Monthly Archives: January 2013

Psst. They’re out there. Watching. Waiting. Planning. Scheming. Lurking in shadowy basements and trolling the far reaches of cyberspace, just dying to get their hands on my personal info. This must be true because folks around me, people who otherwise seem like sane, rational beings blessed with a decent amount of common sense, are skulking around, looking over their shoulders, suspiciously questioning the intentions of others, and spouting dire warnings about the consequences of lax cyber security.

Did you know that hackers can get in through your printer? That’s right, they work their way through the electric wires to gain access to the printer through its power source, trace the USB connection back to your computer, then BAM! They’re in. I know it’s true ‘cause I heard it from my mom who heard it from my uncle who heard it somewhere reliable.

If they get in, hackers might find out the name of my deceased great aunt’s third parakeet, and then they’d have my PIN. Hackers, let me save you the time and effort—the credit cards are at their maximum and the bank accounts are at their minimum.  Don’t bother.

Did you know that anti-virus software is really a front used by terrorists to gain access to your computer? That’s right, they trick you into downloading their software on your computer, then BAM! You’ve given them an open door to any information you’ve saved to your hard drive or sent over the internet. I know it’s true ‘cause a friend of a friend posted it on Facebook.

If they get in, terrorists might get the names and addresses of all my family and friends, or worse, read the archive of Christmas letters to which I annually subject them. Then they’d know the time and location of our next big family reunion and could plan a sneak attack to wipe out a few dozen BBQ-eating infidels in one headline-grabbing blow. Hey, terrorists! We never all show up at these things, so at best you’ll get eight or ten of us. Not much of a statement in that, so maybe save your exploding catering truck for some other function.

Did you know that Dell was caught selling PCs with keyboard loggers installed? That’s right, you come home from Best Buy, set up your brand new computer, start typing, then BAM! The Department of Homeland Security, which ordered Dell to install the loggers in the first place, can monitor every website you visit and every word you type in your most personal emails. I know it’s true ‘cause I read it on the internet.

If they get in, the feds might track my iTunes purchases and my Kindle downloads, which reflect somewhat schizophrenic tastes in music and literature. She could be a dodgy one, fellas, better keep a close eye. Don’t worry feds, as an aspiring writer, I just need a wide selection of catchy lyrics and inspiring prose to feed my imagination. No hidden messages if you play track 381 backwards or string together the tenth word from all the odd-numbered pages in that novel.

I am not vain enough to think, out of millions of potential victims, that hackers, terrorists, and feds are stalking me as an individual target, yet recently it seems that several acquaintances have been brainwashed into believing just that. I can’t seem to make them see the magnitude of their paranoia or its effects on other people’s impressions of their sanity, and frankly, I’ve had it up to my eyeballs with their delusions. I’m waiting for them to break out the tinfoil hats. I’m not blasé about the electronic risks, but for heaven’s sake, the threat of identity theft was just as real twenty years ago when all a thief had to do was rummage through your trash or break in your home office and cart off your filing cabinet. You take all the reasonable precautions, and you get on with life.

I hate when someone engages me in a controversial conversation that then wraps around my brain like a spider’s web. I feel like I ought to be strong enough to brush off the strands of the dialogue and escape the spider’s hold on my thoughts, but in reality, the more I work to break free, the more entangled I become in points I could have made and words I should have said. If a good sleep doesn’t clear away the tenacious gossamer threads by morning, I’ll have to put pen to paper and rewrite the troublesome exchange until I’ve banished the spider and her trap.

Alone. By myself. Can’t see anything. Don’t hear any voices. Everyone must have run away. Friends wouldn’t just leave like that. Guys, where are you, I need help! How much longer can I hold my breath?

Ice on the pond looked too thin to me. Justin, the daredevil, slid over the surface with no problems. Kurt called me yellow when I said, “I ain’t goin’ across.” Laughter from the guys on shore when halfway I hollered, “It’s crackin’!” My boot punctured the fragile crust, opening a crack that swallowed me whole.

Now I’m floating but sinking, red down parka pinning my arms like a straightjacket. On my feet, brother Kurt’s Redwings, two sizes too big, drag bottomward like steel anchors.

Pretty soon, I’m gonna have to inhale; will it hurt when icy water fills my lungs? Quiet bubbles escape my bluish lips as I struggle against the burning need to draw a breath. Regret fills my slowing heart that I didn’t kiss Mama this morning before leaving home with the guys.

Screaming sirens penetrate the eerie silence of my ice water tomb; surely they’re too late to do any good. Two minutes, ten minutes, twenty minutes, how long is too long for a kid like me to go without air? Up on the edge, a shadowy figure stretched flat on his belly lowers a boat hook past the floating Knicks cap. Very gently, the crooked brass finger snags in my poufy red nylon collar, and I am lifted toward light and precious air.

Warm blankets surround me, strong fingers clutch mine, and I awake to find Mama and Daddy leaning over the strange bed I’m in. “Xeric environments are much more suitable for humans than aquatic ones,” the snobby old doc scolds my parents from his post by the door.

“Yellow, he ain’t,” proclaims Kurt to our friends, still awed by my stubborn refusal to succumb yesterday to death’s trap in that murky deep pond. Zipping up my red down parka, I kiss Mama goodbye and join the boys dribbling under the hoop, the frosty asphalt court solid beneath my Chucks.

Today’s challenge was to write a story 26 sentences long, each sentence beginning with the next letter of the alphabet, and being one word longer than the previous sentence.  Idea modified from prompt #15 on http://www.warren-wilson.edu/~creativewriting/Prompts.php

Publishing yesterday’s post was both exhausting (five hours to get those 1000 words!) and exhilarating (the first piece of real fiction I’ve written since middle school). I spent some time today surfing the net for other ideas for creative writing projects, and bookmarked several, but freely admit to not having the required brain power or attention span to do them justice right now. Picking up writing again is a lot like going back into the gym after several months of not exercising; I remember what I used to be able to do, so it’s a little frustrating not being able to jump right back in at that level. But just like the program to regain my former pace on the elliptical, I’ll gradually add time and resistance to my writing regimen, and occasionally mix up the routine in order to rest and recover. Today I feel the need to rest and recover, so this evening I’m reverting to general ramblings.

It seems a shame not to fill this blank screen with ramblings about how utterly content I am today. It’s been one of those days that really couldn’t get any better—to the point where I’m not sure if I should figure out how to bottle it or prepare myself for the $#!% to hit the fan. I slept till I woke up this morning, no EENP, EENP, EENP from the alarm clock to disrupt the circadian rhythm. Once Jim awoke, I tucked my head in its favorite place under his chin to talk about everything and nothing until rumbling tummies finally drove us to put feet on the floor and shuffle to the kitchen for sustenance. No projects or deadlines looming on the horizon meant freedom to spend a lazy morning watching last night’s UFC fights (Jim) and reading a book (me). When lethargy threatened to morph into full-on hibernation, we bundled up and headed out into the falling snow for a wintry walk. No projects or deadlines weighing on my mind meant freedom to enjoy the outing with all my senses: the wooly white sheep who really aren’t white at all against their snow-covered pasture, the subtle differences between the smoke from this house’s coal fire and that one’s wood fire tickling my nose, the snow under my wellies sounding just like a denim-clad derrière sliding on a leather chair. Back home to a hot shower and hot tea and some quiet time at my still-clean desk to brainstorm future writing projects. A no-muss, no-fuss pizza supper (not the traditional Sunday family dinner of my childhood!) before settling in front of the fire to await the start of the playoff games, knowing it doesn’t matter that Jim’s Patriots don’t kick off until 11:30 p.m. (London time) because neither of us has to work tomorrow. No projects or deadlines demanding attention means freedom to indulge in one of my favorite hobbies, crocheting an afghan, during the games. Knowing I’ve eaten well within my calorie limits all week, I can splurge on a glass of Lynchburg lemonade and a bowl full of popcorn tonight. Since the work week doesn’t begin until Tuesday, I anticipate another night of restful sleep after the Patriots clinch their berth in the Super Bowl (Sunday sleeps are usually restless, disrupted by anxious thoughts and worrisome dreams about the coming week). Yes, all is well in my little world today, and this utter contentment is a feeling I could get used to.

My parents are going to say, “We told you modeling would ruin your life.”

From the tender age of 5, I practiced my catwalk poses in front of Grammie’s cheval mirror. As a teen, I imagined myself strutting down the fashion runways of Milan, draped in the latest designs by Missoni and Valentino. My parents, with their conservative Midwest values assaulted by the daring design fads of the 70s, refused to even consider submitting head shots to an agency, much less traveling into the big city for an open casting call. Modeling recruiters don’t often find their way down back-country roads like ours, so my high-fashion dreams gathered dust while I finished school with quiet resentment. When I finally broke free of the small-town stranglehold and signed with Ford Models Chicago in the 80s, I knew I was being cast as a “sophisticated modern woman,” which is industry-speak for “pretty, but past her prime.”  At 25, I knew my chances of being the next Cheryl Tiegs were long past, but when Clairol called, my heart soared. I would be the face of the newest haircolor trend; on the streets, mousy-haired housewives would recognize me as the girl on the box of the same “Extra Light Silver Blonde” they’d just stashed under the bathroom sink, and their husbands’ covetous stares as I passed would spur hundreds of underappreciated homemakers to test for themselves whether blondes really did have more fun.

I didn’t count on one of those goggle-eyed husbands being a raging lunatic. I’m not sure when he began stalking me, but it seems he quickly learned my routine, and knew I jogged alone in the calm quiet of the pre-dawn hours. The unexpected attack occurred between the pink-orange pools of sodium light on the park’s deserted path, and was so violently brutal that it would have ended any chances of a normal life had I survived. It was quite a shock for the elderly man whose little terrier found my cold, broken body in the park’s bushes later that morning, but he recovered admirably when the reporters showed up with their camera crews to get his eyewitness account. In the edited video that ran on the evening news, he and his little dog enjoyed their fifteen minutes of fame while Chicago’s finest futilely scoured the park in the background for clues to my identity and the coroner zipped up my stiff black body bag.

Now tagged as a Jane Doe, I was shocked by how little effort the police put into identifying my ravaged corpse. Not that they had any shortage of murders to solve, but I vainly thought that being a young attractive woman would garner some extra attention for my case. The coroner took some new head shots, a model’s dream, but they were too disturbing to release to the papers for publication. My parents didn’t file a missing persons report because they had no idea I was missing; we didn’t communicate often since they steadfastly believed I had abandoned both them and my Midwestern morals in favor of a depraved life as a model in the Windy City. I didn’t even have a dog who would bark his displeasure when I didn’t come back to the apartment to feed him, so I’m not sure how long it took for my absentee landlord to realize I was no longer paying rent. The authorities remained apathetic about the mystery of my identity, and I became a cold case. After years of taking up space in the morgue’s freezer, my unclaimed, nameless body was finally signed over to a cadaver supply company.

Ironically, my dream of going to Italy came true at long last, though sadly my lithe model body, battered as it was, was not destined to be part of the journey. The cadaver company was contracted to ship 18 human heads to a research facility in Rome, where we’d be used by aspiring plastic surgeons learning the delicate art of facial reconstruction. My teenage vision of being hustled toward the catwalk while a passionate mob of Italian makeup artists dabbed finishing touches to my lipstick and dusted my décolletage was replaced by the harsh reality of being plunked down on a frigid stainless steel operating table and coldly regarded by a couple of emotionally detached medical students. Instead of my face being caressed by a flurry of sable-haired brushes and silky powder puffs, it was attacked unceremoniously with clumsily guided scalpels and tightly clamped forceps. Amateurish, uneven sutures appeared where only the highest quality cosmetics should have been. Having been victimized by these trainees, I can’t see why a model would voluntarily go under the knife in an attempt to prolong her career—I say embrace the crows’ feet and go out gracefully when your time comes.

When the indignity of this medical experimentation reached its conclusion, I was hoping to quietly return to Chicago with my 17 other body-less companions for proper cremation as required by the cadaver company’s contract. Unfortunately, a customs officer at O’Hare, assigned to scan the monitor for unusual results in routine x-rays of incoming cargo, nearly choked on his latte when he saw the 18 of us staring back at him from our crate. Per Murphy’s law, the accompanying paperwork that shows we’re flying into the country legitimately is nowhere to be found, and we are now in custody at the medical examiner’s office until further investigations are conducted. As luck would have it, when all we long for is ashes to ashes and dust to dust, we have finally found authorities who are anxious to solve a mystery. Who are we? Where are we from? Where are we going? Why aren’t we attached to our bodies? If I’d gotten this much attention when I’d been murdered, maybe I’d be resting quietly, still firmly attached to the rest of my slender model figure, amidst the other oak-shaded granite markers in my parents’ small-town Midwest churchyard.

This work is a response to yesterday’s FFF (Friday Flash Fiction) prompt on oneminutewriter.blogspot.co.uk  The prompt was to create a fictional story from the point of view of one of the many unidentified heads that have been found around the world this week.

Photo credits go to my husband, Jim.

The world beyond my window is blanketed in four inches of cleansing, shushing, calming white powder. Having no commitments today that required me to bundle up and shovel out, I indulged in some quiet contemplation of the week’s events, which ultimately led to deeper scrutiny of my more distant past, as I watched the drifting flakes become malleable piles to be sculpted by the wind’s icy gusts.

I took on two new English students this week who both have a pretty good grasp of vocabulary and grammar, but would like some practice with listening and speaking. In our first meeting, the conversation naturally centered around getting to know each other, and the topic of childhood was discussed. One of the women, about my mom’s age, credited growing up with a strict father for her inability, even to this day, to speak her mind. As a girl, she was so apprehensive about his potential reaction that she learned to keep all her thoughts to herself, not to disagree, not to cause conflict. I heard echoes of my own childhood in her description—I was extremely quiet and reserved in my youth, though, thankfully, not out of fear of my parents.

I was painfully shy—I wouldn’t say “Boo” to my own shadow—and lacked any amount of self-confidence. Although there were a multitude of thoughts and opinions swirling in my head, I didn’t place much value on them, and didn’t relish the idea of having to expand upon or defend them. Combined with the fact that I didn’t particularly enjoy hearing the sound of my own voice or drawing unnecessary attention to myself, I rarely gave my two cents worth to anyone. Even as late as high school, I was withholding any opposing viewpoints from my mother and ducking down alternate aisles in the grocery store to avoid saying “Bonjour” to my French teacher.

By senior year of high school, I was beginning to find my voice, thanks to the English teacher who appointed me editor of the school newspaper.  I was forced by that responsibility to manage a team, which meant not only giving my opinion and talking to people I didn’t know well, but sometimes doing so assertively.  The experience proved invaluable to me in college, where I found myself well and truly alone for the first time in my life, with no one to speak on my behalf.  If that senior year of high school hadn’t been an injection of confidence to my ability to speak up for myself—to ask questions in class, to get directions in town, to befriend roommates and dorm mates—four years of campus life would have been unbearable.

Since college, I’ve occasionally been jealous of classmates who went directly into their chosen careers after graduation, and as a result have logged eighteen years in their respective professions. While it’s hard not to envy their certainty about the direction they needed to take (and their retirement funds), I can’t say I regret the winding road of my own work-life, for each job I’ve held while trying to find my true calling has exposed me to new situations that have intensified my voice. As a veterinary technician, a picture framer, a retail manager, a tutor, and a teacher, I’ve learned to speak with empathy, authority, humor, patience, sincerity, restraint, and clarity. Unlike my new English student, I am no longer reluctant to speak what’s on my mind. I will always have some residual shyness, and I often prefer to listen and reflect rather than contribute verbally to the conversation, but I know when it’s important to open my mouth and let my voice be heard.