(This is an excerpt from my latest novel, Summer Chaos. https://www.amazon.com/Summer-Chaos-Pastor-Maudy-Mystery-ebook/dp/B075CSSLYS/ref
 
Setting: Maudy’s lake house a few weeks after a girl was murdered and dumped in the lake. Maudy’s adult children Trevor and Patty and their friends, April, Rich, Edward and Mary Anne are visiting for the weekend. The boys are helping with an experiment to discover where the body went into the lake. Because of the murder, Mary Anne, the petite and beautiful daughter of a foreign president, has been teaching April martial arts. Mandy is Maudy’s cousin, who lives with her.)
 
Student and Master
 
My children got home from church before I did. As I came through the door Trevor met me in the hall. “You have messages on your phone.”

I immediately checked and found a half dozen messages, about the experiment.  “I found one of those pieces of wood on my beach this morning. Do you want me to bring it by?” 

“I found a piece of wood with nails in it and a number on it. Is that something important?” 

“If you are looking for those pieces of wood you had in the middle of the lake, two of them are on my beach.”

While the girls started lunch, the guys shuffled out the patio door to retrieve the pieces of wood and record where they came ashore. 

April set the stack of plates Patty had handed her on the table and followed her brother to the door as if to go with him. Rich blocked the open door and snarled at his sister, “You, stay here. No sister of mine is going anywhere near that side of the lake, and don’t leave the yard here. We don’t know where the killer came from.”

April scowled at her brother and retreated to the dining room. After he left she muttered, “I can take care of myself.”

“No you can’t.” Mary Anne narrowed her eyes and scowled until I felt uneasy.  “Some of these men who kill are unnaturally strong, and they won’t hesitate to do something a sane person couldn’t bring themselves to do. I plan on being very careful, and I have two bodyguards.” 

April pouted as flames of color flared in her cheeks. She began to slam plates at each place on the table while keeping her back to Mary Anne.

Mary Anne glanced up at April then scowled at the salad she was making. Both girls maintained an uncomfortable silence, while Patty and I quietly conferred over sandwich filling. 

Mary Anne finished tossing the salad before she said,  “April, I don’t want you to feel bad about what I said. I used to think I was pretty good with my martial arts. One night, someone attacked Papa. Papa is a great master. Nobody has ever beat him, but this man cut Papa open very bad. None of us are as good as my Papa, and he got hurt. Remember, if the master can get hurt the student is no better.”

April didn’t meet Mary Anne’s eyes when she nodded.  She didn’t say much to anybody through lunch, and I wished I knew what she was thinking.

After lunch, we started a game of sort-of-extreme-croquet. Trevor picked the most difficult places in the yard to place the wickets. One pole he planted under the laurel at the east corner of my front yard.  The other pole sat in the mud at the edge of the lake on the west side of my yard.  The house served as a huge obstacle in the middle of the course. 

Mandy and I had the advantage of having practiced during the week. The young people had the advantage of agility and a lack of ethics.

I wondered about April when she chose to play her ball last. Being extremely coordinated and strong, she had no trouble catching up to Mary Anne’s ball and croqueting it to the back of the rose bed.  April laughed and danced as Mary Anne tangled her hair in rose briars and got a bloody scratch on her leg when forced to play her ball where it landed.

Mary Anne took the abuse well. “You want to play rough. You better watch out.” 

April waited until the game had moved to the back of the house before taking her frustration and embarrassment out on her brother. Since she’d wasted part of her first turn, going after Mary Ann’s ball, April was still in the front yard when the rest of us were in the back. I thought it would take her two turns to catch up with us. As we waited for April to play, I wondered what was taking her so long. Just before I went to check on her, her ball came bounding out through the patio doors. She’d managed to play the ball through the house over both thresholds.  Her ball landed in a great position to go after Rich. 

Rich didn’t have many choices for playing his ball, but he managed to position it to put April at a disadvantage if she went after him. She went after his ball anyway and croqueted it into the lake, then demanded he play from where it lay in 3 feet of water. 

As Rich struggled to play his ball out of the deep water, April laughed at him. I thought she’d settled her earlier discomfort in a harmless manner. I watched Rich put his face in the water to get a better position for hitting the ball and remembered the pollution and stench the night I was called out to the scene where the body was found. My side of the lake smelled fresh, the water was clear and the lake bottom more sandy than mucky. I wondered how many septic systems had failed on the far side and if they were really the cause of the odor and muck.
 
I still felt slightly uncomfortable over April’s abuse of Mary Anne and didn’t want my guest to feel hurt or unwelcome. Foolishly, I thought April was the better athlete of the two. Delicate, fragile, little Mary Anne rose to the occasion and sent April’s ball through the juniper hedge and into the Hull’s yard while loudly proclaiming April had to play from where the ball lay under the Hull’s sprinklers.

I relaxed thinking both girls would be okay until Mary Anne sent my ball into the lake. She called out over my protests. “Oh, don’t whine. It’s obvious you and Mandy have been practicing, while we’ve been slaving away in the city.” Mandy’s ball joined mine in two feet of water.

Mary Anne forced Trevor to play his ball out of the Hull’s yard, he complained, “Edward, do something about your wife.”

“I am. I’m smart enough to stay well out of her way.” Edward shrugged. “You have no idea what you are up against.”
​
By the end of the game, we were all wet, except Mary Ann. Even Edward had to play his ball from under the Hull’s sprinklers. She won the game easily, and April conceded with a wet hug. April is a good sport, so I hoped she’d learned the lesson that her teacher was right.

 
Part of my business involves doing flowers for weddings. I love doing wedding flowers, but then, maybe I’m a masochist.
 
Most wedding planning books tell the prospective bride to start planning six months to a year before her big day. I have done flowers for weddings when the bride planned for a whole week before the ceremony and forgot to order flowers until the Wednesday before a Saturday ceremony. As long as the bride is happy with whatever is blooming at that moment, we can make the flowers happen. Other brides have given me six months notice. For these occasions, I was able to plant flowers that would work for the organized bride.
 
I just finished the flowers for a wedding in Portland. As usual, we learned a few things. The challenge with this wedding was that it was in Portland.  We are on Vashon Island, near Seattle. The Mother-of-the-Bride (MOB) wanted to take the flowers down on Friday, which meant the arrangements needed to be made on Thursday for a Sunday wedding. The main flowers were supposed to be dahlias. From a picking on Wednesday and Thursday, holding until Sunday is too much to ask of a dahlia. They just don’t hold up that long. One of the advantages my business has is that we can furnish short lived flowers like English Roses and Dahlias because we don’t have to ship-except for out-of-town family weddings. Moral of the story: If you want flowers that are shipped, choose something sturdy like tea roses, hydrangea, chrysanthemum, lilies, or tulips and daffodils.

I was sixteen when Mom let me take a bus from Tacoma WA to Woodburn OR to visit a friend. The bus was mostly empty, so I chose a window seat away from other passengers and pulled out my book.
 
The bus was, at most, half full when a man my father’s age got on. He towered over me, and I thought he tried to look down the neck of my dress as he sat down in the aisle seat and leaned toward me.  I found him repulsive but froze where I sat. I covered my legs with my jacket and turned my back toward him. I wanted to move to another seat but felt afraid to try to get away.
 
I still remember my frozen shock when that man sat beside me and started to ask me questions. “Do you like to read?”
 
“Oui.”
 
“What are you reading?”
 
“Les Miserables en Francais.” At the ripe age of sixteen, I’d learned I could easily get rid of unwanted attentions by demonstrating my superior intellect. For those who’ve never done this, my friends and I sat around at slumber parties discussing how to get rid of unwanted attentions without making the unwanted suitor angry or hurting his feelings. Acting smarter than they are is often a real turn off for guys.
 
“I guess you’re real smart, huh.” The pervert hadn’t taken any of my gentle hints.
 
“Oui.” I refused to speak English for the next hour, hoping he’d find chatting with me too burdensome and leave.
 
One thing I hadn’t learned at this age was how to get rid of seasoned predators. My little tricks to get rid of boys my age didn’t work with this man. I couldn’t think what to do. I was afraid to climb over him to get away. Nobody had told me that I could stand, swear like a sailor, and tell the guy to bug off, while attracting the attention of everybody on the bus. Nobody told me that old men were predators. We didn’t call humans predators back then.  Instead, of drawing attention to myself, I sat frozen with fear and tried to cover myself with my purse, book and coat while squished against the side of the bus, away from that creep.
 
Finally, the bus stopped at another station and the driver announced we could get off and use the restroom.
 
Pervert-of-the-Bulging-Pants tried to bump me again. “We’ll just wait and let the others off first.”
 
I stood. “No. I have to use the bathroom now.”
 
He didn’t move and neither did anybody else on the bus. I realized that I had support. The frozen, frightened rabbit response dissolved. I could raise my voice. I could kick him in the knee and stomp on his feet as I climbed past him. Using my purse and book to shield my privates, I inflicted as much damage to his shoes and feet as I could squeezing my way past him and out of that seat.
 
I used the restroom and took stock of my problem. A group of older women were traveling together. I moved closer to them and commented on a hand-knit sweater then I joined their group to talk about knitting. We got on the bus together, and I moved to sit with my new friends.
 
Pervert got on the bus. Instead of taking his old seat, he came back to where I was sitting with the older women. He said to the woman beside me in the aisle seat, “I’m sitting with her. You’ll have to move. There’s an empty seat behind your friends.”
 
I tried to look smug as I said, “We’re going to all sit together and talk about knitting. I don’t want to sit next to you.”  Yes, once I had allies I could be quite bold. I could think what to do. I remained much more polite than I needed to, but back then this nice Presbyterian girl had never even heard the “F” word.
 
The woman next to me said, “I’m staying right here with all my friends.”
 
Pervert finally, turned away and moved toward the front of the bus. I thought he would sit where he had been earlier.  Instead, he moved to the front of the bus to sit next to a young woman in her twenties.
 
I knew he was trying to pick up younger women, but really didn’t understand what was going on. I still have no idea what he wanted. Was he looking for a quickie, a one-night-stand, or did he want the thrill of raping a woman. I don’t know. I certainly had no skills at that age to assess his motives.
 
Once I saw the pervert sit with another woman, I understood he was looking for more than a companion to chat with on a long trip. I looked at the woman next to me. “Thanks for not moving. That guy is a creep. He sat next to me and was looking at me, you know.”
 
The five older women nodded. They did know. We bonded over our shared experiences with nasty men.
 
From those women and their understanding of my predicament, I learned that some men are just plain nasty. It’s okay to use whatever skills we have to get away from them. By the time I was thirty, I’d developed a sixth sense about what men were doing with their hands and whether it was safe to walk past them. I learned to give them The Look, which scared them back a few feet. I learned I could snarl, “Touch me, and I’ll kick your kneecap off.” I learned to be scary.
 
What I never learned as a young woman and am just now beginning to realize is that women shouldn’t have to live with this shit. Men can learn to keep their hands to themselves. Men can sit and read a book instead of picking on young girls. Men do not have to be predators. Their behavior is just plain wrong.
 
 

Once when my mother was in the hospital, her doctor walked into her room and found her crying. He asked her what the problem was. She waved at the TV. “I can’t do anything to help those people.” The doctor picked up the remote and changed the TV from the news to a music channel. He knew she needed to change her focus.
 
Once Mom was out of the hospital, she would frequently call me distressed over the state of the world. I’d tell her to change to the cooking channel. “But I have to know what is happening,” she’d argue.
 
“You really need to eat better. You need to take care of your mental health and half the news is simply manipulating you.” I’d answer. My words fell on deaf ears. I suspected Mom was addicted to the adrenalin boost she got from watching the news. Logic and reasoning failed to help her.
 
I finally used my professional skills and changed my approach with Mom. I’d say, “Did the firemen arrive? Are they using helicopters or airplanes to fight that fire? Did those people make it to a shelter?”
 
My change of focus dramatically changed Mom’s mental health. Despite being over ninety, stubborn, a huge drama queen, and prone to depression, Mom started looking for the helpers in times of tragedy. Once her focus changed, she saw that she could do things to help. If people from her church brought her yarn, she could crochet squares for blankets to send to those in need. She started hand-sewing quilt squares. She was still making quilt tops after she went into hospice care.
 
I won’t say we don’t have troubles in this world, we do. However, how you deal with the troubles becomes a matter of caring for your own mental health, and as Mom learned, you can be a helper.
 
Everyday, I encounter many people distressed over fires, hurricanes, and random violence. I find myself saying, “Yes, the gunman was evil, but look how many people risked their own life to save others. Look at the hundreds willing to lay down their lives for others. The good far outweighs the evil.”
 
As I keep telling the story of the school kid who started a campaign at his school to make hygiene kits to send to refugees, I feel stronger.  I know I am on to something effective as I discipline myself to use the skills I learned in counseling classes to focus on the constructive aspects of any situation. There is power in focusing on the helpers and those who will risk their lives to help others.
 
There is a vast difference between focusing on the helpers in any situation and pretending we don’t have troubles. We do have troubles, but we also have people who are willing to stop what they are doing and stand up to those troubles. 
 
Yes, the political response to the hurricanes in Puerto Rico, left much to be desired. Did you see how the local people handled the problem? Did you see how many people turned their own private home into a shelter for their neighbors? Have you seen the pictures of the local men out clearing roads? In Houston, did you see the pictures of people towing their boats toward the city to help with evacuations?
 
The political figures and the media want our attention. Our attention gives their lives meaning and power. I would much prefer to give meaning to the common person, who goes out and pulls tree limbs out of the road by his house. I prefer to give power to the high school kid who organizes his school and community to send thousands of hygiene kits to evacuees. You know, that school kid has more power than the media person who sits in front of a camera and talks about his opinion without really doing anything to help those in need.
 
Yes, tragedy is part of the human condition. How we respond to that tragedy is our choice. We can become a helper by donating money or by organizing an effort to send supplies to those in need. We can respond to tragedy by reminding others that the good people in this world vastly outnumber the evil. We the common people can have more power than the power elite when we focus on the helpers, encourage others, and wherever possible become a helper ourselves. We have great power because when we work together, there are more of us than there are evil people. Together, we are even stronger than the hurricanes.