When I was six or seven, I used to get earaches a lot. Excruciating. I would lie in the dark and whimper. My mom or dad would put in drops. It took a while but usually, after a bit, the pain would subside.
My parents played bridge back in those days, with The Paynes. Bob and Heidi. They had a mess of kids ranging in age from six to twenty-six. Our families would get together and we’d all go camping. Massasoit. Martha’s Vineyard. Miles Standish State Park. Great times. Lots of laughs.
My parents had a pop-up trailer in which they usually slept and Mr. Payne, (he was a professor at the local community college) provided tents; canvas tents that were big enough to stand in and sleep five or six. I slept in those with my brothers and the two Payne boys who were around my brothers' age. When we unwrapped the tents at the beginning of summer, you could smell the previous summer’s last breath. Invariably, a bunch of earwigs (creepiest insect ever) would scurry out. I’d remember the Twilight Zone episode of the same name wherein an earwig eats through a man’s head and he somehow survives (spoiler alert: it came out the other ear). Stuff of nightmares for me for years. Thanks Steve (my eldest brother who let me watch that shit)!
Anyway. We hung out with them a lot. They lived only a couple of miles from us and, like I said, my parents played bridge with them on the reg. While they did that, I played with Lori (a year younger than me) and, sometimes, her niece, Didi, who was only a couple of years younger than her. We mostly played "Family". Lori and I would be the parents and Didi was our little baby. Once in awhile I’d play with Kenny who would have been maybe twelve at this time. Kenny would involve me in mischief which would be somewhere between adventurous and criminal. He was slick. We never got caught. A couple close calls, but the Somerset Police Department is not exactly Scotland Yard. They had a great house and I loved everything about it. It was around two hundred years old, built in colonial times. The wall switches were pushbutton. You’d push the top button in which turned the lights on and made the bottom button pop out. The stairs creaked a little but it was solid. Safe. I felt as at home there as if I were in my own home. That house had a lot of love. I’m sure there were problems. But love was the air I breathed when I was there. I felt there were ghosts but they seemed happy too.
One night, while Heidi and Bob played bridge with my parents, I had the worst earache I have ever had, before or since. I couldn't play. I couldn't even be near people. I was miserable, lying alone on a couch the family room with the lights off. I had a fairly low tolerance for pain, but when pain was going to park for awhile, I sucked it up. They tried everything. A warm compress seemed to provide a bit of relief, but not much. I remember wondering if I should ask to go to the hospital. But I remembered that even in the Twilight Zone episode, the doctor said all they could do was wait. So I lied as still and as quietly as I could and I waited.
Mr. Payne was a great big man with a booming voice and a barrel chest. When he yelled at one of his children (which wasn’t often) he could be heard down the street. And when he laughed (which he often did) the old house rumbled. He has long since passed, but I'm sure that house still stands and on a quiet enough night, the echo of his laughter can still be heard. That night, Mr. Payne was my caretaker. A true gentle giant. I was this little boy and he put one of his great big hands on my forehead to feel for fever. I was hot. I clearly remember, at one point, he heated some baby oil in a teaspoon over the flame atop the kitchen's gas stove. He came in to the living room and touched the spoon to be sure it wasn't too hot. Then, ever so carefully, he poured some warm baby oil from the teaspoon into my ear. I remember a little ran down my cheek and he caught it with a soft washcloth. I don’t know to this day if that is what you are supposed to do for an earache or not. But it felt good going in. It felt like he was pouring love and kindness into my ear. Warm and soothing. I closed my eyes and slept more deeply than I think I ever have, before or since.
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