Smoke-free Ohio

Harry is doing a story on the "Smoke-free Ohio" legislation that just passed in the November election. His research requires him to visit all three bars in town to get owner, bartender, and customer reaction.

Harry enters the Gulch at dusk. It's happy hour and there are only two or three stools left at the bar. The air is blue with smoke. Virtually everyone at the bar has a cigarette going. The jukebox is blasting 70s rock. He sets his note pad on the bar and takes a stool next to a guy who could be Prince's little brother.

The bartender is a tall, well-built black woman with short hair. It only takes a minute or so to get her attention. Harry looks down the bar to see what others are drinking and orders a Bud Light. When she brings his bottle, he tells her why he is there. Her name is Debbie and she is willing to cooperate, but the place is busy and she runs off to get someone else a drink.

Harry feels a hand on his back. He is surprised when he turns to see that the man behind him is a stranger. The older man looks benign enough, so Harry relaxes.

"What's your name," the man asks.

Harry reacts like the New Yorker he is. "What's yours?"

He looks around to gauge the reaction in his immediate area. He senses nothing but goodwill.

"I'm Harry, Harry Kresge," he says, "and you?"

"John Pitstick. I don't know you, do I?" the man says. "Do you know me?"

"No I don't," Harry says. "But I know the Pitstick name - long-time farmers around here."

After the man confirms that he is indeed a part of that lineage, Harry tries to engage him in converstation about the upcoming smoking ban. But Pitstick only wants to talk about the Ohio State - Michigan game that was played a few weeks before. Harry finally gets it, when the man points to Harry's hat. It's red, with the letters "OH" in bold white relief. Pitstick finally tires of the conversation and returns to his seat.

The man on Harry's left asks him if he is a reporter. Harry says he is and asks the man his name, but he won't give it.

"Don't want anyone to know you were in a bar?" Harry asks.

The man readily admits to it. He also reveals that although he is a regular at the Gulch, he neither smokes nor drinks. Harry finally notices the Shirley Temple on the bar in front of him.

"Well then, what the hell are you doing here?" Harry asks.

"The women," the man says.

Debbie returns. She has a few minutes to talk. Although she herself does not smoke, she feels that secondhand smoke is not a problem for her.

"We have very good ventilation in here," she says, pointing to the large duct system directly above the bar. "The smoke never reaches me. And when I go home at night, my clothes and hair don't even smell of smoke."

She is convincing, but Harry is dubious. After some more intelligent insights, she spies some friends who have come in and are standing at the other end of the bar. She excuses herself.

Harry's bottle is only half empty. He considers leaving it, but that runs against a lifetime of beer drinking. He cautiously turns to the thin young black man on his right, who has been trying to get his attention all the while he was talking to Debbie.

"So you're a reporter, eh?" The young Prince seems friendly enough.

Harry has seen this guy around town before. His dreads, tight leather pants, and the long leather sheaths, tied with thongs, on each arm are memorable.

"Yeah, I'm doing a story about the new Smoke-free Ohio law."

The man hasn't heard about it, because he was in San Francisco during the election campaign.

"I don't really smoke, myself," he says. Then, looking at the cigarette in his hand, he adds, "Only when I'm in bars."

After a short rambling conversation, Harry finishes his beer and starts to excuse himself.

The man extends his hand. "My mother named me Eros," he says.

"I'm Harry. I have to go now," Kresge says and grabs his note pad.

It has gotten dark. The rain that started while he was in the bar is like a fine Irish lace on his face. Harry is glad for the fresh air. He feels as if he has shortened his life by the half-hour or so he spent in the Gulch.

As he comes to his car, he looks across the street at Peach's, thinks better of it, and goes home.

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Niagara Falls at Night

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This is the story of Allen Street Al

Harry Kresge and his friend Lazaro Rodillo watched as Allen Street Al loped off through the tall grass on Lazaro's farm. The groundhog stopped for a second to look back at them, then turned and ran off toward the road.

"I hope he doesn't get hit," Lazaro said.

"Yeah, me too," said Harry. "I kinda like the little fella. That's why I couldn't shoot him."

Harry had been trying to trap the young groundhog for weeks, but kept catching the same racoon. By the time he caught Al, the racoon was so tame that he would have to wake him up in order to get him out of the catch-and-release trap. First he had tried apples as bait, but raccoons love apples. The he tried cantaloupe, something he picked up from the internet. By the time he tried that, the trap wasn't working too good and Al ate the melon and left.

The bait that finally sealed Al's fate was chicken feed. He had become accustomed to going into the chicken coop and helping himself. The chickens didn't seem to mind. They would even stay in their boxes and lay, while he was dining. Harry would watch him from the house. Al was comfortable but cautious. He would take a few mouthfuls, then look out the door to see if anyone was coming. Whenever Harry would step out onto the back deck, Al would head for the bushes.

The problem was that Al had tunneled down next to the foundation of Harry's house. Harry tried several times to fill in the holes, but the next day they would either be reopened or reappear a few feet away. They were right near the laundry room window. Many was the time that Al and Harry stared at each other through the double pane glass. And Harry watched the little guy grow, bigger and fatter all the time, on his chicken feed.

Harry had asked Lazaro for permission to drop him off at his place, should he ever catch him. Lazaro was delighted to play a role in the illegal relocation of the wild beast, but when he heard that Harry had caught a racoon, he said, "Oh, no! Not around here. Not a racoon. Before you know it, he will be in my garbage."

Harry feared that this meant that he had withdrawn his offer to let him release the groundhog on his property. But when he called to announce the capture Lazaro was gleeful at the prospect being part of his release. "Bring him over!" he shouted through the phone.

Harry was nervous driving through town with his illegal catch in the back of the old station wagon. With my luck, I'll get stopped for failing to signal or something, he thought. He drove carefully, hoping that no one would look into the back of the Green Hornet, while he was stopped at a light or backed up in traffic.

His heart sank as he arrived at Lazaro's driveway. It seemed that his friend had invited half the town to watch the show. Lazaro was holding court. "Here he is now," he announced, "the illegal trapper of animals!" Al was put on display, and soon the audience had had enough and drove off. Then Lazaro's troublesome neighbor pulled in, but soon she was gone and they drove the wagon out to the back of the farm and got ready to open the trap.

"Which way do they generally go when released?" Lazaro asked. "Toward us or away?"

"Don't worry. They don't want any part of us," Harry assured him.

And sure enough, once the door was opened, Al stuck his nose out as if to taste freedom, then stepped out and trotted off, away from his tormentors.

When Mona got home that night she seemed subdued, because she could no longer tease Harry about being outwitted by a groundhog.

"The guy at Tractor Supply told me you've got to take them at least five miles," Harry said.

"But it's not five miles to Lazaro's," she said. "Is it?"

"Nah, about a mile and a half or two at the most. But I read on the Internet that a mile is enough."

"What are you going to do if he comes back?" she asked.

"If he comes back, he can stay," Harry said. And he meant it. He missed the little fella already.

"Do you think we're going to have a warm night, tonight?" he asked.

Mona groaned.

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Harry on air?

The highlight of Harry's week is the Wednesday afternoon meeting at the newspaper, where the stories for the next week are discussed and assigned. The quirkiest are always reserved for him.

Next week Harry will be eligible to start collecting social security. Has he gone down to the Social Security Office to sign up? No! He is too busy chasing after a French Canadian film crew doing a documentary on clowns on lawnmowers, or laying on his back photographing the GM of the local radio station with as much of a 500 foot antenna he can fit into the frame.

The station manager is thinking of having the newspaper reporters do 2 – 3 minutes on their stories for the week. Is this right up Harry’s alley, or what! Harry has an idea too: How about letting the reporters slip into first person/present tense on the radio?

Harry on air: So there I am following the crew of six, all wired together as one. Remember the tortoise shell formation form Julius Caesar in high school Latin? The clown is already mowing in the backyard. We start across the front lawn, filming all the way. Suddenly the front door flies open and a woman steps out. “May I help you?” she says.

Suffice it to say that Harry is having the time of his life. If only his body were a bit more flexible…

Photos from our Asia trip

On May 11, 2006, Harry and Mona embarked on a three week trip to the Far East. Harry has posted hundreds of photos on two Fotki sites. To see them, just click on the links below:

Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, a few from Beijing

Beijing

I recommend that you use the "slideshow" option for viewing the photographs.

Cosmic Uncertainty

There are certain things we can always rely on. The sky is up, the earth is down. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The moon, in its many phases, passes across the night sky. Even when it’s cloudy, we know it's there. There are nine planets circling the sun, always in a certain order.

Then the astronomers tell us that Pluto and Uranus have swapped orbits. A year or so later, they tell us that Pluto isn’t even a planet. I watch a TV show on seven ways all life on Earth can come to an end. If the sun even so much as flickers like a candle in a drafty room, all of human history will be no more than the lifecycle of a fruit fly.

I once wanted to be a novelist like Hemingway, a writer for the ages. But how will any of that matter, if eight feet of ash settles over us all, or we are flushed down a swirling black hole?

So we do what we can, find a little love, make someone laugh, try not to think about it too much. I have a blog with a potential of 50 million readers that no one visits. I write for a small town weekly with a circulation of 2000. That’s enough for me. Someday in some cosmic wormhole, Hemingway’s vapors will be mixed with mine.

The Big MF (May 4, 1928 - August 23, 2006)

The Trumpet Player (for Maynard Ferguson)


Thirty years later
I sat in a restaurant
across from the Jazz Port
eating a soft-shell crab
and thinking about Maynard.

Soon, I would take
a seat in the back row
of the tiny theater
as he warmed up backstage
sliding through scales
above double "C"
stealing my breath
and moistening my eyes.

I remembered a clean cut young man
"Swinging [His] Way Through College"
and the Newport Jazz Festival.
So when he came on stage
with "High Voltage"
it was a shock to see
this fat cat with hamburger
lips and long gray hair.

Then he proceeded
to blow our socks off
and I was sixteen again
lying about my age
to get into Birdland
corner of 52nd Street
and a simpler world.

11/05/95

Postcards from the Knitting Factory

The widow who lives
in the house behind mine
replaced her deceased
husband with a burglar
alarm and went to Florida.
When the wind blows
too hard or there's thunder,
a loud motorcycle or a fire
engine passes in the street,
that sucker goes off
like an unremitting
air-raid siren,
and it doesn't stop
for hours unless
someone turns it off;
and the most likely
someone to do that
is in Florida. But
she has a daughter
who checks the house
every now and then.
I don't know her name
or where she lives
so I send postcards
to the house;
freebies I get
at the Knitting Factory,
promoting rock groups,
art galleries, museums,
festivals, performance artists,
walkathons, record albums,
liquor companies, concerts.
The one thing they have
in common is that they are
uncommonly weird. Not
the type of thing
widows who run off
to Florida normally
receive in the mail.
Attention-getters
to attract the attention
of the married daughter
who comes to check the mail
and the burglar alarm
every now and then.
Postcards, where the message
is on the outside
for her to read.
Sent anonymously
upon each occurrence
to date
in the following order:

Andy Warhol - double torsos:
"Please have your alarm checked
it seems to go off too often."
- your neighbor

The Kronos Quartet at BAM:
"Your alarm went off
three times last night
due to the wind. Please
have it adjusted."
- a tired neighbor

Tanqueray Imported English Gin:
"It's 3 a.m. and your goddam
alarm has been going for an hour.
I think a branch bumped your house.
Please do something."
- an exhausted nearby resident

Mammoth Records:
"Your alarm continues
to be a problem. By now
every burglar in the county
knows you're not home
and your neighbors could
give a shit less! Ever hear
of the boy who cried 'wolf'?"
- pissed off in Stewart Manor

SonicNet - Rock & Roll BBS:
"Today a bird shit on your roof
and your fucking alarm went off.
I'm going over there to tear
the fucker off the side of the house
and while I'm there, I may go inside
and take a look around."
- the pink fucking panther

1996

GWB's Resume

GEORGE W. BUSH 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington , DC 20520


EDUCATION AND EXPERIENCE

LAW ENFORCEMENT

I was arrested in Kennebunkport , Maine , in 1976 for driving under the influence of alcohol. I pled guilty, paid a fine, and had my driver ' s license suspended for 30 days. My Texas driving record has been "lost" and is not available.

MILITARY

I joined the Texas Air National Guard and went AWOL. I refused to take a drug test or answer any questions about my drug use. By joining the Texas Air National Guard, I was able to avoid combat duty in Vietnam.

COLLEGE

I graduated from Yale University with a low C average. I was a cheerleader.

PAST WORK EXPERIENCE

I ran for U.S. Congress and lost. I began my career in the oil business in Midland , Texas , in 1975. I bought an oil company, but couldn ' t find any oil in Texas . The company went bankrupt shortly after I sold all my stock.

I bought the Texas Rangers baseball team in a sweetheart deal that took land using taxpayer money. With the help of my father and our friends in the oil industry, including Enron CEO Ken Lay, I was elected governor of Texas .

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS GOVERNOR OF TEXAS

I changed Texas pollution laws to favor power and oil companies, making Texas the most polluted state in the Union .

During my tenure, Houston replaced Los Angeles as the most smog-ridden city in America

I cut taxes and bankrupted the Texas treasury to the tune of billions in borrowed money.

I set the record for the most executions by any governor in American history.

With the help of my brother, the governor of Florida , and my father ' s appointments to the Supreme Court, I became President after losing by over 500,000 votes.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS AS PRESIDENT

I am the first President in U.S. history to enter office with a criminal record.

I invaded and occupied two countries at a continuing cost of over one billion dollars per week.

I spent the U.S. surplus and effectively bankrupted the U.S. Treasury.

I shattered the record for the largest annual deficit in U.S. history.

I set an economic record for most private bankruptcies filed in any 12-month period.

I set the all-time record for most foreclosures in a 12-month period.

I set the all-time record for the biggest drop in the history of the U.S. stock market.

In my first year in office, over 2 million Americans lost their jobs and that trend continues every month.

I ' m proud that the members of my cabinet are the richest of any administration in U.S. history. My "poorest millionaire," Condoleeza Rice, had a Chevron oil tanker named after her.

I set the record for most campaign fund-raising trips by a U.S. President. I am the all-time U.S. and world record-holder for receiving the most corporate campaign donations.

My largest lifetime campaign contributor, and one of my best friends, Kenneth Lay, presided over the largest corporate bankruptcy fraud in U.S. History, Enron.

My political party used Enron private jets and corporate attorneys to assure my success with the U.S. Supreme Court during my election decision.

I have protected my friends at Enron and Halliburton against investigation or prosecution.

More time and money was spent investigating the Monica Lewinsky affair than has been spent investigating one of the biggest corporate rip- offs in history.

I presided over the biggest energy crisis in U.S. history and refused to intervene when corruption involving the oil industry was revealed.

I presided over the highest gasoline prices in U.S. history.

I changed the U.S. policy to allow convicted criminals to be awarded government contracts.

I appointed more convicted criminals to administration than any President in U.S. history.

I created the Ministry of Homeland Security, the largest bureaucracy in the history of the United States government.

I ' ve broken more international treaties than any President in U.S. history.

I am the first President in U.S. history to have the United Nations remove the U.S. from the Human Rights Commission.

I withdrew the U.S. from the World Court of Law. I refused to allow inspectors access to U.S . "prisoners of war" detainees and thereby have refused to abide by the Geneva Convention.

I am the first President in history to refuse United Nations election inspectors (during the 2002 U.S. election).

I set the record for fewest numbers of press conferences of any President since the advent of television.

I set the all-time record for most days on vacation in any one-year period. After taking off the entire month of August, I presided over the worst security failure in U.S. history.

I garnered the most sympathy for the U.S. after the World Trade Center attacks and less than a year later made the U.S. the most hated country in the world, the largest failure of diplomacy in world history.

I have set the all-time record for most people worldwide to simultaneously protest me in public venues (15 million people), shattering the record for protests against any person in the history of mankind.

I am the first President in U.S. history to order an unprovoked, pre-emptive attack and the military occupation of a sovereign nation. I did so against the will of the United Nations, the majority of U.S. citizens, and the world community.

I have cut health care benefits for war veterans and support a cut in duty benefits for active duty troops and their families-in-wartime.

In my State of the Union Address, I lied about our reasons for attacking Iraq and then blamed the lies on our British friends.

I am the first President in history to have a majority of Europeans (71%) view my presidency as the biggest threat to world peace and security.

I am supporting development of a nuclear "Tactical Bunker Buster," a WMD. I have so far failed to fulfill my pledge to bring Osama Bin Laden [sic] to justice.

RECORDS AND REFERENCES

All records of my tenure as governor of Texas are now in my father ' s library, sealed and unavailable for public view.

All records of SEC investigations into my insider trading and my bankrupt companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

All records or minutes from meetings that I, or my Vice-President, attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public review. I am a member of the Republican Party.


PLEASE CONSIDER MY EXPERIENCE WHEN VOTING IN THE 2006 MIDTERM ELECTIONS.

PLEASE SEND THIS TO EVERY VOTER YOU KNOW.

(Received in a chain email. I rarely pass this kind of spam along, but this time I could not resist. Photo borrowed from www.allposters.com, without permission. Ignore my usual copyright for this post.)

Three different MPH signs in less than 3/10 of a mile

As the driver heads south out of Yellow Springs, Ohio on US-68, he is confronted with the following:

• A 35 MPH sign at the town's souther limit (this has been the speed limit for about a mile;
• A little less than a tenth of a mile there is a 55 MPH sign;
• And then, two tenths of a mile later traffic is slowed to 45 MPH for an intersection with a county road.

The limit goes back to 55 in less than a half mile.

Without doing anymore research than the above photos and a check of his odometer, Harry is willing to bet this is the result of three different jurisdictions not consulting with one another: the Village of Yellow Springs (village speed limit is 35), the State of Ohio (state speed limit when not posted is 55), and Greene County, which probably posted the 45 MPH sign to protect those driving on its road at the intersection with Route 68.

As you might guess, the local gendarmes are having a field day with this.

Especially senseless is the 55 MPH sign, which is posted just before the entrance and exit to the Springs Motel. Even a leadfoot like Harry can see a problem with this.

On beating the system...

Here's to Ken Lay, whose timing was perfect.  His cohorts will curse him for decades to come, not to mention the employees and shareholders of Enron.  Hell, I'm just hoping my teeth will hold out for another three years!

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10:00 p.m. Beijing in the Rain

We are the last of the customers.
Outside it is coming down hard.
The restaurant girls are ready
to go home. I picture them
on their bicycles in the dark
and the rain,
dodging trucks and busses
and motorcycles
so we can dine late.

I search their faces
for clues to their lives.
I find nothing,
but blank inscrutability.

Harry & Mona & Uncle Mao

Back from the land of the weird toilet

It's hard to believe we have been back for an entire month.  I guess it's because I have been so busy trying to catch up, launch new projects, and start a new job.  New Job?  That's right folks, Harry has signed on as a freelance reporter with the local weekly and had his first byline, front page no less, published this week.

Did I promise you a shot of me at the Great Wall?  Well, if I didn't I should have.  Behold:

Ni how!

I must tell you at this point that I am using an off-line blog editor, Qumana, for the first time and I'm not exactly sure how this will come out.  If it works, it might encourage me to keep the blog up.  And maybe post my lengthy travel journal.

Cheers!

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I dreamed I won a marathon

In 1980, I ran the New York City Marathon in 3:42:52. I was 36 years old and weighed 134 lbs. I finished in the middle of the pack of 12,000 runners who partook in the event. You’ll notice I did not use the word competed. I finished to the applause of thousands of strangers, but no one I knew was there to greet me. I drove home alone in my ’76 Maverick and watched Alberto Salazar win it on the six o’clock news.

First Name -- Last Name -- Sex/Age -- Place -- Time --- Pace

ALBERTO ----- SALAZAR --- M22 --------- 1 -------- 2:09:41 -- 4:56

VIRGIL ---------- HERVEY----- M36 --------- 6279 --- 3:42:52 -- 8:30

(1980 results from the official New York Marathon archives)

The next year I developed tendonitis in my right knee during training for a second go at it, ran anyway, and dropped out at the 8 mile mark. I took the subway back to Central Park, arriving in time to see Alberto Salazar cross the finish line in record breaking time. I would never run again.

These days I weigh in at a hefty 200 lbs. Last night I dreamed I won the Chicago Marathon. Maybe it had something to do with the tendonitis I’m developing in my left ankle. The crowd was sparse, but at least Mona was there to cheer me on.

Eight years, a half-a-lifetime

I remember Eisenhower being sworn in for the first time. I watched it on a neighbor’s TV. I was nine years old. I was seventeen and in college when he finished his second term and Kennedy took office. Children, who were nine when Bush fils was sworn in, will be old enough to fight in Iraq by the time his term of office is over. Unfortunately, it looks like they will get that opportunity.

I sat out Vietnam on on an island called Miyako Jima, the “Pearl of the East China Sea.” I was twenty-two and had enlisted in the Coast Guard a full year before American forces got involved in Vietnam, beyond the “advisor” stage. That war ran for more than ten years. Toward the end of the war, young men were dying over there, who couldn’t even recall a time when Vietnam wasn’t synonymous with war, even though it was never officially called one.

I would lay on the roof of the pump shack at the LORAN station on Miyako and watch the B-52s from Okinawa fly over. That was 1967. I was getting a tan. I wouldn’t realize how serious the war was until I got home. It ran another eight years. During that time, I finished college and law school, had my first child, and represented hundreds of accused criminals for the Legal Aid Society in New York City. It seemed like a lifetime.

And now about my foot

A little over four weeks ago, I stepped out my front door to warm up Mona’s car before she left for work and stepped on a well-camouflaged patch of ice. It seems weird talking about a wintery day’s accident when we almost hit 80 yesterday, but that’s how it is in Ohio. We are bordered by Canada on the north and Kentucky on the south.

It happened just as I was turning to go back into the house to get the keys that I had forgotten. As I started to slip, the left ankle buckled in and I heard and felt something snap. Visions of Fred Schenck flashed through my head as I went down. Fred had a similar fall on his way to church a couple years back and was in a cast for over a year. I also had visions of me hemorrhaging money in the waiting room of some orthopedic surgeon.

I crawled back into the house shouting, “Help me! Help me!” I knew no one had seen me fall. Inside they were getting ready for work and school. Mona got me a bag of ice and dropped the kid on her way to work. They were both running late. I was left to my own resources.

I didn’t think I had a fracture, but I thought I would know better after I had iced it for twenty minutes. I tested it when I was done. No shooting pains, but I couldn’t put weight on it. I needed a cane. I remembered a long broomstick we had in the laundry room. I crawled down the stairs and hopped across the laundry room to where I knew it was. It wasn’t the solution I had hoped it would be. It was awkward and hard to grip. I used it to get back upstairs. I called Angie Schenck to see if Fred was done with Jack Birch’s old cane. She dropped it off and suggested I see a doctor. By this time, I was pretty sure it was only a sprain. “Sprains can be worse than fractures,” she said. Oh boy, just what I needed to hear.

So here we are, almost a month later. I thought I’d be healed in two weeks. With daily heat treatments and ibuprofen, I’m almost better, but I keep doing stupid things to impede my recovery. A few days ago, I felt almost 100% cured. So I mowed the front lawn, which was rapidly becoming the neighborhood eyesore. That night the ankle was sore again. The next morning it was not so good. I babied it again for a couple days and got back to where it was pretty good again. Walter and I spent the morning in Springfield, where I walked all around Office Depot, Wal*mart and Mier. Then last night, Lucy wouldn’t go back in her cage to sleep and I had to chase her all over the house. This morning it is sore again.

In a few days we will be going to Florida, where I had hoped to get in a little tennis. A week after we get back, we are leaving for three weeks in Asia, where I will walk for miles and miles. Last week we went to the flea market, where I found this really neat made-in-China cane for five bucks. I told Mona it looks so cool, I might just continue to use it after I am better.

So here’s my question: Are they going to let me bring this cane on the plane?










-Harry

Along the bike path

The man was riding his bicycle along a bike path in Southwest Ohio. He had ridden ten miles to the next town. There he had lunched at a picnic table on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich washed down with ice tea he had brought along in a plastic bottle. He had read a copy of the local paper with particular interest in the "Help Wanted" and "Apartments for Rent" sections. Then he rode his bike back again as far as this spot, which was still about a mile from the small house he had rented a few weeks before.

The scenery along the way from Serena to Hollowbrook is particularly appealing for its many variations. The trail threads its way through the one town, past a park with a duck pond, close to a two lane highway, then into the woods, past farms, then more woods, and past an old college, before finally coming into the center of the other town.

At this point on the return trip, the path was getting close to the road again and there was nothing in between, but an expanse of freshly mown grass. The lane of on-coming traffic, headed North, was closest to the path. Cars and trucks whizzed by, exceeding the speed limit of 55 mph.

The man was pedalling along at a pretty good pace of his own. His head was down with his helmet into the wind. The sun was high and there was no shade in this open area. Although he had been looking down, not ahead, and not in the direction of the road off to his right, he sensed a vehicle which was travelling faster than the others, swerving somewhat as it came around the gentle curve in the road. It must have been the sound of the loud engine that had warned him initially. He knew he shouldn't have, but could not resist looking up.

"Asshole!" a man shouted from the passenger seat of a truck as it passed him. It was a rusty, well-dented pickup, carrying a couple of young rednecks. The passenger had his head out the window, hooting and hollering as they continued on, roaring up the road.

The man quickly resumed his downward gaze. He thought, hell, I know what I am, but it makes me wonder what he is that he thinks he has to point it out to me. Well anyway, I didn't give him the satisfaction of reacting. I wonder if he feels better, now.

He started to think about himself, about his situation with the woman, something he had managed to avoid for almost twenty miles of solitary cycling. It's hard to argue with someone when they're not rational, someone who's not on the same intellectual wavelength, someone who is so damned insecure that she looks at your own sense of security and can think of nothing better to call it than selfishness. Her emotions had been taking them around in circles, her own arguments contradicting themselves, and she refusing to see it. For instance, when she said that giving his wife his share to the house and the rights to his pension and just packing up and leaving with nothing for himself was "so damn selfish." Go figure! All he'd wanted was to be alone.

Then she had tracked him down. And she was all contrite. She told him that she not only understood why he had done what he had done, but she thought it was the right thing for him to do and had actually congratulated him on finally taking back control of his life. Of course, she had been pressing him to divorce his wife for years, but never understood the legalities, what in New York they call "equitable distribution," an intricate legal concept that was further complicated by his wife's disability.

She told him she still wanted to be part of his life, wanted to move out to Ohio with him and start all over again. He'd warned her that she'd have to change. She'd said that she would do anything to be with him. He should have known better.

There were signs of trouble, even before she joined him. She called him every night. And every night, he made it clear that this is what he would be doing, with her, or without her. One time, when she asked him what he had done alone in his apartment all day, he tried to explain about the writing, rewriting, editing. Her response was, "You might as well, while you have this time to yourself, before the kids and I move out there." He tried to impress it upon her. "This is what I'm going to be doing for the rest of my life. Get it?" He'd thought she had gotten it. Now, whenever he reminded her about their understanding, it was as if she had never understood. She must have thought he had been pulling a power-play, and that, now, she had the power. But it wasn't about power. As far as he was concerned, no one had any power.

"What if something happens to me, if I get sick or something?" she had asked him last night. "Are you going to send my kids back to their father and just take off and leave me?" "I'd never do that," he told her. "Why not?" she said. "You did that to your wife." Suddenly, out of all the irrationality and anger, there emerged a rational thought with enough force to pull all the other crazy ideas together into a cogent argument. It was a projectile, fired straight and true. It slammed into him with a deadening thud.

"Asshole!"

The man had come to a place where a dirt road crossed the bike path. An old pickup truck was blocking the trail in front of him. The two occupants, large unshaven men in flannel shirts and dirty overalls, had gotten out and were standing next to the truck, leaning on baseball bats.

The man applied his brakes and brought the bike to a stop.

"Did you think you could just ignore us and keep pedalling on your merry way?" He thought it was the one who had shouted to him from the road.

The two men raised their bats and started toward him.

The man got off his bike. He removed his helmet and turned to face them. Then he told them the same thing he had said to the woman the night before. "Go right ahead, if you think it will make you feel better."

Still Sad

Baby is still sad, crying a lot, sitting alone, very testy with poor little Lucy. The only way I can cheer her up is to let her ride around on my shoulder.

-Harry

Gone but almost forgotten

Baby & Kiki

“If it weren’t for Baby, Kiki would never be so tame.” Those were my words on Saturday morning as we were eating breakfast and playing with the birds. We had an unusual situation, raising a hand-fed, clipped-winged parrotlet and a supermarket parakeet together in the same cage. They slept cuddled up together and preened each other and had become the best of friends. They were inseparable.

Baby’s flight feathers had grown back, but she retained her cuddly, sweet personality. She would fly to me and sit on my shoulder and ride around with me all day, if I’d let her. Once Kiki saw this, he started to do the same thing, only with a tad more timidity. It became so commonplace that sometimes I would forget that I was walking around the house with two birds on my shoulders. This went on for months.

Before these two, we’d had a parakeet named Bobo, whom we’d put out on the deck in her cage on nice days. One day, last fall, she escaped and we never saw her again. Shortly thereafter, we visited Penny’s Parrots at the flea market and saw a parrotlet for the first time. A parrotlet, a member of the Amazon family, is the smallest true parrot. They are about the size of a parakeet, without the long tail. They also have a much bigger beak. We ordered a female. It would be a few weeks before they had a hand-raised one that was mature enough to bring home. Meanwhile, it was back to the supermarket where we saw and fell in love with Kiki.

We had Kiki for a couple weeks before they called us to say that Baby was ready to come home. By this time, Kiki had been finger trained had become a pretty good pet. We could let him out of the cage with the confidence that he would return when he was hungry. Failing that, he would be easy enough to coax in.

When we first brought Baby home, we kept them in separate cages. They started calling to each other on the first day. After a few days, we let Kiki out and he flew over to Baby’s cage and started to court her. At first she tried to bite his feet through the bars, but eventually, they started to kiss. It wasn’t long before Kiki moved into Baby’s cage.

Back to Saturday: Mona thought it would be nice it the birds got some fresh air. Can you feel it? Can you feel that impending sense of doom that I felt when I first learned of her intentions? I had to go to the post office. When I returned I was greeted with, “I have some bad news for you.”

My heart sank. I knew that at least one of the birds was gone. As it turned out, it was Kiki. Mona had tried cleaning the cage, outside, with the birds in it. Kiki had been nervous about being outside in the first place. As soon as Mona opened the door, he burst past her and flew into a big tree in the neighbor’s yard. Soon he was lost. I got out the binoculars and started calling for him. I thought that having Baby out there with us in the cage, calling too, might help. Nothing!

It was just like when we lost Bobo, but this time we had a new consideration. Baby had never been alone. From the time she was hatched, she had always been around other birds. She already seemed lost. We decided that we had to get another bird immediately. So it was off to Penny’ Parrots, where we found a smart little yellow parakeet we call Lucy. We’ve had her for two days and, with a lot of help from Baby, she is almost finger trained. They are already sharing a cage and preening each other.


So it is my pleasure to introduce to you our newest pet, and Baby’s new friend, Lucy! By the way, we are pretty sure Lucy is a girl, but if she turns out to be a boy, we will call him Lucky. So for now, it is Lucky Lucy.

-Harry

Thunderbangers at 4:00 a.m.

The weatherman got it right this time. I woke up wondering if it was bombers from Wright-Patt or F-18s from the Air National Guard. Then I remembered the forecast on the 11 o’clock news.

As a cold war kid growing up with elementary school air-raid drills, a thunderstorm like last night’s would have had me listening for the sirens. Imagine that, an innocent child afraid of bombs from the sky! Imagine a country devastated by hurricanes, tornados, and earthquakes – bombed out houses, bodies everywhere in the streets. Imagine if we had the power and the will to tame the storm.

With one foot in the air

These women…
They’re too old for me,
I think
as I lay here
with my left foot elevated
next to my cane.
I am reading my alumni magazine,
searching for names
followed by years,
remembering how they were,
dreaming
of younger women
not so far away.

In Ohio

I live in Ohio,
not by accident of birth,
but by choice, the heartland
over the coastal megalopolis.
I am a veteran, a tax payer,
and a voter
in small-town Ohio.

I saw two parades today,
here in Ohio,
each with its silent
procession of Marines
in dress blues,
dozens of police cars,
lights flashing without sirens,
long black limos
and a horse-drawn hearse.
Two in one day,
the third I’ve attended
in just one month.

Here in Ohio…

This is what you call
hitting home.

When Sadaam attacked Kuwait
I thought we were right
to intervene.

When Sadaam complained
that the children of Iraq
were starving, I took note
of his dozens of castles and said
don’t lay this at our door.
We had him under our thumb
and I agreed.

But whenever anyone suggested that,
unprovoked,
we should violently intervene
in the internal affairs
of another country
in the name of human rights,
I wondered about our own
questionable history.
Where was the Axis of Evil
when we were ethnic cleansing,
hanging our own citizens
for the color of their skin?

Shock and awe..?
Let me engage for a moment
in a bit of sacrilege:
This war is illegal, ill conceived,
and poorly carried out.
This war is the screw-up
of a screw-up president
and his politician friends.
We have gone from WMDs
to the nine-eleven connection,
from ousting a dictator,
to installing a democracy
in a land that doesn’t want one,
when it’s really about oil, Israel,
and Dubuyah’s personal agenda.

Close to two thousand
Americans dead,
another fifteen thousand wounded,
and so many Iraqi casualties
no one can count them.
“Victory is ours!” Bush proclaimed
nearly two years ago
and they’re talking about another year,
another eight billion dollars,
another who-knows-how-many lives…

Who the hell are we
to attack another country
without provocation?
The last super power?
The leader of the free world?
Who is setting the example,
the invaders?
If they came here,
they’d be calling me insurgent!

Why Ohio..?
Why so many young soldiers
fighting in a sandstorm
half-way around the world
from Ohio..?
Because we keep our mouths shut
and grieve in silence?
The last time we protested
the same kind of screw-up,
the Governor sent in troops
and twelve lay dead
in Kent,
hitting home
in Ohio.

We are a safe state.
We are in the President’s column.
As Ohio goes,
so goes the nation.

There will be more parades in Ohio
today
and tomorrow.
The newscasters will interview
friends and relatives,
all who want to believe
these kids died for a cause.
We are a red state,
the one that put the President
over the top.
No one wants to say it…
No one wants to believe it…
But this is just one big screw-up!
They died because of a screw-up.

The government won’t allow pictures
of the coffins.
They tend to dishearten the citizenry.
They may be able to stop the photographs
of the neat rows of flag-draped boxes
in the bellies of C-130s,
but they can’t stop
the parades.

They can’t stop
that funeral procession
coming soon
to a town near you.

August 14, 2005

First one thing happens

First one thing happens, then another, and another, and before you know it, you’ve come full circle. Only, in this case, having completed the circumference, I find myself with an extra bicycle, a small dent in the driver’s side front fender of my ’94 Taurus wagon, and an honorable mention in the “Village Police Report.” Someone up there must be smiling.

It was a Sunday morning. Everyone else in the house was still asleep. I hadn’t been to church in awhile, so I showered, shaved, put on my long pants and got ready to leave. It was a nice day. I decided to ride my bike. In the process of transferring the junk from the pockets of my shorts, I considered not bringing my car keys. I wouldn’t need them, but I decided to bring them anyway. You never know…

Despite the many warnings from my wife, I was in the habit of leaving my bike under the eaves in front of my converted garage. Two-and-a-half years without incident, but on this occasion, when I came out the bike was gone. This was a ten-speed that I’d had for thirty years. The seat and the handle bars had been adjusted that long ago. I’d bought it new in Maine from my ex-brother-in-law, who was running a failing sporting goods store in Kennebunkport. I’d ridden it in Maine, New York, and Ohio. I can’t imagine how many miles. I never felt the need for change, except for the occasional flat.

I felt for the car keys in my pocket. If they hadn’t been there, I would probably have gone back inside and stayed there. I wondered about that little voice in my head as I drove to Sunday worship. After church, I paid a visit to the police dispatcher and Sergeant Nipper was called in from the field to take my report. ‘What’s the value?” he asked. “Oh, I don’t know,” I said. I paid $125 for it new. With a little luck, I could have gotten twenty-five bucks for it at a garage sale.” “Don’t worry, I’ll find it!” he said.

On Tuesday I stopped by the police department. The weather was great, the gas prices were on the rise, and I was getting antsy. On Thursday, I checked the newspaper. Sure enough, it had made the police report. On Friday I visited the dispatcher again – nothing. I had conducted my own search, figuring some kid had needed a ride on Saturday night, borrowed my bike, and ditched it somewhere. I’d been to a number of local bike racks and even searched some thick bushes where I thought it might have been left. Nothing! I started thinking about getting another bike, perhaps a new one with 15, 18, or 21 speeds. What for, I wondered, I only use two or three around town. Maybe I’d get me some kind of flashy cruiser, with fenders and a headlight, something like the bike from “Pee Wee’s Big Adventure.” Who needs gears?

On Monday I had a bunch of errands to run in Xenia. It had been more than a week. Somewhere on my shopping list I had entered the word “bike.” As I was driving down North Detroit Street, I spotted a house with about 50 bicycles on the front lawn. This is a kind of Xenia tradition, people selling bikes off their lawn. I decided to check it out on my way back out of town. Who knew, maybe I’d find my own bike. I wondered what I would do.

My errands done, I found myself pacing up and down the two rows, examining the corroding artifacts like some kind of bicycle anthropologist. One rusty three-speed “Free Spirit” coaxed a snicker. The quintessential Yellow Springs bike, I thought. A Mongoose in the second row caught my eye – too flashy? – I wasn’t sure. A bike can say a lot about a person. No one came out of the house to greet me, but there was a phone number on a makeshift sign. I dialed it on my cell phone and ten minutes later the lady of the house was there to help me.

The bikes in the front row were five bucks apiece. Those in the back were from fifteen to twenty-five. The Mongoose was in the back row, but I’d noticed a shimmy in the rear hub while I was waiting. The Free Spirit was in the front row. I’d examined it more closely and decided that all it might need is a new set of tires and a can of WD-40. “I’ll take this one.” The woman looked at me a little funny. “I’m from Yellow Springs,” I explained. She smiled and nodded.

I threw the bike in the wagon and started to back out of the narrow driveway into the heavy traffic on North Detroit. When there was finally a break in the flow, I gunned it and cut my wheel sharply. I was so concentrated on the traffic to my right that I failed to notice the telephone pole close on my left. The ensuing crunch got my attention. The price of the bike suddenly went up. I checked the damage in the Groceryland parking lot.

By early afternoon I’d adjusted the seat, pumped up the tires, and applied heavy doses of WD-40 just about everywhere. I got on and rode it around the block. I found a broken spoke that I’d failed to notice in my initial inspection, but it didn’t seem to matter. I grabbed my backpack and rode it into town, taking Corry Street to the Post Office, and then on to my office on Dayton Street. I was beginning to fall in love with my new found treasure. What a smooth ride..! Perhaps a paint job and some shiny new wheels…

I decided to take the bike path on my way back home. As I passed the bike rack at the south end of the cabooses, something caught my eye. I jammed on the brakes and turned to look back. It was my bike! I examined it, not a scratch, nothing missing. I locked up my new-old bike and rode the old-old one home. On the way I thought about how the five dollar bike had been like a divining rod in the way it had led me to my lost bike. If I hadn’t bought it, I never would have been on the bike path and probably never would have found my stolen bike.

“I hope you learned your lesson,” my wife said. “What are you going to do with that rusty five dollar bike?” She protested when I told her I planned to leave it in front of the garage. “I don’t want that ugly thing in front of my house!” But who knows, maybe it will bring us more luck. As they’ve been saying a lot on TV lately, everything happens for a reason.