The days seem to be passing at an unnatural pace.  I prefer to think fast but move slow.  It suits me.  I’m built for it.  Anything else and parts of me begin to rattle.  Have I mentioned the twitch in my left eye?  I wake up, twitch-free, but that usually only lasts about an hour.  And then it starts, off and on, all day long.  I wonder if other people can see it?  My voice is calm, and I feel calm, but my nervous system obviously has something else on its mind.  Nerves must end at the skin but start at the truth.  It makes sense.  If you torture someone to get to the truth, what do you go for every time - the nerves, of course.

Last week was all about money.  The lack of it and the manipulation of it.  Lots of shifting around of money.  Cash flow, covering bills, paying quarterly payroll deposits.  Let’s not forget the audit.  Everything with a deadline that seems one week too soon.

And then the dog neutering and all that watching and extra care and “No!  Don’t lick!” that goes on after that.  The big plastic hood that looks like a cheap lamp shade, bumping into everything all over the house, including my face, first thing in the morning.  All the extra barking because the hood obviously acts as some sort of satellite dish, amplifying the footsteps of people and the squeaks of squirrels.  Feeling sympathetic, I pet the dog endlessly, seeing nothing but his body and the plastic lampshade.  Would we still have pets if they came with no heads?  Alive still, but just headless?  I don’t think so.  I think it’s all about the head.  Good pets need a face.  Without a face they’d be more like bed pillows that needed constant fluffing.  Useless.

And then there’s the approaching divorce, and the search for her new house.  On Friday she found one she liked.  I was called in to inspect and give my opinion.  We had to move fast.  The problem in Salem right now is that houses under $200,000 seem to sell just about the same time that the realtor is done pounding his or her sign into the front yard.  I guess it’s called a seller’s market.  There is no time for contemplation, no time for comparison, no time for anything.  You have to be quick.  There’s no time for blinking, or in my case, twitching.  You almost have to carry your earnest money around in your pocket if you’re going to play the game.

And in the middle of all this - Halloween.  Shuffle, shuffle.

On Monday, or maybe Tuesday, I sign papers for the farm’s refinance, the first step of the grand plan.  The funds are released, previous loans repaid, and the farm is mine.  This frees her to pursue her new house.  Everything falls into place.  She moves in November and I move in December.  See how simple it all seems.

And somewhere in the middle of all this, only one day away, there is Nano.  Write, write, write.  I’m still without a plot or any characters.  Oh well.  If you’d like to be the character in a novel, drop me an email.  Tell me a few things about yourself, maybe include one or two of your peculiarities, and I will cast you as one of my stories characters.  Keep in mind that if you do this, you give away all rights and privileges, and that I might very well turn you into something that you are not.

But come on, it’s all part of the fun.  Your chance to take part in my unnatural pace.

Operators are standing by to take your details.

At 7:00 a.m. sharp, the phone woke me up.  I’d hardly gotten any sleep, the dog constantly waking me up with all his moaning and groaning, trying his best to lick his missing testicles.  It was Matt Groenig.  He’s always calling me after I’ve had a particularly hectic day.  Pestering me, really.  He has some crazy idea that he can turn my life into the next Simpsons or Futurama.  Frankly, I’m getting tired of his calls.

“Hello, Keith?  It’s Matt.”

“No, Matt.  Not today.  Not tomorrow.  I wish you’d quit asking.”

“What are you talking about?  I didn’t say a thing.”

“Sure, Matt.”

“Well, I did heard about your day yesterday.  I’m telling you, we can turn this into something, you know.  I’d be happy to fax you over a few sketches.”

“Matt, you know how I feel.  I simply refuse to be drawn with a big overbite.  I hate that.  Besides, you know the real problem.  He’s sitting there, isn’t he?”

“No, no, no.  It’s just me, all alone.  Promise.”

“I’m on speakerphone, aren’t I?”

“What . . “

“Hello, Rupert.”  It’s always the same thing.  Ever since Matt started calling, Rupert Murdoch thinks he can hover over the speakerphone, listening to every word.  I really hate how pushy billionaires can be.  Worse even then the idea of being drawn with an overbite.

“Hello Rupert.”

“Uhhh, hello Keith.”

“Goodbye Rupert.  Goodbye Matt.”

The main difference between mathematics and writing fiction is that there is no such thing as negative words.  You can delete all day long, just pounding away on that key like its the only one on the keyboard, but you’ll never get less then zero words, no matter how hard you try.

Mathematicians know this, and as a result, seldom write fiction.  I can’t prove this mathematically.  Not with words, anyway.

Other then that, I can never get enough Toothpaste For Dinner.

I suspect the artist is a mathematician himself.  Someone who tried too hard, and slipped into the other side.

The word findings, I come to find out, is slang for “you owe us roughly one thousand dollars.”  Erin the Auditor cleared that up for me as soon as I had taken a seat.

“We’ve disallowed the child support payments that were paid through the company and classified as an employee loan,” she says.  She is, of course, referring to the payments I’d made over the last eighteen years for my daughter, paid by the company only because the State of Oregon, in cooperation with the State of Arkansas, had decided that the support needed to be withheld from my paycheck in spite of the fact that there was no court order for any such thing.  And believe me, no amount of phone calls or letters or personal visits to people’s offices could convince anyone otherwise.  I was not about to try and convince Erin.

“So we’ve adjusted up your wages for the last three years, to reflect these amounts,” she says, pointing to the papers she’d handed me when I’d walked in, “and this amount here reflects the penalty and interest now due for those years.”

Erin looks different today, and then I realize that she doesn’t have her hair in a bun.  Pulled back in a ponytail, it almost looks playful.  And then it hits me - it’s the Friday right before Halloween.  By taking her hair out of its bun, Erin is dressed for the holiday.  Leave it to an accountant to imagine such an affordable costume.

One of the problems, she goes on to explain, is that I have not been paying myself enough.  Basically, it boils down to this.  Based on Erin’s study of other companies similar to my own throughout Marion County, and based on the number of hours I claim to work during a normal working week, I should be making quite a bit more money.

No shit, Erin.

And because it appears that I was not actually paying myself this “fair” amount, the child support figures would be factored into my wages in order to “bring the numbers closer to what they actually should be.”

What the fuck?  I’m being penalized because I don’t pay myself enough?  I have a hard time wrapping my mind around this one.  I thought struggling financially was payment enough?  I imagined what Erin would say if I was one of those monks who walked around the streets all day whipping himself in the back.  Would a study of other monks in the area show that I wasn’t being hard enough on myself?

“You can, of course, contest these findings by filing with the Employment Department,” Erin informs me.  Let me, if you will, interpret this for everyone so that there is no misunderstanding:

You may delay payment and incur more finance charges if you’d like, as well as continue to pay your accountant her salary.

I know when I’ve been beat.  Erin and I shake hands and she thanks me for my time.  It’s time to leave.

Now I know I keep talking about resting my head against her breast, and I must admit, I thought about it one more time.  What could it hurt?  Wouldn’t she just take it as some sign of submission, that I’d been broken, patted on the head, and placed back into the herd to continue breeding taxable income?  How could she take offense by such a harmless gesture.  I should do it, I thought.

But I didn’t.  I couldn’t risk causing any suspicions, not when I was that close to getting out the door and wrapping this whole audit up.  Besides, I was afraid if I got that close to her chin, I might be tempted to give her a little head butt, just to see if I could make her ponytail swing around a little.  That’d be fun, I thought.

By the time I’d walked down the flight of steps and back out to my car, I’d already decided on my next move.  Because that’s what it’s all about, you know.  The moves.  They move, then you move.  Then they move again, and so forth and so on.  It’s all a game, with the only problem being that they enjoy playing it a whole lot more then I do.  Must be the benefits.

Anyway, all I need to do is lay myself off next month and collect back my money.  Simple.  And that crazy Erin, she’s really going to be fuming when she realizes that by bumping up my wages for the last few years, all she really did was give me a fatter unemployment check.  I bet she’ll be hopping around her cubicle when she finds out about this one.  If I know her, I bet she would’ve rather taken the head butt then give away a single penny.

The phone rings while we are in the waiting room.  Twenty dogs are barking and I shouldn’t answer it.  I wouldn’t if it were anyone other then Erin the Auditor.  I do so love our time together.

“Hello, this is Keith.”

“Good morning, Keith.  This is Erin the Auditor with the . . . “

“Pepper?”  Shit.  Wouldn’t you know it.  It’s our turn.

” . . . and if we were able to meet later this morning I think . . . “

” . . . if you could fill out these forms, reading through the additional options that you might . . . “

” . . . that we might be able to wrap . . . “

” DAD!  Whooo!  Pepper’s peeing!  Whoo-hooo!”  The good thing about suade leather shoes is that dog pee just makes it look like you’ve walked in wet grass.  No big deal.”

“Whooo!  Whooo!”  Little boys do so enjoy random acts of urination.

” . . . left my fax number on your other machine, so if you . . . “

” . . . you forgot this line, and again right here, and I’ll need . . . “

*****

But that was three hours ago.  Erin the Auditor has been faxed and prepped.  I meet with her in 45 minutes.  She gives nothing away over the phone, except to say that she will go over her findings with me in the office.  Findings?  That sounds suspiciously like “the error of your financial ways” to me.

I was feeling sorry for poor old Pepper earlier.  Drugged and snipped against his will.  What a way to spend a Friday.  But I have a feeling my day isn’t going to end up much better.  I wonder if the Employment Department offers an optional $10.00 pain medication shot when I leave their office.  At least the vet does that much for their victims.

But I have my doubts.  They’ll probably just put one of those big, white plastic hoods around my neck, so I can’t lick my wounds.

Findings.  That shouldn’t be a word.

What did I tell you?  Cycles.  I toss and turn one night, and the next I sleep completely through, which for me is a rare event.  Maybe it’s because I sat at my desk for ten straight hours, pushing my way through pile after pile of receipts.  I think it was thought of hiring a secretary that scared me into action.  I mean, think of all the things that could go wrong.  Right off the top of my head I thought of ten things, and I’m sure there’s plenty more.

1. What if she ends up being a forgery expert, and keeps my checking account drained?
2. I don’t find out until it is too late that she enjoys changing her hair color, and each and every Monday she arrives at her desk with new hair.  This alone could be so disconcerting that I get nothing done.
3. She interviews nicely, hiding the fact that she smacks her gum and says things like, “yada yada yada” and “to make a long story short,” which everyone knows is just a quick way for someone to get onto an even longer, more boring story.
4. We become comfortable enough around each other that she begins asking me if she looks fat in certain outfits.
5. She has a jealous boyfriend who begins calling and checking up on her, finally telling me one day that I don’t want to fuck around with him.
6. She is actually quite good with the accounting software, and constantly heckles me about all the mistakes she finds.
7. She slowly begins to fill up my pleasantly empty house with knickknacks, thinking that she is doing me a favor.
8. She once worked for the state and constantly demands that I install cubicles in the office, even though there are only two of us.
9. She brings her own clock radio to work and plays Paul Harvey all day long.
10. She’s young, but wears a perfume that constantly reminds me of my dead grandmother.  I keep turning around, forgetting who is back there, and eventually pull a muscle that keeps my head painfully twisted to the side, tilted slightly down, which the secretary mistakenly takes as me staring at her chest.  She files a sexual discrimination suit.  I try to explain everything, but can’t lift my head to look the judge in the eye.  He takes this as a sure sign of guilt and rules in her favor, granting her a huge monetary award and the promise that I cannot possibly let her go.

What a night!  Awake from three to five, lying there with the blankets pulled up tight, yawning and yawning but never actually pulling the whole deal together.  And then sleep from five to seven, filled with one bad dream after another.  A divorce fight.  A big, four story house somewhere in the mountains, but apparently rented out as a dormitory to what seems like an entire college.  Some young guy calls me dude one too many times and I almost rip into the guy.  Another dream with some sort of police interrogation.  Someone escapes.  There’s shooting.  I’m trying to catch up with someone, but the snow is so deep.

There was more, but I think I’ve forgotten.

Wake up and shower the boy.  What’s with little boy B.O.?  Did I sweat and stink when I was eight?  I can’t imagine it.  I was skin stretched tight over a few puny bones.  Nothing more.  Bones don’t sweat.

Drop off the boy at school and a quick breakfast and coffee at the cafe.  Answer a few emails.  I love this place.  Good coffee, good food, and wireless internet.  But the table I slip into, the one nearest the only outlet in the place, proves to be a bad choice this morning.  A couple of young women on one side of me with a baby, and an old lady on the other side.  Everyone is quiet, no complaints there, but I keep smelling urine.  Is it the baby or the old lady?  I don’t really want to know, and yet, I love a good mystery.  Between slurps of coffee I discreetly lean one way, then the other, sniffing.  But my sniffing is as effective as my early morning yawing.  No results.  Maybe one of them will leave and solve the mystery for me.  Maybe it’s me.  Maybe the dog peed on my shirt last night, it dried, and now I’m officially part of his territory, no matter how far I walk around the city. 

I need to push my way through those child support figures and come up with an agreeable alimony payment.  I have to factor in loan and gift money that will need to be repaid over time.  The house deal confuses everything.  The farm was bought from my parents with the help of money from her family.  I am over a barrel.  Everyone walks by and takes a slap at my ass, including the Employment Department.  Erin, the friendly audit woman, is getting restless.  How did she get my new cellphone number?  Did I give it to her?  I can’t imagine I’d get that lazy with my privacy.

“Hello Keith.  I’m just following up on those loan agreements that you promised to get to me.  Will I be seeing those soon?”

“I should be getting those to my accountant today,” I tell her.  That was Monday.  The days slip by so fast.  Surely she must have other files.  Someone else to pick on.  I should have never joked about resting my head against her breast.  She must have access to my email and website.  She’s resharpened her pencils and is coming after me.

But I wasn’t thinking about Erin as I tossed and yawned my way through the night.  Maybe I should have been.  Maybe that would have put me to sleep.  No, you know what I was thinking about?  I was thinking about hiring a secretary.  I was thinking about the huge, huge mess that my desk and accounting has become.  I was thinking about the daily payroll and billing that I am always behind on.  I was thinking about the luxury of someone else answering my phone.  I’ve wrestled with the mess all by myself for more then fifteen years, and the idea of turning it over to someone else becomes more and more attractive each day.  With each yawn this woman saviour became clearer and clearer in my imagination.  I almost had her completely visualized but then fell asleep.

But realistically, how in the world would I ever hire this person.  My office, which is honestly in a shambles, is now located in my apartment.  Who in their right mind would accept such a job?  And then there’s the move.  My guess now is that I’ll be back in the house before Christmas.  Do I hire someone for the next month or so, then give them a leave of absence while I relocate, only to call them back into yet another home office situation?  The whole thing is chaos.  I need to face the truth.  I have worked for fifteen years to create perfect chaos.  Let’s hope my insurance company doesn’t find out.  The worker’s comp rates for chaos are bound to be through the roof.

Six days until the great novel writing kickoff.

I am without plot.  I am without character.

Yet it spite of my shortcomings, it seems I have been invited to a novel writing party, hosted by the local Nano group’s fearless leader.  She has promised snacks and door prizes, attempting to lure us in like a pack of wild ETs.  Or maybe I should practice our new collective nouns.  Give them a whirl.

A ward of writers.  A conflagration of writers.  Whatever.  That odd mix of humans in Meeting Room A with Doritos breath and sticky laptop keys.  You get the picture.

I may very well break the two year conversation embargo and attend.  Everyone in the forum keeps introducing themselves, some of them claiming how “old” they are.  One of them even confessed to their “oldness”, claiming the ancient age of 33 or 34.  I almost swallowed my tongue.  I may have to attend just to show them who the group’s real Rumplestiltskin is.

Who needs plot and character if you’re Rumplestiltskin?  Just lock me in a room with my laptop and I’ll try to spin a little gold.  Or at least eat all the Doritos.

A few passing thoughts:

• Whoever thought computing child support payments would be so complicated?
• Everything seems like it would be easier if I had a normal job with a consistent salary.
• Every time I hear her say, “I don’t want to screw you, but I think I’m entitled to something,” It feels like my insides turn very cold.
• She never makes fast decisions, so the fact that she is suddenly pushing papers my way means that she has a plan.
• There was a time not so long ago that I would have been curious about her plan.
• I don’t know her plan.
• It suddenly occurred to me this morning that I don’t know who she will vote for.  Since legally we’re still married, this seemed odd.
• She looked at a house less then a mile away from mine.  “Is that too close,” she asked.
• I had visions of her stalking and harassing me, but kept them to myself.
• When I move back into the house, it will come with a cat that wasn’t there when I left.
• Her affair began when my son was in kindergarten.  He is now in third grade.  This particular section of my life has gone on much too long.
• I have gained roughly 35 pounds during this same time period.
• I once pretended that the U.S. was at war because of my inner conflict.  It made no sense.
• I have often thought that the biggest drawback to getting the house back is that there will be no cable modem.
• When I think of this, my next thought is almost always the same - what the hell is wrong with you?
• I like to pretend that my extra 35 pounds will simply disappear when I move back into the house.
• I also like to pretend that the war will end.
• And that high-speed internet will decide to include isolated country homes.

I have this idea that everything moves in cycles.  In and out, back and forth.  That everything about our lives could be plotted out as some sort of sine wave.  That nothing is ever really new, just like nothing is ever really old.  That if we could see the sine wave of ourselves, and somehow study some of it’s details, we would have a much clearer image of our lives.  It’s a 20-20 hindsight thing, or maybe a rehash of the history repeats itself thing. 

I never said I came up with the idea.  I know it isn’t anything new.  I just like thinking about it.

Who wouldn’t like to take a look at the cycles of their life?  A graph of how we move in and out of our personal relationships would no doubt make a fascinating study.  What would we do if we had access to a sine wave that somehow charted the state of our mind, and that we were able to lay this chart over the other charts of our entire past life - our work relationships, job history, and relationships with our children.  Maybe we could take a better look at the smaller, seemingly less significant things that make us who we are - things like our reading or eating habits, or maybe our preferences for color, or music, or style of clothing. 

If we had access to this kind of information, in some sort of easily understood format, would we be able to make any sense of it?  Would be walk away with a better understanding of what makes us tick?  Are we even capable of understanding perspective?

I spotted my new sister-in-law’s new car early last night, sitting outside her and my brother’s favorite watering hole.  Not a new car, really, but new to them - a ‘69 VW Bug.  I really should have kept driving, and may have, if I had access to some of those charts I’ve been talking about.  But I don’t, and I didn’t.  Keep driving, that is.  I pulled in, and in no time at all was sitting next to them, matching my brother, beer for beer.

I really have no idea how he does it.  He’s not a particularly big man, so where does all that beer go?  Like I said, I really have no idea.  What I do know, however, is that the sine wave of my beer drinking tendencies hit a particular low last night, or would that be a high?  I’m not sure.  I suppose that would depend on just how you lined up that sine wave with the one that dealt with the toilets in your life.

These weren’t necessarily any of the things I was thinking about last night as my head hovered over the toilet bowl.  Probably far from it.  It’s hard to remember.  I do remember thinking that I was lucky that my son had insisted on placing toilet cleaning on his chore list last week.  And yes, that’s no typo.  Toilet cleaning was his idea.  And no, I have no idea why.  I don’t think it’s really a toilet thing as much as he likes getting his hands on the typically off-limits bottle of bleach. 

But enough of that.  Last night I was sick, but today I am better.  Things seem clearer.  I have new perspective.  If there is one universal truth, one commonality with all of our beer drinking charts, it is that nothing clears perspective better then a good vomiting.

If you’re like me, you have a hard time getting to sleep at night because you’ve never been able to accurately visualize a stack of one million pennies. 

Consider the problem solved, thanks to The MegaPenny Project.

Update

Wasting time wouldn’t be complete without Tourette Syndrome Barbie.

Or if you like the group Weezer, you might want to try your hand at a little Sumo wrestling, Weezer Style

You remember wet willies?  That thing where someone pops their finger in their mouth, gets it all wet and slobbery, and then puts it in someone’s ear.  I’ve decided that parenthood is nothing more then an alternative version of a wet willie.  All the talking and nagging and constant demands.  Someone always has something they want you to hear.  There’s always something in your ear.  There’s no getting away.

Yesterday I was pestered relentlessly about something that looks more lobster trap then toy.  Some sort of combination sports game that the commercials have convinced my son will provide years of joy and excitement.  For only $179.99 I could have one of these pipe and net contraptions sitting in my living room.  My son could throw footballs and basketballs and soccer balls and god knows what else at it, and an electronic voice would offer encouragement with each attempt.

Sounds about as good to me as a wet finger stuck in my ear.  I’m thinking about buying a whole pit of them and throwing in a few advertising executives. 

Do you know how hard it is to convince a child that television toy commercials are filled with little undersized children whose sole purpose is to make the toys look bigger then life itself?  Those kids aren’t happy, I tell him.  Of course they look happy.  They’re being paid.

I wish they sold televisions at the dollar store.  Can you imagine?  Televisions for only one buck.  I think it’d feel good to be able to walk over and kick in the screen whenever you felt the urge.

So nothing was accomplished yesterday.  We went roller skating.  Wishfully, I thought I would be able to think about a story plot while I skated around the roller rink with my son.  But the place was so crowded that it was all I could do to avoid being swept away in their short little madness.

And I obviously have that look about me this week.  Someone wants to take a poke at me.  Even at the roller rink, trouble brewed.  I looked at someone wrong, and don’t you know it, he came after me.  I heard him say something to us as we skated by, but I didn’t catch it, so out of friendly politeness, I slowed down and told him I hadn’t heard him.

“Why don’t you mind your own business?  Can’t you give a guy a little privacy?”  I think this guy was even more riled up then Dominique from Friday night.  And I wasn’t even skating with his girl.  As a matter of fact, I don’t think he had a girl.  The guy wasn’t any taller then my waist.

“What?”  I couldn’t believe it.  When did little boys in Hawaiian shirts become bold enough to take on full-sized men?

“Mind your own business.”

The funny part is, I think this little guy shook me up way more then Friday night’s ex-con.  I kept looking out of the corner of my eye, searching through the crowd for that blue Hawaiian print shirt.  I watched where I was going, not wanting to suddenly bump into him and make matters worse.  Occasionally we would pass by each other and our eyes would lock, and sure enough, I was the one who would always look away.  I wanted no piece of this kid’s action.

In my thinking, an ex-con would be sort of predictable.  He’d want to fight.  He’d just want to bring it on and mess me up.  But this cantankerous, angry little boy, he was a different story.  I have no idea what he was thinking.  Three feet tall and full of fury, there’s no telling what he might have done.  Maybe he was only thinking about giving me a wet willie, wondering how he could possibly reach all the way up to my ears.  Maybe.  But with that attitude, I kind of doubt it.

Now that I think of it, he may have very well been one of those kids I’ve seen on the commercials.  One of those feisty, undersized runts who are only happy when you pay them.  A victim of modern day advertising, his happiness and innocence stolen by one too many behind-the-scene glimpses.  Maybe I should have just offered him a dollar.  Maybe the kid just needed a payoff.  Like a miniature gangster, waiting for his cut.  Who knows what the kid needed.  All I know is that I skated around the issue all day.  Literally.

One thought is to dig up an old, long dead plot idea.  A human tragedy that I partially imagined almost seventeen years ago.  Always up for a challenge, today I will try to think of an alternative, comedic way to tell the same story.  I love a munch of moping characters as much as anyone, but I know I don’t want to spend all of next month writing about them.

I fill that role all by myself just fine.  I don’t need to create anyone.

So come on, you sorry, pathetic creatures.  Where’s your fruity, chewy center?  So someone dies.  So what.  Was it death by whoopie cushion, that’s what we want to know.

The stars slowly align.  Just as I was about to announce that I am seriously considering participating in next month’s novel writing foolishness, NaNoWriMo, I get an email from the Salem, Oregon forum group leader.

It’s easy to see why this could be taken as a sign.

Participate . . . participate . . . participate . . . I can almost hear the groans of this inevitable universe, prodding me into my proper place like I’m some sort of child actor who keeps missing the big white X that has been taped onto my spot on the stage.

But my mind wanders.  And is it any wonder.  Stumble Upon is truly a fun way to waste time.  Thanks Catherine. 

Here’s a couple of last night’s distractions:

Weird and Wonderful Patents

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/games/

Squares

Paper Toss

http://www.trashlog.org/

http://www.specialdefects.com/v2/

http://openinghooks.us/

Juggling Stickman

Leave It To Bush :: Featuring Two Ferrets and Gary Busey

Sometimes around here we just make up words to get us through.  Like today, it was complean.

complean (kom’ plÄ“n’), adj., v.t. 1.the state of being completely clean. 2. to engage in completely cleaning something. - compleaning, v., compleaner, n.,

Me: If you keep after that closet and all those toys, it’ll be complean.

Him: This is too hard.  Will you help?

Complean is often confused with complain, as in, oh, quit your complaining.  This is in no way interchangable with the parental instruction: oh, don’t quit you compleaning

I’ve decided that it’s not safe to leave the house, and I have hunkered down for a long stay.  There’s trouble all around.  Not only that, but decisions to be made.  Hundreds of them, waiting for me everywhere I go.  The house is the safest place.

The final straw came last night when I thought I would go out and have a beer and look at people.  It seems like a safe enough thing to do.  It’s early.  There should be mostly sane people still milling about the world on their way home from work.

A half a beer later and someone is small talking me to death.  I asked for it, I think.  I could have stayed home.  I could have sat somewhere else.  I could have turned left instead of right.  I could have done a hundred different things.

“Do you think I could use your cell phone?  I need to call and check on my baby?”

It sounds innocent enough.  Besides, I am forever the good samaritan, coming to the aid of those in need.  Who am I to stand between a concerned mother and her baby?  I give her the phone and she steps out the door for a little quiet.  Her purse is there by my feet, so I’m fairly sure she won’t disappear with my phone.  It is magic, remember.  I’d hate to lose it.

A few minutes later, she walks back in and hands the phone to me.  “It’s for you,” she says.  I should mention that the small talk has revealed that while I’m only a half a beer into this night, she is a bit ahead of the game.  Four drinks ahead.  Whatever she’s been drinking seems to make her very concerned about what I do for a living.  She asks me four times how works been going?  But that’s before the phone thing.

“It’s for you.”

I take the phone.  I like to think that I’m good at thinking ahead, but I hadn’t prepared for this.  I never thought about her answering my phone.  I hope it’s not a customer.

“Who was that?”

You know, no matter how close you are to getting divorced, your soon to be ex-wife will always flair up if a woman answers your cellphone.  I think that may be a proven fact.  It wouldn’t matter if you were lying in a hospital bed, gasping your next breath, and a nurse answered the phone to try and help.  No, that last breath would have to be used trying to explain another woman.  I think it’s just the nature of the beast.

“I loaned my phone to someone and I guess she answered,” I say.

“Oh.”  Click.

I don’t really talk on the phone enough to have ever mastered the fine art of hanging up on someone.  I think it probably takes practice, I don’t know.  But what I think I do know is that it’s supposed to make the other person get all nervous and jittery, and that they’re supposed to get right back on the phone and call that person back.  I think that’s how it’s supposed to work.  Someone tell me if I’m wrong.  But for me it’s just never made much sense.  If someone’s mad at me, and they have me on the phone, and then they hang up on me, why in the world would I call them right back?  That doesn’t make any sense.  Maybe I’m wrong, but aren’t you glad to be off the phone? 

The phone rings again and I answer.  It’s my son.  I wander around outside the bar talking to him for fifteen minutes, while he asks me a million questions about who answered my phone.  It seems it was him who called when the woman answered, and when it wasn’t my voice on the other end, he handed the phone to his mom.

Everything seems so explainable when you slow time down.

He mostly wants to know what the woman looks like.  What color is her hair?  Is she wearing shorts?  Who is she?  What’s her name?  Who is she as tall as?  Why are you outside?  Is the music loud?  Who plays the music?  Does the woman play the music?  Does she play rock or country?  I try to answer each and every question the best I can.  Eight year olds deserve answers.

Now all this time that I’m talking with my son, I keep hearing the phone beep in my ear.  Over and over, at least every minute, sometimes more.  Someone is calling.  It’s the same number over and over, but I don’t click over.  I hate call waiting.  People can wait is my theory.  I’m busy.

When I get off the phone I check.  Fourteen calls from the same number, and one voice mail.  I check it.

Hi Keith, this is Dominique.  Stacy’s fucking boyfriend, dude.  Please tell her to call me.  I don’t think you know what you’re getting yourself into, bro.  You don’t fucking know me, dude, but . . . um . . . I better be getting a fucking phone call.

I wonder why people are so quick to jump to conclusions?  They make no sense.  But then, neither does staying there a moment longer.  Fucking people.  All I wanted to do is have a beer.

On the drive home the phone rings again.  I may hate call waiting, but I love caller ID.  It’s my new bro, Dominique.  I answer.

“Hello.”

“Is this Keith?”

“Yes it is.”

“This is Dominique.  I don’t know what is fucking going on, but you’re there with my girlfriend.  You don’t know me dud, but I just got out of prison.  You don’t want to be fuckin’ with me.”

“Dominique.  Listen.  I’m not even at the bar anymore.  I loaned my phone to your girlfriend.  As far as I know, she’s still there.  She was there when I left.”

“Man, you don’t want to fuck with me.”

“Dominique.  No, I don’t want to fuck with you.  I don’t want to fuck with your girlfriend.  I don’t want to fuck with either one of you.  I’m just a guy with a phone who you’re not going to call anymore.  Okay?  Got it.”

“Alright, dude.  We’ll leave it at that.”

“That sounds good.  Good bye, Dominique.”

“Bye.”

Some nights the only thing left to do is drag out the disco ball and dance.  I hang the light and he fires up the music.  Being eight, he has no accurate sense of what disco music is really supposed to sound like.  But he does his best, picking and choosing, and as luck would have it, hits disco paydirt.  Funky Town!  I hit the final switch, the dance floor goes dark, the music starts, and the light begins to spin.

“Dad, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you dance.  Do you know how?”

Does a father ever admit to his son that he doesn’t know how to do something?  I mean, it’s dancing.  How hard can dancing be?

“Do I know how to dance?  Are you kidding?  I’m a great dancer!”  I haven’t danced in more then a decade, maybe longer.  I jump and shake around.  I bob my head.  I do a double check that the blinds are drawn, and then go all out, raising my arms above my head - the ultimate dance commitment for any old, awkward guy. 

We shake our way through one song after another.  We’re naturals.  I was born to boogie.  I lived the disco era.  Funny, though, this dancing thing.  I don’t remember it requiring quite so much breath.

Some words seem too close, suggesting to me that maybe the world overlaps in more ways then I’ve previously suspected.  Language is the trick time has played on us; its secret way of being everywhere and nowhere, all at the same time.  Pinning down the meanings of words seems about as easy as riding soap bubbles.

dissilition

\Dis`si*li"tion\, n. The act of bursting or springing apart.

disallusion

\Dis`il*lu"sion\, n. The act or process of freeing from an illusion, or the state of being freed therefrom.—Lowell.

disillusion

\Dis`il*lu"sion\, v. t. To free from an illusion; to disillusionize.

n : freeing from false belief or illusions [syn: disenchantment, disillusionment] v : free from enchantment [syn: disenchant] [ant: enchant]

disclusion

\Dis*clu"sion\, n. [L. disclusio, fr. discludere, disclusum, to separate. See Disclose.] A shutting off; exclusion.

dissolution

\Dis`so*lu"tion\, n. [OE. dissolucioun dissoluteness, F. dissolution, fr. L. dissolutio, fr. dissolvere. See Dissolve.] 1. The act of dissolving, sundering, or separating into component parts; separation.

2. Change from a solid to a fluid state; solution by heat or moisture; liquefaction; melting.

3. Change of form by chemical agency; decomposition; resolution.

4. The dispersion of an assembly by terminating its sessions; the breaking up of a partnership.

Dissolution is the civil death of Parliament.—Blackstone.

5. The extinction of life in the human body; separation of the soul from the body; death.

We expected Immediate dissolution.—Milton.

6. The state of being dissolved, or of undergoing liquefaction.

A man of continual dissolution and thaw.—Shak.

7. The new product formed by dissolving a body; a solution.—Bacon.

8. Destruction of anything by the separation of its parts; ruin.

To make a present dissolution of the world.—Hooker.

9. Corruption of morals; dissipation; dissoluteness. [Obs. or R.]—Atterbury.

I suppose I wouldn’t have thought of any of this if it hadn’t been for the phone call this afternoon.

“So, have you been down to the dissolution office?”  My mind plays over the possibilities.

“No.  I haven’t.”

“Well, if you do it costs $15 for the papers.  But you can get them free online.  Do you want the address?”

“Sure.”

I’m not so sure about anything today.  First an audit, and then a personal phone call from who I thought was my wife, but must surely be a google operator.

“You can lead a horse to water, and obviously you can make him drink,” I say.  Well, maybe I only thought it.  “Did you know that?”

“There are over 750,000 references to “you can lead a horse to water” alone.  Let’s stay focused, please.  Download the papers and let me know what you think.”

Part One :: The Gathering, or Scratching Spreadsheets in the Sand

Who are these people who thrive on numbers?  What drives them?  Is an audit like a good mystery novel, something to pour through and unravel?  Does she see me, or am I just my array of figures, stacked neatly in front of her?  If I lean across the table and put my ear up to her chest, would I hear her heart racing with excitement of her task?  I have hundreds of questions, but not one of them have anything to do with accounting, so I keep quiet.

But I am not without my minor plot twists.  A hair falls out of place as she spots an irregular name. 

“And who is this?”  she asks, one hand pointing out the name on the check register, the other quickly tucking the misplaced hair behind an ear.  I notice the dates on the thick stack of papers - February 2002.  We’ve barely begun.

“Which line?” I ask.  It seems appropriate to ask.  I’ve already spotted the trouble.  Even I know that haircuts are probably not a legitimate business expense.

“This one.  It’s a check for $12.00 made out to Carla T.  Who is this?”  Funny how I protect Carla’s true identity from you, but not from the auditor.  I wonder why that is.

I play my honesty card early, which I’m sure will help get me through the rest of the morning.  I’m friendly and open, willing to share and admit anything.  I have nothing to hide.  “Carla cut my hair,” I reply.  My accountant squirms a little in her seat. 

There are other areas of contention.  Some are easily explained, others require a little more imagination.

“Mervyns?” comes one single word question, pencil poised.

“Ummm, that’d be rain gear,” I answer.  The pencil pauses, then writes nothing and we move on.  Rain gear.  I’ve started to get a feel for the game.  My accountant would be proud, if she knew.

I do end up with one small lecture about who should and should not be claimed as an employee when I am questioned about Delmar.  Delmar, I tell her, is a 90 year old farmer who mowed and bailed a field for us.

“Well, is Delmar a business?”

“No, as far as I know, Delmar is just a 90 year old farmer.”

“Well, 90 or not, this $280 expense should have been reported as payroll.”  I listen patiently while she explains the fine points of employment law.  I am a good listener.  I could listen all day and whoever was talking would walk away thinking that I was the best listener that they had ever had the good fortune to meet.  I’m that kind of listener.  Mostly though, I just like to watch people talk.  It’s interesting the different ways that people go off in search of what it is they are trying to say.

I wait until she is done talking before I throw my monkey wrench into the equation.

“I think Delmar is probably dead.  He went in for some sort of cancer surgery the day after he bailed hay for me.”  This, unbelievably, is the truth.  Like most old farmers, Delmar had been a true believer in the old saying, “make hay while the sun shines.”  He may have had cancer, and he may have been dying, but it was June and it was sunny and the hay field was calling his name, just like it’d done for the past 70 odd years.  I don’t think I could have kept Delmar out of that field if I’d tried.  And I’m almost positive he would have refused to fill out an employment application.

I didn’t try to explain this to the auditor.  She was mostly just concerned about whether Delmar was a business.  She was taking furious notes.  I could have explained it to her in a different way, but I don’t think it would have mattered.  Delmar, when you came right down to it, was all business.

“Well, I’m not sure what happens if the person involved is deceased,” she said.  “There was a memo on this the other day that we were looking over.  I’ll check it again when I get back to the office.”  I was kind of hoping that this was a new problem.  Maybe something they could name after an old farmer.  The Delmar Clause, something like that.

And then, just before noon, it was over.  I was given the task to produce three loan agreements and one lease agreement.  It doesn’t matter that every bit of paperwork that needs to be produced is some sort of agreement between me and me.  And there were some other amounts in question, some various checks written to me that couldn’t be easily explained away.  But my accountant is already working away at the next stage of our battle, even though no official date has been set as of yet.

But the clashing of accountants should prove exciting.  I can’t wait to watch them fight it out.  I honestly don’t think I’ve ever had two women fighting over me before.  Not like this.  But I certainly never imagined that it would be a pair of accountants. 

Oh Delmar.  Where are you when I need you?

I have completed my mail in ballot.  My votes are cast.  Needless to say, I have voted for . . .

I would show everyone my ballot, but one of the conditions that I had to agree to is that I would not show my ballot to other people.  Yep.  Seriously.  It’s a voting condition here in Oregon.  Located just above the signature line are a series of bulleted conditions, one of them being:

• I voted my ballot and (did not unnecessarily show it to anyone)

If you use a mail in ballot in Oregon, you have to promise not to pin it to your chest and walk around town.  You can’t fold it into a pirate hat (presidential side out) and wear it into any bar, tavern, or eating establishment.  You can’t, even in cases of high wind, allow your ballot to blow out of hand and pass in front of the eyes of neighbors or friends.  And you must not, under any circumstances, take digital photographs of your ballot and post them on your website.

Unnecessarily show it to anyone?  What in the world is that supposed to mean?

So, if John Kerry loses the election by one Oregon vote (I know, an impossibility), and I’ve flashed around my ballot, will I be able to prove in a court of law that I had necessary reasons to do so?

And do lawyers sit around inventing these things?  These rules?  Has life somehow been transformed into nothing more then a great big game of attorney solitary?

Is it possible that we will soon be voting on whether or not we might need a constitutional amendment to help define what is meant by necessary as opposed to unnecessary?

Please.  Anyone.  I need clarification.

And for God’s sake, if we’re going to keep playing games, enough with the jokers wild.  I’m sick of this game.  Let’s play something new.

The problem isn’t that today is moving fast, but that tomorrow is approaching even faster.  I’m afraid that the two will overlap somewhere in my sleep and I won’t be ready for it.  Maybe that’s all dreams really are - two days jockeying for position.  Tomorrow somehow attempting to sidestep it’s rightful place in the timeline.

An email alerts me that my audit is tomorrow morning.  I think I have everything we need, my accountant writes.  Will you be attending?  Do you have the corporate minutes?

This last question is nothing more then her covering her butt.  She knows I don’t have the minutes.  I am a corporation of one.  I have been a corporation of one for the last fifteen years.  Not once have I felt like keeping minutes of a meeting that in all essence never actually happens.

The business world is a wacky place.

Yes, I have the minutes, I write back.  The two of us act as if we are closing some multi-billion dollar, under the table deal.  Maybe I should shred something.  No, no.  You’re getting ahead of yourself, Keith.  Slow down.  You’re about to overlap.  I think you should call a secret meeting of the shareholders.

Are you kidding?  You better make it a director’s meeting only.  Who knows what will be discussed.

You’re absolutely right.  But hold on.  I am the president and the sole shareholder.  What should we do?

I don’t know.  Is someone taking minutes?  Anyone?  Nothing but silence.  Just like the last fifteen years, no one steps forward.

I know this day is going to overlap, and I think it’ll be sometime tonight just around 11:30.  I can feel it.  Why else would it have taken me until after lunch to finally get my morning cup of coffee?  Everything is out of synch.

I pulled up to the coffee stand, the same one that I always seem to go to.  I’ve been there enough that the girls know me and what I drink.  Everything is easier when it’s predictable.  But it’s late now, after lunch, and there is only one employee car parked off to the side.  The red Honda with the Bush sticker on the trunk.  The owner’s face appears in the coffee stand’s window.

“Hello,” she says.  She’s the one with the gravely voice.  The one who always makes me think of that Nazareth song, Whiskey Drinkin’ Woman.  I have no idea why some women get whiskey voices and some just stay light and squeaky their whole lives.

“Is that your car?” I ask.

And that’s the thing about this upcoming election, you see.  I could have been asking about her car for any number of reasons.  Maybe it had a flat.  Maybe the window was down and it was starting to rain.  Maybe I just like red Hondas.  There could be a million reasons I ask my question, but because of this particular election, we both know exactly what I’m talking about.

“Actually, I don’t care whose car it is?  I just want to know if that’s your sticker.”

We both laugh it off and neither one of us press the issue.  Why spoil a perfect thing?  The world doesn’t effect us.  She makes coffee and I drink it.  Does it matter at that very moment which scoundrel is president?  A little, I guess, because the coffee girl pretends to hawk something from her throat into my coffee.

“Damn Republicans,” I mumble in my best, pretend-irritated voice.  I tuck a dollar in the tip jar.

“Foolish Democrats,”  she replies, her eye on the dollar.  “You’ll waste money on anything.”

The party was a success!  Surprise guests and hyperactive kids, all capped off with a runaway dog that had to be chased halfway across one of the city’s largest parks.  I’m still out of breath, two hours later.  I think the complete blow by blow, complete with action photos, can wait until tomorrow.

There will be a birthday party here in the apartment this afternoon.  My son has planned and arranged everything.  All I’ve had to do is provide transportation to the party goods store and pay for the cake and snacks.  Other then that, I have stayed out of it.  More then anything, I’m curious just what kind of birthday party an eight year old will throw for his own mother.

If everything goes according to his plan, it will go like this.

We have cleaned the apartment as best as we know how.  The dining room, which normally looks more like a garage then a dining room, has been emptied of bikes and remote control cars and electric scooters.  We don’t put on airs around here.  We eat when we’re hungry.  We seldom dine.

A cake has been bought, selected entirely (like everything for this party) by my son.  I stood by silently, an observer with a loaded wallet.  A white cake with raspberry filling, complete with white frosting and pink and yellow frosting flowers.  When asked what color he would like the cake personalized with, my son was quick to answer.

“Blue.”  The cake girl and I look at each other.  Blue is about the only color in the universe that will not look good on top of this cake.  I see the girl gearing up for what she thinks is a clever way around the problem.

“Well, what color is your mom’s favorite color?  Maybe that would look nice.”

“Blue.”  I don’t say a word.  If I’ve learned anything in the last eight years, it’s that I’d have an easier time teaching a rock to swim then convincing my son to change his mind once he has it set on something.

And there will be ice cream, of course, as well as two kinds of chips and three flavors of soda.

“But not Cheetos,” he says.  “Those are too messy.  There’s only enough napkins for two each.”

Yes, two napkins each.  Eight plates, eight party hats, eight blowers, and eight matching plates and cups. 

“I think she’d like Shark Tale,” he says, although the reason why escapes me.  No one in this family has even seen the movie.  But like I say, I’m an observer only.  I don’t question the theme, just pay for it.

This catches us up to yesterday afternoon, when he was carefully handwriting the invitations and deciding who should be invited.  Like any party, this is perhaps the hardest part.  Care and careful consideration must be given to each invited guest.  What will be the likelihood that they can attend?  Will they get along with the other guests?  Do they like cake?  Will they be excited?

It took about fifteen minutes for my son to hone his guest list.  There could only be eight people in attendance, since of course there were only eight Shark Tale plates.

“I’ll invite Adam and the grandma from next door,” he says.  “And what about Ryan from school?  He could come over right after school and help with the balloons.”  Counting himself, me, and his mom, he was up to six guests.

“Wait!  I’ll invite the girl from upstairs.  Do you think she’ll come?”  It should probably be pointed out that with the exception of her own son and her soon to be ex-husband, the birthday girl would not know a single soul at her own birthday party.  But this did not seem like much of a problem to my son.  His social skills obviously extend well beyond my own.

“I’m not sure about her,” I say.  We really don’t know her very well.  We’ve only talked twice,” I remind him.

“But I like her.”  He’s now talking to me the way that he talked to the cake girl.  Tiffani, the upstairs girl, will be invited.  We march up the stairs together, and I listen while my son shyly invites a twenty two year old woman to a birthday party.

“You don’t have to bring a present,” he says.  “Just come and have some cake.”

So with the neighbor girl promising to come, we were up to seven guests, which you’d think would seem like successful party planning.  But not for this boy.

“We still have one plate, dad.  We need one more guest.”  He’s right, I suppose.  What would we ever do with one Shark Tale paper plate, cup, napkin, blower, and party hat set?

“Let’s just keep that spot open,” I suggest, trying to sound party-wise.  “You never know.  Someone may just turn up.”

And sure enough, while he’s off at school, no doubt worrying about how many balloons to buy after school, another guest has offered to attend.  A friend of the birthday girl who claims she wouldn’t miss it for the world.

“I’ve never been to a party planned by an eight year old,” she says on the phone.  “It’s too cute to miss.”

So in less then four hours it’ll be party time.  About the only hitch is that the apartment owners and representatives from the city have notified me that they will, sometime this afternoon, be entering the apartment for some unknown reason.  Smoke detectors?  Who knows.  Maybe they just heard about the cake.  And I suppose a cool party dad would have an extra set of Shark Tale plates, stashed away for such an emergency, but I know that’s not going to happen.  I’m not quite that cool.

Every time the leaves begin to turn yellow, he thinks about counting them as they drop to the ground beneath the sweet gum tree.  The sweet gum, after all, drops its leaves slowly, sometimes taking all winter.  It’s not even unusual to see the next Spring’s buds pushing off the last of the dried and brown leaves.  The sweet gum moves to a beat, it seems, that even he should be able to keep up with.

But each year he successfully talks himself out of the counting.  Don’t waste your time, he tells himself.  No one cares how many leaves a tree has.  Especially a sweet gum. 

And he is probably not far from the truth.  Everyone in their right mind hates the sweet gum.  Once the flashy, yellow show of the Fall’s leaves is over, the slowness at which the leaves drop is nothing more then an irritation.  His work of cleaning up around the tree is erased each and every day, as the sweet gum’s leaves continue to drop all winter long, messing up the yard when nothing else can.  The sweet gum, he thinks, is a tourist tree - something to be enjoyed only if you can walk away from it and reminisce about it’s beauty.  But standing there, each year with the rake in his hand, his collar pulled up high to keep the rain off of the back of his neck, the tree’s beauty seems lost.  They are more like opponents or enemies, matching wits in battle, then a man and a tree.  And for the next five or six months, he will peek through the curtain of the front window, spying on the tree, looking for weaknesses.  Maybe an ice storm he thinks.  Anything.  Anything to help take that tree down.

But the tree is always there, waiting.  Holding onto its leaves.  Waiting for the companionship of the man and the steady sound of the rake’s metal tines, sweeping across the wet grass.

The trouble is that too many things happen at once.  How can I possibly keep up with the constant overlapping?  I suppose that is was just about the same time last night that the woman is promising to flash her breasts for my Democratic presidential vote that Imaginary Keith decides to call the house.  There’s no way to know for sure, but it’d be like him to try and get in the middle of something like that.

K?  Are you there?  Come on, pick up.

The message is silent for a bit, and I imagine him on the other end of the line, trying to reach me.  It’s enough to make me question why I would ever venture out of the house.  I hate missing his calls.

Come on, K, pick up.  You are there, aren’t you?  Anyway, listen.  Ruckert has disappeared and I think he may be heading your way.  Your not going to like this, but my I.D. is missing, and I think he may be traveling as me.

I can hear Imaginary Keith take a deep breath, possibly thinking of what to say next.  Imaginary Keith’s I.D.?  Since when did imaginary friends begin carrying I.D.?  I try not to think too hard about it.  It’s all part of the overlapping.  I couldn’t keep up if I tried.

I think he wants to slip into Oregon undetected, I’m not sure.  But anyway, I’ll be traveling as Ruckert and try to beat him there.  See you in a couple of days.

Everything had been so smooth, I thought.  The house refinancing, her decision to leave the house before the end of the year, even work picking up and the money beginning to slowly trickle in once again.

“I knew it wouldn’t last,” I say to the answering machine.  “And who is Ruckert?”  I guess I’d be finding out soon enough.

The evening is a success.  Not only do I meet up with my brother, but I find a Bush sticker on a toilet, and I meet a girl who promises to flash us if we will vote for Kerry.  I instantly think of Spanglemonkey.  This is one of her tactics, I’m almost positive.

Naturally, I fake reluctance.  “Okay, I guess,” I say.  Is it dishonest politics to promise something you were already committed to?  If you’d seen the girl’s eyes light up when she discussed the problems with the electoral college, you’d have lied too.  I mean, that and . . . well, flashing.  Everyone has a moment of weakness.  Cut me some slack.

But like I said earlier, the problem with taverns lies in the answers.  How will I possibly collect on this flashing promise?  You see, I have the question, but there is no way of knowing the answer.

I have not heard from Imaginary Keith all week, and I still do not know who Ruckert is.  I have, however, just come from the farm, where I walked a spell, taking in all that I have missed during the last two years.  I wonder what it will be like to move back?  On the surface, it would be appear to be a dream come true.  Twelve acres and the nursery.  The quiet of country life.  Open space and open air.  Few neighbors seldom seen.  Dogs that run free, barn cats that need little care.  Chickens and cows.  The trickle of a creek, cutting its way through the property, a one minute walk away.  On the surface it all seems so good.

But I’ve begun to think what it will mean below the surface.  How will I react to being back in the house?  Will I be haunted by memories that exist only there in that place?  Will I find myself looking out through windows with eyes trapped in a two-year old past?

I have a lot of questions that will be answered soon enough, that’s for sure.  I once said that it was the questions that were easy, and not the answers.  But I think I might have been wrong.  The answers are there all the time, just staring us in the face, waiting for us to open our eyes.  The answers don’t blink or look away.  They don’t question their purpose.  They’re answers, after all, not questions.  Life for them is much simpler.

I am heading out tonight to find a beer.  I am on the run.  Answers, I am almost positive, seldom hang out in bars or taverns.  I think it has something to do with the alcohol’s affect on the questions.  Answers really hate that.

He is thinking about what to do with all of the leftover stuff, all of the stuff that neither he nor she cared to claim - the meaningless trinkets and old blankets.  Old bottles of expired dog shampoo and do-it-yourself dry cleaning kits that seemed to tumble out of every closet.  Box after box of stuff.  Old shoes and coats.  Single gloves and polyester shirts with missing buttons.  In one corner he finds hundreds of vacuum cleaner bags, apparently bought in some bulk internet deal, all fitting a vacuum cleaner that no longer even exists.  Every closet and every shelf has something.  There seems to be no end to it.  No end, and no solution.

And then it hits him.  Of course, he’ll use It.  The thing that has been his biggest secret all of these years.  The thing that he has lied about to everyone, hidden away in the attic or crawl space of every single house or apartment he’s lived in since 1979.  The howitzer, he realizes, is the perfect solution.

He props a ladder against the hole leading into the attic, climbs up, and feels his way through the dark until finally his hand bumps up against cold steel.  Barrel, breech, carriage, his hands move their way around the gun, searching for rust.  Everything seems in order.  In the dark he breathes in the oil and the faint smell of gunpowder.  The feels the howitzer’s tires, and even they still hold air.  He realizes that he is smiling to himself.  With a range of more then 11,000 meters, he’ll have the house clear of stuff in no time.

The howitzer rolls slowly across the ceiling joists, and the house creaks and groans, happy to have its secret finally exposed.  How many times has he lied about that ceiling?, he wonders.  How many times had he heard, “Honey, the ceiling seems to be sagging?  Should we call someone?”  And how many times had he replied, “No, everything is fine.  It’s an old house.  You have to expect a few bends and bows.”  He had felt guilty, at first, lying to her like that.  But that was only at first.

After more then twenty years of telling the same lie, it had become easy.  His guilt for lying was now nonexistent.  He remembered the day his father had pulled him aside, telling him, “My father told me this when I was your age, and the day has come for me to tell you.  A howitzer, son, has no place in a marriage.  Keep it safe.  Keep it secret.

It was perhaps the one vow he had never broken.  He had done his part.  There was no shame in that.

He rolled the gun out into the yard and slowly filled the barrel with odds and ends from the house.  He started with the kitchen, cleaning out cupboards and drawers, packing the barrel tight with odd serving forks and corn on the cob holders.  Kitchen rags and bottles of cooking sauces from the refrigerator that were sure to have expired.  He loaded everything he could find into the barrel and tamped it down tight.

“The 105mm howitzer, with its hydropneumatic recoil system, its horizontal sliding wedge breech mechanism, and its split trail carriage, has a maximum range of 11,270 meters, and a maximum rate of fire of 10 rounds per minute, or a sustained rate of fire of 3 rounds per minute.”  And even though no one was around to hear him speak, the words felt good to say.  It was good to get it off his chest.  He had kept his secret long enough.

“But that firing rate would assume the use of a full, 8 man crew,” he added.  “Cleaning the house may take me a little time by myself.”

Satisfied that the kitchen was finally clear of everything, he loaded the powder.

“Clear!”

“Clear!” he repeated.  A force of habit.  A safety measure, falling on no one’s ears but his own. 

“Pull!”

He jerked the lanyard and the cannon roared to life, sending the kitchen stuff in a north/northeasterly direction, which was mostly a guess, since he had no compass.  A few rags caught in the breeze and landed a couple of hundred yards out, in the field, but the rest had disappeared.  He doublechecked the elevation of the barrel.  47 degrees.  He was fairly confident that the mess would clear his brother’s house, which he estimated at slightly under three miles.

“I’m sure he’ll call if he recognizes anything,” he said, heading back into the house for another round.

Seems someone threw a holiday and forgot to tell me about it.  Columbus Day.  Such a festive event.

There will be no money shuffling today.  But this doesn’t mean that I have come to a complete standstill.  No way.  I got on the phone, fully prepared to rattle someone about interest rates.  I almost wrote rats.  Interest rats.

It’s a good thing I don’t rip into people.  Seems I’ve had a message sitting on machine from last Friday, that I still haven’t heard.

“Did you get my message on Friday,” Interest Woman says.  No, wait.  We better call her Finance Woman.  Interest Woman could be misconstrued.

“I’m glad you called,” says Finance Woman.  “Did you get the message I left Friday.”  It’s apparent by now, or at least should be, that my entire life is nothing more then a series of paraphrases.  Pair of phrases.  You pick.

“Oh, no.  I didn’t.” I reply.  She has no way of knowing my history with my answering machine.

“Well, the initial lender that I thought we’d use . . . . (we?  I like her, but have no intention of cosigning the loan with her.  Should I tell her?  Should I correct her?  Should I drive down and straighten this mess up in person?  It’s always so much nicer talking in person.  If you must know, I’m not much for phone conversation.  It just seems so . . . I don’t know . . . phony.) . . . . so it looks like the third choice is the floating rate with the cap.  I just need you to tell me how to proceed.”

Shit.  I should have been paying attention.

“What was the second option again?  Was that fixed rate?  I bluff a semi-intelligent question.  My years in business have left me with the ability to pause just long enough with my questions to give people the impression that I am thinking greatly about what they have said.  It is one of my most precious possessions.

Pay attention, Keith.  Pay attention.

“Well, that lender will do the stated income loan at . . .” Finance Woman has an answer and a solution for every conceivable question I could possibly imagine.  Everything appears to be in order.  Everything is pre-approved, just waiting on the property inspection, which has already been scheduled for Wednesday.

“Lunch time,” I say to myself after hanging up the phone.

As I drive over to Subway for lunch, I’m thinking about trying out that NaNoMo thingamajig that starts the first of next month.  You know the deal - you write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days.  It sounds sort of like the kind of chaos I like to heap upon myself.  Maybe if I can clear my desk by tomorrow morning and complete my entire list that I made earlier, I will seriously consider it.  Who knows?

I walk into Subway, order a sandwich, then mosey over to Jamba Juice, which is connected.  And what do you know, it’s Friday Night Girl.  Ends up she works there, so I have her whip me up some sort of strawberry concoction with an added energy boost.  I suppose I could ask for a sexual prowess boost, but know I’d never pull it off.  Not my style.

We chit chat a little about our weekends and that sort of thing.  I have to make almost everything up because, of course, I did nothing and have nothing to talk about.  If I give her my number, she says she’ll give me a call sometime.  Is it the new cellphone?  Is it already hard at work, casting some sort of mojo around me?

On the drive back home I’ve forgotten all about the 50,000 word novel.  Just as well.  Who has time for that?  I have an hour and half before I need to be at the school, picking up Energizer Boy.  But first, a quick trip over to the house, to pick up the pup.  Yes, the pup.  My son has a new dog.  I suppose I’ll have to write something about that deal one of these days.  Post a picture and all that business.

See what I mean.  Who has time for novel writing?  With a small boy, a new pup, and a cellphone casting magic spells, who has time for anything.

These and other important questions will have to wait.  It’s Monday.  Full speed ahead!

The prodigal son has returned from his weekend at the grandparent’s house.  I loaned him the digital camera and he snapped away to the tune of 150 pictures.  Or so the story goes.  Naturally something went bonkers on the way home and now it appears that everything is lost except four pictures of the neighbor’s wiener dog.

This train of events has me wondering just how I might get my hands on the DNA strand that dictates a person’s tendency to blame things on others.  My son is apparently coded in this manner, and frankly, I’m thinking that a little bit of gene manipulation therapy might not be a bad idea.  Where’s his “accept fate” strand?  Where’s his “buck up and take it like a man” strand?  And in the interest of political correctness and the fact that anything is possible these days, where’s his “buck up and take it like a woman” strand?

And just how old is “take it like a man”?  Does anyone know?  All that stop sniveling, no crying business.  I have a hard time believing that “take it like a man” has always been around, and only in recent history have men decided that there might be another side to things.  Everything moves in cycles.  Even men.  The problem, I guess, is that men think this means motorcycles, which, by the way, a friend and I discussed on the phone this weekend.  We’re both considering alternative ways of death.  Naturally, the topic of motorcycles came up.  But more on that later.

Genetically speaking, I know that I am half to blame for my son’s attitude.  But it’s not in the training, I know that much.  I’ve always been one to accept the consequences of my actions, and yes, even accept the random and unpredictable actions of the world.

But I really don’t like being blamed for things way, way, way beyond my control.

My theory, which I believe my son is still much too young to fathom, is that there is no such thing as control.  There is the perception of control, nothing more.  Control, in my mind, somehow speaks of something absolute, and I don’t believe there are any absolutes.  Everything is in flux.

Like my attention span.

Like my weight.

Like my ability to feel happy.

Like my shoe size.  Well, not really that one.  I like to think that when it comes to shoes I’m all fluxed out.

Ramble, ramble, ramble.  Here’s what I need to do this morning.

1. Complete two bids
2. Call three customers and confirm bids
3. Call the refinance woman and rattle her cage about the apparently higher then expected interest rate
4. Shuffle some bank funds
5. Find some coffee
6. Call my accountant and find out if we’re ready for the audit
7. Smooth out this whole moblog, cellphone camera entry business
8. Find some lunch when I finally realize I’ve missed breakfast
9. Recover my son’s lost digital pictures, if possible

And stop writing in lists.  Life, after all, only appears sequential.

My quiet weekend is almost run its course.  Mr. Questions will arrive at the doorstep within hours, maybe even minutes.  I better make a list.

1. I accomplished very little this weekend.
2. I did discover late last night that Soul Train is still on television, although it appears that the original host has been replaced.  I watched about three or four minutes, which is just about how long I’ve ever watched Soul Train.  Everyone was still shaking and grinding just about how I remembered.  I did see one new dance I hadn’t seen before.  Some baggy pants man with a backwards baseball cap was dancing with the bottom front of his t-shirt (does that part of a shirt have a name?) stuck in his mouth.  At first I thought it might just be a fluke, like maybe he was trying to buckle his belt or something, but the camera kept coming back to him, and sure enough, each time that t-shirt was still stuck between his teeth.
3. I’m thinking that I might try coming up with my own dance gimmick.  But at 43 and a bit overweight, it’s going to have to be a good one if I’m going to make the cut.
4. I’m also thinking that Martha Stewart is going to surprise everyone with her new prison sentence.  I think she’s going to end up earning computer privileges, start a blog which will become an instant hit, and then turn around and market the whole thing next year as a complete new line of products.  Think of the possibilities.  Hand towels with her prison number stamped on them.  Wallpaper with actual Martha Stewart blog material repeated at pleasing intervals.  Maybe a series of bath towels with her favorite blogrolls woven into the pattern.
5. I studied my new cellphone’s owner’s manual.  I can now say a person’s name and the phone automatically dials.  I contain my excitement in public, so as to not be confused with some sort of Star Trek geek.
6. I might watch The Alamo.
7. I received some loan papers in the mail for the house refinancing.  The interest rate appears to have “floated” a little higher then I was originally led to believe it would be, making for a payment several hundred dollars higher per month.
8. I’ve never believed that life would be fed to me with a golden spoon.
9. I just remembered something that Friday Night Girl said to me.  “Do you drive a truck?”
10. I have almost no memory of what I did only yesterday.  It’s hard to remember nothing.
11. I’m out of milk but caught up on the laundry.
12. I sometimes find myself wondering how long my son’s gerbil will live.  I am motivated to think about this because of the smell.
13. I frequent bars so little, that I am almost positive that I stick out when I’m there.  I imagine I look like a tourist, although I can’t imagine what country I would be visiting that would be so smoky and have so many drunks.
14. I keep thinking I will buy frames for some photographs I’ve taken of my son.  But every time I see the prices I think that capitalism must be some sort of psychological experiment to see just how far people can be pushed.  I keep putting the frames down and walking away.  I watch out of the corner of my eye, to see if anyone is taking notes.
15. I want to write more about Imaginary Keith and his new friend Ruckert.  I should have done that yesterday.
16. Today is my daughter’s birthday.  She is 19.  I called her up.  She now has her own apartment and roommates and a job and plans to go to school.  She has turned from a little girl into a little adult.  My mind pretends to follow her around to see what she is all about, but there is nothing really to follow.  I know so little about her.
17. The house gets inspected on Wednesday.
18. I watched a film on the internet yesterday that talked about the plane that hit the Pentagon.  The film claimed there was no plane.  It showed that there was no wreckage from any plane.  It talked about all of the cameras that were aimed in that direction and would have caught the plane on film, such as on a hotel, a gas station, and the highway department’s, and how the films were all confiscated within minutes of the pentagon being hit.  It showed the perfectly round holes in the pentagon, such as a missile might make, not a passenger jet.
19. I admitted to a friend that I had not watched a single presidential debate.  I even admitted to not knowing 100% for sure who represented a blue state and who represented a red state.  In my life, these things are unimportant.
20. I am going to vote, however.  So please, there is no need to rip into me.