Weekly 5-10 minute writing prompts from feather anchor adages.
8.9.10
WK.01 | Extra Credit - Your father's shirt pocket. 5 MINUTES. GO!
7 comments:
Anonymous
said...
It contains a letter from Leyte, an island in the Philippines. The penmanship was a new language of curse. Girlfriend soaked sentiments, three pages long. Similar to the one McArthur carried in his left pocket, scared as he was, he was always pictured with the trace of his hands holding something, scared as he was it was a letter written by his mother. "Don't come back until you bring me one of those people."
My father came after a miscarriage. He fought his way out, like thumb on rosary at its last rotation before bedtime. He couldn't wait to sleep, he was in love with his dreams, there he was a gold button, a shield, a perfect sunset. His shirt pocket contained none of these, he wasn't important enough to be noticed. Not important enough to be noticed.
My father wore old 50's style cardigans and button down shirts. I always thought it was so that he would look both professional and approachable. He was a minister after all, leader of as flock. I do not remember what he carried in his pockets. Perhaps his pipe, back in the days when he smoked one. I do remember taking one of those cardigans when I left home. At the time it was punk and I loved it. I miss it. Rubber bands... that is something he always had on him, rubber bands. And bits of paper and pens. For taking notes for when inspiration hit him. He was always out talking to people. So inspiration could come at any moment, from any snippet of conversation. I remember those rubber bands, though. They were a tick, like counting or hand washing. I'm not saying he was OCD. But there was always rubber bands.
Empty and crisply pressed my father's pockets are as impeccable as his word. I always marvel at how new and freshly dry-cleaned he looks. His shirts smell of Downy. I sometimes put things in his shirt pocket but it never stays there long. Far more things everywhere else. There's a comfort to it, his pockets have been the same since I was little, I used to try to sneak things into them without him noticing; one time the chocolate melted but he didn't get mad.
His hands, those precious fans of fingers come out and press against the nighttime window, pressing in toward me, noticing me, loving me. And then the hands disappear, back into the pocket of darkness. I wait and my father's hands do not reappear. Day and night I stare out the window, waiting. My pillow smells of salty sweat and baby tears, my tears, the grief of a four-year-old. Daddy is dead. Big men in heavy coats clunk into our living room and carry him away from our couch, the place he dies. Mama keeps saying, "He was only thirty-seven." I keep saying, "Watch the window." Double ten thousand and that is how many nights I watch the window, hear trains and wait for his hands to come out of those dark pockets.
pressed. there is nothing there, but i can smell the juicy fruit- its got t be somewhere! cigarettes, handkerchief (used), cross pen, all these pockets... inside left breast pocket, there it is! two sticks of juicy fruit and a small pink spoon. did he go to baskin robbins without me? toothpicks in wrappers. the smell of perfume somewhere. not on hanky.
“Fred, come look at this,” she called from her son’s room. John was visiting from Seattle and Phyllis had been straightening his things when she found an envelope in his shirt pocket.
No one was quite sure how John and Linda first met. He was serving in the Coast Guard and she was a high school senior at Berkeley High. We know she often slipped out of her bedroom window at night and caught a ride into the city. Maybe she met him at the Club Flamingo or The Long Bar.
John was charismatically handsome with blue sparkling eyes and a slightly predatory nature which must have been oddly intoxicating and sadly all too familiar for the young girl.
He’d ingratiated himself into the Berghold’s nucleus and led Phyllis and Fred to believe he’d marry their girl one day.
Fred took the envelope from his wife’s hands and opened it.
Dear John, I miss you so much. Janie and I went to Fredrick and Nelsons last week and I purchased several new outfits for my trousseau. Can you imagine? In just three weeks we will be man and wife!
Ever yours, Trudy
Needless to say, when John and Linda returned late that night, aglow from high balls and dancing, Fred met them at the door. It was not the first time John would be caught and it would not be the last. When Fred told John and Linda what he’d learned, all three burst into tears. John promised to break it off with Trudy and he did.
Several months later, Linda, despite her poor grades and lack of initiative, was halfway through her first term at Oregon State University, when she announced that she and John would be married.
John had learned from his mother how to manage affairs with the opposite sex. Hazel arrived in Seattle on a Greyhound bus as a young girl, far from the barren Midwest farm where she grew up. Her first stop was a dress shop, her second, a beauty parlor, and her third, the Washington Athletic Club on 6th and Union.
She sought out a rich and eligible man, quickly married, bore a son, divorced with a tidy bank roll and did the same twice more in the span of nine years.
By the time I met her she was with her fourth husband, Rex, an asthmatic old pervert who loved to read true crime serials, porn magazines and drive his leather lined Cadillac. When Rex died she married his mechanic who drank McNaughton’s and milk on account of his ulcers.
John and Linda made their home in Ravenna. Soon after I was born and handed over to Karen, my first nanny.
John, meanwhile had taken over his father’s sawmill machinery business when he met Yoshimi, a Japanese foreign exchange student enrolled at the University of Washington. They’d met at a bar on her 21st birthday. The affair had a lasting effect on the girl, even though they had to part when she returned to Japan; John gave her a promise ring that she kept hidden for the next thirty years.
Yoshimi married a prominent psychiatrist and had two healthy children. Over the years she kept in touch with her Seattle host family and they in turn, tracked John even when he moved to Portland, years later. She’d visit the states occasionally and tried several times to reach him. He never seemed interested in seeing her again.
During one of her visits she’d reached John Jr. just before she was scheduled to go to the airport. Intrigued Jr. called his dad and pleaded with him to meet her. This time, unfortunately for her, he did.
Within the span of the next two years she divorced her husband, lost face with her family and community. She lost every chance of inheritance she could have had, and married John. I declined the wedding invitation as I was already well aware of where their union would lead.
Ultimately, Yoshimi was robbed of what little riches she brought with her into their marriage and was beaten by John. Eventually, she was left stranded in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the night when John was arrested for his third drunk driving incident. She crept off into the woods and never looked back.
Before Yoshimi there was Karen, the German piano teacher who had a lovely house over by Reed College. He’d met her through the personal ads in the Willamette Weekly. Karen was elegant, brilliant and utterly stupid in love. By the time John was finished with her she’d bankrolled a European vacation for him; he’d run up her credit cards, stolen her jewelry and beaten her.
Before Karen there was Jennifer. Jennifer was a successful interior designer, a blonde bombshell with a lot of laughter in her heart. She stayed with him through his recovery from cocaine addiction and through lots of false starts and stops with failed business ventures. By the time he finished with her, he’d wasted away all of her assets and beaten her for the very last time.
Before Jennifer there was Pat. Pat and John were at their worst together. Coke, scotch, and heroine blurred any chance of a semblance of a normal relationship. I saw a lot of black eyes on both of them when they were together.
Before Pat there was Linda and a string of nameless lovers in between it all. After Linda and before Pat was “The Big Goof Off” and the end of their marriage.
When I think of John, his charms and his addictions, I hope that I have not inherited more than a thick shock of silver hair and the silver tongue that goes with it. Sometimes, I am not so sure. It is in the exploration of this terrible heritage that I aim to find out for certain.
7 comments:
It contains a letter from Leyte, an island in the Philippines. The penmanship was a new language of curse. Girlfriend soaked sentiments, three pages long. Similar to the one McArthur carried in his left pocket, scared as he was, he was always pictured with the trace of his hands holding something, scared as he was it was a letter written by his mother. "Don't come back until you bring me one of those people."
My father came after a miscarriage. He fought his way out, like thumb on rosary at its last rotation before bedtime. He couldn't wait to sleep, he was in love with his dreams, there he was a gold button, a shield, a perfect sunset. His shirt pocket contained none of these, he wasn't important enough to be noticed. Not important enough to be noticed.
My father wore old 50's style cardigans and button down shirts. I always thought it was so that he would look both professional and approachable. He was a minister after all, leader of as flock. I do not remember what he carried in his pockets. Perhaps his pipe, back in the days when he smoked one. I do remember taking one of those cardigans when I left home. At the time it was punk and I loved it. I miss it. Rubber bands... that is something he always had on him, rubber bands. And bits of paper and pens. For taking notes for when inspiration hit him. He was always out talking to people. So inspiration could come at any moment, from any snippet of conversation. I remember those rubber bands, though. They were a tick, like counting or hand washing. I'm not saying he was OCD. But there was always rubber bands.
Empty and crisply pressed my father's pockets are as impeccable as his word. I always marvel at how new and freshly dry-cleaned he looks. His shirts smell of Downy. I sometimes put things in his shirt pocket but it never stays there long. Far more things everywhere else. There's a comfort to it, his pockets have been the same since I was little, I used to try to sneak things into them without him noticing; one time the chocolate melted but he didn't get mad.
His hands, those precious fans of fingers come out and press against the nighttime window, pressing in toward me, noticing me, loving me. And then the hands disappear, back into the pocket of darkness. I wait and my father's hands do not reappear. Day and night I stare out the window, waiting. My pillow smells of salty sweat and baby tears, my tears, the grief of a four-year-old. Daddy is dead. Big men in heavy coats clunk into our living room and carry him away from our couch, the place he dies. Mama keeps saying, "He was only thirty-seven." I keep saying, "Watch the window." Double ten thousand and that is how many nights I watch the window, hear trains and wait for his hands to come out of those dark pockets.
pressed. there is nothing there, but i can smell the juicy fruit- its got t be somewhere! cigarettes, handkerchief (used), cross pen, all these pockets... inside left breast pocket, there it is! two sticks of juicy fruit and a small pink spoon. did he go to baskin robbins without me? toothpicks in wrappers. the smell of perfume somewhere. not on hanky.
My father’s shirt pocket
“Fred, come look at this,” she called from her son’s room. John was visiting from Seattle and Phyllis had been straightening his things when she found an envelope in his shirt pocket.
No one was quite sure how John and Linda first met. He was serving in the Coast Guard and she was a high school senior at Berkeley High. We know she often slipped out of her bedroom window at night and caught a ride into the city. Maybe she met him at the Club Flamingo or The Long Bar.
John was charismatically handsome with blue sparkling eyes and a slightly predatory nature which must have been oddly intoxicating and sadly all too familiar for the young girl.
He’d ingratiated himself into the Berghold’s nucleus and led Phyllis and Fred to believe he’d marry their girl one day.
Fred took the envelope from his wife’s hands and opened it.
Dear John,
I miss you so much. Janie and I went to Fredrick and Nelsons last week and I purchased several new outfits for my trousseau. Can you imagine? In just three weeks we will be man and wife!
Ever yours,
Trudy
Needless to say, when John and Linda returned late that night, aglow from high balls and dancing, Fred met them at the door. It was not the first time John would be caught and it would not be the last. When Fred told John and Linda what he’d learned, all three burst into tears. John promised to break it off with Trudy and he did.
Several months later, Linda, despite her poor grades and lack of initiative, was halfway through her first term at Oregon State University, when she announced that she and John would be married.
John had learned from his mother how to manage affairs with the opposite sex. Hazel arrived in Seattle on a Greyhound bus as a young girl, far from the barren Midwest farm where she grew up. Her first stop was a dress shop, her second, a beauty parlor, and her third, the Washington Athletic Club on 6th and Union.
She sought out a rich and eligible man, quickly married, bore a son, divorced with a tidy bank roll and did the same twice more in the span of nine years.
By the time I met her she was with her fourth husband, Rex, an asthmatic old pervert who loved to read true crime serials, porn magazines and drive his leather lined Cadillac. When Rex died she married his mechanic who drank McNaughton’s and milk on account of his ulcers.
Part Two of My father's shirt pocket
John and Linda made their home in Ravenna. Soon after I was born and handed over to Karen, my first nanny.
John, meanwhile had taken over his father’s sawmill machinery business when he met Yoshimi, a Japanese foreign exchange student enrolled at the University of Washington. They’d met at a bar on her 21st birthday. The affair had a lasting effect on the girl, even though they had to part when she returned to Japan; John gave her a promise ring that she kept hidden for the next thirty years.
Yoshimi married a prominent psychiatrist and had two healthy children. Over the years she kept in touch with her Seattle host family and they in turn, tracked John even when he moved to Portland, years later. She’d visit the states occasionally and tried several times to reach him. He never seemed interested in seeing her again.
During one of her visits she’d reached John Jr. just before she was scheduled to go to the airport. Intrigued Jr. called his dad and pleaded with him to meet her. This time, unfortunately for her, he did.
Within the span of the next two years she divorced her husband, lost face with her family and community. She lost every chance of inheritance she could have had, and married John. I declined the wedding invitation as I was already well aware of where their union would lead.
Ultimately, Yoshimi was robbed of what little riches she brought with her into their marriage and was beaten by John. Eventually, she was left stranded in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of the night when John was arrested for his third drunk driving incident. She crept off into the woods and never looked back.
Before Yoshimi there was Karen, the German piano teacher who had a lovely house over by Reed College. He’d met her through the personal ads in the Willamette Weekly. Karen was elegant, brilliant and utterly stupid in love. By the time John was finished with her she’d bankrolled a European vacation for him; he’d run up her credit cards, stolen her jewelry and beaten her.
Before Karen there was Jennifer. Jennifer was a successful interior designer, a blonde bombshell with a lot of laughter in her heart. She stayed with him through his recovery from cocaine addiction and through lots of false starts and stops with failed business ventures. By the time he finished with her, he’d wasted away all of her assets and beaten her for the very last time.
Before Jennifer there was Pat. Pat and John were at their worst together. Coke, scotch, and heroine blurred any chance of a semblance of a normal relationship. I saw a lot of black eyes on both of them when they were together.
Before Pat there was Linda and a string of nameless lovers in between it all. After Linda and before Pat was “The Big Goof Off” and the end of their marriage.
When I think of John, his charms and his addictions, I hope that I have not inherited more than a thick shock of silver hair and the silver tongue that goes with it. Sometimes, I am not so sure. It is in the exploration of this terrible heritage that I aim to find out for certain.
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