Guy Stuff

Guy Lombardo, being from Canada, grew up pronouncing his name as though it was “gee,” a command used to turn a horse to the right (as opposed to “haw” ... what Canucks call a lady of the evening.) But, after many years dealing with the boobs south of the 49th parallel, the baton of the “Royal Canadians” orchestra eventually relented and started answering to “Guy” (rhymes with “pie.”) Early in his career, Mr. New Years and his fellow music makers dressed as Mounties in Smoky-the-Bear hats, gray jodhpurs, red riding jackets, high black saddle boots, cross-chest leather straps, and brass-buckled belts. However, as their midriffs drifted east and west, they switched to a double-breasted tuxedos with white carnations.

Actually, Guy Lombardo hated New Years and everything that went with it. His audience was generally loud and boorish. His band members would often get sloshed and pee themselves. Champagne gave him a crotch itch and caviar, the runs. He hated wall-to-wall football throughout New Year’s day since he invariably had a rip-roaring headache from all the ambient cigarette smoke of the previous night. But his wife was a gridiron junkie so he was forced to endure every last tackle. And he was still brushing confetti out of his dinner jacket in July. But since 1954, the Royal Canadians were getting enormous fees to usher in New Years on national television. They had become a holiday icon much like the lighted ball dropping above Times Square. So Guy always put on his game face and smiled his way through this annual ordeal. In fact he claimed that when he died he was going to take New Years with him.

In 1992, the Lombardo orchestra was to play out the old year at The Rainbow Room in Rockefeller Center. He had assembled most of his best players from times past and augmented them with a string section from the New York Philharmonic. The festivities started at 7:30 with a eight-course dinner including roast beef, Yorkshire pudding, and black-eyed peas (for the superstitious). The meal ended with Lindy’s cheesecake and a token haggis for those with “Mac” prefixing their last name. Guy and his guys played light vespers throughout dinner and moved to show tunes after the coffee was served. Then he brought on vocalists for the more romantic golden oldies which were punctuated, about ever fifth melody, with a rumba, a samba, or a polka. The evening went swimmingly until sometime after 10:30 when things started getting a little strange.

It all began when a slide trombone player hit three sour notes in a row during a “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” solo. This was unusual in and of itself, but when the first violinists broke his G-string during “Some Enchanted Evening”, Guy started to show some concern under his facial patina of teeth. Then the drummer put his stick right through the skin of his tom-tom ... and four reeds of the saxophone section all broke simultaneously during “Midnight Sleigh Ride.” By 11:15, Guy’s world was rapidly coming apart. Up till then the TV networks had been able to cover most of these faux pas’ by cutting to commercials. But at this point, things were unraveling so fast that the networks were forced to broadcast any new errata to the entire nation ... like when the guitar player fell off his stool during “Spanish Eyes” right into the horn of the tuba. Or when the piano lid collapsed during “Kitten on the Keys” ... taking a portion of the pianist’s scalp with it.

By this time the audience had stopped dancing and just stood there, mouths agape, watching this scene out of a Keystone Kops movie. Guy tried to dispel the spell by calling an extended break during which the networks panned over the revelers in Times Square or switched to “A Horn Blows at Midnight,” starring Jack Benny. During this time out, Guy assembled his band members and forbade them to have anything more to drink. He also summarily dismissed two woodwind players who already had stained the knickers’ fronts ... and forced steaming hot coffee into his only flautist, since she was needed for “Auld Lang Syne.”

When they returned, it soon became clear that it wasn’t just the booze at work ruining this “first night.” Next acoustical tiles began dropping from the ceiling. Then the fountain in the middle of the dance floor went berserk and sprayed many patrons with cheap champagne ... while, at the same time, its multi-colored lights began shorting out, sending sparks leaping across the wet floor to the dancers. Five were electrocuted on the spot ... quivering like they were enraptured with ecstasy. Then the spinning mirrored ball came crashing to the floor, killing the bass player and badly injuring five spectators. And as the witching hour approached, things became even more bizarre. Tables began levitating. Forks and knives came alive and embedding themselves in peoples’ posteriors.

Through the glass ceiling above the dance floor, one could see incredibly bright lighting flashes under gray, ominous clouds. Then thunder came rolling into the restaurant, almost drowning out the orchestra which, by now, was almost completely out of syncopation due to its lack of a drum beat or bass notes. But they played on ... like the band on the sinking Titanic. At the first stroke of midnight those guests not already dead or injured were looking for a rapid escape route. Right then, Guy noticed a unfamiliar face in the brass section. This player was clearly not an ASCAP member. He had a flowing silver beard and was dressed in a long white robe. As he raised his trumpet to his lips, Guy noticed a name badge pinned to the breast of his cassock. It clearly spelled out, in diamond-inlayed lettering, “ARCHANGEL GABRIEL.”

Those of you reading this are obviously living in a parallel universe.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

A PC Christmas

“T’was the night before Christmas ...” The NAACP has complained to the Civil Rights Commission arguing that this line should be updated to read “T’was the night before Kwanzaa ...”

“Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.” The Friends of Animals takes umbrage at the term “creature” and is insisting that it be changed to “lovable, furry thing that should not be trapped.”

“The stockings were hung by the chimney with care” The Cross-Dressers of America want it noted here that this means taupe silk hose with oh-so-cute lacy stuff around the top ... and that only Woolite should be used to wash such dainties.

“The children were nestled all snug in their beds” The North American Man-Boy Love Association wants this changed to “nestled all snug in our beds”.

“... while visions of sugar plums danced in their heads” Michelle Obama has insisted that this phrase be changed to “thoughts of low-fat Greek yogurt” and is threatening to go on The View if she is ignored.

“Mama in her kerchief and I in my cap” The Queer Nation is objecting to the use of such stereotypical male/female bonding units as representing an idealized family.

“The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow” Yoko Ono insists that such sexists comments show that we still live in a male-dominated, piggish society. She wants this word changed to “chest.”
“As dry leaves before the wild hurricane fly when they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky.” The Environmental Protection Agency has issued a complaint stating that leaves left unraked into the winter represents a violation of Sections 125.92: J and 9734.2: D-G of the Omnibus Environmental Protection Law of 1993.

“... with a little old driver” AARP has sought an immediate court injunction to estop such pejorative comments about senior citizens.

“... jolly old elf and I laughed when I saw him in spite of myself” The Little People’s Society has also insisted that the term “elf” and its associated derision be immediately expunged from this narrative.

“On Dasher, on Dancer, on Prancer and Vixen” The ASPCA has issued a formal complaint against St. Nicholas, citing his verbal and physical abuse of these eight tiny reindeer.

“He was dressed all in fur from his head to his foot ...” The Animal Liberation Front has threatened to throw cow’s blood on anyone who dares to dress up in such insensitive costumes.

“... little round belly that shook when he laughed like a bowl full of jelly” The Surgeon General has demanded that a printed warning be put on this page saying that being obese to this degree could be hazardous to your health.

“The smoke, it encircled his head like a wreath” Henry Waxman, a congressman from California, has threatened to hold hearings unless this line is stricken in its entirety.

“He filled all the stockings and turned with a jerk” Steve Martin has gone to court suing for 10% royalties for the use of the term “jerk”.

“... up the chimney he rose” The Trial Lawyers of America has stated that forcing Santa Claus to enter and exit a premises via the fireplace is demeaning and likely to cause bodily harm. They are assembling a massive class action suit against all those parents who allowed Santa to visit in this manner.

“He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle” The AFL/CIO is demanding to know if St. Nick is a member of their North Pole Teamsters’ local. If he can’t produce proof that he is, they are going to picket New Years.

“Happy Christmas to all and to all a good night!” The National Education Association has objected that this line, and all the rest of this story ... saying that they contain words that are spelled correctly. This is obviously intended to stifle the creativity of our children.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Over the River ...

The five of us arrived at Grandmother’s house after a long, chilly drive in Uncle Bill’s old Packard. His over-sized gray sedan smelled of damp mohair and the allspice, mace, and cinnamon that infused the steam seeping in from the pie basket in the trunk. In this hamper were three plump pumpkin pies, a cardamom-mince pie, and two zesty lemon pies with their alpine-high meringues dotted with caramelized sugar drops, all packed in among four dozen yeasty, poppy-seed dinner rolls. We also carried bouquets of the last of the brilliant fall asters and multi-colored maple leaves. Greeting us at the door were most of rest of Grandma’s and Grandpa’s issue and a few neighbors; 22 in all, beaming and chatting with growling stomachs.

We doffed of scarves and greatcoats and were given hot mulled wine or a Bourbon Old Fashion, according to our taste. Scattered around the den and kitchen were the hors d’oeuvres: butter-tender Schmaltz herring in a sweet-sour-cream sauce sprinkled with lots of chopped fresh dill; oysters Rockefeller (saucer-sized and nestling a bed of chopped spinach and a drop of Pernod with a bubbling crust of bread crumbs and grated Parmesan cheese); mounds and mounds of tender Jumbo shrimp with a sharp horseradish and chili-sauce dressing, crisp celery and carrot sticks with a dip made from butter and blue cheese mashed together and thinned with a vintage port wine; colossal Pimento-stuffed olives; miniature sweet Gherkins; and an assortment of odoriferous cheeses (a runny Brie, a ripe Gorgonzola, a well-aged Gouda, a nutty Emmenthaler, and a creamy Double Gloucester) with lots of crusty French country bread.

After over-sampling this largess and re-acquainting ourselves with each other, we were led into the candle-lit dining room for a family prayer and the object of our sojourn. There on the groaning board were ten chilled bottles of this year’s best Nouveau Beaujolais (fruity almost to the point of a fine Spanish Sangria); a huge cob-smoked ham with a orange-honey-clove glaze over a copious coat of toasty fat; two boned legs of grilled baby lamb basted with its garlic, rosemary, and lemon au jus; a 32-pound roasted capon turkey, cooked to a juicy perfection with its chestnut and sage dressing; and three gravy boats filled with a glistening minced-giblet gravy (made with the turkey pan drippings, arrowroot, and the water in which the giblets had simmered all morning along with celery tops, some carrots and crushed shallots).

Filling in the voids on this massive table were the poppy-seed rolls, a large chaffing dish of whole cranberry sauce augmented with toothpick-thin candied orange-rind strips and Grand Marnier; Greek string beans (made from haricots vert, an oregano-laced marinara sauce topped with bread crumbs and grated Romano cheese and baked to a nutty crust); golden carrots Vichey (dime sized carrot slices and tiny pearl onions blanched into tenderness and then sauced with a roux made with flour, grated onion, a soupcon of nutmeg, and fresh cream); two casseroles filled with steaming sauerkraut, laced with caraway seeds and nestling fresh baked kielbasa; a watercress, Belgian endive, and avocado salad with its mustardy vinaigrette in a yeoman-sized wooden bowl; and a surfeit of fluffy, butter-and-parsley-topped garlic mashed potatoes.

For dessert, out came all the pies we had brought; a chocolate and vanilla-iced Daffodil cake, a browned and steaming rice pudding studded with currents, candied citron, and dried cherries; a rainbow fruit compote (cantaloupe, watermelon, and honeydew balls with strawberries, blueberries, Valencia orange slices, and soused with Marsalla and champagne); and steaming pots of Costa Rican coffee and Earl Gray tea. For dessert’s dessert we had pitted prunes that had soaked to a divine softness in Armagnac; the remainder of the pre-dinner cheeses, now surrounded with ripe Anjou pears, Macoun apples, and fresh figs; and, finally, minted chocolate twigs.

We all sleepily threw ourselves into the washing up and, when it was over and done with all the crockery dried and put away; we settled around the roaring fire in the living room with a glass of hard cider or warming cognac. After many war stories, seasonal songs, and familial antidotes, we pulled on our weather clothes and re-entered the old Packard. Following lots of thank-you’s and echoed good-byes, Uncle Bill pulled from the curb with a short toot of the oogle horn. On the way home we all fell into a deep, high-blood-sugar and L-tryptophan induced sleep. Unfortunately, this also included Uncle Bill ... who consequently drove off of the road at over 60 MPH ... directly into a bridge abutment. Contented ... and with full bellies of Butterball ... we all instantly perished in a Thanksgiving fireball.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Trick or Treat

It was a late Halloween afternoon, 1960 in Saratoga Springs, New York. The ponies had all gone south for the winter as had most of the birds that spent their summers in this bucolic hamlet. But it was clear that Saratoga Springs aspired to wealth and notoriety beyond its modest size ... with its hot-spring spas, its stately mansions and its miniaturized versions of everything else that was “New York City.” (It even had a Kosher delicatessen, “Moshe’s.”) The daylight was now fading fast as Eastern Standard Time had been re-introduced the weekend before ... just in time to force youngsters to go begging for their candy in the dark. This societal idiocy was ameliorated this particular year by a very bright harvest moon that gave off an orange glow like a sinister jack-o-lantern.

The kids along Congress St. in this tiny berg were doing all the things that children normally do on Halloween ... skipping through the fallen leaves, car egging, window soaping, tree toilet papering, and, of course, trick or treating. They were costumed out as poltergeists and puppy dogs, comic book heroes and cake-walkers, doppelgangers and desperadoes, ghouls and gorillas, ballerinas and boxers, grandmas and even one Gumby. As they went door to door for their penny candies, apples, and small change; it was clear that Congress St. was also a remake of an old New York City thoroughfare -- the 52nd St of the 1950s. For at every answered door was a young woman drawn from a wide variety of hues who was generally scantily clad, heavily made-up, and clearly hoping for a client from the rapidly diminishing tourist population ... or one of the returning college boys ... not a munchkin with a held-in-front brown paper bag.

Now Clement Whether, at 14, was a little older than the rest of the Halloween revelers, but, being a little slow of wit, still clung to the his childhood delights. Having recently moved to “The Springs,” he hadn’t yet been clued into the real function of Congress St. So he turned onto this shady lane in eager anticipation of sugary rewards. Clem was dressed as Samson with a large club, a fur loin cloth, and sandals ... an appropriate facsimile since he was well-muscled from his summer’s lumber jacking. At the third house on the left Clem was greeted by a gorgeous nymph, stripped to her smile, who, when Samson reddened and stammered “trick or treat?”, replied with a sultry look, “Both ... my trick will be your treat, handsome.”

© Copyright,  George W. Potts

Katz's Meow

Katz’s deli brimmed with portlies this cool Autumn forenoon. Many were gofers multi-ordering over-stuffed sandwiches and Dr. Brown’s for their office betters. The countermen were operating with the dexterity of Japanese griddle chefs, stabbing pastramis and beef briskets from the steam table and slicing them onto seeded rye or pumpernickel till a quick glance at the customer told them to stop. If said customer was clever enough to extend a greenie on the countertop, the cutting continued until there was a kalbfleisch tower.

Norris Nasselrod looked markedly out of place as he pushed his way into this odoriferous Octoberfest. He was athletically thin in a white tie and tails. The Hamilton that Norris slyly edged onto the counter had every white-apron in the place scrambling to take his order. But Moshe Poppel quickly testosteroned his right to hook and land this flounder. Moshe had established this pecking-order apex by “accidentally” dropping a butcher knife on the foot of any fellow worker who looked cross-eyed at him. He had done this so often that Blue Cross had specifically excluded this medical condition from further insurance re-imbursements.

Moshe took Norris’ order of a corned beef on marbled rye and outdid himself to justify the impending generous tip. A whole slab of steaming Jewish chateaubriand disappeared under his huge chef's knife and reappeared precariously balanced on serving-platter-sized crust of piebald provender. When he was done, he tucked three half-dones on top of this cholesterol cornucopia while wrapping it in an expanse of waxed paper.

As Norris was given and paid for this gastromonstosity, he deftly retrieved his sawbuck and slid through the lunch crowd like Paul Horning through the Cleveland Browns’ secondary. He penguin-suited his way out onto Houston St. and into a waiting cab before Moshe’s jaw stopped dropping. The derisive laughter and applause from the assembled lunch patrons and his fellow workers caused Moshe to redden from the neck upwards. By the time this sanguinity disappeared under the white yarmulke that Moshe was prone to wear, his whole face and most of his bald head were a bright crimson. The metaphor was obvious to everyone. Henceforth, Moshe was secretly referred to as “Pimple” Poppel.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Gone Fishin'

It was early summer and the fluke were now biting in and around Montauk, Long Island. These aggressive flat fish were being taken in profusion using sand worms and shiners, on Gosman’s Dock and off shore, for just the last few days. The flounder had disappeared about eight weeks earlier and the offal leftovers had thus been lean for the wharf rats and seagulls. But now things were picking up again. At this news, Bruno Alewife began to smile anew. He loved and lived to fish. He was the town barber only to have something to do in the winter ... and to get enough money to keep his outboard boat, “Avatar,” in decent repair and full of gas in the other seasons. But with clement weather and promising fishing reports, Bruno put his well-worn “Gone Fishin’” sign in his shop’s window in Heather Hills and drove to Gurney’s Marina where he kept his twenty-two foot run-about with its faded blue cabin awning and its 33-horsepower Evenrude.

Bruno’s dream had been to catch a “doormat” fluke, a fish the size of the marlin-embossed sisal rug that lay in front of his tonsorial salon ... or, generally agreed to be a fish of twenty pounds or more. Old-timers often talked about hauling up these trophies on a regular basis before the Moonies had started using their drag nets on George’s Banks. Now the oft-repeated joke was that catching such a fish “would be a fluke.” It was even possible to catch a doormat flounder; but, because it required going out to sea a little further than he liked ... generally in more inclement weather, Bruno kept his chimeras confined to catching a doormat fluke. He had come close twice. Once his line snapped just when he was about to boat at least a thirty pound monster. And the second time, a Mako shark took two-thirds of his prize as soon as it hit the surface about fifteen yards out. Bruno brought back the head and dorsal fin of this almost-doormat, but his buddies only scoffed at his empty boasts as to its pre-Mako dimensions.

This day seemed perfect for prize taking. The waters were generally calm and a sea mist would keep things cool and should pull the fish up from the depths. Bruno left the harbor in good spirits with a cooler full of beer, two wrapped cheese-steak heroes, and his small portable radio tuned to the “oldies” station. He decided to try the bay first and then, if things didn’t work there, the ocean. He fished up and down the Peconic Bay with only a few throw-backs. So, around twelve-thirty, he decided to try his luck on the other side of Montauk Point. He powered up the ‘Rude and pointed his boat toward the fog-horn’s wail on the island’s eastern tip. In route, he leaned on the gunwale and proceeded to devour the heroes while steering the boat and sucking down three ‘Gansetts.

By the time he reached the confluence of the currents coming around both sides of Long Island, Bruno’s senses were a little dulled. He had been through these waters many times before and knew that they could be treacherous. Right off the Montauk Point cliffs and for about a mile off shore, the sea was always roiled, trying to resolve which flow was to prevail. Even on perfectly calm days, the waves in this area suddenly rose to ten feet or more ... and one never knew exactly which way they were going. On this particular day, Bruno was in a hurry to get to his next fishing hole and so cut the point a little too close. He got caught in the worst of the rip currents and had to fight to keep the Avatar on course. One nasty wave lifted his stern completely out of the water which then over-revved his outboard. When the propeller resubmerged, its tremendous torque sheared off its hardened-steel cotter pin like it was a thin pretzel.

Bruno swore and reached for his tool box with one hand while pulling the engine up out of the water with the other. But fate had more bad news in store for this erstwhile Isaac Walton. Just as he was to insert his only replacement cotter pin into the prop shaft, another wave jerked his boat sideways so violently that, in reaching for support, Bruno dropped this critical object into the sea. Some expletives later, Bruno sat pondering his options. The race on the ocean side of this confluence was now pulling him out to sea at about a three knot clip, so his small paddle was of little use. Visibility at this point was only about fifty yards so there was only a small chance that the white towel hung on his outrigger would be spotted by any craft large enough to offer assistance. And since it broke four years before, Bruno did not carry a two-way radio. He was indeed in a real pickle.

The Avatar drifted this way for about three hours ... further and further out into the shipping lanes coming off Sandy Hook. And since the weather was clearing, Bruno was now optimistic that he would be spotted. He dozed for a while, made sleepy by the sun and the three more beers he had imprudently downed. He awoke with a start. There off to the aft was a huge oil tanker, riding high in the water after having disgorged its two million barrels of petroleum into holding tanks near the mouth of Raritan river in New Jersey. The tanker was made in Japan, of Greek registry, flying a Panama flag, with a Romanian captain who was, at this point, snoring in his bunk after spending the previous night boozing and debauching on Tenth Avenue in Manhattan. Not that he would have necessarily seen Bruno’s boat had he been at the helm ... for the ship was the length of three football fields and its angle of vision was further obscured by its high draft. Had it been fully loaded, there might have been a minuscule chance that Bruno would have been spotted, but, even then, little could have been done to stop in time. There was an unofficial but sizable betting pool among its polyglot crew as to how many sails they would find wrapped around the propeller shaft at each trip’s end.

When Bruno fully realized his predicament he started shouting at the top of his lungs ... to no avail. The decibels produced by the bow-wake of the tanker were ten times louder than Bruno’s meager protestations. Then for a brief moment Bruno thought that he might be spared. The tanker was clearly not going to hit him head on ... perhaps a glancing blow only. But such is not the fate of doormat seekers. From about a ten foot distance, Bruno’s flimsy outboard was sucked underneath this behemoth ... where it traversed almost the full length of its barnacle-encrusted double hull before being chewed into chum by the huge, twin-opposing, ship’s propellers. After this gauntlet of mayhem, there wasn’t a piece left of the Avatar or its hapless captain that was as big as would have emerged from a ten-second-pulse on a Cuisenart. Everything had been brutally and efficiently pulverized. All was gone ... fishin'.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

The Way of All Flesh

The fat Hereford steer entered the slaughterhouse, five paces behind his erstwhile feed-lot mate. As soon as he pushed his way through a thick curtain of hanging black plastic strips, his skull was adroitly sledge-hammered by a bare-chested Negroid giant, named “Hard” Thomas. The Hereford dropped to his knees and was dexterously hooked on his knee tendons and winched upside down into a throat-slitting position. This was quickly and quietly done so that the Hereford could then donate his vital fluids to a small red river sluicing down a small gutter in the cement floor. This rivulet was later magically converted to the highest grade fertilizer. (The corn grows better because of the blood of the steer that ate the corn.)

The overhead conveyor chain then moved the still-twitching Hereford first to the header who, with a razor-sharp knife the size of a Samurai sword, finished the beheading process. The head was dropped onto a rubber conveyor belt moving off to the right, perpendicular to the main carcass procession. This noggin was in turn processed into hot dogs and dog food. Next the Hereford was introduced to two skinners, one on either side, who had its hide off in 15 seconds flat. This was dropped down a chute into a vat of lye to remove the hair, then to the tannery, and then to Italy or Brazil to make the finest shoes or pocketbooks. Simultaneous to the hiding, the steer was gutted. With three dexterous swipes of a knife, the offal was dropped into a stainless-steel container which was then whisked off to be processed along with the head.

What was left of the carcass was cut asunder with a stainless-steel chain saw and entered, through another black plastic curtain, into a chiller which, within the course of 25 yards, dropped its temperatures to 38 degrees F. Then, both halves went to a phalanx of butchers who quickly dissected them into T-bone steaks, sirloin steaks, filet mignons, New York strips, skirt steaks (from the diaphragm), beef briskets, top rounds, bottom rounds, eye rounds, rump steaks, chuck steaks, neck meat for hamburgers, standing rib roasts, short ribs, ox-tail chunks for soup, beef shanks for osso bucco ... and an assortment of other viands. Thence these cuts were sent to the packagers who prettied them up in crushed ice and stretch wrap for the ravenous trenchermen in the finest restaurants and home kitchens of America.

By contrast, “Hard” Thomas has been a strict vegetarian since three days after he started his current job.

© Copyright,  George W. Potts

The County Fair

Woody Whitbach ambled along the midway of the small carnival that had attached itself, like a tick on a hound dog, to the Somerset County, Pennsylvania county fair. He, being a raw-boned farm boy of thirteen, had never seen so many new things in one day. First there was the FarmAll “Dynamo” Wheat Combine which aptly combined the operations of cutting, raking, threshing, winnowing, bagging, and straw disposal ... all in one bright-red behemoth. Then there was cotton candy, spun fluffy and pink from some kind of metal contraption behind the counter of the Ladies’ Auxiliary tent. And corn dogs.  And big pretzels with mustard. And there were exotic breeds of cows, pigs and sheep; and an elixir called Kickapoo Joy Juice that was supposed to “make you more of a man.” Woody sensed that he knew what this phrase meant, but he couldn’t imagine why any man would need such help. He would get a boner just looking at the girdle ads in the Sears Roebuck catalogue.

All this novelty was causing his head to spin above the Ferris Wheel in an out-of-body experience. But he abruptly came crashing back to earth as he caught glimpse of a nude female breast off to his left. There, on one of the side-show stages, was the most beautiful girl Woody had ever seen, dancing the hoochy-koochy to some scratchy jazz-music coming out of two loud speakers hung above her head. She was wearing a number of diaphanous multi-colored veils that swirled around as she danced, exposing a shoulder here, a thigh there, and then the pale curve of her buttocks. But no matter how long he watched, he could not recapture another bared tit before this dancer retired behind the tent folds for her real “show.”

Woody was contemplating waiting around for the next “teaser” show. (He wasn’t a total rube ... his school buddies had given him this much prepping.) But it was getting late and since he had only one quarter left in his faded jeans, he decided to take the big step. With shallow breaths, he plunked down his specie and tried his best to saunter into the hot and dry “girlie” tent. After about five minutes the show began. Throughout this wait, Woody thought he might faint from the combination of his sexual arousal; the proximity of the other tittering teenagers and guffawing men; and the foul, stale air of the tent.

To a live drum beat, onto the stage came the most decrepit female he had ever seen. She was at least fifty with orange hair, sagging boobs, and hips, two ax-handles wide. She tried her best to reproduce the movements of the sylph whom Woody had seen only moments before. But the results were only laughable. Instead of rhythm, she had spasms; instead of allure, she had repulsion; instead of “take it off,” the crowd was shouting “put it on.” After a few minutes of such farce, the barker from out front came on stage to say that the “real show” was about to begin in the rear tent. For only one dollar more you could therein see Gloria (the tease dancer) and “all of her womanly charms.”

Since Woody was out of money, he slouched out of the tent and thence onto his daddy’s waiting pickup truck. The cool night air dashed his arousal as he rode home in the back of the truck. Chores resumed the next day and school began the next week. Woody spent a long and a sweaty year saving for the next summer’s Somerset County Fair. This time he showed up with five whole dollars and he wasted no time looking at the cows and the combines.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Mow 'em Down

Stock Photo

The Kecksburg (Pennsylvania) Arrows were bouncing along at the bottom of their Class A league rankings. They had no pitching. Their hitting was sporadic at best; and their coach, “Snuffy” Smith, was pushing every last bit of his meager paycheck up his variegated nose. In fact, if it weren’t for those MacDonald’s Quarter Pounders that the team manager, Harvey Hoople, bought him when they were on the road, Stuffy would have long ago starved to death. Things indeed looked mighty grim for Snuffy's contract renewal.

With ten games left in their miserable season, the Arrows were finishing their last road trip with two games at Memorial Stadium in Front Royal, Virginia against the Front Royal Royals. They had lost the first of these games 22 to 3 and, after a hot, stuffy, air-condition-less night at the Super 8 motel, were taking to the field after going scoreless in the top of the first. Their pitcher for this game was Achmed Mohammed Hussein, a northpaw blackamoor from Brooklyn whose right arm was a full two inches longer than his left. Achmed, having not yet pitched on this circuit, had the only clean uniform on the team. The Arrow’s road colors were heliotrope on damask rose with apricot piping and Achmed, so pristinely attired, caused a ripple of admiring mummers throughout the stadium.

The Royals, also resplendent in their home-colors of royal blue and pale puce with tangerine piping, started off with seven quick hits, six walks, one hit batter, three errors, and a balk. As a consequence they were laughing and joking ... and razzing Achmed mercilessly.  Achmed’s eyes were beginning to water as the Royals were about to bat around for the third time; so, calling time out, he sauntered over to the Arrow's dugout. Reaching into his electric-blue Adidas bag, Achmed grabbed an automatic Uzi with three full banana clips duct-taped together.

With an existential smile, Achmed then proceeded to mow down the whole opposing team (including the coach, equipment manager, and the batboy) in their dugout as methodically as they, up till fifty seconds earlier, had humiliating him. When he finished, Achmed wiped off the Uzi with the team towel and threw it onto the field to the horrified gasps of the 1,835 paying fans. Of course, a jury of his peers was unable to comprehend the concept of reasonable doubt and completely bought the defense argument that Snuffy had earlier commanded the dim-witted Achmed to "mow 'em down"... and therefore Achmed walked.

© Copyright,  George W. Potts

L’Ouest Sauvage

“Lash” LaRue De La Paix trotted into town on a magnificent Appaloosa which made the street-tethered roans, pintos and sorrels look like so many hippo-mongrels. Lash was a cow-garçon from Marseilles who had come to Dodge City in search of adventure and some poontang. Sitting high in his saddle, he sneeringly steered his stallion among his lessers, sniffing the air for those female pheromones which would lead him to his evening comfort.

“Lash” wasn’t his Christian name; it was Gregorio. But Gregorio assumed this new appellation on the boat over to America somewhere northwest of the Sargasso Sea in order to distract females from his somewhat androgynous appearance. It worked like a charm. Within fifteen minutes of his rechristening, he was playing the ole in and out with a scullery maid from Bristol who was coming to America to wed her 12-year pen pal from Newark.

When Lash reached the only three-story hotel in Dodge City, The Roxy, he guided his horse to its hitching post. In doing so, he swung his right leg back over the saddle and spent the horse’s last ten paces suspended on his left stirrup. This bit of grandstanding was for the benefit of a comely miss who was standing on the hotel porch with at least eight crinolines hiding her pouting charms (on which Lash was already beginning to fantasize.)

With a tip of his 37.85 liter hat to this potential conquest, Lash tied up his horse and took the porch stairs three at a time. This was a grievous error in judgment. He missed the top step by millimeters and fell headlong into a gunslinger named Mickey from Butte, Montana. Without so much as a how-de-do, this desperado pumped all six bullets from his pearl-handled Colt into Lash’s torso ... which quickly twitched into stillness.

They buried him on Boot Hill with but a single word carved on his graveboard, “Frenchie”. His horse and saddle were sold to cover the funeral expenses. Mickey took the rest of Lash's personal effects for the insult.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

The Farmer in the Dell

The Red Dart bus dropped Geoffrey Granger off at the foot of a long dirt lane leading to a cozy farmhouse. He stood there for a good five minutes sucking in all the sensory stimuli of this bucolic setting. Manure, fresh-cut hay, ozone from a recent thunder storm, and the flowering privet in the hedge-row all contributed to the aromatic melange that Jeff used to resettle his mind into a yeoman’s serenity. A nearby plowed field steamed slightly as it was being plucked over by a troop of magpies foraging for a late lunch. The L-shaped road ahead was paralleled with a phalanx of tall maple trees that swayed in the slight breeze like a line of ballerina dancers at the practice bar.

As he turned and trudged up this rutted path, he gauged the caliber of the herds of sloe-eyed Jersey cows, Black Angus steers, and milky-white Marino sheep grazing in separate, movable pens on the lush alfalfa and clover fields. The husbandry prowess of this croft’s owner was evidenced by the well-fed sheen on the bovines’ hides and the length of the ovine wool. A gaggle of Canada geese paddled noisily in the nearby irrigation pond which was reflecting the increasingly bright August sun and random, racing nimbus clouds throwing crisp shadows across the huddled water lilies.

As he approached the enclosed barnyard he noted a parcel of piebald Guinea hens and russet Rhode Island Reds pecking and scratching and throwing up the afternoon dust. Ten Poland China sows and one enormous boar rooted in the mud of a pig sty attached to the side of a carmine-red barn and their communal grunting created a soothing background cadence. To the side of the white clapboard farmhouse, the kitchen garden was overflowing with lush red tomatoes, purple-black eggplants, vermilion and verdant peppers, and a wide range of salad greens.

Just as Jeff was turning by the silo to enter the straw-filled upper barn his whole world went blank, mute, and odorless. It was quickly clear what had happened. Jeff’s black Labrador, Flatulence, had tripped over and, consequently, pulled the plug to his Dell, Studio XPS 9000 with Windows 7, personal computer system on which he was running the virtual reality software “Agra-Views.” Jeff removed his wrap-around, viewing and smelling, acoustical-helmet and gave his now hang-dog pet a swift kick to the solar plexus.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

The Soda Jerk

The McCrory’s Five and Dime in the Cameron section of Alexandria, Virginia was in a gradual economic decline. Even in the early 1950’s it was becoming anachronistic. Its sales-atolls of fabrics, notions, candies, hardware, toys, and such .... with a clerk centered in each lagoon ... were lapsing due to changing business economics -- to be replaced in the years ahead by shopping carts and check-out counters. Even its high, tinned ceiling and its rotating wooden fans would soon succumb to air conditioning. Along its entire left wall stood an old-fashioned soda fountain with chrome and red-plastic-covered stools and a long burnished-brown Formica counter.

Into this merchandising museum stepping Gregory Tyro to interview for an advertised job as a soda-fountain server. He was a sophomore at nearby George Washington High School and, since he was the only person to apply for this position in three days, was immediately hired. He was to work Tuesday and Thursday afternoons from 3:00 until 6:00 and all day Saturday ... for 75 cents an hour (from which he had to pay for his lunch on Saturdays.) Gregory’s customers tended to be gray, mousy saleswomen from McCrory’s and the other modest emporia of this small village. They would invariably order the daily special, such as a grilled cheese sandwich, a small drink, and Campbell’s tomato soup (with a sweet pickle) for 70¢. They generally were a very persnickety sort. A smudged plate, a dirty knife (which they probably wouldn’t use anyway), or unevenly-toasted bread would send them into spasms of grousing. Once satisfied, they would then nibble at the corners of their sandwich and slowly sip their soup until their half-hour break was consumed. Then they would leave three quarters on the counter, netting Gregory a whole nickel for the abuse.

Sometimes, his customers would be a local banker or a gas station owner who would eat fast and leave a bigger tip ... or retirees who would come in for a cherry or a vanilla Coke and then douse it with ammoniate and phosphate from a cruet on the counter (indicated to be "for their nerves"). In his six months there, Gregory did get pretty adept at this job.  He could fry a burger or make a malted milk with ease.  The one hitch was that the malted milk machine invariable gave him a small shock when he pushed the steel contained into its harness.  And the half-hour cleaning-up of his workspace at the end of the day wasn't his favorite either.  Only rarely did someone of Gregory’s own age penetrate the blue-veined veil of this eatery and give him someone to talk to. But, because he was young and usually shy, and because such novelty almost always swamped his vocal synapses; Gregory would generally open by saying something stupid like, “Ghat can I wet you?”

This was the first of many customer-service jobs that Gregory had during his salad years. And he learned from these experiences that working almost always tends to be work. (If you haven’t figured it out by now, Gregory was yours truly.)

© Copyright,   George W. Potts

The Boston Marathon

(stock photo)

Rosie Dispozishen laced and re-laced her sneaker as she edged closer to the starting line of the 53rd Boston Marathon. At this time, the departure point of this increasingly-famous race was not a very big berg ... only about 4,000 souls. However, on Patriots’ Day every Spring, it more than doubled in size as runners from around the world assemble there for this great grandmother of all long-distance races.

Rosie knew that she was in for a tough race. She had competed against all of her low-number rivals at least once before and fully realized that they had the tremendous edge ... they all had two legs. Not that one leg hadn’t served Rosie well in the past. She and her two-legged partner, Butch Dykstra, had won almost every three-legged race in the country. She also did extremely well in foot races as opposed to feet races. But two legs just always seemed to work out better in a marathon, and Rosie knew that her work was cut out for her. So she sidled up to the starting line by leaning on, and then elbowing out of the way anyone who showed her the slightest sympathy. By the time the gun sounded, a beaming Rosie was leaning on her crutches in the front row of runners, somewhat incongruous with her four-digit seeding number pinned to her chest.

The race was on! Rosie quickly dropped her crutches and bounced along on one leg for about a mile before she could go no further in that mode. Then she plopped to the ground and started rolling. Since all the other runners had, by this time, passed her by; this was not the hazard it otherwise might have been. Other than making her extremely dizzy, this method of propulsion was relatively untaxing for Rosie. She had progressed for about another half mile this way before she rolled onto her rump and, putting her arms behind her, began to crab walk. However, her vertigo was, by then, so advanced that she waddled around in circles for a full five minutes before she was back on the bee-line toward Boston (where the race winner was just then crossing the finish line).

So it went for Rosie, alternatively springing forward on one leg, then rotating her torso, and then crab walking. By night fall she had reached Framingham and had acquired a police escort lest she be run over in the dark during her supine or prone race phases. And by early the next morning, a scratched and bruised Rosie was bouncing her way through Wellesley, almost unnoticed by the college coeds on their way to class. Then, she delayed rush-hour traffic in Newton for about two hours as she tried to revolve her way up Heartbreak Hill ... but kept rolling back down. Finally, around eleven PM that night, almost 36 hours after she had crossed the starting line, a thoroughly battered and humbled Rosie finished her most grueling marathon. However, by then she had been noticed by the press and the public. She was said by many to have had more courage than even Amelia Earhart.

And so to honor her one-legged spunk, the small town at the start of this great race rechristened itself as “Hopkinton.”

© Copyright   George W. Potts

Topiary

A boxwood  llama perpetually grazed one spot on a former hay field, now populated with a plethora of other leafy-coifed biota ... a cypress elephant, a rosemary pig, a cedar lion, a blue-spruce giraffe, a hemlock hippopotamus, and a juniper horse ... all seemingly like the hemp-induced chimeras of a gene-splice between Salvador Dali and Edward Sissorhands. But they weren’t. These topiaries had been carefully nurtured and tonsured by Amos Roosevelt, a overly-shy car mechanic, who was brideless, parentless, and childless ... and, therefore, able to spend all of his spare time and most of his salary on these organic origami.

Throughout the spring, summer, and fall; Amos was up at six A.M. pruning, plucking, and fussing over his children, as he called them, before he donned his impeccably clean overalls and went off to the mechanic's garage. Again, in the evening, Amos would lovingly tend his progeny until encroaching darkness would force him into his modest home where he ate his frugal meal, and, after sketching a few new ideas, would retire to his lumpy bed. This bush-artist was the grand master of his craft. He even went so far as to cause fern eyelashes to sprout on the giraffe’s doe-eyes; monster cactus teeth to root in the gaping mouth of the hippo, and gigantic ears to grow on the elephant’s head out of ... what else? ... elephant-ear plants.

Amos was an extremely private person. He was not an old man, probably no more than thirty-five, but he seemed as celibate as the Pope. This was as much due to his compulsions as it was to any testosterone deficiency. But, at the furthest-reaches of this acreage, in the center of a tall privet maze ... far from the prying eyes of the occasional tourist ... was a topiary that no one else had ever seen. It was an evergreen Aphrodite ... hedge-manicured to the finest detail by Amos. She had an aquiline nose, pouting lips, and cascading tresses that reached halfway down her sculpted back. She was standing on tiptoe and the resulting muscular tension reached all the way up her thin legs to her well-trimmed mons Venus. Her taut stomach arched up to two perky breasts crafted to perfection, even down to the aureoles around the nipples. Nothing was left to the imagination.

This was Amos’ one and only diversion. On most sunny Saturday afternoons he would casually wander to the back of his field, enter and traverse the hedge maze, and then, gazing longingly at his creation, he would disrobe, grab his pruning shears, climb his tripod orchard ladder, and hoarsely whisper to his shrubbery fetish, “I love yew.”

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Good & Plenty

As a nine-year old in the late 1940’s, heaven to me was a Saturday matinee at the Manos Theater or the Strand Theater or the Grand Theater in my Pennsylvania hometown, Greensburg. The Grand, behind the courthouse, was the seedier of the three and, therefore, the favorite of the munchkin set. With our silver quarter clutched tightly in our fists, it lured us onto its boisterous ticket queue with a western, a serial, a B-film (generally a comedy or a mystery), and a cartoon. One would enter this cavern of delights after lunch on Saturday and emerge squinting into the late afternoon sun. We never begrudged the squandering of our allowance and much of our Saturday on such frivolity. We were innocents ... we knew not of television or VCRs or Dolby sound systems or the Internet.

Invariably, we spent our whole quarter ... 15 cents to get into the magic shadow show and the rest for such nickel treats as Dots, JuJu Bees, Necco Wafers, Good & Plenty, Red Hots, and that requisite bag of popcorn. Good & Plenty was a favorite since the empty box made the best mouth-tooter to blow in between the features. If one sat in the balcony, half of your popcorn was generally showered on your screaming peers below. Too much popcorn or tooting invariably brought the matron usherette with her ill-fitting brown uniform and massive flashlight. The faded purple braid on her left shoulder rewarded her for what we knew not ... perhaps scowling.

The western proffered usually starred William Boyd (as Hopalong Cassidy) or Gene Autry (and his side-kick, Cannonball) or Lash LaRue or Roy Rogers (and Gabby Hayes). There was always a big posse chase, lots of ricocheting bullets and horse prat falls, but no kissing. If there were western songs, we usually hooted and hollered until the last stanza. The serial would be something like The Perils of Pauline (with Betty Hutton) or Flash Gordon (with Buster Crabb) or Red Ryder (and Little Beaver) or the Lone Ranger or Johnny Weismiller’s Tarzan. Then the main feature could be Charley Chan or Abbott & Costello (meeting Frankenstein or the Wolf Man or the Invisible Man) or Bob Hope and Bing Crosby (on the road to Rio or Bali or Morocco) or Errol Flynn as Robin Hood or Laurel and Hardy in the French Foreign Legion.

Often there was also a Movietone News short which highlighted recent world events in sports, entertainment, and of course, the reconstruction from the war in Europe or the Pacific. But it was the cartoon that took our breath away. Porkie Pig and all his friends coming out of that rainbow bulls-eye was our thrill of the week. And, if perchance there was a second cartoon, we squealed ... for we knew we had been gifted by the gods.

© Copyright George W. Potts

The Master Put Down

Eunice sadly decided that it was time. Not that Fluffy was particularly old. Her adorable little miniature poodle was only a little over eight and might be expected to live another eight or ten years. It was more that Eunice herself was getting on in years and could no longer take Fluffy for her numerous walks. Nor could her increasing delicate psyche take Fluffy’s nervous vigor. This over-energetic dog was constantly running to the front window to bark at passer-bys or delivery men. Fluffy also frequently browsed and selected a squeaking dog toy from her basket and chewed on it for hours until it finally gave up its squeaker … only to be quickly replaced by another rubber fire hydrant or stuffed mailman by one of Eunice’s numerous grandchildren or neighbors.

It was all getting to be too much, so Eunice called the vet and made that auspicious appointment for the very next day to put Fluffy “to sleep”. She tossed and turned all that night worrying how she could go through with this fateful decision. But, through a vale of tears, she drove Fluffy to the veterinarian in plenty of time to meet their three-fifteen appointment with destiny. She parked her sensible hybrid vehicle where it said “visitors” and put Fluffy on her sequined leash. As they were walking into the vets’ office there was a cacophony of barking coming from the next-door kennels. Fluffy responded with her own vigorous series of yaps and yips.

Once in the vets’ office Eunice and Fluffy were escorted into a room that had already been prepared for their visit. There was a thick blanket on the floor and a series of scary implements on the examining table … a syringe, an electric razor, and a series of liquid-filled vials. Eunice was told how this “procedure” would go. She was asked if she wanted to have Fluffy cremated and put in a monogrammed brass urn. She nodded assent.  Finally, she opted to have a plaster cast of Eunice’s paw made and sent to her. Eunice was then instructed by the attendant to sit with Fluffy on the blanket and try to keep her calm while her credit card was hit for $568 for a long series of these and other manufactured charges. Finally Eunice was given a box of Kleenex and told that the “doctor” would be in shortly to “see” Fluffy and that Eunice could then leave by the back door.

Eunice had a good cry and stroked Fluffy and told her how much she loved her and how much she would be missed. After what seemed like an eternity there was a soft knock at the door. Eunice sobbed, “Come in.” When the door opened, instead of a white-coated veterinarian, there, standing on their haunches, were three gigantic dogs – an Irish wolfhound, a mastiff, and a Great Dane that together must have weighed five hundred pounds.

Fluffy gave a yelp of friendly recognition. Then, as the mastiff reached for the syringe, Eunice realized what was to take place next. She screamed and fainted dead away.

© Copyright George W. Potts

The Chocolate Angel

I was “on the beach” during one raw December in New York City. It wasn’t pleasant. My start-up company had run out of money earlier that fall and I was looking at my prospects with a fair dollop of pessimism. Christmas was rapidly approaching ... at about the same speed that my family’s checking account was diminishing. We had told our children of our predicament, but we couched it with enough optimism that the kids did not seem concerned. Moreover, there still were credit cards, department store charge accounts, and a few more unemployment checks; so my wife, Jeanette and I were still able to indulge ourselves almost everything we needed to make Georgie’s and Becca’s Christmas morning all that they had come to expect.

Christmas eve came and its bourbon had erased any residual angst I was still suffering. Our apartment in Stuyvesant Town was festooned with mistletoe, holly, and a multitude of other Yuletide decorations. The Christmas tree was a beautiful blue spruce -- lit, garlanded, and icicled into a fairyland icon. Gaily wrapped presents were spread out around the tree like supplicants around an emir. They extended so far out that there was little room left for our gaggle of guests to put their snowy feet. They were enjoying eggnog, old fashions, Christmas cookies, and milk punch to the strains of Johnny Mathas’ “I’ll be Home for Christmas.” The conversation drifted from the U.S. departure from Viet Nam to the minute details of our respective morrow’s menu. Our children were asleep in their bunk beds after I had read them their traditional “A Visit from St. Nicholas” story.

In the midst of all this celebrating, the “ding dong” of our apartment door intruded itself. I thought it was just another neighbor, so I opened the door with an expectant smile. Standing there was a well-dressed black lady with two large shopping bags ... apparently full of Yule-wrapped packages. She said, “Is this the Potts’ apartment?” Taken aback, I replied that it was. Then it was her visage’s turn to register surprise. But she was undaunted. She thrust these two shopping bags upon me and then handed me a letter that was addressed: “Santa Clause, North Pole.” I stood there grasping these two holiday sacks ... with my jaw sagging onto my ski sweater. I was too chagrined to invite her into our apartment ... lest she notice the sea of largess half-covering the living room floor. But I did stammer out a syntactically-fractured “thank you.” Then, after an embarrassed pause, this chocolate angel turned on her heels and fled onto the elevator.

When she was gone and I had retreated into our apartment, I emptied out these shopping bags. They contained red and green wrapped presents addressed alternately to Rebecca and George; and a few unwrapped toys ... I think a fire truck and a doll. Then I opened the crayoned letter. It contained a plea from Georgie to Santa Claus for some presents since “his Daddy was out of work and there would be no money for Christmas for my sister Rebecca and me.” It was indeed one of life’s precious, bitter-sweet moments.

© Copyright  George W. Potts

Another Modest Proposal

(With apologies to Jonathan Swift)

Humankind has been cursed over the millennia with two major man-made scourges – war and violent crime. From billions of dollars of government-sponsored research, we now know that both these plagues have, as their major causative agent, one relatively simple organic molecule, testosterone. Therefore, in order to cleanse the world of war and violent crime we need only rid the world of testosterone. To accomplish this end is also relatively simple – the world needs only to castrate each and every male the world around. Now there might be a few problems with this approach… but I also have solutions for these issues too:

1) It will be relatively simple to cut the testicles off of every male baby. We can think of it as a kind of super circumcision. We can create an elaborate ceremony around this deballing … maybe calling it a “bris-cut” (with a nod to the Jewish crowd). We might also make all these newly-made eunuchs honorary citizens of France. However, castrating adult males might be a little more difficult … with some fairly serious rebellions resulting. I suggest that this reluctance be defeated with the “salami approach” (excuse the pun). That is, we snip the more unpopular males first -- lawyers, felons, Madison Avenue types, politicians, Canadians, car salesmen, and Bill Gates. Then, little by little, we can expand those males that get neutered to include a larger and larger percentage of adult males until finally the snipers themselves are held down by the snipees and deballed to the cheers of Gloria Steinhem, Jeanne Garofalo and the NOW crowd. I also suggest that Harry Reid be put in administrative charge of this worldwide process since he has obviously already undergone a nut-ectomy.

2) There almost certainly would arise a black market in artificial testosterone. Therefore, it will also be necessary to make all testosterone, in pill or injectable form, a controlled substance with severe penalties for its illegal possession – possibly a public beheading by radical Muslims or PETA. The only population segment who could be written legal prescriptions for testosterone would be female athletes and Hollywood producers.

3) Once all males have been castrated there then arises the obvious (and ominous) dilemma of how we propagate our species. For the first months or so fecund females might be inseminated from the existing frozen sperm banks. However, for the longer run, there will need to be a better solution. Obviously, the cloning of humans might be a neat answer … if this process ever becomes viable and reliable. But to avoid all the possible technical and genetic pitfalls of this resolution, it might be necessary to keep a nominal number of uncastrated males around to provide for species propagation. I suggest that this breeder stock of males (drones) be kept under strict lock and key and milked regularly for their spunk by the likes of Madonna, Monica Lewinski and Elton John. The number of males required for this societal duty might not be that great since each ejaculation produces tens of millions of sperm cells. I suggest that these lucky guys might be selected by voting on American Idol. Perhaps, with frequent milking and careful rationing of results, Barack Obama, George Clooney, Bill Clinton and Donald Trump (my predictions for the voting outcome) might be the only studs required worldwide.

And thence comes the age of Aquarius ... and love will conquer all.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

The Old Man

I was sleeping in my grandparents’ sewing room. It was a small room at the head of the stairs and beside their only bathroom. My grandmother had moved her old treadle Singer sewing machine away from the back window which overlooked her flower-laden back yard and installed a fold-out bed for me in its stead. My sister and mother shared the front bedroom as we had recently moved in with my mother’s parents. 

My mother had left my stepfather, Sarsfield (Sarge) Burns, after about three years of marriage. I, at the age of twelve, wasn’t entirely unhappy about this development despite my new cramped quarters. Sarge (I never called him Dad) was not a good father or even a mediocre stepfather. He adored my mother and older sister. But he treated me with total indifference other than to use me as a gofer and a grunt. This included lugging bushel baskets of dirt around to fill in holes in the front lawn and fetching his Corona-Corona cigars from the drugstore about a half mile away. No, I didn’t really miss my life with him.

My new bedroom had, to the right of the entry door, two large built-in closets containing my grandparents’ mothballed clothes. Above them were two smaller built-in storage cabinets holding, among many sewing notions, at least a dozen large tin containers of A&P black pepper. I was curious about this hoard until my grandmother told me that, during the war, black pepper was hard to come by. I assumed that she was referring to World War II. This room also had a side window which looked out onto the next-store house across a small dark walkway. It couldn’t have been more that ten feet to this modest home of the Trouts and I could see into its back bedroom like it was an ell of off my own little room. Since their house was shorter than my grandparents’, I looked into this room from behind and above at a slight angle.

My mother, my sister and I stayed with my grandparents for about six months and, throughout I had a clear view into the Trout’s lighted back bedroom. And for this entire period it seemed that nothing went on in this room other than an old man sitting on the edge of his sagging bed that had been pushed against the back wall. I assumed that this sad sack was the father of either Mr. or Mrs. Trout, but since I never saw him outside in their company, I could not be sure. He was a rather gaunt soul with a bit of a paunch, an angular face, and usually, a stubble of whiskers. He sat on the edge of this bed, generally in his gray wool pants, suspenders down, and an old-fashioned armless undershirt, staring at the wall. That’s all I really ever saw him do there -- stare, with a haunting hollow gaze, at that floral wallpaper on the opposite wall. Actually, this is not quite true. He did from time to time hack up some phlegm and spit it a dirty old rag that he held on his knee. Then he went diligently back to his task of trying to stare the budding flowers into bloom ... or the perched birds into flight.

This scene repeated itself over and over -- early morning, late night, or even if I was in my room in the afternoon. He just sat there, staring ... hardly ever moving. Often I would force myself to stay awake late into the night to see something happen. But it never did. A few times I did see him go out of the room presumably to the bathroom, but that seemed the range of his physical activity. He sat there staring ... staring until I thought that he must be mad. Of course, there was no way to know what he was thinking, but I would imagine that he was reliving his life in the foreground of that wallpaper ... dancing, going to war, getting married, playing baseball, harvesting wheat, whatever. He just sat and stared until my grandma’s backyard garden had faded and we had moved away.

And so, while still quite young, I had learned a serious lot about getting old.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Hot Buttered Toast

Indian Mountain, a boys’ boarding school, was a self-contained community. Located near Lakeville, Connecticut along with its sister school, Indian View, it was patterned after an English preparatory school ... even down to calling its classes “forms”.

I was in the fifth form, a new student there and my first year away from home. Just about everything was new to me, but I wasn’t particularly homesick. I was more detached, drifting through this novelty without leaving any footprints. My father had died four years earlier and my mother had just remarried a dapper New Yorker named Sarsfield “Sarge” Burns. He was very cosmopolitan poltroon and lived in the Hotel Windsor near Central Park. I had never imagined that people could live in a hotel. But he didn’t take to children the way he took to my mother, so my sister and I were shipped off to Connecticut for a year of boarding school while my mom was introduced to the glamours of city life. While we were away my mother moved everything out of our house in Greensburg, Pennsylvania and she and my new step parent moved into a bigger hotel room at the Hotel Salisbury, on 57th Street, diagonally across from Carnegie Hall. It was to this hotel room we returned to for holidays ... to sleep on cots in the corner.

This school was understandably sited at the foot of Indian Mountain and most of its facilities -- classrooms, an assembly hall, a small library, the dorm rooms, a dining hall, a locker room, an infirmary and even some faculty quarters, were all located in one big brick building. If the weather was bad, we could spend the entire day indoors ... in our large brick cocoon. We would wake up in our dorm rooms, go to the basement to perform out toilets, move to breakfast in the dining hall, go to classes, eat lunch, more classes, study hall, dinner, assembly, study hall again, and then back to our rooms until lights out. If the weather was good, we would play outside before dinner, usually a sport appropriate to the season. On the weekends we usually played hare and hounds outside or went on a school trip. When we were in the dining hall, we always ate at the same table and sat in the same seat. Meals were served family style in bowls and platters from which we took what we wanted. At the head of each table was a proctor, who was either a faculty member or someone from the school administration. It was this proctor’s responsibility to see that we ate everything on our plates and did it with a semblance of decorum.

Mr. Howell Richards was an English teacher of a certain age and my dining table proctor. He was archetypal English from the tip of his oxblood brogans to his Paisley bow tie and wire-rim glasses. He always wore tweeds ... not just a tweed jacket, but a full tweed suit, often with a vest of the same brindle colour. These suits always hung on his thin frame like a sheet over an old chair. He was a meek man ... a man who seemed to be waiting to inherit the Earth. He had an even meeker, childless wife who was prone to dangling onto his sleeve like a waif clinging to her mother’s dress hem. She made a mouse look debonair. She was devoted to “Professor Richards” as she called him, trying to get us to do the same. Mr. Richards wasn’t a professor, but if we called him that, his whole mien brightened by about 50 lamp watts. The Richards’s lived in a modest home that was built as an ell off the back of our brick cocoon, near the dining hall. The Richards’s needed only to exit their front door, take about ten steps across a courtyard, and enter the side door of the dining hall to sit down to a meal. Their table was the one closest the side door nearest their abode. I say the “Richards’s” because Mrs. Richards (I think it was Florence) always ate with us. She sat to her husband’s right and would tend to his every need throughout the meal. She was so very solicitous that she even made me, a budding social oaf, uncomfortable.

And one of Professor Richards’s needs at every dinner was toast, hot buttered toast. We usually had old stale cold toast for breakfast, but it was always soft, squishy rolls for lunch and dinner. When Richards and his wife entered for dinner, we would stand as they sat down. Then Florence would discretely place next to her husband’s plate a small napkin-wrapped package she was carrying. We all knew what was in it ... hot, aromatic, done to a tee, butter-infused, cut-on-the-diagonal, white toast. After the usual blessing, Professor Richards would open the napkin wrapping like it contained a cache of diamonds. And out would flood the sweet aroma of this hot buttered toast. Then throughout the meal, be it spaghetti, or meat loaf, or Swiss steak, or whatever, Mr. Richards would nibble his hot buttered toast ... his toast exclusively ... his raison d’être ... his holy right ... his status symbol ... his badge of honor ... the meaning to his day ... and maybe even the foundation to his entire life. If Mr. Richards had to choose between his toast and his wife, I suspected I knew what his choice would have been.

But this hot buttered toast also became my obsession. I would plead with my eyes to Mr. Richards for just one small bite of that hot buttered toast ... as would most of the other boys at the table. But Mr. Richards kept his eyes averted from our longing stares and just kept nibbling on his hot buttered toast after about every second bite of his dinner. And when the meal was done and the hot buttered toast was but a few crumbs, he would fold up the napkin, give it to his wife, and stand up, signifying that another Indian Mountain repast was completed. Then, as his wife demurely tucked this napkin into her coat pocket, we would all stand to be excused. Finally, the Richards’s would exit through the same door they had entered ... together ... Mrs. Richards hanging onto the Professor’s sleeve ... quiet and alone.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Upon Reaching Sixty

As I am entering my sixty-first year I feel compelled to reflect on my past life and on what may be my dubious destiny. First, I am all too aware that, if I am very lucky ... given the suspicious quality of my genealogical soup, I should be thrilled to live to eighty. Thus, I am likely now three-quarters of the way through my life journey and, in the distance, I can discern that grimy station at the end of the tracks. Certainly these last twenty years are doubtful to be as rail-smooth and offer the same panoramas as my first three score. In fact, unlike the song’s “purple dust of twilight time,” my dotage will probably be awash with the choking soot of infirmity ... not a very happy thought. And when my train finally pulls into its death-depot, I likely will be fearfully frozen in my berth.

So, why the journey? How is it that I am on this pilgrimage to the worm farm? Can this all evolve from one balmy night in May, 1938 when my parents did the nasty to the strains of “Stardust” lilting out of their brown Philco radio? Does my Dad’s one wriggler and my Mom’s willing ovum beget “me?” Logically, I understand, but emotionally I am confounded. It’s akin to turning the Empire State Building upside down and balancing it on the very tip of its antenna. That one moment of conception is the pin-point fulcrum for my entire life: a massive number of happy ceremonies, bitter failures, transient joys, defining events, greasy hamburgers, loopy ideas, indulged senses, and bodily functions -- all crammed into my sixty trips around the sun. Did my Dad, now gone for almost fifty-five years, really comprehend what he was begetting that May evening? Most unlikely. Sinister Nature makes our procreation so euphoric that we aren’t tempted with consequential thoughts.

And so I was born ... into a planet reluctantly entering the Second World War. The ovens at Treblinka had yet to be built. Jet planes were only a distant, discounted idea. The first computer, Eniac, was still a maze of radio tubes and wires. And our leader in the White House was quietly hardening his arteries with the contents of his theatrical cigarette holder. The town into which I set my tiny ink-stained foot was Greensburg, Pennsylvania; a grimy mill town thirty miles east of Pittsburgh. Greensburg was built, like Rome, on seven rather steep hills. It straddled Route 30, the old Lincoln Highway ... well before the age of truck routes around towns (such “civic planning” destined to drain these towns of their life force.) Our white clapboard house was owned by my mother’s father. It was a modest home, by today’s standards, set high on the eastern hill which cast its morning shadow on the high-school football stadium and a triple set of feeder rails connected to the main line of the Pennsylvania Railroad. The mainline itself framed the town’s northern bluff which, in turn, created the valley through which the Lincoln Highway promenaded.

My bedroom window overlooked this valley and often at night, particularly after my father had closed his eyes forever, I would sit on the edge of my bed watching the trains tightrope their way across the horizon. The wail of their steam whistles drew me to reveries of getting older and traveling to strange new places. Now, I am much older and have traveled to many strange new places. And, unfortunately, trains no longer belch coal smoke and lure dreamers with their mournful trills. It’s as though, as a young boy, I was suddenly able fly across that valley and board that train to my future. And now, having traveled well along to my destination, I yearn to be back in my old bedroom, sitting on my chenille bedspread, staring across the valley at that moving line of lights.

(Written 11 years ago.) © Copyright, George W. Potts

Be My Valentine

Sheldon was very depressed, almost despondent. His mother, to whom he was deeply attached, was dying. Sheldon’s father, a tailor, had passed on almost fifteen years earlier, while Shel was in seventh grade. His mother had stepped in to fill his father’s role, and then also became his mentor and his closest friend. It was she who had inspired him to do well enough at PS 168 and Bronx Science to get a full scholarship at Harvard. She encouraged him to go into premed studies and then, after he was accepted to Columbia Medical School, sold shoes at the Thom Mcan store on 46th and Broadway so he would have enough spending money to subsist in a small cold-water flat on West 178th Street.

After he had graduated from Columbia with honors and got an internship then a residency in cardiology at Bellevue, Shel moved in with his mother in her two-bedroom apartment in Stuyvesant Town. It was like he was a kid again. She would always have his favorite foods waiting for him no matter what time of the day or night he returned home. She would be waiting there in her flowery chintz bathrobe with a plate of blini or some sliced brisket and half-dones from the 2nd Ave. Deli. On the Saturdays that Shel was not working, they would travel by the Canarsie line to the Pastrami King restaurant in Brooklyn and spend hours gorging themselves before going on to Far Rockaway to watch the surf or bask in the sun, depending on the season.

But this particularly cold February things were very different. Shel’s mother could no longer go out of their apartment. Shel himself had diagnosed his mother’s condition -- congestive heart failure. Too many corned beef sandwiches and too little exercise were conspiring to take Shel’s mother away from him before her time. She was only 58 after all. But there was little Shel could do, save a heart transplant, to return his mom to here former vigor. And the cost of a new heart for her, even with Shel’s medical privileges, was well beyond what he made or could even borrow (being already tapped-out due to his medical studies). And besides, by the time Shel’s mother reached the top of the waiting list for a new heart, it most probably would be too late. So Shel’s brooding mood matched the grayness of the late-winter Manhattan weather.

Now Shel, although not quite handsome and hardly the athlete, had attracted, by his potential earning power, the attention of quite a few of the female hospital staff. He was constantly getting invitations for coffee, or for drinks after work, or to spend the weekend helping some comely nurse paint her apartment. All of which he refused. That is, all, until this particular Valentine’s Day when he got dozens of cute cards with all kinds of sappy and suggestive messages, such as: “You can have my candy, Valentine” or “You can put your dart in me, Sweetie.” One particularly florid card showed cupid shooting an arrow into the tukhas of a doctor who was, in turn, ogling a nurse with a lot of cleavage showing. It read, “Just say the word ...” It contained some of those little heart-shaped candies that had inscribed things like “Be my Valentine” and “My heart is yours;” and the card was signed “Amanda.”

When he read this card, Shel immediately got a half a woodie ... for he had been secretly admiring Amanda, out of all the nurses vying for his attention. She was statuesque with large breasts and, unlike most women endowed in this manner, also had a very shapely derriere. She was, of course, a blond schiksa whose intellect was not the match of Shel’s. But in some ways she did remind Shel of his mother and this made him feel more comfortable around her. She often knitted socks, just like his Mom. She drank her tea with a slurping sound, just like his Mom. And she often wore he hair in a tight bun covered with a snood, just like his Mom.

So Shel decided to break his self-imposed exile and have a go at Amanda. He sent her back a note asking if she would like to have dinner at the local Szechuan dive. His beeper went off fifteen minutes later and its text message read: “YES! YES! MANDY.” They met later that night at the restaurant and small-talked their way through the Hunan chicken and the sweet and sour pork. When Shel asked Mandy to come back to the hospital, she practically gushed her assent. Then she, from behind, placed her hand into Shel’s right front pants pocket to let him know a bit of what was coming. They practically ran back to the hospital and up to the top floor where the residents had temporary lodgings while they were on duty. By the time Shel had closed the door and moved his black bag off of the bed, Mandy had already shed her blouse and had let her beautiful breasts come cascading out of her bra. His breathing became short and shallow.

Shel, then cracked a couple of Amyl Nitrate vials, which they both quickly sniffed. Then he produced a Nitrous Oxide inhaler, which Mandy quickly sucked into her lungs as she slipped out of her panties. Shel quietly held back. Then he produced two Seconols, which, while Mandy downed hers, let his slip softly to the floor. Next he lay his drowsy and giggling date on the metal-frame bed and proceeded to tie her up, hand and foot, as she squealed with delight. Next, he opened a canister of ether, which, as Mandy inhaled its distinctly sweet smell, brought a flash of panic to her eyes. When Amanda was fully zonked, Shel slipped a rubber sheet under her supine nude torso. With that, he retrieved his black bag and proceeded deftly to spread open her chest, cut out her heart, and place it, still beating weakly, into a sterile cryogenic package ... and then into a small Thermos ice chest. He then calmly phoned for an ambulance to bring his mother to the hospital. As he double-locked his room, picked up the ice chest, and turned to make the necessary preparations in Operating Room 4, Shel, with a sly smile, realized that he truly had stolen Amanda’s heart.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Soul Proprietor

Things hadn’t been going right for Jim for quite some time. Business arrangements that seemed like they were done-deals inexplicably fell apart. Friends took umbrage at some random comment and turned to ice. His wife and his children hated him and treated him like he had a contagious disease. James Caterwaller felt like he was living under some kind of thunder cloud ... like the character, Joe Bfstplk, in the old L’il Abner comic strip. He couldn’t remember the last time he had won at poker or at the casino. Every time he had a decent-looking car, it would be totaled. His twenty-one-year streak of bad luck was beginning to grind Jim down. When he was much younger he had always been lucky. Women would swoon into his arms at the dumbest comment. He was regularly winning raffles and games of chance ... a Camaro, a trip to the Bahamas, a Harley Davidson, a bag of gold coins, four cash prizes ranging from $100 to $1000, six turkeys (five Toms and a capon), and a set of dishes. He was often accused by his fraternity brothers of having a horseshoe up his ass. His moniker among the Greek brothers was Lucky Jim.

Why this miasma hung around him now was the subject of many a sleepless night for Jim. Had he broken three mirrors? Not that he could recall. Well, maybe one ... a long time ago. Was he being punished for all the hearts and hymens he had broken? Probably not ... for most of these women also had designs of their own. Had he offended some lesser god to the degree that he was being hounded into his crypt? He couldn’t remember anything specific ... perhaps it was his youthful digging in an old Indian burial mound? Nah, that was well before he had had his run of good fortune. This bad luck thing was a splinter in Jim’s psyche.

As a result of these misfortunes, Jim, not normally an irrational fellow, had acquired over the years a staggering number of obsessive superstitions. He would never have the salt passed to him without it being set down on the table. He would never enter and exit a house without sitting down. He never walked under ladders. He would never let a cat walk across his path without spitting three times. He would waste hours watching digital clocks till they clicked up combinations of his lucky numbers (3, 7 and 9). He would be sure that ever wad of paper that missed the waste basket was a curse on his day. He never opened an umbrella in the house or put a hat on a bed. He never spoke ill of the dead. He knew that those years whose digits added up to a number ending in six were doomed.

Then one day a revelation occurred to Jim. An old drinking buddy from his fraternity was listed in the alumni magazine as having died in a skiing accident in Colorado. This name, Morton Melvane, started the wheels spinning in Jim’s brain. What was it about Morton Melvane that was special ... other than he was a nice guy and could play the piano like Andre Previn? Aha! Jim had bought Morton’s soul (for five dollars) one drunken night at the frat house many years ago. This remembrance now triggered a flood of other such recollections. Jim now remembered that he had purchased many different souls in his salad days. He was wont to do this as a devilish prank during drunken parties. He would announce to a group of revelers that he was buying souls for whatever people wanted. Then, if he had the requested funds in pocket, he would draw up a contract on a scrap piece of paper:

 “I, ____________________ , sell my eternal soul to James Caterwaller for the sum of $________ .
Signed _________________________”.

Jim would then get the person to sign this document and give them their requested pelf. This amounted to anywhere from a penny (for those wishing to prove their atheism) to fifty dollars (for the less sure, but more hard up). One late night at a poker game, he even bought a fraternity brother’s soul for twenty dollars, in lieu of his marker.

Could this amassing of people’s souls be what was causing Jim’s ill-starred streak? Particularly, if these people were dying? First, Jim had to reconstruct all the names on all those contracts. In fact, where in the world were all those contracts? Jim had saved them in an old cigar box which, as he recalled, had gotten pretty stuffed. It was held shut by the original brad when the box was full of stogies. Jim went through the entire house and couldn’t turn it up. He seemed to remember he had kept it in the old antique desk, but it was no longer there. His wife said she hadn’t thrown it out ... so where was it? Then, as life happens, a family emergency arose (Jim’s daughter was cut when she ran into a plate glass door) and his quest for the cigar box was postponed until Jim once again noted the passing of another one of his contract signers. It seemed, over the next nineteen years, that the weight of the souls he had purchased in his youth were beginning to bend his back to age and infirmity.

If you purchased someone’s soul, were you then responsible for it after the contractee had died? This was a frightening thought for Jim. Where these people roaming the world looking for their souls just as Jim had repeatedly rummaged through his house scouring for their mortal contracts? Were these dispossessed dopplegangers playing tricks on Jim’s private life and fortunes until he somehow released them from their own eternal damnation? Jim would periodically come back to these same thoughts, late at night, when his life was going particularly bad or when another of those accursed names appeared in the alumni magazine. This old parlor game that Jim had used to enhance his mien and mesmerize women was turning into his own personal Hell. He had to find these soul contracts and somehow release himself from their onus!

But the time finally came, when they were packing up to move out of their lovely old Victorian house and into a modest retirement facility, that Jim’s wife let out a whoop! She had found the old cigar box at the bottom of a trunk containing their children’s saved toys and books. With trembling fingers, Jim went through the now-yellowed slips of paper. There was Morton’s soul! There was Jerry, the poker player’s soul! Hadn’t he died in Viet Nam? There was Lucy Starkey’s soul! Wasn’t she Ron Bosset’s girlfriend back in college? I wonder if they ever got married? I wonder if she is still alive? All together there were thirty-five souls which had been purchased for a total of $634.67. Jim went to his computer and figured that, had this amount been invested with some conservative mutual fund forty years ago, it would have grown to about $150,000 today ... enough to have paid off the mortgage on their old house ... and thus not requiring their current move. But it was too late now. The contract had been signed and they had to be out of their only real home by Thursday.

With a sigh ... and then a longer sigh, Jim took the cigar box full of spirit covenants to the hearth in which was burning their very last fire ... a flame which had defined their hospitality over the last seventeen years ... and threw the slips of paper, box and all, into the conflagration. They burned with uncommon haste and heat. And Jim thought he could hear Handel’s Hallelujah chorus echoing faintly in the crackling of the flames. All was reduced to ashes in very short order and Jim felt as though a burden had been lifted from his shoulders. His step was lighter. His wife and children were warmer. And on the very next Friday, Jim hit the state lottery ... for $150,000.

© Copyright, George W. Potts