Walden Pond

23 July 1845

She had refused him and he was crushed. He had imagined their life together. Him writing wonderful transcendental treatises and her taking care of him, washing his clothes, cooking his food, cleaning the cabin. It would have been perfect. She claimed she cared for him but that her father would never let them marry; he was beginning to suspect this was a lie. Last evening in the Pub he heard from a mutual friend that she had accepted the proposal of another man. It had only been one month since his own proposal. Was she fickle? Were her affections easily swayed? He was in fact sure it must be something in her character for he was a fine catch. He was very fashionable just look at his very cool and stylish neck beard. He was very smart, just look at his great writings and pondering. He was very well connected was not he, with his many fellow transcendentalist? It must be her. I mean what women would not want to live with him in a small shack on the edge of Walden Pond? It was going to be lovely. Oh well, her loss, who needed women anyway? He should get back to his writing.

Elvis has left the Building

He stood by the grave and admired the many flowers left by fans. It was a lovely site to behold. He was still amazed all these years later the reverence people had for him and his music. The fact that even after his death his name could still bring millions and millions of dollars was at times shocking. But he was happy that his family was taken care of because he had had to leave all those years ago and he felt bad about that. He felt bad that his daughter thought he was dead, but it had to be done. His life had been spiraling out of control for so long that the only way out was death. So he had planned it, everything down to the last detail. It had worked perfectly. Everyone thought he was dead and despite the occasional " I saw Elvis story” in the Weekly World News he had lived a quite life. None of those stories ever got close to the truth. Did people really think he would still look like Elvis? After his "death" he had lost weight and dyed his hair blond and gotten plastic surgery. He looked nothing like himself. His current wife and children had no idea he was anything more then Ted Fromby from Winnetka. IL, High School History Teacher and baseball coach. He was really proud of his team; they had made the State play-offs this year. He took one last look at the grave, turned away with a chuckle and headed back toward the front gate where his family waited.

Miscellaneous Monsters

When she had joined with them last spring she had never realized how powerful she would feel. For so long she had lived in the shadows, hidden by her family and of her own accord. Then one night a year ago she had been on one of her late night walks through the city. She avoided the daylight and as the town slept she could wonder the streets without fear of being seen. But on this particular night she stumbled across an amazing vision, at first she thought it was her eyes playing tricks but it was not. There in the light of a street lamp she saw a thug attack a woman and then before she could act from the darkness came this band of misfits who stopped the attacker and helped the victim. They hid their collective identity's behind masks and capes, but she could see that like her they were different. For the first time in her 16 years she knew she was not alone. There were others like her. Others who hid in the darkness, but used their strength for good. She had found not only comrades, but a calling. She followed them back to their hideout that night and begged them to let her join them. They finally relented and let her join the team. She still lived in the shadows of the night but now she had friends and respect and a grateful city. For alone she was just one monster but together they were superheros!

The Day She Discovered Her Superpower

July 4th 1984 started like all the other 4th of Julys she had experienced in her 14 years. Flags were proudly displayed on every lawn, dogs barked in yards and kids played on the sidewalks. They were heading to the parade that morning and then going over to the O’Malley’s for a bar-b-que and swim party. The parade was fun and she got a huge bag of candy. At 14 she was just on the verge of being too old for parades and bags of candy but for this one last summer she was still a kid that was until she discovered her power that afternoon at the pool party. It all started innocently enough. She realized as she was changing in the bathroom at the O’Malley’s that she had forgotten her t-shirt that she always wore over her swimsuit. Her mother who had always thought it strange she would wear a t-shirt to swim in told her to get changed and forget about the t-shirt. So that is what she did and when she walked out of the bathroom that day it was the first time that anyone in the last three years would see her without a bag shirt and they were surprised. The body in the swimsuit was that of a woman. At 14 she was still embarrassed by her shape and had tried, successfully since developing to hide it all behind large shirts. But in her swimsuit she was exposed and embarrassed, but the embarrassment went away quickly when Tommy O’Malley asked her to join his team for water volleyball. Tommy was the eldest O’Malley boy and at 17 with his beach blond looks he was popular with the girls and he had never in the 8 years she had known him ever given her the slightest acknowledgement, but today was different. She was different and she quickly realized the power she had been hiding behind that t-shirt. Over the next several years she would use that power without thought, she became very popular with the boys and liked the attention she got when she wore a low cut top. As the years passed and she got older and wiser she realized that the true power of her weapons was in knowing when to use them and when to conceal them.

New and Improved

She was not so sure that she liked the new and improved Lorali. As she looked at her new face in the mirror she felt slightly sick. Is this who she was now. This pert nosed full lipped beauty queen that looked back from the mirror. When she had first removed the bandages she felt giddy with anticipation but seeing the face was a whole different matter. She looked nothing like the old Lorali. Could she live with this new face. Would she become a different person with this new and improved face. She was scared for the first time since the surgery was suggested. Scared that she had made a mistake, scared that she would change, scared that no one would recognize her ever again. Her doctor entered the room and gently lead her back to the bed. In soothing words he told her not to worry that it would take a little time to get used to the new her. She fell into that dreamless sleep that only medication can bring.

The Doctor walked back to the observation room where his colleuges waited. " I am worried," he started " her heart rate skyrocketed when she saw her face, what if it can not hold out when she finally sees what we have done to the rest of her? What good will a cyborg be if her heart explodes just from the shock of being a cyborg."

Ordering Pizza

She was hungry and he was going to be late he said but that he had a way better excuse then the last time. Way Better! So she waited and when he got that there it was a better excuse, he had brought stuff to make dinner, Way better because she was hungry. But by the time they got around to making dinner it was already eight o clock and she was super hungry and secretly thought to herself maybe they should just order a pizza. As they cooked the dinner and her stomach would growl she would think to herself I wish we had just ordered a pizza. Then everything started to go wrong and the chicken burned then the rice boiled over and it was time to face the truth, they should have just ordered pizza. So she called the pizza place on the corner and ordered a pizza. As she sat and stared at the pizza all she could think about was how she really did not even like pizza!

Good Times

Now and then I sit and stare out of the window wondering how I got to this place in my life. Once i had been young and carefree; willing to do almost anything for a good time. But things have changed now and I am calmer and more set in my ways. Things I once did now appall me. I lived hard and fast and have the scars and body art to prove it. When your young you think the whole world is your oyster to use a cliched phrase. I really thought I would live that kind of life forever. I was stupid. Now I know that the things we do catch up with us and we will have regrets. But sometimes despite everything I remember myself then and feel a little wistful. Wistful for the beauty, the youth the innocence I had. Now as a sit and stare out of this barred window in this maximum security prison with all the other murders I know that beauty, youth and innocence do not last for ever and if I had been smarter I would have used those things wiser instead of wasting them a good time.

The Dance

On the edge of the dance floor stood the girl. She was small for her age and covered from head to toe in unrelenting black. Her classmates would have been surprised to learn that she loved to dance for they had never seen her dance at a single dance over the last four years. She had come to every dance but she always stood on the sidelines, alone. At this ,their Prom and final dance of High School, she came alone and stood on the side of the dance floor in her black dress. Not a single peek of skin was revealed by her dress. Most of her classmates could not remember if they had ever seen the girl's skin other then her hands and face for it seemed she was never without a long sleeve turtle neck and long pants. But none of her classmates ever really paid attention to the girl in black. There were ,at every High School, those kids everyone considered odd and she was one of them at their school. So when the clock struck midnight and she vanished from her spot no one seemed to notice. If they had been paying attention they would have seen the air next to her shimmer for a second and her quickly slip through the shimmer. If someone had noticed her disappearance and followed her through the shimmer they would have believed that the punch was spiked and what they were seeing was all in their imagination. For through that shimmer was another dance floor identical to theirs, except instead of the frolicking young students from Peyton High School the dance floor was full of monsters, demons, witches and vampires. And there on the dance floor was the girl in black, no longer in black but free of the constraints of the human world she removed her long dress to reveal a shimmering silver strapless dress. Her tattooed arms waving to the music she danced with her friends and practiced her magic. Reveling in the freedom to be herself.

When she returned home that night and her parents asked how the dance was she would replay as always, " It was fun." And her parents would be happy that the daughter they loved but who seemed so odd and weird to them at least made the effort to be normal every once in awhile.

The Walk

I saw a movie once at the National Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. It was at the end of the tour I took. We all filed into the small theater and the film started. Survivors told their stories. By the end I wept. A women shared her story in flashes. A man shared his in flashes. It was summer and she was going to school when her father made her change from her sandals to her winter boots. She thought he was crazy but he seemed so determined she did what he said. The man joined the US Army and went to fight in WWII. The day the woman wore her winter boots in the middle of the summer was the day her family was rounded up and sent to a concentration camp. She spent two years in that camp wearing her winter boots. Near the end of the war she was forced with thousand of others who had miraculously survived to march from one camp to the next in the middle of the winter. If she had not been wearing those boots she would have died. Her father was already dead. The man helped the US Army push into Germany. He had seen terrible things over the last few years but nothing prepared him for what was to come. When the German soldiers abandoned the camp where she was they were free but so many did not have the strength to leave. They were living skeletons. She and several other women went out side the gates to get water. There they were approached by US Soldiers who had come to liberate them. When he approached the group of women he was shocked. They were like skeletons with grey hair but none of them were older then twenty. He asked if he could help them, he called them ladies. When the US soldier called them ladies she wept. It was the first time in years anyone had ever referred to them as ladies. She fell in love with him just a little bit. That love would grow and be returned. They would marry and have children and one day would make a film that would be played in the National Holocaust Museum.

Left then right

First she turned left on Main street walked a few blocks and turned right into the alley. She dropped the bag of cash in the red dumpster and walked back out heading back the way she had come. It was all the money she had in the world but it was worth it to get him back. Who ever had done this had known her weakness. She was both angry and sad that someone must either hate her or was so desperate for money they would do this evil thing. 53,429 dollars. That was how much they wanted. It was exactly what she had in her savings account. She had a sneaking suspicion that the person who was doing this knew here and knew her pretty well. She walked back to her apartment on pins and needles. They said they would call once they had retrieved the money with the location to pick him up. She waited half the night for the call but it never came. She was devastated. She had done everything they asked but still they had not given him back. She cried that night for him. The the next morning through the haze of her tears she heard a faint barking. She jumped up. The barking seemed to be coming from the entry way of her apartment building. She threw open the door and there he was jumping with joy, wagging his little tail. Her baby was home.

The Pile

It lay in piles about the room, tall piles, small piles, wide piles, and very green piles. He came to the room often just to look at it. All that money just laying around. They had no use for money anymore but they kept it here stored in a subbasement of the Cultural History Museum. As a guard at the museum he had keys to everything and on his breaks he would often come down here to see the money. They had never had money during his life time and it was not until he had started working at the museum had he ever seen it. He could on a certain level understand its draw. It was so lovely to look at. They had not need of money now. Everything was was kept on little chips embedded in the back of the neck. When he got paid they ran a scanner across his neck, when he bought food they ran a scanner across his neck, and when he bought a dirty magazine they scanned his neck. It was easier that way. But when he looked at those piles of money he sometimes wished for the old days. One of his co-workers would make fun of him always telling him statistics about crime and money and germs and money. He knew it was not healthy but he loved the look of it. He imagined that spending it had felt good. To actually have something tangible as proof of days work must have been nice. So it was not a surprise to his co-workers when he was discovered that day, naked and laughing, rolling around in the piles of money.

The Hospital Morgue

It was cold, really cold in here she thought. She threw off the blanket and tried to sit up. She rammed her head against the ceiling. Was she dreaming? She sat up again scrunching down to avoid hitting her head. The ceiling was maybe two feet from the bed. She felt around in the darkness and only felt the cold sides of this room she was in or better yet this box she was in. What the heck was happening. She started to shake and then screamed as loud as she could. Nothing, no one! Her neck throbbed as if it had been torn open. She tried to figure a way out of this cold box but she could not find a latch on what appeared to be a door at the end of the long box. Then a thought struck her. Was she in a coffin? Was she buried alive? She screamed again. Nothing! Oh my God, Oh My God she thought I have been buried alive. Who would do this? How did they do it? She did not remember much from the party the night before. All she remembered was dancing and drinking and people dressed in crazy costumes. She had spent weeks deciding the perfect costume for the Halloween party. She had found the delicate white silk dress at a thrift store and then splattered it with fake blood. She had painstakingly painted on the bite marks for her costume. She had gotten so many compliments on her Vampire's Victims costume. Then the very good looking guy dressed as Dracula had found her. She was sure it was true love, they had spent the entire evening together. But then it all went hazy and she could not remember the rest of the evening and now she was buried alive in this steel box. She began to scream and kick and cry and then light at the end of the tunnel. She was slowly pulled out of the steel box. She blinked at the bright light. Looking around she saw that she was in a hospital morgue. She sat up touched her neck and realized that the bite marks were not the result of her make-up. He was standing with his hand held out for her. She put her hand in his and stood up.

" Ah my little victim, the night is ours." Dracula said

The Queens Law

The Queen stood on the small balcony over looking the parade area. She was pleased, the preparations for tomorrows celebration were almost complete and every thing looked wonderful. She turned and walked back into the palace with a satisfied smile on her face. She decide to retire to her rooms for the evening and prepare herself for the next days celebration. She slept that night secure in herself and the laws she had set forth for this land. She was ,to her mind, a wonderful leader and tomorrows celebration would reinforce all the good that had happened since she had come to power.
The next morning she dressed with care in her brilliant blue sparkly frock and proceeded to the same balcony on which she had observed the preparations the day before. The parade ground was crowded with her subjects and a loud cheer went up when she stepped out on the balcony. This was it, the culmination of everything she had just spent the last year doing. A celebration of her first year as Queen. When she had passed her first decree she was uncertain how her people would take it but they had accepted it without reserve and once that decree had been put into action and all the humans eliminated it was easier to impose her rule on her subjects.
She stepped forward to the railing of the balcony raised her hand for silence and a hush fell over the crowd. " Friends, Robots and countrymen lend me your audio sensors......"

Dream Job

What do you do for a living he asked? She looked at him seriously and said, " I sell world Peace." he laughed thinking she was joking, " No really what do you do?" It was the same every time, they always laughed, no one ever took her seriously. But what she said was the truth, although admittedly she did say it to be cute and funny. It invariably worked, people laughed and thought she was charming and clever. She would then explain she was a fundraiser for an organization that was working toward the ultimate goal of world peace by eradicating poverty, etc, etc. They would nod their head and say the same thing, " Who doesn't want world peace." So she used the line often and the result was always the same, but she believed most people really did not get it, that the idea of real World Peace was so foreign to them that they could never understand that when she said it she really meant it. Sometimes at night she would fall asleep thinking about all the things that needed to be done at work and just like any job there were little annoyances she had to take care off and as she fell asleep sometimes these would be in her head but as she dreamed on those nights it was never about the annoyances but about a world full of peace and happiness for everyone, she knew it was a cliche but when she awoke on those mornings after such dreams she felt energized and would smile into her cereal bowl in the morning thinking about how best to sell her product.

Sorry, No Scribble

The teacher had written this on his first piece of art that fateful day in first grade. When he read it his little mind rebelled. Who was she to judge that his scribble was not art. So from that day forward he refused to draw anything but scribbles. They were beautiful in there simplicity. Each time his drawings would come back with comments about his scribbling when he was asked to draw a house or his family. He did not care his teacher was a philistine. In High School his scribblings got darker and richer with color, but all the while he continued to fail every art class he took. But he cared not for their F's and continued to scribble his heart out. Perhaps no one would ever see what he saw in those beautiful colorful scribbles. In college he continued with his art. Having given up hope that anyone would recognize the true beauty of his work he was surprised to be asked to exhibit his art in the annual College Art Show. When he won the first prize he was even more Surprised. 15 Years later he was still surprised of his success. His Art sold for millions and was displayed in every major Art Museum in the world. That first Art Teacher had even sent him a note after his first major exhibit. " I was wrong, scribble all you want!"

Hi my name is......

Sherry and I like long walks on the beach, sunsets and white wine. For the hundredth time that day he heard those same words, hi my name is! It was a tiring job to say the least and he was sure that when his grandmother had paid for is college degree she had not expected that this is what he would be doing with that degree. But getting a degree in English Literature with a specialization in mid 19Th century male nature writers was not the best degree to try to look for work. So he had ended up here editing these dating videos for The Romance Movie Dating service. All the videos seemed to be the same. Long walks and sunsets. For two years he had seen the same thing over and over again. It had in fact made him very cynical about true romance and he guessed he would never meet the woman of his dreams. But the next video changed his mind and life forever. Hi my name is Electa and I like to dance in the rain during the full moon, I like to sing at the top of my lungs while driving and I love to read mid 19Th century British novels about nature.

The Collection

She typed in the secret code and walked into the room. With a whisper the steel door closed behind her. It was in this room that she felt the most like herself. calm and secure. She went over to the large comfy chair and sat down. Then when she was comfortable she flicked the remote control and the lights came on casting a soft glow over her collection. She had spent years assembly this collection and although no one else would ever see it she was proud. Proud of the time she had spent in collecting it. proud of the room she had built to house it and proud of her ability to keep quiet about the collection. If anyone ever found out about it she would lose the collection for sure. They we come for it and her and know one would ever see her again she was sure. She sat back in the chair and looked around. It was truly the most lovely collection ever. It was in fact now after all of her hard work the only collection of its kind in existence and she hoped that it would be so for ever. As she looked at the all war heads in this room and housed in the basements that went deep into the earth surface her pride came back in force. Pride in a job well done. For this collection of warheads was in fact every single warhead on the planet and not a single soul knew that she had spent the last ten years replacing every nuclear warhead in the world with fakes and that she had all the real ones. She took a bottle of champagne from the small refrigerator next to her chair, uncorked the bottle and toasted her collection.

The Writing on the Wall

Dear John,

I am writing this on the back of this match book because there is no other paper in your house and in fact that is one reason why I am leaving you. How can a person live their life without notepads and notebooks. For God sakes I could not even find an old receipt. You have no books! But I digress. It is not you it is me. I was stupid. All I saw was a pretty face and great abs. You have a six pack! I admit I was blinded by your beauty for a while. I had never been with a guy who looked like you before and it was fun and sexy, but I need more. I need someone who will argue with me about politics and religion and world events and why batman is a way better superhero then Superman. I want someone who reads. Reads a lot and wants to talk about those books. I want someone who is willing to make fun of himself and do stupid stuff like dance in the middle of the Museum of Art even when there is no music. Do you even know where the Museum of Art is? Really it is me not you. I am sure there is some woman out there for you it just is not me. I need more! Good-bye John it was fun but I have got to think about myself here.

Have a good Life,

Sylvia

The Industrial Psychologist

He sat there day in and day out listening to them answer the questions that would either prove they would be a reliable employee or they would be a terrible risk to hire. The company he worked for sold paper and before he took this job he had not realized how difficult selling paper apparently was. The questions he asked often brought the perspective employees to tears. It seemed at times there were no sane people left in the world. The door to his office opened and his secretary said, “Your 3 o’clock is here Dr. Lazer.”

His three o’clock walked through the door and he could already tell the man was not going to make the cut. He was interviewing for a job in sales and Dr. Lazer could already tell from his nervous energy that he was going to fail this test. The man sat down and Dr. Lazer began asking him questions, probing his psyche. After twenty minutes of questions Dr. Lazer was pleasantly surprised that the man was doing so well. All that changed with the next question. It was the question that often made or broke the interviewee. So Dr. Lazer asked the man, “If I were to make the statement that in the future only Robots will know love. What would your response be?” The man just sat there with a defeated look on his face and began to cry. Dr. Lazer was disappointed. This is what happened every time he asked this question. Only about 1 in a 100 was able to pull them selves together and answer the question with a semblance of intelligence. When the man sobs finally stopped Dr. Lazer escorted him to the door. It seemed as if they would never fill this job.

Dr. Lazer went back to his desk and sat down. He picked up the picture of his family and felt all his gears and bits and hard drives whir with emotion. In the end Dr. Lazer knew that the last question was unfair to his human interviewees. And there were times he regretted having to use it to weed out the loose cannons because both he and the humans all knew that the future was now.

I get that sinking feeling

She heard the crash before she felt the jolt jar through her body. As it did she lost her balance and fell. The sirens went off as she was rising from the floor. She calmly went to the bed and rummaged under it until she felt the soft padding of the life vest. She pulled it out and put it on over her lovely evening gown. It was her first grown up gown and she felt very beautiful in it. It was a lovely pale blue silk that clug to her body in all the right places. She went to the door and looked out in the hallway. It was empty, which she thought very odd. She realized that other then the siren it was eerily quite, no screaming or running. She made her way down the hallway toward the stairwell. As she approached the stairs the ship jerked violently to the left and she was thrown first to the floor and then as the ship tipped she was on the left wall. Oh no she thought, this ship is sinking.

With a loud roar the ship was sucked into the ocean and the light blue silk quickly turned to midnight as the ocean swallowed it.

Dear Diary

It lay on the table. All of her deep dark secrets contained in the little book. It was lovely to look at with its sparkly flowers embossed on a pale blue background. The only thing keeping those secrets inside was the little lock on the front. To read it would be the greatest violation of her trust, but not to read it would be a lost chance to know everything that went on in her mind. He really wanted to know everything that went on in her mind. He had loved her for as long as he could remember and it was slowly killing him. He never seemed to be able to say the right thing to her to convince her that they were perfect together. So he held the little key in his hand that just may unlock all of his dreams or would it crush them? He was so uncertain. He had never had to face such a dilemma before and he was sure that he would never have to face this kind of dilemma again. He held the key up to the light and watched as the it gleamed. What should he do? He sat for many minutes holding that key trying to decide what he should do. Finally he picked up the diary and took the key and went over to the bedside table. He carefully put the book back in the drawer where he found it and placed the key under the lamp just like she had left it. He left the room, firm in his decision.

20 years later on their 10Th wedding anniversary she gave him a small package. He unwrapped it, expecting to see a watch or some such thing but there folded in the paper was the diary. She leaned over and kissed him as he opened the diary and read the first entry.

Dear Diary,
My brothers friend Steve came over again today. I think I may be in love. He is so funny and smart and handsome. But he is a junior! Do you think a junior and a freshman can date? I really like him! I wonder if he could ever like me!"

The decision

The decision to do it was not an easy one. After she did it she was pretty sure it was the wrong decision. She should have spent more time thinking about it but she was like that, impulsive. Besides it was too late now anyway. It was done and she could not change it. She resolved right then to be less impulsive and think her decisions through more. It was really too bad that she would never have the chance to put that resolution into practice, but when you decide the fate of mankind on an impulse you really only have yourself to blame. She watched from her window in the Oval Office as the first mushroom cloud appeared on the horizon toward New York city. It was really too bad she was a bad decision maker.

The Perfect Heart

The first time she realized it she was only eleven, but it was not until she was thirteen that she felt it. That day started like any. She put on her favorite pair of jeans and a loose fitting tee shirt and went to school. It was during math class that it happened. The boy was neither a crush nor a friend but when he told her she was fat she felt it. Felt it in her core. From that day forward she felt as if she was a fat girl. In college she made a friend by chance only because she had jokingly commented that if she had lived during Rubens time he would have painted her. In reality she was far too thin for Rubens tastes, but when she looked in the mirror all she saw was fat. She nearly starved herself her sophomore year weighing in at 92 pounds, something she was very proud of at the time. Also at the time she was chased after by men like she never had been before and never would be again. With her 34 double D’s and size 2 body, she was the Barbie doll all men dreamed of. But in reality she was not much more then a skeleton. She gained most of the weight back when she realized she could not go on never eating. She liked food too much. It was not until she was in her thirties that she realized she was not fat. Curvy, womanly, bodacious perhaps but not fat. But the Phenomenon that was the skinny, skinny woman was well entrenched in society and still she heard the comments and occasionally, not often but occasionally still cringed from the sight of her own body. But the day she went to a new doctor and he checked her heart rate and listened to her heart and asked if she did anything aerobic and she replied walked, he said “Well it must be working because your heart rate is perfect, your heart sounds perfect.” Vindication at last. She would have bet her perfect heart that those phenomenally skinny women could not claim they had “a perfect heart!”

Wicked, Wicked Girl

Her first fully formed memory was of her third birthday. She had wanted a Suzie doll. The baby you fed a bottle to and she got a diaper rash. It was all she wanted. What she got was a regular baby doll that only closed its eyes when it slept. She cut off its hair and pulled out its eye lashes and then buried the whole thing in the back yard. Her stepmother called her a wicked, wicked girl. She knew that she was suppose to feel bad about it and that being a wicked, wicked girl was not a good thing but when she repeated the words to herself and they rolled around on her tongue she felt good and liked they way they sounded. So for the next 10 years she did everything in her power to be a wicked, wicked girl. She never did what she was told, she always behaved badly in public and as the years went on she was told over and over what a wicked girl she was. She knew that her stepmother hated her and she did not blame her. So when they sent her to the boarding school she was prepared. it only took her ten days to get expelled. At the next boarding school it only took seven, the next three and the last one only 4 hours. She was wicked and she liked it. The hour before her life changed she was once again rolling the word wicked around on her tongue and as always it tasted good. When the train stopped she did not notice at first. Not until she saw them did she realize what was happening. They converged on the train and people began to scream. She grabbed her bag and sunk to the floor. She knew they would eventually find her and she had to be ready. When she heard them coming she jumped up and sprayed the can of mace right into the leaders eyes. He yelped and dropped his gun. She ran. Ran as fast and as far as her legs would take her. She stopped to rest and tried to think of a plan. she would have to disappear. Her parents had finally done what they said they would do every time she did something wicked. They had sent these men she was certain and if she did not get away they would make sure she was not wicked anymore.

The Large Appliance Department

His name was not Bob but that is what he used while selling large Appliances at the Sears on Lawrence Avenue. He was grumpy and with his gravely voice he scared off some of the pretty young things that come in during the hottest part of the summer to buy a air condition. It seemed like Bob had spent his life around large appliances because he knew so much about BTU,s and electric coils. But Bob had only worked at that Sears for a couple years. Before that he had lived in Tuscon and sold cars, before that he had lived in Topeka and sold mattresses and even before that he had lived in the Twin cities driving a snow plow for the city. If the pretty young things buying those air conditioners had stopped to notice they may have figured it out, but most never took the time. From his dress shoes to his three gold rings and large gold chain around his neck to his slicked backed hair Bob was so obviously not a Bob that it was a common joke among his co-workers. Little did they know that the joke was on them. When they joked about how he did not look like your typical Midwestern Bob, he just nodded his head and said nothing. He liked his job at Sears and the city he lived in and had no real desire to move again, so he kept his thoughts to himself on the subject of his name. What he wanted to say was " That is right you idiots, I ain't no Bob, my name is Tony and I come from Trenton and in the blink of I could break your neck and have your body disposed of!" But he didn't and besides he did not mind the name Bob so much at least it was better then the name he had in Topeka.

"What's your sign?"

“What’s your sign?” The man sitting next to her asked. She glanced over at him with disdain. Did he really just ask that question? Had she some how been transported back in time to 1978? He looked normal enough and was actually kind of cute so she wondered what he was thinking by using such a silly pick-up line. When she turned back toward him he was gone. That was weird she thought but as she sipped her drink and tried to forget about her terrible day she forgot about him and listened to the inane conversation her friends were having about some celebrity. The next morning as she was just coming out of that deep refreshing sleep one achieves from just a few glasses of wine she recalled the guy and his “ What’s your sign?” line. The more she thought about it the odder it seemed. That afternoon while she was sitting at the café drinking her coffee and typing on her laptop the last thing she expected to hear was that same question “What’s your sign?” This time it came from an elderly women sitting next to her at the coffee shop. “You look like a Gemini, are you a Gemini dear?” She could only nod her head yes as the woman started to babble on about Gemini and their traits. She packed up her lap top finished her coffee and escaped. Two days in a row the same question, this was getting weirder by the moment. The next evening as she walked her dog along the path by the lake she heard it ever so faintly wafting on the breeze from the beach, “What’s your sign?” She jerked her head up and looked toward the beach but did not see anyone there. Weird! After several days with no one uttering those three words again she forgot about the weirdness of it all and after several weeks it did not cross her mind again. So the day it happened she was not prepared for it, if she had maybe noticed the signs she would not have been walking alone that night along that stretch of road where he was known to have struck before.

The next morning the paper waited on her front door step. A door step she would never cross again. The headline read, “Gemini Killer Strikes again.”

It Started With a Scab

She picked at the scab on her knee. It felt good and when the scab slowly peeled away leaving a shiny bloody spot it felt even better. That was how it started, the cutting. As a remembrance of that day she first picked at a scab as a small girl. Now she cut all the time and each time she did it felt better then it had the last time. She hid the cuts behind long sleeves and no one had guessed yet and that also made her feel good, knowing that it was her secret.

He was a Hit and Run Hugger

As he crossed the street he did not notice the taxi that was zooming toward the intersection. Perhaps the taxi driver was distracted by the pretty girl in the back of his cab but he failed to notice the red light and ran it, hitting the man crossing the street. There was a slight thump as the taxi winged the man’s right leg but he remained upright and although he would have a nasty bruise he was uninjured. The taxi screeched to a halt, the driver jumped out ran toward the man and screamed, “Are you hurt?” The man shook his head no and then as if possessed the taxi driver reached out and hugged the man. He released him as quickly as he had hugged him and ran back to his cab, screeching as he fled the scene.

The Corn

When she left the city on the lake to drive home to her parents for a week-end or a holiday she would drive straight down the interstate. With each proceeding mile the city would become a distant memory of steel and concrete as the cornfields and cow pastures grew more numerous. She would exit the interstate at a small town 9 miles from the tiny town she grew up in and although she cherished every minute in that city on the lake she always felt like she was coming home as she sped through the fields high with corn. That is how she remembered her childhood. Corn. It had been everywhere. Across the street and up on the hill and surrounding her High School. She recalled long summer drives on lone country roads with corn six feet high on both sides. She and her brother and friends had built a corn fort one summer. Knocking down the stalks in a circle that surely from the air looked like a crop circle. Corn. It had played a large part in her world in the country. In the city she only found corn in cans or in a farmers market stall. But she could still conjure in her minds eye a dark night lite only by the moon with corn surrounding her as she walked the country road near the house she grew up in and if she tried really hard she could still remember the scent of the corn in the night.

The Birthday Girl

She stood on the corner in her party dress. The lyrics from that song that everyone can sing kept running through her head. “It’s my party and I will cry if I want to, cry if I want to. You would cry too if it happened to you.” She was not crying, but she was very tempted to let the tears she was holding back flow. The party was not supposed to end with her standing on the corner in her party dress. She was supposed to be dancing and laughing and having a great time. It was her birthday after all. But no she was standing here, waiting for a bus. This was supposed to be the best birthday ever and it had so far turned out to be the worst, even worse then the year she had chicken pox. A single tear slid from her eye as she tried to force her mind from the depressing images that flashed before her eyes of the spoiled cake and screaming match that had occurred, her friend’s looks of horror. Her hand still hurt from where she had slapped him. Slapped harder then he deserved but when what you expected as a present is so far from what you get you may become a little irrational. Was she really that hard to read? Did her friends and family really think she would want a gift card to Home Depot? Who were they buying that gift for, certainly not her! The worst birthday ever, but still the waiter did not deserve that slap. It was just a little water.

Zombie War

The mask slipped down a little. She was sweating and her hair and face were slick with the sweat. She tightened the straps on her mask to make sure it slipped no more. If any of the rancid air got in she would be dead. She gripped the machine gun in her hand even tighter. Her team of hunters were tired. This was the 10th patrol in a row they had taken, but so many of the other patrol teams had lost too many members to take this, the most dangerous patrol of the night. She walked slowly behind her captain as she heard the large town clock strike midnight. Twelve gongs rang out through the night, signalling the beginning of feeding time for them. THEM, that is what they called them. THEM, those who had been their loved ones once. THEM, those who ate the flesh of humans, THEM, those who should have stayed buried in the ground but now walked among the living. She clearly remembered the night she was on patrol and finally encountered a former loved one. Her sister! She had done what was necessary but it still had hurt her heart when she had severed the head of the thing that had been her sister. Her family was all gone now and all she had left were the men on this team, they were now her family and she would do anything to make sure none of them were ever turned into one of THEM. She tightened her mask again and prepared for the fight that would surely come as THEY began to feed.

Turning Back Time

The room whirled and danced as she spun herself around and around just like she had as a small girl. Her vision started to blur as she spun faster and faster. Finally she landed with a thump on the floor. Rubbing her thigh where she had landed and was sure to have a bruise later she wobbled her way to the kitchen still dizzy from the spinning. She checked the clock on the microwave and then went to the calendar, hoping to see the calendar turned back to April. But it was still firmly set at June. She new it was futile these crazy attempts at turning time back, but she had to do something. She had ruined it and the only way to get a second chance was to go back in time. She had tried everything, pleading, begging, crying, cajoling, everything! Nothing had worked. He was gone and he was not going to ever give her a second chance. The restraining order was sitting on the coffee table as she wandered back to the family room. Had he really done that? Had she really been that bad? She knew that the calls and e-mails were endless but did he really have to file a restraining order, she only wanted a chance to explain. Explain that it had been a mistake and that she was really sorry. Was that really too much to ask for? She lay down on the floor and looked at the ceiling. The spinning had been her tenth attempt at turning back time, all ideas she had gotten from the internet. None had worked. Tears started to leak at the corners of her eyes as she remembered the confrontation two months ago. He had been so angry and she had done a terrible job of trying to explain and that was it. It was over. She cried herself to sleep that night knowing that there sometimes were no second chances.

The Ocean Voyage

When she saw the ship slowly moving into the port she knew her freedom was over. She had married him in that spur of the moment movement that was sweeping across the country in the first years of the war. He had been funny and handsome and was leaving in the morning for the war front where he might possibly die. They had spent one night together, their wedding night and in the morning he was gone. She was not even sure she could really remember what he looked like. She had spent the last three years marveling at the freedom the wedding ring on her finger gave her. With a husband over seas fighting she was granted the freedom to live alone and work and spend as much time with her friends as she wanted. It was the first time in her life she had never had to report her whereabouts to anyone and she loved it. Every minute of it. Free, like the waves of the ocean which were bringing that freedom to an end.

He sat on his bunk as the waves of the ocean lapped at the sides of the ship that was slowly making its way into the harbor. He tried to drown out the voice in his head by listening to the slap of those waves against the ship, but it was no use. The voice kept repeating one word over and over and over again. That word was Idiot. He had been an idiot to marry a girl he had just met and knew nothing about the night before he left for war. But he had been sure he was going to die in that war and she had been funny and pretty. And now here he was. Stuck, trapped, and imprisoned in a marriage with a woman he did not know. As the waves drew the ship closer to shore he closed his eyes and tried not to think about the freedom he would lose when this ocean voyage ended.

The Wings

When he was born the wings on his back were laying flat against his body and the doctors and nurses did not notice them at first but as they placed him in his mothers arms one nurse noticed the pale blue and green iridescent color of the wings. She said nothing. Later that day after she finished her shift she went to the nursery to find the boy with the wings, but he was not there. When she asked around she found out that he had been air lifted to another hospital for surgery. The floor was filled with the gossip of the boy with wings and how he was sent to have those wings removed. The nurse said nothing but she would quit that job in a few weeks and disappear. She had been quite and no one really noticed when she left. The boy would grow up forever hiding his back from everyone, including his parents, who had never fully recovered from the trauma of his birth. They had no other children for fear that they too would have the same terrible defect as their son, whom they had never told about the wings only the surgery to "fix his spine". So on his 15th birthday when he felt the first tingles in his back where the wings had once been he thought nothing of it. That night when he took off his clothes and saw the first sprouts of the wings he screamed. His mother came running into the room and when she saw the pale blue and green of the sprouting wings she fainted. When they tried to explain to their son about his birth he grew silent. The wings by now had grown to just over four feet each. He could wrap them around his body and cover them with a shirt. Over the next few years his parents tried to have him get them removed, but he refused. On his eighteenth birthday he gave his parents a birthday gift and disappeared. They were relieved. He told no one of the wings but whenever he got the chance he would soar over the countryside with his beautiful wings sparkling in the sunlight. One day ten years after leaving home as he was flying over a empty field far out in the country he spotted a speck that seemed to be moving toward him. He dropped to the ground and waited. As if dancing on the wind a young woman came into view and dropped down in front of him. The stared at each other for a few seconds and then he started asking questions, he was out of breath and she was laughing. She patiently answered all of his questions about who she was, where she came from, and why she too had wings. As they sat and talked he noticed a shimmer in the distance. She jumped up and started fluttering her wings. She explained that it was her family approaching. He was shocked as a group of people floated down to where they stood.

"Those Wings of yours are just as lovely now as they were when you were born." said the young woman's mother.

I have been shot

So on Sunday morning I was minding my own buisness walking my dog when out of nowhere my arch nemisis, Joshi, appeared and proceeded to pull out a gun, aim it at me and shoot me. Multiple shots to the head, chest and stomach. Joshi is almost three now and it was a water gun, but still he shot me and was laughing the whole time. The little monster.

City on the Lake

She had spent large portions of her life moving from one place to another, never feeling like she was home. In those places she did not call home she had a good life but something always seemed to be missing. So when she returned from a stay over seas and settled in a city where for once her parents and siblings all lived she felt maybe this would be home. But over the next five years they all left. Left her in this dirty, sad and broken city that was slowly falling apart at the seams. Her family was gone and she had no boyfriend and only a few friends and a job she loathed so what was keeping her tied to this city? Nothing. She packed her bags and moved to the gleaming city by the lake and on that very first day in her new city she felt as if she was coming home. Something in the air and on the wind made the strings of her heart strum for this city. She felt it deep in her bones. She had no real connection to this city, other then brief visits for fun and work and a glimmer of past knowledge of her grandmother’s youth here. It was not until she discovered the manuscript buried in a filing cabinet drawer in her parents garage. When she read the history of her grandmother’s family and learned that they had chosen to build their hotel, before the turn of the century, in that gleaming city on the lake she felt her heart strings strum again. She read of the hotel and her great grandmother, she read about her thirteen year old grandmother taking the train downtown, she read about the city her family had loved and she knew without a doubt that she was home. Home in a city that had everything, museums, shops, theaters, comedy, friends and lovers. But most importantly roots. Her roots.

The Turquoise Bike and The Secret Past of Mrs. Komp

I had these two stories posted on Six Sentences so I thought I would put them up here as well.

The Turquoise Bike

When the snow stopped falling she knew it was time to finish it. She loaded the glock, strapped it to her thigh, pulled on her leather jacket and headed out the door. She ran into her eighty-seven year old neighbor Mrs. Komp on her way down the front steps where Mrs. Komp was chaining up her turquoise bike. “Off on another of your adventures” Mrs. Komp asked. She just nodded her head at Mrs. Komp as she pulled her car keys from her pocket. “Be careful dear and don’t shoot any bystanders this time, one shot to the head is all it should take for that weasel” Mrs. Komp said.

The Secret Past of Mrs. Komp

She waited for the door of the elevator to close before she removed the letter from her bag and stared once again at the face that had haunted her dreams since that night 60 years ago. That night had changed her life forever and this face was the reason she had become the person she was today. That night 60 years ago was supposed to be her wedding night, but one bullet had ended her dreams and set her on this path of destruction. Tonight she would end it and with this one last job she could retire and disappear to a tropical island. She had grown weary of this profession and besides her eye sight was faltering, that is what happened when you got old. As the elevator reached the 25th floor and the doors began to slide open she pulled her .45 from her bag and waited for her moment.

Kurt Vonnegut 1922-2007

"We are what we pretend to be so we must be careful what we pretend to be." Kurt Vonnegut

It is a sad day for America. We have lost one of the most brilliant minds in America and with his passing a small part of what has made this country great in the past is gone. If we fail to acknowldege this we will soon have no cutlure left. So tonight instead of watching a stupid reality show are lame sitcom grab a copy of Welcome to the Monkey House or Breakfast of Champions or any Vonnegut book and see what makes America great.

The Image is from his website.

In the news.............

that morning was a story of woman who was found wandering around downtown wearing a wedding dress and carrying a bloody knife. When interviewed by police she claimed she had no knowledge of who she was or where she had gotten either the dress or the bloody knife. They admitted her to the psychiatric ward of the county hospital where she underwent a multitude of tests. All of the test and psychiatrists agreed that she was suffering from amnesia. The police tested the blood and could find no known DNA match. They plastered her face over all the news outlets in the city, state and entire country but no one, not a single person, came forward claiming knowledge of the woman. So after a few months of hospital care and still no return of her memory and still no person coming forward claiming to know her, she was released. The people of the city had been generous and when she left the hospital there was a very large sum of money waiting for her, donated by people who felt bad for the young woman with no memory. She rented an apartment and found a job and created a life from nothing. With no memory she could create what ever she wanted. For a while she was a minor celebrity in the city and people would approach her at restaurants and in the grocery store, wondering if her memory had returned. After a year people stopped approaching her and her celebrity wore off. Two years into her new life she meet a man and fell in love. He loved her humor and her brain and did not care that she had no memories from before two years. They married and in a few years started a family. And still no glimmer of memory. Her husband would sometimes ask and she would always say the same thing, " I don't think it is ever coming back." Doctors would occasionally call to interview her for a paper or a study about amnesia and it sometimes lasting effects. Then one day when her children were nearly grown and on their way out the door headed to school, she sat down with a coffee and began to read the paper and there in the news was the story she had feared she would see all these years. The story was about two hikers who found a body in a shallow grave in the forest preserve that bordered the city. The story went on to mention that the body appeared to be wearing a tux. The police were chasing leads. She set the paper down when she heard the doorbell ring. She slowly got up crossed to the sliding glass door and slipped out the back, leaving the police ringing the doorbell on her empty house.

In the Kitchen

I did not get the chance to post something for the Sunday Scribbling topic in the kitchen but I did write this recently:

There was a single light glowing above the sink in the kitchen as she slowly pushed the back door open and slipped into the house. She began tip-toeing to the front of the house. She had made it to about the middle of the room before she heard the flick of the light switch and she was blinded by the flood of lights that filled the kitchen. He sat on the stool in the corner by the refrigerator. He was wearing his fire engine pajamas and looked like to the entire world the perfect image of the perfect little boy, but she knew better. She knew that in his small blond adorable frame he contained more evil then had ever existed anywhere else on earth and she regretted the errand she had had to run this night that put her in this position. She knew that he would use this to blackmail her into something terrible. As she stood there frozen in the middle of the kitchen and looked at the adorable blond child, a vicious smile spread across his face transforming the angelic child into the monster he was. She knew the moment he decided what her punishment would be bad she could tell it was going to be very bad. How long was she going to have to continue this charade and how was she ever going to rid the world of his evil. She was the only one who saw and knew and one day she was going to have to end it. When she looked back at the child his smile had slipped a little and she remembered to make her face the blank mask that was her only protection. He looked her up and down and then in his sweet high infant voice said, “You are in big trouble Mommy, you should never have left the house without telling me, this is what I need you to do…..”

The Deep and Dark

In the dark forest behind the house where she grew-up there was a place no one went. All of the other kids in the neighborhood were scared of this deepest darkest part of the already dark forest. That is the place where she would go to sit in silence and dream of a future outside this godforsaken town and its equally forsaken inhabitants. She would sit in the dark hollowed out oak tree and imagine herself in exotic places doing exotic things. She was a voracious reader and she knew that the world beyond this hellish town was real and magical all at once. She imagined that once this town had been a better place but it had lost all of its magic long ago. She knew this but no one else did, so they feared this forest and its darkness while she tasted of its secrets. When word got out that she was venturing into the darkness her mother beat her with a wooden spoon leaving welts that took weeks to fade. Her classmates shunned her and called her evil names. But she did not care. They had no magic in their veins anymore and she was pretty sure that most could not read and would never understand the beauty of the forest or the world beyond. She had falsely promised her mother that she would not venture into the deep dark forest again, but once the welts faded so did the memory of that promise and she went back into the forest. That trip into the dark would change her life for ever. As she followed the path deeper and deeper into the forest she did not hear the sirens that warned of a tornado coming, the forest blocked the noise of those sirens like it would block the wind from that tornado. The forest would protect her that day as the tornado would ripe through her town destroying everything in it path including the house she lived in. When she would emerge from the deep and dark of the forest and survey the ruin of her town and home, she would only shed a tear for the books she had lost, but nothing else.

When the state legislature passed the bill that would allow for a mall to be built where that forest stood, one woman wept at her computer in a city across the ocean. Wept for the deepest darkest part of that forest.

Ballad of a Giggling Girl

He wrote the song about a girl he knew in High School. It rose to number one on the Pop Charts quickly. He went on all the morning talk shows to perform and he went on all the late night talk shows to perform. When they asked if the song was about anyone in particular, he lied made up a pretty story about a lovely girl in college. He kept the real story to himself. The story of the fifteen year old girl who giggled at the drop of a hat and loved him like he would never be loved again. A story of a summer filled with gigles and love. A story so sad it still made his face flame with shame. A story of destruction. A story of that same giggling girl discovering his deception, of hearing the laughs of thier fellow classmates when she confronted him in the hallway and he denied any knowledge of thier shared summer. A story about the look on the girls face that shattered his heart and ruined him for anyone else. A story of a girl who never giggled again. On those late night talk shows he would play that ballad with all his soul. Straining to hear the giggles.

Future Visions

She saw the future in her dreams. When she was six she dreamed of her high school graduation. When she was nine she dreamed of her college days and what she would study. When she was twelve she dreamed of her future career. When she was sixteen she dreamed of her wedding day and saw the man she would marry. Her dreams continued to show the future, so she made no plans and let her dreams carry her along. She graduated from High School just like her dream. She went to college and when she graduated she got the job she had dreamed of. All her dreams had come true so far and so she waited for the rest, and as she waited she failed to take notice that her life was passing her by, so when she woke upon the morning of the day she dreamed her wedding would be and had no groom to marry her dreams crumbled. As she sat on her bed and cried she slowly realized that dreams could not compare with life and she had let hers go by without taking part. So she got herself up off her bed and made the decisions to no longer rely on her dreams to build her life. Now she would make the decisions. And as the rest of her life unfolded she no longer was just along for the ride but was the driving force and that made all the difference.

The Evil Eye

She had worn the necklace for as long as she could remember. She could still remember the day her grandmother had given it to her. It had been her sixth birthday and her grandmother, who had been living with them for three years by then, had pulled her into her room. She sat her on the bed and gave her the gold chain with the beautiful blue crystal pendant. When she looked at the pendant she would swear to this day that the eye winked at her. Her Grandmother stressed that she must wear the pendant always. That it would protect her from anyone who was trying to do her bad. So she had. Not because she believed but because she had loved her grandmother. A woman from another land and another time, who did not fit in to the American culture, who kept her old superstitions. The girl had never been to her mother's homeland, a place her Grandmother described with such love and hate at the same time. A country left to die under a communist regime for 39 years. A place where to this day folk myths, legends and superstitions still existed. So she wore the necklace for 30 years now, never giving it a second thought until someone asked about it and then she would tell them the story of her grandmother and how she made her swear never to take it off. It was a good story, people enjoyed it. So the day that it happened she did not even realize that without her grandmother she would not have lived. He was walking toward her on the sidewalk and at first she did not notice him, but as he got closer she felt the change in the air and shivered. She did not look at his face as he approached a warning remembered from her Grandmother. As he passed by she could feel the heat of the pendant and at that moment she understood that there was evil in her modern world and that she must listen to those old superstitions and protect herself.

Trapped and Puzzeled

She awoke with no knowledge of where she was. She blinked her eyes rapidly hoping that would help. But it did not. She tried to sit up but realized almost immediately that she could not. Her arms were chained to the bed on which she was laying. What the heck was happing? The last thing she remembered was the sound of her students leaving the classroom at the end of the day. She had gone to the window to look out on the playground and there was a loud banging sound then nothing. Everything after that was dark. What had happened and who would do this to her. Over the next few years she tried to figure out how she had come to be trapped in this dark place chained to a bed. She heard voices outside her cell often but when she screamed for help none ever came. It was a puzzle she feared she would never solve and slowly she came to accept her imprisonment.


The Nurse was checking her vitals when her mother walked into the room. “How is she doing today?” her mother asked. “She is the same, Mrs. Thompson. No change, she is still in a coma.” the Nurse replied.

Karl Marx and the Rolex

So I was in a meeting at which a gentleman wearing a Rolex (a real one) was speaking about things that purely fit into the category Capitalism with a big old C. And as I was occasionally weaving back and forth between what he was saying and my own random thoughts I almost missed when he quoted Karl Marx. I kid you not a man wearing a Rolex talking about Capitalism, specifically World Points earned on certain credit cards quoted from Karl Marx. The direct quote was “World Points are the opium of the masses.” I almost busted out laughing, I quickly surveyed the room and either they were not paying attention or had better poker faces then because no one else seemed to notice. I have a couple questions still bouncing around in my head now. Did he realize that was Marx? If he did was he being ironic? Will I ever have an answer to these questions, I doubt it, but at least a have had this surreal experience. Gotta love this Country.

Movie Star Crush

She was not the type of girl boys had crushes on. She had her share of crushes growing up but she never knew of a single boy or girl for that matter who had a crush on her. And when she was young it hurt but as she grew older it did not bother her as much. But she did dream of what it would be like if some one did have a crush on her, would it make her feel powerful, would she finally feel pretty? She knew in her heart that these were ridiculous things to dream about but there you have it the mind does not always agree with the heart. So she was utterly unprepared for when it happened. She did not even realize it was a crush at first. At the age of thirty –five she never expected to be the object of anyone’s crush let alone a famous movie star. It happened quite by accident, she was crossing one of the many bridges that span the Chicago River when her heel got stuck in a crack between the planks. He was approaching from the other side, she had heard he had a Condo in this part of town but she never expected to see him. But there he was helping her pull her shoe out of the crack, making her laugh and asking her to lunch. She declined of course. It would be ridiculous to think he was interested, but then the calls and flowers started. She finally agreed to meet him for lunch at some upscale restaurant she had never dreamed of going to. It was nice, but the food was better then the conversation and she realized that his personality that blared so loudly on screen was an act. He was an actor after all. She thanked him for lunch and planned to never see him again, but he had other plans. She refused his dinner invitations; she threw the flowers in the garbage. This was getting ridiculous and she had no experience with these kinds of crushes. How was she going to get him to stop? When he invited her to the Oscars she finally told him NO for good. She went to an Oscar party at her friends that year. She had told no one of his crush, because who would believe her anyway. They watched the arrival of the Stars, oohing and ahhing over everyone’s dresses and the handsome men, Then there he was on the TV, alone and looking forlorn, when E Entertainment Television asked him why he was alone he blurted out the whole story, he was in love with a girl in Chicago who had turned him down. After that night everything in her world went topsy turvy. The Press would not stop calling. She had to change her phone number 20 times. She could not leave her apartment without being followed. When she had dreamed of someone having a crush on her this is not what she had expected. She wanted her life back. So late one evening when the reporters were drinking coffee at the corner Starbucks she snuck out of her apartment with a small bag and disappeared into the night. After a month of no reappearance the press and her crush moved on to the next big thing, while she silently slipped back into her life.

Red Velvet Cupcakes with Pink Icing

I think I had the best valentines day that I have ever had since i was a little kid. do you remember how great valentines was as a kid? You got a little folded card from everyone in your class and there was a party with cupcakes and candy and everyone was wearing red and pink and you had also gotten a box of chocolates from your parents as well. There was no pressure just fun. That is what valentines should be like. But as I walked by the florist yesterday as everyone was rushing in to get flowers, it just did not seem that fun. We humans put to much pressure on ourselves to have this fantastical romantic day that no one can ever really do. So I have for many years boycotted the day. I do not wear red , I do not buy cards , I do not send flowers. And this year was no different. But this year my friends D and S and I decided to have dinner at my house and watch Lost, which we occasionally do on Wed, anyway. So I made Lasagna and Red Velvet Cupcakes with Pink Icing and D brought cocktails and we sat and ate and talked and then watched Lost and it was so nice. I think that when people first started celebrating Valentines day this is what they meant, have a good time, enjoy your friends and loved ones. Do not expect presents because you will be disappointed.

If only everything could be this Yummy

She lost her virginity in the cornfield behind her house the summer after her senior year and it was yummy. She had dreaded the experience because she had heard the stories of pain and unpleasteness that the first time would likely be, but with him it was different. With him everything was yummy. She was in love for the first time and he was everything she had ever dreamed of. He was funny and smart and so handsome it almost made her weep. With his intense blue eyes and serious talk of world politics she had fallen hard and the fact that he loved her still amazed her even to this day 20 years later, to think that the beautiful young man with such a charisma could love her, the bookish chubby weird girl. She had spent most of High School dreading the mornings when she had to leave, she planned her escape down to the last detail and then he had entered her life and she gave him everything she had been saving of herself. They spent hours driving around in his car talking and laughing and loving. And in the field the week before she left for College she gave him her virginity and it was perfect so perfect that at that moment she knew nothing would ever be as good as that. She left for college while he stayed home and worked on his father’s farm and slowly this beautiful thing they had slowly started to disintegrate and in the end she was left with a sweet yummy memory that still twenty years later could bring a smile to her face. There were many more boys after him even one she married, but none of them could ever dislodge that blue-eyed boy from her heart and when she heard of his death a little piece of her disappeared through the whole in heart that he had left.

It Started With a Scab

She picked at the scab on her knee. It felt good and when the scab slowly peeled away leaving a shiny bloody spot it felt even better. That was how it started, the cutting. As a remembrance of that day she first picked at a scab as a small girl. Now she cut all the time and each time she did it felt better then it had the last time. She hid the cuts behind long sleeves and no one had guessed yet and that also made her feel good, knowing that it was her secret.

Good-Bye Cruel World

He stood to the side of the road with his thumb lifted waiting for someone to show some mercy and stop and offer him a ride. He had been waiting for days although to him it had seemed like months. This place, this world was so sad and he could not bear it any longer, so he had packed a bag and was heading home. He was hopeless and this was the only answer he had found. It was drastic he knew but he wanted it worse then he had ever wanted anything, even worse then he had wanted world domination and the end of the human race. He wanted all of his circuits removed and he wanted to be melted down, robot suicide they called it.


On a Side note I will have a story up on Tuesday on a site called Six Sentences, check it out.

The Chronicle

It sat on the top of a huge pile of garbage in a dump that was soon to be turned back into green space. The images inside showed smiling faces, laughing babies and holidays filled with love and joy. One image was quite remarkable. It was an image of a young woman sitting on a park bench surrounded by small children. Every face looked serious and their clothes attested to the fact it was some time in the early 1920’s. Images like this exist in many places that is not what made it remarkable. On the back of the picture hidden from view were the names of those who had posed for the picture, one being the owner of the photo and the book that contained it, and if you knew history and understood what had happened in Russia during the Revolution you would have known why another name, the name Anastasia Romanov was remarkable. But it sat there on that heap of trash forgotten by those who had loved the one who had cherished it. She had died years ago and as it passed from generation to generation it become nothing more then one more book to be stored. And finally when it passed to the great granddaughter and she got married and started her own family it was abandoned, this chronicle of one woman’s life was thrown on a trash heap and would soon disappear for good. And once more a history would be lost forever.

I like Robots

I like Robots that is why I like fantasy. The kinds of Robots I like do not exist in reality. They have laser beam eyes that can blow up whole cities. They have computer brains that allow them to feel anger and hate. They want to destroy the human race purely for the reason that they are more intelligent then humans. I like evil computers as well. Ones like HAL and the computer from War Games. Give me a good story about evil robots and super computers and I am hooked. Robots Rock!

In the blink of an Eye

In the blink of an eye the idea was there, as if it had always existed and just needed to be noticed. She gathered up her things and threw them into a backpack. She left through her bedroom window hoping against hope that her parents did not hear her as she shimmed down the trellis by her window. She made not a sound and the house remained dark and quite and like that she was gone. When her parents woke the next morning they would think she was sleeping in. It was Saturday morning and teen-agers liked to do that they would think, each privately wishing she would get up so they would not have to talk to each other. They had loved once but that love had died with Greg there first child. They knew and Susan knew it, but no one said anything and they all went on living their lives together in that house but being utterly and completely alone. That was why Susan knew the idea was sound and why she had left. Her parents finally decide that 2pm was a long enough sleep in and went upstairs to rouse their daughter that fateful Saturday morning. When they realized she was gone they became frantic, calling the police and everyone they knew. But they slowly came to realize that she was gone and no amount of searching, pleading on television news programs, posting signs or milk cartons was going to bring her back. For years they continued the charade pretending to be the concerned loving parents of the missing girl. Until one day they both knew it was over, and it seemed as if at one exact moment they both had the same idea at the same time. They both packed a bag and the Mother left through the front door while the Father slipped out the back. When it became evident that they were gone the bank foreclosed on the house and it was sold to a lovely young couple with two young children, one a boy and one a girl.

Too much kissing

All the kissing was too much for her. Every where she went in the small village people would stop to greet her and kiss her on each cheek. It was what they did. After only a week in the village she had stopped leaving her apartment. She did not want to risk bumping into someone on the street who would greet her with kisses. Her family had never been really demonstratively affectionate. She knew they loved her and she did not need them to touch her to prove it. She had told her friends her loathing of being touched and they knew not to touch her, but here where she barley spoke the language and did not want to offend the culture she had said nothing and had to endure the numerous kisses. Her first two months there she barley went out. She avoided places where she knew people gathered. She cringed when she saw people she knew. But slowly ever so slowly things began to change, she began to change. It happened quite by accident about 8 months after she had first arrived. Someone who understood English over heard a conversation she had with a visitor about her dislike of being touched. Word spread around the village. Out of respect for their beloved American they stopped touching her. They no longer kissed her cheeks or looped their arms through hers. She did not notice at first, but as the days and weeks passed she felt as if something was missing and she slowly started to crave a kiss on the cheek. One night she had a vivid dream about a village where no one touched or kissed. When she awoke in the morning she realized that she lived in that village, but it was only her they did not touch or kiss. She worried she had done something to offend them. She spent the next few days deep in depression. The villagers noticed, they became concerned, what should they do. One brave soul decided to take action. He approached the American and touched her arm, forgetting the villagers pact, she burst out crying. The villagers poured from their houses, what was wrong they asked. She burst out with her fears and how sad she was they no longer kissed her cheeks. They responded with their fear that they had been kissing her too much and knew she had not liked being touched. Then they all hugged and proceeded to kiss each other on the cheeks, this took several minutes while everyone laughed and hugged and kissed. When she returned to America a year later she was a changed person, she greeted everyone she meet with a kiss to each cheek.

The Common Cold and the Koran

The past week has been filled with a stuffed nose and four boxes of Kleenex. With all of the technological advances we have made in the past 100 years and all the new medicines you would think that we could eradicate the common cold, but no we all continue to suffer through bouts with this miserable little virus. I hate having a cold, hate it hate hate it. I am not a good sick person. I hate laying about not being able to breath and trying to think of something else when all I can think of is that I can not breath. You would think that those doctors who have perfected the perfect breast implants would have used their talents for something more worthwhile, like finding a cure for the common cold, but alas there is no money in that.

obviously I am in a grouchy mood because of said cold but this has not diminished my loathing of a certain congressman from Virginia and the thousands of journalist and others who were first shocked then offended by the new Congressman from Minnesota who being a Muslim will of course be using the Koran for his swearing in. This is of course completely sensible to me, of course a person who is being sworn in to an office that has a swearing in would use the religious text of their choice(or maybe a copy of Kurt Vonneguts, "slaughter House 5" if they have no religion). But apparently the congressman from VA and many people have not read the constitution, particularly the first 10 amendments because they were under some sort of illusion that this country has a specific religion. Because it does NOT! And the argument that it says "IN GOD WE TRUST" on our money does not wash. That was added in 1954 the same year that "Under God" was added to the Pledge. We can choose any religion we want or no religion at all. This is the USA for #%$%^& sake. Of course a Muslim being sworn into office would use the Koran. Stupid Dumb Americans, get off your asses and read something. No wonder the world hates us when we make it so easy for them.

My Mom Cooks Like it is still the 70's

I can hardly contain myself. The last few days have been torture. And I foresee the next two days being just as bad. I leave for home Friday morning. Home is Avon Indiana(not actually the town I grew up in but very close and I will drive through my small town with its single four way stop.) My parents have a condo in Avon and my sister and her family and my brother and his will all be there and we will pretty much gorge ourselves on food. My mom is a great cook and we always have the same things at Christmas, Turkey on Christmas eve and Ham on Christmas day. Intermixed with all of that are the snacks. Cheeseballs, cookies, Chex Mix(homemade of course) and more specifically, a dried beef horseradish creamcheese roll up thing that is so good I crave it. It is one of what I call the 70's hors'douvres. The other is a dip made with creamcheese, garlic and chili sauce. My Mom got these recipe's in the 1970's and they are so delicious they just may be the best thing ever to come from the 70's.

Only two more days!!!!!!!!

I am one of those people

I never thought I would be one of those people, but I am. My last two posts have had pictures of my dog Chavdar, dressed for the holidays. In today's picture he is an elf. He is so darn adorable. I swear that I do not usually dress him up in costumes, but at Halloween and Christmas I can not help myself. My favorite part I admit is the fact that he looks so angry when in costume. He hates it and you can tell in the pictures. That is what makes so adorable. I promise this will be the last picture of Chavdar(for at least a couple of weeks)

Merry Christmas

I love Christmas. Despite my lingering doubts about the existence of a God let alone a Christian god I still love Christmas. I love that despite the sometimes bitter cold evenings, that the twinkling Christmas lights on the houses in my neighborhood make the walk from the train so much better. I love the constant strains of Christmas music pouring from cars, headphones and stores. I love my Christmas tree, I turn it on first thing in the morning and it is the last thing off at night. I love that my friends Gwyn and Peter are having a holiday cocktail party where Peter and I will play Christmas carols, he on the piano and me on the violin. I love that I will see my entire family for four days and that we will bake cookies, eat lots of chex mix, play board games and video games, watch "National Lampoons Christmas Vacation" and my Dad will laugh so hard he will cause himself to cough because of his asthma, and we will laugh and have fun and open Christmas gifts. Christmas is Wonderful.

The Reward

She received a reward every time she behaved. A cookie here a piece of pie there and sometimes a pair of diamond earrings or plasma screen TV for her room and once a pony. She learned to always behave. At her father's company Christmas Party she was on her best behavior everyone commented on how cute she was and what a good girl. But underneath all of the good behavior lurked a soul that wanted to yell and kick and scream at the top of her lungs. She kept her dark feelings all bottled up and slowly the rage built and built and as the years passed the rewards stopped. She no longer received a cookie here a pair of diamond earrings there. She dyed her hair purple then blue then green. Every part of her body that could be pierced was and she was on her ninth tattoo. Her parents told her every day how disappointed they were in her and she was not invited to her father's company Christmas party. So that night she sat on the balcony of her room that over looked the garden below where people from her father's company mingled. They laughed and drank and made small talk. She heard her father's voice before she saw him, " Lillian, oh yes it has been hard since she stopped behaving. We are not sure where we went wrong, but tomorrow we are having her sent to that school where Thomas sent his daughter. Yes, that's the one, when his daughter came back she was perfect never caused a problem, we hope we will have the same kind of success with Lillian. Yes, yes, their methods are violent but we think this is the only way...." She did not want to hear the rest. She had suspected they were planning something and now she had her answers. She would not let them do this, she had seen that girl when she had returned and she saw that her eyes were dead. She would not let that happen to herself. She went to her closet and started throwing things into her backpack. She lifted the edge of her mattress and removed the stack of cash she had secreted away for just such a time. She crept downstairs and out the front door. She looked back over her shoulder at the house glistening with Christmas lights, she could faintly her music and people laughing as she walked toward the street. One day she knew that her parents would get the punishment they deserved.

Basketball

I grew up in Indiana and went to Indiana University. Both of which when told to most people help explain my interest in basketball and enjoyment in watching a game live. I am not in general the kind of person who gets into sports, but having been around basketball fever all of my life and seeing some really amazing players and games I do love a good live game. Basketball is fast paced and there is always action on the court. So with that said you can understand why I so enjoyed going to a Bulls game last night with 3 friends. We had such a fun time. Professional sports games are like going to a carnival. There is always something happening and there are cheerleaders and really tall men and mascots who dance funny dances. Above is a free picture you can get taken and go online and get. You can see how much fun we were having.

Also note the new glasses and still long hair.

In the last hour.......

of the last day of the last year of the 21st century a girl child sat on the edge of the wall overlooking the forsaken land. She tried to picture in her mind what it must have looked like a hundred years before when people roamed the cities on foot, in cars and trains and buses. She imagined that it had been beautiful, but now all that was left was a wasteland of tumbling broken steel, glass and concrete. She knew that soon there would be nothing left, not even the ruins. Plans were underway to finally clean up the forsaken land. She watched as the men dressed in bio-hazard suits set the charges that would implode the ruins and obliterate the past. They had chosen to forget the past. What was done was done they all said. But secretly she kept a hidden journal full of clippings and photographs and stories about what the world had been like before the "Change". If they knew she had these things they would put her away like they had the historians and scholars. So she kept it all hidden where no one would ever look. She jumped as the first explosion went off. Then as if it were a fireworks display they all went off in succession. And then it was done and the past was gone. Along the wall where a platform had been set up for the dignitaries a loud cheer went up. Tonight there would be many parties of celebration, ringing in the New Year.

" I need a hero, I'm holding out for a hero......"

The song kept running over and over in her head. Everywhere she went there it was like a small pounding headache. On the bus over the talking and laughter and grinding of axles the song was faintly playing. Walking to work as the traffic zoomed by she could hear the chorus over and over again. She could not explain how it got stuck in her head, but it was. Had she heard the song recently on the radio, she was sure she had not. Had someone at the office been singing it? There was not a single person in her dingy gray office that could even possibly know the words so that was not an option. Why could she not get it out of her head. It was like a bad case of the hiccups. Nothing could stop it. Not listening to her favorite song, not going to a loud concert, nothing. It was stuck and she was sure it was going to last forever. It had been three weeks now. And now even when she dreamed it was there playing softly in the background. She was pretty certain she was going insane. That day for lunch she headed out by herself. Usually she brought something and ate it in the lunch room but today she felt like getting out. She stopped in the first diner she saw, opened the menu and had an epiphany. There was the answer to ending her misery and getting rid of the song. When the waitress asked for her order she politely said, " I'll have the hero."

Portland, Oregon

I went to Portland a few weeks ago and have not really had the time to write about it. I had a great time there. It was fun and relaxing and I did a lot of things. When I got back to Chicago a number of people asked me what my favorite part was. There were so many great things, I could say visiting Cargo, where they had a Pink Mao bust, with Laini, or going to Powells three different times and searching through their stacks and stacks of books, or going to Multnomah Falls, or the Corn Maze, or shopping in all the cool shops, or visiting the Portland Historical Society Museum. All of these things were amazing and I had a great time but honestly my favorite part was just hanging out with Alexandra and watching DVD's of the Office. Laughing and talking and reminiscing about our Peace Corps days. I am fortunate to have Alex as a friend and I miss seeing her all the time. One of the best times Alex and I had in the Peace Corps was watching an eight hour South Park marathon and eating homemade pizza and just relaxing. We were living and traveling and experiencing so many things while we were in the Peace Corps, so to have the opportunity to just slug about and relax was actually a luxury. And to have a friend like Alex was a gift. So my favorite part of Portland is just being able to hang out with Alex and laugh and talk and enjoy.

Sunrise

She could just see the first glimmers of light as the sun began to rise. She allowed a small smile to touch her lips. She had hoped she would make it until morning and she had. Her work was not done, but at least for a few hours she could let her defenses down and relax a little. She really needed a coffee she thought. Isn't that what people did in the morning. It had been many years since she had seen the sunrise. She had chased the night for too long. Now she had a moments break to bask in the glory of the sun. Breakfast. That is what she needed. Eggs and bacon and pancakes and hash browns. It all sounded so exotic and delicious. She made her way to a diner on the edge of town. She was overwhelmed by the choices. She settled on the blueberry pancakes smothered in maple syrup. The first bite was like falling in love and she gobbled down the rest without taking a breath. She gulped her coffee and when she was finished she sat back with a satisfied smile. As she left the diner she caught a glimpse of a dark figure lurking in the shadows. Her break was over; back to the grind. She darted into an alley and made her way to where she had seen the figure. She saw the opening in the ground and followed the familiar sent of blood to the chamber below. The casket was sitting in the middle of the floor and the lid was still vibrating from being slammed shut. She withdrew a wooden stake from her bag, opened the casket and plunged the stake into the vampires heart.