by Bonniel Rostok

Created on: May 15, 2009

Warrior, Alabama

A month ago, I started getting the phone calls. They woke me from a dead sleep. I'd rush out to the living room where my cell was plugged in and check only to see the time and the message that "charging was completed" reflected back to me. No alerts, no messages. No calls. This happened for one week and then moved into the second week. I had to get up at 5 am to commute 90 miles to my job. The dream calls were making me nod at the steering wheel, correct comp 1 papers erratically, and were turning me into a lousy grouchy human being. A friend of mine, who I fancy to be somewhat of a shaman, suggested I assume a particular acupressure pose and ask who was calling and what this person wanted. Exhausted and loopy from various sleep remedies, too tired even to laugh, I obediently did what she told me to do. And honestly, I was terrified. First, what if someone answered? Second, who would it be? Third, was my friend, who is far more spiritual than myself, full of shit? I went into the pose, asked who was calling and what he or she wanted. And someone answered. It wasn't in some voice-from-beyond kind of way. I just had a feeling of who it was. No one actually spoke. It was just that, in a moment or two, I had access to information I didn't have before. It was from and about my grandmother who, until this past weekend, lived in

Kingsport, Tennessee. Her body had been steadily failing her for several weeks, but at the time of the phone calls, she was alive and well. However, the information I got was that she was going to die soon and take her stories with her.

My grandmother, Mary Moncrief Whitener Dail, grew up in Warrior, Alabama. She was a beautiful woman. She'd been a swimsuit model in her youth. I saw the pictures. She was a buxom cross between Vivian Leigh and Eva Gardner. She married William E. Whitener II. I don't know how, when, or where they met, but the marriage was a disaster. The fragments I have from my father involve alcohol, butcher knives, and wife-swapping. In 1961, Mary Whitener left Alabama and her husband with my then 11 year-old father, moved to Washington D.C. and landed a job in the White House. She saw John Kennedy's body laid out after his assassination. She remarried John Dail, a kind man who didn't know where he began or ended. My grandmother didn't know her borders either, but was more feral than my grandfather. Again, not an ideal marriage. They gave birth to my aunt, however, who is only six years

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