LETTERS FROM HOME: LIKE POMPEII

Jan. 27, 1994

Dear Carolyn,

The rain has been falling for three days now, with just a little break yesterday afternoon. It began with a crescendo of rumbling thunder, and lightning that turned the night white. Then just a steady rain that overflowed planter boxes and kept time on the roof.

The rain in Northern California is that way, not like the gully-washers in Missouri. But the effect is the same. The town's barometer of rainfall is the nearby Eel River. It's about four times its normal size and brown instead of the usual green. People say the steelhead fishing will be good once the rain stops.

KMUD, the local public radio station, says 5 inches have fallen over the past few days. It's a cold rain, the kind that keeps people indoors close to their fire and makes them restless.

On a sunny day a few weeks ago, I took a slice of fresh-baked cinnamon bread out to Milton, who does our landlord's gardening. Between bites, he warned me that couples don't stay together long here on the North Coast. I suggested that, if true, the weather and the isolation might have something to do with it.

After all, we're 60 miles from the nearest metropolis, which I define as anyplace that has more than one movie showing at the same time. And though DC and I live on a regular block in a town that has a supermarket and fax machines, many folks hereabouts are way out in the woods where neighbors are scarce as parking meters and solar power is a necessity.

"You've really got to like somebody and they have to like you to live that way," I said.

Milton smiled, then told me he, his wife and their infant son lived out in the wilds many years ago. One day they drove to a country store for a few things. Milton left them in the pickup. When he walked out of the store reading a newspaper minutes later, the truck was gone.

Milton searched for them, and the police did too. A few weeks later a friend told him they were staying near San Francisco. His wife showed up again sometime later, but only stayed long enough to get her belongings. He says he never did find out why she left.

"Better take the keys whenever you get out of the car" was DC's cheerful response to the story.

She and I have been cohabiting for a month now. Yesterday I asked if there is anything I do or don't do that she doesn't like. She said no and immediately asked me the same question. Neither of us is guilty of being too sure of ourselves.

Returning from lunch with DC today, I followed the Eel down the hill that stretches between Garberville and Redway. My aged Honda began lurching on the way down. I figured water had gotten into the fuel line. But the bouncing didn't stop, and blue smoke soon drifted from beneath the hood.

I stopped down by the river and walked away, somehow knowing I'd probably just witnessed the old car's death rattle. It's a sad day. We've driven from New York to California, from California to Missouri, back to California and lots of miles in between. Lots of my life produced the coffee stains on that carpet.

Something had told me it wouldn't be leaving California again, but like Milton I never expected our relationship to end so abruptly.

"Some things are like Pompeii, one of my friends says. "They just stop."

Love, Sam