The mutual poet and I wrapped our scars around rainbows like barbed wire cuts of rust wrenching the tears from the colored spine like lemon juice or the salty water from a baby’s crushed ice face. The mutual poet and I stayed up all night, for three nights, maybe a week, we couldn’t sleep, but a bit at twilight and the sun shook us from our slumbers and we blotted it out with a big patch of dark cloth the color of blood running from a split-open heart on some cold boulevard by a bar after a bruising breakup over loud music, cigarettes, and rum.
We ate nothing at breakfast and sauteed bullets for dinner; he wandered around in a daze mumbling things to himself, forgetting where he left his lit cigarette and I followed in his footsteps, perfect synchronicity as he did one thing and then another, rapidly changing gears and always mumbling like a freight train feather with a bad valve and he had a poor sense of concentration, his brain like a steam-whistle screaming away at 5 o’clock but five o’clock comes every 17 seconds or so; was this the end of it all? the great melting mind (and Joejack if you hear this, you’ve been there before but now safe in the bosom of the valley far north) — you will all hate this, say I am a tantric rip-off of some dead so and so … so … no love in this poem? love in every poem, even the most seething verse and the darkest string of words was once spawned from love and it is our gift to stitch them together in the ocean quilt with sawdust and bone.
But back to the mutual poet — he once put something in the oven, fell asleep and then woke to the stench of burning food and a choking cloud of smoke, he once put a gun to his head not really knowing if it was loaded or not — pulled the trigger — wasn’t that time.
Just trying to get back from wherever I came, haven’t had a home in centuries, no place to dwell with any decency, no place to settle in for the long haul; different doorways trap memories behind them, too many doors and different floors, and some places are filled with love and others filled within silence and fingernail scratches on the wall from just trying to remain standing and well the boo-hoo girl went back to white dinosaur in a green car and she should be happy there, then again she’s happy everywhere.
The moon, mutual poet, was muzzled pink tonight, hanging there like a faded ruby with bruises and the clouds all around it were like melting blue butter and black-eyed whipped cream, the brutal stars and stripes puffing away on another hand-rolled cigarette and the monkeys were swinging madly from limb to limb as the warm river rolled by beneath another freeway to another kingdom of fractured lives slaving away, day after day, to barely get by as strangers manipulate the development of their children’s minds and fights roar out of control and another head is buried in a wall.
They buried the mutual poet on Good Friday 1913, yet he remains with me here today; his motions are my motions, his forgetfulness and inability to speak coherently are traits we both share, but if he was here and I was there, would it make any difference at all?
Well goodnight Joejack. I picture you laughing at a sad movie or crying while watching a comedy; do you know a guy died in your house? — the one with the long hallway — it always creeped me out, but if you think about it, we are all walking over someone else’s bones. Goodnight Joejack.
When one is inside a living hell one begins to wonder if life is really hell and that we are living as damned souls rather than breathing, beating flesh is it a reversal of reverence? or a carving into a dirty brick wall running along an avenue in some dirty brick town hall where everyone lives and dies at the mall because shopping soothes the grated spirit and machine guns make us heavenly patriotic we all share the same hell, but it’s personalized just for us a little agony here, a little sadness there, a few suicidal tendencies sprinkled in between like tooth-cracking rock candy on a wedding cake spelling out disaster and the peace sign all muddled together painted in a gleaming red of blood and all the crystal tears dry up and blow away in the breath of broken angels slouched at the bar my world is spiral notebooks full of spilled and infinite ink and dreams filling these white, chalky veins dreams of innocence twisted inside out like guts in a blender and the torturous high-speed button is stuck, lashes of a wicked wind like a bunch of reckless bros tossing back Fat Tires at a pub in Nob Hill and smoking black cigarettes with a scent of pine and when will it be time to throw the switch and juice it up real bright and glossy fizzing orange firebombs licking at tender wounds while wearing this metal hat and laboring in the pain of beachside memories of little boys tossing sticks at the water and maternal maids bracing themselves against a chill California wind and then what of him as he shakes bone-chilled against the cement of some dead-end den watching the whispers of a life gone by float to the endless sky, but he never wants to say goodbye
By
Aaron Echoes August
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This frustration of motion this inept spinning of my tangled web all the deceptions we weave all the arrows we sling at ourselves when there is no reason and I am empty without her as lovers fill the home and I still spark the sunset bewildered and alone
I come from a place not known a high hill tucked far away behind the sugar plants and the factories belching out babies in bleached Red Radio Flyers bleached by the sun bleached by the burn of innocence aged and I am an astronaut floating untethered a radio-free lamp ray looking for a light bulb to suck and swirl
I came upon a disillusion a fair lady needing to escape and I have the power at my foot but I am empty and frayed for love is a magic trick something splayed secretly in the shadows and I have knife points in my heart slowly choking on the trickle a scissor slice an orange wave salting the wound and when I am brought down by Paris will I ever be enough?
Where has my patience gone where has the image in the mirror dissolved to and the bottle keeps me warm as I pace restlessly in a chill and maybe when I meet God I’ll just come out and ask her when is love ever real?
So nothing ever works out as planned you see winds up being just Gallo and me my empty need raining through the moon sparks dripping off the razor’s edge and me bleeding helplessly until she comes to me but my fate is drowning so stop being so pained and jealous but I can’t help the shiver inside that nervous twitch of wonder left adopted by the night sweats so why don’t I just give in and count all my blessings in disguise?
I am not an iron cross I am not a thermostat so what am I? the unexplainable the paintable tab in a ghost story the sexed up frolic on a smooth hardwood floor come on give me a moment to explain my reckless stance and I know I feel too much baby broken clouds weep my name
I don’t understand maybe I don’t need to understand this ritual of disturbances I just want to care
I could tell when I walked in the door that I was motionless moving some parade of wrecked divinity caught off guard by the sizzle frying my heart an empty line an empty space a tent stake forced through my handicapped resistance I don’t want to feel the shock again of another love left abandoned just whisper to yourself it’s all right it’s just life it will all end someday soon
So fuck this feeling game it will never be the same I’ll always be capsized my soul is a hurricane aimed directly at myself and I am not some Wizard of Oz with a magic touch and spit my road isn’t yellow brick I’m getting sick in a Denver trash can you can see how my madness wanes then comes back again in waves I’m just crazy about her sticky needles in the haze I’m just a camel with no Baghdad a radio-free lamp ray electrifying the endless sea.
Karl from the city went to work cleaning the mess he made in the kitchen as Franco and Cheise Karn Mouise looked on. When he finished, he rinsed out the towel and washed his hands in the kitchen sink. “Well, I suppose I should get going now before they wonder if I went AWOL,” he said to them.
“Can I have a hug before you go Karl?” Franco asked with open arms.
The man eyed him, confused, and wondering. He looked around to make sure no one was watching but then again nobody could have been.
“All right,” he said. “Bring it in.”
“Oh yippy!” Franco squealed, and he wrapped his arms tight around Karl’s body and snuggled him lovingly.
“All right, all right, that will do, mister. Thanks for saving my life. You both take care now. And be sure to clean up your yard before they send someone else a lot less understanding.”
Karl limply smiled at them, went to the door, opened it, and walked out into the mean world.
“Well,” Franco said to Cheise Karn Mouise. “Now that that’s over with. Let me ask you one last time. Are you still planning on staying here to watch your stupid football while I go have a sparkly good time shopping?”
Cheise Karn Mouise looked up at him with little expression. “Yes.” Then he turned and disappeared into the other room.
Franco yelled after him. “Fine! I’m going now. You may choose not to be happy, but don’t rain on my parade. I’m going to be so gay they’re going to have to wipe the smile right off my dead body!”
The front door eventually slammed and Cheise Karn Mouise was all alone in the house, nice and snug in a comfortable chair, and he was glad for the peace and quiet.
After a while, Cheise Karn Mouise fixed himself some microwave popcorn and an iced grape soda before getting back to his football. He watched one game, then another, and was then into his third when he realized Franco had not returned home yet. He clicked off the watching devices and the house was eerily silent except for a lonely low hum of electricity throughout. The light of day was beginning to crisp over. He was oddly worried and went to a window and looked at the street. Franco’s car was still gone. Cheise Karn Mouise tried calling him on his cell phone but there was no answer. He began to think something bad had happened, but he decided to just go ahead and take a nap on the living room couch. So what if he wasn’t home yet? he thought to himself. Franco’s a grown man who can take of himself. Besides, they had gotten into a fight, and he was mad, and he had to play the little game of acting like he didn’t care even though he did care. It was a lot of emotions for a small puppet to juggle. Being really alive, he decided, was tough sometimes.
And that’s when he started to cry before he fell into a deep sleep and he dreamt about how he was first created, how he had once been nothing but pieces of a puppet that had to be assembled. He dreamt about how it took the thoughts of some human being in a wood shop down in the snug of Lyon, France to come up with the idea, the design, and to finally carve, shape and birth him into the living world before shipping him off simply for the entertainment of others. He truly was a puppet in a world with countless opinionated hands.
It was later when his phone rang, and it startled him awake. He fumbled in the darkness for his puppet cell phone. “Hello?” he sleepily mumbled.
Franco Dellaronti was crying on the other end.
Cheise Karn Mouise sat up. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“They beat me up!” Franco said, whimpering.
“What!? Who beat you up?”
“Just come get me. I’m at the First Church of Loving Goodness on 37th Avenue. I’ll be the one bleeding on the steps out front.”
“I should call an ambulance for you.”
“Just come get me!”
Cheise Karn Mouise went to the garage and jumped in his dream car — a Kia Soul specially made for puppets with souls. He activated the garage door with a press of a button on a remote, fired up the car, and tore out of the driveway like a puppet with purpose. “Don’t worry my human friend,” he said aloud to the kaleidoscopic dash. “I’m coming to get you!” and he cranked the volume of his favorite song — Pumped Up Kicks by Foster the People — and he drove along to the beat like a ferocious dancing wind to get to Franco before he possibly died.
When his GPS had finally guided him to the church, he saw Franco Dellaronti slumped on the stairs out front, leaning against a silver rail. He worked himself out of the Soul and ran over to him. His master was a bruised and bloody mess, and he carefully shook him a little bit. “Hey man. I’m here. Jesus… What happened?”
Franco looked at him with a dazed expression. “I wanted to say a prayer for you. I wanted to pray that you find true contentment in your puppet life and be gay all the time.” He turned his head and looked at the doorway of the church. “I was in there, giving my prayer and they were going to start a night service and then they told me I had to leave.”
“What on earth for?”
“They said I was a sinner and that I was destined for hell. They said Jesus hates people who are gay. And I wondered, how could Jesus possibly be against someone being happy? Anyways, I didn’t want to leave. I told them I wasn’t finished praying yet. That’s when a group of the church men grabbed me and threw me to the floor. They started punching me in the face, and then the women there and even some of the children started kicking me and spitting on me. I think someone threw a Bible at me. They looked right at me and told me God hated me and that they hated me, too. Then they hustled me outside and dumped me, and I’ve been sitting here all wumbly bumbly and half bleeding to death ever since. Why did they beat me up for just wanting to pray for my beloved puppet friend to be happy?”
Cheise Karn Mouise sadly sighed and then said, “Because they’re hypocritical assholes.”
“I just don’t understand, Cheise Karn Mouise. I just don’t understand.”
“I know. Neither do I, but don’t worry about that now… Let’s get you home. Where’s your car?”
“They set it on fire.”
“What!?”
“Yes. They wanted me to witness the burning. They told me it was a preview to my own personal hell.”
“What horrible people.”
“Yes. I’m going to see a lawyer about all this,” Franco said.
“Good. Can you walk?”
“I’ll manage. Thanks for coming to get me.”
“I should have come with you in the first place. I’m sorry for acting like a dick.”
“Oooooh,” Franco managed to happily squeak through his pain.
“Zip it,” Cheise Karn Mouise said, then he laughed. “Let’s just get out of here.”
They rode in silence for a while until Cheise Karn Mouise suggested they get a late-night treat. He thought it would help cheer Franco up a bit. “How about some ice cream? And not that yogurt crap. I mean real ice cream. Are you in the mood for some 24-hour Cream King goodness?”
Franco Dellaronti brightened through the pain. “Cream King? Absolutely. I want to get something super swirly.”
Cheise Karn Mouise shook his head. “God that’s gay.”
Then the puppet with soul gripped the steering wheel of his ultra-cool Kia Soul as he plowed the night streets, and he was glad to be in a fairly decent mood, his good friend and master at his side, badly beaten, but still alive. Then something in the sky caught both their eyes, and they saw magical electric Jesus riding a bicycle, and he gave them a friendly wave and smile before rising and flying off across the face of the blue-white moon — like an E.T. kid — on his way to space Heaven.
Author’s Note: Mature Content. The following story contains language that some readers may find offensive. Skip this one if you don’t like that sort of thing.
“I don’t think I want to give you kudzu pie anymore. You’re horrible to people,” Franco angrily ranted.
“Oh, come on. You can’t come down on a guy for just doing his job. I don’t make up the rules. I got bills to pay just like everyone else,” the city man said.
Franco pondered that and then reconsidered. “Okay. I’m sorry. Would you like some lactose-free egg nog to go with that pie? There’s nothing more refreshing than a cold glass of lactose-free egg nog.”
“Sure. That would be great. Thanks for considering my dietary needs.”
“No problem. I’m magical like that.”
“Say, do you mind if I smoke? I could really use one right about now.”
“Nah, go ahead and suck on your fag all you want,” Franco told him.
“What did you just say?”
“Suck on your fag…”
“I know, I know. That is so gay, mister.”
“Jiminy Effin Cricket! What is it with everyone!? A fag happens to be a colloquial British term for a cigarette!”
Franco plopped down an emerald-green ashtray in the middle of the table followed by a plate with a chilled and wobbly piece of green kudzu pie. He went and yanked a plastic jug of lactose-free egg nog from the refrigerator and filled a tall glass and sat that before the man as well.
“Would you like me to squirt some cream on it for you?” Franco asked him.
“Excuse me?”
“Whipped topping. On your pie.”
“Yes, some cream would be, um, very nice.”
“Here you go. Enjoy.”
“Thanks.”
Franco watched with bizarre fascination as the city official opened his mouth and filled it with a piece of the cream-covered kudzu pie. He chewed. Then he stopped chewing. His face morphed into a horrifying grimace and then a huge and sloppy spew of mashed kudzu pie and cream shot out of his face and splattered all over the table. He made a horrible gurgling, gasping, groaning, grunting noise and clamped both his hands around the glass of lactose-free egg nog and tipped it to his mouth and started to suck and gulp ferociously, wheezing and whining and spitting as he did so. He paused briefly and then suddenly the egg nog came shooting out of his mouth as well and he cried out, “Spoiled! It’s spoiled!”
The official suddenly stood up, grasped his throat, and then just as suddenly, collapsed onto the floor.
“Holy shit!” Franco Dellaronti exclaimed. “I think I just killed him with kudzu pie and lactose-free egg nog!”
Cheise Karn Mouise rushed into the kitchen. “What the hell is going on in here!? What’s all the noise? Just look at this disgusting mess! And who the hell is that?!”
Franco frowned. “It was a guy from the city. He gave me a 600-dollar ticket because I left my smashed-up kudzu pie stand in the yard. I’m considered a public nuisance now by the entire neighborhood.”
“That’s totally gay.”
“No, it’s not! I’m not happy at all. In fact, this is all really pissing me off! And just look at this mess and this body! What the hell am I supposed to do?”
Cheise Karn Mouise shuffled over to the coffee pot that sat on the counter and struggled to reach it. “I don’t know. Did you check to see if he’s dead?”
Franco turned to him. “You want me to touch his body? Gross.”
“Maybe you should give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. I bet you’d like that.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I thought you were gay,” the puppet said, still struggling for the coffee pot.
“I’m usually very gay, but not today! Aren’t you my friend? Don’t you care about me at all and my need for overflowing happiness?”
“Of course, I care. I’m just not really all that interested in feelings… It’s gay.”
“I think you fear giddiness,” Franco sternly pointed out. “You fear your own emotions.”
“What? I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
“You’re afraid to be happy with who you truly are.”
“God! Quit talking so damn gay… And I know what I am. I’m a puppet who has been blessed with life.”
“Why are you afraid to express your true inner thoughts?” Franco said as he went to him and helped him with the coffee pot. He poured some into a cup and handed it down to him. Cheise Karn Mouise sipped at it, looked up, and tried to smile but couldn’t.
“Do you feel guilty about something? Do you experience inner turmoil?” Franco asked, trying to dig a little deeper into the soul of his friend.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore. It’s weird. Let me just drink my coffee and go back to my football in peace.”
“It’s not good to hold your feelings in,” Franco told him. “You may explode like an ice cream truck one day.”
Cheise Karn Mouise took another sip of his coffee. “Just drop it I said!”
“All right. All right. I just think it would be a benefit to you if occasionally you tried to get in touch with your feminine side.”
“That has to be the absolute gayest thing you have ever said to me,” Cheise Karn Mouise said.
Franco finally gave up. “Fine. Be unhappy for the rest of your life… So, I guess I am going shopping by myself after all?”
“I don’t feel like leaving the house. I told you that.”
“Are you sure? There’s a new frozen yogurt shop at the mall.”
“Yogurt is gay.”
“Well, I’d be gay too if I was full of fun and fruity flavors with a cornucopia of yummy toppings.”
Cheise Karn Mouise shook his head at him. “Your psychiatrist really needs to get to work on you. Jesus.”
“I’m looking forward to it. Therapy is all about finding your happy place no matter how screwed up you are.”
Then there came a sludgy groaning from the floor as the man from the city stirred. “Oh god, I feel horrible. What happened?”
Cheise Karn Mouise threw his coffee cup in the sink before rushing over to check on the man from the city. He had an idea how to save his friend some cash. “You were choking on a delicious piece of kudzu pie and my friend here performed the Heimlich maneuver on you and saved your life. You should thank him, not give him an outrageous ticket for just trying to bring a little edible joy to the world.”
“He licked my hiney? That’s so gay,” the man from the city frightfully moaned.
“No, you brute! The Heimlich maneuver,” Cheise Karn Mouise explained. “It’s a very helpful medically endorsed physical action used to dislodge food or foreign objects from a choking person’s airway. It saves lives. Just like it did here today in this very house, in this very room mind you. Are you dumb or what?”
The man struggled to get to his feet.
“Oh, good heavens, you’re gross,” Cheise Karn Mouise said with a scrunched puppet face of disgust. “Franco, fetch this poor fella a warm wet towel to clean himself with.”
“Of course, of course.”
“What’s your name friend?” Cheise Karn Mouise asked. “I don’t believe you supplied us with any official identification.”
“My name is… Karl, I think. Hey, wait, are you a fucking French puppet? Am I talking to a puppet? Whose hand you got up your ass?”
“I suppose you wish it was your hand up my ass, don’t you,” Cheise Karn Mouise teased. “And yes, Karl, you are talking to a French puppet. I am Cheise Karn Mouise of Lyon. And I am truly alive on my own. No hand up my ass required. This world of ours is a very strange and horrible place, isn’t it?”
“And yet so beautiful and delightful,” Franco sing-songed as he returned and handed Karl the warm, wet towel.
Karl wiped down his face and the front of his suit jacket and shirt. He looked at the huge mess splattered on the table. “Did I do that? Gosh, I’m so sorry.”
“Well Karl, why don’t you make it up to us. First, by cleaning up this nastiness, and second, by tearing up that ungodly citation,” Cheise Karn Mouise pleaded.
Karl flickered his eyes and said, “Yes, yes. Of course. I was never here. I saw nothing. Everything is in order.” He chuckled a bit. “Do you have any Bounty paper towels?”
“Oooooh,” Franco beamed. “The quicker picker upper. Right away, Karl.”
Karl leaned over and whispered to Cheise Karn Mouise. “Does he always act this gay?”
“Yes, he does. He’s a very happy and positive person and there’s nothing wrong with that.”
“Right, I didn’t mean anything by it. I was just wondering.”
My latest gripe involves Equate nutritional shakes from Walmart.
I enjoy a good nutritional shake now and then, but what I don’t enjoy is the battle that commences when I try to open the little plastic bottle. They have a strip of plastic around the cap and the neck of the bottle, and according to the “instructions” you are supposed to pull down at the point where it says EASY OPEN.
But alas, I repeatedly fail in my attempt to scrape, scratch, gnaw, tug, pull, yank, peel, pluck, tear, dislodge, or unencumber this immortal ring of plastic, that is until I finally secure the aid of a very sharp object to do my bidding. Ah, slice… That’s the word I needed.
Now, this is a product that is essentially geared toward older individuals, and I can only imagine the difficulty someone with weakness in their hands or arthritis in their fingers must have trying to open such a package. I imagine a lot of these things get thrown against a wall in a fit of anger and a cloudburst of expletives. Trust me, I understand. There are plenty of times I wanted to chuck one of these babies right out a window.
And while I’m at it, let me shed a little light on other packaging gripes I have… Hopefully, some of you will agree with me.
Let’s begin:
Disinfectant wipes!
Okay. How is it we have robotic surgery, but no one has yet been able to come up with a packaging design solution that allows for the easy dispensing of a cleaning wipe. Blammo Batman! I don’t get it. It’s 2022!
I don’t know about anyone else, but the simple act of purchasing a container of disinfectant wipes gives me anxiety because I foresee the painful battle that is surely to come. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve nearly undone the entire contents of the plastic cylinder just in order to get ONE damn wipe. It’s like one of those magic tricks where the demented clown with blue teeth keeps pulling handkerchief after handkerchief out of his clenched fist — you know, how they just keep coming and coming and coming out and no one has the slightest idea where the hell they are actually coming from… That’s the visual I portray, including the demented part, when all I want to do is get rid of some kitchen bacteria!! Picture a pissed off Happy Gilmore saying that, and you’ll get the idea of my state of mind at that point.
I popped open a new container just a while ago and it even has a label right on it that says: First wipe ready to go! Bullshit Arm & Hammer! It was literally one long knotted string of Rain Fresh scented wipes that looked like bed sheets after a torrential spin cycle in the wash machine. Arghhhh!
Moving on.
Sliced cheese packaging or anything that has one of those zipper seals you have to activate with a firm pull before getting to the goodies.
You know what I’m talking about. The packaging where you first have to Tear Here (and you never clearly ascertain where the here is) to get to the zipper seal part that you open by pulling apart like some holy guy did with the Red Sea. I am tearing here! It doesn’t work! I still can’t open the bloody thing! And that’s when I reach for a pair of good scissors and have at it. There! Zip that provolone cheese! Don’t even get me started on trying to press the seal back together. Ugh. And I believe that holy guy was Moses.
And you’ll all appreciate this one because it really hits home for this website, Cereal After Sex… Cereal bags!
Okay, I’m trying to get to my Raisin Bran, not a tomb of gold at Fort Knox. Now I know why cereal is so packed with vitamins and minerals… Because it’s such a strenuous workout just to open the damn bag. We need the nutrients! I pull and pull and pull on that superglued bag until eventually it either rips open in a very bad way and the cereal goes everywhere, or, you guessed it, I go to my old reliable — scissors — and just slice that sucker open. They should save us all the trouble and just include a pair of scissors with every box.
Whew. Now, I’m sure there are tons of other products out there that have horrible packaging. Isn’t life hard enough as it is? Why pile all this on top of us, too? Is this just another sinister plot to control and demean us? I don’t know, but if you have a few horror stories of your own related to packaging frustrations, please share. Until then, I’m going to try and open my bottle of prescription nervous pills.
Franco Dellaronti was lying on his bed in a very dark space, and he was in a state of horrible depression and self-doubt because of his failure as a kudzu pie entrepreneur. He scrunched his eyes and wrapped his arms around his belly because he was in so much pain. The he heard the faint sound of someone slowly opening his bedroom door. He sat up on the edge of the bed while trying to settle his raging heart that was now pumping with fear. “Who’s there!?” he cried out. The door creaked open wider. Franco tore a drawer open in a nightstand near his bed and pulled out a gun. He shakily aimed the revolver toward the invisible menace hovering somewhere in the door frame. Whoever or whatever it was moved closer. He felt it.
“I’ll shoot! I swear I’ll shoot!” Franco yelled out.
“Don’t shoot! It’s me.”
“Cheise Karn Mouise?”
“Yes!” He reached up to a light switch and flipped it. The room became painfully illuminated. “What the hell are you doing? You could have killed me!”
“I’m sorry. I was half awake and very sad and my head wasn’t very clear. I thought you might be an intruder or a rapist.”
“I’m not an intruder or a rapist, but thanks for locking me out of the house you big goof. I think I got sunburned.” Cheise Karn Mouise walked across the floor and hopped up on the bed next to the man.
“I’m sorry about that, too. How did you get in?”
“I broke out a basement window… I didn’t know you were a gun owner.”
Franco was frustrated with himself. “Yes. I don’t know how to use it very well. It’s heavy and makes my wrist hurt.”
“You’re just being a pussy,” Cheise Karn Mouise bemused. “Are you sure you’re not a girl?”
“What? That’s a horrible thing to say. Of course, I’m not a girl… And why are you suddenly being so snotty?”
“I had a pretty rough day and I’m completely sunburned, and it hurts like hell,” the little puppet man complained.
Franco looked at him and felt bad for locking him out of the house. “Would you like me to rub some pain-relieving aloe vera gel all over your body?”
Cheise Karn Mouise was confused. “Um. What did you say? What do you want to rub all over my body?”
“It will help soothe your sunburn. I bought it at a Greenwalls pharmacy in Cortez, Colorado after I went on my hiking sabbatical in the high desert without the proper clothing and sunscreen. It really does help ease the pain, but you may smell like mouthwash for a while.”
“I think I’ll just deal with the pain,” Cheise Karn Mouise said, and he winced as he adjusted himself on the bed.
Franco tried to convince him. “Are you sure? I really want to rub this all over your body.”
“What the hell is wrong with you!?” Cheise Karn Mouise snapped.
“What? I’m just trying to help.”
“You’re acting very gay.”
“Gay?” And Franco thought, then said, “Even though I’m pretty upset about the whole kudzu pie fiasco, I am generally a very happy person.”
“Don’t you know what gay is?”
“Well sure. It’s like how it is when I’m so light on my feet that I could just jump over a rainbow. When I’m completely joyous about life. When I feel gay, gay, gay!”
Cheise Karn Mouise shook his head, looked around the room, and then stared at the floor and mumbled. “Okay… You can rub it on me but do it quick.”
The morning was filled with the smell of coffee and bacon and gross wet eggs as the man and Cheise Karn Mouise sat at the kitchen table and awkwardly ate breakfast together. Franco looked over the rim of his cup at the puppet that had come to life by the power of kudzu pie. He loudly sipped to get his attention.
Cheise Karn Mouise set down his fork and looked at him. “Must you do that?”
“What?”
“Slurp at your coffee like a dime store hooker.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You sure are sorry a lot,” the puppet snapped. “You should probably do some research on that and figure out what is wrong with you.”
“I pay a shrink to do that.”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot.” Cheise Karn Mouise scoffed. “I’m afraid you’re wasting your money.
Franco was hurt by the comment and tried to turn the tides of the conversation. “How’s that burn feeling today?” he asked.
“I think it’s better. That stuff really does work.”
“Good. I really enjoyed rubbing it on you.”
“I um… Enjoyed it too. And you’re pretty good at rubbing.”
Franco was pleased with himself, but bashful enough to change the subject. “I thought today we’d go down to the puppet store and get you a new outfit. That one looks very dirty and gross. Then maybe we could pop over to the mall.”
“Today? Not today. I want to stay home and watch some football games I recorded. I haven’t gotten to yet.”
Franco fluffed his hand in the air. “Football all day? No. We’re going shopping.”
“Why are you being so gay again?”
“What? I’m not very gay at the moment. You’ve upset me. And I think organized sports is just a ginormous waste of time. It’s barbaric and merely weekend fodder for the brain-washed masses.”
Cheise Karn Mouise threw his napkin on the table and crawled down. “So is shopping,” he snipped, and he disappeared into another room.
It was then that the doorbell rang, and Franco Dellaronti huffed, “Oh good big balls who is that!?” He got up from the table and walked toward the door and yanked it open. There was a serious man standing there and he wore a navy-blue suit with a red tie and his hair was clipped short and neat and was the color of vanilla frosting and even had the swirls in it like you might see on cake. He was holding some kind of computerized tablet. “Are you,” he began, and he looked down at the tablet and squinted his eyes a bit. “Franco Dellaronti? And are you the owner of this property?”
“Yes, I am. And this is my house. Who the hell are you?”
“I’m from the city and I’ve come here to control your life. Is that your smashed up lemonade stand littering your front lawn?”
Franco peeked over the official’s shoulder. “Yes. It’s mine. But it’s not a lemonade stand — it was a kudzu pie stand.”
“What the hell is kudzu pie?” the city official wondered out loud.
“It’s a delicious pie made from a sprawling southern vine. Would you like to come in and try some? It would be no trouble at all to plate you a nice fat slice.”
The official hesitated and looked around and sniffed before stepping up and in. “It smells kind of weird in here, but I guess I can get past that for a piece of delicious pie.”
“Oh, that’s my roommate. He has a problem with personal hygiene. My apologies. But please, come sit down.”
Franco led his guest to the kitchen and offered him a seat at the table. “Would you like a big glass of milk to go with that delicious kudzu pie?”
“No. I can’t. I have that lactose intolerant thing. Do you have any beer?”
“Beer? They let you drink beer while you work?”
“Sure. Everyone drinks on the job at the city,” the official teased as he looked up at the man’s confused face. “I’m just kidding. I can’t drink on the job,” he said, and then he winked at Franco. “But I do it anyway.”
Franco fumbled around in the refrigerator. “I’m afraid I don’t have any beer, but would you like a frosty wine cooler?”
The official scrunched his face. “Hell no! I don’t want a wine cooler. That’s gay.”
Franco rolled his eyes and grumbled. “My smelly roommate has been saying that to me all day. I just don’t see what’s so wrong about being happy. Why is everyone so against being happy?”
“I don’t know, but I think you may be a little confused… Anyways, forget the drink and let’s get down to business. Now, the broken stand out in the yard is considered refuse and city code #32-HTBF-43C clearly states that any refuse on personal property must be stored in an approved refuse container which must in turn be stored in a garage or other location which renders it hidden from public sight. So, I’m afraid you are in violation, and I’ll have to fine you.”
“Fine me!? How much?”
“It’s 600 dollars.”
“That’s preposterous!”
“I’m afraid it’s the law.”
“Fine. Let me go get my purse,” Franco whined.
“What? Now that’s gay.”
“Seriously? Can I not be happy about one damn thing today!?”
“You really carry a purse?” the city official wanted to know.
“Yes. I carry a purse. So what!?”
“But you’re a man for crying out loud! Use a wallet like the rest of us.”
“Purses happen to fit my personal needs better than a wallet. I could wear a dress if I want to. It’s nobody’s choice but mine!” Franco exclaimed; his hands now high in the air.
“Do you?”
“Do I what?”
“Do you wear a dress?”
“No, I don’t wear a dress! I just like purses. I have a lot of shit to haul around, and I need a purse. Now, can I just please pay the fine so I can get on with my life!”
The official sighed and printed a piece of paper out of the handheld machine, tore it off and gave it to Franco. “Sorry. I can’t take any payments. That would be too efficient. You must come down to city hall and pay in person, but you can only do it between 10:30 and 3:30 on Mondays and Thursdays, unless of course Monday falls on one of those fake holidays, then you’ll have to wait until Thursday. Also, the office is closed from noon until 2 to accommodate our staff’s completely impractical lunch period. And if you’re late on your payment for any reason, they’re going to tack on an exorbitant fee that no one is willing to explain to you and a warrant for your arrest will be issued. So, yeah. Sorry about that, but I’d suggest you get this taken care of as soon as possible.”
“That’s all so completely ludicrous. So, on Veterans’ Day for example, the government takes the day off to honor the same people they don’t give a shit about when they come home from one of your profit-making wars?”
“I work for the city mister, not the federal government. If you got a problem with war, take it up with President Orangutan Assface.” The official laughed and dragged his rough fingers across his scratchy beard. “Hey. What about that kudzu pie?”
My wife and I love watching House Hunters, especially the international version of the show. It’s been a thing for us for a long, long time. We love to yell at the people for making stupid choices.
Now, we know a lot of the show is fake and from what I read the people have already made the choice of what house they want even before they are filmed “house hunting.” I also read that sometimes the show utilizes younger actors to play the buyers who in reality may be old, ugly, and boring. Something like that. But even with all that in mind, it really grinds my gears when I see people who make a living as “social media trendsetters” or “lifestyle enthusiasts” or “product ambassadors for an international marketing start up” or “nomadic online fashion consultants” and they have a budget of like 2 million dollars and I’m just like “WTF!”
Just once, I’d like to see a guy who vacuums for a living and makes 13 bucks an hour trying to buy a house. Now that’s putting reality in Reality TV.
My wife understandably gets frustrated with my House Hunters frustration. I just can’t help it, though. I’m an edgy individual. Take last night for example. The buyers were two guys — 23 and 24 years old, respectively, who were friends and business partners — who earn a living by making YouTube videos about video games or something like that. It was never made totally clear. But nonetheless, they supposedly have 2 million subscribers to whatever they do and in turn must make a shitload of money because they were looking at houses priced around $1.3 million. I just sit there and shake my head and I truly don’t understand it. How!?
Am I envious? Yes! Am I bitter? Yes! Why? Because (with the exception of the last two years of my semi-retirement and “working” as a struggling writer) I have worked my ass off my entire life at jobs that were killing me emotionally… And for what? I never got ahead. I never got noticed. I barely squeaked by. And in the end, I got kicked to the curb like a bag of trash because of some corporate algorithm. I bang my head against the wall and holler to the heavens, “What am I doing wrong! I just want to live, not suffer to live!”
It seems so damn easy for so many others and some days I struggle just to get up, make coffee, and do the laundry. Sigh.
But then I look over at the corner of my desk and I see a pile of notes from my wife. She leaves me a love note on my desk every morning before she leaves for work. Even if I have been an ass. I’m usually still sleeping. But reading her note is pretty much the first thing I do in the morning. They are a daily reminder of all that we have, together, in this life. She’s my Reality TV.
I know I bitch and moan about life plenty, but she is always reminding me of what truly matters. And when I stop and really think about it, instead of getting caught up in the charade of societal guidelines, it doesn’t matter I don’t have 2 million followers or a million-dollar house. I have our simple sweet life together, and though it’s not always easy and often fraught with worry, fear, problems, and so on. The love we have is the richest in the world.
Well, that ended completely different than I thought it would. But she’s good at getting me to turn things around when I need it most.
By
Aaron Echoes August
If you would like to help me become a successful know it all featured on House Hunters someday, please sign up below to follow this blog. Thanks for reading.
Author’s Note: You might recall me recently posting a story about how Joe Pera Talks With You is my favorite new TV show and how in it I go on and on about how my wife and I spent part of our honeymoon up in Marquette, Mich. I wanted to add some pictures in that post but it turned out they were on my Mac laptop and not on my HP desktop so I had to go dig them up and transfer them over so I could make good on my promise. Anyways, what follows is my first attempt at a photo-centric post… If I can figure it out. Thanks for looking.
In and around Marquette, Mich.
Click on the photos to see them larger against a black background.
Restaurant in downtown Marquette. We had a mediocre breakfast here.Iron ore dockLake Superior Iron ore dock with wooden pilingsSkeletal remains of wooden pilingsMore skeletal remainsDowntown Marquette with historic Landmark Inn in backView from hotel breakfast roomAnother view from hotel breakfast roomSign in convenience store bathroom in MunisingPiles of dirty snowIcy Lake SuperiorStatue of soldier at war memorialLake Superior and lighthouseLake Superior with ore dock in backgroundMy wife contemplating life on the shores of Lake Superior. She’s wearing a coat because it was March and pretty coldMore beautiful Lake SuperiorOur hotel room. Sorry about the mess. If you look closely you can see a pair of crutches. My wife was on crutches during our honeymoon because of a bad knee that she had replaced the following monthA tree looking out upon Lake SuperiorA pier jutting out into Lake SuperiorAnother view of the lake from a lonely park we visited
About ore docks
I don’t think I ever saw an iron ore dock until I was in Marquette. They are huge… Things. I don’t even really know how to describe them. They sort of look like elevated piers in a way but much wider, and they are kind of creepy and imposing. I don’t entirely understand how they work, but from the reading I have done it seems they are used to fill ships (that pull up, or I guess float up, to the sides of the dock) with iron ore by means of a series of chutes that flip down. The ore is brought to the dock via railcars that ride along tracks at the top of the dock. If anyone knows more about iron ore docks and how they work, please leave a comment. Thanks for reading.
CEREAL AFTER SEX 