“Mornin’ Mr. Cooper!”
The little boy rode his bike by the older man. Mr. Cooper, walking toward the beach, was a fixture in this small, seaside neighborhood. Slightly slumped and balding, he wore thick glasses and a slight smile. “Morning, Daniel.” Mr. Cooper knew all the neighborhood kids by name.
The town of Pass Christian, Mississippi had slowly bounced back after Hurricane Katrina devastated it in the summer of 2005. Large live oaks that once shaded the palatial mansions were no longer there. Nor were the original homes. Highway 90 was all that remained between the rebuilding town and the passive/aggressive Mississippi Sound. Mr. Cooper stayed, though. He loved the Mississippi Gulf Coast. He rebuilt his small home with the money from the insurance company. He was one of the few on his street who had flood insurance. Mr. Cooper was always one to do the rational thing.
He walked down to Highway 90, carefully crossed the four-laned road and began to take his daily walk along the water’s edge. He found all kinds of things along the water –but mainly he found peace. It was funny how the very body of water that had cost his town dearly gave him so much.
Two women stood at the edge of the town’s playground as their children played. They looked across the highway at the slightly hunched old man walking slowly toward the setting sun.
“He seems nice enough. But what do we really know about Mr. Cooper? He seems friendly to all the kids. I dunno — it makes me nervous.” Stella Stinebring said to Frieda Gibson.
Frieda put away her iPhone and said, “He’s harmless. I think he’s retired from the Post Office or something like that. He keeps mostly to himself — except for his nightly walks. He’s almost like a town mascot.”
“Is he married?” Stella asked.
“Why, are you interested?”
Stella shot her friend and dirty look. “Just curious, that’s all. Never hurt to ask a few questions. Particularly about a man we know nothing about.”
Across the highway, Mr. Cooper walked slowly along the surf. A keen observer might have noticed he was looking for something. But that observer would not have guessed what it was. Mr. Cooper was too guarded.
What the sea taketh, it giveth. Mr. Cooper always carried a bag for the trinkets that washed ashore. One day he found a ring. The next he found a campaign button. Mr. Cooper was collecting bits and pieces of lives washed to sea. No one would have guessed it, but he was looking for that one piece to transport him to another time and place.
A seagull flew overhead, crying out to lost souls of the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
Mr. Cooper watched the gull and then looked at his battered wristwatch. It was time to go home. He headed back east, toward Gulfport and the casinos. He knew that Mr. Whiskers, Mr. Cooper’s 16-year-old cat would be hungry. The white sand was pinkish now from the setting sun as purple clouds hovered over the Gulf. The water was tranquil and so was Mr. Cooper’s mind.
Mr. Whiskers greeted him as only an ancient Siamese cat truly can. “MEORWER,” the bony cat meowed in a deep moan.
“No, Mr. Whiskers, I didn’t find it today. But I know it is out there. I’ll feed you in minute. I promise.”
No one in Pass Christian had ever been inside Mr. Cooper’s house. If they had, some of the mystery of the man might be revealed. Clues were littered throughout his small cottage. But Mr. Cooper was determined only allow one person — or cat as the case may be — would ever know the truth.
Mr. Cooper was an artist. And his name wasn’t Mr. Cooper.
Across the cluttered living room was a blank canvas. A blank canvas that had sat in Mr. Cooper’s house since 1995. That was the moment his muse had left him. And from that moment on, Mr. Cooper, or previously known as Pablo Geavense — renowned oil painter, had desperately searched for its return. An old, yellowed newspaper on the floor had a headline that told the next chapter of Pablo’s life. “Renowned painter vanishes.” That’s what they thought, Pablo shrugged. That’s what they thought. Mr. Whiskers knew the truth.
Pablo “Cooper” was like Superman in a roomful of Kryptonite — he had lost his creativity and now was powerless. Mr. Cooper opened a can of tuna and fed the old cat. “Maybe we’ll find it tomorrow my friend. Maybe tomorrow.”
Sunday afternoon meant time for another walk. Mr. Cooper walked past the kids playing in the park and the disapproving Stella Stinebring. He caught her scowl and winked at her. She scoffed and quickly looked the other way. Mr. Cooper laughed as he headed down the hill toward the sea. He carried his bag and his stick. Today was the day he’d find his muse. He just knew it.
Lightning danced on the horizon, stabbing and jabbing at sea below. The tranquil brown water now had whitecaps on it. Wind whipped the sand and what little hair he had left on his head. Mr. Cooper walked slowly, looking carefully at the beach ahead of him. A storm was blowing in from New Orleans.
Mr. Cooper walked to the surf’s edge and felt the warm water wash over his feet. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a locket. He carefully opened it and looked at the picture inside. It might have been sand in his eye or even salt spray, but he felt a tear well up in his eyes. There, inside the locket, was the picture of the love of his life. The love of his life who he had caught with another man.
From that day in Paris, Mr. Pablo Geavense “Cooper” had not touched a brush. He had become the servant who buried his talent. Hurt, anger and fear choked his creativity killing it like the first frost of the year. Bitterness ate him alive. He kept the blank canvas as a reminder what he used to be able to do. And every day, he searched the beach, hoping to find the art inside of him again.
And then an epiphany struck him like the lightning on the Gulf:
His art was nothing more than a reflection of himself.
He gripped the locket and looked at it once again. He then closed his eyes, took a breath and threw it out into the Mississippi Sound. He let go of his bitterness, took a deep breath and felt the salty air fill his lungs. Like a boat freed from its anchor, Mr. Cooper began to add brushstrokes to his life’s canvas once again.
Epilogue:
Mississippi Museum of Art features Coast artist’s first show
Jackson, Miss — Over three hundred people crowded the Mississippi Museum of Art Tuesday night as up-and-coming painter Pablo Cooper opened his first show of his work. Critics worldwide have raved about Cooper’s paintings, writing that they remind them of a ‘More talented Pablo Geavense.” Cooper, from Pass Christian, was accompanied by his new wife, Stella.
Love. This. Story.