Guest Blogger #18
I don't recall when I first ran across today's writer, but I seem to remember one of my readers pointing me in her direction (Carroll?). So much to read, so little time...
...but this lady is worth the effort. Birdie writes Beauty Dish: The Underground Adventures of an Avon Lady, which has rapidly become one of the most popular Salon blogs. Not only is she a wonderful writer and storyteller, but she has probably the most ENERGETIC site I've come across, just oozing organization...and stuff. Really. Check it out, get lost in Birdland for a while. Dude, it's like, cosmetic.
The Power of Pig
by Birdie Jaworski
I'm not a Believer, at least not the kind that attends church and casts silver hopes to the heavens. I ran away from home the day after I turned sweet sixteen. I tossed my rosary beads out a bus window along a windy Massachusetts highway and told the man upstairs to leave me the hell alone. He'd done enough trouble, thank you very much. He sure listened. I hiked a mountain range of dynamite blasted coal between then and now. I'm still hiking. I know I'll hike forever. But six months ago, something unusual happened. Some Kind Of God came to live at my house.
I didn't know he was Some Kind Of God at first. He arrived right after my kids had a bad case of chicken pox, the night I decided I would never find a good and kind man, be filthy rich and famous, have a sparkling clean house, or even sell enough Avon to meet my basic bills. He arrived at four a.m. with a scream from my youngest son and the crash of a plastic star ship careening off the wooden dresser.
"What's going on out there!" I headed for the hall, tripped over the dog and smacked my elbow against a corner. "Ouch! Hey! What's all the ruckus about?"
8 sat on the lower bunk, shaking, pointing to the window.
"Someone's outside! I think it's a ghost!"
"Oh Lord, there's nobody outside. You must have heard the wind. I'll go outside and check, come on, come with me, we'll check together." I grabbed his hand and dragged him to the front door, 10 and 18 and dog on our tail.
Suzie heard it first. She growled, white hair up in mohawk shackles, and she leaped to reach the door first, growls erupting into barks. I let go of 8's hand, pointed to the couch and turned to stare at the
boys.
"Sit down and wait!"
I snuck up to Suzie, peered out the opaque etched glass, saw no reflection of person or ghost, but something small, low to the ground, moving in circles, tangled. A lost dog? I pushed Suzie aside and opened the door a crack.
A baby pot-bellied pig rose his snout and gave a bleat. A long black leash snarled through his legs and neck, one end tied to the handle of my door. He wore a red leather harness with silver studs and a three-sentence note was duct-taped to the collar:
My name is Frankie Bacon. Please give me a good home. We know you love animals.
I did what any other mom of three doe-eyed boys would do. I took the pig inside, gave him a hug and a bowl full of dog food and let him sleep in the laundry room. He didn't look like Some Kind Of God. He looked exhausted and afraid and ready to pee. And pee he did - on the floor, on my lap, on the careful mound of folded sheets I arranged for a bed. He even peed in his food bowl and the next morning his breath smelled like piggy urine and Kibbles and Bits.
Man Oh Man, I thought. Gotta get rid of this pig.
And I tried! I placed an ad in the local paper. I posted requests for pig lovers on Craig's internet List. Not a single gentle pig aficionado attempted to make contact. I even attempted a long drive to
a safe pig hideaway haven I read about on some porcine website, but they were closed when I arrived.
Meanwhile, Frankie sure made himself at home. He discovered every cabinet containing food and started stealing the dog's chew toys. He learned to sit and stand and roll and play dead and dance and fetch and sing! He took climbing the hill and trotting across the catwalk to the treehouse and spent long afternoons under the Mexican Pepper tree watching people walk up and down the neighboring street. One day he even dropped a heavy rawhide bone on the sidewalk-ridden boxer who
leaves gifts of dog do under my pear tree. Klunk! It landed on the offender's lumpy head, and I received a snotty call from an irate owner.
Damn, that pig is smart, I thought. Gotta get rid of this pig.
But Frankie stayed. He snoozed in the morning sun, his pink and black and white sides coated with perspiration, while the kids played water fights. He sat under the early evening shade of the macadamia trees and mimicked the call of sparrows and crows in an uneven earthy grunt. One afternoon I heard a raucous cheer from the neighborhood kids and ran out to the backyard to see Frankie run at full speed across the yard and then SPLASH!!!! A full stomach belly flop and fast scoot along my boys' Slip 'n Slide. He rose at the end, up on four hooves fast, and I swear he bowed and waited for his score. He ran to the end of the line and waited his turn without a push or shove, and he stood with respect until the tiny boy before him finished his slide and stepped off the plastic.
Wow, what a strange animal, I thought. Gotta get rid of this pig.
Frankie ate me out of house and home, too, put away more food than each of us human animals combined. He let crumbs fall from his mouth onto the floor, near x-rated ecstatic groans escaping his lips, the first bite to the last. He honored the meal with a sideways flip to the ground, a full-on collapse of satisfaction, ending each meal with a gratified snore.
Today I realized something I should have known six months ago when that crazy pig appeared at my door. I sat at my desk, trying to finish some routine Avon chore, my boys fighting down the hall, an uneasy feel in the pit of my stomach.
Man, I thought. Why is life so stupid sometimes? Why's everyone so unkind?
I shifted my feet and twirled my chair to look out my window. The hammock slung under the roof deck rocked with the wind. Someone snuggled under a woven Navajo blanket, let the airy drone of the swinging bed carry them to sleep. I didn't think about who might be hogging the hammock. With three boys and endless visits from neighborhood kids it could be anyone. But this kid lifted his...
snout... from under the covers and rolled into a new position. Frankie. The pig! In the hammock!
I stood, walked to the window and smelled the lavender and sage. Frankie sniffed too, a deep and hearty snort, and I swear he sighed my cares away. I don't know how he lifted himself into the hammock. I don't know how he knew a breezy nap could be so damn good. I only know
tonight I'll dream about the innocent happiness of my personal pork. Only Some Kind Of God can know such secrets. And I'm so happy he decided to incarnate here, in this time and place, and teach me and my family a thing or two about life.
8:50:59 AM 
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