A Visit With Mrs Elizabeth Erickson

8/12/2019 A Visit With Mrs Elizabeth Erickson

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A Visit With Mrs. Elizabeth Erickson

Jeisyn Murphy, MA

The house seemed so much smaller than what I had constructed in my mind. As I

parked the car and began clearing my head I thought of many of the people that Iknew that had been to the Hayward Avenue addressthe home of Dr. and Mrs. Milton

Erickson since 1970. It was July 24th, 2003 and twenty-three years since Milton

Erickson had last viewed the corner house lot.

It was 2:00 p.m. and we had arrived at our appointed time. My colleague, David, and I

approached the front entrance of the residence. I noticed various kinds of plants, in

particular a row of cacti that lined the porch. Immediately we heard fierce barking. Mrs.

Erickson owned two Manchester Terriers and although we couldnt see them yet, we

would later discover that they looked like miniature Doberman Pincers. She quickly

opened the door and told us to wait a moment, then closed it to herd Thunder Heartand Charlene to the backyard. The dogs were excited and so was I.

Mrs. Erickson returned to the door and opened it allowing me to open the screen. I

stepped in, shook her hand and said, Its a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Erickson. Im

Jeisyn. Murphy, isnt it? she said as she took my hand. Yes, thats right, I said,

surprised that she would recall my last name. She shook my hand with an unusual

amount of pressure placed on the lower part of my wrist with her right forefinger. It was

remarkably noticeable. Her twinkling blue eyes made direct eye contact with mine as

she welcomed us into her home. I felt immediately at ease.

Im going to show you some things in this room and then well walk out to Dr.

Ericksons office. It is exactly as it was when he was alive. She spoke with careful

enunciation and it was obvious that she had decided on a particular agenda. At the

same time she had a gingerly tone to her voice that indicated there might be some

delightful adventures in store for us. Now Dr. Erickson loved wood carvings, she said

enthusiastically.

She directed our attention to several iron-wood carvings of many different animals that

were on shelves in her TV room. She viewed them with as much interest as if she, toowere seeing them for the first time. Mrs. Erickson told us that a trader with the Seri

Indians always made his first stop at Ericksons house when he learned how interestedMilton was in wood carvings. When the trader visited, he and Milton would sit out on

the porch and talk about the Seri and their carvings for quite awhile. I looked outside

and could see the row of cacti on her porch. Mrs. Erickson said, Milton planted those

himself. He would just break off a piece and stick it in the ground and it would grow.


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She commented on him growing up on the farm in Wisconsin and that he enjoyed

planting very much, especially cacti.

It wasnt long before we were back to talking about the iron-wood carvings. I had just

noticed one of his bolo ties displayed on a shelf when Mrs. Erickson told me to pick

one of carvings up and notice how heavy they were. I went over to a basketball size

carving of an Octopus. The wood was a deep brown color and very smooth to touch. I

was quite surprised when I tried to lift the carving. It must have weighed nearly 50 lbs.

Mrs. Erickson went on to say that she pointed out to the trader how many of the Seri

carvings were of wild animals and not domesticated. On his next visit he brought her a

carving of a dog with a bird in his mouth. I said that a dog with a bird in his mouth

didnt seem very domesticated. She replied, Well yes he is. Hes gone and caught a

bird and brought it back for us to see. Hes very proud. I had to agree with her, he didlook proud.

She offered to show us her living room, that there were more wood carvings and other

things we should see. As we were passing her TV I noticed three 5 figurines from Star

Trek. I asked her, Are these yours? Do you like Star Trek? Oh yes, Milton and I

watched Star Trek, but the old television series, you know. I still enjoy it very much. I

saw these in a magazine and ordered them. I was quite struck with how real to life they

are. Wharf, Data and Captain Picard stood facing the West poised and ready for

action. We moved along.

In order to get to the living room we would have to pass through the kitchen. This

meant we would encounter Thunder and Charlene. They had been put out in the

backyard earlier but now were barking even more urgently as if they were convinced

Mrs. Erickson had strangers in her house that she was unaware of. No coaxing would

help. We could let them in. Theyve never bitten anyone, she said. I told Mrs.

Erickson that I had three dogs and would be quite comfortable. She seemed relieved

and allowed the dogs to come inside. They sniffed and chortled and continued to warn

her of whatever it was they thought was dangerous. I knelt down and began to pet

Thunder (her older, male Terrier). He stopped barking and took to the affection and

attention quite readily. Mrs. Erickson commented that he was the smarter dog and

caught on to what was happening around him much faster than Charlene, who wasnervously checking David and me out. I was enjoying playing with the dogs and curious

about what we would see in Mrs. Ericksons living room but there was a nagging

curiosity about what would it be like to stand in Milton Ericksons office. I stood up and

looked toward the living room. There was something on the wall that I recognized.


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Mrs. Erickson noticed that I was already peering into the living room and we began

walking towards it together. I pointed to a scene on the wall over a couch and said, Iknow the story behind that. She smiled and said, Yes, that is a wood carving that was

made by an artist who was a patient of my late husbands. It was a piece crafted with

wood about 3 X 4 of Mrs. Erickson as a young mother cradling a baby in her hands

with four other children surrounding them. She commented, Those are my five natural

children. My late husband had three of his own from a previous marriage that he had

sole custody of when we married. The ones in the carving are mine. I had heard that

Dr. Erickson had a patient who was an artist and had lost three of his fingers on his right

hand in an accident. While the man was in the hospital Erickson sent a message to him

saying that he should rest and recoverthat when he was released, Erickson would

make very sure that he be would able to keep making art out of wood. And not only

that but that Erickson would teach him to shake someones hand in such a way thatthey would never know he was missing three fingers.

We continued to move around the living room with Mrs. Erickson as she showed us

various items that were of importance to Milton, including a bowl that he had someone

carve out and that he, himself, had smoothed and finished. I put my finger inside the

bowl and gently traced circles starting in the center and moving out toward the edges.

Not a single bump was in the bowl. Milton had polished it thoroughly.

Next we turned and faced the sliding glass windows that framed the backyard and

apartment house. Both Thunder and Charlene were calm now and followed alongbehind us. Mrs. Erickson pointed to a very large Palo Verde tree that was in the center

of her backyard. She said that this tree was Dr. Ericksons favorite kind of tree and that

he would sit under it during the day to relax. She mentioned that these trees were very

brittle and usually were reduced in size by the desert winds. This one however was

protected on all sides either by fences or houses and was able to grow twice the size of

most Palo Verde trees. She said that she had recently seen a picture of the largest Palo

Verde tree in Arizona and claimed that she and her son Robert both feel hers is larger

but that she didnt want busloads of curious people coming over to see it. It was clear

though, that she didnt mind opening her home to us so that we could have a glimpse

of her life with Milton Erickson.

We made our way out to the backyard with both dogs following behind us. As I walked

closer to the Palo Verde I decided to stand underneath it. I thought about Milton and

how he must have felt sitting under its green canopy of branches that were stark

against the blue Arizona sky. Mrs. Erickson was mentioning that one of the large

branches had snapped off and that Robert was planning on moving it out of the way

the coming weekend, but I was caught between time for an endless moment. I could


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feel the hot, dry air on my skin, see a latticework of green branches laced like a ribbon

with the blue sky above my head and I was listening to Mrs. Ericksonthe world cameto a stop. And just a few feet from me was Ericksons office, a place where countless

people experienced their own world changing before their eyes. Mrs. Erickson was

moving on to the pomegranate bush by the apartment house entrance. She was telling

us about how she had made jelly out of the fruit and that Milton both liked the flavor of

the pomegranate and the fact that one of their plants was producing food. He really

took delight in accomplishing more than one thing at once.

The apartment house was both a residence and Ericksons office space. One of his

granddaughters was living in the residence for the summer and signs of life were

abundant. Mrs. Erickson led us past a beige, accordion-like divider and I felt that I had

been transported back in time. It could have been 1979 or 1980. A light layer of dust

blanketed everything. I recognized a black and white Indian-made rug, some paintings,and certificates I had seen in videotapes and pictures. There was a tall bookshelf that

contained titles of various subjects that I could now read: hypnosis, psychology,medicine, and even science fiction. This room served as a lobby and a space for larger

groups of people that would listen to Dr. Erickson lecture. The door to Ericksons

smaller office was partly opened. David and I followed Mrs. Erickson.

This office was approximately a 15 X 10 sized room. Although it was small it had four

chairs and a desk in it. One of the chairs was a rolling chair situated at Dr. Ericksons

desk. The other was a smooth, green chairthis was the clients chair. Whether it was a

private session or in a group, Erickson had the person he was working with (at leastdirectly) sitting in this chair. And there was a chair to the right of the green chair. Mrs.

Erickson sat down in the green chair while David and I looked about the room. She

looked pleased to see us take so much interest in his office. She talked about many

objects, one of the most meaningful was a leather-bound set of the Encyclopedia

Britannica. Many years ago, Dr. Erickson wrote an article on hypnosis that was

published in that encyclopedia, she said in a dignified tone. The set had three

volumes. The middle volume had a small, white piece of paper surrounding it that

read: This set belongs to Robert Erickson. July 23, 2003. Mrs. Erickson had given the

set to her son, Robert, but he wanted to leave them displayed in the library for others

to enjoy. Looking around the office again I took in as much as I could. In one corner of

the room stood Dr. Ericksons cane. On the walls were various awards that he wasobviously proud to display: a famous historical document framed in glass, and on

shelves and his desk stood more iron-wood carvings. There was another bookshelf that

included similar categories and authors (including Asimov) but with additions: there

were some books on language, historical books, some American classics and even

comic books.


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It seemed to me that the occurrence of the color purple increased as we moved from

the TV room, through the living room and into the apartment house. I noticed a purple,handmade Octopus lying on Ericksons desk. Its still black eyes were staring at the

ceiling (not unlike many of the patients that once sat in that office) and on the wall to

the left of his desk hung an abstract purple painting. I sat down next to Mrs. Erickson

and inquired about these items. She said that many patients made Erickson gifts that

he liked and some of them he used as teaching tools. She said that Milton had a color

deficiency because he was red/green colorblind. She thought that the purple color

probably appeared blue to him and that he appreciated that color very much.

Mrs. Erickson was beginning to look tired. She was sitting to the right of me in that

green chair and I was full of appreciation. She had given us quite a gift that afternoon. I

didnt want to say goodbye but it was time. I was the first to stand up and Mrs. Ericksonfollowed. As we were leaving the small office Mrs. Erickson pointed to an item on Dr.

Ericksons desk. She told us with emotion in her voice, This is Dr. Ericksons lastappointment book. I stared at the dark blue book with his writing on it and for a

moment imagined what must have been in those pages.

We passed into the larger office and I thanked her for allowing us to visit. I took my last

look around and had a very peculiar feeling. This room contained the ghosts of so

many words, sentences, facial expressions, indeed all manner of communications that

have helped people to learn, sometimes to unlearn and relearn, and to have

experiences that caused them to live healthy and productive lives. Silently, I alsothanked Dr. Erickson on my way out.

We walked back towards the main residence side by side. I could feel the world

beginning to move again and I was aware that I had rejoined the present. Just as we

were about to leave the phone rang. Mrs. Erickson excused herself. I knelt down to pat

Thunder and Charlene goodbye who were both in good spirits and heard Mrs. Erickson

telling Robert that she had professional visitors and would have to call him back

shortly. She returned to the front door smiling and I took her hand, Thank you, again,

very much Mrs. Erickson. It was pleasure spending time with you. Still holding my

hand she replied, I enjoyed the visit, as well. Thank you. I continued to shake her

hand with a gentle amount of pressure placed on her wrist and we both smiled.

Mrs. Elizabeth Erickson died on Dec 26th, 2008 at 9 pm in her home in Phoenix.

A Visit With Mrs Elizabeth Erickson

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