The Real Me: Joanne W. Iverson

It’s dark. It’s raining. It’s cold and windy. It’s only early in the evening, about 6:30. Come out the front door of the hotel to the wet street that’s lit by street lights. Turn left walk on the sidewalk, past the huge cement truck yard. The highway here is very, very busy with speeding traffic as we walk to the pedestrian light at the corner.  

Something’s different. Cars are going the wrong way! Be careful! Wait for the light to change. Dash across to other side. Go straight on to Narrow Lane. It parallels the river Thames. This is the old side of the city, reclaimed. No people walking here. Little stores, walkways through and behind some of the reclaimed buildings.

It’s lonely.  We are headed for dinner at the Grapes pub in Limehouse.

If we didn’t know it was there waiting for us, I would be apprehensive about walking further.  See steps winding down to the water from an unremarkable building. On the other side, the overflow from the river churns up against old lock gates.

I go inside the old building and climb the stairs. It’s not even furnished, yet it’s so much like home, not unlike on our street at Second and Arch in Philadelphia. An extra place to hide away in. 

It was dark up there and looked as though no one has been using it. Paintings were stacked randomly around the room and I went to search for a good one. I was disappointed to find that every single one was a poor painting of some part of the anatomy of some woman’s body. There was one painting of a man making a funny face that was in reality an ugly picture of an ugly man making a funny face. I looked around some more and found not one that was worth any extra perusal or thought. 

As I looked around the room, I suddenly wondered why I thought that I should stay and try to find an artwork of beauty. I thought perhaps this house, since it is a very old place and hot, that maybe it is haunted. I looked around and concentrated on the seventh rung of some kind of ladder for knowledge of the spirits that inhabit this building. I was disappointed to find that there did not appear to be any. So I took a last look around and opened myself to communication with any spirit that lives there. Unfortunately,  there was no response and there was no feeling that anything other than me inhabiting that room.

So I walked to the top of the stairs and started down, taking care that my bad ankle does not give away and happy that no bad spirit messed up my gate. I took them one at a time and went to Limehouse to have dinner with my friends.

Everything you do is from learned behavior.

When I was a little kid, I heard wonderful music, played by my mother on an old piano in my home.

I had no idea how to repeat the lovely sounds I heard, but I figured out that the sounds were a result of a succession of keys that I pressed that actually sounded like the tune my mom recently played!

And this is how I learned to play by ear. 

It turned out to be a nice, sunny day after all.  It had rained lightly all day but now there is no wind, the river is calm and there are few shells rowing up river. 

Jimmy had the captain’s permission to take out one of the older singles and he was anxious to put in a lot of miles. He left the dock enthused to row in a real shell, not just the gig he had learned in. I was happy to row along beside him.

It was beautiful on the race course. No other boats are in sight. I just keep on rowing in my single . . . I’m at the top now. Should turn around and head back but it is so nice up here that I’ll just keep going “up towards Manayunk.” Another 20 or so strokes. . .through two big bridge abutments. . .still rowing. . .then. . . BANG! THUNK! What happened??  

Jimmy fell into the water! 

I watched as he let go of his oars and grabbed his boat, realizing quickly that he had rowed over a submerged boulder and damaged his shell badly. It was already taking in water from the big hole in the bow and it would not be possible to upright, get back in, from where he was in the water.  So Jimmy swam to shore.

On the west bank, I noticed the fishermen, sitting and talking while they ignored the hapless rower.

But not the kids, who were sneaking a swim nearby in the “forbidden” river. They saw the rower swim away from the boat, and before Jimmy had even reached shore, they were clamering to get into it.

Sykes Skinner, at 12 years old the oldest and biggest kid, succeeded in boarding the craft.  Straddling the narrow  width of the boat and balancing himself, Sykes stood up and loudly proclaimed, “I found me a boat!”