Runner

Runner






John Fertig woke at four in the morning for the day’s chores. Rubbing sleep from his eyes, he shut down the loud, low-pitch buzzing of the clock/radio that had almost scattered him to a dash. He stored a mental list of the morning chores, tallying them up. John Fertig saved. He sometimes was paid when he went with his father went to cut down old and useless windbreaks at neighboring farms. He ran a trap line and brought the dead raccoons and rabbits into the small town twenty miles distant, haggling for the best bargain his could with the tanner. He started running the morning work, using the three pointed tines of a pitch fork to load hay into the complacent and empty cattle troughs, stealing the work and adding it up to feeding chickens while a rooster cried nearby in the dark, repeating toward a crescendo he checked the orchards for windfalls, he marveled at the dumb luck that often came along to fill a basket as he carried the fruit back toward the farmhouse. He figured that the collected effort added to some reserve inside of him that with time and thought he could turn to his advantage to tally out.
He stepped into the mudroom of the house and loosening his boots, dropped them under the collection of sheepskin coats and heavy rain jackets that marched a series of hooks on the wall. John’s mother, Lucy, cooked grits in an iron frying pan atop the Franklin Stove, which his father and mother had bought when they had run from the city for a simpler life. During that cold spring the stove that also heated the house, a warm center of faith, excepting the second floor where electric blankets provided warmth. He shoveled down the hot buttery grits along with a thick slab of fried ham. The lack of eggs reminded him that he still had to run out to the chicken coop to pick up the day’s results. After breakfast he excused himself from the table, explaining he had forgotten the chore. His father, a tall square framed man made a low sound of approval. In the mud-room he noticed a leather jacket and strapping his boots, he thought about checking the traps later in the day. He stepped into the red, peeling paint coop that had been a denizen of the farm when his father and mother had moved there. He raided the chickens of their eggs collecting them, personal prizes as the creatures made the usual squawks and fluttering terrified anew, with surprise that accompanied his daily chore. Loyally and trustingly investing the eggs in round cups in a box designed for the purpose, he made his way back to the house.















This is an exercise in free writing where the body of the text is free writing and then the theme lines are added in hope of finding a better expression of them. There is some inspiration in it... The words 'tally in' and 'tally out' being one and the whole idea of 'loyalty and trust' running along with with the main themes of saving in an external and internal sense....anybody care to finish it? Hans Lillegard