Wiley James: Journal Entry

I’m obsessed with the letter “W”. It is my mother’s fault. She named me Riley, but the story goes a maternity ward nurse misheard and recorded my name as Wiley. My mother didn’t bother to change it back and now here I sit writing this as Wiley…last name James.
That is the other problem. I have a last name for a first name and first name for a last name. When asked, “Name please, last name first.” I say, “James, Wiley.” 90% of the time the name taker assumes I am an idiot and records me as James Wiley, not Wiley James. If not for the hearing impaired nurse the world of my name and my registration in this universe would be much less complicated.
My “W” obsession began in the first grade. The room was encircled with the upper and lower case letters of the alphabet, you know, those ball and stick letters that are printed in the classrooms of the first and second graders and then slanted into a sleeker, slanted cursive in the third, fourth, and fifth grade rooms. My first grade teacher told me she picked my desk closest to the W as I was the only one with a W name. In fact, I was the last letter in the alphabet when she lined up my fellow first grade classmates. It made me special. I loved my home in the classroom stationed right beneath the capital “W”.
By third grade I felt physically uncomfortable unless I was seated close to the W. I don’t think I realized it then, but looking back I remember the sickness in my stomach every other month when the teacher would decide to move desks in the classroom. Then came sixth grade. The green and white alphabet letters were gone. I asked the teacher where the letters were and he told me, “James, you should know your letters by now.”
“Ah, Mr. Anderson, my name is Wiley, James is my last name,” I said sheepishly.
“Oh yeah, sorry, ah, Wiley. No more penmanship, buddy. You are a sixth grader now,” he said through his fake but anxious first-year teacher toothy grin.
I missed my “W” locale. I started substituting “W” words for my un-tethered desk position. I sat by the window, by the waste basket, and the world map. My friends were kids with “W” names. There was Tommy Wilson, Wendy Wadsweller, and my best friend, William (aka Willy) Winkerton. By ninth grade it was becoming an abstraction. My papers would fill up with wavy W’s rolling to the right filling all the blue lines of the notebook paper. My only sport was wrestling. It kicked the crap out of me, but ultimately it was the only thing that got me through high school and on to college.
My parents were proud of their son, wrestling his way into a full athletic scholarship at Western Wyoming State College. I trained, starved, sweat, and bled for the tiny little “WW” emblems awarded for each match ending in my pinning m opponent. It was all about those letters.
Okay, obviously I did work through all the classes and end up with a BS degree. I managed to take 80 percent of the courses taught by “W” professors. Most of them were in the College of Engineering, thus my degree in Civil Engineering, Hydrology…. yes, I am a degreed water expert.
I’m employed by the Washoe County Water District. Specializing in water management, my job is to assure the citizens of Reno have clean water flowing out of their taps, their lawn remains green, and their cars can be washed regularly. I’m a mid level bureaucrat spending most of my day behind my desk. I long for the days when I was first hired, those hours in the field, calibrating weirs, calculating water flow, and predicting snow melt. Those were my clean water days. Now my desk has me fully immersed in waste water management. My field days are limited, but I do have a county issue bright yellow hard hat that reads, WCWWM (Washoe County Waste Water Management). I find myself gazing at it, hanging there with all its “W’s” printed in an official font.
During college I met and married Wanda. We were together long enough to spawn Wesley and Rita. Her insistence on naming Rita proved the demise of our marriage. I just couldn’t pronounce her name properly and it always came out “Wita”. Wanda believed I was rubbing her nose in her decision and made the final ultimatum. It was to be either our marriage or my love of the letter “W”. Needless to say, I’m now a single man hefting a good chunk of my paycheck from the WCWD to Wanda and the kids, Wesley and Wita.
After the divorce I decided to try therapy. Of course, I could only see “W” therapists and there were only a couple listed in the phone book. I began seeing Dr. Wendell White. I felt his approach was a bit odd. He would have me sit in front of a mirror naked and utter the letter “W” over and over again until I was too cold to go any further. Then I was to jump into a hot shower and scream, “I HATE W!” until I was warm again. His theory was to associate the cold, naked, loneliness with “W” and zap the obsession when I’d had enough of it. I practiced this exercise for 2 months and found no relief. Luckily there were no side effects to this torturous experience.
Still feeling helpless with this obsession, I started acupuncture with Dr. Wong Woo. I’d lay prone on his flat stone slab. He’d insert needles in my elbows, my neck and in the second joint of my big toe. He’d leave the room, dimming the lights. I was to visualize the little “W” critters high-tailing it out of my body via the holes pierced in my skin. For good measure, Dr. Woo would wedge open my mouth to allow any stray “W”s to find their way out of my digestive system. After 30 minutes he’d return, remove the needles and the wedge and pronounce me clean of the “W” curse.
The effects of this “W” skedaddle lasted a day or two, but would return as strong as ever. I’d find myself parked at the grocery store gazing at the sign noting Watermelon, 49 cents; at the movie theater marquee advertising the Saturday kids matinee, Willie Wonka; and in my own parking space at work, W. James, WCWD.
I write this to discover the achy source of this obsession. Who knows? Is it physiological, or psychological? Am I a victim of an odd electrical hiccup in my brain’s circuitry? It is part of me, like the bunions on my feet, the extended canine tooth in my mouth, and the single dimple on my left cheek. I admit it is an odd quirk, but I’m maybe it is harmless if I embrace it. Fighting it gives it power. Blaming my mother and my little name snafu doesn’t explain or excuse it. Perhaps it is the difference between addiction and obsession. Addiction is the fight, the battle that consumes the psyche trying to fend off the obsession. I’ll quit the fight as I’d rather live with obsession than addiction.
My thing for “W” is part of me. I like the symmetry of the letter, the inversed double hump. The “O” is boring, the “Q” too complicated, the “X” so angry, but the “W”, the luscious double dips lavishly consume the space on the page. I can’t explain it other than the calm I feel when looking at it and the peace that floods through me when I press my pen on the page and loop a string of “W’s” across the paper.
Letting it inhabit me seems, at this point, to be the best solution. I’ll let this little “W” nestle down into my being, carve out a spot in my spirit, and perhaps, in making it comfortable, it will sleep peacefully and let me realize the fullest life possible….in the universe with the other 25 letters of the alphabet.







June 25, 2009

Note: Occasionally I find a teacher victim that will let me into their room to do some writing with their students. June, 2009, I was able to work in my niece’s, Holly Albers, classroom. They were 3rd graders, the most amazing group of almost 4th graders I’ve worked with. Part of my teaching is writing a story. The story is always an adventure story involving my dog Pearl (the most lovely Bernese Mountain Dog). They give me ideas, some I take, other’s I reject, as I tell them, this will be my story. I may or may not use all the ideas. When I left after that first day, the items that we decided upon to be in the story were: a gold mine, a mining car, a secret potion, and (of course) a monster. The following is my third grade story.


The Secret of the Golden Potion


“Come on Pearl, time to go home,” I said. Yawning, I locked the door of the bakery and dropped the key in my purse. Pearl trotted along next to me as I reached into my pocket for a couple of golden cubes. We needed to set out a few more of these on the way home. My hand searched the bottom of my jacket pocket and came up with only two cubes. “Oh, oh,” I thought. “Pearl, this is the last of them. We need to go back!”

We headed for home. As we walked, a flood of memories rushed into my brain. It was only one year ago…

Pearl and left our home in Olympia in October, heading to the Northern Cascades. My objective was to take some good pictures of the fall color. I was going to use the pictures with some poetry I had been writing. By lunchtime we passed Marblemount and entered the park along the Skagit River. I registered at the ranger station, loaded my camera into my backpack, and tossed in a bottle of water, a bag of kibble for Pearl and a sandwich and apple for me. We headed up the trail into the forest.

I took a deep breath and felt the cool clean damp air rushing into my lungs. Pearl raced up and back on the trail, sniffing this and that. I’d walk past her and then she’d catch up, her feet beating the trail behind me. She’d speed past, her furry body brushing my legs as she zoomed by, on ahead to the next really good smelly thing.

Much of the forest is pine and fir. These needles are a lovely green, but stay that way all year long. I was looking for some deciduous trees with their leaves turning bright fall colors. The trail switch-backed up several steep embankments and then dropped down again to the river. It was the groves of Alder and Maple along the river that proved to have the best color. The shape of the orange, red, and yellow leaves silhouetted against the grey rock and steel blue water made beautiful pictures. I was snapping away with the camera when I realized that I had passed Pearl at the top of the bank before walking down to the river. She had not yet caught up with me.

“Pearl!” I called her and heard only the sound of breaking branches. “Stay on the trail!” I yelled. I fully expected to see the white blaze on her face emerge from the thick under-story above, but all I heard was more cracking and snapping of branches.

“That dog can be such a pain,” I thought to myself, or maybe even said it out loud. I shoved my camera back in my backpack and retraced the trail back up the hill.

“Pearl. Come here girl!” I called. I could hear more rustling coming from the uphill side of the trail just above me.

With a heavy sigh of exasperation, I walked into the brush. Carefully I tried to step around the bits of green, placing my feet on the empty spaces of the forest floor. Because I was concentrating so completely on my feet, I didn’t see Pearl as she slid into a hole on what I came to find out was an abandoned mining car. I looked up when I heard the scratch of rusty metal on metal. I stumbled through the brush and stood staring into the entrance of an abandoned mine. Two narrow gauge rails led into the darkness.

“Pearl!” I called. She turned and I saw her white face was just a few yards from the entrance. “Come here, NOW!” I yelled. She just kept staring at me. It was that look in her eyes that told me that I was about to find myself in a brand new undertaking, one that didn’t involve photographing fall colors.

I took a few steps into the cave, careful not to trip over the rails, to the little car in which Pearl was now standing. She moved a bit to the side of the car, giving me room to get in next to her. “What am I doing? This isn’t some crazy carnival ride,” I thought as I lifted my right leg into the car. Then as I was pulling my other leg in, the car lurched ahead and rolled into the dark. Faster and faster we went as gravity pulled us down and deep into the mine. Luckily I got myself into the car ducking my head just as we zoomed under a set of overhead beams.

It seemed like forever, but it was probably only about 15 seconds and we slowed, leveling out into a dimly lit chamber. There were several candles stuck in the walls. As my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I realized that the chamber was glimmering. The flickering candlelight reflected a golden shimmer. Wide eyed, my jaw dropped. Pearl leapt out of the car and started sniffing away.

“Pearl,” I whispered. “Come back here.” Ignoring me, she kept following her nose, which led her into a small alcove directly in front of the car. With a startled “yip” she jumped back away from the narrow slot in the golden wall.

The noise was faint, at first. But it continued to get louder and louder as a purple smoke billowed forth from the slot in the wall and the room filled quickly. By now, Pearl had returned to the wall, sniffing away, in spite of the now deafening noise of what sounded like cymbals and xylophones. Still in the car, my hands gripping the side rails, I screamed when out of the smoke a large dog-like creature appeared.

“You’ve come Pearl,” the creature growled.

“My name is not Pearl, that is my dog,” I answered nervously.

“I’m not talking to you, human, I’m talking to Pearl!” he barked.

I sat down deeper in the car. Never had I felt so helpless. Pearl and I have been in some precarious spots over the years, but I’ve always managed to get us out of harm’s way. This time it was clear. I wasn’t involved in this one. This wasn’t about me, it was about Pearl.

The wiry haired creature stood on four legs. One ear poked straight up while the other flopped to the side. He had a very large head and stubby snout making his lips move more like a human when he spoke. He was scary and funny looking at the same time. I wanted to scream AND laugh out loud even though my heart was pounding.

Pearl and the creature circled each other, head to tail to head, communicating their past experiences and present situation like dogs do when they first meet. “Don’t hurt her,” I pleaded.

“Be quiet, human,” he answered.

There wasn’t anything I could do but sit and watch. I had no escape without Pearl. She wasn’t about to leave as there was something here she needed to do and it was something I could not understand.

I settled down a bit and began to take in the glory of this chamber. The clanging metal noise had subsided when Pearl and the creature began sniffing at each other. The walls were golden, but not solid gold…more like painted with gold frosting. I reached out from the car, ran my hand across the wall, and gathered a fist full what looked like thick gold soap. I took a dab and rubbed it into my arm. Suddenly I felt calm. I wasn’t scared or nervous or mad or angry. It was weird. I didn’t feel giddy or excited either. I was relaxed and at ease.

By now Pearl and the creature were “talking” like dogs do; rubbing their heads together, nosing into each other’s ears. Pearl began to jump away from the creature playing her favorite game, “Come and Get Me.” The creature obliged running away and then lunging back at her. I couldn’t help but giggle at Pearl’s playfulness with the odd looking hairy hulk.

Tired, Pearl circled and lay down. The creature began to talk to me.

“I see you’ve experienced the golden potion,” he said. “We’ve been making this for centuries, but was interrupted when humans came and began pounding, scraping, and chipping out the gold. They are gone now and there is much work to be done, catching up with 20 years of production”

“What is this?” I asked.

“For generations my kind has been making it. We take the water from the nourishing river, pitch from the majestic trees, and gold dust from deep in the earth. We mix this all together, roll it out into big slabs, and then cut it into cubes. In the early spring when the snow has melted and the new babies are born, we come to the surface and spread the cubes all around the forest. We even go into human villages and leave cubes here and there.”

“Why? What does this do?” I asked.

“It is for the babies,” he responded.

“Babies? Why the babies?”

“Silly human, you think I’m talking about the human babies,” he said smiling at me. “It is for the animal babies. As the mother bears forage for berries in the forest, or the mother birds search for grubs, they seek out this potion. When they return to their babies, the wee ones get a little at feeding time.”

“Why? What does this do?” I asked. This was getting really weird.

“Did you feel it when you put some on your arm?” he asked.

“Feel what?” I lied. I didn’t want to let him know that I felt anything.

“You know you did,” he responded. “You felt calm didn’t you.”

“OK, yeah, I did,” I admitted.

“Don’t you think young animals are scared when they have to go out on their own to find food, or young birds are nervous about taking that first leap into the air to fly?” he asked.

“Well, I never thought about it, but yeah, I guess that would be pretty scary,” I said.

“This potion is gives them a bit of tranquility to make them realize they have the courage and confidence to make a life on their own,” he said.

I’d never thought about that, but it made sense to me.

“But why go into the human places?” I asked.

“It is for the puppies and kittens,” he said.

“Oh,” I said. My eyes welled up when he said that because I remembered when Pearl was a puppy and she cried that first night she was with me. I knew she was missing her mother, brothers and sisters.

“This makes them feel better and lets them accept and thrive with the love of their new human family,” he said. “Pearl, like all animals, knows about us. You must take a supply of cubes with you and spread it out around your town. We have so much work to do here in the forest. We haven’t been able to get to the human places.”

“I’d be more than happy to do so.” I replied.

With that, he disappeared into the slot of the wall. He reappeared with a big box of the cubes.

Wagging her tail, Pearl made one more playful leap at the creature. He smiled as he pushed the box in my direction.

“How do we get out of here?” I asked, still gripping the side rails.

“I have a system of ropes and levers that will pull the car with you both back to the surface.”

Pearl leapt in. I carefully laid the box of cubes next to her.

With a series of tugs and jerks we moved back up the rails. I looked back and saw the creature disappear through the purple smoke into the slot in the wall of that glimmering chamber.

***************

My eyes snapped back into the reality of my walk home. Pearl had run ahead and was waiting for me at the front door. She gave me a couple of woofs that meant, “Hurry up, I’m hungry.”

We went inside. I filled her dish with kibble. As she munched through her dinner bowl, I packed my backpack. We were going back, back to the chamber, back to the creature. We had to get more cubes, those of the golden potion that brings comfort, peace and love to all the world’s puppies and kittens.