*Joke Of The Day

CATEGORY: A day in my life

AUTHOR'S PHILOSOPHY: As a storyteller, I regard it as my obligation to form a crowd of one for street performers. I'm usually rewarded with a new story to tell.

The street corner display is crude –a tower of three blue plastic crates. I slow down to read the small sign rigged on top. “Joke of the Day. Donations Accepted.”

My jokes are not crude, the proprietor informs me.

I smile, as required.

If you want a dirty joke madam, he says, you can put that dollar bill right back in your Bhopal satchel with the Malavi dialect writing.

I’m thoroughly respectable, I assure him.

He nods and removes the bottom crate, placing it against a store window within a small patch of shade. Patting to make sure it’s steady, he motions with a courtly bow for me to sit. I'm too hot to match his theatricality with my usual flair. I just want to sit down and watch someone else perform for a change.

Meanwhile, passers-by walk around us with the nonchalance of city dwellers accustomed to street antics. When he starts telling me the joke, however, a few people stop to see what's going on.

The joke is about a rabbi, a priest, and a flea in a bar, who meet a farmer’s daughter knock-knocking on the door. I don’t get the punchline, but enjoy the delivery. He acts out all the parts pretty well, I think, with an especially graceful leap as the flea.

During the telling an even bigger crowd assembles, and everyone claps at the end. The dollar bills in his hat mount up.The impromptu audience melts back into the late afternoon sunshine, but I remain sitting gratefully, for an extra moment or two. Then I remember what he said about my purse.

How did you know it’s from Bhopal, I ask. Have you been to India?

He nods. Not only do I know where it comes from, he says, but I can translate the embroidered words.

Really, I exclaim. What does it say?

He holds up a finger for me to wait. Reaching inside one of the crates, he pulls out a thick black marker. Then he begins writing on the other side of the joke sign. When he finishes, he sets it back in place.

“Translations. Donations accepted,” it says.

Fair enough, I think, handing him another dollar.

And that’s how I learn my purse has a dirty joke about eunuchs on it, written for all the world to see. Or at least, for those who claim to understand Malavi.

*Party Games

CATEGORY: Pure (or impure) Imagination

AUTHOR EXPLANATION: This is why I don't go out much.

Last night I met a wonderful girl at a party. I mean I could really talk to this girl. She approached as I was standing around feeling ill at ease holding a glass of wine, not connecting with anyone. To appear actively engaged in the party, I was shaking my glass a little and holding it up to my ear, as if listening to the tiny tinkling of the party charm around the base. My party charm was a skateboard, though I don't skate. I didn't get to choose my own charm, which I thought was supposed to be part of the fun. If I ever give a party, people will be able to have whichever charm they want. I mean if I owned party charms.

I noticed the girl earlier because she was dressed modestly by today's standards, the only one - male or female - whose nipples weren't featured prominently.

She didn't bother with introductory chatter, after a simple hello. "I want to stick one of my fingers into that fan," she said, indicating the one in the window closest to us. "Do you think I should?"

I advised against it. "I mean if there were fewer people at the party I'd say go ahead."

She nodded.

"I know a fun party game," she suggested. And it was fun! We went around the house guessing how each person was going to die. At first we were conservative. Cancer, heart attack, car accident - your garden variety deaths. Then we became more creative and developed back stories. My best contribution was the surfer dude wannabe who joined his father's relatives in the I.R.A and died with bombs strapped to his body at Heathrow. We regarded his once-gelled hair slicked flat with booze as he downed shots for a stunt. What a glorious death he would have compared to his current shallow life

The game that engaged us the longest was her idea. It was called "Assassin." You follow a drunk guy home from a party, then off him. This led to a lively discussion about method.

Now she's sleeping. I mean in my bedroom, and I'm fixing breakfast which I intend to serve her in bed.

Then we have to decide how to dispose of the body.

*The Importance of Food In A Relationship

CATEGORY: Part memoir, part wishful thinking

AUTHOR REFUSAL: will not say which part is which

I ran into an old boyfriend today. He looked great, and he must have thought the same about me because he suggested we continue the conversation over burgers and beers.

"I don’t know, Nate.” I shook my head. “That’s quite a comedown from the last time we dined together."

This was in reference to a meal we ate at Brazzaville in the Republic of Congo early 1999.

As a consultant in the airline industry for emerging nations, Nate travels all over the world. Accompanying him on business trips, which I was able to do a few times, was always an adventure in gastronomy.

"Liked that bat stew, did you?" he smiled.

"Hey, I got it down - and managed to KEEP it down," I reminded him.

"Only because I drowned it in the mango sauce," he countered. "I had to pour all of my sauce on your plate, too, when the Mbasa weren’t looking.”

When I asked him where he was going next, he replied, "How do you like your bobotie?"

"Stuffed with currants and flavored with gare masala" I shot back, grinning.

“In or out of a pumpkin?” His eyes narrowed.

I hesitated, unsure of myself.

Then, “No pumpkin,” I said firmly. “The Argentine version with pumpkin is based on a different sect of the Boer culture, the ones who chose not go to the East Indies. So, it’s too far from the source, for me."

He studied me, appraisingly.

Perhaps it's time to renew my passport.

*That Old Tub

CATEGORY: Memoir, Dream

AUTHOR INSIGHT: Brazil is a fictional place, in reality.

I close my eyes and awaken in my young husband's dream. He wants to be a fisherman off the coast of Bahia, Brazil. I want what he wants.

Now I'm with women all waiting for our men to return on that old fishing tub, Mas Linda. Everyone here thinks it's good luck my name is Linda, like the captain's wife. I think to myself, that old tub needs a lot more than luck.

I'm in a tin kitchen by the sea and they feed me soup made from fish heads. It is flavored with spices timed to explode in waves. First the mouth, then the throat, then the chest.

They laugh when I gasp and cough. Even their laughter is to the beat of samba . I don't mind being teased. It distracts me.

I love being here, truly. The air's so sweet I don't even want to exhale.

But all I can think about is where's that old tub.

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/forums/?ID=51268146

*Bee Boy

CATEGORY: Memoir

AUTHOR INTRO: If a grown-up Bee Boy should happen to read this, it might help him to know I came to be a pariah of sorts, in time.

When I was 14 years old, I saved my little sister from an attack by Bee Boy at the Greyhound Bus station in Philadelphia. We were there on alternating Saturdays throughout 1962, catching a Baltimore-bound bus to fulfill court-ordered visits to our father.

In those years, east coast Greyhound bus stations were repositories of ancient filth. Like the accumulation of mankind's history stored

at the Library of Alexandria, the grime at Greyhound told stories. You could read the myriad substances produced and disposed of by human bodies. These stories were authenticated by odors trapped in the building for decades, like ghosts doomed to haunt the place their earthly life ended.

"Don't forget to go to the bathroom NOW," I'd remind my sister before we left home.

I was determined our very first visit to the station rest room would also be our last. It was the thick-textured dirt climbing my toilet stall like jungle vines that convinced me.

Unfortunately, my sister was not fastidious by nature. At first, she was not willing to hold in her pee just because I said a plague might invade her panties if she used the station toilets. The word 'cooties' had lost its terror for her - my fault for overusing it when we were much younger.

For this occasion, then, I made up some convincing-sounding disease names. Mackolepsy. Chronic Nostrilitus Lympasematic Syndrome. The former resulted in drowning, because you became unconscious, slipped off the throne, twisted your body around, hit your head, and fell face-forward into the toilet bowl. The latter caused the paramecium viral form of bacteria fungus to enlarge in your blood stream and be excreted from your armpits or unravel from your nostrils, several days after exposure. This would happen in your classroom or the playground, and for the rest of your school years you’d be shunned.

Thank God we had no Internet back then. A kid today would have googled my homemade medical conditions and realized I was lying. Instead, wide-eyed, my sister finally agreed not to use the Greyhound restroom ever again. She was over 30 when she learned the truth. She said she was tempted to stop speaking to me until I reminded her I once risked my life to save her from Bee Boy.

Who was Bee Boy? He was a kid about my age, headquartered at Greyhound. I learned something from him: until then, I thought only in India did the homeless live without homes.

There was no doubt he was without family or home according to station employees. He was in and out of the place at all hours, and he slept there. He lived on burgers and fries customers left on their plates at the station’s restaurant counter, scraped off and saved by waitresses who felt sorry for him. The newsstand owner threw a couple of peanut butter cracker packs and and a mini-carton of milk at him every day, in exchange for a guarantee he wouldn’t come close and bother the customers. Though he was universally pitied throughout the station, the stronger feeling he evoked from others was revulsion.

Now I realize Bee Boy was mentally retarded, emotionally disturbed, nutritionally malnourished, physically disabled - you name it. He suffered from everything but mackolepsy and nostrilitus. In retrospect, it breaks my heart no one thought to alert social agencies about him. Not even the cops on the Greyhound beat did. Deep down inside, no one believed he was ....human. A smallish hunchback perched on his short, chubby torso and the way he rubbed his hands together (and his feet, while sitting) made him resemble a bee. It didn’t help that his only vocalization was a humming, increasing to a sizzle like food burning on a grill when he was angry. I didn’t create the name Bee Boy; the Greyhound crowd did, and it stuck. But I wasn’t nice to him, either.

My sister and I weren’t the only passengers in the waiting room who Bee Boy harassed. We just made it easy for him by appearing like clockwork every other Saturday at 8:30 am for the 9:15 express to Baltimore. Some cunning survival instinct he possessed, registered that fact.

Originally, I assumed he just wanted to frighten us. Soon I realized his goal was to sting. The first few times he buzzed around, we shooed him away with our hands. After that, we came prepared. I armed both of us with a low-tech piece of equipment, the fly swatter. Just a handle with a rubbery flapper at the end to keep him further at bay.

We employed a defense strategy too: usage of a protective wall by sitting in the midst of the maximum number of people available. If our human wall got up to leave on a bus earlier than ours, we changed seats to a population cluster of newer arrivals. Our maneuvers around the station infuriated me because I could see he enjoyed the chase.

One Saturday morning we were earlier than usual because the schedule to Baltimore had changed. There were hardly any people around. Fortunately, Bee Boy wasn’t there either. My sister was nodding off, more asleep than not. Suddenly, I had to pee so badly I briefly fantasized about doing it off in a corner, like Bolivian women who squat everywhere, their act hidden by voluminous skirts. That way, I could simultaneously avoid the bathroom cooties AND be able to keep my sister in sight in case Bee Boy materialized. But I was wearing jeans.

Unfortunately, this time, I had to use the bathroom. I just had to. I figured I would run and be back to my sister well before Bee Boy could reach her, even if he walked in right NOW, I reasoned. The bathroom and my sister were on the far end of the station, seemingly miles from Bee Boy’s Market Street entrance. Possibly I should have awakened her, but I didn’t want her to know I was violating my own rule. Once you lose face in front of a younger sibling, the balance of the entire relationship is knocked off-kilter, forever.

I took a deep breath, ran to the bathroom, and emerged a minute later, still holding my breath. I was pleased with myself for being so swift - until I saw Bee Boy hovering above my sister, who had just that second awakened to the nightmare sight of him about to sting her.

“Leave her alone,” I screached. I sprinted toward them, just as a can of coke catapulted out of the newsstand and bounced harmlessly off Bee Boy’s hump. The surprise of it slowed him down just long enough for me to reach his side and to push him as far away from my sister as I could. “Get away from us you ugly, disgusting insect,” I screamed.

I was shorter than Bee Boy and skinny. What I didn’t expect was to push him with such force that he fell. I don’t know whether he was hurt or not, but he cowered there on the floor, crying. Sobbing, truth be told. My sister was crying too, so I turned to comfort her. I walked her away with me, leaving Bee Boy in a humming heap on the floor.

I steered her over to the newstand and the owner handed us two Hershey bars. “Is she all right” he asked. “I saw what was happening and threw a can of pop at him.” My sister was sniffling while unwrapping the candy bar, and I concluded she was just fine.

No one went to Bee Boy. He laid out on the floor for a long time, and no one went to him. People walked around him, but no one checked to see whether he needed help. Our bus was announced, eventually, and he was still there.

Sunday evening upon our return, I half expected him to see him in the same position, in the same spot. But we never saw Bee Boy again. No one knew anything about what became of him, either.

The newsstand guy retired within a few months and sold his small business. The restaurant closed down because a McDonalds and other fast food places had moved in on the block. The cops we knew were rotated elsewhere. Soon, my sister and I were the only Greyhound regulars who wondered about Bee Boy. It didn't occur to me at age 14, that someone's existence could be forgotten.

Last night before posting this, I searched on the Internet for “Bee Boy” (and Beeboy and beeboy and even beboy). Would he turn up in anyone else’s memoir of the Philly Greyhound Bus Station in the early sixties? Nope. I’m the first to capture him on paper.

Though my own heartlessness back then pains me now, it's understandable. And I'm willing to bear that pain and bear witness to it, if it means Bee Boy will be remembered.

*A Rare Species

CATEGORY: Memoir

AUTHOR NATURE-OBSERVATION You might wonder, reading this, why in the world my former husband and I ever divorced. Trust me. It was for the good of the planet.

My former husband Lane and I met to discuss the wedding of our daughter Bay and ended up driving to the Ohanapecosh Valley to hunt a fugitive wildflower.

"How long have you been looking for this thing?" Lane asked, amused as always by my obsessions. Since the divorce I've amused him, anyway.

"At least 40 years," he continued, answering his own question.

I couldn't believe he was coming with me on a search for the phantom orchid, aka cephalanthera austiniae. Long ago when we were married, he wasn't interested in my botanical adventures. But after Bay's wedding discussion ended, he asked what I was doing for the rest of the day. When I told him of my quest, he said he'd like to join me.

"We're getting along so well, I'm feeling lucky," he observed. "I think I'll be the one to spot your mystery plant first."

He was making this into a competition. I smiled at the familiarity.

"Why the Ohanapecosh, though?" he asked. "I thought you told me once phantom orchids were extinct around Mt. Ranier."

"I thought they were," I said. "But I stumbled into the blog of someone who claimed to have found a few in the Valley. In four different spots! Oh, Lane, what if I can find them, at last?

"Aren't you glad for the company?"

I was. Then I thought, maybe we've found something rare at this late juncture in our lives. That elusive species between a man and a woman - friendship.

*She Just Blacked Out, Is All

CATEGORY: A Day in The Life

EPILOG BEFORE THE FACT: I did not renew my contract with this organization after the following incident.

One of my jobs as manager of a private university dormitory is to distribute mail. I notice Alison hasn't picked up her mail for several days, and it occurs to me I haven't seen her lately. I go to her room and find only her roommate Jody there.

Jody mumbles something and slinks past me. My voice pursues her down the hall. Jody! Please tell me where she is.

Reluctantly, Jody turns back to me and says, If you must know, she's in the hospital. But don't worry, she's fine now.

I'm always the last to know these things. Parents hire me to manage young women who refuse to be managed. I refuse to be in this position much longer.

I don't take their attitude personality. I represent authority, and they thought college meant being beyond authority. They don't yet know they will meet with authority throughout their lives. You got to serve somebody, Bob Dylan says. I'm just the first somebody they meet after they thought they were through with all that.

So Alison is in the hospital and her friends have formed a conspiracy to keep me and her parents from knowing. Legally, neither the parents nor I have any rights in this matter.

I don't even bother to ask Jody whether it's alcohol related.

You think it's alcohol related, Jody says. It really isn't.

I don't say anything and suddenly, Jody's talking: She just blacked out, is all. At a fraternity party. The stupid security guards forced the guys to call an ambulance. She's fine. She just blacked out, is all. She just got alcohol poisoning, is all. But that's not alcohol related. It's horrible, forcing her to go to a hospital when she didn't even know what they were doing because she was blacked out.

Jody's too-skinny frame shakes with indignation.

I look at the bulletin board, across from Alison and Jody's room. It has colorful posters with all the important information about alcohol poisoning, eating disorders, signs of bi-polar disorder. I'm sure nobody reads them.

Can I go now, please, Jody asks, torn between manners and her desire to be free of me.

I have only a few seconds to say something meaningful that might penetrate her denial of reality.

Death, Jody.

I choose my words carefully.

Death. Alcohol poisoning can lead to death. Alison might have died if she hadn't been taken to a hospital in time.

Whatever, Jody replies.

I hold her eyes with a steady gaze. And it makes me feel better now, because I can see she looks frightened. She just can't admit it to me.

Whatever.

*Christmas Dinner

GENRE: Fiction, for those who might wonder

AUTHOR ENDORSEMENT: A Christmas story is never out of season.

“Matt’s "the one. I knew it immediately,” Mallory smiled at her stepmother Ellen as they waited for the last of the Christmas pies to finish baking. Apples and cinammon scented the air.

“Oh, Mal,” Ellen hugged the girl she had raised since the age of two. “We’re all so happy! He just seems perfect!”

The two women were sitting in the kitchen, the largest room in the old farmhouse. Mal looked fondly at the person she called Mother. She was still wearing her faded apron after preparing the enormous breakfast of eggs, pancakes, hash browns – the works! Ellen rarely ventured far from where food was stored, prepared, cooked, served, and cleaned up, so the apron of the day tended to stay on unless she were going out.

“I was afraid you wouldn’t approve, “ Mallory ventured.

“Because he’s black, right?” Ellen always came to the point.

“ Look, I know you and Dad were hippies way back when, and I know you had black friends in the city. Still, I admit to worrying what you would think when I brought home an African American guy. “

“Well, I hope you realize it makes absolutely no difference to us. We could see right away, just as you did, that he’s the one. Even little Petey said it.”

They sat in companionable silence for awhile, ‘til Ellen shooed Mallory out of the kitchen.

“Go on, rescue him from everyone in this crazy family. You should be with him now. There’s not much time left before I need to start getting serious about dinner."

Mallory was glad she had made the trek across country to spend Christmas with her family. She loved their special traditions, and it just wouldn’t have been the same with Matt’s family. Besides, this was her first Christmas as a full-fledged adult, age 21. Their most important tradition was actually her responsibility this year. She had been a bit nervous but later, lingering at the dinner table while munching the last of Matt’s thigh from the bone , she basked in her family’s praise.

“You did a fine job selecting Christmas dinner, daughter,” her father said, making it official.

“I love the dark meat, “ Petey piped up.

They all had a good laugh at that.

*Storytelling, The Haiku Way

Category: Haibun. An essay or story incorporating both prose and haiku or senryu (the haiku of human affairs).

Author's Insistence: Haiku is not the 5-7-5 version you learned in 3rd grade. It can be 5-7-5 in syllable and line structure, but it is inaccurate to suppose it MUST be. It is usually three lines: short-long-short, but even that is not set in stone. Please, don't get me started on this issue in the world of Haiku! Far more important than syllable count is that haiku needs to be a bite-sized moment in nature or a thought or an experience, incorporating a contrast or change between one line and the other two. And for just a moment, the reader enters the consciousness of the writer to see beauty or irony or whatever it was the writer saw --SJ

I am a Once Upon A Time storyteller of folktales from Long Ago and Far Away and sometimes from as close as my own imagination. Schools, libraries, hospitals, festivals, farmer's markets, ferry boats, churches, bars, city streets, private homes - I've set up shop just about everywhere.

venues -

the storyteller's body

a stage

I have been a storyteller since I was a child,telling stories to younger children. I probably have a hundred tales collected in my head. One of these days I'll catalog them. Meanwhile, the right story always seems to march front and center for the right audience. I do not know how I know what the right story is. Sometimes, I plan a certain one for a certain occasion - but when I'm looking at the audience, another story tumbles out. I just go with it.

My dream once was to be an itinerant storyteller. Now, I wait to be asked.

an invitation

to do what I love best -

my answer yes

I've had some challenging audiences. Older elementary ages for instance, or middle school. They think they're too sophisticated for stories. I don't argue with them or try to persuade them. I just begin with the magic words and enjoy seeing faces change as the story chips away at their cool veneer. Sometimes I bring a puppet 'helper' and, invariably, a young cynic reacts with derision.

your puppet's not a real rabbit-

that's true

but it is a real puppet

Another challenge was an audience of blind children. I worried because my performance 'style' depends heavily on the visual. Facial expressions, hand gestures, body movements - how could a story be good without? What happened illustrates the importance of marching into the lion's den occasionally. One becomes creative, quickly. I added sound effects and participatory actions and made up a song, to my stock Halloween story about a character named Li'l Ogre. I still believe it's the best I've ever told a story and now I tell that version of it to everyone.

Take a deep breath -

just like that, YES, to help

Li'l Ogre run away

Recently, I hooked up telling stories to the homeless. It started after I donated food to a new Tent City in the neighborhood. I noticed they didn't have much for desserts. Well, no one can live by nutrition alone! I bought hot chocolate packs and mini-marshmallows - which must, in winter, be accompanied by a story. I was then asked whether I could tell stories at a shelter too.

small hand at my sleeve -

can the story star a girl

named Akisha?

Viktor chimes in -

an advocate for a Viktor

to be hero

Each child should have their own personal stories in my opinion. Adults too, need stories linking them to the same foibles and problems and triumphs and insights as the rest of humanity has possessed down the ages.

folk tales

a haiku moment

throughout each story

*The Last Time I Had Chocolate

CATEGORY: Memoir

-When do you get used to the odor of chocolate air, I asked Peter, as we sat out on his deck during the late evening firefly show.

-This is Hershey goddam Pennsylvania, he replied testily. The town was built around the chocolate factory. If you don't like it, go to Utzville.

That's where they make Utz potato chips. Stick your face in an empty potato chip bag to imagine what houses, clothes, and children smell like, in Utzville.

-I'm not complaining, I told him, though in truth the breeze from "Chocolate Headquarters USA" was cloying as only proximity to industrial-sized vats full of liquified candy bars, can be. It was said the very soil in Hershey made chocolate puddles when mixed with raindrops, but I never happened to be there during the rainy season. I can verify, however, that Peter's homegrown medical marijuana was suspiciously sweet.

I was almost enjoying my last night before flying home to Seattle.

-Oh God I'm glad you called me to visit in the summer so we could watch the fireflies together, I said, lighting a new joint.

-I'm happy to oblige you by dying in July. I wouldn't want you to be inconvenienced, having to visit me during a snowstorm.

-And how great is it to be smoking dope legally!

-Technically it's only legal for me, but no one's around for miles. You're safe unless I decide to narc on you.

-All those times when getting high was ruined by the fear of being caught. I love this, now. With you.

-Oh please don't let my imminent death spoil your stoned fun.

He'd warned me there would be remarks like these. Said, ignore them.

So I spoke of the beauty of fireflies, and I recalled college memories, and our travels as lovers. I think chocolate came up in the conversation again: The magic brownies I baked for us and for our friend Jim. At some point, I coaxed a smile from him. At another, we held each other and cried.

I almost declared I'd never eat chocolate again, because I would associate it with our last time together. He'd have said that's ridiculous, don't do it on my account. But I just lost my sweet tooth forever after that last visit.

Another thing I didn't tell him was how badly I'd miss his friendship as I grew older and older, while he remained perpetually 45. That's because I didn't know it yet.

*Skippy The Dog

Category: Fiction

Author Query: Tom Robbins said, "It's never too late to have a happy childhood." True or False?

Sharon's mother remarried and the new little family moved from Baltimore to Philadelphia, where the stepfather lived. Sharon missed her grandmother and the tidy bungalow with faux chalet shutters and a big yard, the only home she had ever known. Most of all she missed Skippy the dog. No pets were permitted in the cramped apartment house, not even a very small half-Spitz, half-water spaniel.

"It's just temporary, living here," Sharon's mother explained. "We'll move soon and bring Skippy The Dog."

The stepfather described the house they would have as soon as he recovered from a back injury and could return to work. "I love you, Sharon, and I love your mother. I'll take care of you better, very soon. And Skippy The Dog too, of course."

While the stepfather rested at McGuffy's Tavern everyday, the new little family was swamped with financial troubles. Sharon's mother became a Kelly Girl and Sharon babysat afternoons and evenings for a sickly toddler next door The listless child with constantly poopy diapers wasn't as much fun as Skippy The Dog and smelled worse than he did, too. Kind of a doggy smell without the fun of having a doggy. Still, she tried to liven him up. "Here is the beehive, where are the bees?" she would chant, to entertain him with fingerplays and songs she knew. The boy's watery eyes barely gave her a glance. Sharon thought constantly of Skippy The Dog, who used to love listening to her and was eager to learn everything she taught.

"Don't worry, I'll take good care of him, " Sharon's grandmother had promised, but soon after that she got sick and died. Then the bungalow was sold and Skippy The Dog was sold with the house. The stepfather laughed about that, but Sharon asked to see the document from the real estate company. As she read the crisp paper, the words "Skippy The Dog" leaped up at her just as Skippy The Dog himself always did when she came home from school in Baltimore.

Meanwhile, all moneys from the sale went to pay Nana's hospital bills. There was nothing left for the new little family. When he heard that, the stepfather put his fist through one of the walls in their apartment, and he put a fist in his wife's face. The hole in the wall was so large and her mother's face was so battered that Sharon, who had been babysitting when it happened, believed it was her mother's head that had gone through the wall and not the stepfather's fist.

During the confusion of screaming, neighbors, police, and ambulance, Sharon stole back her babysitting money hidden in the plaster of paris gargoyle on the stepfather's bureau. She ignored the gargoyle's evil appearance.

"You don't scare me, " she whispered to it. "The stepfather is handsome and look what he did."

With the money, she took a bus back to Baltimore to save Skippy The Dog. She knew it was too late to save her mother.

When she arrived, finally, at the bungalow, she introduced herself to the new owners as Skippy The Dog's mother. The middle-aged couple invited her in and the three of them sat in the living room making polite conversation about the house and the early life of Skippy The Puppy.

"We love him," they smiled. They had shiny yellow teeth and the bungalow smelled strange. The new owners are aliens, she decided, and they're here to make experiments on dogs.

They served her graham crackers and milk, and though she was hungry, she was afraid to ingest food touched by aliens.

"Thank you for the cookies and milk and thank you for taking such good care of Skippy The Dog, temporarily, until I could come for him," she said.

The couple exchanged glances. "We love him," they repeated their earlier comment.

"As soon as we get settled, you can come see him anytime," she reassured them.

The doorbell rang, and it was two police officers. "We're here to make sure you get back to your parents in Philadelphia, safe and sound," they told her.

She began to cry, then shriek.

"Shhh, hush" the alien wife cautioned, looking worried. "We don't want Skippy The Dog to hear your voice and get upset."

"Well what the hell, do you think I came here just to meet you weirdos?" she spat out. "SKIPPY," she yelled at the top of her lungs. "SKIPPY,IT'S ME, MOMMY!"

Before the adults could react, she was out the door and in the yard. She and Skippy The Dog fell all over each other.

"I love you, I love you, I love you," they sobbed out joyously.

Sharon had to be quick. She started fumbling with the long chain that allowed Skippy access to most of the big yard.

"Where have you been?" Skippy The Dog asked.

"Quick, there's no time to talk. We're on the run!"

They were at the edge of the woods now, behind the house, when Skippy the Dog laid down at the top of the path, resting his head on his paws.

"I can't go with you, Mommy" he said.

Sharon stood very still.

"You left. Nana left. The aliens feed me," he whimpered.

She stared at him.

"And...and, I don't think you can take care of me. You're not old enough. You don't even have a place to live."

She kissed him on top of his silky head and ran into the woods behind the house.

Life became easier after that, even though she spent the rest of her growing up years in a succession of unsuitable foster homes. Where there is no expectation, there is no disappointment. She never bothered to respond to people's supposed concern or apparent affection whenever she happened to run into either.

When you learn that not even man's best friend can be trusted, you're darn sure no one else can be, either.

*The Idiot's Guide to Prayer

Category: Fiction

Author's Wish: Apparently, everyone's equal in God's eyes, and if that's the way He feels, fine. I just wish He wouldn't require us to agree with Him on that point.

Every morning now, even before my first cup of coffee, I pray. I pray that God will convince Thea to come back to me. I pray He will tell her it’s His will for her to live with me forever.

Meanwhile, I suspect she's praying for Him to send me to rot in hell forever.

How does God deal with all these competing prayers, I wonder.

Esteban walks in and sees me in prayer position by my bed. "You don't know how to pray," he scoffs. “Prayer involves a lot more than just getting down on your knees.”

Esteban is my friend and coincidentally, one of the men attempting to replace me in Thea's bed.

I regard him with the kind of critical eye a woman might have. Thea’s, let's say.

His short hair is slicked back with 'product.' Thea prefers natural hair on the longish side. Like mine.

Esteban has many fitness center-induced muscles. Thea likes men with builds on the thin side. Like mine.

Estheban is a Catholic atheist. Poor guy. He's nothing like me at all. He hasn't a prayer. Oh wait. I forgot. Thea doesn’t know I’m religious now, because I only started praying when she left me.

"You're wrong" I say to him now. "I do know how to pray," and I point to my recent purchase, “The Idiot's Guide To Prayer."

"Well then, go ahead," Esteban suggests, "tell me how."

I focus my attention upon him.

"First you focus attention," I explain. "And then, you umm, umm, it’s kind of, see what you do is, well, it’s very personal."

"You spent money on this guide for idiots?"

"Idiot’s guide," I correct him.

"That's just idiotic. Expecting a book to teach you how to pray.”

“Some people use a book for that, Esteban. It’s called The Bible.”

“Why don’t you read that book then?”

“I’m into technology. I prefer HELP manuals to stories and parables.”

Maybe he’s right, though. All my praying hasn’t worked yet, and it’s been a whole month. Lately I’ve thought I should change tactics and demand Thea come back to me. Pick her up, throw her over my shoulder and carry her through town, like that John Wayne movie.

After all, the Idiot’s Guide said God helps those who help themselves to what they want.

*Murder, Maybe

If you don't like to laugh at old people, better skip this story. My excuse is that I've been forgetful my entire life. _SJ

On the day she was to visit her home in England for the first time in three decades, Kit was found dead on her floor. The two friends driving her to the airport had pounded on the door, then used the key they knew she hid in the garden.

"At least she was drinking Earl Gray breakfast tea as she passed" said Kit's friend Margaret, referring to the china cup shattered on the floor by the body. "She loved Earl Gray."

"This just isn't LIKE her," frowned Kit's other friend Annie.

"Dying, you mean?" asked Margaret, sitting back comfortably in the recliner, as they waited for the arrival of the 911 personnel, just called. "I agree, it is a bit unusual. She's never done it before that I recall."

"Do you notice how untidy the apartment is," Annie gestured, ignoring the other's words.

Margaret looked around for the first time. "Why no, I hadn't. Being preoccupied by Kit's dead body and all."

"So now what do you say?"

"Why, yes, I agree with you. Untidiness isn't like her."

"So what do you think?"

"You’re the one who thinks."

"Kit was not about to leave a mess like this before a long trip."

"No, she wasn't. " Margaret took a deep breath. "Are you suggesting foul play?"

"I'm suggesting we have only a few minutes before the authorities come to find the clue Kit would most definitely have left."

"Why not let THEM find the clues? That's their specialty."

"Who knew Kit the way we did? We're wasting time Margaret. They're going to charge in here destroying evidence."

"Too bad Kit is dead. She could have helped us"

You take the bedroom," Annie ordered. "I'll stay in here"

"Wait a minute, what are we doing?" Margaret's head was spinning.

"Looking for incriminating evidence."

"What will it look like?"

"How should I know? Kit was a very clever woman. Far cleverer than whoever murdered her. Even more clever than we are."

"I object to that last statement" Margaret objected.

"Object later. Find evidence now."

"You're being rather relentless."

Annie looked at Margaret directly. "Someone murdered our friend. And I'm not happy about it."

Margaret nodded and sighed. "I'm a bit tired today," she said. "So I suppose I should come right to the point."

"You killed her, didn't you!"

"I was about to say the same thing to you!"

The two elderly ladies regarded each other suspiciously.

There was a long silence.

"I think we both did it," Annie said, flatly.

"What?!"

"I think we did it and then forgot about doing it."

"This isn't the first time you've accused me of being senile. And even if I were, forgetting that I murdered my friend is not exactly like forgetting to buy butter at the store.

"We didn't murder her. Technically, we just killed her. In reality, we assisted her to commit suicide."

"That's absurd." Margaret shook her head firmly. "Why would she commit suicide the day she was returning to her beloved home after all these years."

"Because of the letter," Annie reminded her.

"What letter?"

"You see how senile you are, Margaret, you've forgotten that already."

"Show me this so-called letter, Annie."

"That's what we're looking for."

"Well, why didn't you say so before?!"

"Because I FORGOT, you birdbrain, " Annie exploded.

"Do NOT insult my brain, just because I'm senile!" Margaret said, with dignity

Annie's brow furrowed. "What was I saying just now?"

"How should I know. Something about a letter from Kit's fiance Hilary."

"Hilary??!" Annie sputtered. "How could he have sent her a letter? He died during the war!"

"Kit had a fiance fighting in Iraq?" Margaret asked, puzzled.

"Not THAT war! She was 84 years old, remember? It was World War II !"

"Yes, but Hilary died."

"No, he didn't. She just got his letter yesterday, forwarded from her sister in England."

"Wait! This sounds familiar, Annie!"

"That's because she told us last night."

"No, it's a movie I saw with Bette Davis and - oh, what's his name? The handsome one."

"Brad Pitt?"

"Bette Davis and Brad Pitt never made a movie together, silly

"Why are we talking about a movie, when there's a dead body on the floor?" Annie pointed out to Margaret.

Margaret screamed. "Annie! There's a dead body on the floor!!!!"

Annie screamed. "Oh my God, it's KIT!"

"How could it be Kit? She's going to England today, to kill her dead fiance Hilary!"

"I'm confused. How could she kill someone who's already dead?"

"Oh Annie, you're even more senile than I am. Don't you remember the letter Kit's sister forwarded from England? It was Hilary, confessing on his deathbed that he had faked his death in Vietnam, to get out of his engagement with Kit?"

"Vietnam? Kit was too old to have been engaged to someone who fought in Vietnam."

"Did I say Vietnam? I meant World War II."

"I saw a movie once about Vietnam," Annie said, "with that handsome actor Brad Pitt, who gets killed"

"Was Bette Davis in it? Playing his fiance, now really old?"

"Bette Davis is dead."

"Is that who's body is on the floor?"

There was a pounding on the door.

"I wonder who that can be," Annie said.

"Kit, oh Kit" Margaret yelled into the bedroom, tripping over a body on the floor that she hadn't seen before. "Someone is here to see you."