Tagged: short stories

No, I Don’t Think You Do—smh

“We’ve been reading that Huck Finn book you used for school.” The student would have known by “we” the man meant, “your mom and I”. “It has some highlighting in it. Would you say that it is a previous student’s or yours?”

The driving age step-son answered, “Probably mine.”

“Oh,” said the step-dad, who for 8 years has tried to impress upon the lad the penultimate nature of truthfulness. “I was going to say, ‘If you had said it was some other kid’s annotations, that it seemed like a kid just marked up things because he had to, without actually meaning to mark where he highlighted.’”

There was a slight pause, not long enough to indicate shame, then a ready confession , “That was the first book I read at [excellent charter school]. So I probably highlighted at random because I didn’t understand what annotating meant.”

“Ah. Okay.”

Silence ensued for the next few hundred yards of road.

The man began again, “Would you say that you understand what annotating means now?”

“Yeah. I mean, sometimes, I still probably make extra marks because my hand is there with the highlighter and all,” the boy rambled, still not betraying he understood the nature of the path he had set off on. “And anyhow, they don’t really check highlighting anymore. Now they look at the notes in the margin.”

The family finally arrived on the home stretch.

The dad resumed, “So what I am trying to understand is why you would try to fool them instead of ask for help. Like highlighting at random is some kind of deception, versus just asking for additional explanation.”

“Then my homework scores wouldn’t have been good,” the teenager countered. Against all odds and historical evidence, he delivered his next claim with moral superiority, approaching outrage. “You want me to get bad grades?!”

I looked at A-, I mean, the man looked at the student in the eyes. The student pulled his backpack from the trunk without breaking eye-contact, in some sort of primal posturing ritual, taught by who knows who.

The man, from a the street corner just beside hopelessness, concluded, “Yes. I would rather you always tell the truth and fail.”

“Friday was good. Saturday was good.” – A Short Story.

Whatever similarity the following short story has to a real conversation last night, a conversation between a husband and wife, I assure the reader that the account is one sided and therefore pure fiction—at least according to all the women.

Our south facing bedroom was dark and remained so despite the sounds of a few belated fireworks which our extraordinarily wealthy and patriotic neighbors to the north were letting fly. I had just plugged my phone in and put it in its final resting place on the nightstand. I remained on my side, facing out, my back to my wife. I had a good amount of covers to work with and couldn’t help but release a final chuckle-turned-outright-laugh at The Office blooper short we had just watched.

Friday was good. Saturday was good. Today had been alright.

There was a pleasant mood for those two days as my wife, bless her heart, had not had a chance in hell to work and so was herself at ease and agreeable for once. She seemed to have truly come to peace with the fact that the great serpent of old, the one with the red, scaly appearance and bifurcated tongue, seemed to genuinely not be her husband. Can you understand what I am trying to say, reader? Married life felt kind of normal.

I decided to test the waters and say something true. I knew it was a risk, but I was feeling risky.

“J- seems to actually need a few days to warm up to me every week that I am home. It’s like he becomes softer as the days go by,” I said. Truth be told, halfway through my brief report, I started to wonder if she was even awake anymore.

“I don’t understand, Baliye,” she replied.

I suppose I ought to clarify here that Baliye is her heathen tongue’s ‘my husband’.

“I’m saying,” I started again, “that I can feel that J-, while happy to see me when I first come back home from my week away, seems to take a few days before he fully relaxes and becomes himself. It’s hard to pick exact behavior differences, but I feel it,” I continued. I didn’t share the one instance that was on my mind, the at church earlier when I had pulled him back from the center aisle into the pew. I sat him next to me again and looked down at him, placing my stern, glaring but sparkly-eyed face right over his. He looked up at me and purposely bonked his nose into mine. He does that sometimes. But not on day one, two, or three. Anyhow, I continued, “And the other week, when I was making a trip to load the car before leaving, he actually burst out crying, saying he thought he told me that he wanted a hug before I left.”

I paused for a few seconds. And then picked it up again, “It’s hard to believe he will actually be home for one more whole year before he goes off to kindergarten.”

I had done it. Or I had thought I had done it. I have long held the belief, informed by who knows what, that women, even depressed, selfish, greedy, complaining wives, want to hear what their husbands really think and notice about the family. Like I thought there was a universal truth: every wife, at any moment loves to hear her husband express something that sounds vulnerable and comes across as intimate.

I was proud. Dare I say I thought I deserved a reward? No, I dare not. I honestly just felt like giving. Like I said, Friday was good and Saturday was good.

She then says, “There is a school nearby, R-, I think-”

-there is no force as yet studied by students of natural science that can cause boiling faster than the words I was hearing-

“-which has a preschool, like three days a week.”

(Here the copy of this fictional tale which I found seems to be missing a paragraph of caps-lock ferociousness.)

She responds, “You said what you think. But I can’t say what I think?”

I think is she genuinely unaware of how conversations work? “No, mee-stee-yay, no. You don’t get to say what you think. Not when the person who spoke before you just expressed how happy they were at a set of circumstances and your thought is a brainstorm of how to destroy those circumstances.” (Mistiye is the heathen ‘my wife’.)

Friday was good. Saturday was good.

On Noble Pleasure

Anyone else, for whatever reason—be it environmental considerations or energy (mine is energy)—refuse to turn on hot water to wash their hands? And given this state of play, then, every so once in a while, wash them right after someone who isn’t so aware, and, for the briefest of moments, feel just regal as the still-warm water hits? For my part, I imagine the pleasure is exactly comparable to what it must have felt like to sneak a dessert made with the richest, purest, and freshest ingredients right off the King’s china after he had departed—and before the other (reckless and shifty as they were) servants entered—the hall.

Did the “God and Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ” Tell Me to Calm Down After My Car Broke Down on the Side of the Road?

As an EMS Helicoper Pilot, I absolutely refuse to sit in a car parked on the side of a highway. State Highway or otherwise, no way. Emergency blinkers on or not, you couldn’t pay me to sit inside the parked car and await my fate.

So I walked away from the car through some desert grass to a flat spot which, coming back in the morning, proved to be the access road to the parallel running railroad just a little farther away.

My main thought was, “Why would this happen? Have I been too unhinged in my thought life recently as my wife made terrible decisions about contagious kids? Maybe. But, no. I don’t really believe in such cause and effect. So why? Why can’t I just get home?”

Friends came to my immediate rescue, but not before one “Maryland Man”-type character pulled to a stop to see if I needed help. The passenger’s inability to look anywhere but forward was silly and unnerving. But, on the whole, the driver slowly developed a demeanor of, “I have more to lose than this gringo off duty cop,” and so he was happy for me to thank him and send him on his way.

Another vehicle, this time a sedan, came to a stop alongside my parked car—on an active lane of highway—and expected to see someone in the seat. Upon discovering my car was empty, or perhaps seeing the traffic behind him wasn’t necessarily going to stop, he pulled forward, and then got out and approached the car. I yelled from the side road area and he got back in his car. Unlike the MS-13 wannabe who definitely would have taken advantage of someone, this guy seemed “merely high” and in need of a loving act to square him with god.

As my pal finally approached, I still felt terror that some drunk was gonna take us all out as I quickly moved gear from my car to my rescuers.

Fast forward to this morning.

I was now, while standing a ways off the road again, on the phone discovering that the insurance-directed tow company had no idea I exist. The wind was blowing much colder than anticipated. The sun, while near constant in its role, was behind clouds. And I still had only one thing on my mind. “I will never sit in a car parked off the road on a highway. No, sir. Not me. I’m not going out like that. I’d rather freeze.”

Another rando pulls off (smartly) onto a driveway-esque point where the road would allow easy crossing of the railroad. I think, “Yup, I should’ve pulled off there too.” I walk over and say, “Thank you, but I already have help on the way.”

A 60ish year old local woman rolls down her window and replies, “What? Okay. I thought you were Jeremy.”

What a world we live in. I thought for a minute about whether Jeremy has my body type and Carhartt hoodie jacket, or my car. Or maybe both? That would be weird.

Finally, my wife, in a move totally unexpected for a million reasons, most especially the fact that I told her to go all the way to the next light just a few miles down for the required U-Turn, caught my attention by rushing to a stop and swinging the U-Turn at some random access point in the median which I honestly had not even noticed until just then.

Here’s where things get spiritual.

As this maneuver is being completed, I noticed two snow-plow-type city trucks slowly coming toward us. They were driving on the shoulder, spraying whatever they were spraying on the side of the road.

With me, faithful reader?

I tell my wife, “Please move to in front of my car so that you don’t get hit. I need to grab stuff from my car and I don’t want you guys (J- is in the car too) to get hit while waiting and trying to help me.

She did.

Slowly the trucks approached, turned their spigots down to a trickle, and gave way to pass by before resuming.

Another minute of moving gear—unprotected by those two trucks—and we were off. Success.

I am not one to find God, especially the actual, factual Biblical Father/Son/Holy Spirit, in every waking and coincidental moment.

But, right or wrong, when I saw those “blockers” slow rolling up to my family and I, and at the precise time that we were all there, I felt like maybe He was telling me, “Dude—too tight. You’re holding on too tight. It’s not your day.”

Just Feel Like Doting On My Son and His Father

He’s down in the family room, riding a wooden rocking horse around the room. In his hand is a stuffed “stick” which is part of a marshmallow roasting stuffed toy. He doesn’t think it’s a stick, though. It is a rifle.

Oh. And don’t forget the Christmas tree and other seasonal decorations. And a giant grizzly bear, lovingly known as “Papa Bear”. And a toy helicopter that over 2 ft long!

Want to know how you too can reproduce this scene in 2025? It’s easy: no tv!

Happy Thanksgiving! And Merry Christmas!

On Being a “One Mistake” Man

It just occurred to me that I am a “one mistake” man. The way this came to mind just now was while driving. Picture me in the classic post-stoplight intersection need to merge right (to get to Freddy’s) and there are cars zipping into the new right lane with whom I need to merge. Rather, we all need to zipper merge.

If you drive a good car and can’t merge, I respect you—you’re probably just decompressing from a hard days work. If you drive a disproportionately small car for an adult man who can grow a decent beard and can’t merge, then that’s one mistake too many. And I do not respect you anymore.

One mistake at a time please.

Two Updates on the Boy Child

First, during my attempt to get more of the cookie for myself, when I told him that the cookie was very big, J- innocently said, “My mouth is big!”

Second, we have this game Poop Tracks which is actually a pretty fantastic board game for little kids (if you care to have them turn into Tom Brown Jr.-like trackers). You spin a spinner and do what it says. The options are, “Draw 1 (or 2), Trade, Swipe, or Skip.” Naturally, I take it upon myself to teach my progeny the proper way to trade and swipe. And, naturally, the proper way to swipe is through distraction. So my kids now look forward to the spinner landing on “swipe” so they can say, “Look at that, Dad!” before proceeding to take one if my cards. Well, just now, as J- and I (A- is now in kindergarten 😦 ) were having a donut, he says, “Look out the window, Day-ad!” Obviously he was priming me for the take, but for what? I played along and then he swiped my napkin. What a guy!

A Lesson that Requires Pocket Change

My friend, an older, heavyset gentlemen, keeps his story going with, “It’s about listening. You gotta teach the kids how to listen.”

Here he pauses and apologizes as he needs a break. He often needs to take a break, but doesn’t seem too concerned with the underlying medical condition.

The cloudiness disappears and he resumes.

“I teach my grandkids how to listen by placing a penny on the palm of my hand right here-” here he holds out his left hand, palm facing me, and points to the spot where I have always assumed street magicians palm the coin.

He continues, “Then I place a nickel next to it and a quarter next to the nickel. Then I tell the kids, ‘Johnny’s mom had three kids. Penny, Nick, and ??’”

The man turns to me, and I open my eyes larger than normal, while raising my eyebrows. I mean to merely indicate that I am not ready for an interactive moment, but I also admit that I don’t yet understand anything from this listening lesson.

“It requires the coins. Who has some coins?”

I follow him to the table where some other men are sitting and my friend asks the leader and most responsible of us, “Jim, do you have any coins? I need a penny, a nickel and a quarter.”

Surprisingly, and as predicted, Jim pulls a 1986-sized fistful of pocket change out of his shorts’ pocket and finds the required coinage.

My friend then places the coins in his palm, penny, nickel, quarter. Jim is paying attention, but the previous conversation he was apart of continues to unfold as well.

“Johnny’s mom had three kids. Penny, Nick, and ??”

Wishing to show my language prowess, I forget about the spelling of ‘quarter’ and begin to contemplate every name that starts with the ‘kwart’ sound.

“Kwart? Kurt?” I guess.

Shaking his head in shame, my friend repeats, “Johnny’s-”

“JOHNNY!” I exclaim, joyfully. “Johnny,” I then repeat, with a pronounced note and loud look of playful disgust.

Jim knowingly smiles.

My friend says to him, “You’ve heard this one before, huh?”

A slow nod from Jim answers.

“You see, Pete, someone has to teach them how to listen.”

****

Here’s the catch, faithful reader. Anyone who gets the right answer already knows how to listen. The all important and usually lacking skill in the human, imho, that my friend taught his grandkids (and I) is humility.