Snapshots: Confessions of a Café Crawler

By James A. Baumgard

"Family, Friends, and Other Strangers" commemorates those Baumgard has lost. "Applause for Four Paws" is dedicated to those whose affinity for their pets, and theirs for us, is unquestioned. "Me, Myself, and I" may seem overly self-indulgent, but when can a writer be self-indulgent, if not while 'confessing'?

Set adrift after his wife died, Baumgard met a few women who, unaware, helped to fill the void. They were not lovers. Rather, they made him feel he signified. Their stories are a way of showing his gratitude.

The section on poetry covers a wide range of topics and styles among them haiku and limericks.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jan 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9781667882338

Book preview

One

Breakfast With Brother Jay

Many years ago, when it became too obvious to conceal, brother Jay outed himself to me. Because he has since talked freely about his homosexuality, over an anemic brew the French call jus de chaussette (sock juice, or rinse water)—I always meant to ask: when did you realize you were gay?

A year after Barbara and I divorced, he replied without hesitating.

The waitress swung by, coffeepot in hand. I placed a hand over my half-empty cup; Jay pointed to his. As she poured, he tore open a couple of sugar packets and emptied them into the steaming cup.

A bit late to learn you were gay, no? I asked, after the waitress had left. He married and divorced young, so he must have been in his late teens or early twenties. I assumed you knew before then.

So, you think I married Barbara to prove to myself I wasn’t gay?

Not at all. But didn’t you at least have an inkling early on that you were…different?

What if I did? Besides, what does it matter when I knew?

It doesn’t. I was just asking. There’s no judgment attached. For what it’s worth, I assumed you married Barbara because you got her pregnant.

You and brother Henry. Did it ever occur to you we married because we loved one another?

Hey, no need to take my head off. I was paying you a compliment. It’s more than a lot of guys at that age would’ve done.

Including yourself.

Yes. Including me.

Instead of relishing his ‘gotcha’ moment, he magnanimously changed the subject—to his first gay experience.

I was walking home late one night, blotto drunk from a party, when an older man pulled up beside me and asked if I wanted a lift. I had my suspicions, but got in, anyway. When he started touching me, I figured he wanted to do it in the car. To my relief, he suggested we go to his place. I could’ve bailed on him when we got there. Part of me was curious, and besides it seemed too late to turn back. Long story short, it was over before I realized I had made one of the biggest mistakes of my life. I pulled up my pants and left. He didn’t renew his offer to drive me home, and I didn’t ask.

His dry-as-toast description of a life-changing experience didn’t answer my question. I suspected the experience only confirmed a long-denied inclination. But because I had learned more than I wanted, I kept my suspicions to myself.

For several days afterwards, I banged every girl I knew.

I can’t picture you being blotto drunk or a serial banger.

You saying I made it up? That just because I’m your kid brother, I don’t know how to drink?

I don’t see how that follows.

Are you saying I only pretended to be drunk? Why? To give myself cover for my actions?

You’re putting words in my mouth.

But that’s what you were thinking, right?

I think a lot of things. Some I could be locked up for.

I suppose you think I also made up the part about sleeping around.

I admit that sounded farfetched, more so than the drinking.

Why ask when you already know the answers?

It isn’t so much that I know the answers, because I don’t. It’s that when you say one thing, I hear things you’re not saying.

You know what your problem is?

Enlighten me.

You think because you’re my older brother that makes you smarter. Well, it doesn’t. Not any more, and not for a long time. If you accepted me as an equal maybe you wouldn’t be so judgmental, not about me being gay necessarily, but about so many things.

Worried that his sudden outburst had attracted unwanted attention, I glanced at nearby tables and was relieved I had only imagined he jumped on the table and shouted his pent-up grievances to scores of scandalized ears. Though clearly exercised, he had kept his voice below the mix of indistinct chatter and piped in music.

Wow. It sounds like you’ve been waiting a long time to dump that on me.

I have. Sorry to be so blunt, but you asked for it.

I had to admit there was a kernel of truth to what he said, especially the part about me thinking I was smarter than him, which was demonstrably true, though I could less demonstrative. If I wanted to return the favor and been as blunt, I would’ve told him he had stretched credulity too far too often for me not to question his more dubious claims. He doesn’t intend to deceive. Rather, he is a storyteller at heart. To those unacquainted with him, he can sound charmingly candid. I won’t take that away from him.

My inquiry into his ‘dark’ side botched; discretion dictated that I not to ask when he learned he had AIDS, which seemed to be the next logical step. As his older and now only brother, some may question the wisdom of waiting so long to ask. Actuaries place bets against us the day we are born. The older we get, the worse the odds. After a certain age, they become ridiculous, and both of us have reached that ridiculous age.

I’ve met a few of Jay’s lovers, and most of them struck me as decent chaps. Jose, the last that I’m aware of, was his partner for many years.

My mother stayed with them when she moved from Chicago to Long Beach. They gave her their only bedroom. That the ever so tidy Jose lived with my not so tidy mother for a year in a one-bedroom studio apartment suggested a martyr-like forbearance.

Although he and Jay were estranged when my wife died, Jose came to the funeral to lend me moral support.

---

As I drove home, it occurred to me I forgot to ask Jay a question long on my mind: if he and Jose were AIDS free when they began their long and presumably monogamous relationship, who caught it from whom? Some questions are best left unasked.

Aug. 1, 2014

Two

God Laughs

A man walks into a bar. It’s Make God Laugh night; the place is packed. Customers line up to tell their plans to the old man standing at the end of the bar. Straight out of Old Testament central casting, by his hoary mane and flowing beard the customers recognize him as God. One by one they approach and whisper their plans in his ear. And every time, the walls quake with laughter.

---

I looked forward to my annual pilgrimage to San Francisco, as I do every October, to celebrate my son’s birthday, and because the weather is predictably idyllic. But this year was special; accompanying me was my friend and soul mate, Myrna. She and my son would meet for the first time.

We factored into our plans Myrna’s aging and ailing mother, whom Myrna left in the capable hands of her brother and sister, giving her a much needed break from her duties as primary caregiver, if only for an extended weekend.

By buying airline tickets a month in advance, I got round-trip tickets at an affordable price. Besides introducing Myrna to my son, I wanted to introduce her to the qualified joy of a long, leisurely bus ride. To that end, we planned to fly up to S.F. and take the bus back.

---

I landed in the Inland Empire twenty-six years ago, after an eighteen-year layover in San Francisco. I knew the City by the Bay well and visualized all the places we could pack into a three-day visit. Myrna’s would be the fresh eyes through which I viewed my former home.

We touched down in Oakland on Thursday around 1:30, took the tram to the BART station, got off at Civic Center, and walked to my son’s place in nearby Hayes Valley. With just enough time to walk to Japantown and back before my son got home from work, we stowed our backpacks and set off for the first of many sightseeing adventures.

Myrna and my son David and took to one another from the start. We readily agreed on sushi for dinner and, with little discussion, drew up an itinerary for our 3-day stay.

After dinner, we settled down to watch a movie before retiring for the night. Fifteen minutes into the film, Myrna received a call.

My sister Tina, she said after a brief, mostly one-sided conversation. Mom just died. She took a breath, exhaled, and….

While not a total surprise, Myrna had hoped her mom would hang on till she returned. With her brother and sister looking after her, she had no reason to be there—except be there.

Later, after the movie, and David had gone to bed, Myrna buried her face in her hands and wept, something she wanted to do the minute she got the devastating news.

I miss my mom, she said, between sobs. I knew how ill she was, and shouldn’t have left her. I want to go home Saturday.

That gave us Friday to check a few boxes on our itinerary. But a few minutes and another crying jag later, I want to go home tomorrow. You stay with David, though. This is your vacation, too.

I admit to a fleeting temptation, soon dispelled by the thought of her bearing her grief—and her backpack—on the lonely flight home. I went online and purchased two tickets.

She was still a little squally Friday morning. When the dark clouds parted, she acknowledged there was no reason to rush back, that we could have stayed at least one more day.

To make the most of our now ultra short vacation, we decided to visit the ultra touristy Fisherman’s Wharf. Although a good distance from Hayes Valley, to allow Myrna to see some of San Francisco’s noteworthy neighborhoods: Western Addition, Pacific Heights, Nob Hill, Russian Hill, to name a few, we traveled by shank’s mare.

Myrna is that species of walker who, while maintaining a withering pace scarcely slackened going up hill, bemoans the ardors of the walk as her wheezing companion struggles to keep up.

We reached our destination somewhat worse for wear, but with souvenir shopping for her granddaughters in mind Myrna shrugged off her fatigue—me not so much.

Mission accomplished, on rubber legs we walked to a bus idling near the Hyde Street Pier.

From the bus driver, we learned that the fare was a whopping $2.50 per rider, half price for seniors. Without a transit pass or the exact fare, we were looking at a long, punishing walk back to David’s. The driver looked on with a bemused smile as we carefully counted our money.

We’re twenty-five cents short, said Myrna, favoring the driver with a consummate doe-eyed, damsel-in-distress look.

Wait at the stop, he said, pointing. I start my route soon. Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.

And take care of us he did. I inserted two singles and a quarter into the fare box, and he waved us through.

During our schlep to the Wharf, Myrna allowed we could have taken the bus back, which we had originally planned to do on Sunday. Had we done so, we would’ve gotten back earlier than our flight—and for a fraction of the cost. We had both gotten so caught up in the moment’s emotion, I more so in hers, that we weren’t thinking clearly.

Myrna expressed regret over fighting with her mom and for not telling her how much she loved her. Theirs was a rocky relationship, which can happen when two intimate strangers are thrown together. The mother resented being uprooted; the daughter resented her mom being deposited on her doorstep.

Besides self-reproach, Myrna feared the reproach of family members for leaving her mom at such a critical time—even though she had entrusted her to the care of two reliable siblings.

---

For the little that we accomplished in so short a time, I am thankful. For all the things that might’ve gone wrong and didn’t, I am doubly thankful. Even so, methinks I hear the faint rippling of laughter.

Oct. 15, 2016

Three

Double Jeopardy

My wife Mimi and I kept to our Saturday routine despite the upsetting phone call the previous night. We made the rounds of garage sales looking for nothing in particular, hoping to find something we didn’t know we needed till we found it. Afterwards, we drove to Little Saigon for grocery shopping and lunch.

Jerrold around age 6

Why did mom call Jay first? As the older brother, I outranked him. But it was he who informed me brother Jerrold had died. Although Jay was the youngest, because he had AIDS, the smart money would’ve bet on him to be the first of four brothers to shuffle off this mortal coil. But we go when summoned.

I phoned mom. She sounded remarkably composed, given she had just lost a son. But then she’s very good at hiding her feelings.

She said Jerrold had had an inoperable and untreatable cancer of the colon. There remained only to keep him as comfortable as possible and to let him die at home, as he wished. Dennis, Jerrold’s longtime friend and flatmate, was taking care of the arrangements.

---

He stayed by Jerrold’s side the whole time, Mom said. Then, hesitant, I have only three boys now. You have to take extra special care of yourselves, she added, before breaking down.

The questions I wanted to ask her I thought best to save for another time. Foremost being—why the hell did she wait till Jerrold died to tell me he was sick?

---

Mimi had picked up a compact stereo at a garage sale. When we got back home, I set it up for her and left her to enjoy her tapes and CDs.

I climbed the stairs to my office, prompted in part by an imminent recycling fit. These fits strike when my clutter level reaches a certain level. It isn’t so much the quantity of material things surrounding me as the hold the stuff has on me. As a packrat’s offspring, I know the task will be daunting. The business of deciding what goes and what stays is a god-like activity, and after several hours of playing judge, jury, and executioner, I took a well-deserved break.

I survey the pile of discarded items and realize that separating the wheat from the chaff wasn’t the only reason I came upstairs.

I pick up the family album and stare at the photo of an impish six-year-old boy, and weep. I wept for the loss of that boy; the fifty-one-year-old man he had become; and for the brother I no longer have.

The previous September we were chopping wood together, two middle-aged men, brothers, sometimes estranged, never close but brought closer than either of us could remember. At the end of my weeklong visit, he drove me to the airport. We parted. I don’t remember whether we even shook hands. That was the last time I saw him. He called a couple weeks later with an update on mom. We chatted for a few minutes. That was the last time I heard from him.

As I look at the photos, unanswerable questions arise. Why, for instance, does a person who smoked three packs of cigarettes a day for most of his life live long enough to collect Social Security while my brother, who never smoked a cigarette in his life, is cut down a day’s march past his prime?

Or why does a person who spent his entire life daring his diet to kill him live long enough to enjoy his golden years while my brother, a knowledgeable and respectful steward of his body, meets a premature and painful end because of a corrupted gut?

Or why one person lives to tell his grandchildren tales of his misspent youth while my brother, who, except for a stint in the Navy, seldom strayed from his parish, and whose successes and failures were of such modest proportions as to ensure his anonymity to all save those who knew and loved him, is cheated of his allotted time?

I, a fifty-five-year-old burnt-out programmer (IBM punch cards were in use when I started my career and had disappeared before the current crop of programmers was born), had just started a new job and was afraid to ask for time off to attend my brother’s funeral.

Conscience does make cowards of us all. So says the Bard. The same could be said for age.

A year after brother Jerrold died, I flew to Chicago to see mom.

---

Mom is an inveterate hoarder. She can throw nothing away. She presides over her clutter like a queen over her unruly subjects. From her throne in the front parlor, she sorts through teetering stacks of newspapers, poring over the pages, snipping out articles. The snippets go in one pile, the mutilated newsprint in another. One stack’s loss is another’s gain. Because neither snippets nor newspapers will ever leave her parlor, the culling has zero net effect on the amount of clutter.

The clutter spills over into the kitchen. The table is a repository for everything but the proverbial kitchen sink. The few square inches of visible tabletop are reserved for dining. The mess is so off-putting that I rarely eat with her, and have to hold my plate on my lap when I do.

It’s surprising she didn’t invite more pests to her table than the pesky flies that swarm around her; at which she flails, the loose flesh of her arms swaying forlornly back and forth.

I keep everything covered, she whines.

Why don’t they go somewhere else, she complains.

They’re not going to get my muffins, she declares.

The scene is both ridiculous and pathetic.

Her bedroom is a tiny, windowless alcove carved out of the space under the stairs that leads to Jerrold and Dennis’s two-bedroom flat. There, I stayed during my annual visits, and there, Dennis allowed me to stay this time—allowed but not welcomed.

Brother Jerrold, a confirmed bachelor, took Dennis, twenty years his junior, into his real estate business as an apprentice and, when the business folded, took him into his life—from protégé to surrogate son. Dennis had an older, divorced sister. I met her once and found her attractive enough to tempt even a confirmed bachelor. Perhaps Jerrold had another reason for keeping Dennis close.

Jerrold owned the two-flat and the fixer-upper next door. According to mom, he left the former to her and the latter to Dennis. Without supporting documents giving her title and/or Power of Attorney, she had only a dead man’s word. I’m sure Jerrold made his wishes known to Dennis, who had an inalienable affection for my brother, but whom I hardly knew.

With Jerrold gone, mom assumed the role of landlady, which made Dennis the tenant, one who paid no rent or offered any quid pro quo.

Mom is a shut-in and depended entirely on brother Jerrold to do her shopping, take her to doctors’ appointments, wash her clothes…everything but cook and clean house. Dennis did none of these things. In fact, mom complained he rarely looked in on her.

I didn’t dislike Dennis, but didn’t trust him either. To ensure that mom is secure in her own home, it behooved me to find the documents, but where to begin?

It’s unlikely Jerrold gave mom such important documents for safekeeping; they would be swallowed by the clutter and seen no more. I asked Dennis about them.

I’m sure they’re around here somewhere, but I don’t have time to look for them.

And I didn’t have time to wait till he did. More to the point, he seemed irked when I asked, resentful even; as if to say I had no right poking my nose into Jerrold’s affairs. Plus, he seemed defensive, suggesting a lack of candor.

The next day, after Dennis left for work, I went to work searching for any documents that would support mom’s claim to the two-flat. I had exhausted places to search and not found what I was looking for when I came across a copy of Jerrold’s death certificate. Curiously, the cause of death was redacted.

Can the deceased or spokesperson request the cause of death be censored? It’s possible in Illinois, which has a privacy law. It said so on the certificate.

Jerrold must have known that mom would tell us he died of colon cancer. So, why the secrecy? A further search turned up an unredacted copy of the death certificate. The cause of death took up two lines but meant only one thing: brother Jerrold died of AIDS.

Not till brother Jay outed himself to me was I one hundred percent sure he was gay. I had seen signs that Jerrold and Dennis might have been more than just friends, but I dismissed them. It was inconceivable that of four brothers, two would be gay.

Jerrold Robert 2/22/1945 - 4/18/1996

Sep. 30, 2015

Four

Mom’s Toilette

I pulled her into a sitting position, swung her legs over the side of the bed, and placed her walker within reach. She gripped the walker, hoisted herself up, and immediately emptied her bladder.