Birds Nest in Winter Treetop Exposed

by Noble K Thomas - February 2nd, 2009

It must have first come into being
On some random spring day,

A long stubborn process, some instinct being satisfied,

Twig by twig, stick by stick,
A busy beaked bird desiring a temporary home.

This sod bowl tapestry wedged high into the sky.

And then came the fragile white jewels,
Thin-skinned eggs protecting a brewing inner world, until

                     tap – tap – tap – CRACK

Then tweet – tweet – how sweet?
Now off you go and beat those tiny wings!

All through the summer
It stayed hidden in the plush of fluttering green,

And then through autumn,
As the wind hacked away at the dwindling camouflage
Concealing an abandoned artifact.

Now I see your remains
Revealed by time as nature recedes,

And I wonder what else is out there,
Undetected but real all the same.

Still unheard because of all the clatter,
Still unseen because of all the clutter,

Perhaps something wonderful is out there,
Flourishing within quiet solitude,
Patient as the filling moon,

Waiting for our arrival.

Birds nest in winter treetop exposed,

Awaiting not the return of the bird,

But acknowledgement by the seeking man.

Still Now

by Noble K Thomas (February 2010)

It is still now,

This precious moment
Defined by comprehension
Of our conscious existence,

Of this abundant light
And unlimited air.

Praise the random bark of a dog,
The sound of the old train whistle bending down the breeze.
The feel of the sun upon your face,
The sound of your own finite breathing.

O the long quick slide down the thermometer of our life,
From the welcoming yellow to the fertile green and into the deep sky blue,
From the waning orange to the crumpled brown and into that streak of silver,
Then the long sink into the deep sea of eternal black.

The sundial in the garden
Strangled by forgotten vine and hungry weed.

Damn the material riches of this world
That pale to the gift of simply being.

It is still now, you fool,
But it won’t be
Forever.

Blood Rainbow

by Noble K. Thomas

There’s a pot of dung at the end of the blood rainbow,

Evil pot,
Over-flowing pot,

Pot of Man.

A Solitary Lighthouse

by Noble K Thomas

Built upon a dismal reef of sunken rocks, some leagues or so from shore, on which the waters chafed and dashed, the wild year through, there stood a solitary lighthouse.
--- from A Christmas Carol: Stave Three by Charles Dickens



Old Willie climbed the winding steps yet one more time. Always damp, the smell of wet limestone and burning ember filled the chamber as he stepped carefully upon each slick stone abutment with a full flask of grog strapped across his heaving chest. He was getting too old for this, his knees knew it, his heart knew it, but every evening his soul insisted that he forget about those two sorry complainers and rise, rise, ascend to the top yet again, and on this Christmas Eve night he did just that.

And there awaited poor Benjamin. Poor cold lonely Benjamin, looking suitably drab in his grey longcoat and cap, keeping the iron basket filled with the burning lumps of coal, and his soul screamed that he was too young for this! And yet the coal kept burning through and Benjamin kept scooping fresh replacements and the lantern surely glowed strongly whether his spirit did or not. Alas, it was Christmas Eve and somewhere he knew a beautiful young girl waited for him, outfitted from head to toe in the red and green glory of the Yuletide, ruby lips and twinkling eyes, awaiting her handsome lighthouse keeper whether she knew it or not. But he could not escape this lonely vigil, not for several hours yet, and he was sworn to hang steadfast by feeding the fire and keeping the light.

But what is this? Cast by dripping candles upon the curved staircase wall a shadow now ascends, could this at long last be the material manifestation of the ancient maritime ghost, the briny myth raised from out of the stormy depths? But even now the shadow recedes and a man of flesh and bone takes its place, an aged specter with milky moribund eyes and a toothless grin.

“Aye Benji, it is only me, your old fool Willie here to relieve you early if only you might first partake in some good Christmas cheer before absconding with your merry self.” For the old man was fond of the boy, he favored him as a grandfather might a grandson, and all he could offer him on this night of gifts was a special brew of rum, lemon juice and cinnamon spice as garnished by the windswept salt of the sea, and, as diminished as it might appear, his very own flesh and bone.

“Good God old man, you scared the devil out of me, or at least my most recent impulse to commit misdeed in this world,” and now Benjamin chuckled in relief, happy to satisfy his mentor’s request as long as the partaking was brief and the liquor strong. He would not admit it to his friends perhaps but the ugly truth was that he’d become quite fond of Willie as well. “So what have you got there, friend?” he inquired, pointing toward the sheepskin vessel that hung proudly atop the man’s sunken chest, and Willie swung the flask over his head and tossed it to his eager apprentice. And then, as if it was the only proper method of response, he broke into song and danced a spry jig:

‘Tis time for the hearth and the old Yule log,
‘Tis time for the earth and its Yuletide fog,
‘Tis time for the spit and the roasted hog,
‘Tis time to get drunk on the Yuletide grog!
And in the mornin’ let the Missus flog,
Have no cares, for me the life of a POOCH!
Despite his decrepit state the aged reveler displayed a rather loose stride and his vocal delivery was quite spirited and punctuated with an ornery wink and Benjamin suspected that the flask had already been significantly drained prior to the little man’s arrival, yet when he shook it he noted with surprise that there seemed to be plenty of the tawny liquid remaining inside.

***

And so they passed the next half hour sharing the grog and rehashing old stories that primarily revolved around the excitement of springtime storms and the unapologetic fury of the overheated summer and the inevitable boredom that descended with autumn. Willie had seen it all, he’d been the unofficial witness to all local coastal events over the last half century or so, some good but most very bad, and although rescues were possible, more often than not after the splintering of wood and the faraway shouts came only the tell-tale shards, the torn debris, the sad washed-up human remains. He’d collected more than his share of corpses in the foamy wash and so knew well the fragility of human life, its preciousness, and the final unyielding judgment of a death by drowning.
Willie took another swig and glanced at the boy. Benjamin’s short tenure had seen nothing of the sort as of yet, but give it time the old lighthouse keeper thought. Oh Lord but give it time.

***

Benjamin admired the man and enjoyed his company, yet in the end he mostly felt pity for old Willie. Although he had never seen it for himself he knew that Willie lived alone in a tiny hut comprised of thatched bush and stripped wood on the outskirts of the deep forest. What’s more, his faithful hound Wallace had perished in late July, the victim of some mad insect’s bite or some other internal malfunction of the variety that rendered the beast prone on his spine for three days and three nights spewing and howling until the spigot was finally mercifully twisted tightly shut and then, shockingly fast, a forlorn serenity was stumbled upon. But Benjamin couldn’t know that the old man had willingly come to some ending point as well, a kind of happy resolution, contented at the end of a long life if that’s what this was all leading up to.

***

The hour was growing late, the night time air frigid with gusts from the roiling sea, but old Willie implored Benjamin to join him up and out on top for but a moment before the lad departed.
“Are you feverish man, has the wicked grog finally permeated the very last corpuscles of your dwindling cranial flab?” he responded in unfeigned alarm. “My pink bum has no earthly business up and out on top at such a time as this, and as for yours, I suppose you may do as you foolishly wish!”
The old man leaned forward with a grin, his breath stinking of molasses and barnacled wit. “Imagine that, a strong young thing such as thee, fearful of a little cold, of a little disagreeable breeze, my boy, you would do well to stay clear of my bed once the sun goes down and the fire burns out.”
“I should think so,” Benjamin answered with a smirk, and he considered the old man’s cold bed and reckoned it superior to a cozy coffin. “Add blankets,” he offered as a kind afterthought, but Willie had already moved on.
“Fortify yourself boy for there is nothing like a Christmas Eve night! The air tingles with a certain magic that no chilled breeze could ever harden as we find comfort in warmed hearts stoked by boundless good cheer.”
“Aye, that may be so my old friend, yet still, the nose already bleats with a frosty toot.” Yet even as Benjamin spoke these words old Willie was shuffling up the wooden ladder and pushing open the small roof hatch door. Instantly the cold air sought the warmer latitudes below and fell hard into the lantern with the swirling sleet and Benjamin could hear a high-pitched howling as wind cut into carved wood above. The old fool has really lost it he thought, and for a moment he was rightly concerned about the lighthouse’s very future should its long-regaled caretaker no longer be up to the task. And yet with a last look at the remains of the burning coal basket, satisfied, the young man buttoned up his coat and followed on up and out.

***

Benjamin found the atmosphere up top not nearly as unsettled as previously feared but it was still plenty cold. Up here a complete circle of darkness seemed to be pushing in all around them, the barren land behind them as indistinguishable as the brooding sea to their front, and although no gulls cried the beating of the waves upon the rock mingled with the groaning sky to complete a symphony fit for solemn meditation.
And then came the bells.
Benjamin stood straight at attention like a well-trained birder. He couldn’t be certain, after all his head was plugged with the coming malady, but the sound of the bells did not go away. “Do you hear that Willie, do you hear that chiming sound? For the love of Jane Gertrude Purnell, do you hear those ringing bells?”
The brittle old man tilted his head up toward the sky. “Aye,” he said in wonder, “I hear the bells, I do indeed, and that means we are not too late after all,” and he swiveled his head upon his shoulders and scanned the heavens, for exactly what Benjamin could not even begin to imagine, for the darkness was complete and the thickening cloudbank was lowering by the minute. He found no reason to ask, because this strange episode would surely soon pass and Willie would descend into the warmth of the lantern and his stuffed pipe, and then Benjamin would gather his few things along with his scattered thoughts and take leave.
“Do you see it?” the old lighthouse keeper croaked with a heavenly nod, and with mild annoyance the bundled lad turned to see just what on earth the fellow could be referring to, and of course he saw not a thing.
“No,” he answered with hint of annoyed defiance, “I see nothing, not even the raw frost that steams from my very throat, not even the red tip of my dripping snout,” and he knew that there could be not a thing in this sky, for the moon was new and any lighthouse man worth his salt was keenly aware of the phases of this vital orb. But just then, back to the northwest, the faintest of flickers, perhaps a tiny brief ignition.

***

Long ago yet not too far away, deep within the boiling innards of the bustling dark city, a child was born. No father and only a sick frightened child for a mother, the baby boy was snatched from her trembling arms and tossed adrift into the clamoring milieu of what passes for public compassion and then straight into what can only be called a very private suffering. Every day a struggle, every day a fight, and at night there was not even a hint of that healing dose that all human beings require – the dose of simple dependable love. How is it that one who has not been shown even a smidgen of it knows so well the true measure of this love? How can this be when those who are drowning in it pay it so little mind and allow it to seep away unnoticed down the slimy drain? Call it sweet instinct, a primal need as strong as the search for sustenance or the struggle to breathe open air, but he felt its void so deep down within his being that his bones chattered without it.
Those doling out the public compassion didn’t bother with much of a traditional education and the boy became a man and quietly went about his business, working hard and making a few friends and somehow finding a way to get by, to complete one more day, the reward being the opportunity to find the way to get through one more night. The weeks went by, a blur really, then the months, yet another year of tedious meaninglessness, until, incredibly, time stopped: he had met a girl. He quite fancied her and she returned his feelings but her father would have none of it, this young man being nothing more than an unworthy phantom bumbling his way through his own wretched nightmare, with no parents or siblings or family history, with absolutely no experience regarding the fine art of giving and receiving love, with nothing at all, and their courtship was quickly denounced and his exit ensured. All alone he fled to the sea, to the long endless horizon and the vast unknowable worlds that lay beyond, but he never got on the ship that was meant to carry him far away.
For there was a solitary lighthouse nearby that was in need of a strong reliable hand and he possessed that, and he possessed the time, and he sensed that maybe here he might be needed, and given the right circumstances need can turn into love.

***

Ten minutes later back down and inside the warm lantern young Benjamin still could not comprehend what he had just witnessed with his very own eyes. Beyond queer that patch of bright light that flared briefly, the faint silhouettes of two beings hovering within, and before one could really think about it ‘twas all gone. Nothing left but the descending fog and the intermittent suggestion of wandering stars. But it was Willie’s anticipation of the phenomenon that was truly the most befuddling aspect of the entire experience for if it had just been some random cosmic event, the manifestation of some tumbling rock spat out from the angry heavens, then that would not be so odd if still quite unexplainable. But the old man had waited for it – he had clearly advised of its coming.
Now warming his hands by the fire Benjamin thought to choose his next words carefully. But before he could choose them the whiskered visionary spoke.
“Fear not my boy, ‘twas nothing really, just the reminder that we all need a little light, a little love, from time to time.” His eyes were glowing.
And now the boy spoke freely, the dam of timidity broken by the other man’s own carefree plunge. “Really now William, I have never heard you mention this strange thing called love, have you perhaps taken one too many swigs from your oily bag there?” He rubbed his eyes and attempted a wry smile. “Have we both?”
“Why bother to speak of it when one has the opportunity to show it – to put the bloody thing into action? Speaking of which, gather your things boy, the time has come for you to take leave, to flee this lonely place and celebrate the night with those who you love, or might love you if given half a chance.”
Benjamin leaned in toward the old man. “You don’t really believe that I am going to let you off that easy, do you? Come clean with it man – I must know your secret!”
Old Willie wondered how deep down he dared go. Perhaps he had already gone too far but he sensed that this might be it, there might be no next time, and the opportunity to pass along this mystical treasure was perhaps the last gift he might be able to bestow. And what’s more, he knew that Benjamin was worthy of both its endowment and its responsibilities.
“There’s no secret lad – only my stubborn silly attachment to a shred of faith. Promise me only this – no matter the circumstances, no matter whether your old fool Willie still walks this world or not, you will attend this very spot next year and await its return. Beyond next year you may do as you wish – but in twelve months time you must return. And then it is my belief that you will begin to understand.”
Benjamin was perplexed, growing angry, duly impatient. “Wonderful! So over the next twelve months I’m supposed to act like nothing ever happened all the while I’m working side by side, conducting serious business mind you, with a sane dependable cohort? Really now, you’ve topped yourself this time old fellow,” and he roared with a forced laugh and drained what remained of the flask.
Willie fought off the urge to respond by suggesting that that was precisely what grog was good for, to ease and possibly enhance the passing of time, but he did allude to the magical tonic of pursuing attractive mischievous maidens, to gaily indulge and lose one’s self in a whimsical swirl of fragrant petty-coats and whatever else that lies beneath. Oh but he was leading the lad on, almost daring him to chase after the very thing he had not much experienced in life himself, and finished by noting, "dear Benjamin, I'm sure you will find a satisfying way to muddle your way on through."
“Okay – have it your way my friend, I am off to seek my Christmas fortune, a pot of gold beneath the tinseled tree and a beautiful candidate of which you just made reference, or at the very least an agreeable easy chair to relax these bones and a pot of warm salted water to soak these feet.”
“And of course a jug of jolly plum wine!” the old lighthouse keeper cried with another wink.
“Why of course – yes, very good my dear mysterious friend, a big jug of fresh and jolly plum wine, good for both the spleen and the reconfiguration of a soured mind.”
“Off you go!” Willie exclaimed, and by the time that boy had reached the quaint inland with the scattered cottages and the country pathways and the old stone church he had already forgotten about the mysterious light, about the absurd promise, but not Willie, no not him. For he would always remember a long ago lonely Christmas Eve midnight when at this very stark and empty place he had cried out to the open sea, “please oh Lord, I need a sign, give me a sign!” and the sign had been delivered in the form of a visitation, a glowing orb that shone light upon this little slab of cold rock and rising tide.

***

We surely all hear of the tragic ends to dreadful nights, the prayers that were never answered while the storms blindly raged on. But what of those others, the lucky ones that found the light in all that darkness, the unknowingly saved? We hear not of those but that does not mean they don’t exist. They do and in numbers too great to count. They all go home to their wives and children never knowing how close they came to obliteration and not knowing who to thank if they somehow did gain a sense of their fortunate salvation. Even now a ship tosses on the turbulent current out there beyond the breakers, its captain and crew clenched with growing concern, but the coal basket remains stoked and the heat gives off a light that shines through the bitter gloom and now a crewman spots it, he cries out pointing and they all rejoice, their bearings quickly determined. Now the slimy hull of the vessel will scrape not a thing this night, only glide through cold lovely water, and in a few hours the entire crew will reunite with family and friends, sharing a full glass and a smile by the warming cheerful fire.
Willie smiled as he watched the light of that ship finding safe passage through the night. He is satisfied, proud, so privileged in the knowledge that he helped frightened men in their time of need. So rejoice in your purpose as lonely as it may be! There is really no such thing as destiny, some aren’t deemed more worthy than others to be blessed with a life filled with happiness and abundant love, but things just happen – molecules collide, our world takes shape, and the sun continues to just burn away. But there is a coal basket that needs replenishment and families that need your dependable light!
Now past midnight and it is Christmas Day. Even the sea seems to sense that it is time for some peace and a calm silence descends. Willie takes a rag from his back pocket and washes a window, he looks out, remembering that long ago night, the first visitation. He remembers the sadness assuaged by the promise, the promise that every Christmas Eve the light will return to remind him, and when at long last it does not, prepare to celebrate! In the meantime continue to feed the basket that shines the light from this bony outcrop of jagged rock. Because soon enough the greater light will descend and sweep him up gently in its wake. And it will be then that he rides that golden wave with the very last angel, the ghost of Christmas Forever.

--- NKT December24, 2009

Here We Come!

What if I were to tell you that my name is Clyde, I’m three feet, six and a half inches tall (and proud of every stinking inch), I reside with Fatso and the Bitch north of Nome and women absolutely adore my little pink ass. Well, that’s what I am telling you, my name is Clyde, and since I’ve already got your attention, you shouldn’t mind if I elucidate further.

Let there be no lies, misconceptions or deception of thought between us. It’s time to come iceberg clean. So - let’s get a few things cleared up right away. Quick, before I forget.

The standard Americana depiction of the jolly elf hard at work is a crock of runny reindeer shit. Hours are long and conditions are, shall I say, quite chilly. I suppose that we are spared from boredom by the odd memory condition which I shall touch upon momentarily, yet how much satisfaction can be accrued even after only a few hours’ worth of the mindless tinkering that my blistered fingers remind me of oh so well at the end of a long day (and they are long here in the land of the midnight sun)?

Now Fatso is actually okay – that is if you enjoy random fartations and public displays of deep nose-spelunking. His jokes are stale and he possesses an odd proclivity to mindless winking but at least he makes the effort. As for the missus, now there’s your problem, she obviously hates us all and the arbitrary punishments that she dishes out are barbaric, wicked and, I must admit, highly creative.

There are two types of male elves – me, and the rest of those tiny peckers running around the place. That’s right, I’m endowed, and once a gal lies with me there’s really no going back. My nickname is Aurora. Aurora bored Alice… bored Janie, Clementine and a bunch of others! Yes sir, my northern light beams long and hard all through the night and I bring satisfying tidings of squealing delight!

And finally, Rudolph didn’t really have that shiny red nose – sad to say that what created all the fuss was in fact his poor rear end after the abominable snowman got done with him.

As for that odd memory condition I mentioned. It’s funny – we all understand the concept of past and future yet none of us can actually remember much beyond which lady elf we took out beyond the reindeer stalls last night and screwed and screwed sending mutual cries of ecstasy bouncing off the icy blue hills and into the shiny wilds of Moose Hollow. Even now my very first memory is that of me tap-tap-tapping away just yesterday morning on some piece of crap in the workshop and looking down at my aching calloused hands and wondering hey, just what the hell is going on here anyway? Some have speculated that maybe this is in fact hell, that this is the final lot for all the awful nasty folk, forever mindlessly tap-tap-tapping away in a place as cold and icy as a penguin’s sphincter, but damned if any of us can remember what we did to deserve such a fate! Maybe this is exactly how they want us – absent of memory, a pale ringing void resonating throughout our noggins, with no real motivation or goals and therefore no intention of making any trouble. Still, perfection has no reward here, so every once in while I don’t tap a nail in all the way or I leave a wooden edge un-sandpapered and splintery. For some reason that helps keep me sane and capable of carrying on.

Naturally it is beyond me how they are able to keep us without memory and existing essentially on a day to day, tap-tap-tap basis. Besides our normal work shifts we do our daily elfin calisthenics, eat regular elfin meals, and partake in weekly elfin cap fittings where strong bolts of electromagnetic energy is blasted into our caps in an effort to keep them spiffed and well-fitted. So, alas, the whole thing remains a mystery. In fact, it’s time for my weekly fitting right now – be right back.

Okay, I’m back. Where were we?

Yet there continues to be rumors, soft spoken whispers in the deep of the bleak North Pole night. One is that of the so-called Great Elf Rebellion of 1976. Just after the runaway commercialization of the holiday season had reached a fever pitch. After all, there’s only so much one elf can do, even an elf with a huge wiener, and it seems that the generation that came before us finally hit the wall. Literally. There are still stains from the violent collisions on the southern barricade that borders the courtyard to prove it. That is if it’s really true which I seriously doubt. But I am troubled by the fact that over the years my mother has urged me to say hello to grandpa every time we stroll past one particularly large and ostentatious stain.

I know what you’re thinking. What about the odd memory condition - but it seems there are some things that you just can’t forget no matter how much you’d like to. Call it instinct.

And then there’s the Underground Polar Railway, a subterranean escape route that unfortunately ran into a thick wall of antediluvian nickel-pan and as a result veered slightly off course and toward the west and subsequently beyond the Bering Strait, where it seems legions of our little people wound up as personal sex slaves to those insatiable hairy ogres of Greater Siberia. So I guess it’s rather fortunate that they can’t remember a couple of days ago, last week, or last month. And with no sense of the past there can be no real worry about the future. So good for them! It all works out in the end. Yet still, they must wonder as to the origins of their anal angst every morning when they rise once again and waddle off to the cold uncaring toilet. And their caps! My god, over time they must have become appallingly unfitted!

But now a glimmer of hope. There has been talk of a new spirit this Christmas of 2008, one more fitting and appropriate for these trying times out there in the Greater World. Given the state of the worldwide economy how could the concept of unlimited soulless gifting even be considered believable? Could there possibly be any wisdom in pursuing such a senseless endeavor, insisting to continue the yuletide ruse? Anybody with half a brain and a quarter of a heart would be able to tell that it was all a bunch of phooey and, accordingly, seek to find the true source of such inane material frivolity.

We could be found out!

And the reason that that would be such a bad thing eludes me at present.

Anyway, about six weeks ago we diverted all of our workshop efforts from the fabrication of silly toys towards the creation of an impressive array of hot pointed cattle prods, steely scrotum grippers, and surprisingly efficient nose-hair rippers, the purposes of which we can vividly imagine. But the coup de grace is the bitches’ very own concoction, more a scheme really, one of applying an impressive adhesive to the left testicle of the more deserving scoundrels and permanently attaching it to his right nipple. This year a special militia of covert operation elves has been gamely assembled and shall follow strict orders regarding the infiltration of the sprawling castles and erstwhile domains of those corporate executives and financial jerks who wantonly stole from the people. With brazen intent this militia will seek to take it all back while inflicting calculable pain in the process. And they will be taking pictures and posting ASAP to the internet at www.herewecome.com.

Greed! Amazing how it turned hedge fund managing Nobel laureates into pathetic dimwits – dumb as a door-nail Dickens might suggest. They road along the outer trajectories of the best-case scenarios for so long that they absolutely discarded the notion of an existence of the worst-case scenario. And to think that they were so concerned about an Obama presidency – for sure, the thing they should have feared most was what greeted them every morning when they faced the mirror to secure the knot in their dapper tie. And what now to tell all those earnest individuals hoping for a comfortable retirement? How about save more, expect less, and pray like hell!

Well, there hasn’t been this much genuine excitement around here for years. At least that’s what Fatso says and the bitch, chuckling while flexing one of those new steely scrotum grippers in her sweaty mitt, merrily confirms it.

If you’re offended by any of this then I would suggest that you haven’t learned a thing. Isn’t it about time we moved beyond the lame astonishment regarding the presentation of silly four-letter words, meaningless Freudian slips of the tongue and other crude suggestions? Sure, perhaps there has been one too many references to excruciating posterior folly contained herewith but after the brutal sodomization perpetrated upon the American people by their trusted financial leaders I find it quite apropos, totally legitimate and sadly fitting.

Now you might say, god damn it, why is this little shit telling me all this, isn’t it bad enough that I had my childhood Christmas fantasies yanked away from me at such at tender age and then my hard-earned retirement assets squandered at such a non-tender age without having to hear about all of this? But my friend, I haven’t told you a thing, you’re the one who chose to pick up this book, turn these pages, read these words. It was you! you! you! And like 99% of everything else that happens to you in your life, you have no one to blame but yourself and that little nugget of knowledge, my dear friend, is my personal gift to you on this joyous holiday occasion.

So look out motherfuckers. Here we come!

Idealist or Buffoon?

Stubborn Idealist or Idiotic Buffoon?.. you be the judge.

About a year ago I started training for long distance running and began feeling pain in my right knee. It didn't really hurt while running. Only afterwards and especially when standing up / sitting down. So I laid off the running (turned to elliptical and walking) and eventually saw a doctor last December (mri found normal arthritic wear and tear but nothing more).

Then about a month ago I got the old wild hair to participate in my hometown half-marathon - the OKC Memorial. I thought I'd mainly walk the thing and perhaps sprinkle in a little pitiful one-legged sledge trotting. To just, you know, speed things up a bit.

Sandwiched between a splendid windless blue sky Saturday and an equally tranquil Monday (today) was an absolutely abominable Sunday... spitting rain riding the northern gusts with wind chills in the upper 30s at the 6:30 am race time.

Oh well... and so of course I decided to go ahead and run those first couple of miles and then play it by ear from there. Ended up going on a 4-5 minute walk / 5-6 minute one-legged sledge trot routine and made out okay. Probably ended up runing about 8 miles and walked the rest. Didn't really feel anything until mile 10 or so. Ended up running (if that's what you want to call it) the last mile and really enjoyed the experience. My first. Don't tell my wife but it probably won't be my last.

As for today, my body is SCREAMING in a kind of bewildered protest. Just about everything aches... except my knees. Ha! I suspect that pain will return when all the rest recedes.

An Empty Cage

Time to note a passing - Kurt Vonnegut. Fly away, kind sir.

Time to note a birthday - "It's like watching the aftermath of a 47 car pile-up on some rain-slicked highway... everything's twisted and mashed together!" observed a disturbed Noble K. Thomas.

Time to note a tragedy - Virginia Tech - sad.

An Alternate State Of Being

I have been training for the OKC Marathon (1/2 version) for about 5 weeks now and tomorrow I'm scheduled for an eight mile run. Now that will be the farthest I've ever run in my life. Last week I ran seven. I'm finding that as I round up into better shape that the act of running isn't so much a task or a toiling endeavor but more of an alternate state of being. I look forward to it. My legs are holding up fairly well although I've had a couple of nasty blisters and my right knee starts to ache sometimes. But all in all I'm pleased. I've already told myself that even if I can not run the entire distance I can always walk a part of it. I will finish.

The Ruminator

The Ruminator

Once again the temperature drops and it’s no winter wonderland out there. Just dirty gray and cold. I press my cheek up against the dining room window and feel the frozen glass. The proof of January is pressed upon me along with all those bleak days that wait ahead like dog poop on a fresh snow, and they crowd out any chance at a happy mood. A sigh of resigned exhalation leaves a patch of condensation across the cold pane and so I draw a sad face with my finger. Two dot eyes, a button nose, and one big frown.
The holiday season is over. Has been for a week now. The second week of January and the new neighbors across the street still keep their holiday lights on at night. I don’t know them at all, I’m ashamed to admit that I’m not even sure what they look like, so who am I to say if it’s out of a stubborn forlornness or a could-not-care-less laziness? Maybe they simply forgot. But every morning now for the last week those lights have remained on early in the cold dark dawn as I retrieve the paper like some just-tickled-to-be-here dog and I’m now beginning to wonder if we might have some kind of a record brewing here, Christmas lights shining on brightly into February, beyond Valentine’s, maybe even into March and the coming spring.
So how do I feel about that?
Oh how I do love all those twinkling multi-colored lights. Throughout Christmas they ignite my spirit and add a magic dazzle to otherwise frigid evenings. But it is not Christmas. No. Its last remains were set out by the curb last Tuesday and dumped into that loud hydraulic monster that feeds around here on a weekly basis. And their twinkling presence only serves to remind me of that fact. The Yuletide has receded, drawn back out into that dark and empty sea of time.
So no. I don’t like all those twinkling lights. Not now. Not at all.
The season is over. I fight that sinking feeling inside of me realizing that it can’t be Christmas all year long. That’s what makes it so special. I know all that. Still, the sinking feeling sinks even further.
Actually I do have a dog and his name is Otto. And he’s tickled to be here, especially when I tickle him, but he’s not much of a paper retriever. And that’s a good thing because, like a fine wine and a good book, I prefer my paper dry and legible.
“Here Otto” I call out, and his old watery eyes look up at me and then here he comes, old tail wagging and long tongue dangling, and it is at times like these that I remain pleased that I am the master and he the obedient beast.
“Good boy Otto” I go on, scratching and rubbing him, pleasing him in the most primal of ways, and it brings me a pinch of joy to make my beastly friend feel good.
I get up and fill my coffee cup again. Thank God for the sanctity, salvation and sanity found deep inside the Brazilian-bred coffee bean.
Otto wanders off into the den and I sit down to peruse the paper while the television offers its daily Pavlovian welcome to the commencement of yet a new day. I should be happy. Another day of life, of freedom and opportunity, not just one day closer to death. The familiar voices drone along and I think about my day, the priorities that must be met, the duties that might fetch some attention, the rest that will no doubt get swept yet again under the carpet. “The Midwest will be blanketed with a good half foot of snow later today as a mass of arctic air makes it’s way south…” and I turn to the business section with a sigh. “And now we turn our attention to a story coming out of South America.” I scan the front page and note nothing of real interest so I’m on to the inside pages checking some stock quotes. “It has been reported that there is a coming shortage of coffee beans from Brazil due to inclement weather combined with some new and strange disease strain making it’s way through…” and now I look up at the television. “… and some experts have even warned that, the way things are going, in a mere ten years there may no longer be any coffee beans left.”
I choke on my last sip and turn off the tube with a slightly shaky hand.

At the office I settle down with another cup of coffee and scan the appointment book. I have a 10 am “Get Acquainted” meeting with a retired gentleman and his wife. Lunch with Ted at the Café Escondido at half past noon and then a 3 pm quarterly review with Harold Jones. Damn. Harold Jones is paying for solid financial planning advice (and getting it I might add) but what he seems to think he is owed is a series of investing miracles. He expects double digit returns regardless of the fact that the S&P 500 was down 2.8% last quarter and our balanced portfolio was up 5.3% during that same period. These are the types of clients that you’d be just as pleased to see go elsewhere and take their bad and somewhat ignorant karma with them.
“Good morning, Jake,” Bertha says as she enters my office handing me some files. Bertha is the office manager and has been around here forever, long before Lighthouse Planners took me on five years back, and she provides a warm and supportive presence that is always comforting, especially back when I was new and more than a little unsure of myself.
“Good morning Bertha, how was the week-end?” Bertha, home of the ever-present ruby-lipped smile, reddish-to-gray hair stacked high into a tight bun that loosens as the day drags on, says, “well, honestly, I’ve had better. Mom was an absolute spoiled sport at Bingo Friday night and the Cowboys got stomped yesterday.”
Bertha takes her eighty-five year old mother to Bingo every Friday night and they’re quite the sight, her mother failing in almost all physical and mental capacities except her desire to win, and big buxom Bertha rolling her into the bingo parlor in the wheel chair complete with Dallas Cowboy car flag somehow waving from the back and with a well-worn pioneer blanket folded across her lap.
“Sorry to hear that but I guess the positive side is that she’s still – well, what’s the word, feisty?”
“Oh yes, feisty, and then some. Why she still wants to win so bad is beyond me. You’d think she’d be happy just to get out a little but no – and she fell asleep late in the afternoon yesterday and I still haven’t told her what happened to the Cowboys.”
What happened to the Cowboys was a second-half collapse on the frozen rink of Green Bay, Wisconsin. The Packers rolled it up as the temperature plummeted and the Cowboy players sat stunned along the bench, heads bowed while puffs of whipped ice smoke poured from their helmets.
“Ah, she’ll see it on TV or read about it in the paper. You’re off the hook.”
“Let’s hope so,” Bertha says as she heads towards the door.
“By the way, did you hear about the coffee bean shortage? Price could shoot up and we might even run completely out some day.”
“You know me Jake – I’m just a decaffeinated tea drinker. As for you, well, you’re the coffee-swigging financial expert, you’d better start looking into the buying of coffee future contracts.”
I laugh and say, “yeah, I guess you’re right,” already acknowledging internally the flaw in her suggestion. Because you can’t catch that “caffeine buzz” from drinking cash profits although they might make the prospect of a coffee-less day a bit more tolerable.
“I wouldn’t be too concerned about those coffee beans old boy,” says Bob as he struts into my office. “They’ve been saying for years that we’re going to run out of chocolate, out of the cocoa bean I guess, and from the looks of it we’ve got more chocolate than ever. Now pussy, if we ever run out of that, then we’re in big trouble.” Pussy is Bob’s favorite word, used more than occasionally in situations such as these, but also as a term to describe those who oppose, impede, insult or otherwise get on the wrong side of Bob in any tangible or intangible manner.
Damn. Bertha just left my office moments ago and Bob, who was married when I first arrived at Lighthouse but has since shed that skin, and rumor has it that it was indeed he who got skinned in the end, has a booming voice that he never sees any reason to tone down. I cringe a little but smile a little too because Bertha can’t hear my smile.
I lean towards him and whisper, “well, how you gonna get that if there’s no chocolate to offer her in the evening? And what of the morning after, when the awful truth hits you, with no coffee to zap you back to your senses?”
“But Jake, you know I’m a flirt, squirt and then desert kinda guy – chocolate and coffee never have the chance to enter into the equation. Besides, what of the pistachio nut, now that’s something worth worrying about.”
“How about the wine grape?”
“The celery stalk?”
“Water?”
“What about air?” Bob deadpans leaning in. “Here we are, running all these projections for these suckers, ten years, twenty, thirty, and you and I both know they’re never gonna make it, and neither will we, not with all this shit going on in the world. I say spend it – blow it all – NOW!”
Bob is the kind of friend that’s okay to have around the office, he has a way in helping those long tedious days seem a little shorter, so usually I tactfully play along, but outside these boundaries, be it a drink on the way home or a ballgame on the weekends, well, I just don’t find myself that comfortable around him. I’ve made that mistake more than a time or two.
“Speaking of those suckers, have you had the chance to read this new teleputer report? Some interesting stuff in there.” One thing the world is not running out of evidently is teleputers. I hand Bob the report.
“No – haven’t had the pleasure.” Been too busy all week-end chasing down that aforementioned diminishing commodity no doubt. He looks up from the report and shakes the paper sheets.
“Paper – and trees. What about trees? We’ll need all the shade we can get in the coming global warming fucked-up future.”
Bob turns and takes the report along with his unapologetic booming voice with him.

Harold Jones arrives at 2:58 pm. He’s not one to be too early lest he appear anxious but he’d never dream of ever being late and you had not better be either. I hear his banter out in the reception area, the low confident drawl that already seems to ooze a strange propensity towards sweet savored disappointment, almost as if he’d be disappointed if he was not allowed the opportunity to be in fact truly disappointed, and Bertha’s spirited yet somewhat restrained response, and soon enough the phone buzzes.
“Send him in,” I gasp, and I snap my fingers attempting to assume the role. Jones saunters in with a tight-lipped gaze and I get up and offer him a very firm hand shake and a pickled smile. After a brief uncomfortable exchange of pleasantries we’re down to the brass tacks.
Ouch. I must have sat on them.
Sixteen minutes later he’s up, out my door, and asking Bertha for his pertinent files, documents, tax returns – you name it. All of it. The message is quite clear to Bertha, quite clear in fact to all within the office confines, but I don’t mind it one bit. Let him go I say. Let him find someone else to pester, belittle with his corner-mouthed quips, to slowly degrade, all done mind you with that smirk and that slow shake of the head and those squinty eyes that reflect his barely contained outrage. “I am disappointed,” he had concluded. Disappointed? If he wants real disappointment I say let his sorry ass go right out that door and he can belly up to some fly-by-night schemer dreamer who has designs on liquidating our tidy asset allocations and tossing it all into a tiny overseas start-up selling banana burgers to Siberian goat ropers. And make that a full position margined to the hilt!

Driving home in the late afternoon and a fine sleet is coming down. I have the defrost on with the wipers going back and forth. I’m thinking about Harold Jones of course and about the methods I’d been taught to deal with his sort, and I had tried, I truly had, but sometimes you must face the bitter facts and move on. I don’t like confrontation, I painstakingly and perhaps to a fault try to avoid it, but there had been little choice.
Now look at that – it’s that guy. The one who wanders around town, strolling down busy boulevards talking to himself, stopping in at various public places where everyone acts like it’s no big deal, but it is, and everyone knows it is, but you let it go, because you really don’t want to unsettle him. It’s the local homeless guy. I’ve seen him for years now, walking in the dead heat of summer with a bandana tied around his head, ratty shorts, t-shirt and old sneakers, going somewhere, who knows exactly where, but somewhere. In the spring, in the autumn, and now in the cold gray at the end of a January day, sleet sticking in his red wool beanie and frazzled blonde beard, shoulders hunched around a green army jacket, hands tucked away into the depths of his jean pockets. You never know when or where the homeless guy is going to pop up but you know he will.
And I think to myself, Harold Jones doesn’t appreciate his rate of return but all this guy would like to do is return – to somewhere warm and safe.
To home.

It’s sad to wake up on February 14th and feel alone. Last Valentine’s Day had been quite different, but how was I to know then that I was in fact near the end of the relationship.
I had met April the previous October as the soft autumn breeze coaxed the turning leaves to finally cut loose, one by one see-sawing their way to the cooling ground in a brief final dance. I recall the fresh chill in the air that late morning as I proceeded to the local financial planning meeting held the first Thursday of each month at the public library. April was new to the chapter, a young planner recently hired by a large planning conglomerate, and she appeared out of nowhere somewhat shy yet obviously bright. And very cute. Her brown eyes lit up when I asked her after the meeting if she’d like a cup of punch and a cookie, for she had been standing off alone and away from her mingling friends with that “I’m lost and growing more uncomfortable by the second” look, so I had rescued her, and I soon admired the ring of red painting her upper lip and the corners of her mouth as she sipped and smiled while I talked about my perspective on the proper timing of IRA withdrawals.
Hell yes I gave it my best, but even so, the topic naturally ran out of steam and I began to stammer on about some other less interesting issue and then she came to my rescue saying, “you know, I’d love to talk to you more about IRAs. And 401-Ks. And Monte Carlo Stimulations.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that it was actually called Monte Carlo Simulation but surely I must have at the very least grinned. “Why of course – I’d like that very much. Why don’t you give me your business card and I’ll give you a call.” She gave me a big fresh cherry smile and scribbled her home number on the back.
I was ecstatic leaving that October meeting and as I strolled to my car with her card still in my hand I felt the sun streaming its life-affirming warmth and golden glow through the lovely tree branches. The chill had given way to a splendid autumn afternoon and I felt that golden glow inside.
But the chill is here now.
You know, I could stand a little Monte Carlo Stimulation today.
I could have stood some yesterday.
I have it on good authority that in all likelihood I could probably stand a little Monte Carlo Stimulation tomorrow.
There will be no April this Valentine’s Day. No nobody. Nada. But as I bend over to pick up the morning paper I notice that the neighbor’s Christmas lights are no longer shining. Now how about that? A small triumph to start the day. Christmas is officially over I guess. Drum roll please – let the bells of springtime ring and the coming winds blow!
I wonder what April will be doing today? Will she even think about me? Well of course she will, one can’t help but remember what one did just last year, that being just a few months back, a bushel of weeks ago, really only mere days. So even if she’s with a new boyfriend today she will at some point think of me at least in a small fleeting and vaguely fond manner and no doubt wonder how the ruminator is faring this day?
Well, the ruminator is drinking his coffee this day, coffee tenderly brewed from his growing cache of Starbucks bags and Colombian whole beans stored in a dark and bone dry spot in his cupboard. The ruminator doesn’t go to the store these days without picking up an extra four or five packages of fresh java for the coming bleak days and a sense of rich satisfaction percolates inside him whenever he thinks of the cupboard. We’re talking heaps of the Breakfast Blend and Dark Vienna Roast and a slew of other exotic blends but no decaf. Screw the decaf. What’s the point? And the ruminator is feeding Otto, shaving, showering, driving to work on a bright February morn, surprisingly happy, and there he is, the homeless guy, sitting on a bench huddled over a steaming white Styrofoam cup of coffee.
I, the ruminator, salute the resourcefulness and guile of the local homeless guy by giving my horn a sharp jolly toot as I drive past. And I’m not exactly certain but it does appear I may have startled him and he’s spilled a little of that hot coffee upon himself. Oh – don’t look now but in my side view mirror I seem to see the arm shooting upwards and he’s too far back now for me to positively identify the extension of one coffee-burned middle finger.
I step on the gas a little and look straight ahead and lose myself in the spreading haze of frozen exhaust.

The early spring winds blow and I find myself carried along with them. It’s easier most times to just go with the flow, floating downstream in a pleasant milieu of routine and a few small harmless adventures. Very few in fact, and none truly notable, so truth be told the days just float by as the lawns green and the redbuds bloom.
Soon enough I find myself at Easter dinner with the folks, the siblings, their children, a big fat honey-baked ham, rain pouring down and a bunch of colored eggs strewn about the house, hidden among the plastic fruit, stuck under pillows, wobbling upon door frames, mounted atop brass candle holders. As the unmarried uncle that all the children without question adore I am designated as the primary egg hider and damn if I don’t enjoy it. But as the kids have grown older it appears that I may be running out of those ingenious spots to cast my lot and the fun is wearing thin, especially when I see them go straight to the special locale that had kept them at bay for at least an hour last year.
“So Jake, what have you been up to lately?” my sister-in-law Amy asks over a glass of pinot grigio at the kitchen table. She wants to make small talk, she wants to be my buddy, she wants me happy, but I am more into hiding eggs and staying away from all this small talk.
“Work” is what I say, with a sigh and a raise of the brow. “Busy busy busy.” I realize at once that I’m coming across as a grumpy ass, unappreciative of her effort, so I smile and ask her what she’s been up to.
“Have you heard from April?” a voice sings from across the kitchen, and it’s mother, always the positive one, positive that I need a wife and a family. She approaches in a slow curtsy, hands clasped loosely as if just thinking about praying, and I suddenly look away at one of the few eggs that the kids have still not found. Tucked gently inside an oven mitt hanging stiffly from the oven door, the pink shell barely visible to the eye if seen from the proper angle (that is the one rule, that all eggs must be at least partially visible from some point in the room) and I get up saying, “Nope – haven’t heard from April mom,” and then I go into the living room and announce to the kids, “hey, there’s still one egg hiding out in the kitchen,” and the kids all skedaddle past me while my dad awakens from his wine-induced Easter nap with a crunch and an expletive. An egg had been placed between his legs by one of the ornery grandkids. For a moment he is rightfully angered, but thinking better of it, at his age he should be thankful that it was just an egg that cracked down there.
The rain slackens off a bit and a shard of sunshine stabs through. Dad stands up and wipes the egg shell from his lap with a sleepy smile.
He has risen.

Now in my early thirties I see it all very clearly. Of course I do. The years are all running together and the four seasons are being dragged along with them like battered cans on a string rattling behind a newlywed’s clunker. Just Married. Forever Harried. I have come to appreciate those seasons, to respect them, but I always seem to be longing for the one opposite the season I actually find myself currently ruminating within. And here I sit, still wandering through the springtime of my own life, but it’s always raining. I tell myself as I wipe the fog from my glasses that if only it would just stop pouring for a second then that’s when it would happen. I would get there. I would be happy.

On the Saturday before the 4th of July I gather with Bob and Bertha, her mother, and all the rest of the gang at the annual Lighthouse Financial Planners company picnic. The volleyball net is getting plenty of action and someone set up a nice croquet course where I have already taken a good beating (and I’m still steamed about Jack Benson knocking my ball way off into the pond where I was forced to take my shoes and socks off and wade through the muck using the mallet as both a crutch and divining rod, each careful step bringing more chuckles from Jack and his buds until I almost slipped when I stepped on the damn slippery thing) and now I am sitting down to a hearty meal of fried chicken, potato salad, cole slaw and fruit salad all washed down with an ice cold beer. But as I sit down at the picnic table I detect the odor, as do all of my fellow picnickers, and even Bertha’s mother shrivels up her wrinkled nose. The scum of the pond has literally stained me. So I pick up my paper plate and excuse myself to an isolated stump near the volleyball net.
“8 Serving 6” cries out a young man that I’ve never seen before, probably some co-worker’s son or brother, and he steps into a hard overhead serve that flies over the net with a bang and a young paraplanner near the back line gives it a quick look and then lets it go.
“What kind of effort was that?” Bob cries with hands on hips, face twisted into a sweaty scowl. “Listen Judy, if that ball is anywhere close, then go for it!” Bob turns back around to face the server and assumes the athletic position, knees bent and hands aloft, as the ball gets rolled back under the net and I scoop up another helping of potato salad, not the mustard kind but the mayonnaise and hard-boiled egg and pickled variety, damn delicious, and the server grabs the ball and gives it a bounce or two.
“9 Serving 6” he grunts and winds up into another killer blast that requires a dazzling leap into the air and the ball comes whistling over the net in a kamikaze loop. A determined Judy steps right into its path, a path that would have surely taken the ball beyond the back boundary, and the sound of ball on flesh is heard all around the park. The ducks on the pond give a terse quack and start swimming away as fast as their little legs will take them.
Judy is on her back now, with hands to face covering the tears and muffling the cries, and she rolls over to her side while the women all gather around her and offer some kind of comfort.
“Man oh man – I’m sorry,” says the young man, his eyes alive with excitement as he approaches the injured girl, “I sure didn’t mean to do that.”
He looks into the faces of his opponents for their confirmation of his innocence and finally Joel Singer says, “forget it, no one blames you for that – still, maybe you ought to tone it down a bit, okay? We’re all just here to have a little fun”
The young man bends down into the circle of compassion tending to Judy, and when he sees the blood trickling between her fingers and hears the muted sobs he cringes and quickly withdrawals.
“Yeah,” Bob says as he looks down into the crowd around Judy, “well, it was a foot fault anyway. Our point.”
The young man looks at Bob, but Bob is still looking away, that feigned disinterested look I recognize, and the young man begins to say something as his lips slightly part but then suddenly thinks better of it.
Bertha comes over with a roll of paper towels and kneels to the ground asking a few of the others to kindly lift the poor girl’s head slightly and then she folds a paper towel into a tiny soft square and gently folds it inside the bloody nostril. “It’s okay baby, you’ll be alright, no harm, you rest for a second and give the nose a chance to stop the bleeding, and then we’ll walk you over to a lounger and you can rest,” and I see Judy take her hand and give it a squeeze.
A few minutes later I toss my dirty paper plate into the trash can and Bob barks out, “Jake, get over here, we need another player,” and the next thing I know I find myself in poor Judy’s spot, the young man crying out “10 Serving 6.”
“Whoa, hold on there a minute hoss. We had us a foot fault that last point,” Bob says as he reaches up and looks through the net, his nose poking through.
The kid bounces the ball a few times and casts a quizzical glance at Robbie Sales, raising his eyebrows and rolling his eyes ever so slightly, and Bob sees this.
“What? You don’t believe me? I clearly called it.”
“Uh, okay, whatever, just make sure you don’t touch the net next time pops.”
Bob recedes back into his position but I can see that he is obviously mega-pissed.
“We got 9 serving 6, right pops?” and the young man winds up into a monstrous serve that was either a horrible mis-hit or, more likely, a glorious dead-ringer that never even contemplated clearing the net but instead curved in a nasty spinning arc right under it and into the unsuspecting groin of Mr. Robert Sturdevant, who had an instant earlier assumed correctly that the serve was indeed coming right at him but just skimming over that net, certainly not just under, and having anticipated such, had committed himself to an all-out killer spike-jump with legs splayed wide open, an absolute full-frontal exposure, in anticipation of the conquering moment that sadly never came.
By the time Bob regains his wits the young man is long gone, he’s taken off for the trees outlining the northern edge of the park in a hasty jog, and it is then that I realize that he is no one’s brother or son, just some guy out looking for some free food and a little fun, and here he had found both. Two men help Bob to his feet in all his public misery and with arms around their shoulders they lead him back to the picnic benches where they sit him down with a hard thud.
“Oh damn,” Bob winces, and he leans back and starts to pout.
Judy sits behind him with torn paper towel stuck inside her nose and a wry smile spreading across her face. She looks up at me and winks and nods with amusement. She’s feeling a whole lot better now.
“Damn damn ohhhh damn,” Bob repeats and adds with anger, “if I ever get my hands on that punk. Oh damn. Hurts so damn bad!”
I look at Bob and I see one solitary tear streaking his red cheek. His balls ache, no doubt about that, but it’s his pride that really got whacked good. Here comes Bertha wheeling her mother back to the van, it’s been quite a full day already, and as they pass Bob I see the little old lady look up slowly raising her hand and Bertha stops. As a sniveling Bob looks up she opens her mouth and finally speaks in a voice far more lively and bold than I would‘ve ever fathomed. “What are you Bob – some kind of pussy?”
In the park all is silent except for the caw of a faraway crow but somewhere in our holy world a gong has been firmly struck, unheard by all of us but without question felt below the belt by Bob. He looks up in shock for a moment, lips slightly parted and trembling, and Bertha quickly wheels away her mother before any further inquisition could be established. Suddenly Bob’s head drops to his lap, hands spread wide across his swelling sockets, and the sobs come. One by one they come and one by one our fellow Lighthouse planners slip away, eyebrows raised and a tooth-clenched giggle stifled, until only I remain. The sobbing has stopped now, the shoulders have settled into a permanent slouch, just a sniffle here and there, and I understand that right about now he’s wondering how he will ever live this one down, just who was here to actually witness it anyway, and what to say to whoever remains when he finally comes up for air.
I had thought about offering him a word of encouragement and then a quick pat on the back, but instead I stand up and oh so quietly tiptoe away. Maybe he looks up and sees the back of me sneaking off. Maybe he doesn’t.

It’s dusk as I head home and off in the distance I hear the pop pop pop of firecrackers as someone gets a head start on the 4th. Up ahead I spot the silhouette of person walking way too close to the road, too far off to see if he or she is approaching or receding, and a car ahead of me passes with lights on and I see the pink of a face, not the dark tuft of the back of a head, and it’s a man, drawing nearer, and he’s way too close to the road, no margin for even the slightest of error, and the next car swerves into the other lane to miss him and I’m next, the figure approaching, gaining, and then I see him, hiking boots laced high, a red bandana swiped across his noggin, seemingly just a dirty loincloth wrapped about his ass. And I don’t move an inch, in fact I even hug the right side a little, and I grit my teeth as I pass.
He never looks away. Acts as if he never even sees me – just marches onward toward something and I think of all that leftover food we just threw away back at the picnic.

Bertha’s mom dies in late October. On a blustery Wednesday afternoon just days before Halloween a small funeral is held at the First Methodist Church. I sit near the back with a few fellow workers, smelling the waxed pine of the pew and relaxing as I gaze into the dazzle of lights and flowers. Towards the end of the service, when the organist begins to play Ode to Joy, I suddenly have a vision. I remember where I hid that last Easter egg. Up high on top of the wood cupboard, a precarious perch indeed, and that colored egg must have rolled away and out of sight with the slightest tilt of the earth on its axis. Or with the slam of the cupboard door. Well, that explains the smell the parents complained about all summer long. It wasn’t a dead mouse in the attic after all. Just a poor egg, painted, slightly cracked and forgotten.
Bob did not attend the service.

April in October. Not such a bad thing, maybe even a good thing, if one has the sense to just sit back, relax, and appreciate it. But the ruminator never does. Two Octobers ago she had appeared, a sweet and pretty and innocent girl, and I had run her off with all my somber ruminations. Her words, not mine. I had thought of them as reflective and insightful, as necessary, unavoidable – certainly not somber.
“I don’t want to die in the spring,” I had whispered to her in the freezing calm of winter. And then in the spring I had casually mentioned that “it sure would be a bummer to buy the farm in the fall – don’t you think?”
Well, she did think, and what she thought she must not have liked, and so soon enough a distance emerged between us, one promulgated primarily by April, and then by May she was gone.
I didn’t really lament it at first, but as is my nature, before long I so badly wanted again what I no longer had.

Thanksgiving is around the corner and I am seriously contemplating the offer from Bob, one that involves deli-bought turkey sandwiches, football watching and large consumptions of imported beer, but in the end I turn him down. I almost jokingly suggest to him that Bertha might be lonely this holiday season, maybe the two of them could get together in some hospitable manner, watch the Cowboy game, reminisce, but then my better judgment seizes hold of me. There is still no kidding allowed on that subject, not even the slightest of hazy connotations, so I do my best to bury the memory.
“Sorry Bob – gotta go to the parent’s as usual.”
“Okay, sure, I understand,” he says with a mildly put-off glance, “but you oughta get outa there in the late afternoon and drop by – plenty of beer here. Plenty of chips,” he adds with that wry grin and the wink of an eye. As I move toward the office door I say, “yeah, I’ll try to get away. No promises though.”
“Yeah – no promises. Understood.”
Well, I never did get away and I receive word on Saturday afternoon that somehow Bob got tossed in jail Friday night. I receive the phone call from Frank Weathers, the Methodist minister client of ours who had bailed him out earlier that morning.
“What the fuck happened?” I ask in astonishment, immediately regretting the expletive that somehow slips out of my mouth although Reverend Weathers continues on like he hasn’t heard a thing, or considering the circumstances, doesn’t really give a damn.
“He won’t say much and I didn’t ask. But he smelled like a brewery when I got there. The damn fool had on a pair of Bermuda shorts and a Margaritaville t-shirt. And sandals. Thirty-five frickin’ degrees and here he comes waltzing out of the county jail looking like that. Into a sleet storm. The damn fool.”
I decide to lay low and just wait until Monday morning to hear the finer details from the man himself. As it turns out I have to wait a little longer.

Now all those twinkling lights have returned once more. After I get home from work I walk Otto around the block as the grey mid December day melts away into a cold yet festive dusk and we admire all the displays. Otto appears excited, stimulated by the surroundings, and I can only smile and look away when he insists on relieving himself on one of the Bacino’s toothy elves. And of course there are those who go way overboard, the mixing of grinning neon snowmen with the swaddling baby Jesus seeming at first glance a little misguided, maybe even tacky, but surely everybody’s heart is in the right place.
I walk my dog alone under a cloudy and cold sky that seems to trap all that light beneath it creating a magical dome in which we all work our way through December. I smile in its glow, I acknowledge it, and Otto looks up at me and gently barks, tail wagging and eyes seeing, and we continue on. Although it’s quite nippy I understand that there is no need to rush home because all that awaits me there is a closet-full of stacked coffee beans and an under-used laptop computer and memories of all those lost seasons. Time is marching on brother. My pace quickens as I attempt to walk along with it and the wind cuts through my unzipped jacket, its chill slapping me in the face, my footing suddenly unsure and slipping.

On a late Friday afternoon a couple of weeks after Thanksgiving a group of us from the office meet at the local trendy coffee shop to trade a few small gifts and offer one another good seasonal cheer. I really enjoy the company of my fellow workers, we generate camaraderie, a true synergy, and spending some free time with them is a joy. But there is another reason for our gathering, one that has hardly been able to await its proper turn, and that is to confirm the rumors about our poor Bob.
No – I had not heard from the man. He had not returned my few phone calls nor had he returned to the office since that fateful Thanksgiving week-end. His clutter still remains in his office although it has been tidied up a bit, the half-full coffee mug finally drained and wiped clean and set back in its rightful place for example, but otherwise all remains quite the same while the ghost of Bob eerily hovers about. But Bertha has gotten the word from Reverend Weathers who had, as it turns out, by default become the liaison between Bob and the local court system, and I knew by the look in her eyes that what the reverend had told her wasn’t good.
Bertha sips her hot tea and nervously looks about the shop. The last gift has been opened and the last thank-you given in gracious exchange (and my, the irony of all of us giving one another gift cards from this very establishment, the only differences being the dollar amount, except for Jack Benson, who received a dirty and foul-smelling croquet ball from yours truly), and now we all slow down just a bit and assume a more solemn mood as we know what must be addressed next. I sense the anxiety in Bertha and as the last of the laughter and gaiety fades away into a menagerie of throat clearings and self-conscious guffaws I perk up and offer, “now Bertha, it can’t really be all that bad, now can it?”
She tips her head ever so slightly and raises her painted-on brows as she sheepishly smiles. “Oh yes – it can. It truly can.”
“What did he do – rob a damn bank or something?” Chip Hardy asks somewhat derogatively, and he drowns his own chuckle with a sip of his vanilla latte.
“Nah, not that bad,” interjects Ralph Russo. “Look, I know the whole scoop, the entire enchilada, and if Bertha would like me to, I’d be more than willing to spill all the juicy particulars.” We all turn back to look at Bertha and she responds with relief, “oh, by all means, be my guest.”
Ralph takes a long drag on his coffee and then sets the empty mug down with a decidedly louder-than-needed thud. “Well, it seems that our vivacious co-worker drank all Thanksgiving Day, on into the night, and then well into the next day and evening, and somehow wound up late Friday night at Coco Locos where he got into a bar fight with another patron. The way I heard it, Bob was hitting on the guy’s girlfriend and before long the guy hit him with the unsweetestest of punches.”
“What the heck do you mean by that?” Chip implores, and Ralph tips back his head and grins. “The guy called him a – well, excuse my French, ladies – a pussy.”
That word. That derisive term. The spinning P-bomb that just went boom deep within Bob’s intemperant soul.
One by one our group begins to disband while the other smaller details are freely dispensed among us. Bob broke the guy’s jaw with a half-full whiskey bottle, Jamesons I’d wager. What’s more, the gal emptied an entire can of fresh mace on him in a tornado of uproar complete with arms flailing and hellish screams and then the bartender roughed him up a bit before the cops arrived. Additionally, and most regrettably, he wet his bermudas when they slapped the cuffs on him and as they led him out of the establishment day-old vomit was seen smeared across his backside.
So yes. A Merry Christmas to one and all. Fa la la and all that good shit. As for Bob, hang on brother, it’s going to get a lot worse before it starts to get better. And last but not in the slightest least, as one unforgettable character once bitterly proclaimed to the innocent passing fool: and a Happy New Year to you – in jail!
Well, now we’re down to just a handful of Lighthouse planners and the coffee’s growing cold and my jaw tight. My eye twitches just a little as I absorb this new knowledge, this sad new fate of an old friend, while the perky caffeine wanders throughout the winding conduits of my entire body. The mood has changed in here, it’s late afternoon in early December and the pale gray light grows old and tired and just dissolves into twilight with the blink of an eye.
I bid farewell to my friends and head for the exit. And as I think about stopping by the bakery check-out and picking up some holiday bread or maybe some orange-cranberry scones if they’re not that busy, I spot him. There he is. Sitting off in that small two-person booth in the shadows, all by himself of course, long red stocking cap with a fuzzy white ball bobbing at the end of it, the faded green army jacket wrapped around him and he looks warm and surprisingly well kept. But what really gets me is the shiny laptop computer sitting in front of him. He’s just typing away, in a mad flurry of gesticulation and constant tap-tap-tapping with absolutely no hesitation, he’s writing something like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do in this world, and I think, whatever its source, it must be a large and non-depleting one.
Suddenly he looks up at me with dead blue eyes and his chapped lips move but his expression remains unchanged, stoic, then slightly annoyed.
“Hey man – I found it.”
His voice is strong, low, and confident. I don’t say anything for a moment, quite frankly I’m taken aback, but then I spit out a few words.
“Uh, hey, I could give you a ride if… like, if you needed one.”
“To where?”
“Oh well, anywhere you needed to go.” Those dead blue eyes flicker to life for a moment, he squeezes them tighter with curiosity and his brow deepens with the new growth from last summer’s long miles and tan.
“Like, you know, home or something.”
Is that the beginning of a smile I see tugging from the corners of his mouth?
“Now why in the world would I want to go to a place like that?”
No smile, more of a smirk and just as suddenly those blue eyes go dead and he jumps right back into that swiftly moving river of his thought and words. Tap tap tap. I’ve been dismissed.
Forget the damn holiday bread. I scurry out into the frozen dark and escape into the smell of my car. And I’m thinking, he doesn’t have a home, doesn’t have a past or a future. And he doesn’t want any of them. What he has is what he needs: now and a shiny laptop.
That he found.

I step up to the window and look out. My neighbors, who I still haven’t officially met except for the odd wave as they pull into their driveway or a nod of the head as we all go about the work of keeping our yards green and well-groomed in the summer, never did offer us any lights this past Christmas. Maybe they no longer believe. Maybe they’re lazy. Maybe they think this neighborhood, with all its nutty need for achieving the proper holiday mood and thus accepted status, has finally pissed them off.
My breath blows onto the cold glass pane and suddenly an incredibly faint figure materializes. A round face with a button nose above the remains of a long ago and faraway frown.
I remember. I can’t help but remember. It’s what I do and, as April once remarked, I do it well. “If only you could forget,” she once lamented. But I can’t. And I can’t forget that.
Another year. Another Christmas. Gone. I ball up my fist and with grinding teeth angrily rub away the apparition.
Where are all those twinkling lights when you truly need them? If they were still plugged in, twinkling this very moment and thus proving the existence of our joy, deep down inside I know I could get there, to the promise of an early spring morning, or to that warm place under the carefree summertime sun, or to the path where windswept leaves show you the way to a tranquil spot of earth.
But I don’t see that unknown neighbor across the street retrieving the day’s mail alone in the dark. She happens to gaze across the street where that unhappy face continues to look out, fist still balled, and the mind still ruminating.
She looks away not understanding – not caring.
She’ll never know that I could be happy.

Resolve

2006 was a trying year but we got through it. Taught us quite a bit too, like appreciate life. Enjoy it. Hell - while we're at it, why not even live it!

New Year's Eve Resolutions:

From now on January is a shedding month. Weight that is. Pounds of fat. I plan on losing ten of them by February 1st! Right now I'm around 224. My ultimate goal is under 200. The time has come.

Medicine Park will release two CDs this year. First, the Moogy deal, and then a various artist project that might incorporate a Christmas story writ by me (currently unwritten btw).

I must finish The Lost Child by June 30th. Then write some short stories and prepare for NaNoWriMo 2007 in November. I missed it this year. The working title in mind: The Whistle (a story about a college basketball referee - lots of possibilities there).

Financial Goal Planning of Oklahoma must pollinate by year's end or I'll pull the plug on any future such endeavors. My goal is at least ten clients by that time.

Other goals: prepare for sale of farm land. Hope to average $2500 to $3000 per acre. Hope to have all sold by 2010. And learn more about the winemaking!

So - I got no time for wallowing. Carry on my good men...

Jubilation!

Nicholas is in total remission.

Say no more.

Merry Christmas to all!

What Happened To Poor Old Charlie?

[Last year I read John Cheever's "Christmas Is A Sad Season For The Poor." Someone had provided a link to the short story on the TC Boyle messageboard. Recently I purchased The Ecco Book Of Christmas Stories which includes Cheever's story. After reading it again I had the idea that the story wasn't over yet - at least not for me. So with apologies to the original author, I offer up my conclusion.]

What Happened To Poor Old Charlie?

Talk about an amorphous depression.
The day after Christmas Charlie awoke before six am, his customary time of awakening, with a slight headache and a fuzzy memory contracting into cold clarity with each beat of his heart. He didn’t chuckle at the notion that he no longer needed to get up, get dressed, and take that Elevated train uptown. No, he could sleep in all day if he wanted to, and usually he wanted to, but not today.
Now how sad is that?
Yesterday he got fired by the superintendent of the apartment building where he had worked as an elevator operator for six months. Damn. And on Christmas Day too, an unfortunate series of licentious events bound together with the benevolence generated by the irrepressible gaiety of the season. Little doubt about that. So no more going up and down, up and down. Now it was just down, down, down. Dear Lord – he had most assuredly gotten the shaft!
As he lay awake in the bed that comprised the primary centerpiece to his furnished room, rubbing his head and wondering about next month’s rent, somebody rapped hard on the door.
He didn’t have a wife, any children, no real friends to speak of – he was merely a working man living all alone in his furnished room – and that was just the way he liked it, mind you, so he was quite surprised and annoyed by the loud arrival of some fool at his doorstep at this hour. But his surprise and annoyance by themselves would not make them go away.
The mad clamor of fists on the door once again and then a woman’s voice: “Charlie Leary – I know you’re in there! You open this door immediately or I’ll open it myself!”
He knew right away that this was no idle threat, she had a key, for this was the landlady.
“Charlie Leary! You hear me? I said now!”
“Hold on,” he bellowed, and he pulled the chain above his head and the light from a single bulb clicked on. It was still dark outside his window and he wondered if the guy who ran the all-night lunchwagon would miss him today. He fingered the sleep from his eyes, muttered something under his breath, and moved slowly towards the door amid a flurry of angry knocking, balled flesh pounding upon worn wood, some mad knuckles tossed in for added urgency.
“Now just what the tarnation is going on here?” he asked as he removed the dead bolt and slowly opened the door, expecting to see the landlady standing there in her old pink nightgown and curlers in her graying hair and perhaps the smell of liquor upon her incendiary breath. But no, she was fully dressed, apparently stone sober and standing there with two other women, strangers as far as Charlie knew, and they were all three fully dressed, all three set in the sternest of poses, and one had her hands on her bony hips and sad eyes that simmered with the promise of rage.
At first he felt alarm, now why should this bony little woman be so angry with him, but then he felt a sharp jolt of embarrassment as he followed their gaze downward realizing that he was only in torn underwear with his lone prized possession, the erstwhile family jewels, hanging out like the irrepressible bough and thicket of some overgrown mistletoe.
But not even that was apparently enough to deter the wrath of the bony little woman with those sad eyes. She tore into him and surprisingly, at least to poor old Charlie, neither of the other two women saw fit to hold her back.
Now Charlie found himself in the predicament of his life, being slapped around by a tiny woman and getting his grown-out kinky hair pulled (“I knew that I shoulda got that haircut!”) and he found her fingernails to be uncut and jagged.
“Damn woman, what’s wrong with you?” he cried and he came awfully close to just grabbing her by the scrawny neck and tossing her into the wall because even a big fellow like Charlie could only take so much, enough is enough, but at the last moment she disengaged, probably sensing his breaking point, and backed her heaving self out into the hall with her hair wild in the face but never hiding those eyes.
“My boy almost choked himself to death on that toy truck,” she gasped, and she settled there now, catching her breath, never taking her eyes off the well- hung over man. The landlady, who had just been standing there overseeing the entire scene, spoke again.
“So what do you got to say for your self Charlie Leary?”
Charlie was perplexed, dazed, and feeling the place on his neck where the woman had clawed him but good. He looked at his hand but saw no blood.
“I don’t have the foggiest notion what you are talking about. Either of you. I never even seen this lady before, and God knows, I never seen her son. And who is this other lady anyway?” and he nodded accusatorily toward the third woman, she silent yet set just as hard, and she glared right back at him with her nose all twisted around her face and her brow flattened and he instinctively leaned one step back inside the perceived safety of his furnished room.
“Never you mind who this other woman is Charlie Leary. Never you mind,” said the landlady and then the bony little woman reminded him that “my boy almost choked himself to death on that toy truck.”
Charlie felt a rising inside of him now, damn the headache, and he leaned back at them. “What toy truck? What boy?” he demanded to know and the landlady folded her arms and smiled. “Now you know what toy truck we’re talking about. We’re talking about the toy truck you brought over yesterday afternoon. In one of them pretty silver packages you dropped off,” and when she said pretty silver packages she said it with the air of a snobby uptown dilettante. True, those packages were wrapped expertly in shiny silver paper and boasted big red bows. He had felt proud just having them tucked under his arms if only for a short while.
Could this be true? Could the source of this consternation be his own benevolent and well-meaning self, only wanting to spread the best of cheer, to be a contributor to the Christmas cause? Ah hell, he knew he should have just pawned those presents and bought one of them big picture books filled with photos of Bermuda.
“So what you’re telling me is you didn’t even let your kids open the presents I brought you?” he said, and he was angry and he was hurt but the landlady paid none of that any mind.
“That’s right – my kids done had enough Christmas. We all decided to share our good fortune with the Deckkers. They been having a real tough time lately.”
And now they all looked at the bony little woman standing there up against the wall and he noticed that she didn’t seem all that angry anymore. Her eyes had recoiled and now worry seemed to drip from their sockets. He felt his own anger deflating.
“Her son’s resting at home now Charlie but last night all hell broke loose down at that hospital,” said the landlady, and he noted that she was toned-down a bit as well but still defiant and careful to speak in a serious tone. “And on Christmas Night. Well – there’s bills to be paid now Charlie, a doctor to be paid and all them medicines too. A fiasco if you ask me,” and Charlie wasn’t asking nobody, least of all her. But why was this all his fault? He hadn’t given the gifts directly to the Deckkers. It had been the landlady who had accomplished that deed. He looked at her and began to mention something about that fact but suddenly caught himself and looked down in reconsideration. The thicket was starting to reassert itself and he quickly tucked it back in and then looked back up with a nervous laugh. Something in the landlady’s eyes suggested that he best bury all that, because she was indeed the landlady, and he knew that rent might not be paid on such a timely basis in the upcoming months.
“Why, I got all them things from the folks over at Sutton Place. I didn’t even know what was in them. I was just passing ‘em along. You know, the gesture, the spirit of Christmas.” Now Charlie was smiling at them, feeling good about himself, explaining the situation. For once he was getting out of something and telling the truth.
“Charlie, there are bills to be paid.” The landlady paused right here, the silence creating a big blank space that had to be filled in by thought, and that thought was the fact that she surely wasn’t paying a dime and if he wanted to continue calling this furnished room home sweet home he’d better start digging deep inside his pockets.
“You know I aint got that kinda money,” he said, “and it’s not my fault anyway. You can blame them folks at Sutton Place – the Walsers and the DePauls and that crazy old Mrs. Gadshill.”
The landlady stepped toward him. “Then get your pants on boy. Let’s go talk to them folks over at Sutton Place.”
It was the day after Christmas, the light of the sun now filtering its way between tall buildings, and Charlie contemplating the double dilemma of unemployment and this sudden existence of an unforeseen liability. “Just a minute,” he sighed, realizing that he really had no choice.
“My boy almost choked himself to death on that toy truck.” Yes yes, I know that, we all know that, and why is your child eating metal objects anyway? But Charlie knew that answer almost at once, and a twinge of shame slapped the sneer off his face - because the little boy’s stomach was telling him to put anything small into his mouth and chew.
Fifteen minutes later they were on that Elevated train, the sound of the tracks rattling below them, and there was no need for small talk as the bony little woman stared off in a trance while the other two just sat there, arms folded, glaring at poor old Charlie.

‘Twas the day after Christmas and all cheer was gone. News travels fast, bad news the fastest, and that very morning the news of Charlie’s dismissal spread like fresh mint jelly across the baked flanks of a diminutive Cornish hen. Of course it was Mrs. Hewing from 14 who stoked that first log, ringing the elevator and entering with her two dogs and the sight of someone other than Charlie, even if it was only Fred the week-end fill-in guy, gave her a start.
“Fred – what in the world are doing here at this hour? I mean, did I lose a day or something? It is Friday, right?”
“Oh yes mam, it’s Friday all right, sure enough, nothing wrong with your mind or nothing. I just got a call late last night from the super and he asked if I was ready to move to full time and I says ‘yes sir, I sure is ready,’ and I told him ‘this sure was a nice Christmas surprise’ and he said, ‘yes, right, well be there at 7 a.m. sharp and looking good.’ So here I am mam, right on time looking grand and all, if you don’t mind me saying so myself.” Fred smiled big right then and one of Mrs. Hewing’s funny-looking dogs yelped and then the other joined in and she hurried them off the elevator and out the door to the curb.
A few minutes later she came back in and, right before the elevator door opened to her floor, Mrs. Hewing decided to go ahead and pop the question regarding Charlie’s whereabouts? Fred opened his big yellow eyes and exclaimed, “well, old Charlie got his self fired yesterday.”
“Oh my!” cried the lady as she worked the dogs out of the elevator, and before she could think to say anything more Fred and his big smile disappeared behind the closing door.
He went down thinking about whether he should just throw out Charlie’s remaining things in the locker room or keep them around for a few days. There wasn’t much, an ash tray filled with spent butts and a silver lighter that didn’t work and a just-opened pack of cigarettes (now there ya go!) and a couple of smelly shirts and underwear. Those last two would have to go right quick but he reckoned the first three could stay. You never know when a lighter might start working again. He grinned at his changing good fortune as the darkness outside the windows softened to blue hinting at the coming sunshine that would soon illuminate this new world. In fact, he chuckled at this prospect. Sure enough he thought. Yes sir, sure enough.
“What in the dickens are you laughing at?” asked Mr. Walser as he and his wife dragged themselves inside the building, the stench of pickled tongue and liquored lips seeping from his mouth, and despite the stink Fred just smiled. “Oh nothing really, just happy today I suppose,” and Fred opened the elevator and they both stumbled inside, Mrs. Walser banging her purse against the wall and laughing while the locks of her golden hair cloaked her drunken gaze. Mr. Walser steadied himself against the rail and inquired, “so, where’s our dear friend, old Charlie Whashisname?” and this he asked with one charming raised eyebrow undermined by a slurred delivery, and Fred just said, “well, I’m not supposed to say much but Charlie got his self fired yesterday.”
“This is an outrage!” responded Walser with great aplomb almost knocking himself onto his own ass while his wife reached for him and pulled him to her just as the door slid back open. Then a funny gurgling noise came from somewhere deeper inside the outraged man and right there he wretched for a moment while his wife struggled to keep him afoot. “Preston – Preston, are you alright? Preston?” Fred poised for anything that might happen, squeezing back into the corner as far away from the scene as possible, and he hoped that whatever did happen would do so clearly outside his elevator and onto the pea green carpet of the 8th floor. Once the couple had finally worked themselves outside the elevator Fred quickly punched the button shutting the door but not before he heard one last sound, that of a man hitting his knees with a thud and surrendering to the evils of the overly-celebrated night while a woman shrieked at his side and now Fred was no longer smiling, he was wondering if he should have done more, thinking maybe he should go back, offer help, but then the DePaul’s rang on 9.
Fred was smiling again because that was his natural state. Happy or perhaps too uninformed to understand that he had no reason be, that smile was a fixture on his broad face whether he was struggling atop the stool or sleeping fitfully through a slew of nightmares. When folks needed a big black Santa Claus the image of Fred was usually what came to their minds. Presently the elevator door slid open.
“So it’s true,” gasped Mrs. DePaul. She stood there a moment, her stout arms folded below her impressive bosom, and she made a clucking sound and entered. “Well, you know, I suppose it’s not your fault Fred yet still – I feel for that poor man.”
“Yes mam, I know you do, but there is plenty of skyscrapers out there looking for a good elevator man. I’ll bet ya old Charlie lands on his feets just fine – yes sir.”
Mrs. DePaul clucked again and Fred got hungry for a good fried chicken dinner. With mashed potatoes and peas all covered with gravy. “My husband says that soon enough we won’t even have elevator operators, the apartment owners are cutting costs, you know, and once we start pressing those buttons ourselves we’ll never even remember the day when we didn’t.”
The door popped open. “Oh no Mrs. DePaul! Now no disrespect to your husband or anything, but you’ll always need folks like us doing these things for ya. Like pumping gas. A woman such as yourself could get hurt doin’ things like this. Now don’t you worry about punching no buttons.”
Mrs. DePaul waddled out of the elevator and said over her shoulder, “I should certainly hope you are right.” Then she was out the door and for a brief moment of time Fred ditched the smile and felt a pang of trouble rising within him but just then the front door blew open and in marched three women and one sad familiar face.

“Oh my Lord – look what the cat done drug in!” exclaimed Fred in surprise, not knowing if he should feel friendly toward the man whose job he just took, not knowing if he should feel anger or embarrassment instead, not trusting his instinct to just head on out the door and act real busy, so in the end he just stuck with the surprise and smiled.
“No damn cat dragged anything in here boy,” said the older woman with the angry wild eyes, “so wipe that silly grin off your face or I’ll wipe it off for you.”
Charlie stood back behind the trio with hands in pockets and shoulders hunched, nodding ever so slightly, and raised his eyebrows with a knowing cock-eyed grin.
“So – what can we do for you today mam?” said a somewhat rattled Fred, and he couldn’t hold the woman’s gaze for another moment and desperately looked to Charlie for some kind of guidance but Charlie wasn’t in an accommodating mood.
“What you can do for me is find the fool that would give a toddler a toy truck that has small parts to it – parts that come off if you bite hard enough. Parts that would choke a child nearly to its death and run up a huge hospital bill – that’s what you could do for me.”
Then another one spoke, the small woman with the limbs of a colt and shiny pointed teeth. “My boy almost choked himself on that toy truck.”
Fred could hardly grasp the meaning of the situation unfolding before him and certainly could not grasp his place in it whatever it’s meaning might turn out to be. “Yes mam, I see, but what can I do for you?” This he said as he pointed first at himself and then at her and although his smile was an innocent child-like thing it could become so antagonizing given the right conditions.
At this point the bony little woman lunged right into him and Fred did his best to fend her off while Charlie just chuckled in a satisfied manner until Charlie guessed that that was just about enough. Then he moved quickly behind her and gently yet forcibly pulled her flailing arms back. Fred scrambled away from the group and yelled over his shoulder, “Damn it man, if you want your job back that bad, you can have it!” Then he escaped through the lobby door almost knocking a surprised Mrs. DePaul onto her ample tush in the process.
He was not smiling when he did.

Given the random comings and goings of the Sutton Place residents in no time at all a curious gash of humanity had congealed. By now most had learned of poor Charlie’s dismissal yet there he stood, just outside the elevator, apparently unfazed by yesterday’s pathetic events (“well good for old Charlie!”) and naturally Mrs. Hewing and the DePauls and the Fullers and all the rest were filled with questions regarding the reappearance of this good man.
But the mood soon changed once the nature of the visitation had been revealed by the old angry woman with the burning eyes and no one was allowed to leave until the identity of the perpetrator had been once and for all unquestionably determined.
“You might as well go ahead and get ‘em all down here,” she said. “Every damn one of ‘em. Aint nobody going nowhere until we get this whole thing sorted out.”
Mr. DePaul stepped righteously toward the woman and announced that “this is all so very quaint but I do have a client meeting to attend in a half hour and if you would be so very kind as to step out of my way…”
“I don’t care if you’re shining the pope’s boots you aint going nowhere,” and she placed both of her hands on her hips and fixed a defiant glare. Mr. DePaul stepped back in thoughtful repose calculating the residual effects of just lowering his shoulder and knocking the bitch on her ass. Might not be the prudent thing to do, at least not yet, so he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his pipe.
Although most of the folks wavered upon the fringes and simply listened there was an energetic core of six or seven individuals that exchanged assertments and accusations and then one desperate voice rose above all the others.
“It was Weston that did it!”
Mr. Weston cleared his throat. “I certainly didn’t give anyone a toy car,” he pleaded. “I haven’t even been in a toy store in years. Truth is I hate toys. And I don’t like the kids that play with them either!”
But just then the lobby front door blew open yet again and in shuddered the superintendent, blowing on his hands and shaking the new fallen snow from his coat, and he was pleasantly surprised to see the throng gathered right in front of the elevator door. For it was only the day after Christmas and his heart was still gay and here was an assemblage of his people, the folks he took care of, old clients, friends even, and as he removed his hat and approached the talkative group he felt the warmth firing through his entire body and couldn’t help but offer a smile. And although his presence was for the most part being ignored and many voices were speaking at the same time he did catch that last exchange.
“No – it wasn’t Mr. Weston who contributed that toy car. ‘Twas I!” offered the super in a loud clear voice, and now all talking ceased and seventeen sweaty faces looked over at him. DePaul removed the pipe from his lips and blew out hard. Thirty minutes later, once the bony little woman had finally been plied from his right leg and the owner of the building had been contacted, summoned, and had performed the deed, the superintendent glumly left Sutton Place for the very last time.

Mrs. Gadshill paced back and forth in front of her windows and the door that led to the outdoor patio that towered atop Sutton Place. She was troubled by this new development, the employment termination of that Charlie character, and all because she had had two green pills instead of the customary one. But, after all, it had been Christmas, why shouldn’t she be allowed to treat herself to just a smidgen more, who could possibly care if she helped herself to all the icing atop the cake, the cherry atop the sundae? Certainly not her family, they were all scattered about, attending to their own affairs and pursuing their own Christmas dreams. And as for Charlie, he had appeared so strange yesterday afternoon, too damn happy for a simple working man, and his careless handling of her elevator ride had been more than enough reason to see to his demise. Anyone of right mind would surely concur.
Suddenly and without much contemplation she found herself outside on the patio, leaning over the five foot wall and peering down into the city street where snowflakes twisted downward. Horns honking and voices yelling and Christmas most assuredly was over yet its frigid air remained. No longer a chummy chill, just cold. Bleak. She pondered the loss of her own grace, the way the icy wind might feel running through her thinning hair as she tumbled all the way down, and her forced concern for Charlie. She stepped back and then moved a chair to the ledge. Only one green pill today and now here she stood. Imagine that. But she won’t take that extra step today because her unhappiness is bought and paid for and lived out in such a state of envied grandeur.
It’s all hers.

For sure, Christmas is a sad season for the poor. But for the recently unemployed and newly introduced to the twin perils of lost purpose and an uncertain future Christmas is the absolute shits. The super took one last look at the building and saw a figure standing at the top and leaning over the edge. “Gadshill,” he thought. “If she has any sense at all she’ll jump.” Then he turned the corner and headed toward that all-night lunchwagon he had often seen but never once patronized.