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 |  It's who we are. It's what we stare at in the middle of the night. It's a bug zapper. |
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My friends, When we were young and newly hatched—also young and in love—my husband and I lived with our four young children on the Space Coast of Florida. The massive propulsion of rocket and shuttle launches from Cape Kennedy often rocked the windows and doors of our little love cottage. We were always properly respectful and impressed by the reach of mankind’s achievements. It was a point of pride to stop whatever we were doing (dishes, dinner, dancing, sleeping, fist fighting, etc.) to watch the eastern horizon—hands on hearts, tears in eyes—as the United States of America raced into the frontier of space. One deep, dark morning (about 2:00 am) I shook my husband awake to watch yet another triumph of human advancement. “Get up,” I mumbled to Sherwood, “the shuttle’s going up. We gotta’ watch.” Sherwood moaned, “The garbage is out all ready. Let me die.” He did not open his eyes. “Come on. We should watch. Night launches are amazing.” He dragged himself upright and clung to the window ledge behind our bed. We knelt, with our chins braced on the ledge, our bleary eyes fixed on a blazing light in the eastern sky. We watched. The light did not appear to move. We stared some more. The light remain fixed. We struggled to focus. The light blazed away. We waited for the light to fade into the blackness of space. It did not. We watched and watched and watched. The light stubbornly refused to move. At last, collapsing back into my pillow I said, “Honey, go back to sleep.” Sounding confused, miffed, and a little whiney Sherwood asked, “Why?” “Because for the last eight to ten minutes we’ve been staring at our next door neighbor’s bug zapper.” He went back to sleep. And I lived to worship at the altar of space exploration another day. This story pretty much sums up who we are, and how we got this way—excessive staring at bug zappers. And this is my blog, a space-age way of recording one’s thoughts, ideas, embarrassments, and foibles for the entire known world. Once upon a time, I would have made this record on papyrus, rolled it up, stuffed it into a ceramic jar, and asked to have the whole thing buried with me in my sarcophagus. I still might. Disclaimer: Some of the stuff you will read here is true. Some of it is not. Some of it is the result of wishful thinking. Some of it is the result of too much thinking, and some of it is the result of too little thinking. But all of it will be written with joy and laughter, because the alternative is despair and weeping, and isn’t there more than enough of that stuff out there? Thank you for your support, Linda (Zippity the Zapped) Zern |
| In the week sunshine of a Florida winter, it is customary for some Floridians to sit on their septic tanks, their faces tipped up to the sky, their sinuses exposed to the gentle medicinal comfort of the sun’s warmth, their hope as raw as their throats that God and nature will heal them of their Ebola-Rhino-Flu-Plague. Okay, sometimes I pull a lawn chair over to the septic tank and sit in the sun and hope that it will make me feel better when I’m sick. Sometimes, Phillip, my son-in-law, brings the grandkids over and sits on the septic tank with me. What can I say? It’s Saint Cloud. Once upon a time, we (Philip and I) sat in the sun on the septic tank. I was feeling as weak as two kittens in a sinking sack from Ebola-Rhino-Flu-Plague, while Conner and Zoe (the grand-kidlets) cavorted merrily under a Japanese Plum tree. Zoe sang, “Fruit-fruit-fruit, I want two fruits.” Conner popped in his pants. The world spun gently, right up to the point when Conner, poop in drawers, stumbled in the direction of a strange, horned, white goat that had mysteriously appeared in our yard, having journeyed from somewhere beyond next door. “Phillip, grab that boy before Billy Goat Gruff knocks your kid down.” The goat flipped his scraggly beard in the direction of my voice. Phillip ran and scooped Conner up, setting him next to me in my pool of medicinal sunshine on the septic tank. The goat, a smallish—no higher than my knee variety—with dirty blond hair and “come hither” yellow devil eyes, started a slow determined trot in our direction. Phillip, never a lover of goats or farm creatures in general, said, “What does it want with us?” He sounded nervous—also squeamish. “Oh, he’s probably just seeing what’s what.” I tried to sound confident. The goat kept trotting. I closed my eyes in exhaustion brought on by the Ebola-Rhino-Flu-Plague. The odor of goat, BOY goat, engulfed me, and wow, did he smell close! When I opened my eyes, it was to the sight of this stinker of a goat trying to French kiss the sleeve of my shirt and the sound of obscene noises of goat love. I bolted out of my lawn chair. I yelled, “Or he could be looking for a date.” The goat made a lunge at my leg. I dodged. “Grab the kids before it’s too late—this stinky goat is in full on goat whoopee love mode.” Phillip scooped up Conner but Zoe, misunderstanding what I had said, began running wildly around waving and yelling, “Go away stinger goat. Go away.” Confused, but hopeful, the goat surveyed the scene and then lunged at the closest leg—Phillip’s leg. Zoe waved and yelled, “Leave my daddy’s leg alone.” “It’s having its’ way with your leg,” I screamed, as I ripped the garden house from the side of the house. “Run!” I ordered. Expecting a torrent of water, I turned the spigot on full blast, but lying advertising and crap marketing had given me a false sense of security in my new never-kink hose. A weak drip of water taunted me, and I cringed to see more crimps and kinks than hose. Phillip shrieked. Zoe shrieked. “Bad Stinger Goat!!” I whipped the hose from side to side to un-kink the kinks and to defend whatever honor Phillip had left in his right leg. The goat continued to lust. Finally, the hose kinks came free and I fire-hosed that nasty, stinker of a goat. The goat loved it. The distraction gave Phillip enough of a head start that he, Conner, and Zoe made it to the screened porch. I brought up the rear, not two steps ahead of the now wet and super rank horn-dog of a goat. What I saw in my son-in-law’s eyes still brings a shudder to my soul. What he said next I cannot forget. “I showed fear,” he said. “I showed fear.” He hung his head. Conner tried to pet the goat through the porch screen. I tipped over a lawn table and shoved it against the screen door. “You smell like a bad stinger goat,” I said, avoiding Phillip’s eyes. “I hope you have a change of clothes.” Before he finished slinking off to wash himself, I said, “We will never speak of this.” His chin collapsed onto his chest. He continued slinking. Somewhere in the yard a goat bawled his loneliness. This is the story that I started my website with several years ago. To catch up on all my tales of hose kinks, goat attacks, and family shame check out <zippityzerns.com> |
| The strange sound was either an exploding tree trunk or the sonic boom of a UFO. It was enough to make me get off the couch, quit eating bonbons, and go check. I’m ambitious that way. That crazy bang sound wasn’t an imploding tree trunk, the sonic boom of a UFO, or a drive by brick throwing. It was exploding patio furniture. When I reached the former glass topped patio table (purchased from Home Depot—on sale—end of summer mark down) the glass was still popping and jumping. I repeat, the glass was popping and jumping. It was like looking at the sonic boom of a UFO. It was weird. T. J., my son-in-law, who had heard the crazy bang sound and had come to observe the weirdo patio furniture spontaneously MOVING, said, “I just saw a piece of glass jump in the air, about an inch and a half.” He sounded worried. The sound of snap-crackle-pop punctuated his concern. The glass continued to hop and leap. Looking at the tabletop, now reduced to a glittering heap of puffed rice, I asked, “Well, what’s your theory? Ghosts? Aliens? Solar Flares? Really heavy Windex?” No theories were forth coming. T. J. kicked at the body of a mummified tree frog. We were on the back porch, standing next to the exploded patio table. Every summer here in Florida, when the heat hangs over the Miracle Gro vegetables like a blow dryer stuck on high, the tree frogs creep, squeeze, and slink onto our back porch, looking for . . . what? Who can know? It never ends well. Inevitably, our little amphibious friends wind up in locked poses of desiccated mummification—dead as the nails of a door. At this point, they’re easy to sweep up. Easier to sweep up than the exploded glass bits of our back porch table, I can tell you. The glass continued to pop and crackle while we swept up about thirty pounds of glass. I said, “Okay, here’s the story. I’m going with heat-induced spontaneous combustion, and I’m going to insist that if our patio furniture can blow up because of the heat, than it’s just a matter of time before our body parts start to catch on fire, our eyeballs explode, or we dry up like those mummy tree frogs. We need a pool. I’m going to management. Who’s with me?” Because I believe, not unlike certain government types, that you should never waste a good exploding glass tabletop crisis. Pools for everyone!!! Linda (Crashed Glass) Zern Note: To see actual photographs of the weirdness find me on FaceBook and be my friend. |
| “You are going to flip your gourd,” Sherwood said. Sherwood has been married to me for thirty-one years in October, and he has been alive for fifty-one years this month. Now when someone says that you are going to flip your gourd it generally means (in the colloquial) that a person is going to be upset, fired up, or astonished. When my husband uses this phrase, it might mean that he expects me to go out to the garden, find a gourd, and flip it over. I never know. “Why? Why am I going to flip my gourd?” “I just got my yearly work review. It seems that one of my strengths is communication,” he said. “Excuse me, I need to go and find a gourd and flip it over,” I said. Excellent communication—this from a man that I have to ask every single week, when the taxi drops him off at our front door, “So, did you see Sissy Spacek, Captain Kirk, any ex-presidents, wrestlers, sports figures, members of the twelve apostles, possible terrorists, rampaging children, or people that we know or are related to at the airport?” Because, if I don’t ask, he will not tell me!!! No, that’s not fair. He will tell me, SIX MONTHS LATER. “Oh by the way, last year, I saw the actress that played a Ferengi on Deep Space Nine. In fact, she sat next to me on my flight to Fill-In-The-Blank. We chatted.” I blame Marriott—the hotel, not the guy. Sherwood is now working in Detroit, Michigan for OnStar, owned by General Motors. The Marriott hotel is INSIDE the corporate complex—in a tower. Sherwood is staying in the highest room in the tallest tower. His room is on the seventieth (as in 70th) floor. There is a mystical place in the hotel called the concierge lounge where food magically appears and dishes are washed by elves. The beds are made by hordes of hobbits and the floors vacuumed by a myriad of fairies. Food, goods, and services appear as if by magic in my husband’s life without the give and take of actual human speech, and then he goes to work where he uses up all his communication words. I was describing to Staff Sergeant Zern, in Iraq, his father’s new hotel room. “ . . . there’s a conference table in his room that seats twenty, two bathrooms, a bedroom, and a kitchen. Did I mention he’s staying in the Governor’s suite and his room has 1400 square feet?” I explained to SSG Zern. “Mom, I live in a shipping container.” “What did you say?” “A shipping container. They call them Connex Housing Units—CHU’S. They cut two holes for windows and a hole for a door.” My granddaughter overheard me say CHU’S and thought I said shoes, and now she thinks that Uncle Aric lives in a shoe in the desert. “Wow, but the real question is, have you seen Sissy Spacek lately, and if you had, would you tell me?” I asked my husband what his Sunday school lesson was about this coming Sunday and he said, “Whom the Lord loveth, he chases.” “I think the word is chastens not chases.” “That’s what I said. Whom the Lord loveth, he chases.” I sighed and said, “Hey, have you heard? Aric is living in a shoe in the desert? We should send him a gourd to flip.” Have a magical week, filled with words that make you laugh and people that you make you smile. Linda (Good to Gourd) Zern |
| “The reality has got to stop,” I yelled, wrestling the channel changer out of my husband’s hands. “I can’t take any more reality.” “But I like the crab fishing show.” “That show should be called men smoking cigarettes who happen to catch crabs in the cold.” “How about the truck guys driving on ice show?” I clutched the channel changer harder. “You mean men smoking cigarettes that happen to skid trucks over ice? Ahhhhh! Reality is the worst. It’s like peaking into people’s windows to watch them smoke cigarettes.” “How about when pets with two-hundred pound tumors go bad?” he said. “No, no, no. It’s all cheaters, beaters, or eaters. You want reality. I’ll give you reality. Ploodle, our five pound Yorkshire Terrier, chewed through my computer power cord. It’s the fifth power cord I’ve had to buy this year. Those cords are ninety bucks a pop.” “The dog chewed through five power cords?” He sounded mildly incredulous. “Well, no, I messed up a couple all by myself. I had bad luck.” I tried not to sound pouty. “Did you chew them?” I could feel the wrinkles between my eyes deepen. I tried again. “You want reality. I’ll give you reality. We’ve had so much rain this season I saw an alligator in the back pasture.” My husband eyed the channel changer in my hand, gauging the distance required to snatch it back. “It was swimming,” I said, waving the channel changer so he couldn’t get a bead on it. He looked stumped and a little bit dizzy. “In our pasture, the alligator was swimming in our pasture. How’s that for reality?” He thought it over. “Maybe an episode but hardly a series.” Groaning, I said, “Oh man, I just want to watch something with a plot, dialogue, and a little bit of character development, or maybe a mysterious, disappearing island with a guy living inside a giant, clay foot weaving a tapestry or two.” It was my husband’s turn to groan or snore. They can sound the same. I said, “I’ll tell you what; let’s compromise. Let’s go for a walk, and see if those Sand Hill Cranes are still hanging around our driveway and if those crazy birds are still attacking people when they get out of their cars. What do you say? Good times.” Relenting, he said, “Well, it’s not crab fishing in the North Sea, but it’ll have to do.” I smiled and patted his cheek. “And babe, don’t forget to bring the **snake stick, okay.” Linda (Reality is for the Birds) Zern ** The former owner of our property congratulated me on the purchase, handed me a stick with a bent coat hanger hook on the end, told me it was the snake stick, and assured me that we would need it. We have. |
| Santa Claus lost his mind at our house last Christmas. Santa Claus asked one little green-eyed girl what she thought Santa would be bringing her for Christmas. She said, green eyes soft and glistening and with the complete faith and certainty of the completely adorable, “A puppy and a kitten.” An audible snap was heard when Santa’s mind gave way. Santa began to shop for a puppy. He found one. He found a perky, excited example of one brand of canine at a puppy store, and he bought it—with actual Santa dollars. Upon seeing Santa’s puppy poke his alert, frisky head out of the Christmas gift bag, the little green-eyed girl said, “His name is Ploodle—a perfect name for a perfect dog.” There was an audible snapping sound in the chambers of the little green-eyed girl’s father’s head, and so Ploodle came to live at my house, with me and CoCo Chanel, my free dog. Ploodle is a Yorkshire Terrier and a Chicken Hawk. He feels that it is his personal responsibility to protect our property from cats, bats, sheep, cows, turtles, birds, moles, earthworms, and the two homeless chickens living under the horse trailer. Taking Ploodle and CoCo for one of their multitudinous walks, I quickly steered them away from the picnic table where I spotted a feral cat crouching in terror, unwittingly pointing them in the direction of the two homeless chickens lurking under the horse trailer. Ploodle was on it. Ripping the leash from my arthritic hand and resembling a possessed oven mitt with dread locks, Ploodle propelled himself in pursuit of the homeless chickens. CoCo wanted to propel herself in pursuit of the homeless chickens, but she’s a good dog. Ploodle is bad. Ploodle chased the chickens, cornered one, and bit it on the neck. It died. Ploodle weighs 5.0 pounds. “Hey, do you know how they used to cure dogs from being chicken killers?” I asked my husband. Looking a lot like Santa, he shook his head. “Well I’ll tell you. They used to tie the dead chicken to the neck of the dog and make the dog drag it around for a while.” “Did it work?” he asked. “Who knows? But it won’t work for Ploodle, because the chicken outweighs him. We’d have to tie the dog to the chicken’s neck.” “How about we put a bell on his neck?” “I would, but it might tip him over.” Ploodle does not know that he weighs five pounds and cannot possibly herd sheep, round up horses, drive cattle, or fend off killer chickens, and I’m not telling him. There’s an old saying about “it’s not the dog in the fight; it’s the fight in the dog.” I believe it, and I espouse it as a personal motto. Like Ploodle, I’m small, but I’m feisty, and feisty is hard to outrun. Linda (Chicken Hawk) Zern |
| “I can fly.” My husband of thirty-one years told me one morning. I rolled over, gave him the look-see, and said, “Honey, have you taken a good look in the mirror lately? You really haven’t gotten more streamlined over the years. I’d call it more super carrier. Are you sure you can fly? Maybe you’re floating, but it feels like flying?” “No, no, I keep dreaming that I can fly, and I’m pretty sure that I can.” He was adamant. He continues to insist that he can fly. I insist that he stop snoring. It seems that when he dreams that he is flying, he snores. His snoring does not make me think that I can fly. It makes me think that I am being digested by a whale—with gastric-intestinal issues. I have actually been heard to say in the dark of the night, “Honey, if you don’t stop dreaming about flying (i.e. snoring) I am going to crush your head with a brick.” He says, “Oops, sorry.” And then he rolls over to dream about fighting naked ninjas. I don’t dream. I don’t have to. Sherwood does the heavy dreaming for me—he also does a lot of the heavy lifting. My husband, of thirty-one years, spent the first ten years of our marriage working full time and going to school part time—for ten years. Did I mention that it took him ten years? He graduated from the University of Central Florida with a degree in computer science and ten years of experience in his field of study. During that time he insisted that he always have a job with decent insurance, which turned out to be more than a blessing when we welcomed four children to our home in six years—by caesarian section—exciting, but not cheap, and for fun throw in a diagnosis of malignant cancer. (That was me.) When we brought our first son home from the hospital we owed the hospital one dollar and fifty cents for a bottle of shampoo that I had purchased during my seven days in the hospital. We didn’t have one dollar and fifty cents. We had to put one dollar and fifty cents on a payment plan. For eleven years, my husband worked the graveyard shift. At one point he drove more than one hundred miles PER DAY to get from his job in Daytona Beach to his college classes at UCF. He once fell asleep at a red light, and didn’t wake up until the cars behind him started to beep and drive around him. No one checked to see if he was dead. I tell young women that I go to school with that my guy, of thirty-one years, is the real deal, and if their guy isn’t willing to go to the mat for them the way Sherwood did for me, he isn’t good enough for them or for their children. My husband allowed me to concentrate on raising four excellent children, who are now working on raising their own excellent children. In a day when there is a lot of man bashing in and out of the college classroom, I find it easy to believe in the goodness of men at heart. I have been personally acquainted with the best of men and that has made all the difference. Now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure my husband can fly, because he is Superman. Happy father’s day, darling. Happy every day, forever. Linda Zern—wife of Sherwood (the Super Hero) Zern |
| “Does that say what I think it says?” My husband slid his reading glasses to the end of his nose and read out loud, “Contestants catapult into foam and tackle obstacles – Reality Television.” “That’s what I thought it said.” I sighed. “Man if I had a nickel for every time I have had to catapult into foam and tackle something. Why just today, Conner took a nap on the couch, peed through the cushion (which is foam, by the way), and I had to tackle getting the delightful smell of toddler urine out of the sofa.” “That’s reality for you,” he said. And isn’t it just. So, I’ve been writing an essay, of sorts, every week, for about ten years—mostly about catapulting myself into foam and tackling obstacles; you know, reality. Occasionally, I write a disclaimer about my work, also a warning. So let this serve as a disclaimer and a warning: To “get” my writing, it can help to be familiar with the concepts of satire, irony, caustic mockery, and sarcastic self-deprecation. If you’re looking for Three Stooges eye poking humor, move along. No seriously, keep moving. Mostly, I go for witty, but often miss and hit the acerbic mockery bulls-eye. For example: Satire (seeking to expose wrong or folly to ridicule): Here’s me making a satiric comment using the above mentioned example of “reality” –They were a people given to much foam catapulting and obstacle tackling while Lilliput burned. And no, Lilliput is not a town from the musical Oliver, as suggested by my husband. Sardonic (an adjective meaning scornful; mocking; cynical; or derisive): It looks like some of those female contestants came with their own foam padding built right in—their shirts! Ironic (suggests a milder & subtler form of mockery): I’m so happy that there is a television show that finally shows life as it truly is, a series of foam covered rotating fanny paddles that fling human beings into a soup of muddy goop, while the gods on Mount Olympus laugh. Oh boy, can we watch it every night? Sarcasm: Oh boy, can we watch it every night? Caustic (biting or corrosive): If this “reality” show isn’t an indication that civilization is dead as we know it, I will eat that foam pillow . Wit (one skilled in repartee, humor, sarcasm, irony): Sweetheart, if you make me watch the foam catapulting obstacle show, I will stab you with a sharp object not covered in foam. Okay, this sentence may be less about wit and more about statements that can be used against a person in a court of law. So be warned. I am a writer with strong opinions about foam, catapults, and Lilliput. So it you’re easily offended by strong opinions, expressed with the spice of caustic humor keep your eyes closed at all times while reading. Thank you and have a nice day. Linda (Read ‘Em and Weep) Zern Read More @ www.zippityzerns.com |
| When the cashier asks me, “Did you find everything okay?” I always say, “Sure, yeah, great! I found the toilet seat, dog dip, fire ant killer, and gas can—just great. I would be beside myself with consummeristic joy IF IT WASN’T FOR YOUR DERANGED BUGGIES!” Then she calls security. Here in the south we call them buggies. If you’re a Yankee you may call them carts, and if you’re from England, you call them trolleys—which is just bizarre. There are three types of buggies at Walmart: the ones that pull—to the left or the right, the ones that vibrate like the Space Shuttle during liftoff, and the ones that seize up on you, because it suspects that you are homeless and looking for a spare bedroom. I watched my husband yank, pull, push, sway, and rock a Walmart buggy for thirteen minutes one day when we crossed the invisible buggy alert line. It froze up. He went berserk. “It’s frozen,” I said. He yanked. “It thinks that you’re homeless,” I explained. He tipped, then rocked, and then balled up his fist and cursed the heavens. “Face it; we’re going to have to carry eighty pounds of groceries from here to way out there.” I pointed. It was hard to see our vehicle. It was Christmas time. He growled. The vibrators are often easy to spot. These buggies are often abandoned at various points around the mega-store, due to the hideous clank, clank, clank noise and the tremors that travel up through the one wheel that is flapping free, through the handle, into the bones of your forearm, and finally into your temple—like an ice pick. Occasionally, a small child will also be abandoned with the buggy. It’s a decoy. Don’t fall for it. When you go to assist the child, its mother will attempt to steal your buggy and collect the kid later at the lost and found. The pullers are the worst. Hard to spot and apparently impossible to fix these buggies appear serviceable, but by the time you reach the detergent you will be nearing a state of exhaustion. The exhaustion stems from the constant over compensating you will be forced to do to keep your buggy from drifting—into the buggy with the baby in it on your left or the woman in the hover-round on your right. Tip: The more groceries in a puller the worse it pulls, and if a puller buggy gets away from you in the parking lot there may be no stopping it. Chasing after a runaway cart, screaming, is highly ineffective. Trust me on this. Then there are the perfect buggies. The ones that neither pull, nor drift, nor rattle, nor seize up. A pleasure to push and a joy to load up, these buggies just roll along like a corny song, until you hit a bump and your eggs fall out onto the parking lot, but don’t break, and they (the eggs) go rolling—but not in a straight line, because unbroken eggs can’t roll in a straight line—every where, they roll just every where, and because the eggs didn’t break you feel that you should catch them, because they’re still good. Right? I mean you could still make brownies with them (if you cooked that is) and so you go running wildly through the parking lot chasing eggs, trying to get all your eggs in one basket, but in the end there’s no way that you’re going to crawl underneath that van dripping bio-hazards where three of your eggs have rolled, because there are things that you’ll do for brownies and then there are things that you won’t and that’s life. Sometimes life pulls to the right or left, leaving you exhausted, sometimes it vibrates and shatters your eardrums. Sometimes life locks up on you, thinking that you’re someone else entirely, and sometimes life is just right. Then the eggs fall out and roll away under a van. Linda (Buggy Girl) Zern |
“Sherwood, it is my belief that our bedroom carpet should be reported to the Center for Disease Control,” I said. “What are you talking about?” “Our bedroom carpet! Parts of it are crawling. Look.” I hung my head over the edge of our bed and took note of the deteriorating condition of our twenty-year old, wall-to-wall carpeting—parts of it, in fact, appeared to crawl. “Sherwood, I think our carpet may be infectious; put on your swine flu mask.” He hung his head over the edge of our bed and said, “I’m frightened.” “Time for a change,” I said. After discussing the current economic situation, the problem of collapsing civilizations, the pernicious creep of socialism, and the wisdom of buying raw diamonds and burying them in ammunition boxes in the backyard, we felt impressed to have our worn out carpet replaced. We called Chris the Tile Guy, or we tried. His old number had been disconnected—a sign of the times. I called my contact person to track down Chris the Tile Guy. “Holly, do you have Chris’ number? We need tile.” “He’s here,” Holly said. “What do you mean, ‘He’s there?’” “He’s here—at our house.” She put Chris on the phone. I said, “Chris, I want to spend a percentage of my husband’s evil, capitalistic bonus on a new tile floor for our bedroom. When can you do it?” He said, “Two months ago.” He was at my house before I hung up the phone. During the time that Chris the Tile Guy ripped out our old carpet and gave us a beautiful, fresh, gleaming tile floor his grandmother died. Chris thanked me for my evil, capitalistic business by saying, “I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you called. You made my week, and because of this job, I’ll have money to help me catch up on my rent and attend my grandma’s funeral.” I looked at my gleaming new tile floor and said, “Tender mercies all around.” It was an evil, capitalistic win-win situation. Chris got the business, the government will get the taxes, and I got a new floor that doesn’t make my eyes water. That is how it is supposed to work—no government officials, no demeaning handouts, no culture of impotent dependency, and no corruption of the new robber barons (unions)—just people doing private, capitalistic business and everybody won, or as my daughter’s Romanian ballet teacher was fond of saying in his thick, Romanian accent, “Not difficult, darling. Not difficult.” My daughter’s Romanian ballet teacher was a legal immigrant and now a citizen of this country. He’s one of dozens I have met over the years who came to this country (fleeing communistic stagnation and socialistic big-brotherism) for, how did he put it? Oh right, freedom! That was the word. Twenty million, plus or minus, human beings have NOT lied, cheated, plotted, floated, walked, staggered, crawled, run, snuck, stowed away, and dreamed their way into this country because America sucks. Think about it. Linda (Visions of Private Jets Dancing in my Head) Zern |
| I could tell that the veterinarian’s receptionist was worried that I might be in a somewhat fragile state over the euthanasia of our horse, and that I should be handled delicately, because for a lot of people, people’s animals have become people’s people these days. In a gentle voice, designed for maximum comfort, Miss Jay said, “Have you ever seen a horse,” she hesitated, “euthanized, Mrs. Zern?” I thought hard. I wasn’t sure if watching folks shoot animals in the head and then dumping them in a hole counted. “Well, no . . .” “Have you ever seen a dog put to sleep?” Miss Jay asked. I’d seen pigs butchered and chickens plucked. I once had a headless chicken come after me. “Well, hmmm . . . actually . . .” Her voice remained overly gentle, almost tender. “Well, horses can be a little less than elegant when they’re, you know, well, because the doctor will give them a shot to make them sleepy, and then they’ll . . . they’ll . . .” She struggled for the appropriately innocuous description. “Crash over?” She sounded relieved, “Yes, crash over . . .” I decided to put her out of her misery. “Miss Jay, I know where hamburgers come from, and I used to watch my dad thump our rabbits over the head with a hammer on our farm.” Her delight was immediate and the change in her tone complete. “Oh excellent, well in that case, you’re going to need to have someone dig you a pretty hefty hole and then . . .” I gave old Sonny a good bath, braided his hair, and tied yellow ribbons in his mane. It turned out to be a lovely day to die, and the old horse went out of this life with his mouth still full of grass. Perfect. I should wish such a peaceful end for all of us. Doctor Lee, our vet said, “I don’t know if this is indelicate timing, but if you don’t mind I’ll stick around to make sure he’s, he’s . . . gone.” Oh brother, here came the hemming and hawing again, and so I gave him my rabbits getting thumped on the head speech. He looked relieved. The doctor continued. “I once had an old farmer call me to put down his sick mule, but I only had ten minutes or so to spare because I was in the middle of calving season on another farm. The old farmer said, ‘That’s fine, and I really should have put him down a year ago, but I just couldn’t do it. I’ve had this mule for twenty years, but he hasn’t eaten anything for three days. It’s time.’” So Dr. Lee came over and gave the old mule the standard dosage of anesthesia. Later in the afternoon, Dr. Lee came to check on that mule but really to check on the farmer. Walking out to the pasture, the veterinarian saw that the mule had gotten up, walked 100 yards, and was busy eating grass. The old farmer said, “That mule hasn’t looked this good in three days.” So Dr. Lee had to kill that mule again and he did. Which just goes to show you, that if you’re going to kill something you should stick around long enough to make sure that they stay dead, and that’s my advice for the week. Linda (Last Wishes) Zern |
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