At one point, Anne and Drew lived what they thought was a normal, middle class life.  Drew left the finances to his wife, but didn’t realize until it was too late that she was becoming extremely absent-minded.  One month, for example, Anne defaulted on the mortgage.  The bank was unrelenting in its determination to foreclose, and before they could know what hit them, they were looking for a new place to live. 

Drew came up with the idea that they live on a houseboat anchored off of American Samoa.  But misfortune struck again.  As soon as they had settled into their new lives, hungry octopuses swarmed the deck.  Drew and Anne tried to fight them off, to no avail.  Even worse, an octopus knocked Drew off the boat, and he hit his head on the anchor and broke his neck in four places.  It was ugly.  Drew became an artist after being paralyzed and painted with his mouth.  Although he had some success, Anne left him for another painter, whose name she could not remember.

                                    
“Make your ear hear what your mouth utters”
But how does one hear even a loud noise
When the heart is shut against the world?

How much of the Holy must be imagined
Before It can be ignored to remain
Held in Its place by words?

Words will spill freely and not have their
Meaning overflow from the heart
Yet nothing else is needed.

Solidarity                                Rejection

Stand for                                  Stand against

Stand in                                    Stand between

Stand up                                   Stand over

Stand along                              Stand away

Stand with                                Stand down

He turns his chair away from his desk and now watches the door of his room.  It  opens slowly.  In walks a pudgy woman in her early 20’s wearing baggy blue jeans and a grey sweatshirt, her shoulder-length curly dark brown hair emerging from under a dark blue baseball cap sporting a white “B.”  The man knows that the “B” stands for Brooklyn and that the cap is a Brooklyn Dodgers cap.  He should know, because he put the cap there on her head.  In the man’s world, 52 years have passed since there was such a baseball team as the Brooklyn Dodgers.  In his world, it lives only in photographs and memories.  In the woman’s world, the Dodgers have just left Brooklyn, and she hasn’t gotten over the shock of it.

Here’s the link: http://www.amazon.com/Adels-Journal-Other-Stories-ebook/dp/B005KBQISC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322251029&sr=8-1

To the wooded way I walk alone/In search of a nearer bark/To the forest I am/To the deep green I seek/The knowledge of what is.

And I kneel to limb of soft repose/In hope of a kind response/To the branches I feel/To the dark shade I pray/The dusk and night that must.

In the roots we leave but leaves to be/In need of a pruning sun/To the hearts’ bleed I plea/To the sweet tree I fall/The kiss we drink which does.

What takes almost a year to plan, a tremendous amount of patience, a small army of contractors and other participants — caterer, innkeeper, florist, DJ, guitarist, violinist, car service, banker, printer, computer wizard, glazier, rabbi, manager, lighting director, guests, friends, kosher butcher, families, car rental agencies, vintners, servers, bartenders, airlines, a kiddush cup, a small bag with a ready-to-be-broken glass, craft store centerpieces, and doctors on hand (even if the doctor called upon to render services not once, but twice, is one’s son) — and then is over in an afternoon and evening that go by too quickly? 

 You guessed it … our daughter’s wedding, which we were honored and thrilled to celebrate yesterday with friends and family.  Anyone who’s had the pleasure we had yesterday knows that words cannot capture that feeling of floating along on the tsunami of joy that such a day brings.   

 Now, given that there will likely be thousands of digital photographs memorializing the event, as well as a full-length video, why sit here now and try to put the experience into words?  In other words, why write about a wedding?  Well, one shouldn’t. 

 One should just try to live in the moment and hold the memories as near to one’s heart as possible.

Clayton kept his eyes closed and breathed evenly until sure that the other migrant farm workers in his filthy bunkroom slept.  When he heard their cacophony of snores, he slipped quietly out into the moonless night and looked about quickly to see if any of Lee’s henchmen were around.  Seeing none, he walked briskly but quietly past the bunkhouses towards the road to what he hoped would be freedom from the labor camp.  But, before he could turn out of sight, he happened to kick a beer can, and it scuttled noisily among the stones.  He froze for a second, then heard the barking of Lee’s pit bull shattering the stillness.  Part of his brain told him to drop to the ground and accept the whipping he knew would come for trying to run away while supposedly owing Lee money.  But Lee’s shout galvanized Clayton to abandon the rutted lane and dash into the tobacco field. 

The tall plants provided cover, yet the earth gave way with each step, making it impossible for Clayton to run well.  Within seconds, he gasped for air.  Disoriented in the darkness, he heard the barking of Lee’s dog closing.  He dodged left and right in the hope of evading his pursuers, and as he brushed the tobacco leaves he scratched his arms and face.  Now, the sounds of Lee and his henchmen were both in front of and behind him.  He kneeled to catch his breath, then tried to launch himself up too quickly.  Blood drained from his head and he toppled. 

Lee stood over Clayton, holding a shotgun.  The pit bull grabbed one of Clayton’s legs, biting through his jeans.  Lee kicked Clayton heavily in the side and pushed him over onto his back.  

“I warned you, man.  No one leaves my camp owin’ me money.”  Lee spat on Clayton and kicked him again.  He pointed towards a nearby copse of trees, then handed the shotgun to his chief lieutenant, nicknamed Dread.  “You know whatcha gotta do.  Do it quick.”  He leashed the pit bull, and marched off muttering.  

“Come on, asshole.”  Dread hauled Clayton to his feet.

Clayton thought about trying to run again, but knew that he couldn’t get away.  He had given escape its best shot and had to accept that his life had run its course.  Dread pushed Clayton down to his knees near the pines.  Clayton felt the cold press of steel against the back of his neck.  He …

            The inevitable fact about competitive sports is that, for every winner, there’s a loser.  You know what I mean: for all the joy in St. Louis today, there’s pain and sorrow in Dallas.  For every nine-year old Cards fan whose life has brightened incredibly because her hometown heroes pulled off a miracle, there’s a nine-year old Rangers fan who feels like life is ending.  I know, because as a 12-year-old Dodgers fan in 1962 I recall well the ecstasy of the Dodgers’ comeback victory in Game 2 of the National League playoffs that shifted immediately to deep sorrow when the Dodgers lost the deciding Game 3 to the Giants, blowing a ninth-inning lead.  I cried my heart out, and I’m sure I wasn’t alone.  This revolving door of joy and agony that we put ourselves through spins faster for baseball than for any other sport. 

            Some — and my fictional character, Adel Miller, is among them — hold their heroes so closely to their hearts that they come to believe they are their heroes, or that their heroes have a special, mystical relationship with them.  For Adel, it was Jackie Robinson, who spoke words of love to her that no one else could hear.  For me, it was Duke Snider, the great ballplayer I dreamed of becoming.  Fortunately for both Adel and me, we met our heroes, we touched them, they became real people we knew as well as the lights of our imaginations.

It’s found in “To Hide in Athens and Other Stories”!

He waits for her nervously, yearning for a cigarette, but has stopped and so must be content drumming his fingers on the desk. He wonders at this nervousness. Even as a medical student, he approached each crisis calmly. As a psychiatry resident, he was known for steadiness under pressure. But for some reason, Adel’s imminent arrival has shot adrenalin into his veins. He does not understand why his colleague suggested that he take over Adel’s one-on-one therapy.