An Oddment of Sandwiches

Samson up on the Good Foot

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:14:00 +0000

Samson Pettyjohn entered the gift shop bathroom a bomb squad newbie, hounded by an imminent disaster he was only theoretically sure he could avert. He left the still largely antiseptic chamber a freshly commuted death row prisoner, wanting to hug both the governor and his underpaid defense team, but mostly hungry for breakfast. His world-brightening sense of gratitude led him to consider buying something so he paused for moment to peruse the racks of personalized key chains fobs, pocket knives and tiny license plates. None of them had his name stamped on them, much less "Sam," which was just as well since he'd never cared for the nickname.

Instead he made for the door, which had just admitted a voluble group of elderly women in bright patterned smocks, stretch pants and comfy shoes, all a-cackle over the knickknacks and ready for an early lunch at the adjacent cafeteria. Samson wove between them smiling and murmuring polite excuse-me-ma'ams. He eventually found himself face-to-face with a sprightly crone who matched him zig for zag and zag for zig until he finally grabbed her hands and executed a jump-skip to the left and another the right, repeating the process until he was on the door side.

- Hey Wilma! This one knows how to polka!

- Sneek him onto the bus!

Image Al's Oasis, SD by talented flickr user thebristolkid, used under a Creative Commons license.

This Year's Luck

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 15:16:00 +0000

A sharp pain in his side woke Himmelfarb and when he opened his eyes he was back on the Upper West Side, the sun behind the buildings now, falling further toward the Hudson. A block or so away, an ambulance shouldered its way through the intersection of 72nd and Broadway, blatting its horn in combination with its siren to clear the cars and pedestrians.

Where was Ronnie? Himmelfarb had sent him back to Gray's for two more dogs and another papaya juice. Not so much kraut this time, he had called to the shambling figure already several paces down the sidewalk. I hate a soggy bun!

That was an hour ago. Probably the kid was hanging around outside one of the clothing stores, mooning over the mannequins. Nothing to worry about. Himmelfarb closed his eyes and tried not to worry. He didn't need the extra hot dog anyway. They should be saving their money. And so on.

It was one of those rare September days, still warm but clear, a breeze off the Atlantic easing the heat and stink from the pavement. It made him feel expansive, hopeful even, to sit there on the bench, nestled in the whir of the great city. But the turn in the weather was also a reminder that fall was upon them, with winter at its heels. Himmelfarb, he told himself, it's past time to start making winter arrangements for you and your half-wit charge.

Their luck was beginning to ebb. Ronnie's seizures were becoming more frequent and his own diabetes was getting worse. They were lucky last year with the house in Rhinebeck but the neighbors were wise to them now, and his sister's children had unloaded her place in Sheepshead Bay within a week of the funeral. The funeral that he wasn't invited to. If they didn't catch a break soon, they would find themselves at the mercy of the religious nuts and the bureaucrats, of whom none were to be trusted.

Casting his nets about the five boroughs and beyond, Himmelfarb heard the approach of two chatty private school girls in plaid skirts and blue blazers. Slipping heavy bookbags from their shoulders, they prepared to bivouac at the next bench down. He smiled and lifted his weather-beaten hat to the girl facing him. She looked through him and kept talking.

Seriously, it's gonna be the old man.

The ambulance siren rose again and the pain shot back, this time in Himmelfarb's ribs.

The other girl said, That's what they want you to think.

----
Image above: Leaves on an empty bench by talented flickr user Ed Yourdon, used under a Creative Commons license.

Regarding The Sycamore Hotel

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:05:00 +0000

Penningfeld wanted it. Wanted it bad. He had Daisy talk the Mayor into letting him bid, something that required a waiver (and something that cost the mayor a week of bad press during the next election). And Penningfeld wanted it so much because Mitch and his German backers were bidding, the bunch of kraut hoodlums.

Before you heard about that you couldn't care less, Daisy said, slipping back into her bra. Hook me.

Penningfeld laid his cigar in the ashtray by the open window and stepped around to the other side of the desk.

You don't know what that old pile of bricks means to me, he said fumbling with the clasp. Bah! Don't they make these things with Velcro yet?

Some of us are old fashioned, Daisy said as she slid the folder labeled Mitchell Enterprises under the copy of Parade Magazine from that morning's paper.

Image: Crystal Ashtray by talented flickr user zharth, used under a Creative Commons license.

Illuminati

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 16:53:00 +0000

Holly now owned three antique lamps, none of which she had sought.

First the wisteria Tiffany Lamp with the tree trunk base that belonged to her mother and which Holly had rewired herself, much to her father's discomfort. The brass torchiere came from her cousin Rick's brief flirtation with antiquing. And now the swan-shaped kerosene lamp whose red fuel sloshed as Aunt Doreen set it on the coffee table.

It's passed through four generations of Penders, said Doreen, who was never shy about pointing out that she was not a Pender herself. Loren used to light it every Christmas, the old fool.

Doreen had sold her and Uncle Loren's house in Roan Heights and was parceling out their antiques ahead of her move into Elmhaven. Holly ran her thumb across a chip in the swan's beak and thought that she'd really rather have the old house.

If you don't get busy and have some kids you're gonna be stuck with everybody's junk.

Titles of upcoming works

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 16:20:00 +0000

A Bitch in Every Direction
Chew, Chew, Swallow
Everybody’s Ex-Boyfriend
Here Comes the Neighborhood
The Gospel According to Tough Shit Jack
My Concrete Friend
The Once and Future Tadpole
The Pockmarked Soul
Someplace You've Already Been
Things I Would Have Told You Had We Been Speaking
Three Old Ladies and a Bowl of Chili
Too Good for Ralph
T.R. Reed is an Enormous Buttwipe

The Book of Your Life

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:59:00 +0000

The week before last, a postcard arrived informing me in bureaucratic type that the book of my life was ready and where I could pick it up.

Location: Barlow Community Center
Time: Saturday 7 a.m. to 3 p.m.
Please present this card along with one (1) form of legal ID

You probably remember the Barlow Community Center as Central Methodist, the big church downtown where Locust merges with Main. We used to have chess club meetings there, before the Methodists sold the building to the city and moved out to Kallendar Heights (south of the mall) to a bigger building with a gym. (You broke Chris Coster's nose during a church league volleyball tournament out there, remember?)

I talked Cathy into driving me down there and the fact that I bought breakfast did nothing for her mood. Get there early, she kept saying, but I wasn't sure I could face it on an empty stomach. She also groused about the fact that we had to park three blocks away. A little walking won't kill us, I said and then added, Or will it? She didn't appreciate the joke.

By the time we got there, the line had already reached the door. Inside, in what used to be the Fellowship Hall, it was like Election Day: a group of older ladies sat behind a line of folding tables. I recognized the one who took my card and put a mark next to my name in a binder. It was Shirley, the little woman who used to drive the bookmobile. She didn't seem to recognize me but her glasses were a lot thicker than they were back then. I said thank you when she handed back my numbered chit and when she looked up to say you're welcome and I saw the milky gleam of cataracts.

So what happens is you take the numbered chit upstairs to the old sanctuary (they use it for lectures and concerts now) and file past a group of wooly-eared old men on "the stage" pulling books out of numbered cardboard boxes.

They look so ordinary. No dust jacket, nothing on the spine, but open it up and there's your name and birth date on the title page. I thumbed through mine most of the way back in the car and I pretty much ignored everything else I had intended to do that weekend. I paid no bills, the laundry went unwashed, and the hinge on the hall closet door still squeaks. Cathy called a couple times, probably about some Israeli movie she wanted to see, but I didn't pick up.

I would have felt guilty about it if this wasn't exactly what happened when her book arrived. She moped around her apartment for days with her brow furrowed, flipping back and forth between the table of contents and the index at the back trying to make sense of something in the middle. And within a week the same thing that happened to her book happened to mine: The binding came apart and the pages started to fall out. Half of them aren't even numbered, and when they are, the numbers don't always match the index. Same thing with the endnotes. And today I noticed that the print on the pages of my book is starting to fade, just like Cathy's did. She's been using her old pages for grocery lists, bookmarks or coasters.

So when your postcard arrives, if they manage to find your new address, you might consider just throwing it out. I hear that the unclaimed books get recycled.

Image above, Sun, sky, church and tree, by talented flickr user Jim Moran used under a Creative Commons license.

The Squirrel and the Length of Twine

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:34:00 +0000

This is a story about a squirrel and a length of twine. It starts out very nicely, as stories go, but let me warn you now: there is trouble ahead. Nothing much can be done about it, but I thought you should know.

There is a squirrel who lives in a very high tree and seldom goes out. He has an elaborate collection of shells in his nest, and this collection takes up a lot of his time. He polishes and arranges and rearranges the shells according to various categories. He corresponds by mail with other collectors and reads scholarly shell collection journals and he's made notes toward a scholarly article on the filbert (Corylus maxima).

I have an very fulfilling existence, the squirrel tells himself. I have my work. Yet he becomes transfixed when he hears the other squirrels screeching in the other trees and often finds that he's been leaning, vacant-eyed, over his work bench, paws up and ears cocked.

One day the squirrel looked out of his nest and saw a length of twine hanging down over the opening. He leaned out and gave it a cautious sniff. Nothing, just a length of twine-smelling twine. He returned to his shell collection and several days passed before he noticed the twine again.

One evening, after treating himself to a vintage California Black walnut (Juglans californica), he decided to stretch his legs. He batted the twine out of the way, hopped out onto one of the larger limbs and looked around. He saw leaves and branches swaying in the air. He breathed some of this air. Distant other-screeching floated through the late afternoon. Then he hopped back into his nest to attend to a newly acquired Brazil nut (Bertholletia excelsa).

Several days later, on a day when the other squirrels were especially loud, he found himself crouched at the entrance to his nest, trying to locate the source of the screeching. He noticed the length of twine again. He took it tentatively in one paw and gave it a little tug, just to see if it was connected to anything, and was startled when it gave a little tug in return.

I should make some notes on this, he thought as he looked up the side of the tree, craning his neck and squinting to see where the string came from. He gave it another, slightly firmer tug and got another, slightly firmer tug in return. Then, for some reason neither the squirrel nor I can figure out, he took the length of twine in both of his hind paws and gave it the mightiest yank he could muster.

As you might have guessed, the length of twine mightily yanked the squirrel right out his nest. For several terrifying seconds the squirrel tumbled through a blur of air and limbs and leaves, not knowing up from down or down from up. By a stroke of good fortune, he landed safely on a pile of leaves, and lay there for awhile looking at what he could see of the sky through the trees. One seldom sees the world from this angle, he thought, cradling his neck in his front paws and crossing one hind leg over the other.

Here's where the trouble begins.

The squirrel heard a rustling in the leaves behind him and looked up and back to see the biggest pair of brown eyes he had ever seen. He noticed right away that they were almond shaped and liked this very much. The eyes belonged to another squirrel who appeared to be smiling. The squirrel smiled himself and was surprised to hear himself let out a joyful screech.

From this point on the squirrel's story becomes unreliable. The squirrel insists that he'd seen this pair of eyes earlier, back when he looked up the side of his tree to find out where the twine came from. When I ask why he didn't say something about this before, he rolls his eyes and tells me that if I don't like his story I should make up one of my own. But I have only this squirrel to work with.

However whatever happened happened, the squirrel is much happier these days, although it would have been difficult to convince him that he wasn't very happy before he got yanked out of his tree. You will hear him screeching now and then, but he hasn't spent much time around his nest for several weeks. His shell collection has gathered a fine layer of dust.

Image above by lee.

Harriet at Lunch

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 17:09:00 +0000

After she left for lunch, Harriet Trooping forgot where she worked, which was just as well. Since she was still hungry, she went to a friend's house to ask for some food and was very surprised when her son Nebuchadnezzar opened the door.

"You didn't tell me you were spending the day at the neighbors," Harriet said, taking off her shoes and lying down on the floor. "Mmm, we should get carpet like this for our house."

"Mom, this is our house," said Neb, rolling his eyes. "And you know that Nefertiti and I make meth in the garage with Dad on Wednesdays."

Harriet closed her eyes and smiled, thinking how proud she was that her god-like children were so good at chemistry. And double-entry accounting. And locksmithery.

"Oh, say. Can you or Nef go see if Mommy shut off her car? I think I forgot."

The boy dutifully shuffled out the front door and proceeded to back Harriet's Volvo station wagon out of the cedar bushes at the back of the yard, the same bedraggled bushes that so often kept the car from drifting into the ravine behind their property.

"Here are your keys," Neb said when he returned.

Harriet said thank you, put the fob of her key chain in her mouth, and went back to sleep.

Image above: pink shag carpeting by talented flickr user Ye Olde Wig Shoppe, (used under a Creative Commons by-share-alike license).

Audio Greetings of the Damned

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:00:00 +0000

Ditch

It's Not Because

Courtesy of Rat Bastard Greetings.
"Pushing (and shoving) the greeting card envelope."

Photo by Lee.

Later Something Awful

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 16:15:00 +0000

In an attempt to complete a circle, he closed both of his bank accounts - checking and savings - at the same Wells Fargo branch in Berkeley where he'd opened them six years before, on a warm September morning with sap spitting down from the trees. Among the many things left unaccomplished in California, he had never learned the names of those trees. (The trees were in fact sycamores, and that "sap" a sugary substance called honeydew excreted by aphids. Basically bug shit.)

This was the first time he'd ever closed a bank account. In all the city shifting he'd done in his twenties, settling these accounts was always something left undone when it came time to leave and anyway what was the point of closing the account since you needed a check to open a new account in a new city, right? He really left those pittances behind because he wanted some part of himself to remain. When you leave a place, the place goes on and you fall away. Other people fill the rooms where you slept and ate and loved and fought and the streets forget your tread. And while money comes and mostly goes, a bank account is some kind of record, proof that you were there.

So you can imagine his shock the week before when he called his bank in Kansas City and found that in the seven years since he left, the institution had changed hands so many times that the lumpenbalance of his account had been blown from the ledgers, settling to over eastern Jackson County like so much chaff. And so his determination to leave no such ghosts behind in California.

Nancy, the pleasant assistant manager at the Wells Fargo, asked, a little sheepishly, if she could ask why he was closing his accounts. Her eyes widened perceptibly when he told her he was moving to New York. Moving to New York runs counter to prevailing logic in the Bay Area. This is particularly true in Berkeley where people are accustomed to hearing stories of New Yorkers who have finally come to their senses, fled, and found themselves gratefully enbosomed in what so many of the locals think of as (and one local television station used to gaspingly call) "The Best Place on Earth."

He told Nancy about the job he'd landed with a well-known Manhattan publishing concern. If you want to get anywhere in publishing, he said, you have to do some time in the Big Apple. This resulted in a shared shrug and a nod of their tilted heads.

Of course, he was lying to Nancy. There was no job waiting for him in New York. He had indeed sent the well-known publisher (and many others) his resume but had so far received only a Sixth Avenue breeze in response. For another thing, he'd already moved to New York almost six months before. Five months, two weeks and three days to be exact.

Nancy checked the computer, wrote the combined balance of his accounts on a piece of paper and slid it discreetly, almost conspiratorially, across the marble counter. He had never actually balanced either account, but there appeared to be about as much altogether as he remembered. When he said he'd take a check for $1,200 and the rest in cash, Nancy's eyes widened again. She asked him what kind of bills, and he said twenties would be fine.

As it turned out, that timid four after the comma was actually a nine, meaning that he walked out onto College Avenue with a nervous-making wad in twenty-dollar bills in his front pocket. As he stood looking down Ashby toward the bay, he felt like a character at the beginning of a story in which later something awful happens.

Something About His Pants

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:25:00 +0000

Marcus was attempting to dart past the break room door when someone called his name. Any other time he'd have gone in and sat down, but he was on his way to do something about his pants.

A few minutes earlier, he'd discovered that one of his cheap roller ball pens had exploded in his front pocket. He had just finished running the second virus scan (and removal) this week for Baxter Lambsgrove, the CFO, who spent the entire time yakking on the phone like Marcus wasn't even there, first about granite countertops with his wife (whom he repeatedly called "Babe") and then with someone named Mort about why a person should never hire a Chinese gardener. When he was done, Marcus signaled that he was leaving. Lambsgrove lowered the receiver for the first time.

Looks like you sprung a leak, sport!

Rather than go into the break room, Marcus leaned tactically against the doorframe and stuck his head in, keeping the blue ink slick on his thigh out of sight as well as the now-blue fingers that had extracted the drippy pen. He assumed the standard lunchtime bull session was underway and expected to endure some light ribbing from the maintenance guys before continuing on to the locker room to attend to his chinos.

But instead the break room was quiet. Marcus felt an underlying drone in the way they all stared at him. The only person not looking at Marcus was the baleful and generally mute Peruvian that everybody called The Turtle, who stood watching a bowl of something rotate inside the microwave. And it wasn't just the usual bunch from maintenance and operations. Murphy and Gallegos were there but so was Mary Ellen from events and Lena the new accounts receivable person with the crazy buckteeth. And sitting between Murphy and Gallegos was Sally Kellog, Lambsgrove's spinstery admin, who looked like she'd been crying.

Gallegos spoke first.

Hey man, you know how to get into people's email, right?

Calling Purgatory

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 20:17:00 +0000

It only takes a minute or so...

-----
Voice: Emily Lauren
Produced by Lee for the Hypothetical Seven

Happy at Harry's

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 21:13:00 +0000

The happy hour at Harry's is just beginning to hum when a tall woman in a bright red blazer strides through the door, her eyes sparkling for all to see as she scans the room for the girlfriends she is late in meeting. Ah, there they are! Now to wade through crowd milling near the bar. Excuse me, she says to one man, gently tapping the padded shoulder of his suit coat. He turns and calls out her name all joyously. This is my friend Bob! and Bob cries Hello! and introduces his friends and suddenly the woman finds herself the happy center of boisterous circle of loud chesty men.

Given her smile and admirable poise, this is not the first time she’s found herself in this situation. Either that or she has seen enough Barbara Stanwyck movies to know the drill: She takes in their admiration and sends it back with a ravishing lighthouse sweep.

One of the chesty men asks if he can get her a drink and she says as a matter of fact she was meeting some friends for a glass of wine...

Glass of wine! Glass of wine! the man calls gallantly to the bartender, Glass of wine! and then spins back so as not to lose his place in the happy circle. Another chesty man brakes from the circle and flags down the bartender and pays for the wine and returns triumphantly to the circle with the Glass of wine! Glass of wine! I paid for your glass of wine! Yet another man offers her a string attached to a red balloon he was brought with him to the bar for some reason. It matches your jacket! he shouts triumphantly.

The string turns out to be the one thing in her situation the woman cannot grasp and the balloon shoots for the stamped tin ceiling high above. The chesty men let out a home-team touchdown cheer. And while they cheer and point, the cunning young woman sees her chance and slips away from the circle and moves toward the table at the other end of the bar where her girlfriends wait with sympathetic eyebrows raised and knowing wags of the head.

The balloon bobs along the swirling currents above the bar, rising only to be forced back down by a trio of ceiling fans. The men soon lose interest and their happy circle becomes once more a milling group. The balloon eventually works its way between the ceiling and the blades of the slowest fan and is forgotten until clumps of dust and fuzz that have collected on the backsides of the blades begin to fall and people are saying excuse me but you have a piece of fuzz on your head, on your shoulder, in your drink. A bartender looks up. It's that balloon!

The people laugh and duck and hands cover vulnerable drinks. Soon a clever busboy tapes a bread knife to a broom handle, then tapes that broom handle to another broom handle and pops the balloon, ending the rain of fuzz and raising another cheer from the assembled throng. Several chesty men give the clever busboy hearty backslaps, as he grins sheepishly with his improvised spear.

The burst balloon and string cling tenaciously to one the blades, circling and circling as the happy hour hums on.

------

American Study #28: Kansas City, Missouri

Not Time's Fool

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 17:36:00 +0000

Sullivan paced outside the deli on College Avenue fuming. The sign on the door read "Back in 5 mins" (including the unnecessary quotation marks), but he had now been waiting a full fifteen minutes, according to his expedition watch (which also had a compass and a barometric altimeter accurate to a height of 30,000 feet and a depth of 30 meters - features of questionable utility to a man who rarely left Rockridge).

But Sullivan didn't need a fancy timepiece to tell him this was the third time this week he'd been kept waiting outside the deli and he vowed this would be the last time. Ever. (Other devices commercially available could remind Sullivan that he had made the same vow in March, after the owner's rude remark.)

The expedition watch was unequipped to inform Sullivan that he'd caught the eye of two bored clerks in the cookware store across the street (the short girl with the spiky red hair who thought she knew so much about baking and the tall smartass with the pony tail and geek glasses). Both of whom were now narrating their version of Sullivan's interior monologue to their mutual delight. Bets had been laid as to how long Sullivan would wait. The winner would buy lunch.

Sullivan had considered vowing never to go back to the cookware store as well. But they also sold coffee beans there, in particular the Swiss water process decaf that Sheila preferred. And if he didn't get it there, he'd have to go all the way to North Berkeley.

Image Bo om by flickr user leespeaks.

Hodges in His Home Town

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 17:42:00 +0000

That summer evening began, most auspiciously, with a fist fight. The most pleasant aspect of the fist fight for Hodges was the timing, as if the participants had choreographed the whole thing earlier that day in summer school Metal Shop.

He was driving west on 10th Street in the station wagon he'd borrowed from his father, moving through the thickest part of what was known locally as the Loop. Around him cars full of high school kids watched the sidewalks and parking lots intently for something new or at least interesting, something they hadn't seen the dozens of times they passed up 10th Street to Minnesota Avenue, then over to 11th and back down to 2nd Avenue and back over to 10th to start the circuit again. On the sidewalks and parking lots, other kids gazed hopefully at the cars they had seen pass by dozens of times.

At 10th and Phillips, Hodges saw a ripple go through the sweaty throng a block ahead. The ripple said, "fight!" clearer than any combination of vocables. Faster than the speed of sound, the ripple announced that a welcome point of rage had formed in the humid ennui.

Hodges and his borrowed wagon, idling fortuitously in the far left lane of the one-way thoroughfare, drew closer to the two high-school guys standing just off the curb, puffing their chests at each other, back and forth in a crescendo of tee shirt expansion and thrust. On the stereo of a nearby car Lionel Ritchie was urging everyone to raise the roof and have some fun.

The puffing, which started with so much flair, quickly reached a plateau, a mesa of machismo, and the two contestants started to lose steam. As Hodges drew alongside, it looked as if the fracas might dissolve into the damp night air. But then another, larger kid emerged from the soggy, dead-faced crowd, pushed his fellow primate back with a sinewy and hirsute limb, puffed once for good measure and laid a fistful of bones on the jaw of what was now, beyond any doubt, the beta male.

Hodges heard the mighty crack through the open window. But like so much that happened that night, the action took place on the periphery of his vision. In Hodges' rearview mirror, the impromptu audience was already dissolving. A girl with limp blond hair knelt over the beaten beta, both of whom grew smaller as Hodges drove on to meet his friend Ethan at the bar.

Image above: Phillips11thpano by talented flickr user Jerry7171 (used under a Creative Commons by-share-alike license).

Advice to No One in Particular

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 21:09:00 +0000

Happiness, to hear it described, is a magic bird call
dropped by an elf in a street you have yet to wander down.
For some it's the culmination of some elusive arrangement
of the furniture, while for others it flows from house pets
or shoes, another thousand a month, a more efficient machine
or a hitherto unmet “Right Person.”

As one skeptical of all of this, but who has at times
found himself aware of his situation and yet not displeased,
here is my advice:

If, on some otherwise ordinary day, that gate swings open,
shut your mouth and keep moving.
Whistle past a graveyard, if you have one handy.
This will pass, but you have not, at least not yet.

Go find a plot of ground and introduce yourself
to the insects and blades of grass. Spit, and make mud
with your fingers, which have many other uses.
Mud has been said to cure blindness
but in most cases a diagnosis is all it takes.

Terminus

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 16:37:00 +0000

He often found himself wondering
as he ran to catch a late-night bus
if this was what he'd been after
if this life was enough.

They Just Know

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:56:00 +0000

Scarfa told Barkela to stop being such a fusspot killjoy and keep moving.

There are like a million of us in that place, she said. Has anybody ever checked up on you? Even once?

No, said Barkela, looking back in the direction of the anthill again. They don't have to. They just know.

That's what they tell you to keep you in line, Scarfa said as she started up a drainpipe on the north side of Wrigley Field, headed for the left field bleachers. Come on, the game's already started!

Barkela reminded Scarfa, again, that there were a lot of leftover crumbs from the weekend. Not to mention the leaky hummingbird feeder on Seminary Avenue.

Oh yeah? Scarfa snapped. Well, may I remind you that we are both in our last phase? This is as good as it gets, B. We are sterile female workers and what do we do all day? We forage for scraps and haul it back to feed the queen and her next batch of larvae. And when we're not hauling food, we're out with the rest of the old biddies defending the precious hill.

I know, said Barkela, her antennae drooping as she moved toward the drainpipe. Scarfa was already 20 antlengths up and still talking.

And when we die, we'll get hauled back for food. But the queen lives for, what, 30 years. She gets everything handed to her, gets to mate with drones in mid-air. And if it turns we have too many queens, do we get to eat one? Oh, no. Her majesty gets carried off to start a new colony!

Barkela started to raise an objection about this being the order of things, but Scarfa kept on with her rant.

Meanwhile, the Cubs are having the best season they've had in a hundred years. Think about that! Our ancestors have endured one miserable season after another. But we could witness something that ants will talk about for generations!

The game was rained out after five innings and in the process the scent trails back to Scarfa and Barkela's nest were washed way. Passing through a yard off Kenmore they encountered aggressive carpenter ants swarming an ash tree stump. The larger ants quickly tore Scarfa and Barkela into several pieces, which they then carried to their queen, a sulky and jaded fan of the San Diego Padres.

-----
Image Wrigley Field - Waveland Avenue Exterior by talented flickr user wallyg, used under a Creative Commons by-non.

A long-term diagnosis

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 15:01:00 +0000

I will need you to give me one more deep breath, Mr Darnby, please.

I wish you'd call me Gunther, Dr Balaram.

The old man sat on the examining table with his shoulders slumped. Apurna wanted to tell him to sit up straight but, as usual, he seemed so sad.

One more deep breath, please.

The freckled and hairy shoulders rose and then dropped again before Gunther Darnby continued the his tale of woe - how his plan to head for California after he got out of the Army ("I had the ticket!") was derailed first by his sister Eleanor's request that he wait two weeks so he could attend her wedding ("to that no-good Roger"), then by his father's heart attack, and later by his mother's breast cancer.

And now forty years -- no, wait! -- forty two years later, I'm still stuck here.

All right, Mr Darnby, I'm just going to test your reflexes with this little hammer.

All I'm saying is be careful where you agree to stay, even if it's just for a little while, or you could end up like me.

While Apurna made notes in Mr Darnby's file, she found herself thinking again about her boyfriend Derek's offer to move her into his apartment ("Just until your residency ends this summer"), her parents hinting about moving to Olathe, about the palliative care fellowship in San Francisco she had yet to tell anyone about.

So, truthfully, how long have I got?

A long time, Mr... Gunther, probably years and years.

Oh god. That's just awful.

Image Clinic by talented flickr user jon|k, used under a Creative Commons license.

Stay cool, Roscoe

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 18:23:00 +0000

The residents of Roscoe, S.D., gather to celebrate the arrival of the town's new refrigerator.

Face It With A Grin

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 14:14:00 +0000

Eventually Aunt Olga turned up several blocks from the auditorium, in front of a coffee shop on College Avenue. She was singing.

Her accompanist for the occasion was a sophomore political science major from Holcomb, Nebraska named Karl. It was the first time Karl had played since he abandoned guitar lessons in the 8th grade. The guitar actually belonged to his Karl's roommate Josh, who had agreed to loan it to Karl's sister Rhonda, who was late meeting Karl at the coffee shop.

By the time we got there, Aunt Olga was barging energetically through "Open Up Your Heart (and Let the Sunshine In)" while clapping and stomping and calling out the chord changes: "Smilers never lose -- now E! -- and frowners never win…" Karl sat on the bench, shoulders slumped, dutifully strumming.

Almost three dollars in change had accumulated in the open guitar case. Karl told us to take it all, but Aunt Olga insisted on splitting it.

Image above Bench in My Dog Joe Cafe by talented flickr user wmacphail, used under a Creative Commons license.

Waar is het kompas?

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 15:38:00 +0000

It was dark by the time Kip made it from the Sioux City airport to Verloren. Or at least he hoped it was Verloren. He hadn't seen a road sign since he turned off the highway.

This was the way the whole day had gone: a flat tire on the way to the airport, first flight missed, second flight delayed by mechanical problems and later forced to land in Cincinnati. Then flooding on the highway he was supposed to take led him off down a series of county roads that grew ever more confusing as the day grew dim. And now, to top things off, his phone was dead. At least once he sold his share in the company he'd never have to make one of these goddamned service calls out in the sticks ever again.

The only light still burning on the tiny town's main street was a gas lantern above the door to the bowling alley. That is, he assumed it was a bowling alley. The sign above the door had just the words "Van Bummel" and the image of an oddly shaped bowling pin. There was a low rumble coming from the second floor.

At the top of the steps, a tall blond man with a heavy brow leaned against the door jamb. He appeared to be dressed for some kind of ethnic festival: funny old felt hat, embroidered vest, knee breeches and wooden clogs. At the far end of the long, low-ceilinged room four older men in similarly antiquated costumes were rolling grapefruit-sized balls toward sets of the same strange pins on the sign out front.

Kip asked the tall man if there was a pay phone he could use. Before he could finish the man motioned for him to follow and walked over to a counter on the opposite wall. The man then pulled a tall mug from under the counter and filled it with a frothy brown liquid from a wooden barrel setting in a rack above the counter. He handed the mug to Kip, muttered something and stepped into the next room.

Kip sniffed. The beer smelled good, like brown sugar and grain and grass. What the hell, he thought, and took a swig. It also tasted good and without thinking much about it he drained half the mug. He leaned back against the counter and felt the edge start to come off this long, maddening day.

On the wall above Kip's head, a gas lamp hissed. After looking around for the tall man, he leaned over and refilled the mug. He was musing about things he might do with his coming windfall (sail boat, Harley, Tahoe timeshare, and so on) when he realized that people were calling out to him. The old men at the other end of the room were waiving their arms and pointing to four full mugs that had somehow appeared at his elbow.

What the hell, he thought. With two in each hand and began to move toward the quartet of bowlers through the flickering amber light. Maybe they'll let me roll a game. But then I've got to get out back on the road.

---
Image above: Sunset I-29 by flickr user leespeaks.

Call and Response

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 17:55:00 +0000

The frat boy got one foot on the stage with the help of his fellow Sigma Nus, who chanted "Dude! Dude!" as they pushed his other leg forward. Once he had both feet planted, he threw both arms in the air and shouted, "Dude!"

His arms were still aloft when Oscar and Willie swept in from either side and the frat boy folded with the awkward symmetry of a fitted sheet. With a poignant combination of tenderness and assembly-line efficiency, each burly man slipped a hand into one of the frat boy's armpits and lowered him back to his cohort, who received him with beseechings of "Dude? Dude?"

Image above: rock by talented flickr user Walsh, used under a Creative Commons by-nd-nc license.

First place

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 21:35:00 +0000

Emily Lillibridge got her first apartment in Berkeley by way of Aaron Spink, the older brother of a high school classmate. Aaron and his wife Deena lived in the modest one-bedroom a few blocks south of the UC campus while they attended seminary. When Aaron finished, they went off to the Philippines for a three-year mission project. Since the apartment was rent-controlled they held on to the lease and sublet to a series of students.

Aaron warned Emily over the phone that the place wasn't anything special. When Emily arrived after work on Friday with her first load of stuff, she found that the place was, in fact, a pit.

The counters and stovetop were deep in grease and the oven harbored the traumatic memory of some ill-conceived experiment involving curry, pickles and offal. The bathtub was several shades of tan and stank of patchouli and the toilet wore a fuzzy green boa. The only windows in the unit faced north onto a yard with a tall sequoia in it and beyond that an apartment building even taller than her own, so the amount of natural light was minimal. The upside of this was that you were less likely to notice the carpet, a low-pile number that had started off as a questionable combination of brown and green and only grown more repulsive in the unwashed decade that followed its installation.

Emily went out that evening to buy cleaning supplies and rent a carpet steamer. She spent most of the weekend on her knees or in some kind of a crouch, scrubbing, scouring, wiping and polishing. By Sunday evening her back and shoulders and thighs and calves were screaming, but the job was done and place was hers.

She was just getting out of the rickety old elevator, on the way back up from her last trip to the dumpster, she ran into Kenji and Dale from down the hall. They were going up to the roof and said she should come too. She started to protest but they laughed and pressed her back into the elevator with them and hit the button for the top floor.

It had rained off and on all afternoon, rinsing the air of its usual haze and after two days stooped over, the view from the rooftop staggered poor Emily. In the west, the setting sun reflected thousands of times, from cars on the bridges in the bay and from the windows of the towers of the city as it sank toward the sea beyond. In the east, the tree-covered hills seemed to leap toward the sky.

Punctuation

noreply@blogger.com (Lee) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 16:42:00 +0000

After a moment of awkward silence, Marcus asked a brilliant question, so brilliant that the question mark nearly burst itself with pride.

Image ? by flickr user PetroleumJelliffe, used under a Creative Commons license.