I Don't Care If It Rains Or Freezes

Brian was sitting in his car. The keys were in the ignition, but he hadn't turned his wrist to start the car. The problem was with his Plastic Jesus. Normally the cheerful figurine of the savior sat directly above the steering wheel. This morning it seemed Jesus had decided to venture over to the dashboard in front of the passenger seat.


Nothing else in the car was disturbed. The usual garbage in the wheel wells was in it's place. The fast food wrappers and cups all held their positions, like staunch soldiers in trench warfare. Only Jesus had taken it upon himself to move, to go over the trench into No-Man's Land.


The morning sun was warming the automobile. Soon Brian's armpits became damp with sweat. He was still staring over at that Plastic Jesus, who stood on his abalone shell. Finally, with a shrug, Brian turned his wrist and started the car.


His work was only ten miles away, but the drive took an hour. The cause was, of course, the esoteric manner in which the city had laid out the highways and surrounding streets. They had built an overpass directly above Brian's house. It really was a marvel of engineering. The tall elegant pillars that supported the road almost always glistened in the morning and evening sun. When the city builds an overpass directly over your house they never make it easy to get on the highway. They should install convenient on and off-ramps nearby, but they never do. The excuse the city council gave was simple, direct, and utilitarian. They didn't want to move anymore houses than was necessary.


As compensation for the overpass above his roof the city gave Brian ten thousand dollars. That was enough to take a couple of years off mortgage payments, but not enough to move. His house was now the least desirable dwelling in the county. All of his neighbors left. The neighborhood became a dark silent place.

The solitude was why Brian had purchased the Plastic Jesus, to keep him company on the long drive to work. When you pressed the button at Jesus' feet a recording spouted out various parables from the New Testament. After six months of constant pressing Jesus' voice had become demonic. Brian no longer pressed the button.


The drive to work took twice as long as usual, and instead of parking, Brian drove around the block. He only made sharp right turns, hoping that the force of the turn would move Jesus back over to his side of the dashboard. After an hour of turning right Jesus was still anchored to the passenger side. Brian stared across the sea of fast food wrappers and plastic bags. Finally he gave up.


When the police arrived at city hall they cordoned off the block. When news crews started arriving the police erected barricades. It took several hours for the hostage negotiations to come to an end, even though everything moved along at an eerily ordered pace. The council members were the most unusual hostages. Instead of crying and begging for their lives they laid out the reasons for their decisions. Everything came down to sound, logical, reasoning. There was no malice, only the cold apathy of Utilitarian zoning policies. There were no casualties, but Brian was still charged with several felonies. The sentencing was quick. The public defender had several other, more desperate, cases.


In an unfortunate turn of events, the Judge was very understanding of Brian's circumstances. Instead of time in prison Brian was sentenced with several thousands of hours of community service. He was allowed to return home, where everyday a van would pick him up, and make the long commute to the highway.

As he walked up and down the highway, carrying his pointed stick, Brian found thousands of Plastic Jesus figurines. The ditches along the highway were full of them. They were in their wrappers, fresh and new. A smile lit Brian's face as he gathered the figurines into the pockets of his orange jumpsuit. Suddenly the bridge, the dashboard, the wrappers, even the loneliness all made sense. Next to the ditches filled with Plastic Jesus figurines the city council's decisions and stoicism made perfect harmonious sense. In the light of his unknown discovery life became bearable, and the universe unfolded before him. He filled his allotted trash bags and returned to the van for more.


Years later the city decided to demolish the overpass. The city had shifted to the south, and a different more direct route was needed. The most striking aspect of the bridge was that its pillars still sparkled in the morning and evening sun. Truly it was a miracle that the decades of car exhaust hadn't dulled the shimmer of the white concrete. When the zoning inspectors came to vacate the old dilapidated house below the bridge they found the door unlocked. They found the house in perfect order, save the incredible layers of dust that covered every inch of the residence. In the center of the house they found the mummified remains of a man. The body was lying on the floor, arms outstretched. Surrounding the naked corpse were thousands of grimy Plastic Jesus figurines.

The Ballast of Professor Barnum's Balloon.

In Professor Barnum's balloon it is hard to hear anything other than the sound of the wind, seagulls, and of course that damned slide-guitar he carries everywhere with him. Last week I almost threw it over the side of the basket. But when the old coot pointed out that the guitar provided some of our precious ballast, well I had to acquiesce. The irritating thing is he never stopped playing the guitar. He kept finishing his arguments with a chorded strum of the slide guitar's strings. Even right now he's still playing that damn thing.

We haven't gone hungry yet. Thanks in large part to the seagulls. The butterfly net I brought has seen to that. We hang seagull guts over the side of the basket. Even though the smell is atrocious, the seagulls can't get enough of it. When we get down from here I am never, ever going to eat seagull again, unless of course I've got some of that spicy chinese mustard. My only concern is the similarity between Barnum's incessant slide guitar antics and those of an experienced Guqin player. Of course you and I know the difference between the elegant Chinese instrument and Barnum's backwater bastard of a banjo. 

Yesterday it rained, which was actually the best possible thing that could have happened. Well, rain or a sighting of land, a place to set the balloon down would have been nice. The Professor and I reckon we've got enough water to last us another four days, and if we keep steering into thunderheads I don't think we'll have a problem making it to the mainland. The Professor must be tired, I didn't see him lift his head once yesterday. Yet, the whole day he played that damn slide guitar. 

I'm only writing this note in case we do crash on the mainland. I'm tired of eating seagull, and I can't stand the sound of the slide guitar. If I threw everything over the side of the basket then I wouldn't have to listen to anyone blather on about the relation of balloons and twelfth century scottish folk dances, the relationship is negligible, tenuous at best. I think the Professor might suspect my plan though. If he wasn't dead I'm sure he would say something. Who knew someone could be allergic to seagull down? I might've angered him when I made fun of his hives, but it has been over a month, and he hasn't said a word. All he's done is driven me mad with that infernal slide guitar.  

Tin and Timely Logging Accidents

When I had asked you, "Is that it then?" Well your silence broke me. I couldn't tell you what part. It might've been the liver, but the pain didn't stop at my torso. My nerves might have shattered, of course I mean what's left of them might've shattered. Somewhere a steam gauge whistled as it released a pressure valve. When you slammed the door I crashed to the floor for a minute. 

Anyway I went out back and chopped off my left hand. It hurt that much. I threw the hand at the house. It hit the window with a bloody thwop. The doctors built me a new hand a week later to match the other one. Now I've got two new hands, and neither of them remember how your hair felt running through their fingers. 

When you left for your mother's again, well I lost control of my ax. Either way the doctors said I was better off with this new leg. I can barely tell the difference anymore. I think I run faster now. The trees seem to fall quicker too. What matters most to me is the fact that this leg will never remember the way you would run your foot up and down its calf as we lay in bed whispering our love to each other. 

It wasn't until those suspicious lumberjacks approached me and handed me those blue papers that I figured out was going on. Of course they startled me, just as I was making the final cuts in a large Douglas Fir. Well the ax hit me right in the sternum, and well, you know how strong I am. For a while I was glad to be dying, but then the doctors gave me my new organs. I got new kidneys, a new spleen, of course a whole new digestive tract. Best of all they made it so I didn't need a heart. 

So I guess you understand now why I didn't cry in court. Why I didn't cry when you took the kids away from me. I hope you even understand why I didn't cry when you went into great detail about your love for your new husband. That was really unnecessary, I sometimes think that the judge should have stopped you. I just wrote this so you would understand that I didn't cry because I couldn't. Otherwise I'd rust up.