He’d dissolved his cloak of invisibility, and shredded his veils of anonymity.
He’d uninstalled his mute button, replacing it with an amplifier and speakers.
From now on, he’d seen and heard.
He just hoped he could stand the attention.
The Manual
A new hitch in his giddy-up manifested in his hip when he rose for the morning and stumbled from his bed to his bathroom. Muttering to himself, to which his cat and dog paid no attention, he went about the business of feeding the cat and dog, opening the blinds and checking the weather (looked cold, looked like snow), and made coffee. With the coffee done, he went into the other room with it, turned on his computer, and then pulled his Owner’s Manual from his desk drawer.
“Trouble-shooting,” he said. The book automatically opened to that curled and worn, wine and coffee-stained page that marked the section’s beginning. He expertly flipped the pages, perusing them until he found, “Hip,” “Pain,” and “Stiffness”. Following the instructions, he turned to page one seventy-nine, “Routine Repair for Stiff Hips”. After reading the three paragraphs, he sipped his coffee and smiled.
It was easy enough to fix. He’d do it after he finished his coffee.
Fondly he regarded his Owner’s Manual. Best thing that he’d ever found on the ‘net.
Best twenty dollars ever spent.
The Day
He put his dirty clothes in the recycle and tossed his used tissue in the laundry.
Returning to his study, he reached for his coffee, and remembered, he’d gotten up to get his coffee.
Leaving his study, he realized he put his dirty clothes in the recycle. Getting them out, he found the used tissue in the laundry, blew his nose into it, and threw it in the trash.
Then he fed the cats a few treats and went into his study to read, where he reached for his coffee.
Remembering, he’d gotten up to get his coffee, he laughed at himself. At least he was getting a lot of steps in today. He checked his wrist to look at his Fitbit —
Where did he leave his Fitbit?
Getting up to go find it, he left his study, went to the kitchen, and made a cup of coffee with his Keurig. Satisfied, he returned to his study with his coffee to read, and then checked his wrist to look at his Fitbit —
Where did he leave his Fitbit?
Then, he remembered, he’d put it in his shoe.
Leaving his study, he went into the other room, fed the cats a few treats, and made a cup of coffee.
This was going to take some time. Coffee would definitely help.
Good Things
He admired his pile of shiny copper pennies. All were minted this year, removed from circulation when they found his hand.
Counting his shiny pennies, he made neat little stacks of ten, and then admired the stacks.
Such pennies, so shiny and new, had to mean good luck. He had sixty-four of them. One for each year of his life.
He grinned. Good things were coming his way.
Clearing the Cache
He bought a fire pit and bottle of wine for Solstice, and filched a log from the neighbor’s stack. He lit the log and drank the wine, taking a sip each time the he fed the fire a rejection letter. One hundred sixty-five letters, two hours, and a bottle of wine later, he felt much better.
The cache was cleared. Good things were going to start happening for him now.
Floofiday
Floofiday (floofinition) – a day to honor and celebrate housepets where no work is done, except to serve and help housepets.
In use: “As was befitting for Prince’s fifth birthday, a household floofiday was declared, and all activities focused on feeding, brushing, and playing with Prince. It was a day well spent.”
Wednesday’s Theme Music
Today’s theme music is Live’s “Lightning Crashes” (1993).
I have several Live albums, but I find I must be in just the right mood to play them. It’s a very narrow space.
“Lightning Crashes”, though, came to me this week because one of my nieces gave birth to her third child. All this was shared on Facebook. Everyone is doting on the sweet newborn, including my mother, and there’s rich photographic evidence. The newborn is Mom’s seventh great-grandchild. That juxtaposition of Mom holding this young new life invited “Lightning Crashes” into my stream and the circle of transference of life and existing. One dies, and one is born, and so it goes. There’s a lot of overlap as it happens.
Last Seen
Deadly cold sucked the heat from my bones’ marrow as I surveyed my surroundings.
“Here,” she said.
Here? Here was a sloping field of snow glistening like icing in moonlight. Here was a field edged by elderly pines draped in snow. Here was a starry black night and the pond of a moon staring down on us. Here was a wind slicing through my gloves, shearing off my ears, and paring down my cheeks.
“Here?” I said.
I looked at the traveler. Smiling like she knew Mona Lisa’s secret, she pointed past me into the sky. As she did but before I turned, I caught sleigh bells’ tinny ringing.
Distracted by the famous sound, I turned so quickly, I slipped on the snowy field and would have fallen, had the traveler not caught my arm and kept me upright. After thanking her, I gazed through my breath toward the sound and spotted the immortal silhouette of reindeer pulling a sled commanded by a pudgy elf.
I gasped. “Santa.”
“Yes,” the traveler said.
“He was real.”
“Of course. It was on this day that he was last seen, long before his existence trickled into your dimension’s awareness.”
I nodded. Then this was was where my story begins. “I shall find him,” I whispered into the silent night as the sleigh bells faded and the wind nuzzled me. “I shall find him and bring him back.”
Drivus Interruptus
Driving through the snow,
one hand on the wheel,
while reading a text on the phone
in my other hand.
I never saw the truck,
nor the other car,
I never even saw the sign,
or tried to stop my car.
Oh, jing —
Michael Seidel, writer 