Category: My stories

I’m a photographer.
I like to go to the shore and stand by the highest cliff, and offer to take photos for tourists.
“Can you take my photo?” a guy asks.
“Sure,” I say, and he hands over his camera.
It’s a nice camera, an expensive one.
He shows me how to set it and use it.
“I’ve got one just like it,” I lie.
“Okay, stand there… a little back… back a little more… more… more…”
The guy walks back… and back… and then falls off the cliff.
“Number thirteen,” I say, pocketing the camera, and running back home.

As I get older, I take more pills.
And it’s hard to keep track of them.
The bottles get all mixed up on the counter, and I can’t remember which ones I’ve taken.
My phone reminders aren’t so helpful with this.
And writing on the mirror with dry-erase marker doesn’t help when I forget to read it or update it.
So, I got one of those pill caddies.
Every day has its own compartment, and I fill it on Sunday morning.
Just take the pills for that day, and I’m fine.
Now, please remind me… what day is it again?

Willy and Max were a old-time comedy team.
Willy the straight man, Max was the clown.
Best friends from childhood, they put together an act, took it on the road.
Radio, movies, television.
Mansions next to each other, married a pair of best friends, and spent all their time together.
Max noticed that Willy took longer to remember the setup lines.
Alzheimer’s, said the doctor.
Willy looked forward to Max’s visit every day, even when he couldn’t speak.
Friends to the very end.
Willy’s wife said “Good morning, oh you just missed Max. But he kissed you on the forehead.”

I have battery anxiety.
My car is a plug-in hybrid, and I worry about getting to the end of the electric range.
Sure, it has a gas engine, too, but I have that anxiety.
It’s why I didn’t get a Tesla.
When I go out, I keep spare batteries with me for my phone. And a charger cord.
Just in case I run low. Or get injured.
Same with my laptop, my flashlight, and all my other devices.
As for my smartwatch, I don’t have one.
I have a simple, dumb mechanical watch.
Which I constantly wind.
Just in case.

For team-building exercises, we seek out activities and experiences.
Sometimes, we go to escape rooms, where the team is confronted by a series of puzzles to get out of a locked room.
Other times, we go to smash rooms, filled with outdated equipment, mirrors, and other breakable items to bash with hammers and metal pipes and baseball bats.
They’re great relievers of stress.
I mean, you go into a room and just smashing the crap out of everything.
And the owners of the place, running in, and yelling.
I guess we got confused and smashed up an escape room again.

There is an art to having a good bath.
You need the best oils and salts.
Lay out the softest towels, washcloths, and a robe.
A candle or incense is good, but an essential oil diffuser works as well.
Turn off the lights and let the candle light the room.
Unless you have a diffuser with a light built in.
A bottle of wine, a glass, and a side table.
Maybe a favorite meditation track on your phone, fed to a portable speaker.
A good shower curtain to block out the world.
Oh, and clean the tub.
That thing’s filthy.

I was in the grocery store this weekend, and everyone’s phone alerts went off. except for mine.
I have those emergency alerts turned off.
When I hear everybody’s else’s phone go off, I make moose antlers with my hands on my ears.
Because if it’s like Vesuvius and Herculaneum, where a volcano buries everyone in ash and freezes them in time, there will be 8 billion people staring at their phones while I’m the only one making moose antlers.
And this will confound alien anthropologists digging through the ruins, making them wonder if my bizarre loony gesture caused the disaster.

I need to walk off some fat, but it’s either too hot outside or it’s raining.
And I’m too cheap to go to the gym.
So I bought a treadmill desk for home.
I could put a television on it to watch while walking.
The problem is, it’s old TV, and the picture quality on the Amazon Fire Stick sucks.
And I stopped using it.
So, I got a new smart TV with a network connection.
Great picture, reliable connection.
It works well. Too well.
Now, I can’t stop watching and walking.
And my knees are in bloody, gory agony.

It’s been seventy years since I last went home.
So much has changed. I don’t recognize the place.
Back then, it was just one main street of a few brick stores, all surrounded by farms and houses.
Now it’s a freeway and offices and franchises of everything.
The farms stopped raising corn and wheat, pushing up one final crop of subdivisions and retirement homes.
It’s just like everywhere else these days.
If it weren’t for the Welcome sign, I wouldn’t know where I was.
Where did the spirit of home go?
Covered by concrete and lights and conformist modern life.

Carter soaked up languages like a sponge.
In a day, he was following along in a conversation.
In a week, you could hardly believe he wasn’t born there.
Pretty soon, Carter spoke every language.
There was nothing hidden from his ear.
But he couldn’t read a word.
Except for the wind.
He did his best to listen to the breathing of the world.
But it never spoke to him.
He swore he almost understood what it was saying.
Just barely out of his reach, almost there.
Not quite, but he knew it was saying something.
Like whispers from far away.