I’m crouched down to clean up a game-closet mess on the kitchen floor when I spot a long, grey-brown, cylindrical abnormality looking like nothing so much as a giant turd with a shiny, grape-like skin lying unassumingly on the tile.
Could my child have done this? What about the diapers? How would Traci not have noticed?
I lean closer to smell it. It is pinched off to a point at one end. It is not a regular roundness all the way down, but has a few wrinkles, or slightly inward curves down its length, which is close to four inches. It really looks like nothing but a piece of excrement.
But it doesn’t smell. I sniff, with no result. How could that be? I stare, inches away, confused by its lack of stench. What could it be?
I reach out a tentative finger. I have kids; I change diapers; I’m not as squeamish as once I would have been. It looks just like the dog “mines” we cleaned out of the back yard with a shovel and plastic grocery bag growing up, one of the light ones, after it’s been in the yard a day or so, but not to the point where it’s dried to dirt-clod consistency, impossible to scoop up without it crumbling to dust. But even those I wouldn’t touch with my fingers.
At my touch the object stirs, wriggles, contracts a little. It’s alive! But no, now it’s inert again. Comprehension starts to dawn on me. I reach out again, poke it, it rolls, contracts a little more.
This used to be a monkey. Where are the marker-drawn eyes and mouth? As I lift and handle it, it continues contracting, shrinking, shriveling. Now it is the size or a tootsie roll, though a little lighter in color. Now the rubbery texture is familiar. In the hands of a stranger working in the dim lighting of a pirate-themed restaurant, this simple rubber tube was inflated and contorted as if by magic into the shape of a monkey to soothe my two-year-old, who had been spooked of the artificial lightning and the skulls skewered on the stalactites of the entrance. It had worked like a charm.
But I hadn’t seen the “I work off tips” button on his striped vest before calling him over. I knew my wallet to be utterly empty and vainly searched my pockets, hoping perhaps that some of the lint or paperclips there had been miraculously transubstantiated into dollar bills or quarters - after all, this guy gave all appearances of being a magician the way he could turn a balloon into a monkey, or a sword, or a birthday crown for my mother-in-law, who was rummaging through her change purse to cover for me.
Shortly thereafter, in the car, the monkey had broken. Only his head – all non-specified monkeys are male, aren’t they? – remained, attached to an elongated trunk, like a snake monkey. Working from the memory of my half-interested examination of the monkey’s construction in the restaurant and the slight indentations along the trunk, I was able to reform the monkey to its previous glory. In part, the “how did he do that?” question had been answered for me, but a lot of the mystery still remained.
Now the magic was over, and I’m left with an empty rubber tube that I mistook for a potty-time accident and then a wriggling creature. But my relief in remembering the innocuous monkey was magic enough.
1/25/2010
12/03/2009
Crossing Guard
"I've always liked Crossing Guards," said Traci, "I love how friendly they are, the way they always wave to everyone that goes by."
Sure enough - there was the old, white-haired, orange-vested man standing on the corner with one white-gloved hand raised in salutation to us as we entered the intersection. His face wasfrozen in a wide, senile, squinty smile as he tried to peer through our windshield, which surely reflected the harsh glare of the bright, heatless December sun. He seemed a little ridiculous, standing there in the cold.
I wondered idly whether his friendliness had been a prerequisite for the position, or if he had adopted it as a means of passing the time as he manned his lonely post. In it, I detected a hint of generosity, a feeling of goodwill towards others. If nothing else went well in your day, at least there was that odd old man on the corner who would not judge you too harshly as you passed by. Was his good nature inborn or learned? Were his efforts conscious or so habitual that there was almost no thought attached to them at all?
We drove on, leaving the crossing guard holding his short stop-sign baton and waiting to greet the next passers-by, and I remembered a day a few months previous when I had ridden the bus home. The bus had dropped me a few blocks from our apartment and my walking route took me to the very same corner where the elderly crossing guard worked. As I approached the corner, I wondered what he would do as I, a grown, independent man, crossed the road. I was a little surprised when he ambled authoritatively into the crosswalk from the opposite side of the street, half-hoisting his sign in spite of the near emptiness of the roads. Though I felt a little silly as a graduate student whose elementary school years were far behind him and who had traversed many crossings in much worse traffic conditions in cities far busier than this, I also felt a long-forgotten warmth as the kindly stranger offered his services even to me - one who thought that surely, I was above such assistance. I thanked him in passing, wished him a good evening, and walked the rest of the block home, and forgot all about him.
Sure enough - there was the old, white-haired, orange-vested man standing on the corner with one white-gloved hand raised in salutation to us as we entered the intersection. His face wasfrozen in a wide, senile, squinty smile as he tried to peer through our windshield, which surely reflected the harsh glare of the bright, heatless December sun. He seemed a little ridiculous, standing there in the cold.
I wondered idly whether his friendliness had been a prerequisite for the position, or if he had adopted it as a means of passing the time as he manned his lonely post. In it, I detected a hint of generosity, a feeling of goodwill towards others. If nothing else went well in your day, at least there was that odd old man on the corner who would not judge you too harshly as you passed by. Was his good nature inborn or learned? Were his efforts conscious or so habitual that there was almost no thought attached to them at all?
We drove on, leaving the crossing guard holding his short stop-sign baton and waiting to greet the next passers-by, and I remembered a day a few months previous when I had ridden the bus home. The bus had dropped me a few blocks from our apartment and my walking route took me to the very same corner where the elderly crossing guard worked. As I approached the corner, I wondered what he would do as I, a grown, independent man, crossed the road. I was a little surprised when he ambled authoritatively into the crosswalk from the opposite side of the street, half-hoisting his sign in spite of the near emptiness of the roads. Though I felt a little silly as a graduate student whose elementary school years were far behind him and who had traversed many crossings in much worse traffic conditions in cities far busier than this, I also felt a long-forgotten warmth as the kindly stranger offered his services even to me - one who thought that surely, I was above such assistance. I thanked him in passing, wished him a good evening, and walked the rest of the block home, and forgot all about him.
11/25/2009
kid again
I lofted the hard husk of the walnut into the cool november air. I watched it's dark shape spin and and begin its vertical drop. I waited, waited, and then swung the plastic yellow bat with all my strength. The connection was perfect and the nut sailed into the air, across the yard, and cleared the neighbors' shed, landing on their lawn well out of sight.
Somewhere off to my left, a sharp clang as my brother-in-law shattered another walnut against his metal bat, the shards of walnut splaying out like the wreckage of an exploded aircraft across the ocean of dying grass. It seemed a little counter-productive to be littering the lawn that we had just been raking with walnut fragments, but we weren't thinking about that.
We weren't thinking about much at all, to be honest. Mostly, we were revelling in the simplicity of the physical action itself. Where the projectiles were landing, or in what condition was of little importance to us compared to the smooth satisfaction of a perfect swing and the gratifying crack of a dead-on contact.
Brent's hit percentage was much higher, but his bat was fatter than mine, too. My flimsy plastic bat was barely thicker around than the rake handle I had been using minutes before, but the combination of the wimpy bat and the decaying walnuts was just right for getting the walnuts up high into the air. I had bounced them off the roofs of my in-laws' shed as well as the neighbors', and many had landed harmlessly on the lawn on both sides of the fence, but somewhere in the back of my mind I was vaguely aware of the potential for damage inherent to the activity.
Maybe that was part of the allure.
When one walnut had fallen with a clatter on the patio in the neighbors' backyard, we had all caught our breath. There was a window above that patio, just to the left of the shed. A low-arcing hit towards left center right over the short-stop's head would go right into the neighbors' kitchen. But again, we weren't really considering that.
It had started with mushy apples turned up during our raking. Brent and Jason had begun tossing an apple back and forth, attempting to catch it on the end of their rakes. Their friendly game of catch developed into a competition of who could get closer to beaning the other with a mushy apple. When apples became scarce, a mushy tomato, and then walnuts took over.
Brent and Jason both had plastic rakes, but mine was metal, with longer, separated fingers that rattled like chimes as I raked it across the cold hard earth. The separation of the fingers made it hard to pick up the apples, and especially the walnuts. They bent too far back and the walnut would slip between. And that's why I had abandoned the rake for the bat.
I found another hard, dry walnut at the base of the apple tree by the garden. It was not as rotten as the others we had been hitting, and promised to give me a much better hit. Baseball was the one sport I felt reasonably competent at, having been in several little-league teams as a kid. Now, years down the road I still thrill at the ability to send a ball, apple, or walnut flying.
I tossed the walnut high, and held my stance. Still ingrained from my little-league years, I heard in my head "keep your eye on the ball." I swung and connected. The walnut sprang away towards short stop. It was clearing the corner of the shed in a low arc. Then the sound, like a sound from a cartoon, or movie, something any foley artist would brag about. The musical, sinister sound of glass fracturing and falling. The sound felt like a bad joke, like something that was inevitable, and yet impossible. I didn't want to believe my ears.
And I immediately felt like a kid again. Shame, embarrassment, and fear overcame me as the reality of what had just happened cut into my awareness by means of that single, sharp-edged sound. From the deck I could get a visual of the window, though I didn't need to see to know.
From then on, I hid behind my mother-in-law. I didn't want to confront the neighbors. I didn't want to walk over and knock on the door, or even call. I had been chewed out by this neighbor before, for - she though - recklessly rounding the corner by her house. I knew this would secure my place in her "bad" book for good.
All along, I had known it was going to happen, or at least that it might happen, but I had subordinated prudence to the pleasure of play. In the aftermath, I desperately tried dodging the circumstances. Just like a kid.
Somewhere off to my left, a sharp clang as my brother-in-law shattered another walnut against his metal bat, the shards of walnut splaying out like the wreckage of an exploded aircraft across the ocean of dying grass. It seemed a little counter-productive to be littering the lawn that we had just been raking with walnut fragments, but we weren't thinking about that.
We weren't thinking about much at all, to be honest. Mostly, we were revelling in the simplicity of the physical action itself. Where the projectiles were landing, or in what condition was of little importance to us compared to the smooth satisfaction of a perfect swing and the gratifying crack of a dead-on contact.
Brent's hit percentage was much higher, but his bat was fatter than mine, too. My flimsy plastic bat was barely thicker around than the rake handle I had been using minutes before, but the combination of the wimpy bat and the decaying walnuts was just right for getting the walnuts up high into the air. I had bounced them off the roofs of my in-laws' shed as well as the neighbors', and many had landed harmlessly on the lawn on both sides of the fence, but somewhere in the back of my mind I was vaguely aware of the potential for damage inherent to the activity.
Maybe that was part of the allure.
When one walnut had fallen with a clatter on the patio in the neighbors' backyard, we had all caught our breath. There was a window above that patio, just to the left of the shed. A low-arcing hit towards left center right over the short-stop's head would go right into the neighbors' kitchen. But again, we weren't really considering that.
It had started with mushy apples turned up during our raking. Brent and Jason had begun tossing an apple back and forth, attempting to catch it on the end of their rakes. Their friendly game of catch developed into a competition of who could get closer to beaning the other with a mushy apple. When apples became scarce, a mushy tomato, and then walnuts took over.
Brent and Jason both had plastic rakes, but mine was metal, with longer, separated fingers that rattled like chimes as I raked it across the cold hard earth. The separation of the fingers made it hard to pick up the apples, and especially the walnuts. They bent too far back and the walnut would slip between. And that's why I had abandoned the rake for the bat.
I found another hard, dry walnut at the base of the apple tree by the garden. It was not as rotten as the others we had been hitting, and promised to give me a much better hit. Baseball was the one sport I felt reasonably competent at, having been in several little-league teams as a kid. Now, years down the road I still thrill at the ability to send a ball, apple, or walnut flying.
I tossed the walnut high, and held my stance. Still ingrained from my little-league years, I heard in my head "keep your eye on the ball." I swung and connected. The walnut sprang away towards short stop. It was clearing the corner of the shed in a low arc. Then the sound, like a sound from a cartoon, or movie, something any foley artist would brag about. The musical, sinister sound of glass fracturing and falling. The sound felt like a bad joke, like something that was inevitable, and yet impossible. I didn't want to believe my ears.
And I immediately felt like a kid again. Shame, embarrassment, and fear overcame me as the reality of what had just happened cut into my awareness by means of that single, sharp-edged sound. From the deck I could get a visual of the window, though I didn't need to see to know.
From then on, I hid behind my mother-in-law. I didn't want to confront the neighbors. I didn't want to walk over and knock on the door, or even call. I had been chewed out by this neighbor before, for - she though - recklessly rounding the corner by her house. I knew this would secure my place in her "bad" book for good.
All along, I had known it was going to happen, or at least that it might happen, but I had subordinated prudence to the pleasure of play. In the aftermath, I desperately tried dodging the circumstances. Just like a kid.
10/28/2009
What I don't know
I was sitting upstairs in the extra room that doubles as an office slash craft room working on an abstract for my literature class when the doorbell rang. I knew it was the maintenance guy coming to check on our furnace.
He's an older guy, who is always dressed like a cowboy and has a strong rural accent. He is the epitome of the Logan man to me. He's been here before looking at our fan, or the vertical slats of the blinds of our sliding glass door, or the faucet in the tub. He is always quick and efficient, and seems to know just what to do.
He gives a cursory glance to the thermostat to make sure I'm not just an idiot who can't turn it on, and then heads up to look at the furnace. He's got a brand new filter under his arm. I wonder could it have been just the filter?
He sets to work right away, unscrewing the covers on the front of the furnace, and I hover uselessly in the hallway, watching. As I watch him deftly reaching into the furnace to unscrew this piece, or pull out that sensor, I feel a little panicky. "Don't take that out!" I want to say, "in case you can't get it back in!" But he has no such misgivings.
In the awkward silence of his operation, I realize how dependent I am on his skills. Without his intervention, my family and I would have suffered a very uncomfortable winter. While I sat intellectualizing an argument for a paper analyzing a novel, the life-sustaining skills this man possesses slap me in the face. I hear in his cowboy voice a malediction of my own career goals. He seems to drawl "What you don't know could clog every single intake on this furnace - heck, on all the furnaces in this complex. What you don't know would make you freeze to death. What have you got on me?" And I have no answer for him.
As he finishes up, he gets conversational about the furnace. "It's a pretty simple little furnace, but it gets the job done," he says. It's as if he was reading my thoughts and was rubbing it in.
"It doesn't seem too simple to me," I say, good-naturedly.
He has the patience to give me the run-down of why it wasn't working. He tells me enough to satisfy my curiosity. He adds "they have so many safety features, it doesn't take a whole lot to stop it from working. But I guess it's better than blowing yourself up!"
That I can understand and appreciate.
He's an older guy, who is always dressed like a cowboy and has a strong rural accent. He is the epitome of the Logan man to me. He's been here before looking at our fan, or the vertical slats of the blinds of our sliding glass door, or the faucet in the tub. He is always quick and efficient, and seems to know just what to do.
He gives a cursory glance to the thermostat to make sure I'm not just an idiot who can't turn it on, and then heads up to look at the furnace. He's got a brand new filter under his arm. I wonder could it have been just the filter?
He sets to work right away, unscrewing the covers on the front of the furnace, and I hover uselessly in the hallway, watching. As I watch him deftly reaching into the furnace to unscrew this piece, or pull out that sensor, I feel a little panicky. "Don't take that out!" I want to say, "in case you can't get it back in!" But he has no such misgivings.
In the awkward silence of his operation, I realize how dependent I am on his skills. Without his intervention, my family and I would have suffered a very uncomfortable winter. While I sat intellectualizing an argument for a paper analyzing a novel, the life-sustaining skills this man possesses slap me in the face. I hear in his cowboy voice a malediction of my own career goals. He seems to drawl "What you don't know could clog every single intake on this furnace - heck, on all the furnaces in this complex. What you don't know would make you freeze to death. What have you got on me?" And I have no answer for him.
As he finishes up, he gets conversational about the furnace. "It's a pretty simple little furnace, but it gets the job done," he says. It's as if he was reading my thoughts and was rubbing it in.
"It doesn't seem too simple to me," I say, good-naturedly.
He has the patience to give me the run-down of why it wasn't working. He tells me enough to satisfy my curiosity. He adds "they have so many safety features, it doesn't take a whole lot to stop it from working. But I guess it's better than blowing yourself up!"
That I can understand and appreciate.
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