Timeline

My uncle died last night in Boston, Massachusetts.

And one struggles to take it in. 

Each death seems to knock on the others. Stirring things up that were stilled and dealt with.  Mud blooming in the silent winter pond.

The strained family ties that link back into a known and unknown world of New England life. Its trials and tribulations. But then nothing was ever straight sailing, really, despite the stories.

But he is gone. In his skiff into the sky. With each hour rowing out further into a benign, phosphorescent sea.

An aching uncle-sized hole gapes in the wooden dock at Clingstone.

The ocean tugs. The holding chains jig against the current. The foghorn at Beavertail Point pipes farewell.  And the waves in Narragansett Bay rock. Back and forth.  And forth and back.


And then. Far off. Way far off. On the far off tipping point of the disappearing horizon a tiny red flag rises and flutters in the wobbling, uncertain light.

They know. They know he is coming. They know he is coming home.