Adelaide Literary Magazine No. 31, December 2019

Revista Literária Adelaide

in a trance. The young cute waitress was en- her legs, her legs that she cannot move. He
joying the rocking as she laid there with her is totally out of control, choking her so that
legs spread and this big man on top of her. she cannot breathe, and she fighting to save
She could not see his face as he rocked with her very soul, she reached for the burning
his arms holding him up. It seemed like such candle on the table behind her. The candle is
a long time, rocking back and forth, she was extremely hot, she wraps her burning hand
now done with her pleasure and wondered around it and tries to slam into Frank’s side
if he was going to get his? Back and forth he of his head, she misses, but the hot wax
went, saying nothing, she was now getting around the wick, goes into Frank’s face. He
concerned, this had never happened before. immediately moves his hands to his burning
Wanting to see his face or something, “Frank, face, hot wax in his eyes, burning his eye
are you done, or do you want more, talk to shut, he lets out an eerie retching scream.
me?” There was no answer, this was getting She is now able to push him off of her with
weird, just rocking back and forth. “Frank, his hands still to his face as his skin starts to
please get off me, I need to get up, you are melt. Frank rolls to the right off of her. With
not answering me, so please get off me.” his pants down to his knees, he struggles
to pull them back up with one hand while
Still no answer, she started to push him the other is still holding his face, as he pulls
off. Pushing him harder as she is starting to on his belt, his hand slips and hits the black
get scared, “I mean it, get the hell off of me, candle, knocking it off the bed where it rolls
you bastard get off me,” as she starts to cry under his pants as he sits on the side of the
and pushing to no avail, tears running down bed. With hot flaming wax on the floor the
her cheeks. flames are getting hotter as it burns his pants
as Frank continues to struggle with getting
Frank, still looking at the black candle and them off. The pants are now totally engulfed,
rocking back and forth, he slips back and now he looks to the ceiling with his flaming red
and can see the scared little girl. As Frank eyes and lets out a gut-wrenching scream as
moves down, she can now see his face, she the flames feed off the flesh of both legs con-
looks at his eyes that are now swollen and suming all below his waist, as he disappears
blood red looking like smoke was coming out into a fiery grave, with his light going out,
of them, pure horror takes her over. Now as the black candle still burns brightly. The
screaming for him to get off all to no avail, as waitress gathering her wits about her, looks
he still has his hands and arms on the couch. in the mirror over the couch, and says, “why
Frank, now in a trance, stares into her eyes can’t men just be nice?”
and without changing his expression, moves
his hands to her throat, and rocks back and About the Author
forth. Screaming, crying and with all her
strength she grabs his hands and arms, trying Franklin Powers has published two novels
to release the grip around her neck. The and has had his short stories published in
grip that is getting stronger as he continues journals. A mixture of past experiences
to rock back and forth, now going faster as and witty storytelling gives the reader a
the screaming gets louder. Frank acts like he wanting read.
does not hear her, just staring into her eyes
and now mumbling under his breath, as he
chokes her neck and moves faster between

149

STOOGES IN PARADISE

by Louis Gallo

Once again we nestle in a luxurious ocean- along the genomic line worry and anxiety
front condo not one hundred yards from and foreboding tainted our ganglia cells.
the beach. In the past it was always Destin, We co-exist in low grade panic most of the
Florida and the Gulf, but since BP’s ravage, time which occasionally accrues and ex-
we worry about pockets of crude oil and plodes into full blown hysteria. Not healthy,
the even more toxic dispersants. Apparent- of course, but how override genetics? We
ly, sharks have fled the Gulf and the coral have feebly tried yoga and meditation and
has died, neither of which bodes well. So visualization techniques, but they seem
we changed our itinerary for the last three paltry, say, like trying to slay a dragon with
summers and now camp on Myrtle Beach. spears constructed of crepe paper. These
The waves rush forth and break more fero- seizures are no joking matter, but I often do
ciously here, which we love, but no more in fact joke about them: “Hey, girls, Renee,
ultramarine water or bone china white when do you think the voltage will scorch
sand; Myrtle water is murky and gritty, the us again?”
sand dirty, smudge-like. But neither must
we contend with the vast colonies of algae Bee usually shakes a puny fist at me; Lea
and seaweed always plaguing Destin. just laughs; Renee, who prefers to sweep
the notion under some pristine Sarouk
The CDC warns that e-coli and MRSA carpet, gives me the evil eye.
contaminate beach sand and the ocean
itself. Mothers, scour children who build We scramble for horoscopes in the
sandcastles with Germ-X. newspapers, women’s magazines, wher-
ever we can find them. We know full well
My younger daughter Bee sits with me they are bogus and invented by underpaid
on another balcony overlooking the At- staff. Nevertheless. We scrutinize often
lantic. I tell her stories about her ancestors, ungrammatical messages in the Chinese
especially my father and grandfather, both fortune cookies we crack open every night
dead before her birth. Dusk stumbles in as when commencing supper. We seek omens
we try to relax. I say try because no one in and portents in every insect and bird we
this family has ever achieved pure, easy re- come across when on walks; we relate
laxation, a primordial state I associate with our dreams to each other in ancient tribal
sponges and mollusks lurking at the bottom fashion, hoping for collective insight. Renee
of the sea. Must be nice. But somewhere dreams of evil monks disguised as sharks
and alligators.

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We have ordered miracle cures from the In our devotion to the hidden signif-
varied tabloids. Holy water from Jerusalem. icances of quotidian events and specta-
Splinters of the cross. Lockets of the Bud- cles, our family has become its own iso-
dha’s hair. Did the Buddha have hair? lated fiefdom, a close-knit band of wary
food-gatherers who monitor symptoms and
Bee shoots up from her slouch in instant symbologies and have thereby lost touch
alertness. “Daddy, look!” She must have no- with the bustling world of mercantilism,
ticed that my eyes were closed and I had portfolios, corporate mergers and shenan-
begun to drift into rare, sweet reverie. In- igans, politics.
stantly they click open, an lo . . . right before
us, hovering within the architectural frame “Well at least it wasn’t ospreys,” Renee
of our balcony, hovering, yes, but impossible half laughs. The ospreys have bothered her
. . . three extraordinary pelicans so close we a great deal during the last few days. On the
could with a hint of effort reach out and touch. very balcony where Bee and I encountered
the pelicans, Renee says she saw not one
“Pelican?” Renee stops her wrench work but three – the infernal trinity again! – os-
for a moment and puts on her thinking face. preys, which at first she mistook for hawks.
“Pelican,” she repeats. “Christian symbol.” Renee reveres hawks in totemic fashion,
She rises from her crouching position on the but these looked slightly odd. She assigned
carpet and makes her way toward the room Lea to look them up on the laptop, and
where we store our luggage no doubt to re- Lea dutifully obliged and informed Renee
turn with one of our directories of symbols. that what she described were ospreys, not
typical hawks. Osprey, a new portent for
Renee looks supple and voluptuous in her Renee. She commandeered the laptop only
one-piece black bathing suit; she flips through to discover that ospreys betoken imminent
pages as she returns to the room. “The pel- death and destruction. And to spot three in
ican,” she reads, “will feed her young with her so brief a span thus seemed horrendous in-
own blood and is therefore an icon of ultimate deed. The ospreys so upset Renee that I my-
sacrifice.” She gazes thoughtfully at the ceiling. self Googled in “osprey” on Lea’s laptop (I,
“Hmm, like Jesus and the Eucharist.” who otherwise refuse to go near a laptop)
and found dozens of references to ospreys
“A portent of sacrifice,” I mutter. “Who’s as symbols of abundance and good tidings.
the sacrifice?” I reported this to Renee, but she still insists
that the most reliable sources spelled out
“You, Dad,” Lea laughs. As does Bee who mayhem, desolation, imminent devastation.
still remains in awe of the pelicans. “I saw
them first,” she has said a number of times. North Carolina is on fire. Smoke from
Balboa, first to spot the Pacific – among his the blazes sometimes cascades our way;
kind at any rate. yesterday it was so turgid and noxious we
had difficulty breathing.
“Not funny, Lea,” I snarl. “Though I guess
you’re right. I’m the old man of this tribe.” And yesterday morning as we frolicked
in the surf (yes, we are still capable of frol-
“But it’s probably a good omen,” Rene icking!) Bee reached into the water for what
says. “Resurrection and all that.” she thought was a shell. The girls, hell, all
four of us, still collect beach shells, and we
“Resurrection implies being dead,” I say.
And think . . . there are four of us but three
pelicans. Numerology counts.”

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like those best that come straight from the nostalgia and semi-autistic tradition (to
sea, barring those still beslimed with living conquer time, you repeat it). We christen
protoplasm. These we toss back into their this rubber boat/float “The Stooge” each
oceanic womb. Bee’s shell turned out to be year. The next one, Stooge III
we later realized (thanks to Lea’s laptop) a
mushroom jellyfish. She tosses it away but So as the early riser (I don’t sleep well
not before it had sunken one of its talons on vacations and will harmonize the early
(spikes? teeth? what do jellyfish have?) into rising with a delicious afternoon nap) I take
the skin of her thumb. That thumb, by night- it upon myself to make the drive and fetch
fall, had swollen to twice its size, and we a boat. A shop called “Paradise” looks prom-
lathered it with Benadryl and gave her an ising. I am greeted at the desk by one of the
Advil. Oh, the perils that beset even modest most beautiful blond, blue-eyed Russian
frolickers! Luckily, the mushroom varieties girls I have ever seen on the entire South-
of jellyfish, however frightful (yet eerily eastern coast of America.
beautiful), are not extremely toxic. An-
other night, with our flashlights, we found The store seems empty save for this ex-
dozens of dead ones stranded on the sand. ceptional beauty and her momentous smile,
Bee, the most gentle and compassionate of aside that is from the bounteous shelves
our clan, wept a salt tear for them, despite and display units full of conches, sunscreen,
her wound. Bee has just made fifteen. Just t-shirts, baseball caps, beach chairs and um-
yesterday I pushed her to sleep in a little brellas, jewelry, postcards . . . the trivial sur-
blue swing for toddlers that I found on sale feit of America. I scan the glass counter case
at Sears. since I’m also on the lookout for a pair of
brass knuckles. I bought a pair last year and
During the trip down from the Blue feel compelled to purchase another . . . you
Ridge we noticed that Little Debbie trucks know, for added protection, however illegal
saturated the highways. Why? No direct they may be in my home state. I point out
routes to Myrtle Beach exist; Googled di- the pair I want to Nadya, as her nameplate
rections are complex and labyrinthine, and reads, and she, giggling and smiling, inserts
one gets inevitably lost in varied little Car- her own fingers into the holes. Then she au-
olina towns still encapsulated in the nine- daciously pretends she will smack me in the
teenth century. Yet Little Debbie sojourns face! Laughing flirtatiously, I might add, as
the interstates and state roads and some she sizzles with radiant hormones.
old-fashioned mud roads, her cheerful face
plastered on all the trucks. “Don’t do it,” I laugh. “It’s for defense,
you know, in case I’m attacked by terrorists
On either the first or second day after or deranged tourists. And I’m looking for a
arrival I commenced my duty to seek out a rubber boat for my daughters. Yellow, black
rubber float boat at one of the many garish, and red, a two-seater. Do you have those?”
fluorescent beach shops along the main
highway. The boat must be an exact replica Nadya holds up a finger as if in thought.
of the model we have used for the last three “Ah,” she says. “Follow me.”
years or else the girls will sink into petulant
sorrow. Ritual and repetition are important, How can I describe Nadya’s scandalous
nay, necessities for any family mired in shorts that I do indeed follow to the back
of the store. Surely I must not think on such
things.

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We come to a display of the boats still depositing her on a really scummy floor; so
packaged tightly in bright boxes, and sure slowly, cautiously, I begin to bear her weight
enough, Stooge III beckons. “This is it,” I (no more than 120 pounds surely), lifting as
say, “must be this one. Can you blow it up instructed by my chiropractor, with the legs
for me? The valves on gas station machines only, not the backbone, holding the weight
won’t fit. Do you have an air machine here?” close to my chest and stomach. And while
ascending in such afflicted fashion I see that
Nadya looks at me and nods. She gazes Nayda’s skimpy blouse, unhooked down to
straight into my eyes, and I must describe the second button, has pulled apart by the
this gaze as passionate. “Your face is angle of her descent, and an exposed breast
very handsome,” she says in highly Slav- positions itself a mere head nod away from
ic-scented, broken English. What ho? What my, yegads, face! And I, sinful, egregious I,
is happening here? For a moment it crosses become instantly aroused! What a salacious
my mind that sweet Nadya might be a cad I am. The poor girl remains unconscious,
hooker. Little Debbie, where art thou? I’m a her head dangling over the crook of my
married man; I love, adore my wife, twenty lower arm, and I, bad Samaritan, leer at her
years my junior and sexy and hot and won- naked, exposed breast.
drously beautiful.
I also note that Nadya wears studded
Nadya unhooks an air hose from the wall pelican earrings.
and squats forward slightly as if to pretend
she will aim the air gun at my face. Playful, I carry stricken Nayda toward the front
of course. counter and plan to slide her onto it be-
tween the cash register and a display of
Within seconds Stooge III is alive and sand dollar jewelry. Once I have secured
well. Nayda shifts it aside to refasten the air the buttocks onto a thick plate of glass, I
hose to its hook. I’m still squatting near the gently nudge the errant breast back into
base of the Stooge. She turns and I cannot place within her blouse. Braless, of course.
help but gaze not at her smiling face but the How to explain such firm softness? Soon a
sleek, svelte, Coppertoned contours of her heavyset, short Dravidian who vaguely re-
long legs. Eye level. sembles Deepak Chopra walks in and cries,
“What is happening here?” He carries a box
But all is not well. Nayda’s body begins to of Krispy Kremes. The manager, I assume,
twitch and lose balance, and before I know off on an errand to secure breakfast for
it I’m holding a beautiful albeit unconscious himself and his employee. I of course want
young Russian beauty in my arms, while still no trouble. “She passed out,” I say. “I didn’t
squatting! She had simply passed out and I want to leave her on the floor. She blew up
happened to catch her to break the fall. I my Stooge.”
cry for help but no one else is in the store,
no other clerks, no customers, no managers. He nods, a dark, low-browed man, and
What the hell? Too early for other people? I therefore serious and hopefully intelligent.
must now decide whether to lower her onto “Oh yes, she does that,” he waves the free
a filthy floor – she smells clean and soapy hand. “Some sort of low blood sugar, but not
as lavender – or attempt to rise with her dangerous form. Yes, just rest her onto the
and risk destroying what’s left of my lower counter. That will be fine. A lovely, lovely girl.”
chakras. Sacrifice? I refuse to sully the girl by
“Will she be all right?”

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“Certainly. She always is all right. Just and devour them one by one. Or even a Little
some dazed at first. She will not remember Debbie sugar concoction. Anything sweet.
fainting or anything about an hour before.
Have a glazed?” He holds forth the box. A commercial on the inside television
proclaims: Good news for catheter users!
“No thanks, but let me pay you for a
pair of brass knuckles and that rubber boat So launch we do, but the waves tumble
Nadya blew up for me. Then I’m on my way.” in violently this morning and the girls cap-
size with every bout. Then it’s all four of us
He looks puzzled. “Oh, Stooge?” lifting the blasted boat full of heavy water
and draining it. And this goes on for about
“Right, that’s my daughters’ name for the an hour before I inform them that I need a
boat.” break. So does Renee.

As he makes his way behind the counter, “Ok, girls, you’re on your on with the
Nadya begins to moan a bit and shift her Stooge for a while, so stay close to shore.
body toward me. Slowly her eyes open and Not much of a rip tide yet but it’s there, it’s
she blinks rapidly as if trying to focus. always there, like evil − ubiquitous. Never
have too much fun.”
She mumbles in Russian but I don’t un-
derstand. Renee and I make our way back to the
chairs and umbrellas and take turns keeping
“Are you ok?” I ask, figuring it will take an eye out on the girls. It’s so peaceful and
a while for her to regain full consciousness. pleasant when it’s not your turn. Must
parenthood mean relentless paranoia?
I give the manager a hundred-dollar bill Sharks, mushroom jellyfish, typhoons, mere
and he rings me up. drowning, aquatic serial killers. When one
or the other of us fails to spot the girls as
“You came back to see me,” Nadya whis- they gambol in the surf our hearts sputter
pers sweetly. This time it’s clear, in English, and lurch. Got to keep them in sight. And
and, I don’t know what to make of it. I came thus vacationing means hard work But how
back? Has she mistaken me for some other wondrous it feels to close your eyes and feel
aging dude? Whatever . . . according to the the sun rain down on you − and empty your
manager, she’s tabula rasa for a while. head, if only for the nonce.

When I return to the condo Renee and Didn’t Hamlet say that conscience makes
the girls are still asleep, so I sit out on the cowards of us all. He meant consciousness,
balcony and drink some coffee and wish I’d not conscience, though either suffices.
taken that Krispy Kreme. Not many people
on the beach yet, some early joggers, some Floaters wriggle across my close-eyed
guys pitching sand tents. No signs or omens and thus obfuscated vision. Bits or retina
to speak of nor do I wish to encounter any. defecting. Myopic pressure in the old vit-
What I really want is more sleep, so I head for reous humor. Why not vitreous tragedy?
the bedroom and slide in and embrace Re-
nee’s supple body. She stirs gently and I feel The image of Nadya’s breast crowds out
her breath on my wrist. Ah, two unconscious the floaters. I have resisted thinking about
women in one morning. Maybe that’s a sign! it, I don’t want to think about it; thinking on
such things means suffering, for me anyway,
I must distract myself from perilous
thoughts. I must buy a box of Krispy Kremes

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though in some alternate world of possibility like, but we remind ourselves, after all, they
it could have meant supreme joy. Why al- can handle it.
ways these polarities? Who thought up this
tormented, convoluted scheme of things? It’s so hot I take my time returning to the
fifth floor for a sandwich. I step onto the bal-
Renee raps me on the knee, my bad one. cony and zoom in on the girls with my new
My turn to climb the crow’s nest of obser- Canon digital, click a perfect shot as if they
vation. Life guarding. I open up to her sump- were ten feet away. I turn my gaze toward
tuous smile. “Nodding off, Paw?” she asks. Renee, and . . . whoa! I must have the wrong
“Your watch.” umbrella and chairs. But no, Renee’s flam-
boyant copper hair is unmistakable. And, yes,
“Close your eyes, babe, feels good. We’ll our ragged towels and crooked umbrella. A
soon be out there again navigating the man sits in my chair beside Renee! I zoom
wretched Stooge in deeper waters.” to full magnification and steady the camera
on the railing. A man! He and Renee seem
She does close her eyes but murmurs, to be chatting amiably. He pokes her upper
“We’re the stooges, Paw, all of us, haven’t arm gently and cannot stop touching her. At
you figured it out yet?” one point she clasps his wrist as she slouches
over in laugher! What ho, what ho! She’s
I want the raise a finger, proclaim to the having a grand old time . . . my wife and this
contrary, but it requires too much energy. stranger. And within sighting distance of our
daughters. I must retrieve the voo doo doll
A diet Pepsi explodes in the condo re- from my windshield and impale its groin
frigerator. with needles. I gauge that he’s about her age,
maybe even somewhat younger! There are
Lea begins to sulk because the trip is many young guys who prefer older women,
largely over: three or so days to go. It does but for me Renee remains very young It’s all
seem as if we just arrived, I agree. But Lea relative and your personal kink.
lives for our trips, so it will be rough going for
a while. Bee too laments the swift passage I can make out profiles – alas, the man has
of time but in her own quiet, melancholic a full set of tawny, curly hair and a rugged
way. Renee and I just want to get home so jaw, and I estimate about twenty-nine or
we can take a vacation from the vacation thirty. Seems moderately muscular with a
small tattoo on the neck, some sort of bird
When Bee and Lea have finished numerous . . . yikes! a freaking osprey! Imminent dev-
revolutions, they head straight for our bench. astation? Am I being cuckolded by a whip-
Lea looks green and ill. “I’m going to throw per-snapper who has followed us to Myrtle
up,” she mumbles, and does indeed vomit out Beach to be near Renee? How long has this
her entire supper from Golden Corral. We had been going on? Who is this unknown de-
steered her behind a large, rusted waste bin spoiler? Why is Renee having what looks like
to avoid a scene. She moaned and cried, “I uproarious fun? I shoot Mr. Curley’s head
feel terrible,” and we, of course, hurry her about twenty-five times with my Canon. I
back to the van and head straight to BiLo for had planned to tell Renee about my esca-
Dramamine. I have often suggested ginger as pade with Nadya, but perhaps she intuited
a natural alternative, but the females com- it, as women do. Perhaps this is revenge.
plain it tastes like soapy water But revenge for what? Nadya, when she

Once again Renee and I take a break as
the girls fiddle with Stooge III in the surf.
They drift out a bit farther than we would

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was conscious, merely flirted with me, and “They’re old enough to venture out a bit
I must confess that I flirted back. Harmless, on their own,” Renee says, and I agree. I
right? Or is the grand joy of flirting now off don’t want to agree, but I – we – must agree.
limits as well as everything else regulated by They aren’t babies anymore, sad to say.
the myriad hyena committees charged with
suppressing human nature? Can’t even say I scan the water in the Stooge vicinity,
“Eskimo” now without someone, somewhere and sure enough, see Lea and Bee leaping
accusing you of crimes against humanity. It up as the waves crash over them
certainly looks as if Renee is flirting with this
osprey dude, but what’s strange is that while Renee squeezes my hand tighter and
my initial reaction was rage, hurt, shock, fear sighs dreamily. “I love you, Paw, you know
. . . it dawns on me within minutes, why not? that, don’t you?”
Why should Renee too not have the right to
flirt? Flirting is an upper! Just as long as he I’m tempted to retort with “Yeah, well
doesn’t pass out and she must tuck his way- then who was the bozo whose wrist you
ward schlong back into the Speed-Os. Well, grabbed while I was in the condo?”
what of that too? As long as he’s unconscious,
so what? Just don’t make a field day out of it. “Stooges in paradise,” Renee laughs.
“Who would have thought?”
I shuffle out the condo and make my way
down the halls, across the wooden planks Will I tell Renee about Nadya? Probably
that pass as a pier of sorts and cross the at some point. What is there to tell? Will
scorching sand. she tell me about Mr. Curly? Probably not.
And what of it? But right now no abstrac-
“Hello,” Renee turns languidly as I ease tions, no assessments, no apprehension . . .
myself in the chair. Her smile ignites me, only this, being here, absorbed in the mo-
and the sunlight splashing her face brings ment, the fabulous, eternal, joyous moment
out the freckles that I love. She looks won- that crests and ebbs with the waves.
drously gorgeous. Is it me or has her en-
counter with Mr. Curly brightened her up? A pelican swoops over our daughters
who seem absurdly far away even as they
“Hi,” I say, “where are the girls? I don’t see begin to make their way back toward us
them. I see the Stooge but not Lea or Bee.” with smiles and shells and infinite expecta-
tions.
About the Author

Louis Gallo was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana, and
now teaches creative writing and contemporary literature at
Radford University in Virginia. He is former editor and publisher
of the now retired literary magazines The Barataria Review and
Books: A New Orleans Review. He won an NEA individual artist
award for fiction and another NEA Poet in the Schools award from
the state of South Carolina and has been nominated for several
Pushcart Prizes. He has published poetry, fiction and academic
articles widely in America and internationally. His chapbooks
include The Truth Changes, The Ten Most Important Questions of
the Twentieth-Century and The Fascination with the Abomination.

156

THE DAY IT ALMOST
SNOWED

by Richard Risemberg

I think of it as the day it almost snowed. It was tight, which was usually. The realtor,
really did snow, leaving traces for an hour a short stocky woman who collected art,
or so here and there in the hills, even on had been at an exhibit that included sev-
the beach. Snow is rare in Los Angeles; it eral of my paintings a few weeks before.
hadn’t happened for over fifty years, but it I recognized her, but she didn’t even see
fell, however lightly, that day. It just didn’t me as I crouched in her yard; I was just the
snow where I was, so to me it was an “al- help. I liked the work, though. My paint-
most” day. The closest I came to it was in ings focused on lost corners of everyday
the pizza joint where our little landscap- life that we generally ignore, the places
ing crew broke for lunch, as tables around where the real world lives on without
us laughed in amazement over images of much notice from ourselves. My cat’s-eye
snow that friends had sent to their smart- view of fancy gardens might make a nice
phones. I didn’t bother checking mine; series some day. And I needed income: of
someone else’s snow was not so inter- course my paintings rarely sold, despite
esting. We had had rain instead, and not enough good reviews.
much of that: fat cold drops that freck-
led the sidewalk, while I crouched under When the rain began the boss called
a cactus pulling weeds from decorative for a lunch break. We always called off the
gravel. job in rainy weather. The day was cold, the
clouds steely-gray and smooth, dragging
The owner of said cactus, an upscale dark skirts of rain, or maybe snow, below
realtor in a newish two-story near the them over the brown hills to the north. A
sea, stood talking with our boss under the day off from work meant a day off from
porch while Henry and I worked. The boss pay as well. Our clients, who lived on resid-
was an eccentric Dutch lady who, true to uals from the movie business or commis-
her heritage, liked things tidy; she had sions from selling property, had the leisure
taught me a lot about plants and pleasing to sit and enjoy their gardens from above;
customers. I worked for her when money I had rent to pay every month, and so had

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to grub in the dirt beneath, shaping the Henry and Lida; they nodded approval of
gesso that gave texture to an artful am- a sort, and then their eyes brightened as
bience that they could show off to their the server strode over with a tray of pies.
friends. I had no illusions about my place Outside, the people walking by hunched in
in the world: when I did sell a painting (hal- their heavy coats, one hand grasping the
lelujah!), it was generally to hang in some collar shut. No one looked happy except
pretentious bedroom, a piece of décor to for a young girl in a raincoat, who danced
most, meaningful only to a perhaps cynical along as her mother dragged her by the
handful. I joked with friends that I worked hand, her other hand held out flat to catch
in aesthetic engineering, sometimes with the raindrops.
rocks on the ground, sometimes with
ground rocks in oil, which makes paint. The pizza was hot and good, and a big
It shaped a clever symmetry, though of mug of milky coffee didn’t hurt either. But
course it meant that, barring a big break, I the rain became heavier as we ate; gusts
was a failure by American standards. drummed big drops against the window-
pane, where I watched them run in frantic
Big sparse drops of cold rain continued crooked lines. Lida stared out the glass and
to thwack onto the street and sidewalk. sighed. “I suppose that’s all for today, boys.
We packed our tools into the battered Very sorry. Lunch is on me, at least.” We
old truck we used—”We mustn’t look lingered over coffee; there was no need to
too prosperous, or they will say I am hurry any more.
overcharging them, which of course I
am”—then crowded onto the bench seat I went with them back to Lida’s apart-
to drive to lunch. There were only three ment building to unload the truck. The rain
of us that day, the day it almost snowed. tapered off as we drove, but didn’t really
Henry maneuvered the rattling old beast stop. When we got there, a crew was still
back towards the commercial area, where working on a broken wall; a drunk had
we settled on pizza, if only for the warmth veered off the street in the wee hours and
that radiated from the big ovens behind taken out twelve feet of cinderblock, and
the counter. We ordered our slices and sat the management had brought in three
by a tall picture window, with our eyes on stocky fellows from the eastside to repair
the sky. The gray of the clouds deepened it. They spoke to each other in laconic
to charcoal, the plate glass trembled to Spanish from under their broad-brimmed
the gusts of wind. It was a beautiful day, hats, ignoring us as they smeared mortar
or would have been if the rent weren’t on thick gray blocks. When Henry, Lida, and
late again. I reached for the sketch pad in I shook hands all around and parted, the
my satchel and drew a few quick outlines crew was still at it, hunched over buckets
of an idea I’d had while squatting under in the gusting rain. They didn’t look happy,
my cactus: the spiny, wrinkled arm of the but they didn’t look unhappy either. I sup-
plant itself, two women talking in the dis- pose it was vain of me, but I envied them
tance, a bit of house wall. I showed it to as I headed on home in the wind.

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About the Author

Richard Risemberg was born into a Jewish-Italian
household in Argentina, and brought to Los Angeles
to escape the fascist regime of his homeland. He has
lived there since, except for a digression to Paris in the
turbulent Eighties. He attended Pepperdine University on
a scholarship won in a writing competition, but left in his
last year to work in jobs from gritty to glitzy, starting at
a motorcycle shop and progressing through offices, retail,
an independent design and manufacturing business, and
most recently a stint managing an adult literacy program
at a library branch in one of the poorest neighborhoods
of the city. All has become source material for his writing.
He has pursued journalism, photography, and editorial
writing, which, combined with his years in motorcycle culture, introduced him to the darker
side of the dream. His fiction concentrates on working-class life, homelessness, and cultures
of violence, and the indifference of the Dominant Culture to it all.

159

DO YOU DO HITS?

by James Hanna

I am a magnet for strangers. They approach Not waiting to hear my reply, he scooted
me in airports, subways, and bars, and they his chair next to my table. “Sheesh,” he said,
tell me their most compromising secrets. “the service in here is like waiting for Godot.”
I never solicit these revelations; in fact, I
would rather they left me alone. As a com- Were it not for this hint of a literary mind,
pulsive reader, I wholly prefer the company I’d have taken no interest in him. But his
of books. The Iliad and Moby Dick are such mention of my favorite play made a cloying
durable friends to me that I prefer reunions impression on me. Otherwise, I would
with Achilles and Ahab to making a live ac- have made an excuse to finish my lunch in
quaintance. But strangers tell me their sto- peace. I would never have put my burger
ries—why I do not know. And they tell me down when he said he had stories to tell
stuff that they say they keep hidden from me, I would never have choked back a laugh
family and friends. Perhaps I ought to warn when he said that his name was Finian Mc-
them that I’m a very poor guardian of se- Faddle.
crets, that whatever scripts I find useful, I
will mold into tales of my own. So be care- Sadly, he made no mention of Beckett’s
ful what you tell writers, it may bite you in hapless tramps, perhaps because he consid-
the ass. ered himself no less intimate with the ab-
surd. His voice bore a wounded assurance
I will now betray the confidence of a that the stars were out of whack, and that
fellow named Finian McFaddle. I met him he had no choice but to bend my ear to set
in a sandwich bar in San Francisco’s Mis- the record straight. He preceded each of his
sion District. A waitress had just brought stories with a guarantee of his victimhood,
my order, a hamburger and fries, when he a claim that suggested that Jesus alone was
sat at the table beside me—a bald, mid- less deserving of his fate. “Now I was just
dle-aged man with a chin so weak that he walking around,” he kept saying, “minding
looked like a giant mole. my own damn business, and you aren’t
gonna believe what happened to me next.”
“How’s the food?” he asked me before He described how he’d been a target of sev-
I had taken a bite. His voice was thin and eral robberies, and he said any crackhead
whiney, the voice of a practiced complainer. with a knife or a gun considered him an easy
I suspected that if I had told him that my mark. “Sheesh,” he said, “it’s not as though I
burger was raw, he’d have gladly bawled out live in Hunter’s Point. I live in the goddamn
the waitress.

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Sunset District—it isn’t even a bad neigh- I said, “That’s too much.”
borhood.”
He wagged his head. “You some kinda
I said, “Do you ever do anything else?” cheapo?” he said. “Do you think I’m the
kind of person who won’t leave a respect-
“Whaddya mean by that?” able tip?”

“Anything other than walking around Not wanting to force a scene, I gave him
minding your own damn business.” a ten and a five. “That ought to do it,” I said.
“Not a dollar more.”
“What are ya, some kinda comic?” he
snapped. “Ya think I asked for it? Why are He tucked the money into his shirt
you acting like a prick when I’m telling ya pocket and snorted like a mule. “Ya got no
sensitive stuff.” savoir-faire, buddy,” he said. “That won’t
leave much of a tip. Shit, I don’t know why
I said, “Why are you bragging about I’m bothering to talk to you at all.”
being a victim?”
After the waitress served him his lunch,
He plucked a napkin from the dispenser Finian began to fidget. He took a bite of his
and used it to blow his nose. “It’s like what Rueben and said, “The corned beef’s too
they say about rape,” he said as he balled dry,” and then he set the sandwich aside
the napkin up. “If ya can’t do nothin’ about and picked up one of his fries.
it, ya may as well lie down and cum.”
“Lighten up, buddy,” he muttered as he
“Who says you can’t do something about popped the fry into his mouth. “You a re-
it?” porter or somethin’? Ya look like you’re
gonna take notes. I’m lucky the press didn’t
He rolled his eyes and sighed like a fur- crucify me for what happened to me next.”
nace. “Don’tcha think I tried? The last time I
got robbed, I enrolled in this goddamn class. “I left my pen at home,” I said, and that
A class called Verbal Judo and How to Sur- seemed to satisfy him. Shoving his plate
vive a Threat. I found it on the internet and aside, he started to tell me the story.
thought it was worth a try.”
“It all began with that goddamn class. It
“Was it worth giving up your martyrdom?” was held in the Richmond District in the
local YMCA, and I hadda pay an Uber to get
“Stop being a wise guy,” he said. “I gave there ’cause parking is a bitch. I also hadda
the fucking class a go, but it didn’t work out shell out thirty bucks just to get enrolled,
too well. Shit, you’re just not gonna believe just to walk into this room fulla losers and
what happened to me next.” give up half a day of my life.

*** “Well, the class was run by this woman
with diarrhea of the mouth. She gave us a
Having resigned myself to being his hos- long-winded lecture that was mostly about
tage, I did not expect further abuse. I did body language, then she said if ya wanna
not expect Finian McFaddle to ask me to stop being a victim, you gotta change peo-
pay for his lunch. But after he flagged down ple’s perception of you. Ya gotta take charge
a waitress and ordered a Rueben and garlic of the situation, so they won’t keep pulling
fries, he said, “Lend me a Jackson, buddy. that crap. Then she spoke about verbal judo,
All I got is a buck.”

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which is nothing but running a con. The trick, “Well, one night I strolled ’round the Ten-
she said, is to fool folks into doing what you derloin ’til three o’clock in the morning. Shit,
want ’em to do.” I was gettin’ so frustrated, I was about to
tear up the receipt. But just before I called
“Like getting them to pay for your lunch,” it quits and dialed myself an Uber, this kid
I said. wandered up to me, and he was holding
a handgun. If it weren’t for the gun, I’d ’a’
“Naw, it ain’t quite as easy as that. She laughed at him—he was just some sad little
had us do some role-play so we could Bozo, and his pants were draggin’ so bad
master the techniques, then she gave us that I half-expected him to trip. ‘Your wallet,
each a certificate and sent us on our way. please, mister,’ he said, and I almost felt
sorry for him. His eyes were bloodshot and
“Now I got Scottish blood in me, so I crusty, his cheeks were acne-scarred, and
know how to value a buck. I put the receipt his gun, a nine mil Glock, was shakin’ in his
for the class in my wallet—damn, that was hand.
thirty whole dollars. I was gonna scream for
my money back if that bullshit didn’t work.” “’So you want my wallet?’ I said to him,
and he nodded like a parrot.
“How did you plan to test it out?”
“‘My baby momma she’s sick,” he ex-
“I was gonna walk around, minding my plained. ‘She needs some medicine. I
business, and wait for some punk to rob me, wouldn’t be doing this, mister, if it weren’t
and then I was gonna stare him down and for my baby momma.’
put that crap to use. The proof of the pud-
ding is in the eatin’—that’s what I always “I handed the punk my wallet and he
say. And speaking about eatin’, are you stuffed it into his pocket, and that’s when I
gonna eat those fries?” decided to change his perception of me. ‘Do
you do hits?’ I asked him. ‘I’m lookin’ to hire
“Why don’t you finish your own?” I said a hitman. There’s folks I wanna have wasted
’cause they keep on fucking with me.’
“They got too much garlic in ’em—I
shouldn’t have got ’em with garlic. Say, “Well, the little punk just looked at me
gimme yer fries if you’re not gonna eat ’em. like I was speaking Chinese. ‘I just want
I gotta cleanse my pallet.” some medicine, mister,’ he said. ‘It’s for my
baby mama.’
I passed my untouched plate to him, and
he gobbled down my fries. He then belched “I said, ‘I’m gonna ask you one more time,
into a napkin and went on with his story. so get the shit outta yer ears. What I wanna
know is if can I pay you to do hits.’
“No one gyps Finian McFaddle,” he said.
“I’m too good at pinching a dollar. But I walked “‘Mister,’ he said, ‘I don’t know nothin’
around the Sunset for five whole days, and ’bout that.’
nobody tried to rob me. So I started strolling
around the Tenderloin where it’s easier to “‘Then you’re ain’t worth nothin’ to me,’
get rolled. But even in the Tenderloin, nothin’ I said. ‘Now you can stick me up for chump
happened to me. There were gangs all over change, or you can earn yourself some real
the place, selling drugs and talking shit, but money. How are you gonna play it, son? I
no one tried to shake me down. You’d ’a’ haven’t got all night.’
thought I was a leper.

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“The kid just looked at me funny like he still “Now the little punk handed my wallet
didn’t know what to say. Even for a robber, back and he said, ‘Who you want dusted,
he didn’t seem particularly bright. ‘Who you mister?’ I told him he could start by smoking
be, mister?’ he finally asked, and he started the mayor, and I’d pay him five grand for
chewin’ his lip. His teeth looked kinda old like that. I ain’t sure why I put a hit on the
he’d been smokin’ too much crack. mayor—that was kind of a rash thing to do.
But in the heat of the moment, I couldn’t
“Now I hadda tell him my real name ’cause think of any other way to take charge.
my wallet was in his pants pocket. He had
only to check my driver’s license to find out “The kid’s eyes got bigger ’an doorknobs,
if I was lying to him. So I looked at him like he and he put his gun back in his pocket. He
was a bug and I was thinkin’ ’bout squashin’ said, ‘What choo doin’ in the Tenderloin,
him flat. ‘My name is Finian McFaddle,’ I said, mister? If you got that kinda money, you
‘and I’d like my wallet back. I also wanna could hire some Mafia dude.’
know if you got the balls to do hits.’”
“I guess the kid needed confidence, so
*** I decided to stroke his ego. I invited him
to this all-night diner so we could discuss
When our waitress passed by our table, a deal. After we both ordered breakfast, I
Finian ordered a glass of iced tea. “Make it said I’d give him a trial. I told him to return
sweet, blondie,” he said, “and don’t skimp to the diner tomorrow night, and I’d hand
on the ice.” him a thousand dollars. I said he would get
the other four grand when he took care of
He asked me to lend him another five the mayor. What I didn’t tell him was that I’d
dollars, and he cursed when I shook my be waiting for him with the cops.
head. “What ya loaned me will leave ’bout
a dollar once I pay the check. Even if I throw “Ya know, that kid was so fucking dumb
in the buck in my wallet, that won’t be much that I got him to pay for my breakfast. I told
of a tip. One plus one is just two, buddy him I needed the cash in my wallet to take
boy—ya want me to look like a miser?” an Uber to the bank. I said I expected great
things from him, and we bumped fists to
“Just tell me the rest of the story,” I said. seal the deal. And then I went home and
had the best night’s sleep I had in years.”
“Paaatience, paaatience,” he crooned.
“All this goddamn talking has given me ***
cotton mouth.”
Pausing in his monologue, Finian pointed at
The waitress returned with a glass of my plate. “Ya gonna eat that burger?” he
iced tea and planted it on our table, and asked me. “Ya haven’t taken a bite.”
Finian took a lingering sip then wrinkled
his mouth like a prune. “Paw,” he snapped. “You may as well have it,” I said. “You’ve
“It’s too damn sweet. She musta put cough already eaten my fries.”
syrup in it.”
“Don’t act so high and mighty,” he snapped.
“Are you going to finish your story?” I said. “It’s gotta be cold by now.”

“Quit naggin’ me, buddy,” he snapped. He called the waitress back to our table
“I’ll finish it a damn sight quicker if ya show and handed her my plate. “Give it a sizzle,
some courtesy.

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sugar tits,” he said. “I like my hamburgers holdin’ her cuffs in a pistol grip and clicking
hot.” the strands into place, and she looked so
goddamn grouchy that she hadda be on
“Will you finish the story?” I asked him. the rag. I said to her, ‘Sister, would ya mind
“What happened to that kid?” not breathin’ down my neck?’ And she said,
‘Would you mind dropping the pen, sir, and
“Can ya wait another damn minute?” he putting your hands behind your back?’
said. “I gotta take a piss.”
“Well, before I knew it, I was wearin’ the
Before I could answer, he rose from bracelets and she was reading me my rights.
the table and shuffled towards the John. I I said to her, ‘What’s the charge?’ and ya
considered leaving the restaurant, so he wanna know what she said? She said, ‘Con-
wouldn’t squeeze me for his tip, but he spiracy to Assassinate an Elected Official.
owed me the rest of the story—I had paid We have a witness, sir.’
for it with my lunch. So I suppressed my sur-
vival instincts and waited for him to return. “I said, ‘Who do ya think you’re messing
with, sister—some rube off a turnip truck?
“Lemme give ya a warning,” he said as I got a master’s degree in English, and I’m
he ambled back to the table. “Someone gonna sue you seven times over.’
pissed on the floor of that bathroom, ya
don’ wanna go in there.” “The dyke said, ‘Congratulations, sir. I
have a doctorate in jurisprudence.’ The
“You’re burger is ready,” I told him. “Sugar bitch thanked me for coming into the sta-
Tits warmed it up.” tion and saving the cops some trouble. She
said the city’s tactical unit was tryin’ to hunt
He sat back down at the table and picked me down.
the burger up with one hand. “Ya mind if I
eat it first?” he said. “I don’t want it to cool “She fitted me with leg irons then frog-
while I’m talking.” marched me out to this squad car, and she
told me to watch my mouth as she shoved
He took a bite and made a face. “She me into the back seat. I told her I needed to
overcooked it,” he groused, but he de- take a pee, but she didn’t do nothin’ about
voured the burger in several more bites it. She just sat there waiting for backup, and
than leaned back in his chair. a whole buncha cop cars pulled up. Next
thing ya know, I was getting booked in that
“All right,” he said, “here’s what hap- jail on Seventh Street.”
pened. The next day I went to the Tender-
loin Police Station to set a trap for the kid. I ***
walked into the station and I bellied up to
the counter, and I saw this gray-haired ser- Digging his thumbnail into a toothpick, Fin-
geant nodding off behind the plexiglass. So I ian peeled off a sliver of wood. He then
hammered on the plexiglass to wake the as- used the sliver to pick his teeth, smacking
shole up, and I told him, ‘My name is Finian his lips as he worked. “The trouble with
McFaddle. I wanna file a report.’ toothpicks,” he said, “is that they make ’em
too damn big.”
“Well, he stared at me like he knew my
name, and he handed me a report form, After paying his check with the money
and, while I was scribblin’, this dyke de- I gave him, he kept on picking his teeth.
tective came waddling up to me. She was

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When the waitress handed him his change, kid came to his senses by the time my case
he gave her a sportive wink. went to trial. He didn’t show up for the
hearing, and the court couldn’t locate him.
“How did they find a witness?” I asked. But I spent three months in the slammer be-
“There was only you and the kid.” fore the judge dismissed the case.”

“The kid was the witness?” said Finian. “Maybe the gangs put a hit on the kid.”
“Can you believe that crap? He went to the
Tenderloin station and dropped a dime on me.” “Naw, that ain’t what happened. After
they let me outta the hoosegow, the little
His nostrils flared as he told me this, shit robbed me again. It was only a coupla
and he waited for me to reply. I said, “You weeks later and I was sittin’ in Golden Gate
shouldn’t have hired the kid without Park, and that same damn kid came up to
checking his resumé.” me and pulled a gun outta his pants. ‘I need
some money, mister,’ he said. ‘My baby
“Yeah,” said Finian, still picking his teeth. momma she sick.’ He didn’t even recognize
“He was just a little pussy. Ya know, he was me, he just pointed the gun at my chest.”
even sitting in court when I went for my ar-
raignment. The judge told the little fucker “Did you give him some verbal judo?” I
that he was a mighty fine citizen.” asked.

I said, “Why would some punk in the “Fuck that,” Finian said. He wiped his
Tenderloin want to be a snitch?” mouth, rose from the table, and put down
a one-dollar tip. “I gave the kid my wallet
“All I can say,” said Finian, “is that one and figgered I’d got off cheap.”
and one ain’t always two. But at least the

165



NONFICTION



MEMORIES OF

POLAND

by Alex de Cruz

As something hard struck the soles of my “Tak,” (yes), I replied, using one of the
feet, a booming voice demanded, “PASS- few Polish words in my vocabulary. My
PORT!” Opening my eyes, I found two huge being an American seemed to please them,
men in uniforms towering over me. One of and I’d soon find out why.
them held a short police club he’d used to
whack the bottom of my feet. Combining some English, a little Polish,
and simply pointing, they made it clear that
I was on a train traveling from Olsztyn, my transgression had been stretching out
a city in Northeast Poland, to the port and putting my feet up on the seat opposite
of Gdansk. The shipyard in that city was me without taking my shoes off. I wanted
the birthplace of the Solidarity Move- to shout, These seat cushions are so filthy,
ment, which played an instrumental role I couldn’t get them any dirtier if I tried.
in bringing an end to the Communist rule But I had the good sense to keep quiet. If
of Poland. My hosts at the University of I hadn’t been so tired, I might have been
Olsztyn, where I would be teaching a two- more thoughtful.
week course, put me on the train at 6:15 in
the morning, so I could meet some other I was in no position to protest. I felt like
visiting Americans already in Gdansk. We a mouse trapped in a corner by a cat. They
planned to spend the day touring the city. could have arrested me and taken me off
the train, or just beat the crap out of me,
Since I’d flown into Warsaw only on the since there were no witnesses in sight. After
previous afternoon, I was still jet-lagged. taking a moment to write something out,
Although the train had several coach cars, it one of them handed me a purported ticket
had only a handful of passengers, and I en- for $10.00. Interestingly, he wrote it in U.S.
joyed an entire compartment for six people dollars, not Poland’s currency, the zloty,
to myself. Fumbling around half asleep suggesting it was far more likely a bribe
while the two officials stared at me, I finally than an official fine.
produced my passport. “Ah, Amerykanski,”
exclaimed the one examining my passport. After meeting the other Americans for
breakfast at their hotel, we had a fascinating

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tour of Gdansk. We even visited the leg- very good safety record, but it was too late
endary shipyard where a security guard to do anything about it.
sold us historic photographs, including one
of Lech Walesa leading a Solidarity rally. The I’d met Wlodek, who was my host on
guard probably made more from selling that first trip, when he was visiting the
copies of those photos to tourists than he U.S. on a Fulbright grant the previous year.
did from his salary. After having lunch with Wlodek’s wife and
daughter at their apartment one day, he
My first visit to Poland was in May mentioned elections were being held for
1990, less than six months after the fall of local council positions. When we stopped
the Berlin Wall in November 1989, which by his polling station, he enthused, “This is
marked the end of the Soviet domination a big deal. This is the first fair and demo-
and Communist rule of Eastern Europe. cratic election I’ve ever voted in.” He was so
Over the next decade, I made a dozen thrilled that he took me into the curtained
trips to Poland, typically for two weeks, voting booth with him. None of the voting
to teach short courses, work with Polish monitors objected, which surprised me.
faculty developing their own courses, and
give lectures. My last trip to Poland was Many remnants of the socialist economy
in May 2000. I witnessed Poland’s meta- remained on my earlier trips, especially
morphosis during that eleven-year time during that first visit. I went into a bakery
span. The country was transformed eco- one day to buy some sweet rolls and was
nomically, politically, and socially, as were astounded at the multi-stage process of
the lives of many of the Poles who became making a purchase. After taking a number
my friends. and waiting my turn, I pointed out the items
in the glass case I wanted to a clerk behind
I discovered what an adventure Poland the counter. She wrote a chit listing them I
would be before even getting there. My first took to the cashier and paid. I then took the
trip involved a flight from Heathrow Airport receipt back to the first person who got the
in London to Warsaw on the Polish air- sweet rolls out of the case. She wrapped
line, LOT. They still allowed smoking in the them in paper, which she neatly tied up
Heathrow terminal in 1990. When I got to with twine before handing the package to
my flight’s glass-enclosed departure lounge, me.
it was like there was a forest fire. Many
Poles, especially the men, still smoked and In a Warsaw bookstore near the univer-
being idle and/or nervous while awaiting sity, I was looking through an economics text
the flight they all lit up. I would have gladly printed on newsprint quality paper, when
worn a gas mask. a clerk yanked it from my hands. Pointing
her finger in my face, she scolded me, “Nie,
My next surprise was the airplane itself. Nie (no, no).” I got the message you were
I couldn’t read any of the written messages not supposed to pick up a book unless you
on the plane since they were not only in a planned to purchase it. Later in the 1990s,
foreign language, but they didn’t even use customer-friendly bookstores opened that
the Roman alphabet. After a moment, I re- encouraged browsing as expected.
alized it was the Cyrillic alphabet, and the
language was Russian. I’d never been on a Warsaw had few restaurants in 1990,
Russian-made aircraft, which didn’t have a since not many Poles could afford to dine

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out, and there weren’t many tourists yet. I couple of times a month, I drove out there
ate one evening at one of Warsaw’s suppos- to visit and brought back a car full of food.
edly better restaurants. Every item on the I even took an ice chest to pack with meat.
menu was priced in terms of the number of Quite a few people in Warsaw had relatives
grams ordered. The food itself was medi- in the countryside who were a source of
ocre. That meal served as a great example food.”
of the emphasis in a socialist economy on
quantity, while discounting the importance While visiting Claudia, an American
of quality and satisfying consumers. friend living in a rural town in Eastern Po-
land in 1992, we went for a walk and passed
On that first trip, I stayed in a guest room a small grocery store with a produce stand
in an old building on what would become in front. She saw something that made
the Warsaw School of Economics campus. her eyes light up like she’d won the lottery,
None of the other guest rooms had occu- and said, “Wow, did you see that beautiful
pants, making me the only person at night looking lettuce. I haven’t had any fresh
in this large five-story, very dark building. It greens since I got here three months ago
had an ancient open-cage elevator and ele- in March. It must be imported from the
vator shaft. If the creaky old elevator broke greenhouses in the Netherlands since it’s
down, I’d be trapped in it until morning since too early in the season for local farmers.
there was no alarm system, so I walked up Wait for me. I want to buy some right now
the stairs to my third-floor room. I still re- before it’s sold.”
member the eerie echo of my footsteps in
that empty building Each year as I went back to Poland, the
grocery stores became better stocked not
I ate several dinners at a nearby cafe- only with higher quality Polish foodstuffs,
teria. It didn’t stay open very late so I had but also with more Western products. They
to eat early. For the equivalent of about one began to regularly carry imported fruits,
U.S. dollar, I got a plate with a big mound such as bananas and oranges, for the first
of mashed potatoes and a ground mystery time. Western European supermarkets and
meat covered with a heavy gravy, plus a other retail chains started opening stores
mug of tea. I made quite an incongruous there, which the Poles thronged even if
sight sitting amongst Polish workmen still they were just looking in wonder. When
wearing their blue work coveralls eating I saw him on my 1993 trip, Wlodek took
their dinners. me to Poland’s first Ikea store, which had
opened on the outskirts of Warsaw.
During Poland’s 1980s economic crisis,
grocery shoppers confronted empty At the end of my 1990 trip, I wanted to
shelves and most foodstuffs ended up express my appreciation to my host. I took
being rationed because of shortages. An Wlodek and his wife to a ballet at the Polish
inefficiency agricultural sector plagued National Theatre. The total cost for seats in
Poland, but Polish food commodities were the orchestra section for the three of us
also being shipped to the Soviet Union.A was less than U.S. $12.00, when translated
Polish professor I had lunch with in Warsaw from Polish zloty into U.S. dollars. This ri-
commented, “My family ate better than diculously low price reflected the lingering
most thanks to my brother who still lives effects of the subsidies that traditional arts
on the little farm where we grew up. A had received under the socialist regime and

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the strength of the dollar in relation to the occurred on an evening in 1991, when one of
Polish zloty. my colleagues was giving a talk on the tran-
sition from a socialist to a market economy.
Between 1991 and 2000, the U.S. State In the middle of his presentation, an elderly
Department funded the work of dozens gentleman stood up, interrupted him, and
of U.S. faculty in Poland, including myself, launched into an angry tirade. The man had
through a series of grants. Their purpose probably been an official in the previous
was to help transition Poland from a Soviet Communist government. The young woman,
satellite with a communist government and who’d been translating his talk, broke down
a socialist economy to a democracy with a sobbing. She felt too upset with such rude
market economy. The Central School of Plan- behavior toward a guest to continue and
ning and Statistics in Warsaw had produced wouldn’t translate what he’d said.
socialist bureaucrats. With our assistance, it
became the Warsaw School of Economics, An official who’d organized the event
teaching Western economics and business and also spoke English came to the podium.
management. I also taught and lectured at He was embarrassed and apologetic. My
universities in Krakow, Olsztyn, and Poznan, colleague got him to provide an approxi-
so I got to see most of the country. mate translation of what the old Commu-
nist had yelled. “We don’t need any damn,
In the early 1990s, I taught using a trans- smart-ass Americans coming over here and
lator,which was a new experience. I couldn’t telling us what to do. Go back to the U.S.
be sure what I was saying matched what the and go to hell.” By then the angry Commu-
students were hearing in Polish. I learned nist had left, the translator composed her-
to go over the more arcane economic ter- self, and he finished his talk.
minology in my notes with the translator
before class. Those trips were definitely not Many Poles had relatives in the United
some junket. I typically lectured from 9:00 States. Chicago then had the second largest
to 12:00 in the morning, and after a lunch Polish population of any city after Warsaw.
break, from 1:30 to 4:30 in the afternoon. On one of my return flights, I flew from
Later, we began to “train the trainers”, a Warsaw to Chicago on LOT. By then, the
State Department term, by jointly teaching Polish airline had purchased new Boeing
courses with the younger English-speaking aircraft. The flight was packed with Poles.
Polish faculty. Many of them probably had relatives in Chi-
cago that they may not have seen in years, if
I tried to learn a little Polish, but quickly ever. As the plane was landing, some Poles,
discovered it is a very difficult Slavic lan- who may never have flown before, got so
guage to assimilate. I mastered a handful excited they stood up and began to get
of words and phrases I could pronounce their belongings down from the overhead
correctly, for which I got effusively com- bins. The flight attendants had a fit. They
plimented. Even if I just said “djien dobry” got most people seated again, but even as
(good morning), or “dziekiye ci” (thank you), the wheels touched down, there were still
they’d tell me, “Ah wonderful, you speak a few folks standing. Fortunately, the plane
Polish!” made a nice smooth landing.

As Americans, we were warmly received Polish hospitality was remarkable. On
with a few exceptions. The most outrageous most visits, any other visiting faculty and I

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Revista Literária Adelaide

were invited to dinner at someone’s home, the 1990s, Poles started buying used West
which was typically just a 600 square German cars, BMWs and Mercedes being
foot, socialist-era apartment in a concrete, most popular.
walkup residual tower. We’d all crowd into
the tiny living-dining room. The evening An unfortunate consequence of all these
would begin with Polish appetizers, lots of cars was that driving in Poland became very
beer and vodka, followed by an enormous dangerous. Attention to driving laws was lax
dinner. We learned to save space in our and most major highways were only two
stomachs for not just one, but two desserts. lanes. One publication referred to driving in
Then one evening after we’d finished the Poland as Europe’s “death trap”. Poland had
second dessert, our hostess brought out a the highest number of road deaths in rela-
third dessert dish. tion to the size of its population of all 27 Eu-
ropean Union countries in 2010. Compared
Since many of the junior faculty and lec- to the E.U. average of 69 deaths per million
turers were poorly paid, our dinner hosts people, the Polish rate was 120 deaths.
might have spent a substantial portion of
their monthly salary on that one extrava- One reason for the high number of traffic
gant meal. This bothered me, so I always- fatalities was that on two-lane highways in
brought a nice gift from the U.S. for the Poland, slower vehicles would drive toward
hostess, and the children if there were any. the outer edge of the roadway. This created
a narrow alley down the center for faster
Some of the best Polish food was the cars to pass. If cars going in opposite direc-
hearty soups served at a cafeteria on the tions pulled out to pass using the center
Olsztyn campus. I’d go with a group of pseudo-lane simultaneously, a head-on
Polish faculty for lunch and they got used collusion could easily result.
to me saying, “I’ll have a big bowl of that
wonderful soup again.” Older women did Szczepan was one of the leading faculty
the cooking who’d probably inherited the with whom we collaborated and became a
soup recipes from their mothers, passing good friend. He’d taken some racing-driver
them down from generation to generation. course and owned a late model BMW. He
Besides a very good borsch, they made drove very fast and took risks.
several other delicious soups. Initially, the
Poles found my preference for soup rather One evening, Szczepan had three pas-
than the more expensive meat, poultry, and sengers in his car, including myself. It was
fish dishes curious, since soup was originally raining, making the road slick and visibility
a peasant food, as in most cultures. To feed poor. Szczepan pulled out and began to
their families, peasant women learned to thread the needle of the center pseu-
perform wonders throwing whatever they do-lane. Being seated in the front pas-
had into a pot and slowly simmering it. senger seat, I glanced at the speedometer.
Szczepan was going 120 kilometers per
Under the socialist regime, most people hour, about 75 mph. We were missing cars
couldn’t afford a car. Among those who and big-rig trucks going the opposite direc-
could, the most common automobile was tion by a couple of feet, or less. I couldn’t
the Trabant manufactured in East Ger- keep quiet. “Szczepan, please slow down?
many, which looked something like a 1950s Going this fast in the center of a two-lane
Fiat. As soon as they could afford one in highway in these conditions is crazy. I know

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

I’m uncomfortable, and I’m sure Marie and Poland suffered from its location be-
Jerry in the back seat are too.” tween Germany and Russia, two major
powers. The country had been invaded nu-
After another one of Szczepan’s wild merous times, even by Sweden at one point.
rides a German colleague told him upon Poland ceased to exist as an independent
reaching their destination, “Szczepan, I like country from 1794 to 1918 with the em-
you and enjoy working with you, but I will pires of Austria-Hungary, Germany-Prussia,
never, ever ride in a car you’re driving again.” and Russia occupying the area. Even while
occupied, Poles retained their culture and
Poles were remarkably well educated on language. Today’s Northeast Poland had
the heroic and tragic history of their country. been East Prussia until the end of WW II.
When I started teaching at the university in
Olsztyn, a couple of the Polish faculty took Given Germany’s and Russia’s past
me to the nearby site of the Battle of Grun- treatment of Poland, especially during the
wald that occurred in 1410. Although not Second World War, Poles were remarkably
history experts, they explained in detail how willing to let bygones be bygones, particu-
the combined Polish and Lithuanian armies larly with Germany which is now its major
defeated the Teutonic Knights, a Germanic trading partner.
military order.
By the end of World War II, Warsaw
The battle involved tens of thousands of lay in ruins. The Russian Army had been
mounted knights and soldiers. As the armies pushing the Germans back across what is
faced each other, the Poles and Lithuanians now Eastern Poland. With the approach
outwitted their foe. They remained shaded of the Soviet forces, the Polish Resistance
in the trees, while the Teutonic Knights emerged to fight the Germans within
waited in an open field in the hot July sun. Warsaw. The Polish Resistance hoped that a
The German knights, wearing heavy metal liberated Poland would be an independent,
armor and helmets, and their horses grew democratic nation after the war. When the
exhausted from the heat. Only at that point Russian forces reached the Vistula River on
did the Poles and Lithuanians attack. the eastern side of Warsaw, Stalin ordered
them to halt their advance. By delaying his
On another day, we toured the beauti- army, Stalin gave the German forces time to
fully restored Malbork Castle, the largest destroy the Resistance, which would have
medieval fortress complex in the world. It opposed Poland becoming a Communist
had served as the headquarters of the Teu- satellite of the Soviet Union.
tonic Knights. Again, there was no need for
a tour guide given our well-informed Polish Warsaw had been known as the “Paris of
hosts. the East” for its Baroque beauty. By the end
of the war, 85 percent of its buildings lay in
I found Poles to be very proud of their ruins. In the lobby of the impressive Polish
country’s famous men and women, such as National Theatre, there were photographs
Nicolaus Copernicus the astronomer, Fred- of the twisted bare steel girders and few
eric Chopin the composer and Marie Curie sections of stone wall that remained of its
the scientist. They had a special affection predecessor. The beautiful Old Town area
for Pope John Paul II, who helped bring a of Warsaw, with its cobble-stone central
peaceful end to the Communist rule of his square, is all a reconstruction.
homeland.

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The tallest and dominant building in upheaval initially. The average rate of ex-
Warsaw in the 1990s was referred to as change in 1990 of 9,500 Polish zloty per U.S.
Stalin’s Tower by the Poles. It was an ugly dollar increased to almost 23,000 zloty per
gray monolith that the Soviet dictator had dollar in 1994, because of high inflation and
supposedly given as a gift to the people of a trade imbalance with more imports than
Poland. A glance at Goggle Earth shows that exports. My hotel bill in Warsaw that year
today modern skyscrapers fill Central War- cost over 20 million zloty. Inflation had its
saw’s skyline. most detrimental impact on Poles living on
fixed incomes, such as retirees. In 1995, Po-
To celebrate the completion of one land re-dominated its currency, and 10,000
course I taught at Olsztyn with Wojciech, a old zloty became worth one new zloty, so
young Polish lecturer, we took the students that in 1995 the exchange rate averaged
to a country inn for dinner. We were seated only 2.42 zloty per U.S. dollar. Today, it’s
on one side of a long banquet table. A sim- around 4.00 zloty per dollar.
ilar table on the other side of the room was
empty when we entered, but about a half The Polish economy ultimately became
hour later a tour-bus full of older German very successful. The average standard of
tourists arrived. Some of those Germans living increased by over 50 percent be-
may have had ancestors that lived in that tween my first visit in 1990 and my last in
region when it had been part of East Prussia. 2000. Now almost thirty years later, income
They might even have been very young chil- per capita has more than tripled compared
dren living there when the Germans were to the last years of the socialist era. Polish
expelled at the end of World War II. faculty that I knew went from living in those
tiny apartments in gray concrete towers to
The situation was uncomfortable. The owning spacious new condominiums and
two groups were seated so we looked di- houses. They were able to join the middle
rectly at each other, with about 20 feet be- class.
tween the tables providing space for Polish
folk dancers to perform. We sat like that Poland became a member of NATO in
throughout the dinner service with each 1999 and of the European Union in 2004.
group trying to ignore the other. Then Wo- The country has had one of the fastest
jciech, who’d had quite a lot to drink by growing economies in Europe for many
that point, walked over and asked one of years. If I returned to the Poland now, after
the older German women to dance to the almost 20 years, I imagine I’d have some dif-
folk music playing. She accepted, and that ficulty recognizing it as the same country I
broke the ice. Others soon joined them and first visited in 1990. I remain deeply grateful
the evening ended on a convivial note. for the opportunity to have witnessed and
made a small contribution to the first de-
The enormous changes in the structure cade of the metamorphosis that occurred
of the Polish economy brought considerable in Poland after 1990.

175

About the Author Adelaide Literary Magazine

Alex de Cruz has had a passion for fiction and writing since
reading Hemingway as a teenager. Recently, he’s become
fascinated with writing flash fiction, short stories, and
creative nonfiction. Alex’s work has been published in
Adelaide Literary Magazine, Bull and Cross, Cafe Lit, Flash
Fiction Magazine, Potato Soup Journal, and Scarlet Leaf
Review. He has forthcoming stories in Down in the Dirt and
Scarlet Leaf Review. He grew up in Santa Cruz, California
and now lives in Santa Barbara, after spending forty years
living in the Midwest.

176

TWO STORIES
OF YOUTH

by Ian Bishop

I hated the dinning room, detested the perhaps the dark end of the dinning room
kitchen. Other rooms, and a couple of short which between meals was empty like a lone
corridors, were places I became lost. Ev- stone chapel. I’d stare, always staring, as if
ery minute in the house seemed an age of gluing myself to the surroundings, wishing
dreariness. I’d hang about, sit down, pace I’d become one of the objects: a wall; a
around, try to look as if I were somehow doorframe; a shadow. I waited for some-
locked into a thought, considering an idea, thing deep down to erupt–not from inside
a possibility, while caught in the stair-well: me–but from the depths of a green valse or
up against ceilings, through open doors, the brown wood of a dinning chair, some-
throughout all floors, the smell of cooking thing knocked in by a clattering outside in
reigned. Cover pot and leave to simmer. I the street, fractions of a lullaby when the
recall those instructions from lips, in books, sun shone and cut across the room. The
as if all parts of life were captured inside, harder I stared, the harder the room glared,
bubbling, babbling, bubbling, troubling. Sat and paranoia flared like pieces of sun. A
around the table my parents would serve grill or a frying pan may have just filled the
up promptly, so eating could keep cooking place with rancid burning fumes. Or maybe
alive, and when memories faded, cooking coffee captured the floor; soup in a pressure
could start all over. cooker hissing. My head would become hot
and I’d have to stand. Then it helped to pace
Cooking was king. Eating was queen. around the place. A frame of my stare would
I’d hear them leave, then return, trip after stay in my head like a cardboard box caught
trip, dragging in potatoes, piling vegetables, between tenement blocks. I’d have to move
filling fridges, slapping fresh meat down on quickly. My days were thus a cacophony
on the slab, filling jars of sugar, flour, pasta of dreariness from the staring, to the pacing,
and rice and a thousand more of their ‘must to places in-between, each and every one
have’ family favourites. fragranced by lungfuls from an awkward or-
chestra of smells: the bacons, the hams, the
I’d be in a corner; sat by the window in lambs, the trifles, custard tarts, jams.
my bedroom or a window in the lounge;

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

Meal times were rapped out on the base tried to balance what to eat and what not
of a pot, accompanied by shouts of Dinner! to eat: as if all this was quite a normal pro-
Lunch! Breakfast! They shouted because cedure. Some of my criteria were based
they thought I’d not heard the pot. They on what I thought I could possibly endure,
rapped the pot because they thought I’d most was random and rested on eating very
not heard the shouts. This was their court: little. My attempt at rigour served only to
cooking, eating, rapping, shouting. Check for further cloud my mind, and like a hurriedly
salt, pepper, thickness, rareness, correctness. trimmed moustache, a balance would not
A little wine from the cupboard might be materialise, just a lack of understanding as
used last minute (from a tiny bottle like olive to how such a method could possibly fail to
oil for ears) to track down morsels that had come up with an answer.
stuck to the bottom of the pan; boil them off,
collect them up, bring them back to the fold: What I did eat, I ate in small mouth-
‘for they are by far the tastiest pieces!’ fuls, mindful of being watched––for I was
certainly in the wrong––mouthing morsels
Once the raps and shouts had started, when I knew full well of the disgust. Halfway
the scene would fill the bottom hall as a through a meal (time could be tracked by
factory lets off steam. The whistle blows, counting my fidgets) I’d leave and start
the workers flow. Their house, their world, pacing, surveying the objects in the house:
their perfect process of perpetual godli- the large vase by the window, a perfect
ness. I greeted my parents’ hilarity with polished sideboard, or the cotton sacking
grumpiness, as was my way. I could have that covered the lounge chairs––as if they
been the jester had I given off a little less spoke––could speak––would speak: Tell
gravity, had I skipped, tried to act out the me! Tell me! Tell me! Meanwhile the meal
buffoonery. But those royal meals (three a I’d left on my plate looked on, imagining me,
day, sometimes four) – attend or have your eating me without mercy, becoming fatter,
head chopped off! – failed to relieve my fuller, stouter, while I became thin.
deep depression (mid-afternoon, maybe
late evening, large cakes would appear My parents were repulsive. Shovelled
sandwiched with buttercream held high their food in: further, further, fuller, fatter.
on plates with rims like stetsons). They
looked to me, my parents, for a sign–just a They lived for nothing but to cook and
glimmer–of joy, as I appeared amongst the eat and cook and eat. They were Hydra:
steam and the engine, they would keep-up those tiny creatures that glue themselves
their tempting, as if they thought they just to rocks and plants at the bottom of the sea
had to tickle the right place inside, but their where they wiggle tentacles attached above
delight was my morbid disinclination. Food their mouths, take in every morsel they care
was a lighthouse keeper who loved to hear to, swallow them down whole and digest
the splintering of hull upon the rocks below. each scrap. If a delicacy proved dangerous:
A stormy morning that circulated dark holes Hydra was quick to poison. When prey was
like those kitchen gadgets chop-up waste. right, they’d opened up their mouths, en-
gage their stomachs and UUUHHH!
I ate very little.
Nothing has happened. Not ups nor
My mind reasoned, from one side of downs, just flats. The fat flat of the land, on-
the plate to the other, then back again. It wards, outwards, up into every corner, every

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Revista Literária Adelaide

crevice, every horizon. And I’m always here. cosmic interlocution. There was nothing to
Full. Undigested. Sat at the table I never do but sit back down and wait (as if grace
left; like a terror still lived from the night were contractual) for the end. Eventually I’d
before–sudden–clear, every nuance, every collect the plates and pots and cutlery. My
grimace. My thoughts were never thought job was to take away slops and scrub-up the
in reason–I sulked them–fought with them crocs.
under the burden of my phantom belly.
How could I be calm and straight forward I flunked that too.
when I felt I was always nearly about to
have the flames sucked from me. I’d scowl; I don’t want to wash-up! I’d exclaim.
my leg tremor ticked. Yet my parents were Or make such torment getting through a
functioning beings–functioning with food! quarter of it I’d be able to slink away; I knew
But surely I’d seen them do something be- they’d seen at least some discipline for the
sides. They had lives, got up and about in day: and what could they say? I failed the
the house, outside the house, with things test: I always failed the test.
to accomplish, plans? And they’d had lives:
work, jury duty, holidays. I’d often ob- ‘Just look at yourself!’ My parents said.
served them talk the talk, walk the walk–– And I did. Not the ‘Get a job!’ – brick laying,
although––after a meal they’d sit the seat car timing, bread mixing, porter, driver,
–– then the sacking talked! It squashed and tester, sorter, grinder, part timer, fixing the
shrieked and creaked and dived down to paper with pencil and eagerly phoning for
catch them. vacancies – kind of looking.

After dinner I’d join my parents, televi- I had a feeling. I’d always had a feeling.
sion on, me merely making a dent while pot And I’d go along and look at it in the mirror.
washing was still to be done. Their tenta-
cles––quiet for a while––would soon start Disbelief.
to twitter with a fancy for finding what was
still to come. Little chuckles and splutters, ***
handkerchiefs for dabbing the corners of
mouths and the tips of noses. When food- Christine worked in a book shop I walked
full my parents were calmer. Less strychnine. into. An overnight visit to Nick’s. I’d left his
Longer breaths. It must have spoiled diges- place in a daze and dosed down the street
tion, me leaving so abruptly in the middle of to the bus stop. On the way the bookshop
their mouthfuls. I think they counted, gave entrance was on a tight corner; it scooped
me a fair chance, a playground game; then me up. Narziss stayed a scholar and a monk;
they’d shout: Goldmund quit cloisters for a sea of blood
and lust; all wrapped-up in a ruined mon-
Halfway through! We’re only bloody astery closeted by silhouetted trees. The
halfway through! book seemed just the thing. Toppled on the
end of a stand. I’d never really liked a book,
The disciplining of their hearts. The hub held a book, chosen a book, school wasn’t
in the hubbub of their day. They wore that like that. Christine was a looking kind of
table like an ancient trinket or a bracelet, person. Through Transport, Psychology,
a ring of sacred faces etched upon their Religion she fixed and picked me up in her
patterns as if they were engaged in some look. Some people walk peering down or
somehow into the midst, but Christine was
a looker. She was a mover too. A moving

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

person, gliding from Poetry through History premises – although a pop-up shop or two,
to Philosophy, she looked at me again, as if fresh paint, smart new signs – small indica-
a second fix might further inform the first. tions of rejuvenation. Even without seeing
In her look I thought she saw the world in her face I knew. Christine’s moves were
a come-as-you-are kind of a way. She may recognizable from miles away, at oblique
have read every book in the shop but she angles, or tangled amongst throngs of shop-
didn’t care. I felt her energy: a glass-as-full- pers. Maybe I noticed her presence because
as-it-is kind of person. As I clicked through everyone else was standard, a collection of
the checkout her eyes caught me once arms and legs out to lunch that walked and
again, looking from Fiction A-G, triangu- sat and spoke and hunched.
lation perhaps, or just making use of any
shots she might have left. I paid for my vol- She was on a bus ... reading a book! I
ume and fell back out into the curve of High daydreamed knocking on the window. The
Road. She stood holding a pile of books. I bus pulled away ... but I kept the dream ...
made out the title of the top volume: Canal not a clue what I’d do if it woke. That was
Travel in Victorian Britain. my state. Town was my new found land. I
was broadening horizons, pushing back
Christine was easy to watch. So were the boundaries – although home still ate me up
trees I’d noticed since I’d starting leaving – was too courteous to spit me out. I kept
home for walks and occasionally staying arriving back, leaving, morning, evening. I
a night on Nick’s floor. They were thin tall was learning to plan, to think, to listen to
populars, then turning off the lane, large thoughts–just a little–through my walks. I’d
oaks and beech. Like the trees she was easy always been a hoarder of great facts, I liked
to see again and again, and again and again to learn but school had made me a fool.
her image struck my mind. I revisited the Often I’d fallen asleep, head on my desk,
book shop several times. Christine was al- head on the wall, head on my knees. As I
ways busy, yet always noticed me hanging wandered around town, thoughts of those
around Classics, as if I knew something. days reemerged, some facts, ideas, bits and
(I knew I liked the black bindings and the pieces I’d gathered from lessons, more likely
paintings of faces and pillars that adorned laying on my back staring up at the sky. It
their covers). She’d do something with her seemed to me there were facts, and there
face, a greeting, like a pout but her eyes was thinking. Facts made me think. But
would hit me first, then she’d further im- thinking also smudged facts, clawed them
press with a soft hiss of lips which bought back, took them apart. Most of my thoughts
light to her whole face. I’d forgotten images lurked, moved like trapped dogs, vanishing
could travel like clouds. One minute epi- when the door opened, slipping back when
sodes of dank and murk, the next–without I returned.
warning–a rough breeze, a shifting, a
glimmer of light. Could that be her? This was new ter-
ritory! I was leaving the outskirts of town
That was her! She was walking the behind when I saw; far ahead; a figure;
one-way system. I watched as she climbed shoulders and a shoe propping it against
through a coble of car exhaust and dirty the wall of a building. (I may have seen the
buildings, pubs where time had long figure smoking, perhaps just taking air, or
been called, flourishes of empty rundown maybe drinking tea). This was a busy road

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but the area was country. Still some dis- Christine walked to the sink, picked up
tance existed between me and the figure an old style kettle, the kind that would be
from where I walked. The street reminded hung over a roaring fire. She filled it and
me of a Lowry, but there was no doubt it fired the gas ring.
was her. I’d never glimpsed Christine so far
from town, so close to my house. I knew I sat at the table.
the building she leant on. I’d known them
as a child: cottages clasped together, so low She was saying I must be an avid reader
it seemed the top gutter could be almost the amount of times I visited Books Books
touched by finger tips. I recalled that the old Books. Christine was only in three days a
man who kept the watch shop once lived in week, the rest of the time was spent sorting
one of them, but he was long gone. The cot- out business. There were so many web or-
tages had fallen into the past, forever there ders to process and dispatch, it was crazy,
but mostly forgotten, out of mind, taken and this being such a small cottage.
for granted, nothing to do with anything
anymore, their ancient paint still peeling. The table was solid wood. A deep grain
I quickened my step and crossed the road, ridged over its surface. I scratched a finger-
stooping along the pavement, that name nail repetitively in and out of the curves.
unspeakable.
So you live around here?
Hi. She said.
yes
I followed her long green skirt into a lar-
gish stone kitchen. My eyes were filled with I half-mouthed.
raven hair. In town I’d seen it tied back. Now
she kept it off her face instinctively. Inside She put down two cups of tea.
the cottage, cloth hung from ties strung
beam to beam. A few pieces were hanging Looked into my eyes.
in the centre where the table stood but
most were draped to one side under a lower I recalled a seaside vista. The sea so far
sloping roof – space incorporated from an out walking there was impossible. Not a
outbuilding, or an old-fashioned walk-in sound. Then my gurgling thoughts sprang.
larder. Many pieces were bright, some neu-
tral, vague greens, browns, a few contained Drains were a Great Idea! Although they
heady swirls of a psychedelic mix. Parts of smelt. Toilets too, with their U bends to
the kitchen were in shade, cooler, more keep out cholera while effortlessly expelling
withholding than areas that soaked up full spent fumes. The bus station was in a low
sun. I had a feeling some bits were made for part of town, in a dip with the drains and
the shade. From the far corner, spreading the public lavatories. No matter how low
out into the add-on, a series of large vats, the bus station, it always stood above the
some with their tops covered, others open, filth of the drains.
maybe oily, definitely murky. From where
I stood by the table, the kitchen stretched Water pumps ... in coal mines ... they
to a sink where food pitted the metal of were a Great Idea! Without a pump there’d
spoons and pan handles stuck out all angles. have been not so much coal as slurry, and
drowning miners. Tractors, cars, coaches,
bread making mechanisation, trains, cities,
cathedrals ... Victorian Canals.

Now they were a Great Idea! Indus-
trial Britain: the up and down of goods on

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

waterways, their locks and tunnels and heavenly pursuits, to come back down and
horses and funnels ... bring the good news, quietly. Or perhaps
I’d escaped and was wandering, wondering
I reminded myself a couple were killed how people live in the world. The whole
when the car in which they were travelling town knew that the ancient building was
crashed into the ramparts of our medi- up there – from parts of the road you could
eval cathedral. Great Ideas go wrong. They see bits of the wall – but no one had ever
slump to EAT ideas. Loose their GRRR. Be- seen a monk. Not just silence then, but in-
come everyday, or worse, drag down the visibility. Great when getting to know your
everyday: they pollute the skies, pollute deity, like looking through their belongings
the seas, leave people trapped underneath while you’re in feeding the cat. Perhaps
the wheels. Outside our school a boy was they just didn’t exist and the building (their
knocked down by a car. When we arrived home) everyone had seen (well, bits of the
from lessons there was only a pool of blood. wall) was just a tale, old and deserted, told
to keep the children company.
My body was sitting opposite Christine.
On a slightly wonky bench she kept wiggling Christine was standing by the vats,
in an attempt to make me smile. Although talking about dyeing. Batik, tie-dye, bhatti
limp and awkward I was not reflecting the ... there was such great satisfaction, she lec-
sickness of my stomach. I had been eating tured, in the process of soaking; waiting;
as prescribed: three square meals, unfor- transforming. Primarily she was looking.
tunately they were still square, stuck in my Still it was the looking that I liked, although
gut, when what I really needed was a dif- her voice was sweet. Surely it must be (and
ferent shape, something thinner or circular, have been) the case that we humans looked
something stomach shaped like I’d seen on first, talked later? She moved her body as if
biological charts in the hospital. How those conducting the trails of material that were
pictures could possibly be me, or some kind hanging over the beams. A few of the vats
of me, made me uneasy. As if we were rou- looked dead dull, as if a million years old,
lette: risks calculated, odds and evens, prob- reused over and over throughout the cen-
abilities ... the weight of the world knocks– turies until now they still had something of
we watch–as the wheel spins, but nothing those ancient years in their liquid. Others
happens, just carry on–or something does– had the colours of berry bush summers.
but in another way, for a different reason, We’d had holidays that had been bright. At
or no reason, that gets a nod or a shrug. If the farm, staying in the old gate house so
you were uncharted there was no winning, we saluted the farmer and his wife each
no loosing. time they exited the estate. As a child I was
always up staring out of windows. There
I farted. was the pile-up on the bridge road one
summer, tangled metal, crumpled people,
We laughed, more than before. My what you’d expect, but we were first on
stomach was looping like a fairground. I scene, right behind, steam pouring, wheels
drank a sip of tea. Christine watched me still spinning. My parents just sat in the car
drink. She’d stopped talking. Always the and stared. Although I knew where not to
looker. She may of course have thought I’d look, I looked. That’s not a look that’s in-
taken a vow of silence, that I’d come from spired. It’s a look that’s dragged out of you
the monastery on the hill, sucked up by

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however hard you try to pull it back. Also lifted my arms; led to play with dyed mate-
there was the contamination one year (I rial on a woman’s body? By what magic was
was too young to even say the word). Our I doing something I had no control over?
farm was closed a week into our stay and Had I said it was alright?
we had to move to a farm down the road
(to friends of the farmers that owned the Now my fingers were employed draping
closed-down estate). There was a lot of a long cloth (bright orange, dark red circles)
talk about cattle and food chains and loud around Christine’s shoulders. She pulled
crying noises from animals in the fields her hair clear, it cascaded down her back.
over the hill that were keeping us awake She no longer looked, my face was in her
at night. eyes, she slipped my hand inside her blouse.
Between the layers of loose fitting material,
My hands pulled material from around she was in bed–yet standing up–in sheets
Christine’s outstretched arm, as if she were peeled aside to find a place for me. My
a machine producing the finished product other hand instinctively thought of Napo-
and I the artisan still excited at the wonder leon: sneaked inside his uniform. This was
of what dyeing could do. Why was she al- the correct stance for a man of such po-
lowing me to scroll her material? Using her sition in the eighteenth century. But also
arm for display purposes? I remember it useful if constant sensitivity in the stomach
was soft, the cloth. Then she snaked some region were to cause you trouble: slip it in
sneakily around her neck. How could I have there and look for all to see as if everything
followed? Moved from the table; stood-up; was under control.

About the Author

Ian Bishop lives in Kent UK and teaches social science in
schools and colleges. His work has been published in Orbis
and The Interpreter’s House.

183

ROUNDING THE
SQUARE: A SHAMANIC

APPROACH TO
GENDER

by Daniel Thompson

I am not who I appear to be, but I have nev- could make such an obvious mistake. But
er felt like anyone else. children, indiscreet as they are and deficient
in social graces, do not find it strange to be
In a time of dysphoria and social ac- making such assumptions. They may not
tivism, there is a way to talk about identity even realize they are doing it. This behavior
that there never was before. This article is can follow someone through their entire
not about me. It is about the way people life, a kind of hindsight bias or curse of
see, think and talk about me. knowledge where one assumes that other
people possess the same information and
The first time I was mistaken for a girl was observe the same conventions that they
when I was a child. Or rather it wasn’t that I do. It may also be the reason why people
was mistaken for a girl, but that my appear- feel no shame or remorse in discriminating
ance challenged the conventions of what against others.
a boy should look like. It didn’t take much,
only that I was short and my hair was long. I Even though I do not subscribe to the
was surprised and a little disappointed that social constructionist’s theory of gender
someone could be so unperceptive as to as- assignment, it is true that the confusion on
sume that I was female based simply on the the playground was based on the familiar
presence or absence of hair. stereotype that only girls wore long hair, or
to be more precise, only girls and hippies.
At first, I thought they were being disin- My intention is not to disprove the social
genuous until I realized that they weren’t. I
had never even considered that someone

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constructionist’s theory—they are prob- the truth in someone else, they are also
ably right in more than a few instances—I failing to recognize it in themselves. Be-
am merely saying that what seemed to be cause to know others is to know oneself.
a gender issue at first, was actually a so-
cio-political one. It doesn’t matter if you are It’s this failure to recognize the truth of
a homosexual, a trans, a hippie, or a punk, someone else’s identity that is the source of
we are all members of the counter-culture. most if not all prejudices, that when these
Even poor people are members of the count- views and biases become large enough, the
er-culture to the extent that they reject or size of a country for instance, they become
do not fit into the bourgeoise social order. what is known as Fascism.

I grew up in a small logging town where I said before that the first time I was mis-
any deviation from established norms gar- taken for a girl I was a child, but there have
nered hostility and prejudice, even against been several other instances since then.
a child incapable of making any kind of in- Although I believed the motivations at first
formed political choice. to be largely socio-political, as I got older, I
found more and more that how I saw myself
Although the prejudice directed at me was not at all how others saw me. Kids are
was not entirely gender related, the force short, some more than others, but they’re
was the same. A kind of ignorance, such as all like that, however I failed to grow taller
the aforementioned hindsight bias where than 5’ 4’’, and as a musician, I often grew
any kind of discrimination against humans my hair long. These physical attributes cou-
by other humans is based on some con- pled with my naturally gracile bone struc-
sensus idea of what being human means. ture and sparse facial hair signaled to less
intuitive and emotionally aware people
With this limited knowledge, one group that I was perhaps female, which did abso-
encounters the other and immediately rec- lutely nothing for my success with women.
ognizes a difference—expressed through Of course there was nothing I could do
shock, fear, outrage—rather than a corre- about it and so I simply went on with my
spondence—expressed through friendship, life, largely unconcerned as a straight, white,
comradery or inclusion. This fear is simply male, not really enjoying much privilege,
our own ego becoming threatened by the but not acting like a victim either—I assure
existence of the other, which is immediately you the ‘white male superiority’ status gets
apparent to anyone who has experienced knocked down a couple of rungs when
discrimination first hand, or who has experi- you are lacking in the typical ‘white male
enced any kind of ego death. They find they dominance’ traits like height, build and sec-
are no longer afraid, because they don’t ondary sexual characteristics.
identify with anyone’s idea of themselves
but their own. As I have tried to point out, What I did have though was a perspec-
oppression is broad-based and we should tive that few outside the LGBTQ+ com-
cast our net wide, not just to identify the munity have, but which those acquainted
myriad ways in which it is being practiced with the mystery traditions of ancient and
on various populations, but to identify the indigenous cultures do. While it is true
source, which I argue is an insensitivity on that culture does play a role in a person’s
the part of people who are unaware of their gender to some degree, it has no influence
own biases. So, while they fail to recognize on whether they actually identify as that

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

gender. True identification is much more a ideas as a war. Concerning because there
part of one’s essence, a spiritual/ metaphys- are people, large numbers of them on both
ical concept wherein people are born of one sides, who are very passionate about their
or two spirits. I use the terms spiritual and ideas and are ready to defend them, vio-
metaphysical because if we are to rely on lently if necessary, but cathartic because
the terms that biology gives us, we would these ideas have always been there, in po-
have no other choice than to accept the tra- tentia and are finally now being expressed.
ditional assumption that boys are born in
a boy’s body and vice versa. I feel that the Amoung the names currently associated
spiritual, emotional intelligence explanation with the Culture War, few are as recogniz-
contains more information than the purely able as the Canadian psychologist, Jordan
intellectual, and this can serve to explain a Peterson. Peterson’s main criticism, one of
host of social and cultural phenomena, not his main criticisms of the trans community,
just the subject of gender. is that there are only a finite number of pro-
nouns and no more. According to him, new
By this reasoning we can argue that pronouns cannot be invented, even though
just as biological gender is acquired, so is new words are being added to other word
the psychological and emotional sense of classes all the time. The invention and in-
gender and the only socially constructed corporation of new words into the lan-
aspects are the tertiary ones; long or short guage is called descriptive, as opposed to
hair, pink or blue, muscular or gracile, pants prescriptive which dictates how a speaker
or leggings, shorts or skirts. should use language. Descriptive language
changes according to use and reflects how
All indigenous societies have their equiv- society uses language, rather than the other
alent of a Shaman or a Medicine Man whom way around (as long as it does not break the
they go to regularly for advice, consultation rules of syntax and grammar). There are no
and healing. Shamans are often androg- prescriptive rules outlawing the use of gen-
ynous, two-spirited people. Their visions der-neutral pronouns. I’m sure Peterson
are not simply their own, but belong to the uses both prescriptive and descriptive lan-
group/ species as a whole. These marginal- guage in his daily life, therefore his argu-
ized people can be from anywhere and look ment is not a very good one.
like anything, what defines them is a certain
knowledge and self-knowledge that clues Reference can also be made to many
them into the grand scheme of humanity other languages where objects are given
and the cosmos, perhaps even its teleology genders and are characterized as being his
that outside their personal experience, is or hers. This enhances both the phenome-
not widely known or considered. nological world and our ability to describe
it, treating things (and people) as male, fe-
For millennia, civilized culture has ig- male, both, other or neither. But rather than
nored these marginalized voices, but now, choosing new terms, many transgenders
after the successes of last century’s civil have resorted to variations on the existing
rights movement and today’s Culture War, he and she, which from a linguistics per-
various new frontiers have been opened up. spective are completely interchangeable.

It is concerning, but also cathartic that Language doesn’t care whether the
we are referring to the free exchange of word is spelled ze, he, je, or ae, although for

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logic and sense certain combinations of let- to the subject. However, there is a prece-
ters are preferable to others. Ze and he are dent for such a concept in the ancient mys-
equally logical and sound ‘right’. Ze and zhe tery traditions, such as Sufism, which con-
still follow the same structural rules as he tributed extensively to the development of
and she, they function the same way, they modern psychology.
even look the same, but better yet would
be an entirely new construction, such as gru P. D. Ouspensky in his book, ‘The Psy-
or zheb, which would stand for a third or chology of Man’s Possible Evolution’, makes
fourth gender. the distinction between essence and per-
sonality where “Essence is what we are
As Anthropologist Will Roscoe has shown born with. Personality is what is acquired.”
in his books ‘Changing Ones’ and ‘The Zuni This statement confirms both the biological
Man-Woman’, Native American societies and social constructionist view of gender.
(amoung other global indigenous) have a
long history of transgender people, many of The concepts of essence and personality,
whom were considered healers, teachers or grow in parallel with each other, but often
shamans. Sometimes these people were fe- one will be dominant. They are not reduc-
male in-utero and were changed to male at tive or deterministic, but rather easements
birth because the tribe needed more males, to becoming who one will ultimately be.
or became another gender at some point Just because one is born a certain way, in
in their lives as the outcome of a ceremony, a certain place or at certain time does not
vision, intuition or dream. confine them inexorably to those circum-
stances. We are all capable of change and
French colonists referred to these whether we remain the same in our ideas,
people broadly as berdache, meaning inti- beliefs or actions is a matter of choice or
mate male friend, but individual tribes had conviction. Nothing in us is permanent,
their own names for them, including alyha which is how we are able to make decisions
in Mohave, nadleeh in Navaho, and winkte and dispel negative emotions.
in Lakota. Although each name has its own
translation, the words generally mean the We have no way of knowing what goes
state of two-spiritedness, emphasizing the on in the vast oceanic ecosystem of an in-
primacy of the spirit over the physical body. dividual’s body and mind, much less a gen-
In the Omaha language, minquga means der-transitional person, where what’s on
instructed by the moon. Female berdaches the outside does not correspond to what is
are less common in Native American so- on the inside. But I hazard to guess it looks
cieties, but notable examples occur are something like a chimera, one of those
amoung the Cheyenne Piegans and Crows. composite beasts from Greek, Egyptian and
These two-spirited people were capable of Hindu mythology or some arrangement of
doing the work of both genders and were archetypes from the modern psychological
especially gifted in the arts, though not nec- tradition. To be fair though, I don’t even
essarily homosexual, it was not considered think the individuals in question know for
unusual if they were. sure, but I think they can feel it. A feeling
that is so much a part of them that it makes
The lack of scientific evidence for the communication strained because they are
gender spectrum underscores the impor- coming from an emotional center, not an
tance of a spiritual/ shamanistic approach intellectual one. The intellect cannot even

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

explain physical phenomena, not to men- all shapes rather than just the square and
tion mental or psychological. the round. The reason vision-logic hasn’t
claimed a greater share of intellectual real
One way to skirt this limitation on our estate seems to be logistics. Society simply
thinking is through integral-aperspective or can’t accommodate all of these different
vision logic, which attempts to address the positions at the same time, but now that
incompleteness of our default Aristotelian there are people actually holding them,
logic. The reason people are so inclined to they can be integrated; each perspective
disagree with Peterson is because he relies having its own place within the structure
too much on rationality. Rational thinkers like the jewels in Indra’s Net.
generally affirm their perspectives by re-
ducing opposing ones to their own, while The depth of the subject depends on how
vision logic integrates other perspectives many points it touches, how many lives it
into greater and greater systems of knowl- interacts with in the constellation of human
edge. This results in a more transparent issues, which determines how many people
consciousness that is aware of itself, a sort will be affected or even mildly concerned. In
of meta-consciousness of contexts within this case I don’t think it is even half the pop-
contexts. Integrating perspectives, while ulation, and yet everyone seems to have an
refraining from developing one of its own. opinion. Those intimately affected (the op-
pressed) reacting to a global humanitarian
This position can be described as crisis where everybody and nobody matters.
post-structural, where there are pegs of

About the Author

Daniel Thompson is a graduate of Vancouver Island University’s
Creative Writing program. He is a reader and contributor to the
Tongues of Fire reading series and has appeared in The Georgia
Straight, The Martlet, Grey Sparrow and the Gyroscope Review
amoung others. He lives in Victoria, B.C. Canada.

188

THE SPACE BETWEEN
DARKNESS AND
LIGHT

by Cathy Beaudoin

The truth is I’m scared. Meetings with audi- I had few complaints, and assumed I’d con-
tors, lawyers, investment bankers, and oth- tinue in my role as a financial executive.
er financial executives are a faded memory.
The days occupied by pedological objec- Unfortunately, my eyesight didn’t hold
tives, advanced accounting curriculum, and up. A second setback triggered an acute
academic research are long gone. It’s been visceral fear. The vision in my second eye
almost four years since I was expected to started to erode. Instead of seeing the
show up for work. I neither quit nor was intricacies of a slice of pepperoni pizza,
fired. Instead, my ability to do my job slow- a product label on a can, or a football
ly eroded, along with my vision. Able to see glancing off the fingertips of a wide re-
fine for almost forty years, by the time I left ceiver, a fuzzy black spot grew until it dom-
the accounting profession I had limited pe- inated my central vision. When the doctor
ripheral vision in one eye, and a prosthetic confirmed the diagnosis, dry macular de-
in the other. I simply couldn’t do what my generation, I shuddered. My eyesight was
peers did. Forced to step away from the only going to get worse. Euphoric weekends
thing that made me happiest, I was adrift. spent staring at impressionist paintings at
New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art or
At first, I took my vision loss in stride. An reading the spines of shelved books at the
archaic treatment for wet macular degener- Barnes and Noble bookstore would have to
ation scarred one eye. Still, with a fully func- be replaced. But with what? A fissure in my
tioning second eye, and peripheral vision in resolve shook me, and I pictured myself as
the damaged eye, I pressed forward in a job a crippled, cane-bearing woman. After al-
that allowed me to travel, use my brain, and lowing myself some time to sulk, I rallied.
interact with people eager to solve complex Somehow, I’d figure out how to manage the
business problems. When it came to work, inevitable darkness ahead of me.

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

I began to understand my career path, university. My plan settled, I tried to adjust
the one I’d meticulously built over seven- to my new reality.
teen years, wasn’t a long-term viable option.
With the passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, While I methodically dealt with a career
and the need for financial officers to cer- change, it was still jarring to face vision loss.
tify the accuracy of financial information, I remember the first time darkness caused
no company was going to employ a blind a paralyzing sense of fear. Having lived in
accountant. The regulatory scrutiny was Manhattan for eight years, I’d wandered the
too intense. And having built and managed streets of most neighborhoods hundreds of
financial systems in several multi-billion- times, and had a good sense of direction.
dollar companies, I knew the risk of error When I couldn’t see the street signs, I used
was just too high for someone who couldn’t the major intersections and cross-streets
see. Realizing my career was about to un- as markers for where I was, counting the
ravel, I panicked, paced, and worried about blocks as I walked. Colors were also a key
how I was going to take care of myself. I ob- signifier, yellow for the Subway sandwich
sessed over the spreadsheet that tracked shop, red for Bank of America, and black
my net worth. How long could I live without for Heartland Brewery’s front façade. Then
an income? Which expenses should be cut? it happened. Walking in the late afternoon,
Could I live off a check from social security and daydreaming, I lost track of where I
and my savings? was. The sun had dipped below the skyline,
and shadows engulfed me. There wasn’t
When calmer moments prevailed, I used enough light for me to see, and the cruelty
my business skills to deal with the pending of being blind hit me square in the face.
disaster. On weekends, I’d sit at my desk in Relying on memory, I knew there was a TD
a dark corner of my apartment and analyze Bank branch and a CVS drugstore nearby.
my options. Before my diagnosis, I started Looking for greens and reds, I couldn’t see
taking writing classes at The New School. A the colors of either business. Overwhelmed
lifelong lover of good prose and storytelling, and unable to move, I stood in the middle
I’d always toyed with the idea of becoming a of the sidewalk and mourned the loss of my
writer. Maybe now was the time to consider vision.
this option. But when I thought about the
reality of a writer’s life, my chest tightened. “You’re going to be okay,” I chanted. “You’re
I wasn’t ready to spend my days home alone. going to be okay.”
And I was loathe to jump into a profession
that seldom paid a living wage to even the If I said it enough times, it had to be true.
best of writers. I needed a more practical
path. Always thankful for the professors Reminding myself I wasn’t really lost, I
who provided me with the foundation to be took comfort in having the wherewithal to
a successful accountant, I wanted to apply discern north from south, east from west.
my knowledge and experience in an aca- Even if I couldn’t process key visual cues, I
demic setting. I rationalized my vision loss could work my way to a familiar intersec-
as a good thing. Instead of working in the tion. At worst, I could ask someone to read
pressure-packed corporate environment, I’d the street signs for me. But the shadows
go back to school, earn my doctorate de- were a hint of what was to come. Simple
gree, and secure a tenure-track position at a daily activities became a struggle. Shop-
ping in stores made me anxious. A raised

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Revista Literária Adelaide

eyebrow, a curt smile, a nod of the head, all turned over and went back to sleep. I woke
became elusive. up again two hours later, this time experi-
encing a more pronounced pain. I got up,
Heart palpitations and tears reappeared went into the bathroom, turned on the light,
more than a couple of times, though not and noticed what seemed like a white film
always on the streets of Manhattan. They across my field of vision. I knew I was in
also surfaced in the middle of an airport ter- trouble but the dry macular degeneration
minal, train station, or when finding my way made it difficult to see or understand what
back from a bathroom at a sporting event. was wrong.
But the feelings were always the same. I
was helpless, and no longer living life on my Then I watched in stunned disbelief as
terms. During those moments, my tenacity the vision in the eye went from a blurry
never failed me. Although I couldn’t control white fuzz to complete and utter darkness.
the deterioration of my vision, I could con- It was like a movie that faded to black be-
trol my attitude about it. And while happi- fore the final credits ran. I called the doc-
ness seemed like an impossible target, the tor’s answering service, and got myself to
ability to persevere was a well-honed skill. I the hospital, which luckily for me was only
plowed forward and for seven years guided two miles away. By the time I entered the
college students through the rigors of my emergency room, I was projectile vomiting.
classes and helped them understand the In the span of less than twenty-four hours,
opportunities available in the accounting an infection destroyed my retina and my
profession. My work with students, cou- body was doing everything it could to purge
pled with my academic research, filled a the bacteria from my system. Over the next
void. Though the stakes were different, I several weeks, the doctors performed a
was grateful for the chance to continue to series of operations to try to save the eye.
challenge myself intellectually. I flourished, Failing to do so, a final surgery for a partial
at least for a while. enucleation was performed. I was left to re-
cover and come to terms with the fact that
Five years into my academic career, and I only had a little bit of peripheral vision in
familiar with the signs of wet macular de- one eye. Able to see things like when I was
generation, I could tell I had bleeding in the about to walk into a wall, or know a body
eye previously diagnosed with dry macular was in front of me, I learned to live in the
degeneration. This time I had a newer treat- space between darkness and light.
ment, a series of injections of a cancer drug
known for its ability to atrophy the growth My academic career no longer tenable,
of abnormal blood vessels. After a couple I struggled to find purpose. I started to
of injections, the bleeding stopped, and the write my story, hoping it would help others.
blood vessels disappeared without leaving When I wrote short fiction, I integrated
any residual scarring. But a year later, my blind characters into my stories, some-
eye started to bleed again. The doctor com- thing seldom seen in literary or commercial
menced with another round of injections. works. I moved from the northern reaches
Sixteen hours after a needle sent the drug of Vermont to the central coast of California,
straight into my eyeball, at 2 AM, I woke up hoping to find comfort in the sun. I pieced
and noticed my eye was sore. Believing the together a new life, running in half mara-
pain was a side-effect from the injection, I thons, marathons, and trail races, all with

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

the help of local runners who volunteered in glee as she proceeded along the path. A
to guide for me. But it wasn’t until a friend mile or so into the hike, the bugs magically
took me backpacking on the High Sierra disappeared, and it became evident we
Trail in Sequoia National Park that I was re- were hiking along a trail cut into the side
minded of how much I could still do. of a mountain. To my left, steep slopes of
dense bushes were eventually replaced by
Although moving from business to aca- tall pines in some places and cliffs of sun-
demics wasn’t easy, a feeling of accomplish- bleached granite in others. To my right, there
ment was almost always present. Once I was nothing but vast open space. With my
left academics, it was difficult to generate limited peripheral vision, I strained to see
those same feelings. While writing helped, the mountains in the distance or the deep
going backpacking reminded me there were valley below. When a small stream trickled
other ways I could challenge myself, and ex- down the mountain, my boots squished in
ploring in the wilderness was one of them. the mud. I was ecstatic, and felt life coming
When I was in my teens and twenties, I’d back to me.
read dozens of books about adventurers,
and fantasized about how someday I might While the details of the surrounding
climb mountains, raft wild rivers, and see peaks were elusive, I still snapped hun-
the world. A different kind of life was within dreds of pictures. In my tent at night, I
my grasp. But I needed to let go, to finally pressed my phone to my eye and caught a
accept I’d never get my old life back. glimpse of what I’d missed during the day.
For the first time since I left my job as a
My friend and I spent seven days on the professor, I felt joy. Not long after we got
trail, covering close to thirty-five miles. I home, I was eager to get out again. A life
learned how to hike with my guide dog, and filled with hopes, dreams, and aspirations
move with a forty-five pound pack on my was rekindled. And while a discomfort with
back. Starting at an elevation of sixty-eight my blindness remains, the fear of not being
hundred feet, the veins in my neck pulsed challenged has been replaced with a trepi-
as we headed uphill. At first, mosquitos and dation involving coyotes, bears, and narrow
gnats tried to annoy me. Quickly donning paths along steep cliffs. With just a little bit
a head net, I focused on the smell of the of light, I know I can live a full life.
damp earth, and listened to the dog snort

About the Author

Cathy Beaudoin is a writer living on the central coast of California.
Her fiction has been published in literary journals including
Angel City Review, Schuylkill Valley Journal, and Freshwater. Her
nonfiction writing has appeared in Triathlon Magazine Canada,
the Reader’s Choice award-winning anthology: Firsts: Coming of
Age Stories by People with Disabilities, and literary outlets such
as Five on the Fi.

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A SUB ON THE
FIRST TEAM

by Leo Vanderpot

“No other player visible to my generation has concentrated within himself so much of the
sport’s poignance, has so assiduously refined his natural skills, has so constantly brought to

the plate that intensity of competence that crowds the throat with joy.”

–John Updike, Hub Fans Bid Kid Adieu

I sometimes struggled, but for the most Overholt thoracic division, and the Joslin
part I made a lot of money and enjoyed Clinic, where for the first time in the U.S.
writing ads for prescription drugs, a career insulin was administered to patients with
that lasted just short of thirty years. On the diabetes.
other hand, teaching, when I was just out of
college, was a mistake that was quickly cor- Overholt gave us the most patients and
rected. And along the long road to my retire- they came from all over the world, lots of
ment in 2002, there were also some almost tracheotomies, pneumonia, asthma and em-
fun temporary money-makers — proofread- physema. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary
er, waiter, usher in a movie theater, Christ- Disease (COPD) was yet to be so designated.
mas season as a mailman, payroll clerk on Enter irony: COPD was to be my first serious
the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge in New York, diagnosis, some ten or more years ago – and
and – most enjoyable of all – parking cars now that my diagnosis for diabetes is close
at night in front of the Somerset Hotel on at hand (more testing in the works, but the
Commonwealth Avenue in Boston. numbers so far are clearly indicative), I am
struck by the fact that I could go back and
But in the mid 1950s when I was a col- be a patient at both Joslin and at what is,
lege student at Boston University, I became, since 1996, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical
by a wonderful stroke of luck, an oxygen Center (BIDMS). (That’s quite a mouthful. In
therapist at the New England Deaconess this era of mergers, medical staffs may find it
Hospital. It was the best job I’ve ever had. impossible to give today’s institutions quick
I worked closely with nurses, doctors and names – back then, we were always simply
surgeons who treated patients from the “Deaconess,” and everyone knew who you

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

meant when you spoke of “Children’s,” since he was a surgeon I hear him now
“Brigham,” “Baptist,” “City,” and of course speaking mostly to himself. He said, not at
the jewel in the crown — “Mass General,” all softly, “When we screw up it’s always a
or simply “MGH.”) big-time screw up.”

BIDMS, these days, is said to be the of- My medication for COPD these days is
ficial hospital of the Boston Red Sox. Fitting, delivered by a red-plastic aerosol device,
since one of the most pleasant memories of about three inches long. By contrast, as a
my time at Deaconess was the day a man respiratory therapist, I routinely adminis-
from the maintenance crew gave me two tered medication to patients by using one of
tickets to the last home game of the Red two respirators, which we for some reason
Sox season at Fenway Park, which that year, called machines. They were pole-mounted
1960, was also the last game played by Ted structures with a triangle of casters for easy
Williams. He hit a home run at his last turn transport. The medication was held in a
at bat, which I remember, but not as clearly glass nebulizer and was mixed with either
as his running out to left field at the start of air or oxygen from wall-outlets to form a
the next inning, and then ... as his replace- mist. The patient inhaled deeply on a plastic
ment, Carroll Hardy, approached ...Ted trot- mouthpiece attached to a long tube that
ting back to the dugout to a standing ovation. stretched out to a bed or chair. We used
an Emerson machine for day-to-day treat-
More intense and sorrowful memories ments, traveling from room to room in each
remain from those days. One night at Dea- of Deaconess’ three buildings. The Bennett
coness as I entered the Special Care Unit machine was reserved for resuscitation.
on my rounds, I saw a group of doctors sur-
rounding a patient’s bed. The man had gone I got a call on the oxygen-room phone
into cardiac arrest. I had no function there one afternoon and told there was a need for
during that kind of crisis, but I remember a Bennett on one of the rooms on an upper
not being able to leave after one doctor said, floor. I moved quickly and when I arrived at
“We’ll have to go in.” Was there a saw to cut the room I saw that a Bennett was already in
the ribs? Could be. The only thing I recall is use by the attending doctor, the nurses had
how quickly the procedure was performed belatedly realized that an emergency Bennett
and the air of hope and fear in the room as was kept in an alcove on their floor, and in my
one of the doctors began massaging the pa- haste I had failed to remind them of this.
tient’s heart. Some kind of wishful thinking
allows me to remember a positive outcome I remember holding the mask on the
for this patient. man’s face, since the doctor didn’t seem to
realize that the straps themselves seldom
Surgeons would speak to me only on presented a full seal, and oxygen forced into
rare occasions, one of which I remember the lungs under pressure by the machine
vividly. A group of doctors and nurses were could leak out if the mask was not pressed
clustered around a bed in the Recovery by hand. “We lost him,” were the words the
Room, adjacent to the OR. All but one of doctor said, and I hear a clear echo of him
them moved away just as I approached to saying it to this day.
check the wall oxygen. The one remaining
doctor spoke to me, because I was the only I worked a lot of 3 to 11 shifts on week-
other person present, but in retrospect ends, and I have a sense that this was a

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Sunday and the doctor had very little expe- a server of coffee. Her sardonic wit was
rience, lower on the seniority list than some like a sharp-breaking curve ball – you could
others, for why else would he, like me, be maybe see it coming but there was no way
working on a Sunday afternoon….a doctor of dealing with it beyond laughter. Betty
on call with only a couple of nurses and an graduated from the school at Boston’s Mu-
oxygen tech in his white uniform, compe- seum of Fine Arts. She rode a Vespa motor
tent but lacking experience in the most se- scooter, sometimes with me on the back.
rious dimensions of the job. She was a very talented painter, whose large
portrait on canvas of Picasso (in a swimming
I was not, therefore, to join our chief ox- pool) will always be an anchor-memory of
ygen therapist, Bud Murphy, in that small that time, diminished but never in danger
circle (of one) who had been present and of disappearing.
assisted in the god-like resuscitation of a
patient using a Bennett. As Bud told the The 1950s among many, many, other
story, the patient came out of it with a rush things were often an innocent and some-
of super-oxygenation –rising up in the bed times an ignorant time, not the least evi-
– exploding with life. Upon discharge, the dence for this being the fact that everyone
man gave Mr. Murphy, as Bud was always in the oxygen therapy department smoked
called, a bottle of wine and told him that he cigarettes. And while the surgeons worked
would never forget the moment when he to remove cancerous lungs caused by
re-emerged into life and saw Murphy’s face. smoking, some of them may have been
smokers themselves. In 1990, Doctor
Harold Kemp, a retired lecturer in geog- Richard Overholt’s obituary in the New York
raphy at Harvard, had more than one trip in Times tells of how, in 1934:
for bronchitis during my years at Deaconess.
He told me that he liked my spirit, some- “...addressing 300 doctors, he urged
thing you don’t forget. He always wanted to them to support measures to curb smoking.
chat and as a BU student I was more than ‘They actually laughed him off the floor,’ re-
a little eager to be in conversation with called a colleague at Overholt Cardio-Tho-
someone of his stature from the other side racic Associates, a clinic in Boston that Dr.
of the river, as the expression was at Boston Overholt founded in 1940. ‘The air was blue
University. Our conversations were facili- with smoke.’
tated by the fact that he was one of the few
patients who did not use a plastic oxygen “ ‘No one would listen. They thought I
mask or a nasal catheter, either of which was crazy,’ Dr. Overholt once said. ‘I could
de-socialized even the most willing talkers: see so much evidence, and no one would
for him, the doctors always insisted on an listen to me. ‘ ‘’ He would remember his
oxygen tent, for whatever reason, since this skills as a surgeon with fondness, but he
was an outmoded technology back then, insisted over and over again that he saved
used mostly for small children, or those more lives with his anti-smoking efforts
who could not tolerate the newer systems. than he ever did with his scalpel.”

The other person I must mention by When you are doing it, you don’t think
name is Betty Bowker. She worked in the about how impossibly fortunate you are to
coffee shop, but as those who sat at her have a job in a world-class institution, or at
counter learned, she was much more than least I didn’t. But I can now claim with pride

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

that I was at the very least a sub on the first had made an error in their treatment prior
team at Deaconess, and I am now more than to my death; if they had made a mistake, I
ever keenly aware of the skills the men and wanted the mistake forgiven, not punished.
women I worked with possessed. It’s be- Incompetency or neglect, I told them, was a
cause of them that I told my daughters I do different matter, and actionable. Perhaps to
not want any lawsuits brought against med- fully understand, you had to be there, and I
ical personnel, if it was thought that they am grateful to the end that I was.

About the Author

Leo Vanderpot: Of my published work, I’m most pleased
to list a memory piece in Edition 1 of Hinterland, Spring
2019, a new journal associated with the University of East
Anglia. A few years ago, a poem of mine was published in
the now gone dark Scottish journal, Anon, and last year
Northwest Words, published in Ireland, took one of my
more p­ olitically-toned poems. In the US, there have been
acceptances by, among others: Heartland Review, Mid
American Review, Third Wednesday and Seattle Review.

196

POOP LIKE A LOCAL

by Adam Wagner

I’m in Pyeongchang the first time I have to and gum. I buy a pack of both, just in case
poop in a squat toilet. I am meeting a friend things get wild.
from university where we think the 2018
Olympics are to be held. They will actually “Hwajangsil?” I ask. He walks me out
be held miles away at the other end of Py- front and points to a door at the other end
eongchang County – Pyeongchang Village of the bus station.
is about eight city blocks with a tiny bus
station that runs intercity transport once “Kamsamnida,” I say. I do not bow. I walk
every two hours. I am at that station when to the bathroom on my toes, heels in, butt-
the sins of the night before place vengeful cheeks clenched like castle gates against a
pressure on my lower abdomen. spicy pork battering ram.

It was some sort of pork still stuck to the There are three stalls in the bathroom
bone. When the waiter took my order he and each door opens to a ceramic oval in the
waved at his face and said: hot, hot. I said ground – the pusaesig byeongi. White tile
spicy is good at first in German, then in En- stained yellow by treading feet surrounds
glish, and then maybe in Korean. I had to the squat toilet. It is flat on the sides and
shower after dinner to get all the sweat off my round on each end like a miniature NASCAR
body, but I finished the meal and I was proud. track. On one cusp the ceramic curls up in a
riptide shape. This is where the flush pours
I do not feel proud at the Pyeongchang into the trough. There is a small garbage can
bus station. I waddle through a small conve- in the corner half-full of used toilet paper.
nience store looking for tissue paper. There
is always the looming threat of toilet paper I once asked a Korean friend how to
absenteeism in Korean public restrooms. squat-poop. He said I had to do the hunt-
I’ve heard horror stories from other way- er’s squat but keep my heels on the ground.
gooks about having to use a sock, a business He said if I balanced on the balls of my feet
card, or, God forbid, money. I bring what I my muscles would stay tense making it dif-
think are pocket tissues to the gray-haired ficult to relax my sphincter. We practiced
man working the register. squatting in the smoking area outside of our
dorm in Jochiwon.
“Mull-tiss-yu,” he says. They are wet naps.
Now I stand over the trough, one leg on
He points to the pack of regular toilet either side, wondering why I never asked
paper on the counter next to the Mentos what to do with my pants and underwear.

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Adelaide Literary Magazine

Surely they can’t just sit around my ankles. my free hand against the wall, and let the
It’s too risky, they are right in the dan- feeling drift slowly back into my feet. I tear
ger-zone, so I take them completely off one open the new pack of tissues and wipe
leg at a time, careful to step back into my twice. Then I hit it with one of the wet naps,
shoe and not on the yellow tile. With pants and finish by buffering with another dry
and underwear rolled up and tucked under tissue. I check it for poop before tossing at
one arm, I lower myself closer to the hole the bucket in the corner and completely
in the ground. The other arm stays clenched missing. The flush rushes from under the
at a ninety-degree angle like a downhill ceramic riptide and pushes everything
skier tucking for speed. There are no han- down a hole in the back of the trough. Then
dles, nothing to grip. I teeter back and forth, I do the one legged pogo-dance back into
shifting weight between toes and heels my clothes.
before finding that magic middle ground.
Once I’m as comfortable as could be, I let People stare when I re-enter the bus sta-
it all out. The food is almost as fiery coming tion. They are mostly retirees who moved
out as it was going in. out of the cities and became part-time hair
dressers or convenience store owners. Until
I lived in Germany before Korea. I loved my acquaintance arrives, I am the only way-
every minute of it, but it was too easy to fit gook in town. I smile and bow, they return
in. I wanted to meet exotic people with a the gesture and I join them on the bus sta-
completely different culture. I wanted to be tion bench. I am not without wet naps for
uncomfortable. the rest of my time in Korea. There are few
things finer in life than the confidence that
After forty-five seconds of squatting my accompanies being in public with a pristine
legs start to burn and I’m finding it more asshole.
difficult to stay balanced. I stand, pressing

About the Author

Adam James Wagner was born and raised in Marquette, Michigan,
USA. He uses his middle name so that he’s not confused with that
actor from Teeth. He has spent the last half-decade traveling, and
currently works as an English professor in Daegu, South Korea.

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