No. 3

I Will Drop It

Wednesday, January 19, 1911

To Mother Undefiled,

Months have gone by without my documentation of devotion because it was not ladylike but only an accounting. The practice of recording had a grip on the mar, the spoils of my story, of how I got to Bedford, Indiana, after my stay in a Seattle brothel, not in practice there, for somehow I was saved from any stain with that, but in the sully swing of sin I watched and did nothing about but complain and beg for money to leave.

But it was never about the money, which was not the thing that would save me, although it helped and came when I was ready to let go of the thing.

For love of you, I do not want to record the bad parts, but the goodness of David and how he helped me get out of there and to here, sitting on this porch as I write to you, waiting for the children to come over.

My real and true name is Mary. My parents wanted me to fashion your work. Not this “Beatrix Kurtz”, but I will take the new identity, this relay work. But do I have to accept that the new name rhymes with hurts? Just help me not keep a log or record of how I got to Seattle, but my landing in Bedford. Help me record the good times for the uplift needed as soon a circle of children will need someone pulled together.

Mother, your purity is startling! I saw it in my new family, when I arrived last year, after losing the child placed in my care. I had one very simple job, but my attention was pulled away by some upset Italians, many of whom are my friends today, for they stopped their arguing when I started to wail and scream for the lost one. Here I was a stranger to the town, but the instincts of these aliens were universal. A child needed to be found. Why did the Lord bring me here to save me and then let me immediately ruin it all on my own account?

I cannot hold onto the timeline of what Arthur did to me in Seattle if I am to be in your army, my Lady. For love of you, I can have nothing but the daily bread. I cannot hold onto Arthur. This morning, I walked to the outskirts of town to an appropriate resting place there, to leave his memory there! To give him to a junk dealer there!

It made me think of the yard where things are dropped. One day last fall I noticed some coming and goings at the Presbyterian Church with a big pully. This is the church where I sometimes babysit, while the adults are at the service, I get along nicely with them in the basement of the church.

Anyway, on this one afternoon, as the children in my care were playing well together on the porch, I watched the men working. How I miss the men! Would there be anyone in that lot for me?

From my distance I could not see specifics, although I saw that work abruptly stopped, there was a huddle, some yelling, and someone getting dismissed.

That rejected worker was now headed my way. He carried with him something like a pipe. I went out to the road to greet him. I asked him what was going on at the church and what he was carrying.

He stopped because he wanted to vent. The church was getting a new organ. He needed to document and put it in order, I suppose, and blow. He was hanging on to a broken pipe. It was a dusty pipe that cracked. He mentioned it to the foreman that he would like to take it home for the scrap metal. They knew he was going to try to sell it.

I asked the man if I could see how the thing might have gotten broken. He said a repairman fell onto it. He said he was not the man who fell on it. He only wanted to sell it, which was, apparently, the thing that upset the flow of spirit and unity among the workers. He said he got what he wanted and lifted the pipe as he walked away.

Your daughter, Bea Kurtz

Copyright 2026 Christine Friesel