City of Boys – Beth Nugent

Beth Nugent - ??

Ahhh…yes, another story to remind me how lucky I am to be born male. Jeeze…the headaches you women have to deal with throughout your lives.

Godwin hits us with the victim/victimizer one-two punch giving us this selection right after Angela. Sure it’s placement is due just by luck of the author’s last names…but, you know…is there a theme to her selections?

A gritty little story which ends up lending its name to the title of a collection of short stories from Nugent in the early 1990s.

Stories like this cause me to think back to my teenage years. I wonder if any of the girls that I knew in those days we in situations similar to that found in this short. Chances are, they were – and probably worse. Was it of their own doing…or were they subjugated?

Then I think back to my days in the classroom. I think about the young girls at their desks intimidated of me as I walk past them…intimidated just because I am a man, and someone has put that fear of men into them.

And then I am once again reminded that we are humans, and this is how things are, and this doesn’t make me happy but it does fascinate me.

Angela - Bharati Mukherjee

Bharati Mukherjee - July 27, 1940 –

My fortunate life has given me the opportunity to travel outside of this comfortable culture…this comfortable country, to discover the lives of people I will call the “others”. I’ve seen gypsy children in Russia, Romania and Italy. Legless beggars on wheeled platforms begging for food in the streets of Ireland and teenaged prostitutes in Eastern Europe. They are small slice of the “others” that remain bouncing around in my memory jarring me into facing my cushy life and recognizing that my petty problems are…just that.

Now that I have a son, I am hyper conscious of his little world. He lives in a warm house, with warm clothes, a soft bed… is provided with the best of food, has a set of loving parents and extended family. When he cries, he is consoled. When his diaper is wet or dirty, it is immediately removed and replaced with a clean one.

I have to work hard not to think of children that live in the mud, that are abused daily and go to sleep hungry. Children that look at their parents with a smile and see a frown returned.

At times, recently, I have been reflecting back to a train station in Rome.

The group of gypsies mark my father and I at about 20 feet.

Uh-oh… I’ve had run-ins with gypsies in Russia and Romania.

I mumble to my father to keep his guard up. We really don’t have an alternative path and we have to keep moving forward out of the station.

This of course was the reason why the group positioned themselves there.

Wonderful choke-point.

As we approach the group of 5 women, we clutch our packs close to our bodies and notice a swaddled baby being tossed through the air towards us.

Perplexing and fascinating as this is not a sight one encounters too often.

The mind is so quick to process this vision and to recognize that yes, in fact, there is a baby flying towards us and if we do not lift our arms to catch it, the little one will certainly fall onto the street.

Without consciously considering our actions, our arms lift away from our packs in an effort to catch the baby.

The group of thieves, having honed this maneuver to perfection, are able to calculate the speed at which we are approaching, knowing just the right time to throw the baby so that even if we do not reach out to catch the infant, their forward progression measured against ours, would allow them to catch the baby at about knee level.

But they knew!… that we would strain to catch the baby, raising our arms away from our packs and pockets, their forward progression allowing them to come against us in a “hug” with their hands quickly finding our pockets and making away with the contents while shouting and spitting.

Diabolical.

The baby came to rest in the “hug” created by one of the women and my father. His pockets were fortunately zipped shut.

I joined the scuffle which ended in the blink of an eye as the women scurried off with their little swaddled baby “bait”.

I placed the baby at about 2 months old. He probably had about another 8 months in his position. That is of course if he was caught after every toss. What was the success rate of a successful toss and catch?

It’s not that hard to imagine that his little life couldn’t have lasted into its first year.

My son has once again forced me to acknowledge that I, we, are so fortunate.

Angela.

“Angela” was/is an incredible story. Strong with raw detail and jarring in the images it paints.

But where does good intention butt up against exploitation? Love of a person or pity?

When can the good intentions of one, driven by love, actually do harm?

My son was born to us…here in America and is being held in my wife’s soft warm arms. Someplace in Asia, another “Angela” is pulling herself out of a leech infested mud pit…and in Rome a swaddled baby is flying through the air not knowing if this moment of weightlessness will be his final earthly sensation.

Fellow Creatures - Wright Morris

For 28 months, I lived in a small room in a small town in Romania. The room was in a student dormitory. I guess you could say that the room, rather my living space, was divided into three spaces. There was a small entrance hall. Small meaning 3 feet by 5 feet. Immediately off of the entrance hall was my bathroom. 3 feet by 8 feet. Just enough for a toilet, sink and bathtub. Walking forward from the entrance hall, you would step into my living quarters…my room. The room served as my kitchen, bedroom and study space.

Life was tough at times in this little space. It was freezing in the winter, broiling in the summer and there was at least one mosquito in the room biting me throughout the entire year. At one point, I held off an invasion of about half a dozen mice. I used a wooden kitchen spatula to defend my territory.

Early on during my time in the room, I was set upon by the devils of loneliness. The only thing that kept them at a distance was a few beers which would allow me to drift off into a pleasant slumber forgetting that I was very ALONE.

As the first winter was setting in, M and I took a trip to Iasi. As we walked down a street towards the train station we passed a small pet store.

It was in this store that I found a friend that would pull me through some dark days of my life in Romania and who would later connect M’s parents to us after our departure…acting as our presence in their newly empty nest.

He was a small white parakeet we named Bolfic (chubby cheeks).

Bolfic was plucked from his nice warm home in a large cage with about 50 other birds and slammed into a small cage, alone, thrust into the cold October air, transported by train back to Negresti and placed upon my table in my bedroom. Bolfic sat in his 1 foot by one foot square cage for about a month. I provided food and water for him and after a few short days, he seemed to be comfortable in his surroundings. He would chirp in the mornings and was nice and quiet during the evenings.

One day, late in November, I had the rare visit from some friends from another town. The girl who accompanied my friend walked into my room, and after the expected “oh…how cute…you have a little bird”, she opened the cage and allowed Bolfic to fly from his cage.

It was seconds into my protestations that she set upon me scolding me for not allowing the bird just a little bit of freedom.

It was the best thing that could have been done for the little guy.

For the rest of his life, Bolfic enjoyed a bit of freedom that most “domesticated” birds never see. He was allowed to fly about my room, sit on M’s head, and when he was hungry, he realized that he would still have his freedom even if he returned to the inside of his cage to eat a few seeds.

This little bird, in a way helped right me…kept me a bit sane. Was a presence when I walked back to my cold room after a hard day of teaching.

He had a personality, and was rugged.

When M and I got married, I moved into her parent’s apartment. Bolfic came with me. Her parents came to really love the little guy.

It was obvious that when we moved to the States, we would be leaving Bolfic.

Right away, he acted as a stand-in for us.

During our weekly phone calls back to RO, we would ask about him and he parents would carry on telling us stories about his latest misbehaviors.

M’s father would play the flute for him and feed him corn puffs.

He kept M’s mom company during the long dark cold days of wither while her husband was out working.

He had become their “child”.

Well, as it happens to all living things, he died one day.

It’s sad, because I can’t remember exactly when this happened.

I think we found out about his death through M’s brother. He mentioned it off hand during a conversation.

We immediately called her parents, and they explained that yes, Bolfic died.

They said he was flying about the room and hit a wall…they supposed that he broke his neck.

He died doing what he loved…simply flying.

From a crowded cold cage in Iasi, to a small cold room in a student apartment and finally, into a warm loving room in a Romanian bloc, Bolfic brought love and comfort.

The Piano Tuner - Peter Meinke

Peter Meinke – 1932 - ????

With harsh turns of tuning pegs and string pops and banging of

keys…drunken shouts and forcible confinement, we find piano tuners entering our lives and forcing us to look at who we really are.

Driving us to the edge of insanity…and possibly leading us directly into that very state…they do us what we think is harm but should and could possibly be a great service.

Stepping outside of our boundaries is healthy. Being pushed by “tuners” is a healthy thing.

We must learn to recognize the tuners in our lives and allow them to do their job.

We must also tune ourselves. Push ourselves into situations both physically and mentally that pop a few strings or break a few old ivory keys.

The strings and keys will be replaced with newgut and whiter ivory.

“How hypocritical” it is of me to write the above sentences you say…those of you who know me.

Yes, I battle with my tuners. It may appear that I resist their applications.

But in reality, I allow my tuners to work on me daily.

You see, my tuners do not pound the keys, pop strings and confine me.

My tuning pegs are slowly turned…so slow that their movement cannot be consciously detected.

My keys are pounded upon - but their destruction and replacement happens at such a speed that many processes as inactivity and stagnation.

And my confinement…I see it not as solitary- but as a gift of freedom.

Clothing - John L'Heureux

John L'Heureux - October 26, 1934 –

Quite a few of us find ourselves wearing the tight white collar.

Quite a few of us find ourselves shedding that collar for so

meone…something…or just perhaps, ourselves.

I found myself in that position back in the mid 90s, and I discovered that changing my clothing back then was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

Now, re-reading the above sentence, I would like to change the word “changing” to “supplementing”.

I made the additions to my wardrobe for me.

I don’t think I have reached the final outcome of that clothing supplementation - and perhaps I’ll never see the final outcome of the decisions I made so many years ago.

I am satisfied with what has happened and I’ll continue to live in my weird, strange mixed up set of clothes.

You see, I added to my toolbox rather than replacing certain tools.

You’ve Come a Long Way Mickey Mouse –Bev Jafek

Bev Jafek- ???

Mickey has lived his life.

He’s lived his life, seen us, and our place within his life, and reached a certain set of conclusions about existence…the deep meaning of it.

I’m about to step through a major door in my existence on this planet (easy…it’s the only one I’ve ever been on, and the only one I ever will be on). Once I pass through this door, I feel that how I have lived up to that point ( the point where I pass through the door) in my life will be re-focused and my set of conclusions that I feel I have reached so far in my life will be jarred.

This is a great thing.

We all need to be jarred…shaken and disturbed.

It mixes the oil with the vinegar.

But then there are those that are never shaken.

I have a certain fascination with people who work in parking garage ticket taking booths.

I stress over their lives. I worry about them in their little boxes. It’s easy for me to think that they could find another job…but could they really? I mean, has their life been lead to a point where they fit within a predetermined mold that only allows them to sit in this small box and collect parking garage tickets? How does this happen?

And then I think…”do they enjoy what they are doing?”

They have a job…they are making some money…

I think that I also overly my intellectual curiosities onto them.

Maybe they don’t want to “live a life” or they don’t know how to “live a life” and all they really know is their life in the box, and that box is comfortable to them.

I just find their existence really interesting.

Mickey says –

“And then I understood the enormity I had become I was like you. My life was lived on a line parallel to yours, but my capacity to reflect my own essence was so horribly perfect. I had discovered, as only an image can, that all your ability to think and feel is based on truncated images. What an uncomfortable creature you are – how prone to obsession, myopia, how divided from all you survey, what a watcher, defender, conquer. And so it is with love – the more distant I was from her, the more incited I became.

Them I truly saw the world you had created. For you are the species who creates a world to invite images. I found that vehicles, parks, whole streets, even cities had been created to incite images. It was astounding – I now understood what your kind had been feeling, what so much of your world was intended for. I became fascinated with the dialectics of people alone – driving in cars, hidden away with their books, sitting in their homes, drinking in whatever corner the world allowed. For I now knew a human secret: When alone, people have a truly horrifying hunger for another person, a hunger beyond satisfaction, a life of images held like a hand of cards against fate”

What a wonderful set of lines Jafek has written.

The Sudden Trees – H.E. Francis

H.E. Francis - H(erbert) E(dward) Francis - born 1924

And with this story, we find another that I think will stay with me a lifetime.

I’m feeling particularly sensitive to stories about children now – for obvious reasons.

My mind is in that state where anything that has to do with a child, childhood, parenting or family that passes across my radar…is instantly tagged and my hyper-aware, laser-like focus zeros in on it and I need to know everything about what is being presented.

This particular story is the second in this collection dealing with the death of a child and it comes directly after the wonderful story by Starkey Flythe.

I read both of these stories back-to-back one morning last week, and it may not have been such a good idea.

Then again, with this quality of writing, I suppose that anytime I read it, the impact would have been the same.

Found a page about Francis and it contained the following quote by him that gives his statement of writing. It is wonderful

"I want each story to hold in its clarity its own profound sense of the mystery we live. In my work, the story has to fix on what I find to be real (everlasting) in human experience within the flexing language of madness and the forms of chaos in our time.

"I want to live in my stories the lives, the spontaneous momentary revelations, of all who really want to live before they die, or who are not aware that they are alive, or who want to live what they cannot."

Wow…just wow.

“ flexing language of madness and the forms of chaos in our time.”

The madness and chaos of the early to mid eighties was certainly different than what we have today…but they surely had some shit going down back then.

I know that the thought of being vaporized at any moment weighed heavily on my 12 year old mind.

Now, the peace and security of dying instantly in a blinding flash of light has been replaced with the possibility of a long tortuous death brought on by a poison, virus, dirty bomb, a creative terrorist attack…or even worse, that you witness the death of your family due to any of the above.

In his writing, Francis uses his skill to place you directly into the body of the narrator, holding the sickly body of the young girl he is caring for.

You feel his emotions as she progresses through the stages of her sickness.

We should all be fortunate enough to give comfort to our loved ones as the pass away. We hold them at birth, and we should be able to hold them or be held at death.

What a wonderful story.