwelled for half a lifetime.
Structurally, the office has three rooms ... a waiting room/ante-room and a bathroom, as a visitor enters through a now-somewhat-cloudy sliding door which the I-Beadle maintains. A couch and two softish Danish chairs afford sitting in the waiting room. Some samovar/water-heater was there for the first 30 years with fixings for tea; that has now been replaced by a Keurig ... How very modern, Howard. The waiting room gets cold and, anyway, my mind is full of memories and, as a youngster, my first mentor, my Grandfather, would entertain street people and congregants, alike, with a glass of tea and a listening ear, as he first might counsel them before my Grandmother, betimes, interpreted their dreams.
The bathroom is not. Actually, there's a sink and toilet, artwork and some posters announcing awards for a variety of more formal writings than Playing in the Last Quarter. One wall is covered in books, in case the waiting room selection proves inadequate. Some pretty heady books, I've been told, occupy that wall and another bookcase that holds others and plants on top.
The office is bigger. A desk in an alcove holds computer and printer. It's kept out of sight by the glassed bookcase that my Mentor told me I could have on his deathbed (age: c. 99) ... a bookcase which held his sacred books and scrolls for 70 years after his arrival at Ellis Island. One of his scrolls is still in it but I did follow his expressed instructions: It's for you ... fill it with your perfidious writings. (Actually, I've snuck some sacred books in there, as well.) The wall opposite my chair is long and hold about 3 dozen shelves of books which now, as the years and technology have unfolded, could fit on a thumb drive. Even if up to date? an anachronistic library of volumes that -- each in their own way -- pretend to capture the glee and sadness of standing erect on this Earth. In front of the bookcases are two arm chairs that have sat there, except when moved by a visiting couple. There's a chess board there that I made in 1958 and somewhere there's a chess set on the bookshelves and an ottoman that could hold that board when necessary.
There are certificates and diplomas that pretend to attest to competence of the named. There is also artwork and a picture of an old Dokteur from Vienna, now mostly hidden behind a Sensivaria and a rangy Philodendron (named Daughter of Mathilde) ... I guess for those who love the tendrils and dendrites of rangy plants.
To my right is a book table and after that a fainting couch that I found in an Antique Barn in Central Maine, brought back on top of a Citroen Station Wagon, and had recovered in a brown leather ... and that almost touches one end of the book wall. There's my chair and a very similar one across from it. Some tables. Some mostly Turkish rugs ... a 19th C. Yahele Prayer Rug on the wall over the couch.
I am the Beadle. I care for these rooms and prepare them for meetings.
That's the inside. Outside from the curb is a short brick path leading to three stairs and a long brick path with encroaching vines that I must trim ... more often than I do. Visitors, not infrequently, must take refuge on the lawn for a bit to avoid being consumed by those bushes and vines. Three more steps with handrails and 30 more feet of path to the sliding door and the waiting room.
I am the Beadle. I clear the path of leaves and snow. I've kept the path clear for 35 years and, this week, with two relatively minor snowfalls (each about 6 inches), I was leaning on my snow shovel remembering 28 September 1993 at 3:05 PM when a tornado came from above the path leaving someone else's Beech tree strewn on the house ... going up three stories above to the chimney ... leaving the trunk vertically in the waiting room ... through the roof. Fond memories of the Beadle with his chain saw ... two weeks of clearing debris.
But leaning on the shovel and anticipating the back-ache I now have, it became more than obvious that the Beadle needs help. The slaves (who built the 100 foot path with me years ago), my sons, are now looking at 50 and are not likely to show up with shovels to help me dig out before a 6 AM visitor. The Beadle needs help and a bit of acceptance that someday he must leave this office.
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