Pastor Randall Nathan [Retard] is "filling the pulpit" this morning for Pastor Patty, or Rev. Niebhur, as he calls her, since that is the title she prefers. He does not like to preach anymore, even on an occasional basis, because it loses him points in the Hermudgeon of the Year competition, since he has to shake hands with people at the door afterwards and act like he thinks they are more Christian than they were 60 minutes ago.
Him being a preacher was based on a misunderstanding, anyway.
He grew up on a hardscrabble persimmon farm in Arkansas. He was able to go to college, the first person in his family to do so, because he got an Autry "Flip 'em High" Rogers scholarship to the School of Persimmon Engineering at Cratchit State U in the town of Hope's Promise. Autry "Flip 'em High" Rogers was the famous "cooking cowboy" of the 1940s "persimmon opera" movies. They were not critically acclaimed in their day, but every year, CSU has a "persimmon movie marathon" at the Bon Twit Art Theatre.
The young Randall, already dazzled by the bright lights of Hope's Promise, and the hairy legs of the sophisticated farm girls from nearby Periwinkle County, stepped out of the Bon Twit after the afternoon's marathon showing in his freshman year, and there, in the sunset, backed by a severe cerullian streak, were the letters, "GPC," formed by clouds. He was sure it meant "Go Preach Christ." It was only after he was [Retard] and went through the new persimmon museum in Memphjus that he realized that the GPC meant "grow persimmons crunchy," because Autry Rogers IV had done exactly that, at least, he had created "Persimmon Crunch," the new taste sensation, and as he said on the wall of the museum, "Only God can grow a persimmon, but I sure make a lot of money off 'em."
So Randall Nathan had lived his life based on a mistake, serving a God who couldn't even get clouds to form full words.
He can't tell this to Rev. Niebuhr, though, so when she called him up Sat. night and said her husband and children were all sick, so she had to stay home, and since he never prepared sermons anyway, but just told stories, why didn't he just go in the next morning and do his thing, he had to say yes.
So there he was in the pulpit, stuck with the bulletin she had prepared, which said the Gospel reading was the story of Jesus in his home town, and how the people rejected him and were actually going to toss him off the cliff at the edge of town into the persimmon swamp below [he added that piece of geography himself to make it more relevant] but "he passed through the midst of them." Rev. Nathan had always made the point when he preached on that pericope before that Jesus made his escape because "his time had not yet come." He has always regretted reading clouds before his eyes had seen enough to read cloud letters correctly.
Today, though, he said the story was about how Jesus passes through the midst of us all the time and we don't see him, because our eyes are so blinded by hate and antagonism and the sheer tea party desire to throw somebody, especially somebody who's actually trying to do us some good, into a persimmon swamp.
Then he demonstrated. While everybody had their eyes fixed on the screen, trying to figure out the tune to the laundry list of Jesus words they were singing in place of the closing hymn, he just passed through their midst and out the door, thus escaping without anyone noticing. He figured that was why Jesus really passed through their midst without notice, to avoid shaking hands with the people after his sermon.
Well, one person did notice. Two-year-old Clara Wembley gave him a big grin and stuck out her little fist for a bump as he went by. Children notice when someone who reads clouds passes through their midst.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Friday, January 29, 2010
What She Means
Randall Nathan is thinking about what he has learned in 50 years of marriage. It boils down to this: When a woman says "I'm through with the sink if you want to wash your hands," it means, "Wash your hands."
It's Not a Compliment
7 year old Remington Watts told his mother that she would make a good lawyer. Then he added, "I wouldn't take that as a compliment." [With apologies to Periwinkle County's own, Pastor Patty and lawyer Tom Carroll.]
Thursday, January 28, 2010
The Story in a Name
Nita Lessik is worried about her son. He's thinking about giving his girlfriend an engagement ring on Valentine's Day. Nita isn't worried about the girl; she's all a mother-in-law could hope for.
The problem is what to do about the stories they bring to the marriage, and how to give a name to the story they will tell together.
Nita knows that a name is the short form of a person's story. When someone says "Nita Lessik," they aren't just saying her name, they're telling her story.
Traditionally when a woman married, she merged her story with her husband's by taking his name. Ironically, she usually became the main character in the story that originally bore only his name. In the Nathan family, the famous "Grandma Nathan" was originally a Jones. But when anyone said "Nathan" they thought of the story the former Harriet Jones had told. When Grandma Nathan died, a new Grandma Nathan emerged from the next generation, the former Trudy Robinson, now the main narrator of the Nathan story. Waiting in the next generation, already telling the Nathan story in her own way, is the former Claire Tankovich.
When Nita and Chuck married, though, they decided to merge their names as well as their story. She was a Kessik, he was a Lessing. They became the Lessiks.
She tried to get her maid-of-honor to do the same when she got married, but she was a Washit and her husband-t0-be was an O'Neal, so they would have been the O'Shits. Thus Heather decided just to be an O'Neal.
But Nita's son, Mark, wants to marry a girl whose last name is Emswiler-Rommelfanger, and Nita is afraid he will become a Leswilerfanger, which is one hell of a story.
The problem is what to do about the stories they bring to the marriage, and how to give a name to the story they will tell together.
Nita knows that a name is the short form of a person's story. When someone says "Nita Lessik," they aren't just saying her name, they're telling her story.
Traditionally when a woman married, she merged her story with her husband's by taking his name. Ironically, she usually became the main character in the story that originally bore only his name. In the Nathan family, the famous "Grandma Nathan" was originally a Jones. But when anyone said "Nathan" they thought of the story the former Harriet Jones had told. When Grandma Nathan died, a new Grandma Nathan emerged from the next generation, the former Trudy Robinson, now the main narrator of the Nathan story. Waiting in the next generation, already telling the Nathan story in her own way, is the former Claire Tankovich.
When Nita and Chuck married, though, they decided to merge their names as well as their story. She was a Kessik, he was a Lessing. They became the Lessiks.
She tried to get her maid-of-honor to do the same when she got married, but she was a Washit and her husband-t0-be was an O'Neal, so they would have been the O'Shits. Thus Heather decided just to be an O'Neal.
But Nita's son, Mark, wants to marry a girl whose last name is Emswiler-Rommelfanger, and Nita is afraid he will become a Leswilerfanger, which is one hell of a story.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
A Perfect Mousse Drool Day
There are several coffee houses in Periwinkle County. There's "Good to the Last Slop" in Winkleblue, and in Memphjus, the county seat, in addition to "The Mills of the Gods," there is the Jitterbug. That's where Randall Nathan goes when he wants a day with nothing else in it.
The Jitterbug is a hole-in-the-wall place, with a counter, an espresso machine and 3 tables. Scotty, the proprietor, is there primarily to read, but he'll talk if he has customers.
Today there is Gerry, with his guide dog, Mousse, and Morris, who has a headache because he's been to the hardware store. Mousse sometimes gets confused when someone addresses Morris, so to prevent that, in the Jitterbug at least, Morris goes by Dog.
Each of the men sits at a separate table. They're close enough to carry on a quiet conversation. Shared privacy.
Mousse goes from one to another, begging biscotti, even though he's not supposed to. Scotty fires up the machine, and the men sip Mousse Drool, named for Mousse himself, and no one ever says a discouraging word or talks about past mistakes.
Nothing scheduled. Just coffee, friends, a dog. All in all, a perfect way to spend a day.
The Jitterbug is a hole-in-the-wall place, with a counter, an espresso machine and 3 tables. Scotty, the proprietor, is there primarily to read, but he'll talk if he has customers.
Today there is Gerry, with his guide dog, Mousse, and Morris, who has a headache because he's been to the hardware store. Mousse sometimes gets confused when someone addresses Morris, so to prevent that, in the Jitterbug at least, Morris goes by Dog.
Each of the men sits at a separate table. They're close enough to carry on a quiet conversation. Shared privacy.
Mousse goes from one to another, begging biscotti, even though he's not supposed to. Scotty fires up the machine, and the men sip Mousse Drool, named for Mousse himself, and no one ever says a discouraging word or talks about past mistakes.
Nothing scheduled. Just coffee, friends, a dog. All in all, a perfect way to spend a day.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Betsy Joins a Team
Randall Nathan got word that his old friend, Jackson South, had died. Death always starts a person to thinking about themselves, their own mortality, their own identity. Randall began to wonder why he is an hermudgeon now, why he tries to avoid people. After all, he was a personable and popular pastor for fifty years. Well, he wasn't always popular, but he didn't avoid people. In fact, he sought them out, especially the ones no one else was seeking.
He decided that he is such an hermudgeon now because he no longer feels like he's part of a team. Pastors usually work alone, a staff of one, but Rev. Nathan always felt that he was on a team with all the other pastors, in different places, with different people, but working together to defeat the team of evil. In retirement he's lost that team identity.
Ben "Seymour" Bottoms, Sociology of Education professor at Cratchit State U, says that the reason teaching has the highest dropout rate of any profession is not because of stupid kids or mean parents or low salaries or moron administrators. They can survive those if they are part of a team. They don't survive if they don't feel like they're part of a team. They are like pastors, a staff of one in their classrooms. Those who survive, and even thrive, are the ones who feel that they are part of a team of teachers, who know that up and down the hall are others like themselves, alone but together, on the team of knowledge, fighting the team of ignorance.
So Randall Nathan is very pleased that his granddaughter, Betsy, or Elizabeth as she prefers to be known now that she is a teen, has joined a team at school. Being on a team helps a kid survive high school.
She is on the roller derby team. She wanted to be on the wing-walking team, because that is more ladylike, but she was drawn to Julie Wagler, the roller derby coach.
Julie married late in life, to Wally Wagler, the addictions counselor, who is going to baseball fantasy camp come spring training. Julie is the only roller derby queen to be thrice named MVP [Most Vandal-Like Player] of the Third Fifth Bank International United Divided Roller Derby League.
[Vince Pavlov, the owner of Third Fifth Bank, says he named it that because no one would buy a bank until after his/her third fifth.]
Julie Wagler's three Vlad statues sit prominently on a shelf in her classroom at Cratchit State, where she teaches kneeseology, the study of knees, when she is not practicing PT, physical terrorism, on patients at the CIA, Cratchit Institute of Awfulpuncture. She got a doctorate in PT after her career was over because she saw no reason, just because the roller derby league had defuncted because the financial crisis made Third Fifth Bank stop its sponsorship, to stop tearing people's limbs off.
She misses her roller derby years, though, the great contests against the Mississippi Marauaders, and the Rome Vladiators, and the California Proposition 49ers, and the Hoosier Hotshots, and the Assisi Assaisians, and the Cotswald Cut-throats. [The league used Albanian spelling for team names.] So she has agreed to be the roller derby coach at Betsy's high school.
Betsy borrowed her grandfather's old kneepads, [He doesn't do that much praying anymore], and went to her first RD practice last night. She is a beautiful and ladylike girl, but she came home convinced that there is something especially gratifying about pushing a 9th grade boy over a railing and hearing him scream. She thinks this will be good preparation for marriage.
He decided that he is such an hermudgeon now because he no longer feels like he's part of a team. Pastors usually work alone, a staff of one, but Rev. Nathan always felt that he was on a team with all the other pastors, in different places, with different people, but working together to defeat the team of evil. In retirement he's lost that team identity.
Ben "Seymour" Bottoms, Sociology of Education professor at Cratchit State U, says that the reason teaching has the highest dropout rate of any profession is not because of stupid kids or mean parents or low salaries or moron administrators. They can survive those if they are part of a team. They don't survive if they don't feel like they're part of a team. They are like pastors, a staff of one in their classrooms. Those who survive, and even thrive, are the ones who feel that they are part of a team of teachers, who know that up and down the hall are others like themselves, alone but together, on the team of knowledge, fighting the team of ignorance.
So Randall Nathan is very pleased that his granddaughter, Betsy, or Elizabeth as she prefers to be known now that she is a teen, has joined a team at school. Being on a team helps a kid survive high school.
She is on the roller derby team. She wanted to be on the wing-walking team, because that is more ladylike, but she was drawn to Julie Wagler, the roller derby coach.
Julie married late in life, to Wally Wagler, the addictions counselor, who is going to baseball fantasy camp come spring training. Julie is the only roller derby queen to be thrice named MVP [Most Vandal-Like Player] of the Third Fifth Bank International United Divided Roller Derby League.
[Vince Pavlov, the owner of Third Fifth Bank, says he named it that because no one would buy a bank until after his/her third fifth.]
Julie Wagler's three Vlad statues sit prominently on a shelf in her classroom at Cratchit State, where she teaches kneeseology, the study of knees, when she is not practicing PT, physical terrorism, on patients at the CIA, Cratchit Institute of Awfulpuncture. She got a doctorate in PT after her career was over because she saw no reason, just because the roller derby league had defuncted because the financial crisis made Third Fifth Bank stop its sponsorship, to stop tearing people's limbs off.
She misses her roller derby years, though, the great contests against the Mississippi Marauaders, and the Rome Vladiators, and the California Proposition 49ers, and the Hoosier Hotshots, and the Assisi Assaisians, and the Cotswald Cut-throats. [The league used Albanian spelling for team names.] So she has agreed to be the roller derby coach at Betsy's high school.
Betsy borrowed her grandfather's old kneepads, [He doesn't do that much praying anymore], and went to her first RD practice last night. She is a beautiful and ladylike girl, but she came home convinced that there is something especially gratifying about pushing a 9th grade boy over a railing and hearing him scream. She thinks this will be good preparation for marriage.
Sunday, January 24, 2010
Haiti & the Spanish Flu
The scenes of Haiti after the earthquate have brought up memories for 95-year-old Bessie Bandervilt. She grew up in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, in the tiny town of Metropolitan, which was really just a lumber camp for the Metropolitan Lumber Company, 100 families in tiny log homes. The loggers had been recruited from the Finnish-Swedish border, so some were Finns who spoke Swedish and others were Swedes who spoke Finnish.
The Spanish Flu of 1918 hit Metropolitan hard. It took only 12 to 18 hours after exposure for the flu symptoms to hit, and it didn't take long after the symptoms appeared until death. Every day, bodies were carried out of the houses. No family was untouched by that deadly flu, save one.
There was one man, Bessie can't remember his name now, who, for some reason, kept his children out of school the day the flu virus hit Metropolitan. So his was the only family that did not have someone sick or dying or dead. Each day, morning and evening, he and his children went through the town, milking the cows for every family, leaving the buckets outside the doors, so they would not be exposed to the germs inside.
Bessie is alive because of that milk. She looks at those pix of Haiti on the TV and thinks to herself that all the money in the world is not as useful as one family that is willing to milk the cows.
The Spanish Flu of 1918 hit Metropolitan hard. It took only 12 to 18 hours after exposure for the flu symptoms to hit, and it didn't take long after the symptoms appeared until death. Every day, bodies were carried out of the houses. No family was untouched by that deadly flu, save one.
There was one man, Bessie can't remember his name now, who, for some reason, kept his children out of school the day the flu virus hit Metropolitan. So his was the only family that did not have someone sick or dying or dead. Each day, morning and evening, he and his children went through the town, milking the cows for every family, leaving the buckets outside the doors, so they would not be exposed to the germs inside.
Bessie is alive because of that milk. She looks at those pix of Haiti on the TV and thinks to herself that all the money in the world is not as useful as one family that is willing to milk the cows.
A Man of All Ages
Pastor Randall Nathan, [Retard], has decided to go to Sunday School this morning.
He does not normally go to Sunday School, because going out in public voluntarily will cost him hermudgeon [hermit+curmudgeon] points in the Hermudgeon of The Year race. He thinks if he goes incognito, though, he might get away with it. Also, since hermudgeons do not communicate with one another, because that would defeat the purpose, it is pretty much up to each hermudgeon to decide if she or he has enough points to be Hermudgeon of the Year.
He is going to go to Forsythia Lutheran Church, the little church out in the country between the electron mines and the persimmon bogs. Forsythia can't afford a fulltime pastor, so students from Discordia Seminary in Capitol City come down on the weekends. The seminary used to be called Concordia, but after the great patripassionism controversy in the Arkansas-New Jersey Synod, it went independent and thought it only fair to change its name to Discordia.
Randall Nathan goes to worship at The Methodist, because they have a well-earned reputation for leaving hermudgeons, and everyone else, alone. He also wants to support Pastor Patty.
He is sometimes tempted to go to some other church, though, to see if he can figure out why he ever liked the church in the first place. There are plenty of churches he could choose from.
There are three St. John Churches in Periwinkle County.
The Roman Catholic church is St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, named for a man who lost his head because of a woman, which, stated that way, is not at all unusual.
"Catholic" means universal, and St. John the Catholic Baptist Church believes in universal salvation, except for those who do not believe in universal salvation. Of course, those who send in pledges to "Bible Piracy," the TV show of Joseph Olds IV, the great-grandson of Joseph "The Brigand" Olds, reformed pirate turned Bible scholar and founder of St. John the Catholic Baptist Church and College, will be universally saved more efficiently than those who don't.
There is also St. John the Diviner Epispocal Church, known for the ability of its first priest to find good places to dwell wells.
Randall Nathan, though, is in Cognito, his 1951 Studebaker, on his way to Sunday School at Forsythia Lutheran this morning because they have a new student from Discordia who reminds him a little of himself when he was that age, an earnest young man with a crewcut and a lot of passion, and because of the sign this young man has put on the side of the church building. It says "Sunday School For People of All Ages," and Randall Nathan is a man of all ages.
He does not normally go to Sunday School, because going out in public voluntarily will cost him hermudgeon [hermit+curmudgeon] points in the Hermudgeon of The Year race. He thinks if he goes incognito, though, he might get away with it. Also, since hermudgeons do not communicate with one another, because that would defeat the purpose, it is pretty much up to each hermudgeon to decide if she or he has enough points to be Hermudgeon of the Year.
He is going to go to Forsythia Lutheran Church, the little church out in the country between the electron mines and the persimmon bogs. Forsythia can't afford a fulltime pastor, so students from Discordia Seminary in Capitol City come down on the weekends. The seminary used to be called Concordia, but after the great patripassionism controversy in the Arkansas-New Jersey Synod, it went independent and thought it only fair to change its name to Discordia.
Randall Nathan goes to worship at The Methodist, because they have a well-earned reputation for leaving hermudgeons, and everyone else, alone. He also wants to support Pastor Patty.
He is sometimes tempted to go to some other church, though, to see if he can figure out why he ever liked the church in the first place. There are plenty of churches he could choose from.
There are three St. John Churches in Periwinkle County.
The Roman Catholic church is St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, named for a man who lost his head because of a woman, which, stated that way, is not at all unusual.
"Catholic" means universal, and St. John the Catholic Baptist Church believes in universal salvation, except for those who do not believe in universal salvation. Of course, those who send in pledges to "Bible Piracy," the TV show of Joseph Olds IV, the great-grandson of Joseph "The Brigand" Olds, reformed pirate turned Bible scholar and founder of St. John the Catholic Baptist Church and College, will be universally saved more efficiently than those who don't.
There is also St. John the Diviner Epispocal Church, known for the ability of its first priest to find good places to dwell wells.
Randall Nathan, though, is in Cognito, his 1951 Studebaker, on his way to Sunday School at Forsythia Lutheran this morning because they have a new student from Discordia who reminds him a little of himself when he was that age, an earnest young man with a crewcut and a lot of passion, and because of the sign this young man has put on the side of the church building. It says "Sunday School For People of All Ages," and Randall Nathan is a man of all ages.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Pastor Patty Is Reading You
Pastor Patty has been reading all week. That's what preachers do, they read. They read people.
She was walking to the bathroom in the church building and overheard the women in the sewing room. Each week they gather to make quilts for orphanages around the world. Lucille Shambarger said she was worried about her upcoming colonoscopy and what it might reveal.
At the mall she watched Mary Canoli trying to start a support group for people whose pets have died. She calls it "Compassionate Best Friends." Nobody took Mary very seriously, which only added to her grief over losing Mr. Fuzzles. So Mary started a petition to require Buddy Mutts Cafe to admit people with cats as well as dogs. But most people prefer pets who stay on the floor in restaurants, so that wasn't going very well, either.
Pastor Patty knows Del Ecklor fell off the wagon this week. He doesn't know that Pastor Patty knows he is a secret alcoholic. But her mother was a secret alcoholic; she reads the signs. She knows who is drinking and who is not.
She has read the shoulders of school-bus driver, Rob Parkons, knows how he worries about the kids on his bus, especially about first-grader Tami. Tami picks up all the stress of her home and brings it onto the bus, so Rob lets her sit where she's not allowed, right behind him, so she can lean over his shoulder and tell him things he would rather not hear, and ask him questions for which he has no answers. But when Tami has put her stress onto Rob's shoulders, then it is off of hers, so he is glad he gets to walk with that slump.
The Newlands college grand-daughter is in some sort of trouble. They haven't said anything about it, but she knows they haven't walked Franklin and Eleanor, their minature pot-bellied pigs, all week. The only thing that can cause them to neglect F&E is a problem with Allison.
There are others. All week long she's been watching them, and reading their stories.
Now it's Friday, so Pastor Patty is sitting in the back booth at The Mills of the Gods Coffee Company, pulling together the notes for her sermon. That's what preachers do after they have read, they write. They read the stories of the people, the stories they see in their presences and in their absences, and they write them into the story of God.
Pastor Randall Nathan, [Retard], knows he will find Pastor Patty where the mills of the gods grind exceeding fine. He goes to find her on Friday because he has been watching HER all week. He has read HER. He knows she doesn't have much faith in the church to help people with real problems anymore, because the people who are loudest about being Christian are those who are most intent on causing problems rather than solving them. He knows it will be a hard story for her to write this week.
In public he wears a slouch hat with brandy-soaked press passes in the band, and Groucho nose and glasses, with a candy cigarette sticking out of the corner of his mouth, so no one will know who he is. When he entered The Mills, Barry Cobbler, the proprietor, pointed at the back booth.
"I need an area of concern I can use as an illustration Sunday, but I can't use any of the real ones," Pastor Patty said. "What have you been worrying about this week? Since you're in disguise, no one will know your worry is a real one."
"I can't understand why Blogger doesn't have a sphelczhek," he said. "It's very embarrassing to misspell 'embarrassment' or 'misspelling.' That's what bothers me."
"That's not a real problem. You can get your granddaughter to take care of that for you. I'm talking about real problems. I don't know why I even try, though. Nobody pays attention to what I say."
"What do you have faith in?" her quasi-mentor asked. "Something God can use on real problems."
"I have faith in love. Except 'love' is so generic. Maybe a word like 'nice' would be better. It's more specific. People can qualify love, like when they say 'tough love' to justify being mean. Maybe if we would just be 'nice' to everybody, things would get better. But theologians already accuse us Methodists of having no theology except being nice."
"Well, we believe in free will," he said. "You have free will to choose to be nice or to be nasty. Think about that, though. Methodists have always turned insults into ministry; that's how we got our name. What's a better doctrine than being nice? Wouldn't the world be a better place if people were just nice instead of theological? God gives us theology for fun. When we begin to take it seriously, we use it to divide ourselves over against one another, and then we can't be nice. The Niceness creed instead of the Nicene Creed, maybe that would be an improvement. We could be the Nicenists."
"Yeah, but we're not even very good at being nice. The Kitchen Nazis and the Bleeding Hearts are at it again." [The KNs are a Circle of MLW, Methodist Ladies and Women, and The BHs are a Sunday School class that meets on Tuesday night at The Whistle & Thistle Biker Bar and Tea House.]
"And people know I want to be called Rev. Niebuhr, but they insist on calling me Pastor Patty. They do it just because I'm little and cute. If they call me Rev. Niebuhr, they can't treat me like I'm their cute little pet. Calling me Pastor Patty is a way of saying they respect my office but not enough to pay attention to what I say."
Rev. Nathan was sure Barry Cobbler didn't even need his espresso machine anymore. The steam coming out of Rev. Niebuhr's ears could take its place.
"No," he said, "they call you Pastor Patty to bring you down to where they can hear you. Yes, you're little and cute when you're pulling Gracie in her wagon, or dropping Remington off at school, or hitting it over the outfielders in the church softball league, but in the pulpit, you're ten feet tall, and very scary, because they know you've been watching them and that you've read their stories. Go with your faith, your faith that God can use love. Be nice."
Rev. Niebuhr didn't look like she was convinced, so he pulled out the big trebouchet, the real theologian in the family, his wife, Claire.
"Here's something I learned from Claire. When you're in that pulpit, you have only one job. Regardless of how you do it, just remind us that God loves us, that we're still in the Story."
She was walking to the bathroom in the church building and overheard the women in the sewing room. Each week they gather to make quilts for orphanages around the world. Lucille Shambarger said she was worried about her upcoming colonoscopy and what it might reveal.
At the mall she watched Mary Canoli trying to start a support group for people whose pets have died. She calls it "Compassionate Best Friends." Nobody took Mary very seriously, which only added to her grief over losing Mr. Fuzzles. So Mary started a petition to require Buddy Mutts Cafe to admit people with cats as well as dogs. But most people prefer pets who stay on the floor in restaurants, so that wasn't going very well, either.
Pastor Patty knows Del Ecklor fell off the wagon this week. He doesn't know that Pastor Patty knows he is a secret alcoholic. But her mother was a secret alcoholic; she reads the signs. She knows who is drinking and who is not.
She has read the shoulders of school-bus driver, Rob Parkons, knows how he worries about the kids on his bus, especially about first-grader Tami. Tami picks up all the stress of her home and brings it onto the bus, so Rob lets her sit where she's not allowed, right behind him, so she can lean over his shoulder and tell him things he would rather not hear, and ask him questions for which he has no answers. But when Tami has put her stress onto Rob's shoulders, then it is off of hers, so he is glad he gets to walk with that slump.
The Newlands college grand-daughter is in some sort of trouble. They haven't said anything about it, but she knows they haven't walked Franklin and Eleanor, their minature pot-bellied pigs, all week. The only thing that can cause them to neglect F&E is a problem with Allison.
There are others. All week long she's been watching them, and reading their stories.
Now it's Friday, so Pastor Patty is sitting in the back booth at The Mills of the Gods Coffee Company, pulling together the notes for her sermon. That's what preachers do after they have read, they write. They read the stories of the people, the stories they see in their presences and in their absences, and they write them into the story of God.
Pastor Randall Nathan, [Retard], knows he will find Pastor Patty where the mills of the gods grind exceeding fine. He goes to find her on Friday because he has been watching HER all week. He has read HER. He knows she doesn't have much faith in the church to help people with real problems anymore, because the people who are loudest about being Christian are those who are most intent on causing problems rather than solving them. He knows it will be a hard story for her to write this week.
In public he wears a slouch hat with brandy-soaked press passes in the band, and Groucho nose and glasses, with a candy cigarette sticking out of the corner of his mouth, so no one will know who he is. When he entered The Mills, Barry Cobbler, the proprietor, pointed at the back booth.
"I need an area of concern I can use as an illustration Sunday, but I can't use any of the real ones," Pastor Patty said. "What have you been worrying about this week? Since you're in disguise, no one will know your worry is a real one."
"I can't understand why Blogger doesn't have a sphelczhek," he said. "It's very embarrassing to misspell 'embarrassment' or 'misspelling.' That's what bothers me."
"That's not a real problem. You can get your granddaughter to take care of that for you. I'm talking about real problems. I don't know why I even try, though. Nobody pays attention to what I say."
"What do you have faith in?" her quasi-mentor asked. "Something God can use on real problems."
"I have faith in love. Except 'love' is so generic. Maybe a word like 'nice' would be better. It's more specific. People can qualify love, like when they say 'tough love' to justify being mean. Maybe if we would just be 'nice' to everybody, things would get better. But theologians already accuse us Methodists of having no theology except being nice."
"Well, we believe in free will," he said. "You have free will to choose to be nice or to be nasty. Think about that, though. Methodists have always turned insults into ministry; that's how we got our name. What's a better doctrine than being nice? Wouldn't the world be a better place if people were just nice instead of theological? God gives us theology for fun. When we begin to take it seriously, we use it to divide ourselves over against one another, and then we can't be nice. The Niceness creed instead of the Nicene Creed, maybe that would be an improvement. We could be the Nicenists."
"Yeah, but we're not even very good at being nice. The Kitchen Nazis and the Bleeding Hearts are at it again." [The KNs are a Circle of MLW, Methodist Ladies and Women, and The BHs are a Sunday School class that meets on Tuesday night at The Whistle & Thistle Biker Bar and Tea House.]
"And people know I want to be called Rev. Niebuhr, but they insist on calling me Pastor Patty. They do it just because I'm little and cute. If they call me Rev. Niebuhr, they can't treat me like I'm their cute little pet. Calling me Pastor Patty is a way of saying they respect my office but not enough to pay attention to what I say."
Rev. Nathan was sure Barry Cobbler didn't even need his espresso machine anymore. The steam coming out of Rev. Niebuhr's ears could take its place.
"No," he said, "they call you Pastor Patty to bring you down to where they can hear you. Yes, you're little and cute when you're pulling Gracie in her wagon, or dropping Remington off at school, or hitting it over the outfielders in the church softball league, but in the pulpit, you're ten feet tall, and very scary, because they know you've been watching them and that you've read their stories. Go with your faith, your faith that God can use love. Be nice."
Rev. Niebuhr didn't look like she was convinced, so he pulled out the big trebouchet, the real theologian in the family, his wife, Claire.
"Here's something I learned from Claire. When you're in that pulpit, you have only one job. Regardless of how you do it, just remind us that God loves us, that we're still in the Story."
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Retard Redux
Randall Nathan is still putting [Retard], long for [Ret.] after his name. In addition to "retard" meaning slow, which he is in retirement, in Periwinkle County, they pronounce "retired" as "retard," anyway.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
The Brothers Jim go Counter Intuitive
The Brothers Jim run the Buddy Mutts Cafe, the restaurant where you are not allowed in without a dog. Because of the dogs, and Jim's dyslexia and Jim's Spooneristic tendencies, it's also referred to as Muddy Butts. [This isn't one of those "This is my brother, Jim, and this is my other brother, Jim" situations. They are not brothers to each other, but each IS a brother to somebody.]
They put in the "no person without a dog" rule because they thought it would keep customers away, and neither of them really wants to run a restaurant. Jim thinks of himself as a dulcimer dealer, and Jim as a sculptor, specializing in giant frozen persimmon sculptures, which is how he got into the restaurant business in the first place.
Of course, their plan to fail and use the cafe as a tax write-off backfired. Wide and far people bring their dogs from far and wide. Bessie Bandervilt has even opened a dog rental service for the un-dogged on her front porch next door to Buddy Mutts. Her dogs are of the stuffed variety, but the brothers Jim are too busy to notice. The real dogs are humiliated, though, and try to tear the stuffing out of their competitors, which adds another whole level of entertainment to dining there.
So they need another business for the tax write-offs. They are going to be kitchen design consultants. They are no more interested in designing kitchens than they are in cooking in them, but they can't resist the name for their new firm, Counter Intuitive.
They put in the "no person without a dog" rule because they thought it would keep customers away, and neither of them really wants to run a restaurant. Jim thinks of himself as a dulcimer dealer, and Jim as a sculptor, specializing in giant frozen persimmon sculptures, which is how he got into the restaurant business in the first place.
Of course, their plan to fail and use the cafe as a tax write-off backfired. Wide and far people bring their dogs from far and wide. Bessie Bandervilt has even opened a dog rental service for the un-dogged on her front porch next door to Buddy Mutts. Her dogs are of the stuffed variety, but the brothers Jim are too busy to notice. The real dogs are humiliated, though, and try to tear the stuffing out of their competitors, which adds another whole level of entertainment to dining there.
So they need another business for the tax write-offs. They are going to be kitchen design consultants. They are no more interested in designing kitchens than they are in cooking in them, but they can't resist the name for their new firm, Counter Intuitive.
A Literary Agent's Dog
Literary Super-Agent Phyllis Ethridge has a new dog.
No one in the publishing industry knows Phyllis has moved from NYC to Periwinkle County. She maintains an address in Sunnyside, which is as much a part of NYC as Tribeca or Harlem, but still has its own post office name. On her web site she notes that all correspondence, including manuscripts, must be sent electronically. Any mail to her Sunnyside address will be immediately recycled.
Her husband was a CIA agent. For reasons unknown, even to her, he left that agency in a hurry. He chose Periwinkle County as the one place in the whole world least likely to be visited by al-Qaeda representatives, and a certain woman who goes by Trixie. He now runs a coffee house in an old pig barn, "Good to the Last Slop." It's on a side street in Winkleblue, a hamlet of a few houses, a general store advertising "Live Bait and Fine Wines," and an antique store. Their old remodled farm house is located in the Winkleblue suburbs.
Too late, Phyllis learned that almost everyone in Periwinkle County is a writer.
She lives in mortal fear that local writers will learn that that she is an agent.
"That's a mighty fine lookin' dog you got there, Miz Ethridge," said Elmer Ungress, her persimmon gardener. "Looks kind of mean, though."
"It's a specially trained manuscript rejection dog," she said. "It can sniff out a MSW document of any length, electronic or print."
Just then a bleary-eyed slump-shouldered woman parked her rusting Volvo station wagon at the end of the drive and started up toward the house, eyeing the transom on the front door of the remodled farm house. The dog came to a point, its ears and tail pointed directly at the woman's crocodile purse.
"It doesn't meet our present needs," Phyllis Ethridge whispered to the dog.
The dog raced away toward the woman, snarling and snapping. She dashed back to her car, threw it into reverse, and left skid marks in the gravel.
"Wow, that was impressive," said Elmer. "What's its name?"
"Perrejlet."
"Per.. what?"
"Perrejlet. Emphasis on the 2nd syllable. It's short for Personal Rejection Letter."
No one in the publishing industry knows Phyllis has moved from NYC to Periwinkle County. She maintains an address in Sunnyside, which is as much a part of NYC as Tribeca or Harlem, but still has its own post office name. On her web site she notes that all correspondence, including manuscripts, must be sent electronically. Any mail to her Sunnyside address will be immediately recycled.
Her husband was a CIA agent. For reasons unknown, even to her, he left that agency in a hurry. He chose Periwinkle County as the one place in the whole world least likely to be visited by al-Qaeda representatives, and a certain woman who goes by Trixie. He now runs a coffee house in an old pig barn, "Good to the Last Slop." It's on a side street in Winkleblue, a hamlet of a few houses, a general store advertising "Live Bait and Fine Wines," and an antique store. Their old remodled farm house is located in the Winkleblue suburbs.
Too late, Phyllis learned that almost everyone in Periwinkle County is a writer.
She lives in mortal fear that local writers will learn that that she is an agent.
"That's a mighty fine lookin' dog you got there, Miz Ethridge," said Elmer Ungress, her persimmon gardener. "Looks kind of mean, though."
"It's a specially trained manuscript rejection dog," she said. "It can sniff out a MSW document of any length, electronic or print."
Just then a bleary-eyed slump-shouldered woman parked her rusting Volvo station wagon at the end of the drive and started up toward the house, eyeing the transom on the front door of the remodled farm house. The dog came to a point, its ears and tail pointed directly at the woman's crocodile purse.
"It doesn't meet our present needs," Phyllis Ethridge whispered to the dog.
The dog raced away toward the woman, snarling and snapping. She dashed back to her car, threw it into reverse, and left skid marks in the gravel.
"Wow, that was impressive," said Elmer. "What's its name?"
"Perrejlet."
"Per.. what?"
"Perrejlet. Emphasis on the 2nd syllable. It's short for Personal Rejection Letter."
Monday, January 18, 2010
Getting the Right Things Done
Randall Nathan, [Retard], woke up with a strange feeling. "I haven't gotten anything done in days," he thought. "There's coffee to drink, and books to read, and walks to walk, and windows to stare out. It's been days since I've done any of..."
Then he remembered, which at his age is not automatic. The grandkids. They've been sick for four days, and home from school, and Randall and Claire have had them at their house, mostly playing table games.
Then a little smile crept across his face. He remembered when their own kids were that age, and how he longed for more time to spend with them before they grew up and went off and married someone totally unworthy of them, the way Claire had disappointed her parents by doing exactly that. But he had to work back then. Now he has time for kids.
He wrote, "Grandkids are the reward for not killing your children." He wrote it on the back of his hand, just in case he needed to consult it as the day wore on and he had to play one more round of Chinese checkers.
Then he remembered, which at his age is not automatic. The grandkids. They've been sick for four days, and home from school, and Randall and Claire have had them at their house, mostly playing table games.
Then a little smile crept across his face. He remembered when their own kids were that age, and how he longed for more time to spend with them before they grew up and went off and married someone totally unworthy of them, the way Claire had disappointed her parents by doing exactly that. But he had to work back then. Now he has time for kids.
He wrote, "Grandkids are the reward for not killing your children." He wrote it on the back of his hand, just in case he needed to consult it as the day wore on and he had to play one more round of Chinese checkers.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Too Christian?
Pastor Patty has a dilemma. Her 7 year old son, Remington, wants to give his entire savings account for Haitian relief. But that includes a lot of money his grandparents have contributed for his college education.
"Damn," she said to retired pastor Randall Nathan. "What about the law of Corban? The only time the little rascal wants to be a Christian is when it will make problems for me."
"That's the only time being a Christian makes sense," said her sort-of mentor, "when it helps the widows and orphans, which always causes trouble, one way or another."
"Damn," she said to retired pastor Randall Nathan. "What about the law of Corban? The only time the little rascal wants to be a Christian is when it will make problems for me."
"That's the only time being a Christian makes sense," said her sort-of mentor, "when it helps the widows and orphans, which always causes trouble, one way or another."
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Of Kindles, Grindles, Spindles, and Swindles
[Author's note: For some reason, Blogger posted the first two words of the title before I had written anything else. There is nothing missing in that last "post."]
Claire Nathan has been thinking about that woman at the doctor's office showing Randall her Kindle. That got her to thinking about electronic books. A Kindle would save a lot of dusting.
She asked about it at H2O aerobics at the "Q," which is the "Y" for people farther back in the alphabet of age groups. Ivy Wheeler was the only one there with a Kindle. She likes it. But Ivy is the editor of "Saturday Morning Going Postal," the weekend edition of the Periwinkle County newspaper, the "Our World Herald," known to one and all as the "Old Wierd Harold," so Claire isn't sure how far to trust her. Editors are a strange bunch.
She talked to Jake and Jenny Newland about it, too. Jenny had invited her over because she had heard from insurance super-agent, Sam McNorris, that Claire and Randall had a murder-suicide pact as end of life planning. Jenny was interested in the first part of the pact.
Talk of end of life planning caused Jake to bring up his idea that he and Jenny should move to Capitol City, where their daughter is a psychiatric nurse at St. Olga's Hospital. "This big old house and all the big old lawn mowing and the big old snow shoveling and the big old persimmon plot just take too much effort," he said. "We need to be in a condo or assisted living or something." Jenny, however, reminded him that there is no facility in Cap City that will take them and Franklin and Elanor, their minature pot-bellied pigs, too, and she is much more willing to live without Jake than she is to do without the company of the pigs. At least that what she says when she knows Jake and Eleanor are listening. [Franklin has heard so often how much smarter pigs are than dogs that he feels it's not necessary to listen to anybody anymore, since he's smarter than they are.]
"I understand," said Claire. "The more I think about it, the less willing I am to give up the company of my books. I love to see them on the shelves, remember when I read them and what I felt then. So there's a little dust? It just means somebody is either coming or going. You know, 'From dust we come and to dust we shall return.' Sure, when we move into a condo or assisted living, there won't be much room, but I'd rather have a Kindle for my clothes than for my books."
So her husband is out by the Lapis Azuli River, in the basement of Jed Bozo's parents, where Jed lives, and where Randall has been the test subject for Jed's invention, the Grindle, the virtual love machine. Since Randall is a well-known hermudgeon, a combination of hermit and curmudgeon, and it is well known that he tries to avoid people altogether, which causes people to call him up and ask him how his avoidance project is going, because in PC people try to be supportive of other folks' eccentricities, Jed is using him as the test subject for the Grindle, named after super-lawyer Tod Cohen's dog, because it is a virtual lover of many legs. If anybody is willing to eschew real people and get by on virtual love and companionship alone, it has to be retired pastor Randall Nathan.
Randall, though, is not sure he can get along without the real Clarie, even though she is old and wrinkled, even though he has a young and sultry virtual Claire on the Grindle, a Claire on whom he can turn the sound down whenever he wants, so he is talking Jed Bozos into abandoning the Grindle and creating an electronic virtual clothes closet, on which one can store an entire wardrobe through ionic osmosis and just reverse the ionization process when a garment is needed and bring it back out of the electronic tablet to wear. "You could call it the Spindle," he said.
Jed is getting more and more excited. "Yes! he says. "This could put Goodwill out of business, and I hate them, because they wouldn't give my Star Wars cards back when Mother gave them away while Swoozy Mays was dumping me at university. I had to buy them back. I'll call the new clothes Kindle not the Spindle, but the Swindle. Yes!"
Randall thought it best not to mention that his entire wardrobe has already been rejected by Goodwill.
Claire Nathan has been thinking about that woman at the doctor's office showing Randall her Kindle. That got her to thinking about electronic books. A Kindle would save a lot of dusting.
She asked about it at H2O aerobics at the "Q," which is the "Y" for people farther back in the alphabet of age groups. Ivy Wheeler was the only one there with a Kindle. She likes it. But Ivy is the editor of "Saturday Morning Going Postal," the weekend edition of the Periwinkle County newspaper, the "Our World Herald," known to one and all as the "Old Wierd Harold," so Claire isn't sure how far to trust her. Editors are a strange bunch.
She talked to Jake and Jenny Newland about it, too. Jenny had invited her over because she had heard from insurance super-agent, Sam McNorris, that Claire and Randall had a murder-suicide pact as end of life planning. Jenny was interested in the first part of the pact.
Talk of end of life planning caused Jake to bring up his idea that he and Jenny should move to Capitol City, where their daughter is a psychiatric nurse at St. Olga's Hospital. "This big old house and all the big old lawn mowing and the big old snow shoveling and the big old persimmon plot just take too much effort," he said. "We need to be in a condo or assisted living or something." Jenny, however, reminded him that there is no facility in Cap City that will take them and Franklin and Elanor, their minature pot-bellied pigs, too, and she is much more willing to live without Jake than she is to do without the company of the pigs. At least that what she says when she knows Jake and Eleanor are listening. [Franklin has heard so often how much smarter pigs are than dogs that he feels it's not necessary to listen to anybody anymore, since he's smarter than they are.]
"I understand," said Claire. "The more I think about it, the less willing I am to give up the company of my books. I love to see them on the shelves, remember when I read them and what I felt then. So there's a little dust? It just means somebody is either coming or going. You know, 'From dust we come and to dust we shall return.' Sure, when we move into a condo or assisted living, there won't be much room, but I'd rather have a Kindle for my clothes than for my books."
So her husband is out by the Lapis Azuli River, in the basement of Jed Bozo's parents, where Jed lives, and where Randall has been the test subject for Jed's invention, the Grindle, the virtual love machine. Since Randall is a well-known hermudgeon, a combination of hermit and curmudgeon, and it is well known that he tries to avoid people altogether, which causes people to call him up and ask him how his avoidance project is going, because in PC people try to be supportive of other folks' eccentricities, Jed is using him as the test subject for the Grindle, named after super-lawyer Tod Cohen's dog, because it is a virtual lover of many legs. If anybody is willing to eschew real people and get by on virtual love and companionship alone, it has to be retired pastor Randall Nathan.
Randall, though, is not sure he can get along without the real Clarie, even though she is old and wrinkled, even though he has a young and sultry virtual Claire on the Grindle, a Claire on whom he can turn the sound down whenever he wants, so he is talking Jed Bozos into abandoning the Grindle and creating an electronic virtual clothes closet, on which one can store an entire wardrobe through ionic osmosis and just reverse the ionization process when a garment is needed and bring it back out of the electronic tablet to wear. "You could call it the Spindle," he said.
Jed is getting more and more excited. "Yes! he says. "This could put Goodwill out of business, and I hate them, because they wouldn't give my Star Wars cards back when Mother gave them away while Swoozy Mays was dumping me at university. I had to buy them back. I'll call the new clothes Kindle not the Spindle, but the Swindle. Yes!"
Randall thought it best not to mention that his entire wardrobe has already been rejected by Goodwill.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Kate's Low-Light Party
Kate Bates had a New Year's party last week. She decided to have some folks from The Methodist over for supper before she took the Christmas decorations back to the closet in the spare room.
There were three problems, though: 1] The house had suffered more at the hands of children and grandchildren and Shingles, the dog, than she had realized. 2]She can seat but 12, and before she knew it, the guest list was filled with Kitchen Nazis. Kate and her husband, Prof. Ben "Seymour" Bottoms, are Bleeding Hearts. There are certain minefields of talk that KNs and BHs dare not tread together. 3] Two-year-old Clara Wembley came over to "help" her nana prepare.
So Kate put in an emergency call to Claire Nathan. Claire made her husband, Randall, retired pastor and well-known hermudgeon, come along to help.
Kate decorates. Claire cleans. Ben and Randall do what they are told. So, technically, they were good to go. Except when little Clara heard the tumbleweeds of dust in the corners referred to as bunnies, she wouldn't let anyone take a broom to them. Claire solved the problem by putting leftover Christmas bows on them while Kate disconnected all the lamps and replaced them with candles.
Randall distracted the guests by singing "Me and My Shadow" while playing ukelele, as "Seymour" did hand puppets on the wall, incorporating the "bunnies" as part of the routine.
All in all, it was quite a festive and successful occasion.
There were three problems, though: 1] The house had suffered more at the hands of children and grandchildren and Shingles, the dog, than she had realized. 2]She can seat but 12, and before she knew it, the guest list was filled with Kitchen Nazis. Kate and her husband, Prof. Ben "Seymour" Bottoms, are Bleeding Hearts. There are certain minefields of talk that KNs and BHs dare not tread together. 3] Two-year-old Clara Wembley came over to "help" her nana prepare.
So Kate put in an emergency call to Claire Nathan. Claire made her husband, Randall, retired pastor and well-known hermudgeon, come along to help.
Kate decorates. Claire cleans. Ben and Randall do what they are told. So, technically, they were good to go. Except when little Clara heard the tumbleweeds of dust in the corners referred to as bunnies, she wouldn't let anyone take a broom to them. Claire solved the problem by putting leftover Christmas bows on them while Kate disconnected all the lamps and replaced them with candles.
Randall distracted the guests by singing "Me and My Shadow" while playing ukelele, as "Seymour" did hand puppets on the wall, incorporating the "bunnies" as part of the routine.
All in all, it was quite a festive and successful occasion.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Talk This Way
Petel Patel was in Memphjus this week, looking for a site for the new "Language Equalization Center." It has been determined that Periwinkle County has the most typically American speech patterns of the whole country, and Petel Patel's company wants all its tech support people to talk that way.
She selected the defunct "Brideasaurus" wedding center. With a name like that, no one could understand why it failed to attract customers. The first contingent of Bombay tech support people will arrive next week to start their training, to learn to talk like Periwinklians.
Realtor Madeline Twoknives, who is Indian in her own way, took Petel Patel to the Whistle and Thistle biker bar and tea house to celebrate the lease. "Goldurn, ya sweat litl ting," Bobcat Whistle said, as he seated them in the Episcopal Ladies corner and served them the Persimmon Special. "Tis gona make big difrunc in yconomy herebouts..."
Behind the bar, Edith, the thistle half of the W&T, smiled to herself. She had gotten back at Bobcat for his insults by spiking his Ovaltine with alum. Petel Patel didn't know that, though. "Prithee, into what nefarious location have I been led," she thought to herself, "where the denizens speak like demented Muppets." Last seen, she was trying to sneak the signed contract out of Madeline Twoknives' purse.
She selected the defunct "Brideasaurus" wedding center. With a name like that, no one could understand why it failed to attract customers. The first contingent of Bombay tech support people will arrive next week to start their training, to learn to talk like Periwinklians.
Realtor Madeline Twoknives, who is Indian in her own way, took Petel Patel to the Whistle and Thistle biker bar and tea house to celebrate the lease. "Goldurn, ya sweat litl ting," Bobcat Whistle said, as he seated them in the Episcopal Ladies corner and served them the Persimmon Special. "Tis gona make big difrunc in yconomy herebouts..."
Behind the bar, Edith, the thistle half of the W&T, smiled to herself. She had gotten back at Bobcat for his insults by spiking his Ovaltine with alum. Petel Patel didn't know that, though. "Prithee, into what nefarious location have I been led," she thought to herself, "where the denizens speak like demented Muppets." Last seen, she was trying to sneak the signed contract out of Madeline Twoknives' purse.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Sports as Life
Retired pastor Randall Nathan did not pay much attention to Pastor Patty's sermon Sunday. She probably thought he didn't like it, since he glowered through the whole service. Actually, he was thinking of Cratchit State's basketball loss Sat. night to the hated A&M team. The Tiny Tims led all the way, and then lost it in the last minute. That was enough to make anyone glower.
To make things worse, the A&M fans did one of their usual anti-cheers, complete with finger motions, to indicate just how tiny they thought the Tims were.
Cratchit is the first university in the state, founded back in 1800 something, when Mitch Cratchit was governor. Ted McDill, the state senator from the little town of Hope's Promise, had tried to get the new state prison located there, since it was bound to be more beneficial to the local economy than a university. Crime was much more prevalent than reading. But Glen Beckmann grabbed the prison for Faux City, by selling Gov. Cratchit, at such a ridiculously small price that it amounted to bribery, some hill land that he claimed contained gold. McDill had to take, with poor grace, the new state university. The folks of Hope's Promise named it after the governor, in hopes of getting a nice little endowment from the gold in "them thar hills." Of course, the gold never panned out, but it turned out that the hills were great for persimmons. Cratchit created a vast persimmon fortune, but his only contribution to the university was his collection of the roots of the various varieties of persimmons, as the basis for the university's now famous persimmon laboratories. By that time, though, the university was stuck with the name of Cratchit, and Bertha, Mitch Cratchit's wife, had insisted that the athletic teams be called the Tiny Tims, so they were stuck with that, too. Now the university has about 35 thousand students, but crime is still more prevalent than reading.
Randall Nathan was sure that Pastor Patty was preaching well. The people around him all looked uncomfortable. But he was thinking of how sports have become the only metaphor for life. We love our teams, and if they don't win, we get disgruntled. We get angry. We glower. Then, sometimes, we fight the fans from the other teams, in the stands or in the parking lots. It's OK, he thinks, to love the Red Sox or the Packers or the Tiny Tims, to feel your own fortunes rise and drop with theirs. Even if the players on the Cowboys are criminals, or those on the Yankees are cheaters, if they are your team, you still support them and want them to win.
When you take that over into church or politics or the economy, though, and you want your team, the Republicans or the Democrats, the Baptists or the Catholics, the Straights or the Gays, the laissez-faire capitalists or the regulated capitalists, to win, even if they are crooks, even if their policies are bad for the world, that's NOT OK. That's where we are, though. We choose up sides, and regardless of whether our goals are best, or our ways to get those goals are best, we just keep cheering for "our" side.
By the time the Postlude started, he was glowering worse than ever. He had the very uncomfortable feeling that he was on the wrong team again, the ones who know what the problem is but don't know what to do about it.
To make things worse, the A&M fans did one of their usual anti-cheers, complete with finger motions, to indicate just how tiny they thought the Tims were.
Cratchit is the first university in the state, founded back in 1800 something, when Mitch Cratchit was governor. Ted McDill, the state senator from the little town of Hope's Promise, had tried to get the new state prison located there, since it was bound to be more beneficial to the local economy than a university. Crime was much more prevalent than reading. But Glen Beckmann grabbed the prison for Faux City, by selling Gov. Cratchit, at such a ridiculously small price that it amounted to bribery, some hill land that he claimed contained gold. McDill had to take, with poor grace, the new state university. The folks of Hope's Promise named it after the governor, in hopes of getting a nice little endowment from the gold in "them thar hills." Of course, the gold never panned out, but it turned out that the hills were great for persimmons. Cratchit created a vast persimmon fortune, but his only contribution to the university was his collection of the roots of the various varieties of persimmons, as the basis for the university's now famous persimmon laboratories. By that time, though, the university was stuck with the name of Cratchit, and Bertha, Mitch Cratchit's wife, had insisted that the athletic teams be called the Tiny Tims, so they were stuck with that, too. Now the university has about 35 thousand students, but crime is still more prevalent than reading.
Randall Nathan was sure that Pastor Patty was preaching well. The people around him all looked uncomfortable. But he was thinking of how sports have become the only metaphor for life. We love our teams, and if they don't win, we get disgruntled. We get angry. We glower. Then, sometimes, we fight the fans from the other teams, in the stands or in the parking lots. It's OK, he thinks, to love the Red Sox or the Packers or the Tiny Tims, to feel your own fortunes rise and drop with theirs. Even if the players on the Cowboys are criminals, or those on the Yankees are cheaters, if they are your team, you still support them and want them to win.
When you take that over into church or politics or the economy, though, and you want your team, the Republicans or the Democrats, the Baptists or the Catholics, the Straights or the Gays, the laissez-faire capitalists or the regulated capitalists, to win, even if they are crooks, even if their policies are bad for the world, that's NOT OK. That's where we are, though. We choose up sides, and regardless of whether our goals are best, or our ways to get those goals are best, we just keep cheering for "our" side.
By the time the Postlude started, he was glowering worse than ever. He had the very uncomfortable feeling that he was on the wrong team again, the ones who know what the problem is but don't know what to do about it.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Jeff is a... What?
Chief Deputy Les Killinger almost arrested retired school teacher Claire Nathan this week. It was night. She was on a ladder, defacing the billboard at the edge of town for the He Went Gasaway station. Actually she was adding to a previous defacement. Someone had painted, in the big blank part at the bottom of the sign, "Jeff is a asshole." Jeff is one of her former students. She figures the statement is accurate, so she didn't want to paint it out entirely, but every time she drove by, it just rankled her, so she was adding an "n" to the "a."
When Chief Deputy Kllinger saw what she was doing, he held the ladder to steady her. He knows Jeff, too.
When Chief Deputy Kllinger saw what she was doing, he held the ladder to steady her. He knows Jeff, too.
Friday, January 8, 2010
From the Outhouse to the Computer
Ellen Palendro, Bandervilt Professor of Poetry at Cratchit State U, called up Rev. Randall Nathan. Academics often consult him when there is a collision of physics and poetry, since he is the acknowledged expert on the effect of ionic perimiters on iambic pentameters, known as "The Little Bang."
After they got the pronunciation of Percy Shelley's middle name figured out by using the Little Bang theory, they spoke of the passage of time.
"I grew up using an outhouse," he said, "and now I use a computer. The feelings and the results are often very similar."
After they got the pronunciation of Percy Shelley's middle name figured out by using the Little Bang theory, they spoke of the passage of time.
"I grew up using an outhouse," he said, "and now I use a computer. The feelings and the results are often very similar."
HD TV AT THE W&T
Mick Richard's wife has put the Whistle & Thistle off limits to him. But when he was riding by on his way home from work, he saw that Bobcat Whistle had a new sign out: HD TV. Mick wasn't aware that HD was available anywhere in Periwinkle County. He went in. It surely did look like the same old Big Ass [TM] TV.
"That's no HD TV," he said.
"Sure it is," said Edith, Bobcat's wife. ["I'm the Whistle, she's the thistle," Bobcat has always said about the name of their biker bar and tea house. Edith usually has reason to be prickly, since she does the work while Bobcat "hosts."]
Bobcat claims his name is really Bobcat, and those who know his parents believe it. Ochre and Possum Whistle are hippies from the '60s. They are now in their late 70s, but they still wear the same clothes they did in the '60s. Bobcat remembers a little from when he was small. He thinks their names were really Omar and Blossom, but their brains were spiritually altered by the communion elements of the religious services they had with their friends. Along the way, their names got altered, too, and they didn't notice the difference.
"You just need to adjust it with that knob on the front there," Edith told Mick Richard.
Mick took hold of the knob. Apparently some wires had gotten crossed. He felt a current go up his arm.
"Hot! Damn!" he yelled.
"See," said Edith. "HD."
"That's no HD TV," he said.
"Sure it is," said Edith, Bobcat's wife. ["I'm the Whistle, she's the thistle," Bobcat has always said about the name of their biker bar and tea house. Edith usually has reason to be prickly, since she does the work while Bobcat "hosts."]
Bobcat claims his name is really Bobcat, and those who know his parents believe it. Ochre and Possum Whistle are hippies from the '60s. They are now in their late 70s, but they still wear the same clothes they did in the '60s. Bobcat remembers a little from when he was small. He thinks their names were really Omar and Blossom, but their brains were spiritually altered by the communion elements of the religious services they had with their friends. Along the way, their names got altered, too, and they didn't notice the difference.
"You just need to adjust it with that knob on the front there," Edith told Mick Richard.
Mick took hold of the knob. Apparently some wires had gotten crossed. He felt a current go up his arm.
"Hot! Damn!" he yelled.
"See," said Edith. "HD."
The Big Storm
The big storm hit Periwinkle County. The kids loved it, especially when school was called off. The parents felt a little differently about it, especially Chuck "Ugly" Bogreen,whose friends gave him the nickname in high school since the girls all swooned over him because he looked like John Mellencamp. On second thought, maybe they called him that precisely because he looks like John Mellencamp.
His wife, Jenna, works all day as a nurse at The Blau Harr Center for Dessert Days, as the local nursing home, which overlooks the parking lot of The Furry Mammal IGA, is called. Chuck is a carpenter's assistant for his brother-in-law. They had no inside jobs this week, so Chuck had no excuse to take the kids to his mother-in-law for the day. He had to stay home with them.
So Chuck was actually pleased when the homeless guy from Alamama came to the door, frozen like a grape popsicle, and asking for a handout. Chuck saw all sorts of possibilities. He invited the man in, sat him down at the table, got rid of the awful casserole from the night before. The kids all clustered around the table to watch the man eat. Chuck understood; it was an awesome sight. Then the kids began to ask the man questions about his life on the road. The man began to tell them stories. Chuck saw his chance.
Jenna doesn't let him smoke in the house. He went to the garage and lit up. That's also the location of the old pickup he is restoring. Soon he was involved in grinding pistons. Every hour or so, he would stick his head back into the kitchen. The homeless guy and the kids were always around the table. Sometimes he was telling them stories, sometimes showing them card tricks. At lunch, he even fixed them boloney and egg sandwiches.
"That guy is really desperate to stay out of the cold," he thought.
At 4:30, though, he turned him out. The storm was still dropping snow by the pickup load, and it was cold as a banker's heart, but Jenna would be home soon. "Try down at the Methodist," he said. "Maybe the Bleeding Hearts will be there."
Unfortunately, Jenna got home before he had a chance to tell the kids that the presence of the homeless guy from Alabama would be their little secret.
"How did it go today?" Jenna asked.
"It was great," the kids all yelled. "This guy came and Daddy let him in 'cause he was cold and he told us great stories and told us to live right."
Jenna looked at her husband from under unhappy brows. "Just what stories did he tell you?" she asked. "And just what did he say about living right?"
"He told about how he used to play guitar and stuff. And he told us to stay away from drugs and women who can run fast, so we wouldn't have to clap. And he showed us how to fool the card dealers at the casino."
"Ug" nodded as sagely as he could. "All good life lessons," he said.
"Just who was this character, anyway?" Jenna asked.
"Oh,just a homeless guy trying to get warm. It was a good thing to let him get warm, wasn't it?"
"Didn't he at least give you a name?" Jenna asked.
"He told us just to call him Elvis," the kids chorused.
His wife, Jenna, works all day as a nurse at The Blau Harr Center for Dessert Days, as the local nursing home, which overlooks the parking lot of The Furry Mammal IGA, is called. Chuck is a carpenter's assistant for his brother-in-law. They had no inside jobs this week, so Chuck had no excuse to take the kids to his mother-in-law for the day. He had to stay home with them.
So Chuck was actually pleased when the homeless guy from Alamama came to the door, frozen like a grape popsicle, and asking for a handout. Chuck saw all sorts of possibilities. He invited the man in, sat him down at the table, got rid of the awful casserole from the night before. The kids all clustered around the table to watch the man eat. Chuck understood; it was an awesome sight. Then the kids began to ask the man questions about his life on the road. The man began to tell them stories. Chuck saw his chance.
Jenna doesn't let him smoke in the house. He went to the garage and lit up. That's also the location of the old pickup he is restoring. Soon he was involved in grinding pistons. Every hour or so, he would stick his head back into the kitchen. The homeless guy and the kids were always around the table. Sometimes he was telling them stories, sometimes showing them card tricks. At lunch, he even fixed them boloney and egg sandwiches.
"That guy is really desperate to stay out of the cold," he thought.
At 4:30, though, he turned him out. The storm was still dropping snow by the pickup load, and it was cold as a banker's heart, but Jenna would be home soon. "Try down at the Methodist," he said. "Maybe the Bleeding Hearts will be there."
Unfortunately, Jenna got home before he had a chance to tell the kids that the presence of the homeless guy from Alabama would be their little secret.
"How did it go today?" Jenna asked.
"It was great," the kids all yelled. "This guy came and Daddy let him in 'cause he was cold and he told us great stories and told us to live right."
Jenna looked at her husband from under unhappy brows. "Just what stories did he tell you?" she asked. "And just what did he say about living right?"
"He told about how he used to play guitar and stuff. And he told us to stay away from drugs and women who can run fast, so we wouldn't have to clap. And he showed us how to fool the card dealers at the casino."
"Ug" nodded as sagely as he could. "All good life lessons," he said.
"Just who was this character, anyway?" Jenna asked.
"Oh,just a homeless guy trying to get warm. It was a good thing to let him get warm, wasn't it?"
"Didn't he at least give you a name?" Jenna asked.
"He told us just to call him Elvis," the kids chorused.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
She Showed You Her...What?
Rev. Randall Nathan (Retard) went to the doctor today. Got a good report. Came home and told Claire, "The woman at the window at the doctor's office showed me her Kindle,"
"Oh, good grief," said Claire, "why do they have to keep thinking up new names for it, and... wait a minute, she SHOWED it to you? At the WINDOW?..."
"Oh, good grief," said Claire, "why do they have to keep thinking up new names for it, and... wait a minute, she SHOWED it to you? At the WINDOW?..."
Jed Bozos New Invention-Virtual Love
Jed Bozos sits in the garage of his parents' home along the Lapis Azuli River, which is more of a stream, outside the village of Winkleblue. After the rejection by Susie Mays, and his subsequent dropping out of Cratchit State U, he has put in his 10 thousand hours in that garage. He is ready. All that remains is the test on a real person...
Jed has invented, or possibly discovered, he's not quite sure which, virtual love. No one will need the real thing anymore. In fact, what used to be called the real thing will go the way of Cupid himself. The real thing now will be Grindle, the name of his new invention. He has named it for his lawyer's dog, Grindle, who has been known to love as many as two dozen legs on the same day.
Grindle is about the size of a 4X6 notebook. A woman can keep it in her purse, a man in his pocket. Whenever they feel a need for love, they just open up their Grindle, scroll down to the kind of love they want, and look at that specific wave pattern on the screen. Every form of love ever known is on the Grindle. It's just a matter of putting the ions and free radicals together in the proper pattern and letting their pattern sink into your brain. Those old chaotic forms of love, that require another person, will now be obsolete.
But the test... Ah, of course, the Rev. Dr. Randall Nathan, (Retard), the well-known hermudgeon [a combination of hermit and curmudgeon]. He eschews human contact so completely that he even writes a blog called The Complete Hermudgeon: One Man's Valiant Attempt to Avoid People Altogether. Of course, he never posts anything in it, because that would defeat the purpose. The perfect test subject for the Grindle...
Jed has invented, or possibly discovered, he's not quite sure which, virtual love. No one will need the real thing anymore. In fact, what used to be called the real thing will go the way of Cupid himself. The real thing now will be Grindle, the name of his new invention. He has named it for his lawyer's dog, Grindle, who has been known to love as many as two dozen legs on the same day.
Grindle is about the size of a 4X6 notebook. A woman can keep it in her purse, a man in his pocket. Whenever they feel a need for love, they just open up their Grindle, scroll down to the kind of love they want, and look at that specific wave pattern on the screen. Every form of love ever known is on the Grindle. It's just a matter of putting the ions and free radicals together in the proper pattern and letting their pattern sink into your brain. Those old chaotic forms of love, that require another person, will now be obsolete.
But the test... Ah, of course, the Rev. Dr. Randall Nathan, (Retard), the well-known hermudgeon [a combination of hermit and curmudgeon]. He eschews human contact so completely that he even writes a blog called The Complete Hermudgeon: One Man's Valiant Attempt to Avoid People Altogether. Of course, he never posts anything in it, because that would defeat the purpose. The perfect test subject for the Grindle...
The Blind Side
Jake Newland is a football fan. Mostly Georgia Tech and the N'awlins Saints, but any game will do. Jenny, on the other hand, thinks that the only smart thing George Will ever said is that "football combines the two worst elements of American life: violence and committee meetings." But when Jake suggested they go see "The Blind Side" at the Bon Twit movie house, it was something to do, so she went.
"That was a great movie," exulted Jake as they sat over milk shakes at The Whistle & Thistle. "That family really helped that boy. He's playing in the pros now." Jenny didn't say anything.
"And wasn't that a funny line, when the dad said that who would have thunk they'd have a black son before they every met a Democrat."
"Yeah," said Jenny, "wealthy white Republicans helping a kid is so unusual, they had to make a movie about it."
"That was a great movie," exulted Jake as they sat over milk shakes at The Whistle & Thistle. "That family really helped that boy. He's playing in the pros now." Jenny didn't say anything.
"And wasn't that a funny line, when the dad said that who would have thunk they'd have a black son before they every met a Democrat."
"Yeah," said Jenny, "wealthy white Republicans helping a kid is so unusual, they had to make a movie about it."
Difference Between Genius & Stupidity
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." Norman Einstein
The Ten Foot Rule
Postmaster Paul Byrnes took a sneak peep into the lobby of the new Memphjus post office. How come it was so cold? Starla was working the counter. The line was clear through the lobby and out into the weather. Maybe he should get Roy to cut his break short and open another counter post. He didn't want Roy to go postal on him, though. And... wait a minute. The line wasn't really long. But the woman who was next in line was standing 10 feet behind the couple at the window with Starla. That meant the man behind her could stand only half in and half out of the door. 2 other women were out in the cold behind her. This seemed to happen more and more. What was wrong with people, anyway? Over in Verdi County, which people secretly called Mussolini County because of its Italian Heritage, 18 people would have crowded into line ahead of her by now. In Periwinkle County, though, people were just too polite to do that. It was bad enough that Hobby Lobby was letting people order online now. Once Kate Bates and Claire Randall and the rest of those church ladies found out about that, his carriers would be volunteering to go back to Iraq. Now people wouldn't even close up the line, rather make those behind them stand out in the cold. No wonder people were saying that the Obama administration had already failed.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Assisted Living
Insurance Special Agent Sam McNorris has been trying to sell nursing home insurance to Randall and Claire Nathan. Their financial advisor, Lynn Zeligman, has advised them against it.
"Lynn has a PhD in Consumer Finance from MIT," they told him.
"What could she know about money then? That's an engineering school. You people have too much faith in higher education. It's the profit motive that really makes the world go, and she doesn't sell anything, just gives advice. Besides, I took a 3 day course from Federated United."
Sam works for Federated United, know simply as FU to his clients.
"What's your end-of-life plan if you don't have nursing home insurance?" he challenged.
"We have a murder-suicide pact," said Rev. Nathan, mostly just to see the expression on Sam's face. He was not disappointed.
"Besides," Claire added, "men enter assisted living the day they get married, anyway."
"Lynn has a PhD in Consumer Finance from MIT," they told him.
"What could she know about money then? That's an engineering school. You people have too much faith in higher education. It's the profit motive that really makes the world go, and she doesn't sell anything, just gives advice. Besides, I took a 3 day course from Federated United."
Sam works for Federated United, know simply as FU to his clients.
"What's your end-of-life plan if you don't have nursing home insurance?" he challenged.
"We have a murder-suicide pact," said Rev. Nathan, mostly just to see the expression on Sam's face. He was not disappointed.
"Besides," Claire added, "men enter assisted living the day they get married, anyway."
It's Jake's Fault
"Where were you?" Jenny Newland asked, her hands in rubber gloves, dug in akimbo.
"They were way behind. New vampire today. She couldn't find a vein in a gold mine."
"But I expected you to be gone about 30 minutes. I decided to clean while you were out, so you and your stupid walker wouldn't be in the way. Here you are 2 hours later, and I've dusted the whole house, scrubbed the kitchen floor on my hand and knees, put the recycling in the garage. You've just about given me a heart attack."
"It wasn't me," said Jake. "It was the clinic. They were behind..."
Jenny wasn't listening. "You've made me too tired to cook. You'll have to take me out to Muddy Butts."
"It's not Muddy Butts, Jenny. It's Buddy Mutts, and you can't go there unless you bring your dog."
"So we'll borrow Shingles from the Wembleys. He'll be glad to go, save him from having to hide from Clara."
"I still don't see why it's my fault," cried Jake.
Married 52 years, and he hasn't learned a thing.
"They were way behind. New vampire today. She couldn't find a vein in a gold mine."
"But I expected you to be gone about 30 minutes. I decided to clean while you were out, so you and your stupid walker wouldn't be in the way. Here you are 2 hours later, and I've dusted the whole house, scrubbed the kitchen floor on my hand and knees, put the recycling in the garage. You've just about given me a heart attack."
"It wasn't me," said Jake. "It was the clinic. They were behind..."
Jenny wasn't listening. "You've made me too tired to cook. You'll have to take me out to Muddy Butts."
"It's not Muddy Butts, Jenny. It's Buddy Mutts, and you can't go there unless you bring your dog."
"So we'll borrow Shingles from the Wembleys. He'll be glad to go, save him from having to hide from Clara."
"I still don't see why it's my fault," cried Jake.
Married 52 years, and he hasn't learned a thing.
Zorro's Nana
Little Clara Wembley, two years old, realizing that she had made quite a hit, with Jenny Newland's help, by questioning the identity of Jesus' nana, has had the provenance of nanas on her mind. Thus when she saw Claire Nathan in the Gopher IGA, dressed all in black, she pointed and shrilled out, "Is that Zorro's nana?"
Claire froze into a statue. It didn't help. Everyone looked. Claire had just bopped into the Gopher for some popcorn salt so that her husband, Randall, would eat popcorn instead of peanut brittle for his evening snack, which usually stetches from immediately after supper to immediately before bedtime, and sometimes beyond. She hates it when he dashes, or what passes for dashing in him, toward the bed, with a cookie in each hand, shouting "To infinity and beyond..."
She usually doesn't go anywhere in her workout clothes, except to "Lumps." Claire doesn't have a girlish figure anymore, but her workout clothes have to be too tight to keep them from getting caught in the machines. Since "Lumps" is an all women's gym, run by 94 year old Bertha Biggs, who is convinced that women today are pampered, the workout machines are old-fashioned washer wringers to turn, and stove lids to hoist, buckets of coal and water to carry in and out of the gym, and rubber cow udders to squeeze to improve hand strength.
Kate Bates, little Clara's own nana, made things worse by saying, "Now Clara, you know that's not Zorro's nana. That's Rev. Nathan's wife."
Claire spend 30 years teaching in an inner-city school, so she's inclined to make the best of things. Randall Nathan thinks his wife has finally hit dimentia, though, because when she arrived home from the Gopher, in the middle of a snow storm, she dug into the closet and got out the poncho and sombrero and gaucho pants from their NM vacation and was still wearing them at supper time.
That was when she put a plate of beans and burritos in front of him and shouted, "My sword is a flame to right every wrong, so heed my nana."
Claire froze into a statue. It didn't help. Everyone looked. Claire had just bopped into the Gopher for some popcorn salt so that her husband, Randall, would eat popcorn instead of peanut brittle for his evening snack, which usually stetches from immediately after supper to immediately before bedtime, and sometimes beyond. She hates it when he dashes, or what passes for dashing in him, toward the bed, with a cookie in each hand, shouting "To infinity and beyond..."
She usually doesn't go anywhere in her workout clothes, except to "Lumps." Claire doesn't have a girlish figure anymore, but her workout clothes have to be too tight to keep them from getting caught in the machines. Since "Lumps" is an all women's gym, run by 94 year old Bertha Biggs, who is convinced that women today are pampered, the workout machines are old-fashioned washer wringers to turn, and stove lids to hoist, buckets of coal and water to carry in and out of the gym, and rubber cow udders to squeeze to improve hand strength.
Kate Bates, little Clara's own nana, made things worse by saying, "Now Clara, you know that's not Zorro's nana. That's Rev. Nathan's wife."
Claire spend 30 years teaching in an inner-city school, so she's inclined to make the best of things. Randall Nathan thinks his wife has finally hit dimentia, though, because when she arrived home from the Gopher, in the middle of a snow storm, she dug into the closet and got out the poncho and sombrero and gaucho pants from their NM vacation and was still wearing them at supper time.
That was when she put a plate of beans and burritos in front of him and shouted, "My sword is a flame to right every wrong, so heed my nana."
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Pastor Patty Does What Must Be Done
Pastor Patty crawled out of bed and looked out the window. The Sunday morning view was not pleasing.
Periwinkle County is located geographically and meterologically on what "Mr. Robbins," the congenial old meterologist on Channel 8&1/2, calls "The Creases." PC is on the crease of every kind of map. In the east part of the county are the Bleu Tetons. The north part, up toward Capital City, is flat as Kansas. The west, toward Hope's Promise and Cratchit State U, is hill land. Nobody talks about the southern part of PC, even to describe the terrain, except to note that it includes a lot of yard cars. Sometimes it feels like Houston in summer, sometimes like Buffalo in winter, sometimes both at the same time, according to where you are.
Pastor Patty lives in Memphjus, the county seat, named for the biblical city, and spelled according to the reworking of the Masoretic pointing of the Hebrew text by Joseph "The Brigand" Olds, a reformed pirate and founder of Saint John the Catholic Baptist Church and College, which is sometimes inside the town of Memphjus and sometimes outside, according to how Joseph Olds IV feels about the Town Council. Saint John the Catholic Baptist Church theology is universalist. They believe that everyone will be saved, unless you don't agree with them. Then you'll go to hell.
Pastor Patty is not a part of SJTCBC&C. She pastors the church simply known as "The Methodist." This morning she wants nothing to do with it. The Kitchen Nazis have been at war with the Bleeding Hearts over meals for the homeless. [Neither name is an official title, but Methodists are known for taking insulting names and using them as a badge of honor, so both the KNs and the BHs now refer to themselves, with pride, according to the sobriquets heaped upon them by their foes.] It doesn't feel much like a church, more like a town hall about health care reform. The only good part of worship is when the kids come up. You never know what they'll do. At Christmas, when they were looking at the creche set on the altar, and she asked for the name of Jesus' father, little Walter Weter shouted out "Bob," as loud as if he were on a quiz show. The KNs and the BHs laughed together at that.
She talked with her sort-of mentor, Rev. Randall Nathan (Retard) about it. She knew he would have the batteries out of the phones. Like most retired preachers, his goal in life is to avoid people altogether. So she left her husband to get breakfast for the kids, went to the Nathan house, waded through the snow, pecked out SOS in Morse code on the basement window, and was then allowed to slide through the window into his secret lair, the one everyone in town knows about. She was pleased that she could still fit through the window.
Pastor Nathan told her about the boy who didn't want to go to church. It's an old story, but he's an old man, and they love to tell old stories. "I don't want to go," he told his mother. "They never sing hymns I like and nobody there likes me." "You have to go," his mother said. "Give me two good reasons," he pouted. "Well, you're forty-five years old, and you're the pastor of the church."
Pastor Patty is only 35, but she got the point. He knew that she got it, but he explained it anyway. "Some things you just have to do. You don't have to feel like it, or want to, or be in the mood, or be prepared. You just have to show up and do it."
"Will you be there this morning?" she asked him. "Of course not," he said. "I don't have to."
When she followed the acolytes down the aisle to start the 10:30 service, though, he was there, sitting between the KNs and the BHs. She laughed out loud. "The old hermudgeon has been listening to himself again," she said.
Periwinkle County is located geographically and meterologically on what "Mr. Robbins," the congenial old meterologist on Channel 8&1/2, calls "The Creases." PC is on the crease of every kind of map. In the east part of the county are the Bleu Tetons. The north part, up toward Capital City, is flat as Kansas. The west, toward Hope's Promise and Cratchit State U, is hill land. Nobody talks about the southern part of PC, even to describe the terrain, except to note that it includes a lot of yard cars. Sometimes it feels like Houston in summer, sometimes like Buffalo in winter, sometimes both at the same time, according to where you are.
Pastor Patty lives in Memphjus, the county seat, named for the biblical city, and spelled according to the reworking of the Masoretic pointing of the Hebrew text by Joseph "The Brigand" Olds, a reformed pirate and founder of Saint John the Catholic Baptist Church and College, which is sometimes inside the town of Memphjus and sometimes outside, according to how Joseph Olds IV feels about the Town Council. Saint John the Catholic Baptist Church theology is universalist. They believe that everyone will be saved, unless you don't agree with them. Then you'll go to hell.
Pastor Patty is not a part of SJTCBC&C. She pastors the church simply known as "The Methodist." This morning she wants nothing to do with it. The Kitchen Nazis have been at war with the Bleeding Hearts over meals for the homeless. [Neither name is an official title, but Methodists are known for taking insulting names and using them as a badge of honor, so both the KNs and the BHs now refer to themselves, with pride, according to the sobriquets heaped upon them by their foes.] It doesn't feel much like a church, more like a town hall about health care reform. The only good part of worship is when the kids come up. You never know what they'll do. At Christmas, when they were looking at the creche set on the altar, and she asked for the name of Jesus' father, little Walter Weter shouted out "Bob," as loud as if he were on a quiz show. The KNs and the BHs laughed together at that.
She talked with her sort-of mentor, Rev. Randall Nathan (Retard) about it. She knew he would have the batteries out of the phones. Like most retired preachers, his goal in life is to avoid people altogether. So she left her husband to get breakfast for the kids, went to the Nathan house, waded through the snow, pecked out SOS in Morse code on the basement window, and was then allowed to slide through the window into his secret lair, the one everyone in town knows about. She was pleased that she could still fit through the window.
Pastor Nathan told her about the boy who didn't want to go to church. It's an old story, but he's an old man, and they love to tell old stories. "I don't want to go," he told his mother. "They never sing hymns I like and nobody there likes me." "You have to go," his mother said. "Give me two good reasons," he pouted. "Well, you're forty-five years old, and you're the pastor of the church."
Pastor Patty is only 35, but she got the point. He knew that she got it, but he explained it anyway. "Some things you just have to do. You don't have to feel like it, or want to, or be in the mood, or be prepared. You just have to show up and do it."
"Will you be there this morning?" she asked him. "Of course not," he said. "I don't have to."
When she followed the acolytes down the aisle to start the 10:30 service, though, he was there, sitting between the KNs and the BHs. She laughed out loud. "The old hermudgeon has been listening to himself again," she said.
Saturday, January 2, 2010
He'll Have to Go
Hank Johnson was at the Whistle & Thistle biker bar yesterday. He watched some football, but he wasn't interested in any of the teams. He drank some beer, but he wasn't interested in any of the brands. He was interested in that new girl he had met over in Hope's Promise, Ashley something. She was probably just a college girl, but she had given him her number. College girls liked him. All the girls liked Hank. And he liked all the girls. Except for Billie. Ever since they got married...
She'd be home from her shift at the "He Went Gas-A-Way" before long. She hadn't wanted to work New Year's Day. She wanted to go to her folks. Thank God for Raj Misal, the manager at "He Went Gas-A-Way." He said Billie had to work because she was newest. Raj had saved Hank a day of total misery.
It was sort of miserable thinking about that Ashley, though, and how she wouldn't expect anything from him, except romance. Maybe she wasn't a college girl; she was in town for the holidays. Didn't matter. She looked like a college girl. College girls were too young for him. All the better.
He stepped into the old-fashioned phone booth at the back of the W&T. He had watched enough stuff about Tiger Woods to know he didn't want a trail on his cell phone. He dug out the slip of paper with that Ashley's phone number. No last name, just "Ashley." That was a good sign.
Then Jim Reeves came up on the juke box. Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone... Hank had always loved that song. Let's pretend that we're together all alone... It had all the elements a country song needed. I'll tell the man to turn the juke box way down low... And there was something about Reeves' voice... And you can tell your friend there with you he'll have to go...
As Hank listened to Jim Reeves, he looked out into the W&T. There was Ben Bottoms, watching the Big Ass {TM} TV, cheering against some team or another. Ben never cheered for a team, except his alma mater, Beanblossom State. "Seymour" just picked out which team he hated the most and cheered against them. But he was a Sociology professor; you had to expect that sort of thing. In the Episcopalian ladies corner was Ben's long-suffering wife, Kate Bates. She wasn't paying any attention to the football, but she and Ben were together there, in a biker bar that had a silver candlestick corner for when the Episcopalian ladies came in.
Then he listened to the lyrics for the first time, really, listened without that haunting melody. The right melody often hides a song's lyrics, makes you think it's saying something other than what it is.
"That guy is a jerk," he said. "He's not romantic, he's just a jerk."
He wadded up the piece of paper and dropped it on the floor. He stopped in the white tablecloth corner and had a word with Kate Bates. Then he hurried out the door. There was a commercial break, so Prof. Bottoms went over to the corner to tell his wife how his most hated teams were doing.
"What did Hank Johnson want?" he asked.
"Said he wanted to fix something for his wife's supper, to surprise her when she gets home from work. Asked me what would be quick."
"You must have told him right. He sure left in a hurry."
"I gave him a meal plan, and how to fix it, but I know the Groundhog IGA is closing early today, so I told him, right now, he'd have to go."
She'd be home from her shift at the "He Went Gas-A-Way" before long. She hadn't wanted to work New Year's Day. She wanted to go to her folks. Thank God for Raj Misal, the manager at "He Went Gas-A-Way." He said Billie had to work because she was newest. Raj had saved Hank a day of total misery.
It was sort of miserable thinking about that Ashley, though, and how she wouldn't expect anything from him, except romance. Maybe she wasn't a college girl; she was in town for the holidays. Didn't matter. She looked like a college girl. College girls were too young for him. All the better.
He stepped into the old-fashioned phone booth at the back of the W&T. He had watched enough stuff about Tiger Woods to know he didn't want a trail on his cell phone. He dug out the slip of paper with that Ashley's phone number. No last name, just "Ashley." That was a good sign.
Then Jim Reeves came up on the juke box. Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone... Hank had always loved that song. Let's pretend that we're together all alone... It had all the elements a country song needed. I'll tell the man to turn the juke box way down low... And there was something about Reeves' voice... And you can tell your friend there with you he'll have to go...
As Hank listened to Jim Reeves, he looked out into the W&T. There was Ben Bottoms, watching the Big Ass {TM} TV, cheering against some team or another. Ben never cheered for a team, except his alma mater, Beanblossom State. "Seymour" just picked out which team he hated the most and cheered against them. But he was a Sociology professor; you had to expect that sort of thing. In the Episcopalian ladies corner was Ben's long-suffering wife, Kate Bates. She wasn't paying any attention to the football, but she and Ben were together there, in a biker bar that had a silver candlestick corner for when the Episcopalian ladies came in.
Then he listened to the lyrics for the first time, really, listened without that haunting melody. The right melody often hides a song's lyrics, makes you think it's saying something other than what it is.
"That guy is a jerk," he said. "He's not romantic, he's just a jerk."
He wadded up the piece of paper and dropped it on the floor. He stopped in the white tablecloth corner and had a word with Kate Bates. Then he hurried out the door. There was a commercial break, so Prof. Bottoms went over to the corner to tell his wife how his most hated teams were doing.
"What did Hank Johnson want?" he asked.
"Said he wanted to fix something for his wife's supper, to surprise her when she gets home from work. Asked me what would be quick."
"You must have told him right. He sure left in a hurry."
"I gave him a meal plan, and how to fix it, but I know the Groundhog IGA is closing early today, so I told him, right now, he'd have to go."
Friday, January 1, 2010
The Rest of the New Year
It is said in Periwinkle County that what you do on New Year's Day is what you will be doing the rest of the year.
Rev. Randall Nathan (Retard) does not believe such superstition, of course, but just in case, he has secretly removed the batteries from all the phones and taken his black and white TV to the basement, where he will watch football and avoid people all day. His wife, Claire, is making lists.
Two-year-old Clara Wembley is stalking the dog, Shingles. Seven-year-old Remington Watts is posting new ways to control parents on his blog devoted to that subject.
His mother, Pastor Patty, hopes, really hopes, that old saying is not true. Another snowmobile went through the false ice on the lake. She's the volunteer chaplain on call today. She's at the hospital, holding hands, knowing she has no answers to "why does God let things like this happen." She does not want to have no answers all year long.
Wally Wagler is filling out his registration for spring training fantasy camp. He'll be the oldest fantasy camper there, but his registration form does not know that he is over the age limit. His wife, Julie, is at the roller rink, terrorizing the teenage boys as she relives her days as a Roller Derby queen.
Professor Ben "Seymour" Bottoms is at The Whistle & Thistle, watching football on the "Big Ass" [TM] TV. His wife, Kate Bates, is along, but she's at the silver candle Episcopalian ladies tables in the corner, planning the guest list and menu for a dinner party.
Roland Innis is at The W&T, too, but all he sees on the screen is a slideshow of his wife, Roberta, memories of all the things they did together, all the joys they shared. It's his first New Year as a widower, and he wants to sit by himself and mourn, but he knows he needs to be out with people. He is, if the denizens of The W&T count as people, but it's not working very well. He thinks it would be okay, though, to spend the whole year just thinking about Roberta.
And, of course, in her remodled farm house, literary super-agent, Phyllis Ethridge, is rejecting manuscripts.
Rev. Randall Nathan (Retard) does not believe such superstition, of course, but just in case, he has secretly removed the batteries from all the phones and taken his black and white TV to the basement, where he will watch football and avoid people all day. His wife, Claire, is making lists.
Two-year-old Clara Wembley is stalking the dog, Shingles. Seven-year-old Remington Watts is posting new ways to control parents on his blog devoted to that subject.
His mother, Pastor Patty, hopes, really hopes, that old saying is not true. Another snowmobile went through the false ice on the lake. She's the volunteer chaplain on call today. She's at the hospital, holding hands, knowing she has no answers to "why does God let things like this happen." She does not want to have no answers all year long.
Wally Wagler is filling out his registration for spring training fantasy camp. He'll be the oldest fantasy camper there, but his registration form does not know that he is over the age limit. His wife, Julie, is at the roller rink, terrorizing the teenage boys as she relives her days as a Roller Derby queen.
Professor Ben "Seymour" Bottoms is at The Whistle & Thistle, watching football on the "Big Ass" [TM] TV. His wife, Kate Bates, is along, but she's at the silver candle Episcopalian ladies tables in the corner, planning the guest list and menu for a dinner party.
Roland Innis is at The W&T, too, but all he sees on the screen is a slideshow of his wife, Roberta, memories of all the things they did together, all the joys they shared. It's his first New Year as a widower, and he wants to sit by himself and mourn, but he knows he needs to be out with people. He is, if the denizens of The W&T count as people, but it's not working very well. He thinks it would be okay, though, to spend the whole year just thinking about Roberta.
And, of course, in her remodled farm house, literary super-agent, Phyllis Ethridge, is rejecting manuscripts.
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