The Mirror

 

Assignment:

Write just one paragraph.  It is meant to be the first paragraph of a brand-new story of yours in which we are introduced to a character -- or a place -- 

Samuel Clark was invisible not in a physical sense of course or some exotic experiment with refraction or reflection, but in how he lived his life like a mouse that was not missed and easily forgotten. He existed in solitude in a sparse apartment devoid of elaborate furnishings, existing on a minimal diet of verbal interaction, barely on the fringes of civilized communication, emitting an occasional beam of illumination like a reluctant lighthouse when interaction was unavoidable. One of the few enjoyments he allowed himself was to frequent the old antique shops on lower Broadway where he never purchased anything. The antique dealers tolerated him in that at least he made their establishments look busy and he never caused any trouble grazing through drawers of knickknacks, buttons and trinkets and never stole anything.

“Good day Sir!” a new employee, unfamiliar with Samual Clark exploded in positivity, excited beyond measure at the possibility of making his first sale. An unavoidable response was required, and Mr. Clark responded predictably “Good day” forcing as much enthusiasm into his intonation as he could muster. The employee skulked away in defeat.

            One day while strolling along Broadway south of Union Square, he entered an antique dealership that had recently rearranged its inventory for greater appeal and accessibility. This rearrangement brought a full -length mirror into Samual’s view and he had to have it! The mirror sat on a wooden base with a bracket with a pivot in the middle of the frame by which the angle of the mirror could be adjusted. It was dazzling in its ordinariness but something about it made the little voice in Samual’s head say YOU MUST HAVE THIS! Samual was not known for impulsive buying and resisted the powerful desire, walking past the mirror. He coveted and craved the mirror wishing and wanting it, longing to possess the looking glass and he was drawn back to it like iron to a magnet. Like a shark picking up the scent of blood in the water the owner picked up on his interest and slowly and gingerly came in for the kill…

 

Jim

Untitled Short Story (based on Caribbean folklore)

 

Assignment:

Write just one paragraph.  It is meant to be the first paragraph of a brand-new story of yours in which we are introduced to a character -- or a place -- 

The moon, shining as bright as a lantern, led her that fateful night. Completely lost in thought, she leisurely walked along the empty streets, making her way to the seawall. She’d already become homesick the first week of being back in her native country, Guyana. She missed the hustle and bustle of the concrete jungle: the bodegas that never closed, the people that never slept, the lights that never turned off, the sirens that always sang continuously and the trains that always ran. She loved Guyana, in her heart she would always call it home, but from the time that she was a little girl, there was an incomprehensible eeriness that she’d always felt shadowing her. So when she moved to America at the tender age of thirteen, she remembered feeling a sense of relief as soon as she saw the bountiful lights of the restless city from the plane window. Now she was back, entrusted with taking care of the loathsome hag, her grandmother, Petunia. A cool breeze sprinted past her just as she thought of her. Between her appearance and her home, Petunia had grown even more eldritch over the years. Everything about her grandmother rubbed her the wrong way, especially now that she had been relegated to such a state that she barely spoke. And when she did speak, she would squarely look her in the eyes and rasp one thing over and over, “I made a deal with the moon!”

Trudie

Grandma's Love: An Old Book Story

 

Assignment:

Online shopping certainly has the advantage of convenience. But as with all change, something is lost while something is gained.  Do you retain any particularly sweet or vivid memories of shopping in the kind of specialty store that hardly exists anymore?  It needn't be of a bookshop; it can be a memory of shopping for anything: particular garments, foods, etc.  If yes, write and share with us a short personal essay or story about this.

            Am I proud? I was then. Was it my fault that I had been so in tune with my paternal grandmother’s number one weakness? I was her number one grandson, chronologically speaking of course.

We were in the local drug store – at least that’s what it was referred to as back then. Long before the big box chain stores, one might venture into the local…apothecary? Our home-grown drug store, probably not unlike most mom and pop’s carried a bevy of merchandise far beyond the well-stocked apothecary items. Most kids my age would gravitate to the (then) sparse toy aisle for a quick looksee at overpriced cheap things. I, however, would stop short at the front of the store, staring in awe at the drug store book spinner filled with enough books to make one dizzy if you spun it fast enough. Sadly, many of the dime store paperbacks probably found themselves trapped there, screaming, “stop this thing, I want to get off!” Tawdry romances, out of this world sci-fi (light on the sci), rollicking westerns, whodunit mysteries and who the heck is this person biographies; all of these were mixed in with the occasional bestseller and quick buck TV series tie-in’s. Once upon a time, I had been a slave to sitcom serials in print like the Brady Bunch and the Partridge Family, but it had been on this specific day with my grandma in tow when I had eyed the next paperback that she would purchase that I would likely never read. Yes, that was a problem too. So many paperbacks that looked so good in the store simply held so much less luster once I’d gotten them home. This one, however, shan’t not share the same fate, I had sworn this time.

            Matt Helm.

            The Betrayers, written by Donald Hamilton.

I had seen a Matt Helm movie on TV once. It was Dean Martin who had portrayed the role of the quasi-famous secret agent never to be confused with the far more relevant Bond, James Bond. I was only eleven at the time, and James Bond with his arresting eloquence always engaged in exotic far-off locales was a bit above my grade school I.Q. pay grade. Helm, on the other hand, well, what was it about Matt Helm that had had me so engrossed, sitting way too close to the tube, which apparently at that time had been bad for my eyes? I don’t know!

“Buy me,” the book beckoned. “Get me off this crazy thing.”

I lifted it from its minimum-security circular cell and eyed the printed price on the front cover. Ninety-five cents, that was also above my grade school pay grade.

I didn’t have that kind of coinage.

My little short grandma did.

I gulped a guilty gulp, shot a shame filled glance around my immediate perimeter, turned the book over and read the synopsis.

Hawaii?

I knew about Hawaii. Hawaii was an island, all surrounded by water and stuff, and everyone that I knew wanted to go there.

Or maybe their parents did; there was a whole lot of people who loved Hawaii.

Grandma M came up behind me at that point.

“What is that?” she asked, nodding toward the book.

“Hawaii is s-o-o-o-o cool,” I told her. “I always wanted to know about Hawaii.”

“Mmmm, Hawaii,” she nodded dreamily.

I wish that I had wondered just then where her travels may have taken her over her long lifetime. Had she ever traveled? I never knew of the life she and my grandpa had led beyond the two-family house they called home on 91^st Street in Jackson Heights, Queens, only blocks away from New York’s (not so) famed LaGuardia Airport.

“You love reading, don’t you?” she asked, knowing full well that my appetite for books was only surpassed by my insatiable hunger for her world-famous (it had to be world-famous, it was that good) candied sweet potatoes.

I nodded, and licked my lips.

“What other islands are ‘so cool’?” she teased.

Was she teasing? What other islands did I know of beyond Long Island, where I lived? This should have been a simple transaction between number one grandson and equally uno grandma. Now, it was a test. A test of what, though? She really hadn’t examined the book. It could have been a shameless, trashy, you-know-what type, but before I could say, ‘I love you, Nana,’ into her handheld plastic basket and into my life the book went.

I don’t remember if it had been a good book or not, but I did actually learn something about the island of Hawaii.

Brace yourselves, brave readers.

Hawaii is more than just one island!

Really!

There was Molokai, and Kauai, and some other one that I cannot remember.

Who knew?

I did then.

I still know now.

Mmmm, Hawaii.

 

Only a week ago, I ordered a set of Matt Helm DVD’s. It has been too many years to count since I have seen my only Matt Helm movie sitting alongside mom and dad in our Long Island living room. The ABC Movie of the Week that night had been “The Silencers.”

Dean Martin drinking and philandering with floozies at light speed. Family friendly fodder, this was not. What kind of parents were mine? This kind of thing would never be acceptable in this day and

(age).

 

In 2007, my son was only four.

He pedaled his trike while I walked alongside wondering if he might ever grow tired. His legs worked furiously, mine not as much, yet I was the one out of breath. We had finally taken a break at my behest on a dead-end street in our Forest Hills, Queens neighborhood. He climbed off his bike, moved to the closed gate before us and peered through the diamond shaped peepholes at the eerily muted tableau beyond. We were at a Highway Department maintenance facility on a silent Sunday morn. Hulking trucks slept soundlessly; a lone gas pump stood sentry in the hushed sanctuary.

“This is like the Langoliers,” Justin whispered, looking at me for confirmation. Stephen King’s, the Langoliers had been his favorite movie of all-time.

The parenting apple had apparently not fallen far from its tree. Stephen King at four? What kind of parent did that make me?

 

The old-fashioned drug store has been demoted to thrift store now. Old people like me pop into these mom and pop’s on occasion, maybe to laugh, maybe to smile, maybe just to breathe deep and inhale years past, maybe through the pages and bindings of old books, maybe trying to recapture the glorious parts of our past.

Maybe to say ‘thank-you. Thank you, Nana for the books and gifts you bestowed upon me on a whim.

My whim, I’m sure.

Maybe I was clever.

Maybe I wish to talk to her just one more time, my little short grandma.

Maybe to say, ‘I’m sorry.’

Definitely to say, ‘I love you.’

Tom / June 2023

"Reckless Heart" (Temporary Working Title)

 

Assignment:

Write just one paragraph.  It is meant to be the first paragraph of a brand-new story of yours in which we are introduced to a character -- or a place -- 

The office of Campbell I. Gerent was housed within a non-descript standalone storefront sandwiched in between two failing businesses, one a sandwich shop, the other a sandpaper distributor.  What were the chances, Campbell – Bell to his friends – wondered?  On busy little 72^nd Avenue in the borough of Queens, NY, just mere miles east of the big city itself, anything was possible; the classic melting pot, however, seemed to be becoming more of a fondue, at least where the business of small business was concerned, he supposed.  Bell puffed luxuriously on his third cigarette in under thirty minutes and gazed out upon the bustling sidewalk in full unobscured view. He chuckled as passersby passed by, pausing just long enough to squint inside through his almost opaque windows trying to imagine just what it was that a Talent Rod did exactly.  Some were even brazened enough to cup their hands around their eyes blocking out the daylight and trying to peer through the peeling, faded gold letters that read, The Offices of Campbell I. Gerent, Talent Rod.

Tom (July 2023)

Cigarettes

 

Assignment:

Write just one paragraph.  It is meant to be the first paragraph of a brand-new story of yours in which we are introduced to a character -- or a place -- 

I was in an Uber on my way to a medical test. I was staring out the window. We were stuck in traffic. It’s sweltering outside. The Uber was cold with blasting air conditioning.

 A worker who lifts heavy beer, soda and water onto trucks from the discount warehouse walked slowly past my window. He leaned against the hood of a red van and lit a cigarette. I was taken back twenty-three years ago when I quit smoking and felt the nicotine rush and the Marlboro taste. I loved smoking; my body was so addicted and manipulated by nicotine addiction. The craving was overwhelming for a few moments. It would have been so easy to light a cigarette. So darn easy to get addicted again.

At that moment I snapped back to the reality of the Uber ride. I took a deep breath and was so very thankful that I don’t smoke anymore.

Georgia 

Words of Wisdom

When I look back at my developmental years, I have come to realize how important it is at times to have a  mentor. Someone to speak to about what direction to take; someone to confide in that you trust. I had a few that made a powerful imprint of what direction my life took and I was so grateful to them. My father had such a small closed conservative world perspective I would often run to do anything that was the exact polar opposite of his views. During my high school years, I became immersed in my love of music and performing with the numerous instruments I had learned to love. My friends and I created a band that covered the music of “Blood Sweat and Tears”, “Chicago”, “Santana”, etc. and we played at various high schools and coffee houses around Queens. There were ten of us, mostly from the same year at our high school and when you added the roadies and the girlfriends, it was like being part of a large tribe. We spend hours practicing together after school, eating lunch together at the same table in the cafeteria, and socializing with each other on the weekends. The trumpet player in the band eventually dated my sister, ended up marrying her, had three beautiful daughters and they are still together. It was this wonderful social unit that protected and nourished me during my high school years and many of us still talk to each other weekly 50 years later.

 

 My high school band leader and music teacher, Mr. Keeler, took me under his wing and I thrived from his patience and direction. I was asked to be part of the first music theory course offered at my high school and I seized the chance. Eventually, I became an assistant music teacher at that high school to help him with his students. I recently saw a meme that stated,

“The Music Department is an alternate universe

where pupils are often unrecognizable from who they are outside of it.

 The shy become confident.

The agitated become calm.

The lonely become included

. The quiet become heard.

 And the lost become found.

 Music reveals the real child.”

That meme touched me and I knew from my own experience that it was so true. But in the back of my mind, there was always this voice saying, “You’ll never be able to make a living from this unless you go to Julliard or some other known school and prove yourself to be exceptionally talented at this.” Often, I would witness in my friends that there were a select few that were naturally gifted. The types of people that were able to just pick up any instrument and being able to wail on it. This always just astounded me. I worked so hard, paid for private instruction and practiced non-stop for hours to get to my level of proficiency. It was frustrating to see someone so naturally adept. 

 

One day, I mentioned this quandary to my dentist. He was an older Jewish man, Dr. Glazer, and he seemed to have this air of practical wisdom about him. He said to me that he had loved the violin when he was young the same way that I loved the trombone. He then said, “You can have this love for this instrument for the rest of your life, but it doesn’t have to be the center of your life.” That advice made such incredible sense to me. I gave up my quest to become a professional musician and moved on with my life. It was a transformative moment and it was greatly due to having someone older share some practical wisdom. 

Robert 

Bless This House

 

They grew up hard.  Five brothers, and three sisters, with a mom and a dad, both working long hours to fight off poverty; with little time for church or religion. The most important rule of the house was no cussing or swearing, none whatsoever.  Hence, the phrase was invented by the family, “God Bless It Anyway.”

 

Anytime something went wrong in the kitchen, these four words could be heard exploding out of mother’s mouth. As she opened the door of the cabinet, the pots and pans would rush out, squealing and scraping against each other competing to see who would get to the floor first. “God Bless It Anyway,” mother would yell time and time again.

 

The entire family had to agree. In the large neighborhood of houses that were designed and spread out to look like tentacles, they had the holiest kitchen, if not the holiest house in their community.

Ellen G.

Scaring Myself

 

What am I doing here?  How did I wind up with three teenage friends, in the woods of a local park, in the pitch black?

When we were walking on the sidewalk next to the woods, it seemed like a fun thing to do. Leave the sidewalk where the street lamps light up everything and venture into the woods, where the pitch darkness turns everything into something else.

I was shaking inside non-stop so much so that it felt like a group of mariachis were playing inside my stomach.  I was terrified on the inside but tried to act cool on the outside.  My three friends didn’t seem scared but I sure was!

I started remembering a story my sister and her boyfriend told me recently where they were going to walk into the woods at night but then something made them stop in their tracks.  They insisted that they saw the outline of an adult’s stomach lying on the grass, nothing else, just a pink stomach. 

Could they have been right or were the shadows and blackness of the woods at night tricking their eyes and minds? Had somebody just left behind a half of a watermelon on the ground from an afternoon picnic?  They didn’t stick around to figure it out. They were sure it was a person’s stomach cut away from its body.  They ran out of the wooded area and right back to the safety of their homes.

My mind started concentrating on the present again and there I was with my friends who had managed to creep into a darker part of the woods. Trials that were there on the ground to guide us in daylight had now become invisible like a bunch of ghosts hiding in a haunted house.  Invisible paths were playing hide and seek with us in a ghostly way.

We stopped and as I looked up toward the sky.  All I could see were what used to be tree branches but now looked like the long menacing tentacles reaching down to grab all of us and crush us to pulp. Every breath of wind made it seem more and more like those tentacles were bending down lower and lower to grab us.

Then we saw a threatening little man standing off to the side with a machete in his right hand. We stared at him for a minute to tell if he was a sinister criminal or not but this was the last straw for all of us. Was this man really just a tree trunk which took on scary shapes in the complete darkness or was a machete being sharpened and ready to use?

We didn’t stay to figure it out. All of us started yelling and screaming while trying to find our way out of those pitch dark woods. We all promised each other that we would never go back in the woods at night. As for me, I never did!

Ellen G.

Assignment: "Common Words Used in an Uncommon Way"

The police officers raked all the miscreants into a pile then handcuffed and sent them along to Central Booking.

The ravenous tiger swabbed his lips and silently stalked his prey.

The old ship steeped in salty water and salty nautical profanity could almost sail itself.

The tank blustered and threatened as it noisily made its presence known.

Bubbling with glee the tray of lasagna meditated on the rack.

Jim

Assignment: Using "Personification"

The couch appeared forlorn and vacant. Missing were the two cats, one warm           feline reclined on each ample sofa arm. Sweet, sweet HoneyBun with her heart shaped face and soft sea eyes on the right side, an orange, brown and white calico who brought light wherever her delicate paws tread. Big Bongo on the left side, weighty and shrewd, dressed up in his Tuxedo best with no place to go, enormous white whiskers exploring his space. The first cat emitted a light, feminine purr; the other a basso vibration. One at a time, each disappeared leaving only the cool, silent throw pillows and seat cushions to keep the couch company.

How to explain death to a couch? 

Marsha 
7.9.23

A Visit, Two Little Monkeys, and Memories of My Mom

 

“Monkey!!” calls out the father, as he crawls around the den floor picking up is son’s Lego collection.

          His five-year-old son runs in to the room with expectation, only to discover his father wants him to help pick up the scattered plastic objects. Instead, the boy climbs on his father’s back, grabs onto his shirt, and rides on him around the room, while only one of them picks up the Lego. There is company in the room and I don’t think the Daddy wants to make a scene.

          The word “monkey” conjures up memories 65 and 70 years old. My own mother used to look at me from across a room, open her arms, and call out, “Come, monkey.” She’d scoop me into her loving arms and nuzzle my cheek. Though being called a monkey is not considered an affectionate term in the general vernacular, my mother called me that with great affection and amusement.  I would respond with a pleasurable giggle. I can feel the sureness of that encircling love to this day.

          Later in the visit, as he points to two platters in the middle of the table, the father asks his son, “What do you want for dinner, Monkey? Ziti or pasta- chicken with veggies?” A long pause follows. Baleful eyes look back.

          “OK. How about a Go-gurt and watermelon?” He is greeted with a definite left-right head swing.

          “Cake,” declares the son.

          “No. You have to have some dinner first, Buddy.”

          “Cake.”

          Finally, the little Monkey acquiesces to watermelon and peanut butter. When his plate arrives, he eyes the watermelon pits and seems to take offense. The luscious sweet fruit is left, abandoned on the plate, poisoned by the obnoxious black pits.

          I was a picky and particular eater as a child also.  My poor mother! Heaven forfend a lump in the Cream of Wheat or a tiny piece of shell in the scrambled eggs. “Marsha, there is more on your plate than when you started,” she would note after most meals. This former little Monkey recognized the dinner behavior of the current Monkey across the table from me.

          I turned to the grandmother and recounted, “My mother used to call me Monkey also.”

          Her eyebrows rise in interest or surprise. Perhaps Monkey doesn’t sound like the best endearment for a little girl, I thought.

          ”Any other nicknames?” she inquires.

          I could have told her that my father called me “Nashumela” (little soul), my sister called me “Bubeleh” (technically little grandma but in common use, Honey or Little One), my grandmother “Mammela” (little mother) and my grandfather “Marshkonkenu” (little Marsha).

          Nope. The only thing that comes to mind is an expression my mother used when I was unusually irascible (which was not uncommon occurrence).

          I tell this woman, “The only other animal my mother compared me to was a “jackass.”

          I regret sharing this immediately, as I watch the woman’s eyebrows rise skyscraper high and the corners of her mouth drop to the floor. I suddenly realize how awful these words sound.

          I backpedal and explain that Mom would say, when I was being extremely stubborn or petulant: “‘Don’t act like a jackass.’ She never actually called me ‘Jackass,’” I explained.

          “That’s a very fine line there,” the woman whispered through pursed lips.

          “Well, no. that was a line she never would cross.” I replied defensively.

          I think, “How could I have put my mother in such a bad light? She was probably one of the best mothers anyone, especially me, could have had.” The very worst complaint I had ever had was that she was overprotective, something my sister doesn’t even consider a valid criticism.

          I attempt to defend my mother to Monkey’s grandmother by uselessly adding, “I never, ever heard her say a swear word either, not in my entire life.”

          Guilt feels my chest. The last time I felt this way, I wanted to defend Mom when Dr. O came out to talk to our family, while my mother was in the hospital dying. His summary diagnosis:

          “Frances is a teacher. She’s used to being in charge. She’s taking it badly that she can’t be in charge of the cancer.”

          I was twenty- six. I wanted to defend my mother. I felt as if she had been pigeon-holed and stereotyped by this doctor. I wanted to defend her honor, but I could think of nothing to say. I remained silent. I felt shame and guilt for years after, until I was a more mature adult and understood that his observation had been accurate.

          The same guilt and shame rushed back almost fifty years later. Once again, I felt I had to defend Mom in the eyes of this new person I had just met. I felt again that Marsha-for-the-defense had failed and misrepresented her client, her mother. The feeling shadowed me the rest of the evening.

          It was only on the drive home that I remembered what my old therapist had said during group therapy sessions when a question about mothering come up. She would ask me, in front of the group, “How would your mother have handled the problem? or “What would your mother have said?”

          I really did not have to defend her. I loved her. She was human and was allowed to express her frustration with me. A picadillo in the life of a very good woman and mother. I hope that the young father before me is as good a father to his little monkey as my mother was a wonderful mother to the little monkey that was me. 

Marsha
7.5.23

Cairo

African Grey parrots are a very unique type of pet. First of all, they live 40-70 years. Secondly, they are said to have the intelligence of a three-year old child. In the mid-1980's, a very close friend bought such a parrot and named it "Cairo". The parrot bonded with my friend and when he passed away, the bird was totally distraught, plucking out its feathers and was frantic. 

My friend's family turned to me and asked if I would take Cairo and care for her. It was a big commitment because she was such a mess but I didn't hesitate, took her in and never regretted it. This bird was the funniest roommate I ever had. 

When I took the bird to the vet after a few months of being together, I remarked to the vet that she had started laying eggs and up to that point everyone had thought she was a he. The vet asked, "Who's the love interest?" I replied, "Well, since we are always alone together, I guess it's me!!" 

One day, I had some children over to the apartment and they were fascinated by the bird but eventually they turned on the TV to watch "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles". After they left later that day, Cairo yelled at the top of her lungs, "COWABUNGA!!!!". I laughed so hard. Unfortunately she yelled that phrase every day for ten years after that!

A few weeks later, I noticed when I got home that Cairo was speaking Spanish phrases constantly. I couldn't figure out what was going on. This went on for weeks. Eventually I realized that there had been hispanic men sandblasting the outside of my apartment for the last two weeks and she must have heard them on the scaffolding all day long speaking.

When my girlfriend and I decided to live together, she intimated that she wanted to get to know the bird better. I said,"When you are home during the day, teach her your name.... just slowly repeat your name...".  When I got home, Cairo turned to me and said "I love you" like she did whenever I returned. My girlfriend turned to me and said that she had had no luck in getting a response and I said just be patient and she'll get it. The next day when I got home, Cairo yelled at me when I entered, "SHUT UP!!!!" Apparently, Cairo repeated my girlfriend's name from 8am to 6pm non-stop all day and as a result Cairo added to her vocabulary.

One night, the three of us were sitting in a darkened room watching Hitchcock's "Marnie" on the TV. There is a scene in the movie where Tippy Hendron is galloping through the English countryside on her horse and attempts to jump a stone wall and the horse breaks its leg. In a panic, Tippy runs to a peasant's house and asks for a gun and then shoots the horse, "POW!". At that very point, Cairo yells out "Bye-Bye!!" with perfect timing. The two of us fell off the couch and we were laughing so hard.

As part of her repertoire, she imitated every sound in the house, from the toilet flushing to the phone ringing. Our vet's office was over an electrical contractor's business, so every time we boarded her there, she would make the sound of backing up trucks for weeks. 

My slightly hearing-impaired father eventually came to live with us. When I would leave my father in the house alone, upon my return my father would always say there was something wrong with my phones. "Robert, your phones keep ringing but there is never anyone on the other end!!" It didn't take me long to figure out that it was Cairo up to her old tricks.   

Eventually, she even would have fun torturing my sweet little Westie, Frodo. Cairo would call "Come here, Frodo!" and Frodo innocently would come up to the cage and Cairo would nip him on the nose.

We had 35 years together until she passed away. It was so unique to have this pet interact so intelligently with me in this way. You never knew what the next surprise would be. I can't even count how many times my wife and I just busted out laughing during dinner because she would say something funny. 

Robert