Thursday, May 19, 2011

Iron Men

Some people read in bed before they fall asleep, some read to hasten sleep. I love to read but I find it almost impossible to read in bed, for as soon I lay my head down I can feel consciousness slip away.

I even have to be careful how I sit in a chair. But if I have the window open I can stay awake for a very long time. As I lay there with my eyes wide open I watch the window shadow spirit across the wall in its nightly race with the rare traffic on the avenue, and I listen to the sounds of the night.

Mark, my college roommate of four (or was it five) years, liked to have a window open – even in January. I liked having a fan on, he had a humidifier going during the dry winter months. Looking back on I can’t believe neither one of us didn’t get sick. Sleeping in a room with cold, wet air being blown about should have got us two beds in the hospital for pneumonia.

This has been a tough May for many things, including sleeping with the windows open. My father, who was pretty well acquainted with the old ways of thinking, would, on a cold day in May, talk about the “Iron Men.” These “Iron Men,” referred to three days in the middle of May when frost is likely. I remember them coming around sometime between May 15 and 17 (of course I could be off by a day or two one way or another). Dad may have picked this fun fact up from his Czech (or, if you prefer, Bohemian) relatives, or from a conversation with a member of another European clan. I just wish I could know for sure which three days he was referring to so I could be ready.

Other nationalities refer to the three days as the “Three Ice Men,” and have them arriving earlier (May 11th – 13th). For them, these three days coincided with the feast days of three saints. In some countries one or two feast days, with the respective saint, was replaced with one or two other holy days and moved down the calendar. And yet still others believe that the middle of June is the proper place to be on the lookout for frost that is both unseasonable and completely unreasonable.

Whatever the three days are their threat of frost is testing my mettle. I so want to open the windows and listen to the sounds of the night filter through the screen.

As a boy growing up on Church Street in the days before central air conditioning, I could lie awake for what seemed like hours and listen to the night life. Sometimes I would hear my father talking to Donald, our neighbor, or it could be kids still playing outside who were either older or had a later bedtime than me. And every night the train and the trucks called me to ride along.

The other night I opened the window as I climbed into bed after midnight. It was still too cool, but I was growing impatient. On Harlow Avenue I can still hear the wheels click on the rail and the tires whine on the highway. The train whistle is carried up from the valley and begins to lull me to sleep, but not before I hear the sound of gravel crunching underneath shoes.

Am I dreaming or is someone walking on the road outside my window? A chill goes through my body. Have the Iron Men come?

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