Fences and Bridges

The year I turned fourteen, I built a fence gate from Bamboosa and repurposed scraps of wood from the sound stage my father built out in the field to make movies when I was about five. He dismantled it before he left when I was ten, leaving the heap of struts and plywood in a pile behind the stand of Bamboosa. I nailed lengths of the one-inch diameter Bamboosa to the wooden frame I made, fashioned hinges out of leather and twine wrapped around the frame, and laced them through the chainlink fencing on either side. I also fashioned a latch that could take a padlock. The fence gate worked for a few years, until the sun rotted away the hinges. But by then, I'd moved out, leaving my step-dad to fix it. 

The barrier was intended to keep drug addicts from across the street from driving up into the South Forty, which is what we called the vacant lot just down from our house on the hill. Friends of that troubled neighbor thought there was a better view from our field than there was from the dirt road parking area. They were right, but once when they were stoned, they lit a small grass fire as they flung their cigarettes out the window in the dry season. It scorched the outside wall of my bedroom. I did not want that to happen again.

Older brother Mel was twenty, and not home. He was stationed in Sasebo, Japan with the US Navy. It was just mom and me for a few years, then Papa Leo moved in, and he and Mom decided to have a baby. Leo was forty-one, Mom forty-three when she gave birth to little Steven. Probably, mom inspired me to think about construction projects by modeling for me how to lay  an entire brick patio while on her hands and knees. She persevered working on the lovely herring bone pattern, her pregnant belly nearly dragging on the ground by Autumn. 

When little brother Steven was born in December, Mom and my step-dad surmised that it would be good to create an addition on the two bedroom house, so they could have some privacy at their end of the house. They hired a friend who was an architect to build on a bedroom and bathroom at the other end. His friend was a contractor. Together, Arthur Silvers and Abe Osheroff taught me how to build my second fence, not counting the psychological ones no one could see. But who can count those? Near the end of eighth grade, I had an ulcer. Doctor said it was probably stress. In hindsight, I can see that Art the architect, whose young sons I baby sat, and Abe the contractor, who fought against Franco in the Lincoln Brigade, and was full of witty sayings - like: "You know when  your kids are growing older, because their feet smell," were watching my back. They gifted me with a sense of power to manipulate my world in the form of cinderblocks, rebar and cement mortar. I got to be pretty good at mixing cement, setting iron supports, securing the blocks, and finishing the joints smoothly. That wall/fence is still standing more than fifty years later and it is still plumb.

"Good fences make good neighbors."   

~ Robert Frost

I live on another hill now, in Oakland. Strong winds often gust up to this crest and when it rains, it is usually horizontal rain - hitting the windows squarely. A few months back, an eight foot section of the six foot tall back yard fence blew down between our house and the neighbors to the North. Sixteen-year-old Leilani and her friend Danielle were outside talking when I went out to dump the compost and we noticed at the same moment that we could see one another! I asked if they were willing to fix it with me. They were. I went inside to get a ladder, nails, and a couple of hammers. We figured out the tongue and groove boards fit into the frame top and bottom, and that all we needed to do was reassemble the puzzle and nail it back together. Within twenty minutes, that eight foot section was back in place and has remained there through the wild windy rainstorms of this winter. I saw the young women out front last week, and we reminisced about how fun it was to work together to fix that fence - their long painted fingernails and perfect make-up didn’t even get mussed in the process. 

"Something there is that does not love a wall…" ~ Robert Frost.

Sunday night’s Oscars showed that some walls and fences are still in place. Yes, Viola Davis received the gold for Best Supporting Actress in Fences, but I believe it should have been for Best Actress. She made that film and family hang together. 

I'm glad Moonlight got best picture, even if there was a kerfuffle in the announcement of it. And while this year’s awards ceremony was not Oh, SO White as last year’s, we still have a lot of fences and walls to take down and bridges to build between people. 

Bridges from heart to heart can be built of kindness, curiosity, and courage.