Whenever my dad asks me if I want to go grocery shopping with my mom, I always say no. It's boring and I don't like shopping. TV is way more fun. I finally went with my mom one day because I got sick of his reproachful looks.
Here's what I thought when I first entered the supermarket:
The cart is my plate and the aisles are the tables. Food waits on every shelf, and all I have to do is reach out and drop it in the cart. It's like a big party that everyone's invited to.
My mom went to the salad section first, so I got my own cart and started grabbing. There were chocolate chip cookies, animal crackers, apple juice, bagels with raisins in there, and all kinds of cereal! I took some cheese puffs, nacho-flavoured Doritos, string cheese, and three Lunchable boxes. I like the pizza kinds a lot.
Here's what my mom looked like when she saw me sitting in my cart eating a pack of oreos with some milk:
I'm not allowed to go grocery shopping anymore.
When I was turning eight years old, I remember wanting exactly eight candles on my cake. I wanted people to see that I was already almost an adult, that with age comes a greater set of lungs to blow out the flames. I actually do remember inhaling deeply, making sure I blew out all the candles with one breath. Because two breaths is too easy, it's practically cheating. And trick candles are the devil.
I also used to be a pyromaniac, which is why I loved candles so much. I loved to play with matches and lighters around the house, and I used to burn paper because the flame made things disappear right in front of your eyes.
But one time I accidentally dropped a lit match in a trash can, and the plastic bag in there caught fire. So I don't like to burn things so much.
Anyway, my point is that I don't want 22 candles on a cake next year. Please.
Have you heard that the best murder weapon would be an icicle? Yeah, apparently that's supposed to be excellent for stabbing someone and then melting away evidence of murder. I'm not saying I want to be a murderer, but I just wanted to test that out and see if an icicle would really be a perfect murder weapon.
"Dad, do we have any icicles?" I ask my dad. He's watching TV because his old college football team is playing, but I don't think he's really ever paying attention because his team never wins. Why would you want to watch a losing team? Then again, he never seems very happy when he's watching TV, so maybe he is paying attention and feeling depressed at the same time.
"Why would we have icicles? We live in California," he says.
"I want to kill something with it and watch it melt," I say.
Like I said, I don't think he's really paying attention to the TV, but I don't think he's really paying any attention to me either. He keeps his eyes on the TV and just tells me I'm a crazy kid.
I find my mother in the yard outside gardening. "Hey Mom," I say to her when I get close enough, "do we have any icicles? I'm doing an experiment on murder."
"Well honey, I don't know," she says. She's shoveling at the ground and wipes her face with her sleeve. "What's this experiment?"
"I need to see if I can kill something with an icicle and I have to watch it melt."
"The icicle or the dead thing?"
I sigh loudly. "The icicle, Mom. The dead thing can't melt."
"It can if it's made of ice," she says, shoveling harder at the soil.
That shocks me because then not only would the murder weapon disappear, but the murder itself would be gone too. All that would be left would just be water, and what's the point of that then?
"You're really smart, Mom," I say admiringly.
"Go away. You're bothering me."
So I think hard about the coldest place nearby, and I go back in the house and check the freezer. We didn't have any icicles in there, but there are small bits of ice that I can sharpen. I grab the biggest ice piece and begin to whittle it with a butter knife.
When I have a sharp enough piece, I go outside and find some ants. I think about how murder is not good, but then I remember that ants are annoying and ruin a perfectly good cookie on the ground. So I pretend I'm a scientist and how I'm doing this in the name of science, and then I begin to try and stab an ant, but it's too fast for me.
My conclusion is that icicles good for nothing except cooling drinks.
When I was five, I had a goldfish named Harry. Harry was not a regular fish just like I was not a regular boy. We could talk to each other and we were each other's best friend.
One day I was watching Harry swim in his small little bowl and wanted to learn how to swim from him. "Hey Harry," I said, "Can I swim with you?"
"Sure," Harry said. "But you won't fit in here."
So then I thought abou that big bowl that I take baths in and brought him in with me. Harry showed me how to move my arms and my tail, but I couldn't do it because my bones were weird and I didn't have a tail.
"Thanks anyway, Harry," I said, still watching him swim around my legs. "If there's anything I can help you with..."
"Actually," Harry said excitedly, "can I walk with you?"
"Sure," I said. "But we can't do it in here."
So then I took Harry out and put him on the floor. I tried to teach him how to put one foot in front of the other while keeping my body up, but he didn't have legs and his body was too big.
Harry fell down on the floor and sighed. "Let's take a break," he said, crawling into my hand. "Let's just rest."
So that's how Mom found Harry and me, sleeping on the floor next to the bathtub. She screamed and I woke up, but Harry didn't. He was still sleeping on my hand.
If everything feels gooey to you,
Stop and lick your finger.
Fiction is great because you can make stories out of anything. Anyone and anything can be a character, and there are no limits to what that person or thing can do.
In reality, we find lint annoying. But imagine a story based around lint on a sweater as a dying community. There are armies of lint, organized and determined to fight against the enemy, The Roller. When The Roller attacks, it wipes out whole populations by barreling down homes and picking up innocents as trophies. The elders of the community cry for their lost sons and daughters because they have lasted such a long time, and it is only when creation overfills homes that The Roller comes. The Roller is heartless and enjoys taking away the young ones, shedding its skin often for the next generation to experience its full effect.
Something must be done. The elders gather in a sleeve and discuss stratagems, possible hiding places for the new ones in the community, but before they can execute their plans The Roller comes and decimates the lint. Some still remain. Most are gone.
This would be sad if we really cared about lint. But sometimes fiction can fail in believability.
She wore a purple hat brandished with an ostrich plume sticking out flamboyantly and a scarf around her neck that had little peacocks on it. Her clothes in themselves weren't anything too showy, just a white shirt and black slacks. She was even wearing nondescript sandals. But it was the plume, the peacocks, the bright purple lipstick that she must've bought in a good mood that made her so colorful that I could literally see the life glowing in her.
Her eyes squinted until they found me, and then she gasped loudly and began to wave her arm around. "Jess! Over here!"
I quickly walked to her before she could yell some more. "Hi Mom," I said, kissing her on the cheek. "Nice hat."
"Do you like it? I bought it on sale. Seven dollars! Isn't it a bargain?" She wrapped her arms around me and squeezed my shoulders. Even with thin arms, she could still crush me. "Jess! Oh baby, how have you been?"
"Good. How are you?" We made our way to the car and put my bag in the trunk. "I heard you're off chemo now from Dad."
She winked at me and took off her hat, revealing the smooth skin that used to bring her to tears. Now she loves it. "Look at me. If I can't have a hair statement, then no one's going to stop me from having a hat statement." She laughed and opened the car door. "Let's get some ice cream. It's a good day, Jess!"
Maybe we should all buy hats with plumes.
