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Four Magazines

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“Four magazines?”

“Yeah”

“How long did you expect to be in there?”

“I never really know.”

“Really? Never?”

“Well…”

“How old are you? How long have you ever been in there? Even in the worst of circumstances?”

“I never really thought of it. There was that one time I was in there all day. It was awful. I wish I had a magazine or two then.”

“How long were you in there just now?”

“I guess about four…maybe five minutes.”

“That’s not enough time to get through one magazine was it?”

“Nah.”

“But you brought four in.”

“Yeah. Look, I’m not sure what the big deal is. It’s really more of a habit than anything else.”

“A habit?”

“Yeah.”

“Look, I just find it curious that you have a ‘habit’ of taking dense reading material in when you know you’re only going to be in there a few minutes.”

“Sometimes it’s longer.”

“Yeah. Probably because you’re in there reading four magazines.”

“They have pictures.”

“Does that help in some way?”

“It does if I’m not in the mood to read.”

“So it’s a mood thing?”

“It can be.”

“And these are old magazines. You’ve read these before.”

“Right.”

“So, you take a bunch of magazines in and what you take depends on your mood. You often take in magazines you’ve already read, but that’s OK because they have pictures you can look at when you’re not in the mood to read.”

“That gets it.”

“And this…’helps’ you in some way?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do you ever bring magazines other places where you might have to wait?”

“Not really. Doctors usually have magazines. Not good ones. And I don’t like taking my books and magazines places. They might get stuff on them, or I could drop them and they could get jacked up.”

“But you’ll take them in there without a care in the world.”

“It helps pass the time.”

“What time? The five minutes?”

“Are you telling me you never bring anything in?”

“On a rare occasion, I might have brought in a brochure from the mail or something…if I was in a rush.”

“Well, there you go. It’s the same thing.”

“Not hardly.”

“Were you wanting to go in or something?”

“Well, yes. Yes I was.”

“Do you want one of these? I have Popular Mechanics.”

“No. No thank you. I think I can manage this without Popular Mechanics.”

“To each his own.”

“Look, where are you going with those?”

“I’m going to put them back.”

“Where is back?”

“You know…where I got them.”

“You should have them burned.”

Blue

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It was a heavy day. The blue stuck to him like a thick, yet invisible muck. The subtle strains of the week’s exhaustion seemed to come early making the weight of the air and the gravity more prominent. Each deliberate movement seemed slow, and forced, and draining.

There was no one focal point of consternation, rather a collection of a thousand and one annoyances that all vied for his time and demanded his attention. Under the guise of being critical, each item more trivial than the last piled on like a self-generating to-do list created by some dark presence testing his system, working to see what would force the eventual overload.

Comparatively, if you matched his world point for point against those in the throes of a real life and death drama, his troubles were few, his battles simple and his inability to maintain perspective pathetic.

He approached the looming pile of cosmic debris with a half-hearted determination. With his head down, he worked to chip away, to make progress, to sort and sort again, to handle and resolve, but the problems and aggravations multiplied faster than he had the energy to even fully recognize.

The weight of the day was oppressive, resolutions and solutions elusive. His brain generated a multitude of grand and seductive notions about shaking everything loose and then stepping away fast enough to watch it all fall. He’d have a laugh. Where was the value, the payoff for this day-to-day struggle? Is there even a remote chance it will all be better tomorrow?

Despite the overwhelming and obvious evidence that it would most assuredly not be better tomorrow, a small, barely noticeable, and yet quite obvious and determined voice would whisper from the back of his head, cutting through the clatter and noise of his useless imagination, “Keep going.”

Bad Ass

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Riding around in a truck all day gave Gil and Remmy plenty of time to discuss the deeper philosophical questions that plague the minds of all mankind. At least they should plague the minds of all mankind. Gil always said that people who didn’t ponder what he called “the greater questions” were just using up valuable air.

Today, on the heals of another superhero movie release, they revisited the topic of who is, or was, the most real badass human.

“How about…Neil Armstrong,” Remmy offered.

Gil sat for a moment tasting the notion in his head. There was validity there. “First man on the moon. Interesting. You may proceed.”

“Think about it,” Remy started. “Here’s a guy who competes to go to the moon. The freakin’ moon! A place that everyone has seen, but nobody has ever stepped foot on. And when the time comes, they say, ‘Neil, you’re going to the moon.’ And I’ll bet his only answer was, ‘When.'”

“That would be badass,” Gil said.

“Right? Now, think of this. He can’t get in a car or whatever, he gets to the moon by climbing into a freakin’ rocket that is going to ‘BLAST’ him into space! Then he’s got to land this thing that has never been tried in real life, get out, walk around – unarmed – gather up some rocks, take pictures, plant the flag…”

“Bad ass.”

“Right. And he does all this stuff, all while not losing his shit with the realization that he is on the freakin’ moon! I know people that won’t go to the mall across town without a computer to walk them through every step. And if you told them you were going to ‘BLAST’ them some place…they would just melt.”

Gil thought for a moment. “Not bad. But he didn’t do it alone.”

“Right, but it could be argued that most badass dudes don’t. It just looks like they do. They just seal the deal. They pull the trigger. They make it happen. I mean Batman has Robin right?”

“Right.”

“But which one is the bad ass?”

“Not Robin.”

“Not Bobin. I could argue that part of what makes a bad ass a bad ass is that there’s always someone behind him supporting him, promoting him, or needing him which works in turn to motivate him.”

“Good point.”

“They could have just as easily picked another guy who gets up there and just can’t handle the overwhelming awesomeness of what he’s doing and goes bananas. And being second doesn’t matter because that guy is all, ‘Well it must be OK out there, because Neil did it and he didn’t get eaten alive, so I’ll go.’

Then…after all that. The dude flies back, lands in the ocean and is all like, “Yeah, I walked on the moon. It’s cool. No big deal. What are we going to do today?'”

“Being humble is an admirable badass trait,” said Gil.

“I think that we should take all those t-shirts and stuff that says, ‘Chuck Norris did this,’ or ‘Chuck Norris did that’ and replace him with Neil Armstrong.”

“I’d buy one,” Gil said.

SOC 412

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All right…class…everybody? I’d like to get started.

Thank you.

Good morning and welcome. My name is Dr. Dane Cooper. Please check your schedules to make sure you are in the right place. This is Advanced Senior Sociology 412 or as I’ve seen it labelled on the Internet, “Extreme Soc.” If you do not have that on your schedule, you are in the wrong place. You will also be one of the first lessons for the rest of the class. We won’t be laughing at you. We will be laughing with you.

And that is the first lie I will be sharing with you. We will be laughing at you.

Because we will be spending a lot of time together, and I define a lot of time using scientific terms like, “probably more than you could ever be humanly comfortable with,” you may be inclined to begin addressing me in ways that represent a deeper familiarity. Coop, Cooper, Doc, Dane, D.C., D.D.C and so on. That would be a mistake on your part. We will not be as familiar as you feel. Dr. Cooper is the best way to address me and anything else provides me with the unique opportunity to adjust your grade in ways undesirable to you. If you feel that is unfair or makes me an “ass,” you should probably leave now. And that will provide the class with the second lesson of the day.

In addition to spending enormous amounts of time together, you will likely get dirty. Not so much in the physical sense, however that does occur during some of our offsite lessons, but no, I’m talking about your conscience. In order to study human behavior we often need to create circumstances that will generate actual, measurable human behavior. This sometimes crosses with some people’s definition of ethics. I assure you everything we do will be done with the highest respect to ethics and the high moral standard on which this school hangs its hat. We will however dance on that line like the cast of Riverdance performing a sold out show for the Queen and an international television audience while the signal is being beamed out to space for other universes to behold.

If that makes you uncomfortable, the door is there to your right. Please provide us with lesson three for the day.

No one?

Very good. I will now collect your waivers and we shall begin.

Standoff

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“My name is Denali Bins,” He shouted. “I am a baker from Chesterfield!”

Officer Clay Ashton held his stance, arms out and service revolver trained on the target. “Put the gun down Mr. Bins and we can work this all out.”

“We tried that. I didn’t do this! I don’t do things like this!”

“And yet here we are, Mr. Bins. You are holding a gun, you are covered with blood and you’re standing over a dead body.”

“I make bread!”

“Mr. Bins…”

“I make hard rolls…and donuts!”

“And I’ll bet they are delicious, but right now we have to take care of this problem.”

Bins quickly swung the gun back and forth between the two figures stepping up behind Ashton. If it was even possible his eyes grew wider and darted between the now three officers. “Keep them back!”

“They’re just here to make sure nobody else gets hurt.”

“I tell you I didn’t do this!”

“Put the gun down Mr. Bins and we’ll figure it all out.”

“You said that yesterday at the station! We’ll figure it all out! That’s what you said!”

“And yet, you took off.”

“You said there was video! That’s a lie! I make cream puffs and scones!”

A crackle in Ashton’s earpiece preceded the order. The time for chatting was over. The order was given. Put him down.

 

Pre-Internet

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“Look,” Brin said to the sulking Lara. “You kids are lucky. You just don’t realize it. I met your father ‘pre-Internet.’ Do you know what that means?”

Lara pulled the Seventeen magazine on the table to her and began flipping through the pages aggressively. It was a half-baked attempt to show she wasn’t listening, but Brin knew that if she really wasn’t listening, she would have left by now.

“Yes, pre-Internet. Clearly, when I met the man who was to become your father, I didn’t have access to all the information that you people have today. After I met him, I had to talk to him – in person – to get to know him and he was the only source of information I had. You can’t imagine that, because it’s not the world you grew up in.

Sure, he had friends, but they only told me what a ‘great guy he was.’

Had I been able to look him up on Facebook or pull together some kind of Google search, you know…I might have made some different decisions.”

“Ugh…Mom, are you serious?”

“Look, I love your father. I’m just saying pre-Internet people had a huge learning curve to overcome. There was no ‘wikipedia’ to tell me all about what kind of person he was, no electronic photo albums, no friends lists, no texts, no Skype, no unlimited minute phone calls, no Twitter to let me know where he was, what he was doing, what he thought about things…none of it. So all I can say is we did the best we could with the information we had.

You know, come to think of it, maybe I found out he got on the dean’s list once…maybe not, I’m not sure. I’ve blocked so much.

Anyhow, the point is, people today, once you meet each other, and sometimes you don’t even actually meet, you have access to a world of information in minutes that can help you figure out what you might like or not like before you get too invested.”

“You think Daddy feels the same way?”

“Look, pre-Internet or not, your father is very lucky the way things worked out for him. You should have seen him when I found him.”

Lara slid the magazine back across the table. Her phone uttered a short beep causing her to look down immediately. “It’s Phil.”

“You see? How long did that take? Eleven minutes? Don’t even get me started on how long it took to ‘resolve issues’ before the Internet. You kids don’t even know what a fight is anymore. What does he say?”

“He wants to meet…to talk.”

“Uh huh. Let me give you one more piece of advice. One thing we did learn pre-Internet is that when it came time to work things out, we were already pretty good at actual real live talking. Do yourself a favor. If you really want to work on things, put the phone down. Stop texting and go talk to him.

Then…you can text me and to let me know how things go!”

Forgiveness

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He stood there on the doorstep, soaking wet as if he conjured the storm just to appear more pathetic when she opened the door.

She stood in the crack she created by pulling the door open just enough to cover the distance of her shoulders, a gesture to signal an intent to listen, but not an invitation.

He stood in silence. He had a lot to say. Most of it he already said and his intent was to say it again and if there was a way to say it with greater meaning, with a greater sense of promise, he would do it. Still, when the door opened, the practiced words seemed to evaporate.

She looked at him with cautious and hesitant eyes. She bit ever so softly on the inside of her lip. It became a habit over the years that she apparently developed when she was deep in concentration or trying to figure things out. She first noticed it when frosting a cake some time ago.

“I…,” he started.

“Don’t,” she said. “I know.”

He forced his hands deeper into his pockets. “I’m sorry.”

She wasn’t sure how this all landed on her, but the ball, as they say, was clearly in her court. He did some really stupid things. Even now, there was a part of her who wanted to punch him in the face, and she wasn’t taking that off the table, but it was decision time. She was culpable in this too.

She stood in the doorway filling the space between the jam and the door thinking, considering, hoping, debating, cursing, resisting, deciding, redeciding and redeciding again. She took in a very deep breath and looked around him blinking away a tear before slowly opening the door to create an invitation.

As he moved to step inside and out of the rain, he stopped, turned to her and pulled her close.

She hugged him back. Even soaking wet, the greater apology came through.

Maybe she would punch him later.

Evidence

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Detective, Tripp Euclaire bent under the police tape and entered the apartment. As he stood, he surveyed the room. Average. Typical. Little to draw the attention.

“Right this way, sir. At the end of the hall.”

Tripp followed the officer to the far bedroom and stepped just inside the doorway.

“We found her about an hour ago. The M.E. said possible blunt force trauma put her down. It looks like she put up a…”

The officer’s voice trailed off as Euclaire silently raised his hand to stop him from talking. There would be plenty of time for the details. This time was for observance and respect. He stepped closer not realizing the growing clench of his jaw.

She looked like Emily.

Oddly enough, despite the condition of the ravaged room around them, she looked peaceful. Had it not been for the blood spatter across her face someone could believe she was sleeping. His hand gripped the handkerchief in his pocket. He had to consciously stop his arm from wanting to move instinctively to try and wipe the offensive smear from her cheek and forehead. He didn’t know her, but she didn’t deserve this. His hand tightened in his pocket around the cloth, fighting the urge to wipe her face clean. It was the least this poor girl deserved. Still, he knew better. The harsh reality was she wasn’t a poor girl at all now. At this point, to the system, she was coldly and unequivocally…evidence.

Precarious

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Chester sat still, enjoying the quiet. Everything was good, for the moment.

He tried to absorb as much of the calm as he could, for once the chaos ensued he would ramp right back up to where the doctor said he should work real hard to avoid. The doctor called it the ‘Red Zone’. Who does that?

For Chester, life was a precarious house of cards – at least in his mind. The reality was his life was probably not as precarious as he imagined. Work was solid. Things with Alice were solid, he thought. Nothing had broken in the last 20 minutes…all good.

Still his mind seemed to live under the perpetual notion that he was always, constantly and forever, one misstep away from unrecoverable disaster. That everything he had, worked for, supported, built, repaired or maintained was all capable of being stripped away from him and he would be defenseless to stop it. He tamped all that down pretty good on the day to day, but there was an ever present, very subtle buzz in the back of his mind that seemed to constantly whisper, “Watch out!” as if he was undeserving, as if he was living someone else’s life fraudulently and he needed to be careful or the jig as they say, would be up. He feared the moment someone discovered the truth, whatever his world was would be destroyed.

Twins

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Passing himself off as twins was way easier than he thought. Of course he hadn’t planned on taking it to this extreme or doing it this long, but once he reconciled the inner ethical qualms of living in a world of blatant duplicity over relative honesty, it just felt right.

Really, what he was doing was just a more literal representation of how most people live their daily lives anyhow. Sometimes, they were worse. His friend Sal had at least four distinct personalities that she could switch to without a moment’s notice. Depending on her mood, you never knew which Sal you would get.

His circumstance required a bit more finesse. It was becoming art really. He knew at some point the game would be called and one twin would have to absorb the other, but until then, the individual lives of Kevin and Klark were in full bloom and the road ahead was filled with possibilities…two lives worth.

Plan B

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Bits stopped listening the instant Jelly uttered the words, “There’s more than one way to skin a cat.” And the whole time Jelly extolled the benefits of his ‘Plan B,’ Bits wondered about the phrase.

Where did it come from? What could possibly require one to know how to skin a cat, say nothing about why they would need more than one way? How many ways were there? Did someone at some point change the problem from skinning the cat at the onset to actually working through a number of potential ways to determine which one worked best?

She imagined a small research team charting and plotting the goal of getting a cat skinned only to realize once they finished that there might be many more efficient ways to accomplish the task.

“We are going to need a lot more cats,” she heard one say in the back of her mind.

She was also convinced that Jelly’s ‘Plan B’ was doomed to fail. Just casually throwing out the cat skinning analogy without knowing spit about actual cat skinning implied to her that he really had no idea what he was talking about.

Muffin

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Muffin romped over the top of the hill down into Farrington Glenn.

Gimple’s sigh and following scowl drew Custer’s attention. “What worries you so,” he asked.

“She’s slight and reckless,” Gimple answered.

“She’s smarter than you give her credit for,” said Custer. “And she’s only doing what we all agreed needed to be done.”

Gimple tightened his grip on the wooden lever, the trigger of the trap. He watched as Muffin tumbled down the hill giggling. Nearly blissful, he thought. She should be more aware. The pangs of guilt made his stomach roll. “She doesn’t really realize, does she?”

Custer grabbed his shoulder with a comforting squeeze. “She knows.”

Gimple looked at Custer with a quick side glance, “She’s bait.”

Custer squinted out over the hill top letting a heavy breath ease its way from his chest. Another of Muffin’s giggles floated back to him. “She knows.”

Precocious

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At the age of seven and a half, Criss’s grandmother dubbed her as ‘precocious.’ Since then, it’s been a private goal of hers to live up to that.

She could not remember much about her grandmother or many of the things she might have said to her for as their visits to her stately home in Crendinmore were many, their direct interactions were few.

Their visits were routine. There would be hugs and hearty greetings at the door, then the adults would either step away to the sitting room or gather around a large table in the kitchen to talk. In the mornings they would sip coffee and nibble at coffeecakes. Visits later in the day involved simple drinks of alcohol and the sharing of a modest, yet adequate platter of cheese and crackers.

The children were to play. They were given all the freedom they could handle, but the expectation was that they would play, and play nicely, without raising a ruckus so as to disturb the adults. So they played simply, or flipped through old books and magazines to keep the noise to a minimum and the prospect of getting in trouble at bay.

Shame

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Shame. It was a sad thing.

Jinx did good work. The job proved to be hard and it stretched the end of his skills to a new level – a better development for future work. It was a relief to get it all done and done well. Then the compliments came in.

He would have been disappointed had he not received any, but when they came in, rather than accepting and enjoying, and absorbing a real sense of appreciation, he grew warm with embarrassment and discomfort. He knew others who bask in the glow of praise, still others who belittle any level of praise as inadequate, and insulting. But for Jinx, even a modicum of acclaim carried with it a heavy sense of unease.

The Page

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The page had possibilities.

The page had weight.

The page held within it a masterwork or a ruined scrap.

Much like a sculptor who stands before a block of granite or mound of clay, so eager, yet so hesitant to make that first cut, the writer stares into the depth of potential that lies beyond the surface at the page, waiting for the very right moment to write that very first and most important word. For every word that follows is a step down a path toward a new idea. Every word that follows is a decision that accepts some notions and rejects others. Every word that follows is a vessel that carries with it an intimate piece of the writer.

Aware or unaware, hidden in folly or stated boldly, the words place the writer on the page, bare and vulnerable.