Murphy's Law
Berrily We Roll Along
by Nelson
"There are certain pursuits which, if not wholly poetic and true, do at least suggest a nobler and finer relation to nature than we know. The keeping of bees, for instance." -- Henry David Thoreau
"But we can *buy* them already picked," Keith complained, throwing his head back. The ceiling wasn't buying it and neither was I. "I've seen them in the freezer section," he continued to argue as he followed me into the kitchen, "and in cans."
"They are not the same, and you know it." I dismissed his point as I rummaged in the cabinet looking for just the right-sized bowls for our expedition. Not too big and definitely not too small - that would be a sin. "Here we go."
I handed Keith one of the largest of the Tupperwares in our possession, and he looked at it grudgingly. "I like nature as much as the next guy," he continued to push back, "but not so much in late July amid briars and whatnots."
"You promised," I shut him down.
There was a silent pause as he considered that. He found his voice as he sorted out an excuse. "It was a weak moment. I was half-asleep when you asked."
I grinned, and clicked my tongue. "Too bad." I waggled the bowl at him, waiting for him to give in. I knew he would eventually. He *had* promised, after all.
Just as I predicted, he sighed and took the bowl, resigned to follow through on his vow to go blackberry picking with me, no matter how much he despised the dreaded chore. "You're a sadist," he accused.
"You'll be glad when we're eating berry roll later," I told him, making a promise of my own, and one I knew would come true.
My all-time favorite dessert is blackberry cobbler, aka berry roll in my family. The best part is this white sauce; it's mostly sugar with a hint of milk and vanilla - just enough to liquefy the sugar. My granny found the recipe in a church cookbook, and we've used it for years, ever since I was a little boy of about five or six. The extra sweet of the white sauce drizzled over the tart blackberry cobbler is a sweet and sour combo that makes my mouth sing. I absolutely love the stuff.
Wild berries make the best berry roll ever. In our first house, Keith and I lived on a wooded lot that had a thicket of what we thought were weeds, backing up to our property, and threatening to overspill the lot line. We were going to have it cut back until those weeds miraculously turned to wild blackberries come summer. I would have physically maimed anyone who dared to go near that brush to cut it down after I knew what it really was: a wonderland of wild berries. I spent most of that summer buried in the briar patch, unwilling to lose any of the fruit to the bugs and birds, let alone rot on the vine. Talk about a sin. Keith swore my arms and legs were going to be permanently scratched up from hours spent in the summer heat gleaning blackberries from the brush. We had about 1000 or so quarts in the freezer that summer, but it still wasn't anywhere near enough in my opinion.
Alas, we moved, and have since been remanded to wild patches along the highway and down various trails in our neighborhood. One of my favorite new spots was a place I found on the side of a country road not fifteen minutes from our house. Keith swore I had used Google Earth to satellite search the area since it wasn't readily visible from the road, but he should have known better. I really hadn't used – or needed to use – anything other than my honed blackberry patch-finding skills. I always keep my eyes peeled in the summer, and I can spot a blackberry patch from miles away. Google Earth, my butt.
It was to that patch where I dragged my lover and partner in the summer sun, and we tramped into my newly-found favorite place, high-stepping the various weeds and wild things to get to the blessed fruit. The berries dangled in clusters of black gold, their dark purple skins shining in the sun. My mouth watered thinking of how good they would taste later under some white sauce, covered in a blanket of dough.
I carefully selected only the blackest fruit, tenderly pulling them from the vines, and collecting the bits that promised the sweetest tang. The heat hung around my shoulders like a blanket, but I didn't mind. I didn't even notice the thorns piercing my flesh when I failed to adequately slip unscathed past a vine. Heat and scratches were small sacrifices to pay for my beloved blackberries. A true bargain as far as I was concerned.
The price tag was a bit on the high side for Keith, though. "It's hotter than hell out here," he fussed, using the back of his forearm as a brow-mopper.
"Think cool thoughts." I plucked a berry and dropped it into my bowl to join the others I had selected. "We've barely started."
"Fabulous."
"It's not that bad," I said, even as a trail of sweat cascaded from my hairline into my left eye. I brushed it away.
"Whoa!" Keith exclaimed as he ducked quickly in the thicket where we were picking.
"What now?"
"Bee," he groused, swatting at the air. "It got so close, I think I felt the wind from his wings flapping."
"Well, you said you were hot."
He failed to see the humor in it. "See, this is what I hate. Too many creatures and insects. I'll bet there are snakes in this mess somewhere." He frowned as he closely inspected what he could see through the thick briars.
"If there are, they're more afraid of you than you are of them. All God's creatures are," I told him, to which he grunted some unhappy reply, but got back to picking.
My proclamation was soon proven untrue when, to my utter horror, I spied a wasp sitting innocently on my palm like he was kicked back waiting for the next bus. That's how it *looked*. In reality, he was busily stabbing my palm with his poisonous stinger, which is what got my attention to start with. My brain kicked in and alerted me to the fact that I had to get it *off*. Now!
Instinctively, I yelled out while simultaneously smacking my hand against my jeans, effectively smearing little mister's yellow jacket all over my pants while imbedding his stinger in my skin. It was a neat trick, boys and girls. Smush a bee and bury the stinger, all in one smooth move. Look, Ma. No hands. Well, there *was* one hand and it was throbbing instantly.
"Shit!" I yelled out, shaking my hand furiously. I was vaguely aware of having dropped my bowl and losing the handful of blackberries I had managed to pick in the ten minutes we had been there.
"What?" Keith exclaimed. I could hear the alarm in his voice. This was my gig, after all, and if I was screeching, there must be trouble.
"I got stung!"
Then another trick happened. My hand began to grow before my widened eyes, until I worried it would burst. It was like one of those little capsule things with a sponge surprise inside. Just add water and watch it grow, or in my case, add an embedded stinger.
Keith rushed to my side, and grabbed me by the wrist, tugging my hand to him so he could see what was going on. He wore a frown as he studied my hand closely before making a declaration.
"We need to get you to the doctor." He said it in a tone that brooked no arguments, not that I would have with my hand tripling in size. He dug for his keys as he marched toward the car on a mission. "I didn't know you were allergic to bees."
"Neither did I," I confessed.
The pain was excruciating. I don't think I had been stung by a bee since I was a child, and never by a wasp. I had consequently tucked the memory of how much a bee sting hurt somewhere deep in my psyche. I didn't argue with Keith as he ushered me and my Incredible Hulk hand into the passenger seat of the car.
"I lost all my berries," I grumbled from the front seat.
"We can come back another time," Keith promised. I wondered if he'd argue later that I had scared the shit out of him, causing him to so swear under duress, thereby rendering it a voidable verbal contract. There were laws against such things and I was certain he knew it.
My hand pounded and throbbed until I thought it would bring tears. It was horrible. The waves of pain kept coming, building in quick crescendos with each beat of my heart. Pow! Pow! Pow! I was trying to be a man about it, which was the only thing keeping me from losing it, but the ache had me squirming in my seat, and silently promising God anything he wanted if he would just get me to the doctor quickly, and make the pain stop.
Promises unheeded, it felt like a decade before they called me back to see the doctor. It really wasn't that long of a wait since they were worried about an allergic reaction, but every minute felt like an hour. The doctor didn't think it was that serious after all: just a reaction to having the poison pouring into one spot. I can't imagine what "serious" must feel like: I was in pain. I almost came off the table when he touched my hand to dig out the stinger. Still trying to be a man's man, I somehow managed to stay bolted to the table, although I just about bit through my bottom lip to do it. The pain started to subside almost immediately when he extracted the stinger, and I was finally able to breathe.
"There it is," he said, holding up the little thing with his tweezers.
"That's it?!" There had to be more. I was expecting something at least the size of a two-by-four with acid dripping from its razor-sharp point.
He laughed and wiped the tiny thing onto a paper towel. That's all it took to kill the beast: a swipe on a paper towel. "Nope," the doctor said. "Not much to it. Small but painful. The poison is what causes the pain."
"Pain seems like such a small word to describe it. As small as the stinger."
He looked at me over his glasses. "Yes, indeed. Go home, take some Benadryl and something for the pain, put ice on that hand. Make Keith wait on you this afternoon. If you have problems, let me know."
"I can't believe that's it. I thought for sure you'd have to amputate."
He laughed and scribbled the last of some cryptic doctor notes on the billing sheet before tearing off my copy. "No, it just felt like it."
"Thanks," I said sincerely. He was my hero.
I was worn out by the time I walked back to the waiting room. Keith chucked aside the magazine he was reading as soon as he saw me walk through the door.
"You ok?"
I gingerly held my hand back out for him to see. "Yeah. He got it out. Told me to take it easy, take Benadryl and something for pain."
I handed the receptionist the sheet of paper the doctor gave me back in the examining room, and Keith paid the co-pay. He tucked his wallet back into the pocket of his jeans. "I don't think we have any Benadryl at home, do we?"
I shook my head. "I don't think so. I don't want to risk it, either, if it will help with the swelling."
"We'll make a quick stop on the way back."
Nothing had been quick that day except for the time we spent picking blackberries. It seemed like days had passed since I was looking for Tupperware bowls. I was in a foul mood by the time we got home.
"It's hard to believe something so little can cause so much damage," Keith said as we walked back into the house.
"And pain. Don't forget pain," I grumbled.
"Go stretch out and I'll grab something for you to wash down the Benadryl and Ibuprofen."
"I don't need to take a nap, Keith." I wasn't twelve, for God's sake. What I *was* was irritable. It had been a horrible morning, and worst of all, we weren't able to get the berries picked, either.
Keith looked at me stone-faced, and calmly repeated himself as if I hadn't heard. "Murph, you've had a rough day. I want you to rest. Asking you to stretch out doesn't mean 'take a nap'."
I took that in, rolled it around in my head for a sec then said something befitting a person who was feeling… petulant. "I don't need you to wait on me. I can fix my own drink."
I could smell the smoke from the neurons firing in Keith's brain while he carefully sorted through potential responses. It took milliseconds for him to come to a conclusion when I took a bold step toward the kitchen. He landed his hand on my forearm to keep me from moving another inch. "If you don't go stretch out somewhere like I told you, you're going to have a different part of your anatomy stinging."
I looked down at his hand on my arm, and controlled my tone to the best of a grouchy and fed up man's ability. I answered him deliberately, "I'm just trying to tell you that I'm not tired, and I'm not helpless."
Clearly, my tone didn't go over too well. Using the grip he had on me, he wheeled me away from the kitchen, and pointed me toward the living room in the opposite direction. Then, true to his word, he whacked his palm down against my denimed seat, pushing me farther from the kitchen. He really didn't want me fixing my own drink, judging from the burning handprint on my ass.
He didn't explain his actions, and he didn't argue with me. In fact, he didn't say anything; he just went to the kitchen and pulled a glass from the cabinet, fully expecting me to do as I was told, without watching to see that I did. I had gotten the message, just as he knew I would, and I started moving immediately. Sometimes, I just need a little push. Other times, I need a shove.
"All right! The invalid is going," I complained over my shoulder, but only after I was out of arm's length from him.
As if he couldn't catch up. I have a bad habit of doing the walk-away, smart-ass, under-my-breath comments. More than once, those cracks have had Keith coming after me, when just seconds before I had been in the clear. Sometimes, I wonder about my brain in times like those. It doesn't seem to work as well whenever I'm in a bad mood as it does when I'm feeling pleasant. Invariably, as soon as one of those comments leaves my mouth, my stomach flips over and doesn't settle back into place until my sharpened senses fail to detect following footsteps. Those are intense seconds. They're the "oh, shit" moments when I know I just danced close to the line but I'm not sure if I managed to do the two-step over it.
No footsteps followed on this occasion, but I did get the reproving growl, "Murphy!" out of the deal. Emboldened by the miss, I refused to go to the bedroom, just to make a point. I lumbered into the living room, and chose the sofa to rest on because it felt less like a nap environment. My illogical mind didn't bother to notice that Keith never said that I had to go to the bedroom. Nooo, my illogical mind was still stuck on the word nap, which had only fallen from my lips, and never materialized as a command from Keith. My after-the-fact, logical mind picked up on that later, but at the time, I was mad at the world and not thinking exactly clearly.
Unable to hit the whole world, Keith was the closest thing I could target in my foul mood, which wasn't fair to him, but he's a big boy. He can handle it, and deep down, I knew he absolutely would handle it if I pushed him too far, so I was smart enough to be careful, illogical mind and all. The shadow of a sting in my left butt cheek helped clarify some of my thinking, I have to be honest. One clap alone hurt bad enough, and I didn't need an applause to boot with my injured hand.
I clicked on the TV, and listened to Keith dutifully filling a glass with ice and water from our fridge door – something I could have done for myself, my illogical mind pointed out. It only took one hand, after all. I refused to admit Keith was only trying to help, not insinuate that I was physically unable to get my own iced water.
In no time, he was back with a fistful of Ibuprofen and Benadryl to go along with my refreshing beverage. "Here you go," he extended his hand toward me.
I rolled my eyes up at him, and sarcasm dripped from my forked tongue. "Am I allowed to sit up so I can take them?"
He waved the pills in front of me. "You're pushing it, Murph."
He didn't have to say anything else; his tone said it all. Besides, I knew what it meant to keep pushing it. It meant many stingers to my butt if I didn't cut the crap. An applause. Applause generally led to standing ovations; standing because… well, you know.
I sat up and took the pills silently, eyeing Keith as I did so.
He set the glass on a coaster then cradled my wounded hand in his while he checked it again. "Does it feel any better?"
Surprisingly, my griping attitude wasn't enough to chase Keith far, far away from me. He's such a good man. He really didn't deserve to be snapped at by a cranky partner. "A little," I answered him.
He bent down and kissed me tenderly on the top of the head. "Rest."
My eyes averted his, and I felt the slightest bit of guilt beginning to spread. "I'm sorry I snapped at you," I confessed, taking the ice pack he handed me. "I'm just… annoyed."
"I know. You'll feel better after you rest a bit."
A broken record. I couldn't help but smile. "Are you trying to tell me you want me to rest or something?"
"Eureka!" he said victoriously, raising his arms high. "I thought I must be mumbling."
"No, I heard you. I was just hoping to get the needle to stop sticking."
"You have to put a penny on the arm," he chuckled. "Rest."
"Rest-click, rest-click, rest-click," I mocked him with my best rendition of a repeating record as I lay back on the sofa, and applied the ice to my palm.
"Thank yoooou," he sang happily as he went back to the kitchen.
I held up my hand to check it out, amazed at how large it was. The swelling seemed to be limited mostly to the pinky side where that damnable beast stung me, but it was unreal looking. I propped it on a pillow, repositioned the ice, and closed my eyes. It really had been a long day to be only half over. Despite my arguments to the contrary, I was tired from all the traumatic activities. The stress of the morning combined with the whump, whump, whump of the ceiling fan knocked me right out. The Benadryl didn't hurt, either.
I slept so deeply, I had fitful dreams as wild as the blackberries that had led to my demise. In one, we were back out in the heat, and the snake Keith swore must be in the brush had surfaced, and wrapped itself around Keith's leg. I could see its fangs as it opened its mouth wide to plunge them into my screaming partner, but my feet were tangled in briars that seemed to come to life and hold me where I was, keeping me from taking even one step toward Keith. Bees buzzed by my head, swirling a path around me to further imprison me in tandem with the heat surrounding me.
Then, I dreamt I smelled fresh berry roll - a cruel dream, a virtual nightmare, considering we hadn't managed to harvest many berries, and fewer still, since I lost all mine during my bee-wrangling adventures. The air in my dream world was thick with the sweet scent of baking cobbler, and my mouth watered as though it were reality. I began to rouse enough to wipe a bit of drool from my chin, unsure of whether it was a result of the mouth-watering aroma in my dream or from being deeply asleep. I was hot, just like in the brush where Keith and I were picking earlier, so hot that I cracked an eye open enough to find there was an afghan draped across me. Keith. He must have covered me up while I slept.
I dragged myself the rest of the way out of my Benadryl-induced fog when I felt a presence nearby. Keith was leaning over me, staring, which was confusing as well as a bit… weird. Was I still dreaming? I could still smell the cobbler, so I assumed I was until he grinned, and kissed the end of my nose.
"What are you doing?" I asked him suspiciously.
"Checking on you," he smiled.
"How long have I been asleep?" I groggily raised myself up on an elbow trying to see the clock across the room with sleep-hazed eyes.
"An hour and a half." He was kind enough not to point out that the man who demanded not to need a nap had just slept away half the afternoon.
"I feel hung-over."
"Then you could probably use a snack." He brought an arm out from behind his back, and pushed a bowl under my nose. "For you."
I blinked at what had to be a mirage. "But…it's real? How did you…?" I stammered, sitting up.
"I managed to salvage about a cup's worth from what I had picked," he said. "Enough for half a recipe."
"You were actually picking and not just over there complaining? How did you fit it in?"
"I was multi-tasking," he teased back. "I'm a man of many talents."
I shook my head and smiled. My nightmarish day looked to be having a happy ending after all, thanks to my partner. "This is great."
I took the bowl from him with my good hand, and inhaled the sweet scent of berry roll while he checked my injury.
"Swelling's down."
I didn't care. I balanced the bowl on my lap and held it in place with my unswollen fingers, careful not to bump the tender part of my hand. "Where's yours?"
"I'm going to grab it from the kitchen. I'm not letting you have it all."
"You even made the white sauce."
"I had to call your granny for the recipe. I don't have it memorized like you do. She said to tell you she hopes you feel better, by the way."
My granny. The embodiment of 82 years of pure sweetness. I was going to have to call her back, and thank her for giving Keith the white sauce recipe. "I'm glad you were able to get hold of her."
"I had to get her or your mom. Wouldn't be berry roll without the sauce."
"Absolutely not." I dug in and savored the sweet and sour dessert as it filled my mouth. I was in heaven.
Heaven. Where there are no bees. But I hear there's plenty of berry roll. It is Heaven, after all. Berry roll welcome, no bees allowed.
End
