tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-58280934863788705132024-02-20T04:05:26.882-06:00Sometimes Roads Diverge. . . bryan currie . . .Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.comBlogger49125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-19306848703495339642014-07-07T11:10:00.000-05:002014-07-07T11:10:04.580-05:00Bolts and Screws<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyDCQ2fD3B4eagKUDl_o5Cs2MJxYebuhk5Ipx_eAHtDAJDFjKFGKQZStXTTOnkz9NlVaQBzqHn8jEa2mxVfIW_RvnHZuSpfQKvypsYM3sj-zU1BlUpXGaSrIKCbwZzEIVua9-muTkSZnbO/s1600/rusted_nut_s1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyDCQ2fD3B4eagKUDl_o5Cs2MJxYebuhk5Ipx_eAHtDAJDFjKFGKQZStXTTOnkz9NlVaQBzqHn8jEa2mxVfIW_RvnHZuSpfQKvypsYM3sj-zU1BlUpXGaSrIKCbwZzEIVua9-muTkSZnbO/s1600/rusted_nut_s1.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The little girl wandered into her daddy’s workshop even
though she knew she wasn’t supposed to be there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How is it that small feet so often find
themselves in places they’ve been told not to go?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“What are you doing down here?” she asked the back of his
head.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The daddy turned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
little girl’s voice wasn’t big enough to startle him, but he was definitely
surprised to see her in the basement.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m doing what all daddies do in the basement,” he
said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I’m making a monster.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh,” she said, and tried her hardest not to glance into the
too-dark corners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then, after an
uncertain pause she said, “A monster? Can I see it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where is it?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Oh it’s hiding down here in the dark,” he answered.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“But I’m not sure you should see it yet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Monsters can be very frightening, especially
to little girls.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I’m not sure I believe you,” she said, her eyes wide.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“No?” he replied.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“You
know that monster that lives under your bed?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Where do you think he came from?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And the one in your closet?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what
about the one that peeks under your brother’s door after we turn off the lights?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Well,
to be honest, that monster was already in the house when we moved in.</i>)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But those other ones I made down here, in the
basement.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The daddy carefully laid his hammer on his workbench next to
a glass jar full of rusty bolts and screws.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The jar once held something like grape jelly, pasta sauce, or dill
pickles, but now it was filled with a mismatched assortment of pieces and parts
leftover after various projects. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every
workshop, it seems, has one almost exactly like it.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Noticing the jar, the little girl asked, “what are those
for?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Those?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh, those are
the bolts that hold the monster together.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“They must be very special bolts if they’re strong enough to
hold a whole monster together,” she said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“But daddy, what if the monster is too frightening?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if you make it too well?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The father was good at building monsters, but he wasn’t a
skilled question answerer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After taking the
moment his inexperience required, he said, “If you grow up one day and decide
you’re tired of having a monster under your bed, or in your desk drawer, or
creeping around the corners of your marriage, or wherever you decide to keep
all the monsters I make, all you have to do is wait until they hold still for a
moment and then take out their bolts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Most of the time, they’ll fall right apart.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“But how will I do that,” the girl asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“How will I remove them, and what if they’re screwed
in too tightly?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And how will I make the
monster stand still?”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But before the daddy could answer, a very old monster – one
he had apparently neglected for quite a long time – jumped out of the shadows
and gobbled him up in one big bite.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Then, after a loud burp, the monster ducked back into the
shadows and left the little girl alone with her questions.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: right;">
<br /></div>
Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-9673864628041436602014-04-27T19:03:00.000-05:002014-07-07T11:31:55.328-05:00Location, Location, Location.<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="color: #131313; font-family: Georgia; font-style: italic;">“What
you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. It
also depends on what sort of person you are.”</span><span style="color: #131313; font-family: Georgia;"> – C.S. Lewis</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>1. Sticky Side
Down</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She didn’t mean any harm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was just digging.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And isn’t digging what little girls do at the beach?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But her little brother didn’t like it,
not one single bit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Look what you’ve done!” he shouted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Stooooooop!!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
To be fair, the long gash leading from the surf to the
castle’s moat did look a bit infected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It bubbled and foamed each time a wave attacked and retreated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But each time the water emptied, the
wound also seemed to slowly heal as the sides collapsed into each other
and the bottom rose.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact,
after a few more waves the cut would barely be noticeable as a faint scar on
the wet sand.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The boy, visibly upset by his sister’s digging, asked their
mother if he could get a band-aid out of the small “emergency box” he knew she
kept in their bag.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Why, sweetheart?” she asked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“What did you do?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But before he could answer, the boy had already pulled the
paper back off the flesh-colored bandage and laid it carefully on the beach,
sticky side down.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“There,” he said, gently pressing the band-aid onto the sand
to make sure it was secure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Now,
isn’t that better?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Later that day, a teenage girl was drawing a heart in
the wet sand with her toe when a soggy band-aid washed onto her foot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
She screamed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>2.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Soup</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jesse and Sarah had been all over the city looking for
something to eat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sure, they’d
found a castoff crust here and there, but nothing substantial.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For them, as for many of their brothers
and sisters on the street, hunger sometimes drove them to terrible places.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No trashcan was too smelly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No crust too stale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No offering too small.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then they saw it -- a bowl of fresh, undisturbed
gazpacho.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The chilled soup was
sitting on the corner table of a sidewalk café on E 57<sup>th</sup> St.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The restaurant was one of those quaint
spots where the city’s fashionable housewives pause during their afternoons of
shopping to eat off of white clothed bistro tables in the open air.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Of course, there were also breadsticks on the table, but it
was the pale red soup that caught Jesse’s attention -- a beautiful soup left unguarded while its fashionably
dressed owner, who had spent the morning sipping over-priced vinti coffees,
discretely used the restaurant’s ladies’ room.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jesse and Sarah sat on a park bench across the street from
the soup, trying to look inconspicuous. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“I don’t know,” Sarah protested.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We really probably shouldn’t.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“We probably shouldn’t?!” Jesse snapped.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We also probably shouldn’t be eating
out of trashcans… but we are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
also probably shouldn’t be drinking leftover beer out of other people’s cups…
but we are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We also probably shouldn’t
be following bratty kids around the park hoping their nannies will forget where
Jr. set down his organic peanut butter and free range jelly sandwich… but we
are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, you can stay here on this bench if you
want, but I’m about to have some fresh $12.95 soup, all thanks to Mrs. Well Fed
Rich Lady and her tiny bladder.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Jesse lifted himself off the bench and crossed 57<sup>th</sup>
St.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He casually hovered around the
cluster of tables, drawing not a few uneasy glances from the café’s diners,
until we was confident the coast was clear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, ever so carefully, he descended on the soup and took a
long, slow sip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The sweetness of the tomatoes… the rich olive oil… glorious.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Consumed as he was by the delicious broth, Jesse didn’t see
the woman with the large sunglasses returning to her table.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was lowering his head for
a second drink when he heard her yell.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Waiter,” she barked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“What kind of place is this?!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I leave my table for two minutes, and you bring me a bowl of soup with a
fly in it?!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Disgraceful.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>3.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Never Been
Married</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The reason she’d never been married was that she’d never
been in love with a living man.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She’d been too busy loving Jesus, that long-haired boyfriend who never
seems to call back, to find a boy that might one day want to lie with her.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And then Ken showed up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was clean and cut and they almost instantly knew which
hymns would be sung at their wedding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Six months later, those hymns were indeed sung at their wedding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She wore a white dress, and even her
best friends (who knew <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everything</i> about
her), knew the color was appropriate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not surprisingly, her brother thought it would be funny to
decorate the getaway car with condoms.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>For an hour, while the bridesmaids fussed over his sister, Dave and his
friends tore dozens of square foil packages and got slippery lipped as they
blew up the condoms they then tied to her car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What better way to send his Disney princess of a sister into
wedded bliss, he thought, than in a condom-covered car with a note under the windshield wiper reading “May Your Love Know No Barriers”?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Kate and her groom were halfway down Spring St. on that blessed Saturday afternoon before she paid any
attention to the torpedo shaped “balloons” on the car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When one broke free from the side
mirror, she was mortified and said, “oh, I hate to leave that nasty thing on
the street! What if a child finds it?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Her Prince Charming smiled, but didn’t stop the car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He wasn’t going to stop now –
especially not for a condom.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
***</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Mrs Murphy lived in a house separated from Spring St. by
little more than a narrow sidewalk and a slender rose garden.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The widow stayed on a constant vigil to
keep her rose beds free from the beer cans and potato chip bags that blew into yard on a regular basis.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But on Saturday evening when she went to sprinkle crushed
egg shells under the flowering bushes and found a limp condom hanging from one
of the thorny stems, Mrs. Murphy’s disdain for “litter” reached a new high.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br />
<br />
Shaking her head, she sighed. “…practically Sodom and Gomorrah.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>4. An Issue of Blood</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In those days there was a man named Jesus, the son of a
carpenter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because of his great
love for the people, he walked from village to village feeding the hungry and
caring for the poor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And he taught
them many things.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And it came to pass that as he passed through a certain
village, Jesus encountered a young woman suffering from an issue of blood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She had suffered a great deal under the
care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better
she grew worse.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Trembling with fear, the woman fell at Jesus’ feet and asked
“why are the sins of my fathers being visited upon me in this way?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you only wished it, I know you could
make me well.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
“Arise, my child,” he said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I have an uncle, a skilled surgeon, who lives just across
the border in El Paso.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In his
house there are many rooms.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I will
go and prepare a place for you.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And behold, it came to pass that Jesus did, in fact, prepare a place for
her and provided for her every need.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
woman (who was called Angelina) healed nicely and lived in the US for the rest
of her days, doing honorable work among her citizen neighbors.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
But Jesus, having angered the local authorities by speeding
in a school zone, was deported back to Chihuahua. And there he fell among thieves, and his uncle heard from
him no more.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-34108375382898542472013-12-16T16:08:00.001-06:002014-01-28T10:07:41.116-06:00Walls<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbH_q3x8PA2o3fwOgTyz0x4tV51AnSeE78ltF2ehd3aip1KcEb2KcG2BCMvfLhQZix3lCDTzspfHloUkfEENstVls_3KwbGnFHTua9pzvwwMXi-FjNPzUAPR-2VFAyLCA6M98D3KxSqiDX/s1600/0138825_Painting-wall-with-roller-brush_s4x3_lg-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbH_q3x8PA2o3fwOgTyz0x4tV51AnSeE78ltF2ehd3aip1KcEb2KcG2BCMvfLhQZix3lCDTzspfHloUkfEENstVls_3KwbGnFHTua9pzvwwMXi-FjNPzUAPR-2VFAyLCA6M98D3KxSqiDX/s320/0138825_Painting-wall-with-roller-brush_s4x3_lg-2.jpg" height="239" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
building at 439 Argyle St. had reached that awkward age before it could be
called historic, when it was still simply run down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The building and its neighbors formed an
urban forest that families of tenants migrated through like birds. Sometimes
these tenants fit together well and shared their walls without too much
fuss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But when they didn’t match – when
the senior citizens got tired of smelling marijuana in the laundry room or the
young professionals played their music so loud the writers couldn’t find their
words – someone would eventually migrate to another building and make space for
the next hopeful renter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
new girl in apartment 3C rented the space “as is.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She had just broken up with her
boyfriend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Or maybe he had broken up
with her?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Although <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">she</i> made the final proclamation, it seemed his tendency to share
both his bed and his body with virtual strangers was an aggressively non-verbal
way of saying “I think we should see other people.”)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the end, it didn’t matter who euthanized
the relationship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The apartment was his,
and that meant she needed a place to land. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">And
so, even though 3C’s brightly painted walls had not yet been covered with the
requisite “apartment white,” she signed the lease, shook the hand, and thought,
“It’s colorful and it has character.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
can make this work.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">But
shortly after the furniture was arranged and the boxes unpacked, it became
painfully clear to the woman that the red kitchen walls clashed with her
curtains and her couch didn’t look great against the blue in the den.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>None of her prints or posters worked on the
green accent wall, and the bedroom was such an unusual shade of brown that she
fell into sleep every night with the subtle (but very real) fear that she was
being buried alive.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Despite
her initial confidence that she could deal with a few minor color clashes, the
woman soon realized that she needed the fresh start that comes with a blank
canvass of white walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thanks to her
lying, cheating, bastard of a boyfriend, the past few months had been entirely
too colorful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She needed a clean
backdrop against which she could re-arrange her life.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Excited
at the prospect of “doing for herself,” the woman went alone to the hardware
store to find a neutral palate for her walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There, under bright and dishonest fluorescent lights, she thumbed
through the dizzying collection of white, off white, eggshell, bone, cloud,
cream, and frost-colored paint chips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">She
had no idea starting over could come in such a wide array of almost-colors.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
next day, after moving her furniture, taping the baseboards, and covering the
floor, the woman rolled clean white paint over the apartment’s too-colorful
past, replacing red, blue, and green with calm, white neutrality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The woman worked through the night, painting
each room into something that resembled the inside of an egg.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Finally,
when every hint of color was gone, she scooted each piece of furniture back to
its proper place, always careful not to scuff her clean, white walls.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9t2HzW1oMi4-cCV3fMPzEhhu0h5yD1uXUI3__MSJaBNvFuDn3wR4clnEznCD09EyXWAOcRSerdlxwas2f6EGGlQdxMPS2aFKfVE5IkzbjYeHexdlFWadNlUFFSjmidVOj5-_IUBFifacZ/s1600/paintbrush-clip-art-9-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9t2HzW1oMi4-cCV3fMPzEhhu0h5yD1uXUI3__MSJaBNvFuDn3wR4clnEznCD09EyXWAOcRSerdlxwas2f6EGGlQdxMPS2aFKfVE5IkzbjYeHexdlFWadNlUFFSjmidVOj5-_IUBFifacZ/s200/paintbrush-clip-art-9-2.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
problem started in her bedroom, as her problems often did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While getting ready for work one morning, the
woman looked up and noticed a patch of brown on the wall just above her
dresser.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seemed impossible that after
an entire week of dressing and undressing in the small cloud-colored room she
would only just now notice the unpainted brown square.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Puzzled, the woman made a mental note to
“touch up” the spot when she got home from work.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">That
evening, when she walked into the kitchen with her arms full of groceries, she
was surprised to find a similar problem in the kitchen.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her white kitchen walls were turning pink –
which clashed with the curtains even worse than the red had.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Further inspection also revealed a rash of
green on the former accent wall and a line of blue bleeding through the white
corners of the den.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">“How
odd,” the woman thought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I suppose I
should have used primer.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
woman spent the next weekend re-moving the furniture, re-taping the baseboards,
re-covering the floor, and re-painting the apartment with three coats of a
non-color called “Clean Cotton.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Afterward, as she removed the masking tape, the woman carefully
inspected her work to make sure she hadn’t missed any spots or patches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Satisfied that her home was now thoroughly
whitewashed, the woman cleaned her brushes and treated herself to a hard-earned
beer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Four
days later, the color was back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
time, instead of slowly creeping across the walls like sweat through a shirt, the color simply appeared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When
the woman went to bed, the walls were white.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The next morning, the white was gone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She awoke in a brown bedroom, ate breakfast in a red kitchen, and
watched the morning news in a startlingly blue den.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The woman rode to work that day in frustrated
– and stunned – silence.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
next weekend, the woman invited several of her friends to her apartment for a
“painting party.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her friends were
gracious and hardworking people who were apparently willing to overlook the
fact that painting and partying never actually happen in the same space.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Together the friends spread three coats of
“Fresh Snow” on the stubborn walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
by the time they had ordered a pizza and drunk a few of the requisite painting
party beers, “Fresh Snow” was already melting to reveal the red, blue, green,
and brown walls beneath.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Having
spent a small fortune on paint and brushes, the woman finally tapped into her
vacation fund and hired a team of professional painters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two overweight Italian men spent most of the
next Tuesday afternoon attacking the walls with several gallons of
acrylic-based “Mother’s Milk.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the
painters finished, the woman sighed and told them not to bother moving the
furniture back against the walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She could
already see the color creeping back through.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">It
seemed her walls didn’t want to be white.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwZGYI8V7xc-fX1NhWsq0LuGSoRx-jssYYrrErYkb_x3RAlBOFhlSauuiUqHRld9ISPVnW_jW5WKSJTL1GeU2zyE64hyfddSOqoOp7_FHgA5KZhhQGjHAuCuhMa3Jf7riikIFj0PhzUpvF/s1600/paintbrush-clip-art-9-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwZGYI8V7xc-fX1NhWsq0LuGSoRx-jssYYrrErYkb_x3RAlBOFhlSauuiUqHRld9ISPVnW_jW5WKSJTL1GeU2zyE64hyfddSOqoOp7_FHgA5KZhhQGjHAuCuhMa3Jf7riikIFj0PhzUpvF/s200/paintbrush-clip-art-9-2.jpg" height="200" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">Exhausted,
the woman finally did what she should have done months ago - she called her
mother.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">“I
hope you realize that every time you paint those walls, you’re making your
apartment a few gallons smaller,” her mother said. “And besides… why do you
want a white apartment?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My wedding dress
was white, and so was your grandmother’s, and it was a lie both times.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Her
sister was equally as helpful.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">“Is
it so horrible if the walls don’t perfectly match your over-coordinated
life?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You might be looking for something
fresh and new, but that apartment’s not fresh and new. It’s been lived in, just
like you have. Don’t you think it’s a little arrogant to walk into that old
place and expect it to start over?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">And
her best boy friend:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">“Can
you blame them?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, blank pages
aren’t terribly interesting until you write on them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d be pissed, too, if somebody came along
and tried to erase all my interesting.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
woman hung up the phone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She walked
through her red kitchen and sat in her blue den.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She looked at the green across from her and
wondered...<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>were the walls being
stubborn, or were they right?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Before
she moved into the apartment and filled it with her furniture, books, and
baggage, its walls had already hosted dozens of birthday parties, book clubs,
and movie nights.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They had seen the
arguments and orgasms of every family that had lived there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who was she to erase the history that
seasoned these walls – the stories that would seep through even if she tried
her hardest to cover them?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">And
so, instead of asking the apartment to loose itself under her relentless
paintbrush, the woman let herself be its next tenant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She threw away several unopened gallons of
“Cresting Cloud” and bought a new bedspread that looked great in her bedroom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She also found four striped pillows for her
couch and decided that it was fine for her curtains to clash with the kitchen’s
red.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A little conflict made dinner more
interesting. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">The
woman grew to love her colorful and complicated apartment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She even told a few of her friends that she
couldn’t imagine why she ever wanted it to be white.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“White walls are about as interesting as
sleeping babies,” she said one night at the bar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Sure, they’re new and beautiful… but they
don’t have any good stories.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">Not
long after, the woman came home from work and found that her spare bedroom,
where she did most of her reading, writing, and singing too loudly with the
radio, had become the same pale yellow as her favorite spring sweater.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">And it always would be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">And
that made her very, very happy.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-91268312961266137902013-07-27T10:53:00.002-05:002014-01-28T10:09:09.806-06:00Stay Away<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAxNoTbZnhQmvB5JELyTPjSZGHSAHQJOyxNO4QPFsFGImRyxcNzr9Q1xa7CPTD74HZ18-7MUdcOMhiEeXW2NS6HdXB8cChYPnDNyv8rXp2Hz79qeYfVe6aWhILDw20MsxG2uLKYGCXoJC1/s1600/tumblr_m7cvg3tAqU1r8bc3no1_500-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAxNoTbZnhQmvB5JELyTPjSZGHSAHQJOyxNO4QPFsFGImRyxcNzr9Q1xa7CPTD74HZ18-7MUdcOMhiEeXW2NS6HdXB8cChYPnDNyv8rXp2Hz79qeYfVe6aWhILDw20MsxG2uLKYGCXoJC1/s400/tumblr_m7cvg3tAqU1r8bc3no1_500-2.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div>
It’s not uncommon to see people – men and women – rehearsing on the subway. Young white women hold scripts in their laps, whispering lines as the train rocks them toward an audition. Young black men stand in front of subway doors, looking at their reflection in the glass, watching themselves rap, imagining that the voice in their headphones is actually their own.
<br />
<br />
The woman got on the Q train at Canal St., shuffled into a seat, and sat with her knees pressed tightly together. Around her, tourists crowded together in clumps, hot with vacation sweat and proud of themselves for buying big, counterfeit purses in Chinatown. Those who noticed the woman might have wondered what it was like to be her – an Asian woman in the almost-foreign country of New York City’s lower east side. Most of the tourists, however, either didn’t notice the woman or pressed her so tightly behind several hundred other vacation memories that they never thought of her again.
<br />
<br />
In her lap, the woman held a small spiral-bound notebook. It was the kind of notebook little girls fill with stickers and the meaningless scribbles they pretend are words. In the pages of the notebook the woman copied and recopied the strange new English letters, training her hand to remember the way they felt. On its pages she carefully drew the vowels and consonants, stitching them together into something like language. Over it she whispered the clumsy new words that felt big and sticky in her mouth. The notebbook was her private rehearsal space, where she practiced the sounds she couldn’t yet say and studied the words she didn’t yet understand.
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcc51X-t5TLT-kszvKBx_SyVWu1_5MRm0eJdxrP2HZm-_djfMX7tE3jmmGTGzZpRF6CLe_qJ2FFYuU7PUJLucN4XUnGRJvIcHpWOCbTVoIF5MgFhNPSV4uty-Vq0pUi1w1GGiErDWoBeG6/s1600/spiral-notebook-md-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcc51X-t5TLT-kszvKBx_SyVWu1_5MRm0eJdxrP2HZm-_djfMX7tE3jmmGTGzZpRF6CLe_qJ2FFYuU7PUJLucN4XUnGRJvIcHpWOCbTVoIF5MgFhNPSV4uty-Vq0pUi1w1GGiErDWoBeG6/s200/spiral-notebook-md-2.png" /></a></div>
The man looked down and saw the woman’s opened notebook. He wasn’t spying. He was just noticing. When it’s been a hard day and the commute is long and your arm is tired from holding the chrome bar above your head, it’s natural to let both your chin and gaze drop. On days like that, it’s easy to let yourself look down and scan someone else’s magazine… someone else’s crossword puzzle… someone else’s cleavage.
<br />
<br />
On those days, it’s easy to notice the notebook in the small Asian woman’s lap.
<br />
<br />
There, on the blue lined page, printed in too-neat letters, he couldn’t help but notice that the woman had written:
<br />
<br />
<i>I won’t let you control me anymore<br />
You’ve made my life a misery<br />
Do not telephone me<br />
Stay away</i><br />
<br />
The woman’s lips moved slowly as she studied the words. Like a child trying to read the Sunday Times to her father, she furrowed her brow in concentration.
<br />
<br />
<i>Won’t let you control me… Life a misery… Stay away</i>
<br />
<br />
Obviously, these weren’t sentences the woman learned in a language guide. They weren’t the rote “practical English for non-native speakers” phrases that are recited in dingy community center classrooms.
<br />
<br />
“No,” the man thought, “someone helped her form these thoughts. Someone helped her craft this syntax, this story.”
<br />
<br />
As he scanned the lines on her page, the man felt (what?) for her. Sadness? Regret? Pity? After all, these were phrases a person shouldn’t have to rehearse in another person’s language. These were phrases that should slip easily off the tongue like fire, hot and rampant. Unchecked. Yet here the woman sat, silently mouthing the words. Studying.
<br />
<br />
<i>Control… Misery… Stay away</i>
<br />
<br />
But the man understood… or he thought he did.
<br />
<br />
Like most people, he was familiar with the ache of not just speaking words like these, but <i>planning</i> to speak them. Rehearsing them. Anticipating them. He knew what it was like to sit in stammering frustration as the right words lodge stubbornly in your chest.
<br />
<br />
<i>Do not telephone me</i>
<br />
<br />
He guessed that in a week, or a month (or maybe more?), the woman would finally feel confident enough to step off the train and say those lines to someone. But to who? Who was the person she had apparently lived with in love (and then frustration) for so long that she could no longer bear being not understood? Who was this man she couldn’t talk to – this person she had been intimate with, without being intimate? And how long could she ride the train with that notebook in her lap, waiting to tell him?
<br />
<br />
<i>Stay away.</i>
<br />
<br />
The man turned his head and pretended not to see.
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcc51X-t5TLT-kszvKBx_SyVWu1_5MRm0eJdxrP2HZm-_djfMX7tE3jmmGTGzZpRF6CLe_qJ2FFYuU7PUJLucN4XUnGRJvIcHpWOCbTVoIF5MgFhNPSV4uty-Vq0pUi1w1GGiErDWoBeG6/s1600/spiral-notebook-md-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcc51X-t5TLT-kszvKBx_SyVWu1_5MRm0eJdxrP2HZm-_djfMX7tE3jmmGTGzZpRF6CLe_qJ2FFYuU7PUJLucN4XUnGRJvIcHpWOCbTVoIF5MgFhNPSV4uty-Vq0pUi1w1GGiErDWoBeG6/s200/spiral-notebook-md-2.png" /></a></div>
At 8th St., the train slowed to a stop, as it always did. The bell sounded. The conductor’s voice announced the station and reminded passengers where they would stop next. People pushed and shoved as tourists tried to enter the train before commuters had a chance to leave.
<br />
<br />
The woman looked up from her notebook and saw her friend board the train. The friend stood in the doorway for a moment, scanning the car, apparently looking for the woman. When she saw the woman, the friend tilted her head sympathetically. The woman’s eyes filled with tears and closed, pressing heavy drops down her cheeks. When she opened them, the friend was standing in front of her, looking down with both concern and an anger that’s the truest sign of loyalty. <br />
<br />
“甜美的花,我不明白。那个混蛋对你说了什么”, she asked. (<i>Sweet Flower, I don’t understand. What did that jerk say to you?</i>)<br />
<br />
“我不知道 “ (<i>I’m not sure</i>) the woman replied, and handed her friend the notebook.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-75658374344854691602010-07-20T13:53:00.005-05:002010-07-21T09:40:24.705-05:00The Man With No NumberYesterday I was summonsed for jury duty. I’ve been waiting for this day for 17 years.<br /><br />Call me crazy, but I don’t understand why people try so hard to get out of jury duty. Yesterday, when the clerk asked for anyone who thought they should be excused to form an orderly line, 50 people stood and queued to the left of the bench. None of them were dressed as if they would rush back to the office as soon as they were dismissed and put the final touches on their groundbreaking cure for cancer, finish drafting a pre-approved mid-east peace treaty, or tighten the last bolts on one of those anti-gravity hover cars I’ve been expecting since I was 7-years-old.<br /><br />On the contrary, if they were excused, each of these men and women were planning to go home, turn off their cell phones, and waste the afternoon by watching television. Like me, they’ve all spent a significant portion of their lives sitting on a couch in front of the square-headed time eater. And what have they been watching?<br /><br />2000’s: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">American Idol</span></span>, a show where we watch young “singers” perform so we can responsibly cast our vote as to whether they’ve presented a strong enough case to stay and compete on the next week's show. Paula, Simon, and Randy are the judges. America is the jury.<br /><br />1990’s: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">Law & Order</span></span>, a show where the legal process in action – from arrest to prosecution – holds the attention of millions of people for 60 minutes (or up to 5 hours if you get drawn into a vortex of re-runs on TNT) every week… or, if you get caught in the previously mentioned syndication vortex, every day.<br /><br />1980’s: <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">The People’s Court</span></span>. One of the earliest examples of reality TV, <span style="font-style:italic;">The People’s Court </span>gave daytime television watchers a voyeur's seat at the legal system’s bedroom window. While we folded laundry and waited for Al Gore to develop the internet, didn’t we all try to guess how Judge Wapner would settle “The Case of the Overdone Underthings”?<br /><br />Honestly, who hasn’t succumbed to the guilty pleasure of <span style="font-style:italic;">Divorce Court</span>? Who wouldn’t recognize Judge Judy if they passed her on the street? What child of the 80’s can claim that he/she didn’t ask to stay up after <span style="font-style:italic;">The Cosby Show</span> and <span style="font-style:italic;">Cheers</span> to watch as Judge Harry T. Stone presided over his zany <span style="font-style:italic;">Night Court</span>? What baby boomer doesn’t know how <span style="font-style:italic;">Perry Mason</span> ended every week?<br /><br />I’m sure Oliver North, Bill Clinton, Monica Lewinsky, and OJ Simpson each wish America wasn’t addicted to the drama of our legal system at work.<br /><br />I’m also sure John Grisham is thankful we are. His book-to-movie fortune has been funded by courtroom junkies who love reading/watching stories with titles like <span style="font-style:italic;">The Firm, The Client</span>, and <span style="font-style:italic;">Runaway Jury</span>.<br /><br />And yet, when given the opportunity to watch legal drama in real-life, 50 people lined up yesterday in a Brooklyn courthouse to say “<span style="font-style:italic;">No thank you. I’d rather not see the live show. I’ll wait for it to come out on DVD or maybe buy the paperback.</span>”<br /><br />Fortunately, as these men and women gave their carefully rehearsed excuses to the court clerk, I was sitting close enough to the bench to overhear many of their reasons for “<span style="font-style:italic;">why I can’t help protect the innocent</span> (or <span style="font-style:italic;">punish the guilty</span>, depending on whether your glass is more full or more empty) <span style="font-style:italic;">today</span>.”<br /><br />My favorite excuse? A middle-aged man handed his summons to the court clerk and asked (in a heavy Brooklyn accent) to be dismissed. The clerk, confirming that the man wasn’t an immigrant (despite his <span style="font-style:italic;">Brooklyn Forever!</span> accent), politely asked “sir, where were you born?”<br /><br />“I’m from Brooklyn,” the man said, barely hiding his pride that he’s never been above 23rd street.<br /><br />“Then why didn’t you fill in your Social Security Number?”<br /><br />“I was born here in Brooklyn,” the man confirmed, “but they never gave me one of those Social Security Numbers. They must’a forgot. Can I go?”<br /><br />Bank accounts. Insurance forms. Tax returns. W4’s. 1099’s. Credit card applications. Marriage licenses. Certificates of divorce. All of these documents require a Social Security Number. Is it possible for a 40-year-old man to live in Brooklyn, USA his whole life without having a "Social"?<br /><br />Did the man really expect the court to believe that the US Government, who uses this number to make sure every citizen pays every penny of tax they owe, simply forgot to issue him one? It would have made more sense for the man to tell the clerk he was waiting for Uncle Sam to issue him a new Social Security Number ‘cause his old one was broken.<br /><br />The clerk rolled his eyes and told Citizen X to sit down and finish his paperwork. I laughed aloud, wondering again why people gripe and groan when given free tickets to this marvelous show.<br /><br />Tomorrow, the man with no number will sit on a jury. Together with 11 other fair and impartial strangers, he will be forced to do in public what many of us voluntarily do in private – pass judgment.<br /><br />I hope he’s more fair than he is clever.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-17763693110328908022010-07-15T19:17:00.000-05:002010-07-15T19:18:01.115-05:00There Should Always Be DancingA man danced during an earthquake and believed his steps shook the world. When his dancing stopped, the man saw what he assumed his joy had done, and swore to never dance again.<br /><br />Foolish man. There should always be dancing.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-6008639728172750862010-07-01T13:47:00.003-05:002010-07-02T08:09:21.488-05:00What I Did During My Summer VacationProtected by the long shadows of tall buildings, my virgin city skin hadn’t seen the sun in many months. Imagine its surprise when I arrived in Florida, stripped my shirt, and asked it to gradually toast from flour white to a light, golden brown. I know I should have given it more warning. If I had, maybe it wouldn’t have skipped brown, paused only briefly at pink, and committed itself to a stunning shade of red in less than two hours.<br /><br />At the time, exposing my skin to the roasting sun didn’t seem like an unreasonable thing to do. After all, even at its hottest, a summer day in Florida is seldom hotter than 100°. Although 100° is undeniably hot, it’s not technically “scorching hot.” An average oven in an average kitchen doesn’t even offer 100° as an option. The dials on most ovens start at a “warm” (and basically useless) 250°. Chocolate chip cookies refuse to bake if offered anything less than 350°. The bread in your toaster expects at least 400° before it will properly toast.<br /><br />Why, then, was a relatively cool 95° day able to thoroughly burn my skin in less than two hours?<br /><br />The answer, of course, is concealed by my clever cooking metaphor. Everyone knows that playing in the Florida sun has become less like playing in a conventional oven and more like playing in a microwave oven. Thanks to teenagers spraying Aqua-Net in the 1980’s, soccer moms driving SUVs in the 1990’s, and armies burning oil wells in the 2000’s, Florida’s summer sun can now scorch your skin quicker than ever before.<br /><br />You may ask, “Why did you let yourself get burned, Bryan? Haven’t you been listening to Al Gore? Haven’t you been paying attention to global warming, the greenhouse effect, the hole in the ozone layer, and the dangers of UV radiation? Don’t you know that an afternoon at the beach is practically as dangerous as smoking a cigarette or eating out of old Tupperware? Why didn’t you wear sun-screen?”<br /><br />Well… I did.<br /><br />Before my first day on the beach, I carefully applied suntan lotion to every inch of my exposed skin. I even lotioned a few places that weren’t currently exposed, but threatened to be. Because I knew each body part would receive a different amount of sun, I covered each with a different strength of lotion.<br /><br />Ears/nose/shoulders: 70. Face/neck: 50. Chest/back/arms: 40. Legs: 35.<br /><br />When I finally walked onto the beach, my collective SPF (sun protective factor) sounded like a Master Lock combination.<br /><br />And yet, despite my diligence, by lunch-time my shoulders and arms were already the color of a perfectly cooked filet mignon. (For vegetarian readers who might not understand this reference, I basically just said that “my shoulders and arms were hot pink and warm to the touch.”) <br /><br />I spent the rest of my vacation swimming in a t-shirt, hoping that wet cotton has an SPF of “impenetrable.”<br /><br />**<br /><br />Like the best vacation, the good parts of most days pass too quickly. And like the bright summer sun, even nice things sometimes cause unexpected pain. The worst of these hurts are the ones that surprise us – the ones that come without warning – the ones we didn’t know we needed to protect ourselves against.<br /><br />Friends too quickly become former friends. Lovers too quickly become former lovers. Jobs too quickly become former jobs. It’s so easy to get burned. Nobody is impenetrable.<br /><br />I recently got burned, and it hurt. But after the hurt healed – after the damaged layers peeled away and the red faded into tan – I realized that my new, deeper color makes me more interesting.<br /><br />Of course, getting burned also contributes to wrinkles, leathery skin, weird moles, and premature aging – but that’s not the point.<br /><br />The point is – I got burned, but it got better.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDffoZbQtGG5E57s-EhYpRtXjtVUsZ5nddWuH1wcXYxU3CMcm0YcXtHME166Rkz-KOyWvSWWKh9PajDj6HvNVsh6Z1-1BCNqFQn4pijc9AMilae3qm87m05a47_n-okXZ_yUfs3SUV9iqQ/s1600/DSC05012.JPG"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDffoZbQtGG5E57s-EhYpRtXjtVUsZ5nddWuH1wcXYxU3CMcm0YcXtHME166Rkz-KOyWvSWWKh9PajDj6HvNVsh6Z1-1BCNqFQn4pijc9AMilae3qm87m05a47_n-okXZ_yUfs3SUV9iqQ/s320/DSC05012.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5489011655337636850" /></a>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-27237733472646387122010-05-04T11:29:00.005-05:002010-05-04T12:01:26.969-05:00Finding Your Seat<span style="font-style:italic;">(inspired by the stories of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zhuangzi">Chuang Tzu</a>)</span><br /><br />A boy, traveling to meet his friend in the city, rode the subway,<br />constantly looking for a place to sit.<br /><br />When his train stopped, an old woman stood.<br />So did a business man and a girl with her brother –<br />all in different parts of the car.<br /><br />The doors opened, and they went shopping, to work, or to school.<br /><br />The boy scrambled for each vacant seat,<br />but was always beaten by someone closer –<br />someone who stood still until the place in front of them was free.<br /><br />The boy found his way to his friend in the city,<br />but the trip was harder than it should have been – <br />and his feet were tired before he got there.<br /><br />He stood the whole way.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-36734133494811471482010-04-20T10:36:00.001-05:002010-04-20T10:38:07.113-05:00When We Were YoungThere was a day when we were young. <br /><br />There was a day when someone could run fast and someone could make us laugh and someone always smelled funny. There was a day when everyone had their place, even if it wasn’t the place they wanted.<br /><br />There was a day when mothers brought cupcakes for all our classmates. On that day, when our friends sang “Happy Birthday to You,” we shared our cakes with the class as if to say, “no, happy birthday to <span style="font-style:italic;">us</span>.”<br /><br />And for the few minutes between Geography and Gym, it felt good to be a gift. To share.<br /><br />When we were young.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-53853365856783586002010-04-12T09:09:00.002-05:002010-04-12T09:14:50.195-05:00Shadow GamesGracie sat in my lap and wanted to <u><a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/01/let-her-eat-cake.html">play a game</a></u>. This is a reoccurring theme that the distance between Nashville and New York keeps from reoccurring very often. I wish it could reoccur more.<br /><br />This time, Gracie wanted to play outside. But after a weekend packed full with Easter eggs, bike rides, tickle fights, and birthday parties, I didn’t want to go outside. I wanted to rest. In a chair. Inside.<br /><br />“Gracie,” I said, “maybe you should go outside and play by yourself for a few minutes while Uncle Bryan sits here and finishes his tea.” <br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">Uncle Bryan sometimes speaks in the third person because it makes him sound like he’s doing a favor for someone other than himself.</span><br /><br />“But Uncle Bryan, you have to come outside with me” Gracie whined, “I can’t play hide-and-seek with my shadow!”<br /><br />She’s right, of course. There are a very limited number of outside games a person can effectively play with their shadow.<br /> <br />“Follow the Leader” – yes.<br />“Hide and Seek” – no.<br /><br />Maybe that’s why childhood… and adolescence… and even adulthood have been so uncomfortable for so many of us. We’ve spent too much time playing hide-and-seek with our shadow, running from something that can’t leave, hiding from a part of ourselves that refuses to go away.<br /><br />Instead of playing outside, Gracie and I sat at the kitchen table and <u><a href="http://imgur.com/LEYhj.jpg">drew pictures</a></u>. Then we shared a piece of cake and built a spaceship with her brother’s Legos. It was a wonderful afternoon of playing games, telling stories, and spending special time together – all of which Gracie’s shadow was (and will always be) welcomed to join.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-56913202573353482462010-04-06T11:17:00.016-05:002010-08-23T22:22:41.062-05:00Zombie PlaygroundLast weekend, in an attempt to escape from the concrete and chaos of NYC, Jeremy and I took a day trip to Rhinebeck, NY. There, hidden behind a quiet antebellum church, we discovered a zombie playground.<br /><br />If New York City is a Big Apple, Rhinebeck is an underdeveloped peach. Its downtown consists of a single intersection, the spokes of which are studded with a cigar shop, ice cream parlor, antique market, and four surprisingly good restaurants. The buildings in Rhinebeck are all short enough to loose a Frisbee on top of. <br /><br />It took only two hours for Jeremy and me to walk through each of the town's hot spots, eat lunch, and talk with two shop-owners. Our site-seeing complete, we made our way to the suburbs, a three block hike out of town.<br /><br />In Finding Nemo, an ocean native named Gill observed that all drains lead to the ocean. On his Discovery Channel show (Man v/s Wild), Bear Grylls taught that all trails eventually lead to water. As a small town explorer, I would like to add that – depending on your feelings about organized religion – all sidewalks eventually lead either <span style="font-style:italic;">to</span> or <span style="font-style:italic;">past</span> a church.<br /><br />Jeremy and I weren’t looking for a church, but that’s where the sidewalk led us. <br /><br />The white, wooden church that sits three blocks from Rhinebeck’s only red light is probably older than most of the trees in Manhattan. The bell in its steeple has been Rhinebeck’s alarm clock since the days when men set their pocket watches to its hourly toll. Its long wooden pews are polished smooth from ten generations of weddings, Easter celebrations, and Sunday morning services. In its backyard grows a cemetery the congregation started planting in the late 1700’s. <br /><br />Up from the seeds of the church's death and grief have sprouted several dozen antique tombstones. Each stone marker records dates of both joy and pain (<span style="font-style:italic;">Benjamin Cooper: born 1790 died 1843</span>). Many have inscriptions to help mathematically challenged mourners (<span style="font-style:italic;">aged 53 years, 4 months, 8 days</span>). Some even give a brief biography (<span style="font-style:italic;">drowned in the bloom of health</span>) or a frightening last thought for loved ones who might attempt to move on (<span style="font-style:italic;">as I am now so you shall be, prepare for death and follow me</span>).<br /><br />Excited by our morbid discovery, Jeremy and I walked through the people-garden and took pictures of the head stones. I wanted a shot framed with the church in the background and the graves in the foreground, a (probably too obvious) comment on the hope that religion – and especially Christianity – gives its dead.<br /><br />That’s when I saw the playground. Nestled against the back corner of the church, surrounded by a short chain-link fence, stood a cedar play house, four swings, a sandbox, and a green plastic Playskool slide. It isn’t unusual to see a playground behind a church. It is, however, unusual to see a tombstone poking out of the sandbox. Most churches put their playgrounds on an out of the way corner of unused land. Very few build them on top of their cemetery.<br /><br />A closer look at the playground confirmed that sticking its head out of the sandbox was a short, moss covered tombstone (<a href="http://imgur.com/ANoNO.jpg"><span style="font-style:italic;"><u>In Memory of Mary</u></span></a>). Two taller stones (<a href="http://i.imgur.com/qVHzl.jpg"><span style="font-style:italic;"><u>Eliza Ann Williams 1779 – 1810 and Leah Bergh 1769 – 1843</span></u></a>) stood immediately beside Mary’s in the sandbox, casting long shadows across a yellow Tonka truck. <a href="http://imgur.com/bRAje.jpg"><u>Two additional stone markers</u></a>, whose inscriptions have been worn smooth, stood watch over the playhouse and swing set.<br /><br />At some point in the church’s fairly recent past, a middle-aged man apparently stood in the back corner of the cemetery, looked at Mary’s eternal resting place, and thought <span style="font-style:italic;">“This. This is the perfect place for a kid to dig a hole.” </span> <br /><br />And then he built a sandbox.<br /><br />From Mary’s perspective, being buried under a playground probably has significant advantages. Although her neighbors get to rest peacefully on a quiet hillside, they’ve all finished decomposing and have nothing left to do. They’re probably bored to death. Trees don’t really grow quickly enough to provide much entertainment. <br /><br />Planted under the sandbox, however, Mary (debatably) has the best plot in the yard. Every day she gets to watch castle construction from the ground up. She gets to listen to giggling children play their games and tell their secrets. She even gets to feel the soft patter of little feet running through the dirt.<br /><br />Unfortunately, she’s also forced to look up at the not-so-pretty end of neighborhood cats who use her sandbox as a toilet. Every time they make a deposit, I’m sure Mary wishes rolling over in her grave was really as easy as the living seem to think it is.<br /><br />While Mary quietly wonders why Jesus is taking so long to come back, neighborhood children spend their days sitting on her grave, digging in the space between life and death. I hope they appreciate the incredible opportunity they’ve been given. After all…<br /><br />How many kids get to dig for treasure and actually feel their shovel hit a buried wooden box? <br /><br />How many kids get to schedule regular play dates with their great, great, great, great grandparents?<br /><br />And how many kids know that on Sunday morning, when their Sunday School teacher asks the class if they know where they’ll go when they die, that they always have the best answer? <br /><br />“Yes,” they can say with confidence. “I’ll go to the playground.”<br /><br />**<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">To see pics of the playground, click the epitaphs in the story ("In Memory of Mary", "Eliza Ann Williams 1779 – 1810 and Leah Bergh 1769 – 1843", "Two additional stone markers"). <a href="http://imgur.com/EXdmP.jpg">You can also <u>click here to see pics of the playground.</a></u></span>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-43617663647053875462010-03-15T11:25:00.002-05:002010-03-15T11:29:25.395-05:00Epilogue.<span style="font-style:italic;">This is what it says it is… an epilogue. If you would like to read what it’s an epilogue to, check out <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/nature-needs-elevator.html">Part 1</a>, <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/its-not-fall-that-kills-you.html">Part 2</a>, and <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/03/toothpicks.html">Part 3</a>.</span><br /><br />In the years since John, Kyle, and I made our trek up the mountain and through the woods, much has happened. Kyle moved to California to study a scientific discipline I can’t even spell. John finally looked over his shoulder and saw an amazing woman standing there who will soon be his wife. I returned from Yosemite unaware that over the next few years I would navigate a car-sickening ride of life, career, and geographic changes.<br /><br />It’s been a big five years.<br /><br />Re-reading this story has made me realize that I need to go back to the mountain. I need perspective and grounding. I need to dangle my feet over a ledge and remember that sitting on the edge of something uncertain, while terrifying, can also be beautiful and exciting. <br /><br />Of course, I also need somebody to pay for the plane ticket. Interested?Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-61471091255478406282010-03-09T13:30:00.008-06:002010-08-23T23:25:28.682-05:00Toothpicks<span style="font-style:italic;">While this post can stand somewhat steadily on it’s own, it’s much more stable when supported by <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/nature-needs-elevator.html">Part 1</a> and <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/its-not-fall-that-kills-you.html">Part 2</a>. If you haven’t read them yet, maybe you should do that now...</span><br /><br />After an hour on top of Half Dome, Kyle, John, and I headed back down the trail toward camp. Down may be a faster direction than up, but both force your muscles to fight the mountain. And when your muscles fight the mountain, the mountain always wins. And when the mountain wins, you muscles are always sore losers.<br /><br />It was dark when we finally got back to camp. Each of us went our separate ways to shower and apologize to our aching legs. I started a fire so we could heat some canned beef stew, but was overly generous with the lighter fluid. The resulting campfireball almost blew us into the trees. Fortunately, when you’re primitive camping and there’s no TV, a few small explosions are welcomed entertainment. John, Kyle, and I sat around the blaze for hours, staring into the flames, eating our stew and contemplating how much our muscles would hate us in the morning.<br /><br />On our way out of the park a few days later, after our legs had forgiven us, we stopped at one of Yosemite’s redwood groves to walk through the giant trees.<br /><br />The redwoods in these ancient forests are so broad that in 1895, a group of industrious settlers carved a tunnel through one of them. Forrest fires burned a tunnel though another one. The tunnels are large enough for a Honda to drive through without scratching its bumper. The park’s forest rangers don’t like it when you drive Hondas through their trees, though. Apparently it distracts the elves from putting fudge stripes on their cookies.<br /><br />These beautiful redwoods have been alive for (literally) thousands of years. Before Jesus had skin and cooed in the manger, back when the earth was still flat and MTV actually played music videos, these giants were standing. Growing.<br /><br />In the 1860’s, however, nearsighted lumberjacks walked through the Yosemite Valley and couldn’t appreciate the majesty of a forest that was planted when Cleopatra swam the Nile. They stood in the woods and had no respect for trees that would one day rise twenty-nine stories into the sky. They measured trunks that circled ninety-two feet and were somehow unimpressed. They saw branches as thick as a man is tall and continued walking with their hands in their pockets and their minds in their wallets.<br /><br />These lumberjacks missed the majesty and saw only a challenge, an arm wrestling match with nature. They didn’t see ancient beauty in the branches or hear the voice of God rustling through the leaves. With necks bent back and faces pointed toward the sky, they saw only profit. They heard only the whisper of their own ambition. And so, these short-sighted men started chopping.<br /><br />They stood beneath monstrous trees that had outlived fifty generations of men and cut them with saws and axes and other tools that would rust and dull. And when the mighty trees fell, they shattered. Instead of landing whole and complete, the trees cracked under the force of the fall, broken into four foot sections.<br /><br />Sacrificed to ego and ambition, the pieces of these once-giants were too short to cut into lumber for furniture or houses. Wasted, the fallen trees were chipped and whittled into toothpicks and pencils, splinters of their former selves. Ancient pillars that survived two millennia of fire, earthquakes, ice, bugs, and birds were reduced to fifteen seconds of picking corn out of somebody’s teeth.<br /><br />What a shame.<br /><br />In 1878 people picked their teeth with giants. <br /><br />Unfortunately, they still do. <br /><br />In a country where we’re obsessed with all things organic and eco-friendly, too many giants are still being sacrificed for a lesser good, cut down in their prime, whittled into toothpicks of their former selves. If you’ve been listening, you’ve probably heard some of them fall.<br /><br />California couples like the artist and the architect celebrated their love through marriage until one day voters candidly informed them that<br /> **Chop**<br />equality was meant for everyone else. <br /> <br />Millions of hardworking Americans watched as talking heads on the nightly news claimed that <br /> **Chop**<br />they haven’t yet earned the American Dream… or the right to affordable healthcare. <br /> <br />An entire generation of young Africans disappeared in under-reported genocide while wealthier nations<br /> **Chop**<br />fought each other for revenge, ideology, and oil. <br /><br />Ponzi schemes were built, mortgages were sold, and bonuses were collected by wealthy men willing to <br />**Chop**<br />**Chop**<br />**Chop**<br />sacrifice the financial futures of men and women who now fear words like <span style="font-style:italic;">foreclosure</span>, <span style="font-style:italic;">downsize</span>, and <span style="font-style:italic;">retirement</span>.<br /><br />I wonder, though, if the lumberjacks among us would still swing their axes if they stopped obsessing over: <br />whether oaks should be allowed to marry maples,<br />whether the forest should offer free fertilizer and subsidized rain,<br />whether foreign seedlings are taking root in domestic soil,<br />and whether or not it’s fair to ask bigger trees to care for smaller ones,<br /><br />and stop to watch God dancing through the leaves. <br /><br />Which He is. <br /> <br />(I’m sure the poetry of idealism has blinded me to its impracticality. But still, I wonder.)<br /><br />To Be Continued…<br /><a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/03/epilogue.html"><u>Click here to read this story's epilogue.</u></a>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-36011377236516985082010-02-27T10:22:00.009-06:002010-03-09T13:47:44.885-06:00It's Not The Fall That Kills You<span style="font-style:italic;">Every life-inspired story is essentially a peek into the past. Consider this a peek into mine. This is part 2 of story about a hiking expedition I embarked on with my friends John and Kyle. If you know me well (or even casually), don’t be thrown by phrases like “I live in Nashville.” This was originally written several years ago. <u><a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/nature-needs-elevator.html">Check out Part 1 of the story to catch up.</a></u> </span><br /><br /><br />With muscles aching and joints screaming, my friends and I made the summit of Half Dome at 3:00pm, just as the sun lit the valley for postcard views. While John explored and Kyle took pictures, I sat on top of the mountain with my legs dangling over the edge, tempting gravity to steal my shoes. Sitting on top of Half Dome made me wonder how the Earth must have felt during its ten million year labor, giving birth to this mountain of stone. Pushing it through miles of earth and air. Enduring contractions that shook the planet.<br /><br />Looking down into the valley made me question how this mountain must have felt when it was a moody geological teenager and a glacier bullied its way through the rocks, tearing away at Half Dome’s face and digging a valley between he and his friends. It was a glacier that clipped the mountain’s rounded top and gave him the nickname Half Dome.<br /><br />What a cold, hard thing for a glacier to do.<br /><br />But building up and tearing down are the verse and chorus of nature’s song, the synopsis of God’s story. These mountains are human history in slow motion. They remind us that we are creation, cracked and scarred, yet beautiful beyond belief. They tell us that this is life, both majesty and pain, each serving a purpose. They encourage us that our struggles, while important, are seldom eternal.<br /><br />I had only been on top of the mountain for a few minutes when two guys crept up behind me and peeked over the side.<br /><br />“I can’t believe you’re sitting that close to the edge,” one of them said. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll fall?”<br /><br />I smiled. “Well, it’s not the fall that kills you. It’s the two guys that sneak up and startle you while your legs are dangling over a 4,000 foot ledge that kill you.”<br /><br />The two men laughed and produced a peace offering of dried fruit. I accepted and returned a handshake, inviting them to join me on the ledge.<br /><br />As they sat, a hawk made a soaring pass in the space just under my feet. We looked down on the bird as it flew 4800 feet above its unsuspecting dinner. When the hawk turned and its wings caught the wind, I felt like the chorus of an old Bette Midler song. <br /><br />Together we sat on the edge of a mountain, looking down on the world from a rock that has enjoyed its view for ten million years. We chatted. I asked the obligatory questions of “where are you from?” and “what do you do?” They were from San Francisco. One was an artist, the other an architect. <br /><br />Although it was a brief biography, the word “we” was used frequently enough to safely establish that these two men were in a relationship. The rainbow pin on the architect’s backpack hinted that it might be a romantic relationship. So did the fact that they were holding hands. <br /><br />The architect offered me a piece of mango jerky. <br /><br />“Where are you from,” he asked.<br /><br />“Nashville, Tennessee” I answered.<br /><br />The architect sighed a lungful of mountain air. San Francisco sits on the west coast and is known for its famous bridge, hill topping trolleys, and homosexual community. Nashville is in the south, where the Bible buckles its belt. If there is stereotype surrounding what it means to be a homosexual from San Francisco, there is equal preconception of what it means to be a Christian from the south. While people in San Francisco cross the Golden Gate bridge and eat good seafood, Nashvillians go to church on Sunday and enjoy a diet rich in southern fried Christianity. <br /><br />The architect sighed, and with a smirk that obviously masked something like frustration or hurt or betrayal, he said, “don’t worry. We’re not really as bad as Jerry Falwell would have you believe.”<br /><br />Jerry Falwell is a televangelist who, until his death in 2007, led a conservative movement known as the “moral majority.” In 2001 Falwell blamed gays, lesbians, abortionists, and other “pagans” for the terrorist attacks in New York City. “You helped this happen,” Falwell said, implying that homosexuals in the World Trade Center served as lightening rods for God’s judgment. In a moment, on national television, this influential preacher presented Christianity to the world as a faith of finger pointing and hatred.<br /><br />And the world was watching.<br /><br />I paused so the architect would know I had heard what he said and had taken it seriously. Then I smiled. “I’m of the opinion that nobody is as bad as Jerry Falwell would have us believe.”<br /><br />He smiled back.<br /><br />But then, to continue the conversation, the architect asked another question, harmless and ripe with possibility. My answer would either intrigue my new friend or infuriate him.<br /><br />He asked what I do for a living.<br /><br />I had two correct answers for his question. I am an author, but I am also a preacher. <br /><br />To tell the architect that I am an author would likely have given us ten minutes more to talk about. Telling him that I am a preacher, however, was likely to produce an awkward silence and hasty retreat. Being an author would safely establish me as an open minded artist. Being a preacher would associate me with Jerry Falwell.<br /><br />I’m not embarrassed by my faith. I’m not ashamed of my Christianity. But I am sometimes ashamed of other Christians. That’s why I told the architect I am an author and quickly changed the subject.<br /><br />In retrospect, I made a poor choice.<br /><br />What I should have told him was, “I’m a preacher, a Christian. And we’re not as bad as Jerry Falwell would have you believe either.”<br /><br />I wonder if he would have smiled.<br /><br />To be continued...<br /><a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/03/toothpicks.html"><u>click here to read Part 3.</u></a>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-30834292621169922022010-02-19T10:39:00.008-06:002010-03-09T13:46:26.613-06:00Nature Needs an Elevator<span style="font-style:italic;">Several years ago, when I was still traveling as a speaker for youth events and still had hopes of publishing a second book, I went on a hiking expedition with my friends John and Kyle. I recently brushed the digital dust off of what I wrote after the trip and edited it into a four part blog post. This is part one…</span><br /><br />I know heaven doesn’t float in the sky and hell doesn’t bubble and burn beneath our feet, but when you sit on the top of a mountain, you can’t help but feel closer to God. The mountain gives you perspective. It lets you rise above the earth while still standing connected to it. The mountain is grandeur and grounding. It is both powerful and broken.<br /><br />I wonder if that’s why God often brought his favorites to the top of a mountain when he had something important to say.<br /><br />Abraham. Moses. Joshua. Peter, James, and John. They were all changed by what God showed them on a mountain. On the mountain he gave them new perspective. He said, “Let me show you how to rise above this life while still staying connected to it.”<br /><br />I recently hiked to the top of Yosemite’s Half Dome with two friends from college. Together we climbed 4,800 feet, higher than almost four Empire State Buildings, over the course of a nine mile hike to the summit. The two men I hiked with were an unusual and eclectic mix. John, Kyle, and I are old friends who share a love for movies, the outdoors, and everything sarcastic.<br /><br />Kyle and I lived together in a retirement community for a year just after we graduated from college. At the time, Kyle worked for the government and investigated sources of radioactive activity. Obviously, working with radioactive elements is sensitive work. Our elderly neighbors sometimes thought it odd that their lights got brighter and their hearing aids whistled every time Kyle walked into the room. I got nervous every time Kyle found an odd rock in his pocket or came home from work with a bigger bald spot. We owned a microwave oven, but never used it. For dinner I set my macaroni and cheese in Kyle’s lap for 45 seconds and enjoyed a hot meal.<br /><br />John and I were roommates and best friends in college who did all the ridiculous things college friends do. We set flame to our farts and stole shoes from the bowling alley. I have pictures of the two of us so covered in mud we look like we’ve both been iced with earth chocolate. In a time shortly before cell phones and just after smoke signals, John and I installed CB radios in our cars so we could talk and tell dirty jokes across town. John is a professional actor now. While Kyle glows in the dark and cures cancer, John connects with his inner child and uses his Hollywood good looks to date beautiful women. <br /><br />Our hiking trip up Half Dome wasn’t simply a reunion, it was the set up for a really bad joke. A scientist, an actor, and a preacher were camping in the woods . . .<br /><br />To Be Continued...<br /><u><a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2010/02/its-not-fall-that-kills-you.html">Click here to read Part 2..</a>.</u>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-9120098763748372592010-01-06T11:15:00.011-06:002010-05-28T09:51:51.747-05:00Let Her Eat Cake<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAobJpL7cNcq0sgSzTZ2YhaJ6MXoGTAjdvNlKWw2aJ3LXdbSBfJKEnmxCyjOK2mcP2Q4x6WYy5tdDzNqpKlHv5QiK3B_1Q4uZoDTRXVMRxsdjMFKnyYiDNt4JdVD-B1Yh2Tp73AY6DtaTk/s1600-h/Gracie+Flower.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 175px; height: 180px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAobJpL7cNcq0sgSzTZ2YhaJ6MXoGTAjdvNlKWw2aJ3LXdbSBfJKEnmxCyjOK2mcP2Q4x6WYy5tdDzNqpKlHv5QiK3B_1Q4uZoDTRXVMRxsdjMFKnyYiDNt4JdVD-B1Yh2Tp73AY6DtaTk/s200/Gracie+Flower.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5423678147109457746" /></a><br />During Christmas, Gracie crawled into my lap and announced that we were going to play a game.<br /><br />“Great. What’s the game?” I asked.<br />“I don’t know, silly,” she said. “You have to think of one.”<br /><br />Fortunately, I once taught a class at <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">How to be a Great Uncle School</span></span> about impromptu stories and games-on-the-fly. Halfway up my sleeve I found exactly what we needed.<br /><br />“Gracie,” I asked, “if you could open MiMi’s magic oven and find any treat baked inside, what treat would you find?”<br />Without thinking, she said “Chocolate Cake.”<br />“Not peanut butter cookies or a roasted buffalo?”<br />“No, Uncle Bryan, (smiling) Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">MiMi is what Gracie calls my mother, her grandmother. MiMi didn’t invent chocolate cake, but she might have perfected it. She bakes chocolate cake well and often – especially when her grandchildren are spending the night.</span><br /><br />“Gracie, if you could open the magic closet in MiMi’s bedroom and find an exciting something hidden behind her clothes, what would you find?”<br />“Chocolate Cake!”<br />“Not a house for your Barbies or a dress made of diamonds?”<br />“No, Uncle Bryan, (with a giggle) Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">Other than pizza and peanut butter with honey sandwiches, chocolate cake is the only thing Gracie eats voluntarily. Everything else is consumed under duress and only to earn a reward, often of chocolate cake.</span><br /><br />“Gracie, If you could open MiMi’s magic backdoor and go anywhere in the universe – even if it’s an imaginary place nobody has ever been to – where would you go?”<br />“Somewhere that has lots and lots of Chocolate Cake!”<br />“Not Sesame Street or a pineapple under the sea?”<br />“No, Uncle Bryan (losing control), somewhere with Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">Squirming with laughter and lost in her own silliness, Gracie begged for more. “Ask another one, Uncle Bryan, ask another one!” How could an uncle resist?</span><br /><br />“If you could pick up MiMi’s magic telephone and talk to anyone – even someone who’s not real – who would you talk to?”<br />“Somebody who knows how to make Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br />“If you could dig a magic hole in MiMi’s backyard and fill it with anything you can imagine, what would you fill it with?”<br />“A whole ton of Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br />“If you could climb into MiMi’s magic bed and dream about anything in the world, what would you dream about?”<br />“Eating Chocolate Cake!”<br /><br />Every time Gracie said “Chocolate Cake,” a smile spread across her face and into her eyes. The letters of her words were all mixed with laughter. Her love for the cake is loyal and strong.<br /><br />***<br /><br />Gracie is a creative, clever, and genuinely funny girl whose six-year-old imagination skips across ideas like a rock across water. That’s why, when our game started, I expected her to travel through space, talk to the tooth fairy, and swim in a pool of marshmallows.<br /><br />Apparently, I underestimated Gracie’s imagination. It takes a very powerful love – and a very clever girl – to find cake in every question.<br /><br />One day, however, Gracie will discover the beauty of things like new books, old movies, the sound of her mother’s voice, the touch of her lover’s hands, cold lemonade, and fresh snow. All these things will eventually find homes in Gracie’s heart – but she will always love chocolate cake.<br /><br />When stupid boys make fun of her glasses, Gracie’s mother will sit with her on the couch and there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When boys stop being stupid and one finds the nerve to ask Gracie on her first date, her best friend will squeal with delight and there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When she graduates from high school, and college, and feels hope in her future, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When the economy plummets and she can’t find a job, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When a man asks her to marry him, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When she fights with the man and they say hurtful things to each other and she thinks about leaving, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When she sells her first painting or gets a promotion, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When her babies have birthdays, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />When the biopsy comes back negative, there will be chocolate cake.<br /><br />And finally, after enjoying a life full of flour, sugar, and cocoa powder, Gracie will sit at a kitchen table with her grandchildren… and there will still be chocolate cake.<br /><br />**<br /><br />If Gracie is as clever as I think she is, she will eventually realize that Chocolate Cake doesn’t really answer every question. The most important questions are better answered with words like “love,” “my family,” “God,” and “I don’t know.”<br /><br />And if Gracie is as smart as I hope she is, she will also learn to exercise. Otherwise, her love for chocolate cake is going to make her very, very fat.*<br /><br /><br />__________________________<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">* For the record, “fat” is a terrible word and is used here only because Uncle Bryan suffers from an adolescent infection to his sense of humor. Gracie is a perfectly sized six-year-old, and unless her doctors tell her differently, whatever size she grows into will always be exactly the right size.<br /><br />** Gracie, if the internet is still alive when you’re old enough to read archives of your uncle’s blog, give me a call. I'll tell you <a href="http://sometimesroadsdiverge.blogspot.com/2008/05/stick-for-sale.html">silly stories about your brother</a>, we’ll eat cake, and together we can laugh at my receding hairline.</span>Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-68523751995734785572009-12-18T09:22:00.008-06:002015-12-14T19:39:44.820-06:00Santa is a Fraud<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCDoliMgzhLNVnA68nXTriImmrKw9ubomISmc2rzDfdwwZ_SXqbMwGva1Qxwzle_s2f8aFyefNYS35Y31_pWIHfBYKMglymhjPIXyLywrqfOl_YSM07tAxqqhvvVf3Xc1vl3eSpFRFdAzT/s1600/long-knit-christmas-stocking-1-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCDoliMgzhLNVnA68nXTriImmrKw9ubomISmc2rzDfdwwZ_SXqbMwGva1Qxwzle_s2f8aFyefNYS35Y31_pWIHfBYKMglymhjPIXyLywrqfOl_YSM07tAxqqhvvVf3Xc1vl3eSpFRFdAzT/s320/long-knit-christmas-stocking-1-2.jpg" /></a></div>
When the batteries snapped into his back, Capt. Awesome suddenly became aware of flashing lights and Christmas music in the living room. His tiny AAA heart beat faster.<br />
<br />
And then a middle aged woman set him on a coffee table – a COFFEE TABLE! – and took a huge bite from the cookie.<br />
<br />
“What the ****,” he thought. “You’re not Santa!”<br />
<br />
As the woman stuffed him into a red felt stocking, the reality of Capt. Awesome’s situation set in. <br />
<br />
He wasn’t built in Santa’s workshop... he was bought in a store! He was a bastard toy! And like all bastard toys, his life expectancy would be that of a house-fly. Even if he didn’t break before his batteries ran out, Capt. Awesome knew that no self-respecting child was going to choose him over a genuine North Pole toy.<br />
<br />
He was doomed to life under the bed.<br />
<br />
Eventually, the woman turned off the lights and went to bed. After working for hours to build a bicycle and set up something called a “Barbie Tropical Water Park,” she looked exhausted.<br />
<br />
“Why would she go to that much trouble,” Capt. Awesome wondered. “Santa will be here any minute.”<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
Capt. Awesome spent a sleepless night peering over the white-furred edge of his stocking, waiting. To pass the time, he counted the presents under the tree. There were thirty-four. Four red boxes had gold bows. Two red boxes had green bows. Three blue boxes had silver ribbons. Eight boxes didn’t have bows or ribbons. Six boxes were wrapped in green, five had paper with pictures on it, and one little box was silver and shiny. Most of the presents were square-ish, but three were strange shapes that crumpled the paper. Tucked in a corner were two gift bags with white tissue paper erupting from their tops.<br />
<br />
Shortly before 6:00am, Capt. Awesome heard tiny voices telling sleepy parents it was time to wake up. An old man, probably the grandfather, scooped coffee into a pot and made noises that sounded like they belonged outside. A few minutes later, a little boy ran down the stairs and shouted when he saw a shiny blue bicycle.<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome was exhausted. He stayed awake the whole night. Santa never came.
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
It was the parents. It was the parents the whole time. Every box. Every bow. Every toy and foil wrapped chocolate was a fraud. It was all carried home in a sack. None of it rode in a sleigh.<br />
<br />
And the parents let it happen. No, they didn’t just let it happen. They <i>made</i> it happen. Every year they filled their poor, empty-headed children with stories about a fat man – a stranger – who loved them so much and thought they were such good little boys and girls that they deserved presents.<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome was furious. “Wrapping a lie in red velvet,” he thought, “doesn’t make it right.”<br />
<br />
Three weeks later, Capt. Awesome sat on the kitchen table while the mother wrote checks to pay credit card companies for the Christmas presents they had bought. Capt. Awesome thought she should forward the bills to the North Pole for reimbursement, but he decided not to mention it. At the moment, the mother looked too fragile to take suggestions, even from a superhero.<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome was sure that before Christmas both the boy and the girl had written letters to the North Pole asking the non-existent Santa for everything they wanted, including a bicycle and a Barbie water park. To their credit, the boy still rode his bicycle and the girl hadn’t yet forgotten about the pink water park in the corner of her room – not that she could. On December 26, however, their markers suddenly went dry. Every day they played, but they never said thank you.<br />
<br />
Ungrateful kids.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
During the months that followed, Capt. Awesome spent most of his time in the van. He went to soccer practices and swim lessons. He waited in the backseat during dance recitals and birthday parties. He endured the agony of family vacations and once almost won his freedom in a Burger King parking lot. He probably would have gotten away – or at least might have been picked up by a new boy in a new van – if the boy hadn’t shouted for the mother to stop. Apparently, bastard toys aren’t as expendable as Capt. Awesome once thought. Damn.<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome eventually overcame his nausea from the van's stale french-fry smell. He also learned to ignore the endless repetitions of something called “Finding Nemo.” He even taught himself how to mentally dissociate when the boy forced his head through the van’s cracked window as they rushed down the interstate. Capt. Awesome couldn’t tolerate it, however, when he got wedged between the back seats. The horrors he saw in the depths of that dark and sticky hell were more than even the bravest toy could endure.<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome soon learned that the boy’s name was Daniel. The girl was Kris. The mother was usually called Mom or Mommy, except when one of the men was in the van. Then she was called Susan. Capt. Awesome got nervous when the mother became “Susan,” especially if the boy and the girl were staying with a babysitter or sleeping at their grandparents’ house. On those nights, when the mother was in the van alone with one of the men, he sometimes heard things that made him wonder if Susan might be the reason Santa didn’t stop at the Cooper house.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
In November, the mood in the van began to change. The boy and the girl, who seldom sang along with the radio, started requesting songs about Frosty the snowman and Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer. Finding Nemo was replaced by a movie that referenced a disturbing place called the “Island of Misfit Toys.” The mother also began asking the boy and the girl awkward questions about elves and what kind of cookies Santa likes. <br />
<br />
Soon it would be Christmas, the most dishonest time of the year.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
Early one morning, the family piled into the van already arguing about their day.<br />
<br />
“I get to go first,” said the boy. “I’m older so I get to go first.”<br />
“But it’s my turn,” the girl protested. “Daniel got to go first last year. It’s not fair!”<br />
“I told you, it doesn’t matter who goes first. You’ll both get a turn,” said the mother. “Kris, what are you going to ask Santa for?”<br />
<br />
The girl didn’t even have to think about her answer. “I want an American Girl doll, a bike like Daniel’s with a pink helmet and a white seat, and a white fairy princess dress.”<br />
<br />
The boy also had his list memorized. He wanted a chemistry set and a microscope like Brendon’s “so we can do experiments together.” He also said he was going to ask Santa for a remote controlled car and something called a DM3.<br />
<br />
The rest of the way to the mall, the mother was obviously working to keep her lips from moving while she rehearsed their lists. Capt. Awesome couldn’t believe the boy and the girl didn’t see it. Sure, they were only kids, but how weak did your batteries have to be to not see the mother memorizing every word they said? <br />
<br />
American Girl. Pink Helmet. White seat. Princess dress. Chemistry set. Microscope. Car. DMSomething.<br />
<br />
A week later, the mother drove back to the mall without the boy and the girl. She stayed inside for several hours. When she came back to the van, Capt. Awesome could see a chemistry set in one of her bags and the white sequence of a fairy princess dress in another.<br />
<br />
“Christmas,” he thought, “when deception disguises itself as goodwill.”<br />
<br />
After last Christmas - his first Christmas - Capt. Awesome was convinced that Santa was a great manipulation, and nothing more. He was a fraud built by the collective imaginations of adults who regularly spanked their children for lying. Capt. Awesome was sure that by perpetuating the Santa story, the parents were digging their own graves.<br />
<br />
Did parents really think the world leaders these parents were raising would find solutions for the fossil fuel crisis when they honestly believed magic elves spent twelve months a year making everything people asked for?<br />
<br />
Had the parents actually convinced themselves that the global economy would be stabilized by a generation who thought an overweight saint slid down their chimneys to deliver toys?<br />
<br />
And who did the parents think would care for them in their old age? What possible motivation would their children have for giving selflessly to another person when they believed a 1400 year-old fat man existed for no other reason than to give them presents?<br />
<br />
It was all so absurd.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
After the kids sat on Santa’s lap, the van was filled and emptied four different times. The mother brought home rolls of paper and hid department store bags under her bed. At the grocery store, she bought two bags of the candy she used to help fill the kids’ stockings. Capt. Awesome remembered it from the year before when he stood on it through that horrible sleepless night. At the toy store, the mother asked a handsome young man wearing a blue vest to help her load a bike-sized box into the van. The young man smiled weakly when the mother handed him a dollar and wished him Merry Christmas.<br />
<br />
Long before Christmas morning, Capt. Awesome knew that not only was the boy getting a chemistry set and a microscope from “Santa,” he was also getting a basketball and two new shirts.<br />
<br />
The girl would love her fairy dress and would probably spend most of Christmas afternoon riding her new bicycle. But Capt. Awesome knew that “Santa” was also going to surprise her with a shiny chrome bell for her handlebars.<br />
<br />
The kids had no idea what was happening behind the Christmas scenes. Every afternoon they rode home in the backseat of a grey Astro-Van that secretly doubled as Santa’s sleigh. If they knew that Santa poured their cereal and drove them to school every morning, they would go absolutely mental.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
On the Saturday night before Christmas, the mother dropped the kids off at their grandparents’ house and picked up the man who was her current favorite. On their way to dinner, the mother and the man talked about Christmas and which child would like which present the best. “Susan,” the man said, “You’ve kinda gone overboard this year, haven’t you? Can you afford all this?”<br />
<br />
“Not really,” said the mother. <br />
<br />
And then she started to cry. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s1600/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLK50rfqXxQnVmBbaQTIrj-NSITgeGFHBJyi3qlRQJa9zkwbStppuPFgxyvKlYqNAjni5AkVQi4Q3by6KPkCCbMmXTKvEz0LWZgRnfjejCeq9K4a18MrpP6JSdm7ZaH45y6vqfa7CjmFWM/s200/Santa+Sleigh-2.jpg" /></a></div>
After Christmas, the man helped the mother tie a brittled Christmas tree onto the top of the van. After they dumped the tree in a pile near the playground in their favorite park, the man announced he was taking everyone out for pizza to celebrate the new year.<br />
<br />
On the way, he turned to ask the boy and the girl if they had a good Christmas.<br />
<br />
“Sure did,” said the boy. “Santa got me a microscope and a cool chemistry set and a DM3!”<br />
“I got a silver princess dress and a pink bicycle with a bell on the handles,” said the girl.<br />
“That’s great,” said the man. “What did your mom get you?”<br />
<br />
The boy and the girl looked at each other blankly. <br />
<br />
“I don’t remember,” the boy answered. “Mom, what did you get me?”<br />
<br />
Capt. Awesome couldn’t believe his ears. If he had any muscle control – if he had any muscles at all – he would kick the boy in the lap. <br />
<br />
“Santa,” he wanted to scream, “is just a front man your parents use to launder their own generosity. He’s a puppet crafted to give you the clothes you need and the toys you want and let somebody else get the credit. I can’t believe your mom sits in the shadows while an overstuffed fairy tale steals her glory.”<br />
<br />
Ungrateful kids.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-71684226556757072222009-11-16T11:52:00.006-06:002013-07-31T14:37:54.047-05:00Super? Human.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB6pSoTh09dlbvbZEVzgsMHOkZyZ7eHHG0K1yZSRuB8sqNajP_sUO1nyIfnKJlq2Dt0C4kJFmNBM9qEp0T6o53gV5d_3uOAcZXwk2rrkTzfAa_Wni9Tf2IKxSIC7ssXUK36ToB7CF0-mSw/s1600/superherokid-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB6pSoTh09dlbvbZEVzgsMHOkZyZ7eHHG0K1yZSRuB8sqNajP_sUO1nyIfnKJlq2Dt0C4kJFmNBM9qEp0T6o53gV5d_3uOAcZXwk2rrkTzfAa_Wni9Tf2IKxSIC7ssXUK36ToB7CF0-mSw/s320/superherokid-2.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><u>Michael</u></span></div>
</div>
<br />
Michael discovered he could become invisible when he was a teenager – that glandular time when the other boys were also discovering their own secret and hidden abilities. When he realized he could become invisible, Michael dreamed of using his power for the ultimate good: surveillance missions… gaining important intelligence… and infiltrating the girls’ locker room.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-style: italic;">Visibility</span> happens when light bounces off an object and gets caught in the camera of an animal’s eye, making a picture in the brain and immortalizing the object as “visible.” <span style="font-style: italic;">Invisibility</span> happens when light doesn’t bounce – when it passes through an object, frictionless. Clean glass. Clear air. Calm water. These things are “invisible” because light shines through them in a straight line, never bounced back to report the shapes and colors of where it’s been.<br />
<br />
Michael could turn invisible. He could allow light to pass straight through his body, keeping him a secret. But becoming invisible meant light passed through his body. All of it. It didn’t bounce off his shoulders, stomach, and feet, showing his size, shape, and location to everyone around him. But it also didn’t get caught in his eyes.<br />
<br />
Instead, when he was invisible, light passed through his lenses, ignored his retinas, and shot straight out the back of his head, never telling his brain anything about where it had been.<br />
<br />
Michael could turn invisible. But when he was invisible, he was also blind… which made the girl’s locker room much less interesting.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s1600/2032275917-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s200/2032275917-2.jpg" width="177" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><u>Susan</u></span></div>
</div>
<br />
When Susan won $500 in the lottery, she wasn’t even excited. Oscar could fly, and that was so much better.<br />
<br />
If she could fly, Susan knew she wouldn’t need the lottery. She wouldn’t have a car payment, or auto insurance, or rising gas prices to worry about. She could even earn extra money as one of those traffic reporters on the radio that tells everybody where all the wrecks are on the highway.<br />
<br />
Her stupid brother had the power to fly, and he never used it – not even if he woke up late and there wasn’t any coffee and rush-hour traffic was a mess. He said it was too slow. He said he could spit faster than he could fly.<br />
<br />
When they were kids, Oscar occasionally took off in the front yard to show off for his friends. But when his friends started crawling under him to untie his shoes and tickle his feet while he lifted off, Oscar had an important revelation. Unless a neighbor’s cat was stuck in a tree and they weren’t in a hurry to get it down, his power was neither very useful nor very impressive.<br />
<br />
What’s the point of flying, Oscar thought, if it’s not fast? <br />
<br />
As he got older, his opinion didn’t change. Once, when he got caught in traffic on the way to an emergency surgery, Oscar took his chances and took off. Four blocks later, he was passed by a butterfly.<br />
<br />
Now, unless the puddles were unbearably deep, Oscar usually walked. And Susan hated him for it.<br />
<br />
Oscar knew his sister was jealous of his ability, but he was thankful Susan couldn’t fly. His logic? There’s a reason animals in the wild walk on all fours, hiding their underparts. There’s a reason birds, who fly so unashamedly, don’t have external genitals. It’s the same reason women who only wear short skirts, women like his sister, shouldn’t have the power of flight:<br />
<br />
<i>Decency. </i><br />
<br />
Nobody wants to look up and see that, especially in slow motion.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s1600/2032275917-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s200/2032275917-2.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><u>Paul</u></span></div>
</div>
<br />
Like a Bible character he barely remembered, Paul got his strength form his hair. <br />
<br />
In 1967 he and his flower children friends – his botanical brothers and sisters – all grew their hair long in protest of a war they didn’t believe in. But as his friends grew shaggy, Paul grew strong. Very Strong.<br />
<br />
The first time his mother hinted that he needed a haircut, Paul already knew to be careful when he tied his sneakers before a protest. He was so strong that sometimes he got over-zealous and bruised his feet before the laces broke.<br />
<br />
When his bangs had to be parted to keep the hair out of his eyes, Paul was regularly entertaining his friends at sit-ins by bending gun barrels into balloon animals while singing “Give Peace a Chance.”<br />
<br />
By the time Paul’s muddy locks covered the tour dates on the backs of his tee-shirts, he spent every fourth Saturday holding his family’s El Camino in the air while his dad changed the oil. His dad wanted him to get a job that “took full advantage of his talent.” Unfortunately, when you’re a super-strong hippie pacifist, there isn't much work that fits your skill set.<br />
<br />
When the boys in Washington heard about his extraordinary strength, they "randomly" drew Paul’s draft number. Like it or not, they said, he was going to Vietnam.<br />
<br />
“Don’t you want to be a star soldier,” they asked. “Don’t you want to serve your country?”<br />
<br />
He didn’t.<br />
<br />
The first day of boot camp, the Army shaved Paul’s head and gave him a pair of green pants. His commanding officers wouldn’t listen when Paul told them not to cut his hair. They said it was “regulation.”<br />
<br />
Nine months later, Paul ran through the jungle with a new haircut, sweating under the weight of his backpack. Unable to keep up with his company, Paul never saw his home again.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s1600/2032275917-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s200/2032275917-2.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><u>Heather</u></span></div>
</div>
<br />
Heather spent her life as a quiet prisoner to her inside voice. <br />
<br />
Heather’s “inside voice” wasn’t anything like her “inner voice,” that whispering conscience that gives paranoid advice and warns people of impending doom. Heather’s “inside voice” was the contrast to her “outside voice,” a sound that froze everything that moves.<br />
<br />
Every time Heather shouted or screamed, her raised voice pressed a pause button that stopped time.<br />
<br />
Usually when a woman shouts, one of several things happen: 1) people run to her aid, 2) a child is sent to its room, or 3) everyone rolls their eyes and wonders why that horrible woman is being so mean to the poor waiter. These things happen because a shout is meant to be heard. A shout, by nature, elicits a response. <br />
<br />
Heather’s shout, however, was terribly counter-productive. People who heard it, strictly speaking, couldn’t respond to it. They were too busy being immobilized. Frozen. Instead of turning in alarm, people who heard Heather shout were temporarily petrified, stuck in an involuntary game of freeze tag. <br />
<br />
Because Heather had colic as a baby, her father was constantly late for work. Several times a week, he woke up early, sat down for breakfast, and was then turned to a statue while his carpool left without him.<br />
<br />
“Shit,” he thought. “If that kid doesn’t stop crying, I’m going to loose my job.”<br />
<br />
Heather was six months old when her unemployed parents sent her to live with a deaf couple.<br />
<br />
In the 8th grade, all the girls in Heather’s class were required to take woodshop with the boys. The school said it taught them to be well-rounded. One day Heather told the shop teacher that “the needless butchering of trees for poorly made book cases and bird houses violates my principals as a vegetarian.” <br />
<br />
Mr. Reinheart explained to Heather that she apparently misunderstood what “vegetarian” meant. When Heather yelled a defiant “BUT…,” all the drills stopped drilling, all the saws stopped sawing, and everyone in the woodshop froze. It was SO embarrassing.<br />
<br />
By the time she got to high school, Heather was already one of the prettiest girl in her class. When she tried out for the cheerleading squad, her gymnastic routine was great, but her cheers left the judges silent and still. She didn’t make the squad.<br />
<br />
The day Heather rode a roller coaster at Six Flags was an absolute disaster.<br />
<br />
Heather hated being quiet while her friends were being crazy. She hated using her “inside voice” when her inner bitch wanted out. Most afternoons, when she got home from school, Heather was so frustrated that she slammed the door and shouted as loud as she could. <br />
<br />
When her deaf foster parents saw the cat frozen with one leg in the air, wishing its bath hadn’t been so rudely interrupted, they signaled each other and spoke in their sign-language shorthand, “Heather must be home.”<br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s1600/2032275917-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2fTUGw86Lz4hbOcxTTXqnrReGztycotIjLfIaIhpPHoTkmKBBgYa9VtblfF9wBmka9cBXs8j5TL8a9-gJ-pjs4SVzlEAekJUglzrbLQL4BGXrM70iC0uFuQjgaHIXNtGh50alrpnAIX7x/s200/2032275917-2.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><u>Martin</u></span></div>
</div>
<br />
Martin sat in his favorite coffee shop, bemoaning his fate.<br />
<br />
He had been fired earlier that day after an unfortunate incident at school. Martin (or Mr. Smithson as he was known to his students), was walking down the hall just outside the girl’s bathroom, when a kid pushed past him in a rush to get to class. Martin stumbled and tried to catch himself, but with no luck. He fell through the wall and straight into the girl’s bathroom.<br />
<br />
Since he was a child, Martin had been able to pass through things. He could reach his hand through ceramic cookie jars and walk through solid walls. Unfortunately, none of his wardrobe shared his super-ability. Just because Martin could walk through walls didn’t mean his clothes could come with him. <br />
<br />
When Martin fell (literally) through the solid wall outside the girl’s bathroom, he landed on the other side unscathed, uninjured… and unclothed. Now, thanks to the several shrieking sophomores who had seen his “biology lesson,” he was also unemployed.<br />
<br />
The school board said Martin was a danger to the kids. They claimed he was a liability. They paid no attention to his defensive argument. "At least I'm not turning invisible and intentionally stalking through the locker rooms," he said. "This was just an honest mistake." Twenty minutes later, they fired him.<br />
<br />
Martin hated his super dis-ability.<br />
<br />
Superman. Wonder-Woman. The Green Lantern. They all did what came naturally and the world embraced them for it. <br />
<br />
“For the rest of us,” Martin thought, “life’s a little more complicated.”<br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The End.</span>
Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-29112755517873604982009-10-18T17:38:00.004-05:002013-07-30T13:19:39.981-05:00Orbit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3KI-rUfZlTs3NuME9Pq_aR0KFxwEooKw4LlObmgKDe0fx4BpR_a22lXaYg4hhi4PvuPPvF0Aujo8okPFUn1DzjeT71E_IaPx1UnlEmSHNTK4LNvmVJPutLX1HA7Rd_x7EselA_BcFQ3Qc/s1600/meteor_closer_crack2-1.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3KI-rUfZlTs3NuME9Pq_aR0KFxwEooKw4LlObmgKDe0fx4BpR_a22lXaYg4hhi4PvuPPvF0Aujo8okPFUn1DzjeT71E_IaPx1UnlEmSHNTK4LNvmVJPutLX1HA7Rd_x7EselA_BcFQ3Qc/s320/meteor_closer_crack2-1.gif" /></a></div>
The Earth took his training wheels off only a few billion years ago. Before then, he obediently followed the other planets through their frenzied orbits, barely keeping out from under their feet. He wasn't the typical middle child, quiet and demure. The Earth was curious and inquisitive, constantly asking questions like:<br />
<br />
<i>Why do I have to wear sunscreen? <br />
What if I don't want to eat my vegetables?</i> <br />
and<br />
<i>Are we there yet?</i> <br />
<br />
Despite the endless questions, the other planets liked the Earth. He was innocent, green, and good-natured. He never even made fun of Uranus... which was hard not to do. There were a few years during puberty, when his face erupted in a volcanic mess, that the Earth was a little moody, but that was all behind him now. <br />
<br />
The Earth was settling - reluctantly - into middle-age. He was none too happy that his formerly tight pangaea was giving way to urban expansion. His rainforests were receding. His doctor was even nagging that his rising sea levels "might be cause for concern." <br />
<br />
In other words, the Earth wasn’t happy. <br />
<br />
He worried that his life was moving in circles, never really getting anywhere. Parts of him felt like the days went on forever and the night would never end. He enjoyed his yearly commute around the sun, but how many times could he smile and make small talk with Venus as they passed? Sure, she was attractive. Saturn was dying to get his rings around her. Even Pluto, a shy planet with an obvious identity crisis, wanted to talk to her. But for all her charms, Venus wasn’t much of a conversationalist. The Earth needed more. <br />
<br />
He wanted adventure.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
One day, shortly after putting the finishing touches on an amazing sunset, the Earth heard some unsettling news. An asteroid was coming. The Earth wasn’t eavesdropping, of course, but it’s hard to ignore a few billion voices whispering in your ear. As soon as the asteroid was sighted, television reporters across the world began talking about "the catastrophic event," "our pending extinction," and "the violent end of life as we know it." <br />
<br />
And the Earth was listening. <br />
<br />
News of the asteroid’s approach rocked the Earth to his core. The dinosaurs hadn't done a very good job of warning him about the last asteroid, a surprise from the black that hit him like a cosmic car accident. One day he just turned around, saw the asteroid swerve into his orbit, and thought, "shit, this is going to hurt." And it did. Bad. <br />
<br />
"Whoever's out there throwing rocks needs to stop," he thought. "I'm too old for this." <br />
<br />
Unfortunately, the asteroid that was on its way wasn't just a medium-sized rock meandering through the universe. It was bigger. Much bigger. A rock several times the size of Earth, the asteroid was technically a small planet that had broken free from its own solar system and achieved geologic independence. Apparently, when planets stop orbiting a single sun and start freelancing through the universe, they earn the slightly more sinister title of “asteroid.” Unencumbered by the obligations of orbit, the “asteroid” went wherever it wanted, aggressively barging its way through an otherwise orderly universe. <br />
<br />
The asteroid was sighted on a Tuesday. Within a few weeks, it would become visible as a small speck in the Milky Way. The speck would grow as the asteroid approached, slowing filling the night sky. First the North Star would disappear. Then the Big Dipper would loose its handle. Within a few months, Orion, Scorpio, and all their twinkling friends would be hidden from view, eclipsed by the asteroid’s huge girth. <br />
<br />
Several weeks before the Earth and the asteroid met, its gravity would pull the Earth’s oceans from their beds, gathering them together until they looked like a giant raindrop falling up into the sky. <br />
<br />
Then, at the moment of impact, the Earth would shatter like a snowball, barely feeling a thing.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
“It’s just obnoxious the way these asteroids think of no one but themselves,” the Earth ranted. “They go wherever they want and do whatever they want with no thought of who they’re inconveniencing or what they’re destroying. It’s not as if the stupid asteroid doesn’t know where I’m going to be 253 days, 3 hours, and 14 minutes from now.” <br />
<br />
The Earth had a good point. His schedule was as regular as clockwork. In fact, his schedule was the basis for clockwork. Everyone always knew where the Earth was going to be several years before he got there. That’s the beauty – and monotony – of orbit. It leaves little room for variation. <br />
<br />
If the asteroid knew where he was going to be and when he was going to be there, then why, the Earth wondered, did it insist on running into him? <br />
<br />
The answer, of course, was that the asteroid was terribly inflexible. Concepts like “yield,” “stop,” and “turn” implied compromises that the asteroid, who was both terribly selfish and very hard headed, saw as signs of weakness. <br />
<br />
In 253 days, 3 hours, and 14 minutes, the Earth and the asteroid would meet somewhere on the other side of the sun. The Earth couldn’t decide which he hated more – the anticipation of conflict, or conflict itself.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
The Earth wondered how the people would deal with the approaching asteroid. He suspected they would recycle one of their Hollywood clichés and shoot a missile at it. The people, of course, had the same idea. <br />
<br />
Within hours of the asteroid’s discovery, a swarm of satellites started buzzing. China talked to England. Mexico and Canada joined in a conference call with Australia. NASA turned its telescopes to the heavens and told everyone the end was near unless they acted fast. <br />
<br />
The people acted fast. Their leaders pressed buttons and unlocked doors, uncovering weapons hidden long ago like eggs in the Easter grass. <br />
<br />
“If we can split an atom,” the people thought, “surely we can split an asteroid.” <br />
<br />
But given the choice between fight and flight, the Earth wasn't sure picking a fight with the asteroid was the best idea. "Flight," he thought, "might be a better option." <br />
<br />
Afraid for his own future, the Earth began to formulate a plan. <br />
<br />
"If I start running now," he thought, "I can just get out of the stupid asteroid’s way. I can be halfway across the solar system by the time it arrives. If I’m 186 million miles ahead of schedule, I won’t even have to brush shoulders with it when it passes!” <br />
<br />
The Earth knew that speeding up would require everyone – including himself – to adapt to a new schedule. The change would be hard for the people. Traditionally, even slow changes that obviously needed to happen (like evolution and equality) had been difficult for them. But what choice did he have? Change was coming whether he (or they) liked it or not. He simply couldn’t continue on his current course and expect to survive. <br />
<br />
And so, before the people could launch their missiles at the sky, the Earth took a deep breath and started speeding up. Faster and faster he ran. The faster he ran, the faster the days flew by, passing with quickening speed until a single week was little more than a blur of sunrises and sunsets. <br />
<br />
He sped straight through summer and practically skipped fall. The long trip that usually took a lazy year to finish was done in a matter of weeks. Birds, confused by the strobing sunsets, flew south for the winter only to find their homes under several feet of snow. Children were equally surprised when spring break started three days before Christmas. <br />
<br />
The children loved the new schedule. They had hardly finished one birthday before the next one began. Girls celebrated their sweet sixteen with Barbie Doll cakes and Dora the Explorer parties. Boys were old enough to buy beer before their voices changed.<br />
<br />
Anxiety levels also rose among college students who complained they didn’t have enough time to study for exams. Pulling an all-nighter was practically pointless. The sun came up before they could finish a second cup of coffee. And when fraternity boys partied all night on Friday with plans of sleeping late on Saturday, it was sometimes Monday morning before they woke up and wondered where the weekend had gone – which wasn’t very different from the way things had always been. <br />
<br />
Even Santa’s elves were disgruntled. Unable to keep up with their new production schedule, the doll division threatened to strike. <br />
<br />
The future was simply coming before the people were prepared for it. Before the Earth began his sprint toward safety, both the quick and the careful could order their lives because they knew what words like “next week,” “next month,” and “next year” meant. Like “one pound” and “four meters,” the meanings of “one minute” and “four days” were constant. This predictability not only sold thousands of calendars at Christmas, it also gave the people an illusion of control. <br />
<br />
But now “tomorrow” was like a menstrual cycle -- reliable, but unpredictable. The people always knew it was coming, but they didn’t know exactly when it would get there or how long it would stay. <br />
<br />
Across the globe, petitions were signed asking the Earth to slow down. Concerned citizens gathered at community centers and organized anti-Earth demonstrations. Unlike the great protests of the past, however, the people marched without knowing where to go. Since City Hall couldn’t solve their problem, the people wandered aimlessly, hoping the Earth would hear them yell. <br />
<br />
At a march in Oregon, an environmentalist who had once fought to save the rainforests led a group in chanting “stop the world, I wanna get off!” At a rally in Atlanta, a construction worker carried a shovel, but never followed through with his threats to dig a hole. <br />
<br />
It didn’t take long, however, before the people realized that there wasn’t anything anybody could do to make the Earth slow down. <br />
<br />
Activists couldn’t boycott anyone. <br />
Armies couldn’t attack anyone. <br />
Police couldn’t arrest anyone. <br />
Lawyers couldn’t sue anyone. <br />
Men couldn’t threaten anyone. <br />
Women couldn’t manipulate anyone. <br />
<br />
The AARP, whose membership had recently doubled, printed an informative pamphlet, but nobody had time to read it. <br />
<br />
The Earth knew the people were frustrated, confused, and afraid… but it felt so good to finally control his own future.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
The Earth felt it first in his North America. Then it spread to his Europe and across his Asia. This wasn’t one of those headaches he got from too much pressure along his tectonic plates. This headache was the direct result of 6 billion feet marching across his surface in angry unison. If they didn’t stop stomping soon, he would be forced to knock the people off balance. The Earth hadn’t been this upset since the invention of high-heeled shoes. <br />
<br />
During what he considered the puberty of their race (generally referred to as “modernity”), the Earth felt the people had become disturbingly self-centered. Maybe he had a heart of stone, but the Earth was tired of being taken for granted. He was tired of letting ungrateful people walk all over him. <br />
<br />
Wasn’t he always patient during their Thanksgiving Day Parade? Didn’t he suffer quietly through their New York City Marathon? He even allowed their military to practice their ridiculous advances and retreats at all hours of the day and night. His patience, however, was growing as thin as his ozone. The endless protest marches had to stop. They were not only irritating, they were insulting. <br />
<br />
The Earth wasn’t deaf. He knew what the people were saying about him. He was listening when Greenpeace voted to take his name off their website. He noticed when Earth Day was cancelled and replaced with a symbolically violent tether-ball tournament. He tried to ignore preachers when they filled their Sunday Sermons with stories comparing him to somebody named “The Prodigal Son,” but he couldn’t. From pulpits across the globe they shouted that he was like an arrogant child who ran away from his father and leapt carelessly into the future. They said he “neglected his responsibility” and “denied his true calling.” They condemned him for “choosing a path other than the one assigned to him” and urged him to return to “the natural state of things.” They didn’t think the Earth realized how serious things had become. <br />
<br />
The Earth was offended that the same people who invented oil-powered engines and artificial sweeteners dared to lecture him about “respecting creation” and “acting according to the laws of nature.” <br />
<br />
Why, the Earth wondered, didn’t the people understand that he hadn’t broken away from his pre-determined path? He was still following the same circle around the same sun… he was simply doing it differently than he had before. And even if he had rushed into the future, he hadn’t done so carelessly. He had done so from necessity. <br />
<br />
Self preservation and selfishness are two entirely different things.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
Right in the middle of the evening news, the people looked up and saw it. <br />
<br />
Fist the North Star Disappeared. <br />
<br />
Then the Big Dipper lost its handle. <br />
<br />
When a shadow fell across the sun, the people began to panic. <br />
<br />
Some of them ran deep into underground cellars. Others herded themselves into churches to pray. Just as a few important people prepared to push important buttons and send missiles streaking into space (with little or no effect on the outrageous rock), a physicist scribbled something on her chalkboard. Out of the lines and numbers rose a wisp of chalky hope. <br />
<br />
“But how is that possible,” the important people asked. “We already calculated that if the Earth is orbiting the sun at 29.77 km/s and the asteroid is traveling in a straight line at 56.2 km/s, then we should collide with it… 7 months ago?” <br />
<br />
The director of the CIA stormed into the room, brushing the first flakes of a light summer snow off his jacket. <br />
<br />
“So, you’re saying what?” <br />
<br />
“The asteroid,” the physicist said, “is apparently going to miss the Earth by 186 million miles.” <br />
<br />
“Well,” he stammered. “I’ll be damned.”<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s1600/seperator-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNyYRSMBEwuBQAMl3IGJ01YplfJNLuwcB73F6t7CQ7J1Y8isHstRUZo13NfVlUMxO5pKLpwjQgZW4LZxY7zLoaRul8hDqTA8GSrTFlihrTZ97Ih4E8gZRmE1o57Yb2D38AJHSwq7DTTxPG/s200/seperator-2.png" /></a></div>
Before the asteroid arrived, the Earth’s path was familiar and frictionless. Every day he moved through space carried by his own momentum, hardly working to spin through the seasons. In the vacuum, there was little need for effort or exertion. Nothing worked against him. Trusting his instincts and inertia, the Earth took for granted that he would always coast easily through life.
But now, everything was different. As the asteroid came closer, the Earth felt his forward motion interrupted by a sideways force. For the first time since he settled into the routine of orbit, The Earth felt resistance… friction… gravity pulling him in a direction other than the one he had always known. <br />
<br />
At first the asteroid’s gravitational pull was as indefinable as emotion – little more than an idea tugging at his corners. Like happiness, fear, and excitement, it could be felt more than it could be explained. <br />
<br />
As the asteroid came closer, however, its gravity grew into something more concrete. The Earth’s oceans noticed it first. Suddenly disinterested with the moon, they found themselves attracted to the asteroid, drawn to its rugged strength. Like crazed fans, they crowded the beaches and fought for the best view of its approach. <br />
<br />
Like a ball fighting to roll uphill, the Earth strained against the asteroid’s gravitational pull. But when he tried to move forward, the asteroid’s gravity tugged him back. It didn’t matter how tightly he tried to hold to his orbit. The Earth was a movable object fighting an unstoppable force. <br />
<br />
The Earth didn’t know what to do. He had already done everything he could to control his future, and was worn out with the effort. He couldn’t run any more. <br />
<br />
Finally, after weeks (or was it months? or years?) of straining against the asteroid’s gravity, the Earth finally accepted what he could not change. He stopped fighting the invisible truth. Exhausted, he stopped running. For the first time since the asteroid was sighted, the Earth relaxed and let nature take its course. <br />
<br />
And as the asteroid passed – only 186 million miles away – its gravity wrapped around the Earth’s middle, slowly pulling him away from the sun and into the deep, dark unknown. The predictable curve of the Earth’s orbit was straightened into an infinite line. Like a puppy led on an invisible leash, the Earth left his home and followed the asteroid into in the unknown of space. <br />
<br />
When the asteroid was first sighted, the Earth tried to save himself. He chose to run – to avoid the asteroid rather than let it collide with him – and his plan worked. He hadn’t been destroyed by an impact. But despite his effort (or perhaps because of it), his path had been forever changed. Now, as the Earth followed the asteroid past stars he had never seen, he wondered which was better, change or annihilation? He didn’t yet know. <br />
<br />
He noticed, however, that the people weren’t saying anything about what happened. They weren’t admiring the view or complaining about the cold. They were all strangely quiet. <br />
<br />
The Earth thought he might like them better that way.
Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-5758022228899344782009-10-18T17:37:00.003-05:002013-08-01T15:00:11.304-05:00The Extra Credit Kid<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJ4YQqGlRPmDsh37abZSnmkenBnWjPY0skbNG1lhRrMt-lDwPF598D9m8-3jpCIF55fq20Pblv2XGnKi_PeED9-k1DC4-_TMZ1meCmeEY8oPmr2AOCCF61Q4BUrzm0nvXOgMJoLREjh4JT/s1600/a__b_-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJ4YQqGlRPmDsh37abZSnmkenBnWjPY0skbNG1lhRrMt-lDwPF598D9m8-3jpCIF55fq20Pblv2XGnKi_PeED9-k1DC4-_TMZ1meCmeEY8oPmr2AOCCF61Q4BUrzm0nvXOgMJoLREjh4JT/s320/a__b_-2.jpg" /></a></div>
When the boy was ten, his 5th grade teacher used the hour after lunch to teach her class the beautiful language of the deaf. Even though everyone in the class could hear – even though they all listened to their radios at home and turned their TVs louder than their mothers would have liked – this particular over-achieving educator wanted her class to know sign language. She wanted to teach their still innocent hands how to do something constructive. She wanted them to learn gestures that would communicate without offending the elderly.<br />
<br />
The children loved their sign language lessons. Once, during a silent game of Ring Around the Rosie, they even got so rowdy that the teacher had to remind them to use their inside hands. <br />
<br />
After the first week of learning to speak with silent words, the boy told his teacher that his mother was deaf. He said that everyone in his family knew how to use sign language. He had been doing it for years. Sometimes, before bed, he even used his hands to read out loud to his mother. <br />
<br />
"But not the Bible," he said. "All the whosoevers and wherefores make my knuckles crack." <br />
<br />
The teacher was amazed. Like an exotic exchange student from a quiet and faraway land, the boy was a native who already knew the language. He was a natural tutor. In a moment of instructive genius, the teacher offered bonus points to any child who spent time with the boy whose hands could talk. <br />
<br />
He was the extra credit kid. <br />
<br />
Within hours of the teacher’s edict, the extra credit kid became the most popular kid in class. His lunch table was always full. His seat was always saved. He never spent recess jumping rope by himself. He was extra credit. <br />
<br />
Every afternoon The Extra Credit Kid leapt off a bus full of new friends, eager to tell his mother how popular he was at school. With exhausted fingers, he bragged about how everyone wanted to spend time with him because he was good at something. Because he knew something. Because he could do something no one else could. <br />
<br />
Because he was extra credit. <br />
<br />
The teacher asked The Extra Credit Kid to keep a journal of the time he spent with friends from their class. She wanted to be fair when she assigned extra points. The Extra Credit Kid soon noticed that he was invited to lots of birthday parties and sleepovers, but only on nights before the teacher tallied progress reports or just after difficult math tests. He played lots of video games with the lazy kids, but was never spoken to by the smart ones who had stars next to their names on the bulletin board. <br />
<br />
In March, everyone celebrated The Extra Credit Kid's birthday by singing Happy Birthday with their hands. <br />
<br />
In April, his class took a special trip to a school where the children couldn't hear. The Extra Credit Kid ate lunch at a table full of deaf kids and told a joke so well that a boy almost choked on his peas. Everyone from The Extra Credit Kid's class turned around to look. The rest of the cafeteria hadn't heard a thing. <br />
<br />
In May, everyone waved goodbye to each other and promised they'd play together at the swimming pool. <br />
<br />
In June, when school was over, the Extra Credit Kid's new friends stopped returning his calls. His hands, once limber from telling jokes and stories, grew lazy and fat. Summer vacation wasn't nearly as much fun as the school year had been. <br />
<br />
The sixth grade was even more disappointing than the summer. His new teacher, Mrs. Espinoza, had severe arthritis and wasn't interested in sign language. She wanted to teach the children Spanish. The Extra Credit Kid had never been to Spain. For a month he spent the hour after lunch memorizing conjugations with his hands folded politely in his lap. <br />
<br />
It was hard crossing from extra back to ordinary. It always is. <br />
<br />
During the seventh grade The Extra Credit Kid learned to play the trombone. <br />
<br />
In high school his hands were often busy, but with a new form of “sign language” that involved him talking mostly with himself. <br />
<br />
The Extra Credit Kid eventually went to college and found a job and became a man. <br />
<br />
After a while, the man almost forgot that he had ever been extra credit. <br />
<br />
But then, when his mom visited, they would sit together and tell stories with their hands. And laugh. And he would remember. <br />
<br />Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-37293607642422002752009-10-09T09:13:00.003-05:002009-12-18T09:53:33.918-06:00Red Light?New York is a pedestrian city. New Yorkers don’t walk for recreation or because we can’t find a closer parking place. In New York, the closest parking place is New Jersey. In New York we walk because it’s too expensive to hire a $20 taxi every time we leave the house. Poor and unwilling to remain confined to our apartments, we walk everywhere, littering the sidewalks with our smaller carbon footprints.<br /> <br />When we walk, we watch the traffic signals. New Yorkers know that when the green light turns yellow, the stream of cars blocking our path will slow to a stop and we can get an early start across the street. Unlike their suburban cousins, New York drivers are trained to never speed through a changing signal. In New York, running a red light means running over twelve people.<br /><br />Last weekend, Jeremy and I were part of a crowd of NYU students and out of work actors crossing 18th street before we should. Several seconds before the red hand gave way to a walking man, a little girl on the opposite sidewalk stepped away from her father and into the street, following a herd of bad examples.<br /><br />I saw the little blonde girl step off the curb, disobeying the red flashing hand that told her not to. Her father saw it, too. He shouted for her to stop, but in the chaos of the crosswalk it was hard to tell if he yelled more from fear for his daughter’s safety or hate for what his insurance company would do if she got hit by a car.<br /><br />The little girl heard his shout and quickly stepped backward onto the sidewalk, safe and repentant. <br /><br />When he knelt in front of the little girl and put his hands on her shoulders, the middle-aged man was still a father – angry, frightened, and flawed. But when he opened his mouth to scold his daughter, he was also something more – part prophet, part poet, part messiah. If the little girl remembers his advice, it will help her survive more than just the city.<br /><br />“What have I always told you,” he said, sternly. “Don’t follow the people. Follow the signs.”<br /><br />I listened too, and was thankful for the reminder.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-39142830908598543882009-10-01T09:56:00.007-05:002010-03-26T09:21:09.911-05:00SNAP!Mice haven’t invaded my apartment, but they’re beginning to send spies. Every few days one scurries across my kitchen floor and hides under the stove. One by one they enter… but they never return home.<br /><br />When the first mouse was spotted, my roommate shrieked, “it’s not even cold outside yet! I’m not emotionally ready for this!”<br /><br />Is anyone ever emotionally ready for mice to invade their apartment? Isn’t the hallmark of a good invasion that it starts as a surprise? Would the Nazis have succeeded in occupying Eastern Europe if Hitler had RSVP’d with Poland for a September attack? Probably not. That’s why it’s important to end an invasion before it begins.<br /><br />And so, with Old Testament vigilance, I’m catching the mouse spies one by one and killing them.<br /><br />(Technically, <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">and</span></span> is the incorrect conjunction in the preceding sentence. The story shouldn’t read “I’m catching the spies <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">and</span></span> killing them.” It should read “I’m catching the spies <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">by</span></span> killing them.”)<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">SNAP!</span> is my new favorite sound.<br /><br />While I happily accept the role of grand executioner, serial killer, and/or instrument of rodent death for our apartment, Casey (my roommate) is a pacifist. She’s not offended by death, but she doesn’t think it should be forced on anyone (or anything). She wants the mice exterminated, but she doesn’t want to hear stories about it. Like the problem in Darfur, she’s aware of the killing, but thinking about it makes her sad.<br /><br />Casey and I briefly discussed buying catch-and-release traps, but agreed that the theory behind catching and releasing is only effective if there’s an element of rehabilitation involved. Otherwise, your kindness is mistaken as hospitality. After the “release,” you’re practically guaranteed the mouse will bring its rodent friends back to your apartment to meet the nice people who keep filling the wire box under the sink with cheese and snacks.<br /><br />The instructions for these pest-control placebos should read like the back of a shampoo bottle: “catch and release… and repeat.” Unless you have an infestation of golden retrievers, why bother?<br /><br />It might be true that ever time a mouse dies, PETA cries… but in my opinion, the best way to catch a mouse is to kill a mouse.<br /><br />***<br /><br />Belly-up is always a posture of death. When you see a mouse trap flipped on its back, you know your resident rodent has finally joined Puckers – the goldfish you forgot to feed – on the other side of eternity.<br /><br />This morning I looked behind the kitchen trash can to check a trap. It was sprung, tossed at a wild angle by the force of its snapping spring. The bait, a walnut tied to the trap with a piece of string, was completely intact and uneaten. <br /><br />Beside the trap laid a dead mouse.<br />It wasn’t injured.<br />It wasn’t broken.<br />It wasn’t bloody.<br />But it was dead… <span style="font-weight:bold;"><span style="font-style:italic;">next to</span></span> the trap. <br /><br />The mouse was resting three inches from the overturned trap, just far enough to blur the line between cause and effect. It was like finding a dead man across the street from a car accident.<br /><br />Mysteriously, they both lay there, coldly divorced from each other, their bodies not even touching. <br /><br />As far as mysteries go, “the case of the mouse who died, but wasn't caught” isn’t a very good one. I’m smart enough to know that cholesterol isn’t the only thing that causes heart attacks. When, on a calm autumn afternoon, your tiny mouse heart is already beating at over 9 times per second, <span style="font-style:italic;">SNAP!</span> probably isn’t your favorite sound.<br /><br />Animal rights activists can say what they want, but this confirms what I’ve always known. I’m not a killer… I’m a heart-breaker.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-50078353542867639652009-09-10T22:19:00.006-05:002009-12-18T09:52:53.660-06:00The Soda ManThere’s an elderly – and slightly crazy – man who walks past my apartment almost every day. If it’s warm and the windows are open, he stands on his tiptoes, peeks through the screen, and asks, “Do you want a soda?”<br /><br />Usually, I don’t… which is convenient since the Soda Man never has any soda with him. <br /><br />Yesterday I was sitting at the table next to my windows eating dinner when the Soda Man stopped to talk. “Where are you from,” he asked. “Peru?”<br /><br />For the record, I look as much like a Peruvian as I look like a puppy. This should explain the slight up-turn in my voice when I said, “…no?”<br /><br />“India?”<br /><br />Again, I’m one of those Caucasian hybrids who doesn’t look like he’s from anywhere, the human equivalent of a maple tree. I’m too ordinary to be from anywhere exotic. <br /><br />“…no?”<br /><br />“Scotland?”<br /><br />Closer, but still a confused “no.” Letting the Soda Man off the hook, I told him, “I’m from the south.”<br /><br />“Oh,” he exclaimed. “That explains it! I thought you sounded patriotic!”<br /><br />The only remotely patriotic things I’ve done in the past two years are vote, watch fireworks, and sleep late on Memorial Day. I don’t even turn toward Washington, D.C. when I pray. Maybe I'll feel prouder of my country when my country's government starts acting prouder of its people, treating them all is if they're created equally. Even then, however, I'm not sure I'll want to be identified as a "southern patriot."<br /><br />I won't waste valuable space on the internet retelling the part of the conversation where the Soda Man asked what I do for a living, but you should know that our talk ended with the question, “Did you write part of the Bible?” <br /><br />For the record, I didn’t.<br /><br />When you live in a street-level apartment in Brooklyn and your windows have no curtains, you live in a fishbowl of crazy.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-87167835817703589432009-06-20T12:07:00.008-05:002009-12-18T09:52:41.188-06:00Memories<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://fluv.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/pacman.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 2px 2px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height:177px;" src="http://fluv.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/pacman.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Pac-Man was about a hungry circle that lived in a haunted square.<br /><br />Pong was about two lines negotiating the joint-custody of their dot.<br /><br />Frogger was about drivers ignoring the world's most polluted river.<br /><br />But I can't remember who started WWI.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5828093486378870513.post-91796525233832899982009-06-05T23:20:00.003-05:002009-12-18T14:40:29.313-06:00Hi(gh)Several times a week, a generous pot-head (or glaucoma patient) gives the homeless woman who lives in my subway station a free joint. She then sits on her bench, burning it down, filling the cave with sticky sweet smoke.<br /><br />I wonder if the pot-head thinks he's funny, giving a homeless woman an unbearable case of munchies she can't afford to cure.Sometimes Roads Divergehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02570774547324008213noreply@blogger.com0