Sunday, July 20--

8:07 p.m.-

A pissy late afternoon and evening. It's been two weeks and two days since EZ and I were last in My Summer Office and tonight was finally to be the night.

"Forget it," said Trailer Lights after I'd gotten everything packed later than usual and was running fast to finally get going. They've done this to me before, but this time I did everything properly and had Trailer's tongue attached and everything plugged in right.

No lights.

I stayed calm for a second or two, as is my nature and studied the plight.

The last time they failed to light was because the trailer wasn't set down on the ball so the necessary electricity could travel from car to trailer frame. I learned that last time it did this to me and felt a bit foolish for it and even bashed my forehead with my palm, just in jest, to have been such a dumb cluck. Then went out on the water and had a good day, glad that I'd discovered an easy error to correct.

But, three hours ago the ball was secure and should've been transmitting twelve-volt jolts through Trailer Lights in a proper return current. But something was not proper, else the Trailer Lights would've lit.

I told EZ to get out. She jumped down and jumped back in again. (Not so easy to postpone her expectations further.) I word-wrestled her out of her station in the back of the wagon and insisted she "go lay down somewhere else" so I could attend to the electrical crisis.

Unplug the harness. Plug it back in, watching the amber side running light for a sign of life. Then turn on the motor, left blinker too, and walk around the far end of the trailer in case action was happening back there that I couldn't see. Turn off the motor but verify that the taillights on the car were still glowing.

Just fine.

Dinked around for fifteen minutes plugging and unplugging the yoke, shaking and pulling at wires, trying to discover a loose connection so I could patch it and get on my way. I snipped both plastic connectors off, stripped the wires and fastened them together directly with a few twists.

No juice in the trailer.

Out of bitter malevolence I fainted for a few seconds.

When I awoke the amber running light on the side was burning bright. So I invited EZ back into her spot and careened out the driveway, spraying gravel on the lawn and jolting witlessly on the Honda's bucket seat.

All of the former activity was performed with the neighbor lady walking out of her door, lighting a cigarette, then standing on my gasping new grass (we're in a drought, more on that later) and asking questions like, "is a half-ton truck heavier than a quarter-ton one? Do moths hibernate south or just die in fires? Whatta' ya doin' with that ice-picky gizmo with the wire running out of the end? Electrocuting ice?")

Since I was crouched down at the back of the idling car and breathing carbon monoxide and couldn't hear so good because of the bad muffler I stood up energetically three times and yelled, "WHAT?" when she mumbled at me.

One of her questions regarded EZ's health, which has taken a turn for the worse in the past five days. More on that later.

The last question I stood back up out of the fumes to hear was, "you gonna' chance it? Storms moving in. I'm tellin' ya, ya shouldn't go.")

I am not impressed this year by predictions of summer storms. We've gotten no rain despite appalling Weather Channel warnings to stay in the closet or crawl under a nearby pool table, and not drive through standing water whether it's high noon or night. Every rain event has parted, or stopped, at our western county line. Except for three-minute over-splatters from storms sidestepping us, we have not gotten rain and I have become evangelistic about assuring tourists and passersby that they need not change plans and are safe leaving car windows open all night.

I accelerated onto the main highway heading for town, which I must pass through to get out town's other side. Weather Channel dark clouds appeared over Abner's Auto Parts, so I began to think maybe I shouldn't go out just now, rather fill the boat tank with six gallons of gas anyway and go home, for now.

The BP mini mart was bustling with tourists buying beer and armloads of pizzas and thin plastic ponchos and flashlights and long strips of lottery tickets to pass severe weather time in their closets with flashlights. I filled the tank with six gallons of gas for $10, $1.64 per gallon, and went to pay. A sign on the door said, "SEVERE STORM WARNING FOR NOW."

I pulled open the door and went inside. A Mommy was bawling out a girl toddler for being, "such a baby" and whipping her butt. Patrons were rushing, grabbing packets of diapers and Iraqi Bad Men playing cards off of impulse displays. I bought only gas and was slightly chagrined when the girl scornfully asked, "that's all?"

I turned around in my driveway and parked in the usual place so I could spend quality, unhurried time with Trailer Light's wires and reconnect them more sensibly. Got out the propane torch and soldered severed copper back into place, being careful, sometimes, to keep the bare wires apart so they didn't touch and shower out powerful sparks. I did quite well since I touched off no explosions and shut off the torch, glad that I hadn't burned myself too badly.

Turned on the headlights. Trailer did not respond. Kicked the tongue, kicked it again more furiously and the side amber light lit. Pulled at the wires protruding from the hole in the tongue and jiggled the wires coming out of the car and sat down on the gravel to weep.

"Are you sure daisy petals don't really mean love if they count out just right?"

Neighbor lady, smoking a joint, peered down at me from behind the aluminum shed.

I responded one way or another and she went home swinging Jim Beam by the neck.

So, with lovely black clouds towering in the north and doing spectacular things for residents of other counties, I got back in the car and, watching out through the open hatch turned on the left blinker, stepped on the gas, and turned up the radio.

I stepped on the brake. My sweet amber guide back on the trailer frame lit up bright. I stepped on it again. Same deal. Then it went dark. Stepping on it again and again did not do what it did just a moment before.

Out of the car. Stand and berate Trailer for being such a prick and making me lose a July evening on the water, then I noticed both car tail lights dark.

"Oh, I must need to turn on the key or start the engine, or maybe recite backward all Wisconsin counties in pig Latin within twenty seconds while thinking about God," I said to EZ who was trembling with pain on the lawn.

I dithered about both Honda taillights being red plastic but no longer lit.

"Well, this is interesting," I quipped to myself, refusing just yet to stampede and dial up a mechanic on Sunday.

A sensible fix like a blown fuse under the dash was the trouble. Bare wires brushing each other happens when they sway in the breeze.

I reached in through the window and started the motor. The electric seat belt slid up its track and took off my hat as I retracted out the window swearing.

Motor running--the last resort to assure everything should work out right. Taillights do NOT light.

The fuse panel opens with two twists of their clasps and falls to the floor. Many fuses in there though the diagram on the door details each one with a score, declining in severity from 30-amps to 5. Reading glasses on and a flashlight turned on too. Moon roof and electric window slots are ignored. The fuse that's supposed to kick the supercharger electronics into overdrive when interstate passing is required is just an empty hole.

I pull out the fuse marked "tail lights," a red 10-amp one, blackened and melted, the clue to my dilemma.

It's fixed. And, as I sit here at 10:28 p.m., safe under a roof as violent rain is soaks my grass and the Weather Channel's text crawler warns of severe weather yet to come before 11:00, EZ and I will go out in the morning and float on the water, feeling good that the nasturtium hanging beside the door under the cloudburst will be fulfilled.

EZ's left eye has been looking at the inside of her eyelid. She has been screeching and running away from her food and leaving a trail of moistened kibble along the way and going to lay down and get up and shiver by the door, looking out at her future in the woods. I don't know what that means anymore than she does because she and I have been out of control as her pain has increased rapidly in the last few days.

Wednesday morning in Minnesota with Caleb she seemed fine. By Wednesday afternoon her left eye was beginning to bulge and she lay without enthusiasm by the fire. Thursday morning I was forced by her circumstance to say "Jesus Christ" when she walked up to me from the cabin, when she and Caleb got up and her left eye stared uselessly at the underside of its lid.

We sat silently, lost in our own worlds of what-to-do, regretting her suffering and me the adult in charge and clearly having to stop her life soon, today or tomorrow at the latest, so we all wouldn't have to endure her mistreatment by nature.

I called a veterinarian miles away and was assured that the lady doctor could euphemistically put her down at the end of the day when nobody else was around and payment could be quietly handled by an out-of-state check. We drove back to the cabin and instigated distraction by chain-sawing trees.

She rallied moderately by the next morning. The eye was less vile, though she'd been unable to eat since at least last Sunday, when I started paying attention to the level of food in tote. I bought a can of dog food. She ate it hungrily out of my hand and I felt bad for starving her, assuming she'd had no appetite rather than unable to crunch the dry food. I soaked her kibble in warm water and added a third of a can of soft dog food. She dove into it for a few seconds, screeched, and stumbled from the bowl whining, dropping a trail of chunks along the way. I borrowed the neighbor's blender and pureed a porridge for her, but she still only sniffs it and slinks away. The only thing she can eat is prescription diet in tuna-sized cans from the vet, licking it out of the bowl as I hold it at easy head height. Curiously, she holds her left paw off the floor while tonguing the bowl and balances on three legs. A neurological symptom? Or a cute absent-minded quirk?

Tuesday, July 22--

We've had a pleasant hour lying on the bed together, me trying to nap, giving up and reading. A fond pastime we've enjoyed for years, one she's arisen from after a few minutes these past few months to jump down and lay on the floor at the foot of the bed. Today she jumped right up, lay on her side, stretched out comfortably, pressed herself against my hip and slept contentedly.

It's impossible to know her discomfort. Signs of departure from normal are the only indicator. Yelping and pacing a circle in the back of the car skewers my heart. But when she's quiet, laying on her blanket inside or outside on the lawn, what does she want? If only she could just tell me straight out.