HUMAN WRECKAGE
The Cost of a Good Neighbour
Our backyard fence mirrored the London Bridge
of nursery rhyme, falling down, falling down. Ann and I had delayed the project
for two years, managing our home improvement expenses, allotting dollars to
immediate necessity: fence or kitchen, furnace or fence? Besides, our
jury-rigged system of bungee cords, twine and propping stakes had sort of done
its job, much like an intern, a new hire or a boss-favoured incompetent
colleague.
Another replacement had been on tap for two
years. Universal health care is a wonderful privilege though the system’s gears
could benefit from a little lubricant from time to time. Ann finally got
fast-tracked for a shiny new titanium hip, time is irrelevant on bureaucratic
clocks. Don’t do the hippy-hippy shake until the forms have been filled out in
triplicate even if every day following a sleep deprived night becomes
increasingly painful to endure. Disabled parking permits are nothing to strive
for; that polite convenience masks a crippling curse.
Naturally both reclamations involving saws
coincided even though our kitchen calendar clearly indicated they were to occur
a week apart. Schedules are for other people, dictators who make them up and
then can’t abide by them. It’s not spring so much in Edmonton as pollen season. Everything is
golden, dusted with an impossibly fine yellow powder.
Surgery these days is very much an involved
procedure. Last Wednesday Ann and I awoke at four-thirty in the morning: drink
one cup of clear juice – apple or cranberry, scrub incision area, write YES PLEASE
on left thigh, go to hospital with crutches and walker but no valuables. And
meanwhile our backyard had become a Christo installation, flags and paint denoting
the subterranean water main and gas line; a steel bin, three days early for the
demolition of the rotten old fence, clogging the driveway.
Pollen season is also wildfire season. Wednesday
was Africa hot. City buses alternated their
numbers and routes scrolling above their windshields with FIRE BAN IN EFFECT.
Following a visit with Ann after her surgery I took the train home from the
hospital, 21 steaming minutes station to station. As I walked along our street
a furnace gust of wind blasted a cloud of pollen from a giant fir as I passed.
The powder clung to sticky me like corn meal on a ball of pizza dough.
I became even more annoyed as I neared the
Crooked 9. Our fence contractor was pacing in front of out house. He was on his
phone, elbow up, hand to ear. I thought, “Tattoo sleeves with green ink always
look infected. Get off your damn phone and do your job; those things cannot be
good for productivity. Maybe he’s talking to a vendor. The lumber arrived a day
late, after all.”
He waved to me. A few moments later he hung
up. He met me at the end of the driveway by the bin. He was pale, his blue eyes
flooded with anxiety. I furrowed my brow and arched an eyebrow.
“I’m sorry. I hit the gas line. Just nicked
it hand-digging the last post hole. An emergency crew is on its way.” I lit a
cigarette while I digested his information. He said, “I’m not sure that’s a
good idea.”
“Fuckit.”
“How’s Ann?”
“Everything went very, very smoothly.
Excellent. Thanks for asking.” I ruffled some pollen from my hair and scratched
a little more from my beard. I smiled at him. If one job was destined to be
botched on a day like today, well, who cares about a fence and a gas leak? “I’m getting a beer. Want one? We can’t do
anything anyway, only wait for things to get fixed.”