400 Words

Two essays on a random subject, written by Tara and Andrew (400 words each, new post every Wednesday)

[fourhundredwordblog]

Finale

Part three of a three- part series: the others are here and here.

Facerick had finally done it: the device was complete. It was built into the back of an old panel van that looked completely normal from the outside. It occupied all of the interior space except the driver’s seat, where Facerick now sat, waiting to test it out.

He didn’t have to wait long. A lone jogger came up the sidewalk, backlit by the first rays of dawn. Facerick checked all of the camera feeds, made sure nobody else was around, and turned on the device.

As soon as the jogger reached the van, the side door sprang open and several mechanical claws shot out and grabbed him. Before he could let out a peep, they yanked him inside, closed the door, slit his throat, and hung him upside down over the bleeding funnel.

Powerful vacuums sucked off the jogger’s clothes as metal detectors swept over him. Now fully drained, the funnel retracted and the grinder fired up. The corpse was slowly fed into the hopper, where coarse teeth took the first pass of the maceration process. After several grindings and the application of a few fast-acting enzymes, the jogger was reduced to a fine uniform paste. Facerick sampled a spoonful as the device ran its quality checks for pH balance, mineral content, and the like. It was delicious. It was better than he could have dreamed.

The time savings of the device would be difficult to overstate. At best, Facerick could safely abduct and process a human in three hours. Things were faster back when he just ate them whole, but the larger chunks started giving him digestive trouble a few years ago—so he’d been draining and grinding them by hand. The new process went from jogger to paste in just under twenty-three minutes, and Facerick only needed to lift a spoon.

Best of all, he no longer needed to wear a human suit. The local window tinting ordinances were so lax that nobody could see him from the outside. And as he sat there, licking the back of the spoon and looking at his true face in the now-redundant rearview mirror, it struck him that he’d come full circle. No longer would he have to pass among the humans to consume them. He would be unadorned, just as he had come to this planet so long ago. It was the end of an era. If he’d had tear ducts, they would have welled at the thought.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Justice

When I imagine the world I want for all present and future generations, I tend to shy away from the term “justice.” Maybe because online reactionaries ruined it with the phrase “social justice warrior.” Maybe because I associate it with the United States’ criminal justice system, which revolves around punishment. For me, justice isn’t so much about punishing those who’ve done us wrong. Justice is about taking power from wrongdoers and redistributing it for the common good. 

Let’s be honest, bloodlust ain’t just a conservative trait. I often see it in a so-called bleeding heart. This is how so many of us left-of-center end up fighting only Trump, instead of the entire neoliberal system in which he thrives. It’s also how clowns like Pete Buttigieg get the nerve to tell us we shouldn’t have universal free college or health care because then rich people might get to enjoy those things, too. He and his billionaire backers seem to believe we plebes are more interested in punishing the rich than improving our lot.  

Here’s what I think we should do with billionaires - eliminate them. Not by lining them up against a wall and machine-gunning their bodies into swiss cheese, but by taxing them so heavily that they’ll no longer be able to hoard that much wealth. They can have all the health care, public education, and public housing they want, just like the rest of us. We will definitely confiscate their yachts and mansions, which will either be repurposed or left to rot. An ecologically sustainable future means trimming the fat, so no one gets to own a gas-guzzling nautical palace. That’s a slice of my vision for justice.

I admit I have moments when I fetishize punishment. I’m in this Facebook group where we share photos of douchebag trucks, many of which are plastered with racist and misogynistic bumper stickers. When I saw one pic of a ginormous SUV emblazoned with stickers attacking teen climate activist Greta Thunberg, I daydreamed about watching its owner cry as my comrades and I beat his vehicle with sledgehammers. We’ll throw all the douche trucks in a gulag and watch their asshole drivers cry. Then we’ll escort them to free therapy sessions, which will be covered by Medicare for All.

But that’s just a fun fantasy. Eliminating the billionaires is a plan. 

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Justice

When Jolene was twelve years old, she discovered she could read minds. Since she had a geography test the next day, she faced a dilemma. She couldn’t decide whether reading the teacher’s mind would be cheating. She fretted over the choice all night, and in the morning she split the universe in two.

In Possibility Space A, she read the teacher’s mind. She easily got an A on the paper, and also found out that the teacher was facing foreclosure on her home. Jolene never would have suspected that, and it crushed her. She wished there were something she could do to help, but all she could think to do was be sad.

As the years went on, Jolene became better at both reading people’s minds and acting on what she learned. She became fabulously wealthy through insider trading, and used the money to help people in need. Further, she became known as a genius investor, exerting quite a bit of influence on the market, exposing several stock frauds simply by shorting them. She did all this through a series of shell companies, of course. No sense ending up with her brain in pickling brine, being poked at by scientists.

Eventually, she graduated to solving grander problems. She studied negotiation and political science. She worked her way into the halls of power and used her insight to sculpt world peace. She single-handedly saved over a billion lives.

After a long life spent doing as much good as she could, Jolene died and went to face her final judgment.

In Possibility space B, Jolene didn’t read her teacher’s mind. She got a B on the test, though she probably could have done better had she done less fretting and more studying the night before. She never found out about her teacher’s financial problems, and wondered why she left the job halfway though the year.

Jolene went through her life without using the incredible mind-reading ability. She was an upstanding and decent person, helping where she could, and then she died.

The two Jolenes stood side by side at judgment. Jolene A was punished for bending to temptation, using the power to cheat her way through life. Jolene B was punished for arrogance, having denied her gift to the world in the name of purity.

The Jolenes merged in their eternal torment, learning their final lesson of life: In the absence of justice, the law is simply force.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Finale

Here on the eve of 2020, I don’t know what the next decade has in store for me. But I have many guesses. Color me equal parts excited and terrified.

We’ve got until 2030 to completely change the way we live to stave off a climate apocalypse. No matter what we do, we’re gonna need a huge chunk of our species to migrate to the parts of our planet that won’t be underwater or too hot to support human life. Will the fascists have their way, with closed borders and genocide? Will we be forced to work or die for billionaire overlords? Or perhaps die while doing their work? I’m with team Democratic Ecosocialism. Our plan is to create ecologically sustainable societies by redistributing money and power to benefit the many instead of the few. We’re not the only ones fighting for this better world, so I’m not saying our way is the only way to win. But remember that passive acceptance of the status quo is also a choice, and it’s the same as choosing evil. 

I think a lot about the amount of work it’s gonna take to win. Not everyone is cut out for this level of involvement. Democratic Socialism means taking collective ownership of our workplaces, our neighborhoods, our cities and states. I know that sounds exhausting, and we’re all very tired. The good news is that there are plenty of us out here doing a ton of work already. Maybe you don’t need to be quite so involved. But maybe you’d be more energized if you could make a livable wage from just one job, and not have to worry about bankrupting yourself to go to college or see a doctor.  

I have big dreams for this better world. When climate change makes Michigan warmer and muggier, I’ll get one of those unionized Green New Deal jobs and go reforest my home state. I know it’s weird that one minute I’m envisioning fascist billionaires murdering us all, and the next minute I’m planning my idyllic return to the Midwest. I believe half-ass compromise centrism only empowers our enemies, and that we need a bold, positive political vision to beat back the forces of evil. That vision fuels the work I do.

No matter what happens, the world we know is coming to an end. What world comes next? That’s what we must decide.

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

God

When Bob thought of God It always made him smile again Regardless of the big old world And how it piled on

So Bob talked to God And God spoke back in energy The feeling was electric Yet more solid than his hand

And Bob looked to the time When he and God were one again Adrift among the stars and such Away from all the pain

Bob and God got on like they were two sides of a coin Tumbling through the air, in full awareness of the other Never seen together but with the implicit understanding That just one would make no sense That life would be far too demanding On the same side of the fence is where they’d soon enough be standing Leaving two new sets of footsteps in the clouds

When God closes a door he opens up a window So they say, and Bob believed it in the marrow of his bones Then one day his view narrowed on those infinite unknowns He thought he’d take a peek at what was left behind

So Bob opened the door And God was not there anymore He took two steps and fell Not used to walking on his own

And out there in the big old world It felt so cold and lonely And much larger than the day before When infinity was bounded

As Bob started to wander So did his thoughts of what to do With all this newfound freedom And its monumental weight

“What if it turns out that God had never been there at all? Or, if he was, what if he put me here and now to feel this small And tear myself to pieces as I’m grasping for the truth? Is it the knowledge of the serpent or the slashing of the tooth That I should be afraid of? And if he’s made of that much cruelty Should I see it as malicious or a thing of awful beauty Or of alien indifference? And if there is a difference Would it matter if I ever found it out?”

When God closes a door he opens up a window To the soul the light appears and you can see it for yourself The images projected on the mind betray the prejudice Of the thing you most desire to behold

So Bob closed the door And God was right there on the floor He’d been there all along, or Maybe he hadn’t

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Threatening

I just escaped a bourgie trap, one of those adorable-looking cafes that slyly masks its toxic atmosphere until I suddenly realize I do not belong. Like just now, I sat down with my coffee and noticed I was completely surrounded by professional-managerial class white women — some in business attire, some in yoga pants. I gathered from their conversations that most worked at Wake Forest University. The lady to my right complained to her life coach about a kindergarten teacher who’d said her child was doing “great” even though her report card indicated a thoroughly average performance. Her child couldn’t be average. The teacher must have erred. “Obviously she isn’t really assessing her.” Big sigh. “But what can I say - free childcare, right?”

In these social environments I often look to the workers with a sense of curiosity and compassion, but even they felt alien to me. The loud, young, fashionable barista held court among her finely dressed coworkers, saying things like, “Remember when we flew from Madrid to Florence and all those airport people were on strike and we were like ‘Oh my god, this is CRAZY!’?” For her, this customer service stint was just a side trip along a journey to upper-class comfort, not a permanent destination. In ten years, she’ll be on the other side of the counter, bitching to her life coach about her kid’s teacher.

I admit the coffee tasted great, and I adored the quaint, historic setting. But I will never, ever return to that cafe because it’s the exact sort of Winston-Salem environment I find threatening.

I’ve lived in a few rapidly gentrifying towns and generally find these sorta hip establishments extremely unpleasant. Unless you’re a yuppie, the bourgie fruits that come with “revitalization” exhaust way more of your cash and dignity than they’re worth. My favorite haunts are the Greek-owned diners, the fried chicken lunch counter down the street from work, and the taproom where bartenders wear handmade t-shirts that say “Dash Trash” (their way of reclaiming WFU students’ classist epithet for townie workers). I don’t feel underdressed in these places, I can get a quality gyro, potpie, or beer for $5-$6, and I’ll probably never have to overhear a life coach meeting. 

I dig this town and hope to stay a while. But I’m very clear on what I enjoy vs. what I find repugnant.

- byTara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Threatening

Are you threatening me?

Chuck felt the tingle of the sentient manifestation of a democratically elected leader forced out of office to save two bucks on a car battery A rainbow of bricks lobbed over a stone wall The rise and fall of the public’s appetite for seeing him as a person

They came and they got Barbara

Brains aren’t an obsession so much as an acquired taste Crowds are the new Walden She seems happier now

Seven of that giant spider’s lazy eyes are staring at me

There’s a milky haze enveloping the world We seem slower, more docile, plumped with venom and shit Maybe I just have web in my eyes

If we are to be modest

Perhaps it’s arch to suggest that the ones who can’t build robots would make adequate robot lubricant The center will hold, or some center will anyway In the next life, try to be born a bank

Six dollars is the going rate for relief

The coffee is a magical liquid key that bestows entry to the facilities Unfortunately it’s just a bucket in the closet The good news is there’s no coffee

Perhaps it’s time to admit that greatness is at most theoretical

The number of presidents who ascended despite losing the popular vote still lags behind the number who have been shot, but I believe we can close the gap The number of days when slavery has not been legal holds firm at zero If the Founding Fathers could see this, they’d be very old

Can we do something about the giant goddamn bats?

There’s only so much strip mining a guano island can take, and we have better fertilizer now anyway, though it does come with some poisony downsides I appreciate the warm embrace but wish it came not from a leathery wing All of this darkness is getting inconvenient

Are you threatening me?

He tingled as the chuck bit the bit, and he was ready to drill baby drill baby baby drill drill He was indeed threatening me But I stood my ground Getting shot in the face will teach him not to hang those shelves

Seriously, just go to sleep

Nothing good happens after 3:00 AM Everything turns to shit and the shit turns to pretty flowers, but they don’t open until the morning Let’s set an early alarm to catch the first smell

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

God

Some people think god is a woman. But that theory just reinforces my disdain for both monotheism and neoliberal feminism. So this all-powerful being who creates so much suffering and injustice is female? Who fucking cares! She sounds terrible regardless, and I’m sure the hell I may get for believing such things would be preferable to spending an eternity in her company.

For similar reasons, I’m not inclined to support any woman for public office just because we are of the same oppressed gender. And I’m not just talking about Republicans. It pains me when everyday liberal women get excited over the likes of Nancy Pelosi, an establishment Democrat $29 millionaire who regularly ridicules Medicare for All (which would cover healthcare for everyone in this country, and save most of us a boatload of money) and the Green New Deal (cool plan to create jobs and protect us from that looming climate apocalypse). She does so little for the bottom 99% of this country, roughly half of whom are women and girls. Oh, but remember that time when she clapped weird at the State of the Union, like she was throwing shade at Trump? Saucy! Or that picture of her pointing a finger at him? SLAY QUEEN. I sorta get why liberal feminists fetishize Pelosi’s odd hand gestures; what else does she do for us other than occasionally assume a posture of resistance?

For too long, these elites have expected feminists of the 99% to accept this demented notion that empowerment means watching a few of them climb to the heights of corporate and government leadership while we wave and cheer from below. While most of us struggle to pay medical bills, rent, childcare, and student loans, the “lean-in” types answer to corporations that pay their salaries and dividends, and/or donate to their political campaigns. They’re not looking out for us. But we’re supposed to salute them as they look out for themselves.

We can do feminism another way in which we create policies and workplaces that meet all of our material needs, relieve our struggle, and maybe even save us from climate apocalypse. It’s way less about the elite role models up high, and way more about millions of everyday women organizing together to finally get our due. No individual woman is more important than the rest of us. And that goes for lady god, too. 

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Horror

When George was a boy, he would lie in bed sometimes, close his eyes, and imagine that everyone else disappeared. They would be going about their day, hanging laundry on a clothesline or whatever, and then—Poof! No surprise, no pain, no drawn-out speeches about how they never saw Paris. Just nothingness.

It was George’s failure to observe them that caused them to disappear. He hadn’t yet heard of solipsism, nor would he have understood it. He just knew that nobody was interacting with him, therefore as far as he knew they had ceased to be. At least until he had to get up and go in the other room or go to school or whatever. Then there they were, corporeal as ever.

As he grew and matured, he learned that this sort of fantasy was common. That’s not to say it wasn’t a point of concern, however. On the topic of human-object permanence, nearly all babies seem to reject the theory (as evidenced by their remarkable tolerance for peekaboo), then the scale slides dramatically upward by early adulthood, with nearly all fully-formed people accepting the concept. Yet even in his late twenties, George couldn’t shake the feeling.

That was roughly the time when he came to a much more troubling revelation. He had always been very concerned with what other people thought of him. He was self-conscious of the way he dressed, the way he spoke, even the way he stood. His hands always seemed to splay out at awkward angles. It mortified him to imagine how others saw him.

What George came to understand was that nobody thought of him at all. He had been so focused on himself for so long that he’d neglected every relationship in his life. Old friendships fell away and new ones never formed. He drifted through his life like a concerned audience member, but always focused on just one actor. Meanwhile the rest of the cast moved on with their lives, unaware of his internal psychodrama. He was the one who ceased to exist. He stared at his ceiling, amazed at how small he’d allowed his world to become.

Across town, the acid witch had taken form. Her skin ate right through the bra her human self had forgotten to remove. She tore wildly at the manacle that bound her, and bashed against the special ceramic walls. She screamed: a terrible, feral, desperate sound reverberated off the walls. Then George closed his bloodshot eyes, and she disappeared.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Horror

On Friday I drove from Winston-Salem to suburban Detroit, eager to take in the dazzling gold and cranberry-orange fall leaves I just don’t see in the Carolina piedmont. That splendor carried me from Appalachia all the way to my rust belt homeland. But somewhere in northern Ohio I began to recognize some distinctly Midwestern autumn scenes I hadn’t witnessed in a long while - the complete silhouette of an increasingly barren tree set against a vast, overcast sky, and then a massive flock of birds carving a southern-pointing arrow across that same, seemingly endless backdrop. There’s beauty in that stark imagery, but I also felt as if winter’s frigid, bony fingers were suddenly tightening around my spine. That’s the depression settling in.

Winter depresses me no matter where I live. But I forget how much harder it is in Michigan, if only because of the darkness. Once the clocks move back to standard time, it isn’t long before 4:30pm dusk becomes a reality. And what if the sun never really makes an appearance, because a thick, empty overcast fills the sky all day, perhaps all week? Or maybe the sun does come out, but it’s shining over a filthy, crusty pile of days-old snow still frozen in the ten-degree air. In those situations, another night huddled at home under a pile of blankets is preferable to daylight’s demands.

The economy makes the seasonal dreariness even more intolerable. Every day, thousands of Michiganders drive those shitty, potholed roads to get to jobs that don’t meet their basic needs. Throughout my adulthood, I’ve known too many Michigan people cobbling together part-time jobs to make up for a full-time, benefits-paying career that either no longer exists or is too exploitative and harsh to tolerate. Ask yourself how someone scraping to get by in such dark, dreary weather could be anything but depressed. Yet who can afford to get help for that?

I’m relieved to be back home in the south, though I’ll probably carry a bit of that winter horror in my bones no matter where I live. It feels like the chill from standing in sleet too long, and it tastes like the sneaking suspicion that they’re getting ready to lay off some people at work. It’s the ache that comes from clenching every muscle just to brace yourself against a slapping wind.

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Scenery

The patrols ran in pairs now. Two-guard teams, spaced every few blocks, running twenty-four hours a day. In the early days of the quarantine, before the government made its full investment, it was easy to evade them. Most cops aren’t in the best shape, and for them it’s just a job. No sense chasing someone down when it could just be an ambush or a false alarm. No sense shooting some kid stealing extra rations when it wasn’t. But now, with the full force behind them and help always a few minutes away, they were bolder. More efficient. Crueler. They made up their collective mind that this was war, and one they would win.

Stockton was determined too. He waited in the shadow of a trash compactor, doing his best not to breathe. He waited for the glint of light off the guards’ helmets to pass him by. They were taking their time tonight; it must be quiet out there. He checked out the sky. The sickly green from the city’s dome tinted the few clouds that drifted by, nearly as lethargic as the guards. He thought about night a lot lately. He knew that would be the next thing the people “volunteered” for their safety. As it was, night was the only time he could move. The patrols never let up, but the daylight did. One day soon, they’d line the whole city with flood lights and take that away too. But tonight there was cover. Tonight he could move, and he had to find her. He would find the acid witch.

As the guards’ conversation trailed off to a faint whisper, he crept across the alley. He poked his head out to check the street, out of the shadows for just a moment, and saw the other patrol. These ones were quiet, and they were mere feet away. They raised their guns as he slowly stepped onto the street, hands raised.

“Identify yourself,” the bigger guard said. They were so cold, so calm. Stockton was overcome with how easy it was to die now at the hands of these people. He felt the crushing hopelessness of it all pushing down on him. He felt the despair and his worthlessness in the face of it. The guards felt their limbs become heavy. They felt a wave of apathy, then guilt, then despair. They knew things would never get better. They would never leave this imprisoned city. There was no point to them. Each guard put a gun to his own temple and left a mist of blood on the pavement.

Stockton caught his breath. He felt the weight lift. He felt the press of obligation. And he darted back into the shadows, determined to be more careful.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Transition

I just started volunteering for the Bernie Sanders primary campaign, and already it’s such a pleasure. I’ve worked on three local elections before, but obviously this is exponentially bigger. We’ve got a million volunteers signed up to knock doors, make calls, and text for Bernie. 

There’s already enormous momentum. I sense it as a harbinger for all the movement work that’s gonna win Medicare for All, free public college, and national rent control for everyone in this country. I see massive labor and climate strikes on the horizon. This thrills me because I know that’s what it’s gonna take to save us from ecological catastrophe, rising fascism, and the billionaire class. As my comrades say, it’s either socialism or barbarism.

I know for my more centrist readers this all sounds like a big ol’ pipe dream. But I actually believe that President Joe Biden or Chief Executive Mayor Pete doing anything substantive to save us from climate change or the 1% is the real pipe dream. Then again, I’m not really worried what y’all think, because you don’t seem to show up for your candidates that much. Why would you? They’re not that compelling. This is why we don’t hear Joe or Pete boasting about a million volunteers or a million small donors - they’re not gonna hit those numbers anytime soon.

I think we can all agree Trump must be beaten. I’ll go beyond that and say we’ve gotta bring down the entire political party power structure. That’s a big goal, and it’s not gonna happen via one national election. Again, this will take mass movements. Bernie understands this, which is why he refers to himself in the future tense as “organizer in chief”. He’s our biggest and best boost to building power for the American working class. No matter which way his campaign goes, those movements will continue. But putting him in power would be an enormous game-changer.

I get why so many liberals can’t wrap their heads around this unabashedly old and cranky democratic socialist who never goes for folksy charm. He is nothing like a traditional candidate. He just had a freaking heart attack and all of us on the campaign are like ::shrug:: “Whatever.” Even ten years ago, a heart attack would have ended a presidential campaign. But we’re transitioning to a new era of mass political movements, and the old conventions are losing relevance.

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Transition

Darla Chambliss made the short walk from her car to her front door, keys in hand. A bead of sweat curled over the top of her thumb, crawled down the back of her hand, swelled by the first knuckle of her pinkie and fell. Her eyes followed it as it went past her jumble of keys and savers club tags, past the bundle of mail in her other hand, past her sensible work shoes, and finally hit the stoop. A soft hiss rose up as the sweat ate its way through four inches of concrete and started on the dirt below. Darla fumbled the key into the deadbolt. She didn’t have much time.

Finally inside, she locked the door behind her and dropped everything on the floor. She moved quickly to the kitchen, going over the checklist in her head. She filled a glass from the sink and downed it as fast as she could. The dehydration last time had been terrible.

She’d started on the buttons of her blouse with the other hand as she drank, and with both hands free she finally got it off. She unzipped the back of her skirt and shimmied out of it as she made her way down the hall. She scooted her socks off against the carpet and awkwardly hopped out of her underwear as she reached the door to the basement.

As she opened the door, the first pain hit. It was like a jagged knife in her abdomen, slowly twisting its way out toward her navel. She screamed, giving herself the briefest moment to gather her strength. She had to keep moving. The second pain hit halfway down the stairs and her feet went out from under her. She flailed for the railing but only grazed it. She managed to turn just enough to take the brunt of the fall on her left shoulder. It popped.

She scrambled to her feet, her left arm hanging limp, and ran flat out for the open steel door. She pulled it shut behind her and heard the lock engage. It was only a failsafe. She collapsed next to the shackles and desperately worked on securing them. She had never thought to train with one hand. She finally got them all except her right wrist. She needed that damn thing closed, or it was all for nothing. She would be fine. But everyone she had ever known would be dead by morning. She slammed her hip against the shackle, pinning it against the wall, and finally heard the click.

This would be a time to relax. But the final pain came, and she started to change.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Scenery

When I was thirteen, my mom, dad, younger brother and I flew to Albuquerque and road tripped up to the four corners region where New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, and Arizona intersect. During those long desert and mountain drives I saw the most stunning scenery I’ve ever seen, to the point that I now wonder if it was even real.

Like that first evening when we hit the road, we watched several storms descend upon the mountainous horizon. This was the first time I’d seen rain from a great distance  - thin, diagonal, slate grey lines pouring from dark clouds like water from a faucet. Lightning bolts flickered across the mountains like fireflies. Seeing all these storms happen at once felt absolutely surreal.

The following days were much drier, as one would expect the desert to be. What I didn’t anticipate was a sky so blue it was practically purple. Especially against the red-orange desert foreground, it seemed ten times bluer than the hazy, rust belt skies of my hometown. Again, I sometimes second-guess my recollection.

We made many stops along our journey. In southwestern Colorado we took an old-fashioned steam train to a nearby mountain town where the nurse at the general store tended to a pesky cinder in my eye (that was her main job, giving eye washes to tourists). Another day we visited the four corners, a platform in the middle of nowhere where the state borders are marked. You could take pictures of yourself planking in all four states at once, then buy some bolo ties or turquoise jewelry from native vendors who set up tables along the sides. Again, so surreal.

But mostly I remember the endless drives from one tiny town to the next, and how I didn’t even mind being in the car that much because everything outside my window was so mind-blowingly gorgeous. At one point my dad asked if we’d rather stop or drive another two hours. My brother and I shrugged and said, “Let’s keep going.” What kind of magic keeps a 7 year-old boy and teen girl so pacified? Something about the sapphire sky and the rock formations forty miles away that you swear you can just reach out and touch. Time and space had shifted so far from normal.

Sometimes I just want to go back and see if it was really real.

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Window

We’re surrounded by weird stuff. It’s not weird to us, but so many things we take for granted are the results of an ongoing process of innovation. Sometimes I’m struck by how extraordinary a mundane thing is, especially compared to a much earlier thing.

Sometimes the steps along the path are easy to guess. Right now I’m sitting in front of a desk. It’s a highly refined object that would take any one person an inordinate amount of time to create, but it’s not a conceptually deep object. It’s a flat surface on top of some boxes. It’s easy to imagine a person thousands of years ago—who wanted to sit and write at the same time—designing basically this thing. After that, it’s a process of refinement: find proper materials, figure out how to make them flat, make a box to hold stuff, make the box move for easy access and storage, make the whole thing cheaper, do it on an assembly line, etc. The materials and production processes would be astounding to our ancient desk designer, but the finished product would be easy to grasp.

Other things are less predictable. The thing about evolutionary processes is that they don’t necessarily favor improvements so much as whatever can survive. Along the way there can be plenty of stagnation, feature creep, and backsliding. There’s a direct line from the earliest Delta blues singers to Kid Rock. It would be trivial to trace that line (well, any one of a countless number of lines) backward. But good luck predicting how that evolution would go at the turn of the 20th century.

Then there are things that just seem to explode out of nowhere. The ones that follow the formula Thing A + Magic = Thing B. There’s no reason to believe (at least for the casual observer) that A and B are even related. In most of those cases, an expert on the subject would see the connection, and might be able to predict the transition. But there are plenty of counterexamples. Working on coal tar derivatives? May as well lick your unwashed hands to see if there’s anything sweet hanging around. You never know what folks will want to put in their coffee.

There’s a popular argument among the intelligent design crowd that says there’s no use for half an eye. It must have come from God, they say, because the whole makes sense in a way that the parts never could. It turns out they’re wrong for a whole bunch of reasons, but I understand the instinct. Some things seem to lose the magic when they turn out not to have appeared in a puff of smoke. But sloppy iterative chaos is its own kind of magic, and usually it’s the only kind we have.

-by Andrew

[fourhundredwordblog]

Well

Six months ago I weathered a mighty bout of depression, but I’m doing well these days. I credit good habits and firm boundaries. But mostly I thank my dog, Laurel.

A year ago we put down our cat Zenobia. I didn’t expect that the absence of her warm, purring presence would make winter so dreary. I tried looking forward to spring. But by March, even the sunniest daffodils failed to lift me from the void. 

Therapy and longer, warmer days helped bring me round the bend. And on Mother’s Day, I adopted Laurel, a six year-old hound mix who’s had at least a couple litters. The rescue operator told us that once Laurel warmed up she’d be a snuggle bug. What I didn’t anticipate was her fierce commitment to protecting me. Laurel came to us a somewhat skittish, 45 pound love-muscle. Whether she was crushing my lap with the weight of her affection or yanking me down the road as she sniffed out the other neighborhood canines, I was suddenly inundated with the physical force of her devotion. Her bottomless loyalty floors me. But she can also be goofy as hell, skittering about our hardwood floors or striking a glassy-eyed pose as she stands guard on the couch. She’s like a cross between Lt. Worf from “Star Trek: TNG” and Kramer from “Seinfeld”. Quite intense.

Our old dog Dulce was far more placid, gentle, and passive. I heard her bark maybe a dozen times in our 10-year relationship. She expressed her affection in subtler ways, like the soulful “thank you” eyes she’d make when I rubbed around her neck.

I sometimes miss the ease of that relationship; Dulce was a breeze on leash. Laurel yanks and freaks out a lot. But I won’t lie, this North Georgia redneck dog’s fierce snuggle-love has absolutely improved my life. The sauna-like blast of her affection healed winter’s wounds. And I won’t lie, it comforts me to know she’ll tear up a fool who tries messing with me. Who knows when that might be useful?

Again, I’m doing well. I’ve got a good work/family/activism/creativity balance going. I feel positive about the contributions I’m making to my community. And bonus, I notice Laurel’s doing much better on leash lately. I suspect she’s vibing on my confidence. She doesn’t have to worry as much about me now.

- by Tara

[fourhundredwordblog]

Well

The last block of McClellan Street stank something awful. The usual churn of rotting fish rose from the canal, magnified by the late August sun. Ninety-nine days out of a hundred, the smell would be enough to put Dr. Bronson off her lunch. Given her destination, however, she was grateful for this transitional phase.

She nodded to the cop posted outside the last tarpaper shack on the block, stepped through the front door, and saw the bloated remains of Charlie Brummage in the front room. For a moment the death stenches fought for higher ground; after another two steps in, Charlie won.

Dr. Bronson knew as soon as she saw him. Charlie was maybe thirty and in good shape. There were no signs of a struggle, no external trauma: just a chair on its side and a spilt glass on the floor. His hands and back were curled from the convulsions. They’d run the screen, and it would come back as strychnine poisoning.

The sound of the toilet flushing brought the doctor back from her thoughts. She had barely noticed Detective Graham in the bathroom, puking his guts out. He walked out, using a wad of toilet paper to blot the vomit from his tie. He looked up and jumped halfway back into the bathroom.

“Jesus, Doc,” he said. “Make a sound or something.”

Dr. Bronson laughed. She wondered if Graham would ever have the stomach for the job. Of course, even the bad cases weren’t usually quite this unpleasant. She turned her attention back to Charlie. She’d be able to tell more precisely once she got the stomach out, but it was somewhere between one and three days. The heat accelerated everything.

She heard the tap running, but it didn’t click in her mind. When she looked up a moment later and saw Graham about to drink a glass of water, she jumped up and smacked it out of his hand. The glass exploded against the wall as he stood there, dumfounded.

“Goddamn moron!” she said. “That’s five in a week. You don’t think maybe it’s the well that’s poisoned?”

“I was…” he started, then thought better of it. He straightened his tie and pulled his shoulders back, reaching for some dignity.

“You’re fine,” she said. “I’m done. We’ll pick him up as soon as you clear the scene.”

Dr. Bronson walked out to her car. As soon as she closed the door, her hand started shaking. That was too close. They had to figure it out on their own. One of them might be next; the danger of protecting them was too much to bear. But eventually, they’d see. They’d all see.

-by Andrew