Land of the Free, Home of the Brainless(Silverton Style)
May 29, 2015
Getting All Your Lilacs in a Row
June 26, 2015
The book of essays publication is coming along nicely. Its taking up a lot of extra time, but fortunately I am able to take care of all sorts of other projects. One of these is the writing of a short story based on an earlier essay that was posted to the blog a few years ago. Getting the initial idea is winning half the battle when it comes to writing a story. This one is short-n-sweet, but lots of fun when I wrote it.
Word Count: 1355
Disguised Painful Serendipity
Nobody ever said life was fair, and this happens to be a prime example of that. Here I am on the second day after flying half way across the country to visit an old college buddy and hobbled up with a broken heel. Not only does it happen on the very afternoon after I step off the airplane, but it takes place at the initial swimming hole we visit, the very first time I jump in the water, and the exact moment after my buddy says he’s got a great week of visiting plunge pools planned. One has to assume that if it weren’t for bad luck I probably wouldn’t have any luck at all.
God only knows what I did to deserve this? Let’s be brutally honest shall we? Absolutely nothing. Even my own sisters say I’m a shining example of Boy Scout virtue on steroids. Don’t drink, don’t smoke, don’t lie or cheat, have never even considered stealing anything. Volunteer for every sort of masochistic activity that comes along even if it’s about as much fun as life in a North Korean bomb-building factory.
Hell from an international playboy perspective, my life is downright disgusting when you think about it. Then this happens. I know some philosophical metaphor says you shouldn’t dwell on unplanned accidents, but so what. Waah, waaah waaaah. I’m entitled to complain all I want. Of course I want cheese with my whine.
Adam Flanders wasn’t exactly feeling like last week’s Lottery winner. More like next month’s inductee into The Grumpy Old Men’s League of Malcontents. He’d flown in from Montana, where the water temperature at every single swimming hole happens to be a scant two or three degrees above freezing, to his buddies’ neck of the woods in New Hampshire. Mid summer-New England water temps. being in the bath water range. More conducive to actually jumping into holes and swimming around like a happy beaver. In anticipation of their odyssey, Adam thought it quite the novel concept to actually spend some time in the water without planning a split second exit right after entering it.
Speaking of expending energy, he’d spent the entire trans-continental flight slobbering over a book Nelson Honeycomb had sent him in anticipation of their adventure entitled, “Great Swimming Holes of New England”. This missive was a clear indication that there happened to be other “Gen. Y” types like themselves obsessed with jumping into hidden (and not so secret) bodies of water. Located deep within “Lord of The Rings” type environments no less.
White sandy tropical beaches? We don’t need no stinkin’ sea level equatorial environs. It’s easier to jump into the water when you discover a plunge pool for one thing. Besides, the stuff tastes better when you mistakenly swallowing some of it too. Doesn’t make you want to up-chuck whatever’s in your stomach like you do when an errant wave broadsides you.
Fortunately, Adam did have his latest novel to read while lying on a mattress and attempting to entertain himself. Doesn’t help matters that it happens to be some sort of espionage thriller about covert workplace spies. Making razor thin escapes from the clutches of “evil corporate bureaucrats.” Wait a second, that’s an oxymoron isn’t it? Why couldn’t my heel have made a finely edged avoidance of that rock?
Instead I just barely clipped it as I entered the water, crawled out of the creek like some sort of prehistoric amphibious slug, and knew immediately it wasn’t just a muscle pull. Muscle pulls don’t hurt like you’re being stretched out on a medieval torture rack. Maybe they do, never had the occasion to experience that form of physical abuse.
Followed that up in short order by having to hop up the hill to Nelson’s car, then suffer in silence while driving back to the hospital. I should’ve cried and made all sorts of noise, but then Nelson would be tempted to accuse me of being a baby. At least babies have a legitimate excuse whenever they yell and scream.
It’s broken all right. Knew that when I couldn’t even stand up and put any weight on the foot without envisioning an extended vacation at Guantanomo Bay.
_______________
“Man you should’ve seen the expression on that nurses’ face when you exited the examination room and hopped your way down the hall to the bathroom,” said Nelson. “Total shock is putting it mildly.”
Adam grimaced. “What else was I supposed to do? Sit in that diagnosis room with a full bladder till the day after Armageddon?”
“Might take that long too. What were you in there for, four hours? Good thing they were planning to have a doctor examine the X-rays right away.”
“Something like that. God only knows when they were actually going to send a chiropractor in to tell me the heel is out of commission for the next six weeks.
Nelson chuckled. “Luckily this country has the best health care system in the world. Imagine what it’d be like if you weren’t insured?”
“I’d rather not envision that scenario.”
Since Adam’s flight back home wasn’t for another week, he had lots of time to twiddle his thumbs between readings. Unfortunately none of those readings happened to be the local newspaper in Nelson’s hometown of Bradford Cove, “The Times Journal.”
The boy’s next plunge pool visit happened to be “Harmony Gorge”. Just below the site of a former stone quarry that had backfilled itself with a huge quantity of water, then ended up being plugged with a makeshift damn of soil and rock. Not exactly built with the most dynamic architectural foresight put into the endeavor. More like casual afterthought and Bradford Cove’s town fathers wanting to get something done without putting any sort of time, money, or effort into it.
A retired foundation contractor named Horacio Muntz had been warning local authorities for over four years that the makeshift damn was precariously holding up. About to burst as the result of the smallest amount of stress to its wall. This would force its hand and cause the structure to burst ominously. As Horacio put it, “One straw short of a highly aggravated camel back.” Result being a huge wall of water flooding into the gorge downstream and making a person’s last swimming hole visit look like a nonchalant inner tube float trip.
That’s exactly what happened too. Torrential rains right before Adam’s heel mishap had opened up the sky for the past three days. Suddenly the underpinnings of the damn started to loosen up and water began to seep through. Since there wasn’t a kid present to stick his finger in the dyke, things slowly began to collapse. Sure enough water burst through and a perfect opportunity for a front-page story presented itself for an aspiring unpaid Times Journal newspaper intern.
_______________
The incident’s aftermath became quite the topic of discussion for the former college roommates:
“Hey gimpy,” said Nelson as he waltzed into the living room. “You see the front page story in today’s Times Journal?”
“No,” said Adam. “Contrary to what you may think, I’m not really as bored as I look. Your hometown isn’t exactly a hotbed of activity either, so I wasn’t interested. I’m keeping my mind occupied in other ways.”
“Sometimes things can get sort of interesting.”
“Yeah right. News about Ethel Chalmer’s visit to see her new grandson just doesn’t seem to cut it with me.”
“Check this out. Yesterday’s big story.”
Adam’s eyes grew one size bigger. “Oh my gosh.”
Nelson smiled, and then he realized the ramifications had they visited the spot. “Turns out we would’ve been at Harmony Gorgeright when this huge washout took place.”
“Scary.”
“That’s putting it mildly. You breaking that heel was like a blessing in disguise for the two of us.”
“Sure didn’t feel that way when it took place.”
“A lot of things in life don’t make much sense when they happen, but in the end there’s usually always a reason for them to occur the way they do.”
“Almost sounds kind of cryptic.”
“Yeah, like X-Files meets a bad Warner-Brother’s cartoon.”
