Wednesday, January 27, 2010

FREEZE OUT

“Honey c’mon! I go the car loaded and ready to roll!” Ron yelled into the house from the carport. He shut the trunk in the black ’99 Altima and walked around to the driver’s side door. As he squeezed his six foot seven inch frame behind the wheel, he wondered again why he had given up on the argument for a larger vehicle. His dark curly hair brushed against the ceiling of the car, and he took a moment to check in the rear view mirror to see if his hair-do still passed muster. It would do.

A short round woman in lime green knit pants and a pink top exited the house. She tested the front door to make sure that she had locked it and waddled over to the car and squeezed herself into the passenger seat.

“Honestly, Ron, I don’t know why we don’t get a bigger car.” She complained in her nasally voice. He let that comment go… she knew perfectly well why they had bought a sedan and not an SUV, mini-van, or any other family sized vehicle.

“Are you ready for your surprise?” He asked as he started the car and backed out of the driveway. “I wanted to do something special for our anniversary.”

They left their neighborhood of two story homes all poured from the same mold. Their route took them past a vast park comprised of 12 soccer fields. The crowded park had a game on each field, with parents cheering on their kids. Ron drove slowly down the street, keeping an eye out for wayward children and pets.

“So where are we going that is such a big surprise?” Jan’s voice snapped Ron out of his cautious reverie.

“We are going to drive up to Colorado Springs for some ice cream.”

“Down, honey…it’s down to Colorado Springs.” Jan’s voice took some pleasure in correcting her husband.

“What?”

“Look on a map. Colorado Springs is down from Denver, so we will drive down to Colorado Springs for some ice cream.”

“Technically speaking, Denver is 5183 feet above sea level and Colorado Springs is 6008 feet above sea level…so…” Ron let the trivial tidbit hang, and headed in a generally upward climb towards Colorado Springs.

“That can’t be right. Denver is the Mile High City, and a mile is 5280 feet. Why are we going to Colorado Springs for ice cream? We have a Dairy Queen over by the highway.”

“Trust me…can you just trust me?”

In a stinging coincidence, they passed by a Dairy Queen as they got onto I-25. Parents and children clamored for soft serve treats. Ron paid more attention to the scene than Jan.

“I talked to Toby, at work; he gave me the card of the agency that he and his wife used.”
Jan looked at Ron. “He said that it’s really easy, we just fill out a mountain of paperwork and wait for the call.”

Jan found something very interesting about her hands and gave them a thorough inspection. Hearing no answer from her, Ron turned on the radio to an AM station that played big band music. Jan gave him a side-eyed glance and waited for a few minutes before changing the radio to the FM band and hitting a preset to land on light rock station. Ron flexed his hands on the wheel, and kept driving. What else could he do? They drove in relative silence for a while.

“That’s three…” Jan said as they passed the last exit to Castle Rock.

“Three what?”

“That’s three Dairy Queens that we passed.”

“I don’t want us to go for a massed produced soft serve ice cream. I had in plan something special. When we get to Michelle’s you’ll see what I mean.”

“Who’s Michelle?”

“It’s the name of the place. They have home made ice cream and sandwiches, and it isn’t so crowded.”

“One minute you gawk at all of the kids in the neighborhood, and the next you drive a hundred miles just to get away from them.”

“I just wanted to take you someplace special this weekend. I thought that you would appreciate a place like Michelle’s.”

“And a pretty, tall, blonde named Michelle works the counter I’m sure.” Jan turned her face away and watched the Colorado landscape slide past.

Ron huffed once, catching words in his throat before they made it out of his mouth and caused real damage. He chose his next words carefully.

“I don’t know the name of the girl who works behind the counter. It’s just a place that my dad used to take us when I was a kid. I found out that it’s still in business and I wanted to share it with you.”

“But she’s tall and blonde then, right?”

“Who?”

“The girl behind the counter…she must be tall and blonde to get you to drive all of the way to Colorado Springs for ice cream.”

“Look, I can turn around, we can go to Dairy Queen, and you can have the same old ice cream that we always have. Is that what you want? If that’s what you want, we can go back down do Denver and be home in time for lunch.”

“Up.”

“We do not live on a map.”

“No, we live in Colorado where our car is too small for our lives, where Denver is up and Colorado Springs is down, where the ice cream is ‘mass produced’ and the girls working behind counters aren’t pretty enough for you.” She never turned her head away from the passing landscape as she spoke.

“I think that I will get a banana split with extra chocolate syrup and whipped cream.” Ron felt that it was time to navigate the conversation to safer waters.

“Do they have vanilla ice cream…no nuts, no syrup, no toppings of any sort?”

“Why would you want to go to an ice cream parlor and just get vanilla ice cream? Don’t you want something special?”

“I just like vanilla. I don’t need anything more than that.”

“I’m sure that you can get plain ice cream if you want. No one can force you to put toppings on your ice cream.”

“No, I suppose they can’t.”

They exited off of the highway onto Academy and drove the rest of the way in silence.

Monday, January 18, 2010

NANNY TOGGLEBOTTOM'S HANDBOOK OF MAGICAL CREATURES, MYTHICAL MEN, AND OTHER FANTASTICAL FAIRYLAND FRIENDS.

I have been writing, in my little (off-line) notebook, a series of poems. I call them "Nanny Togglebottom's Book of Magical Creatures, Mythical Men, and other Fantastical Fairyland Friends." Initially I wanted to write a book about dragons, but that thas expanded to a series of children's poems about all of the wonderful magic that enters a child's mind.

I have already posted one of the poems (The Ballad of Wallace Thaddeus Linkletter posted in April 2008), and as I move poems from my old-school notebook to my Encyclopedia Bob, I wll post them as well. For now, here is Nanny Togglebottom's Invitation:

I have seen dragons
crossing the noon day sun—
Have you?

I have seen leprechauns
with their gold on the run—
Have you?

No? Well…

Inside my head
fairies fly,
monsters grumble,
and unicorns cry.

I will open my stories,
I will open them wide.
For the price of your company
I will let you inside.