The Neighs Have It

 

Photographer Unknown, 

from the personal collection of Roberta A. Robertson

The recording of the bugle played over the loudspeaker and my eyes flew open. It was morning, I rolled over and looked at my watch. Saturday morning. The summer was almost over, finally!

But first it was breakfast. I was alone again, just me and 40 other girls who had perfected the art of pretending I wasn’t there. And just like every other morning, I watched my eggs get cold while I waited for the morning prayer. This had been confusing at first, my parents were the type of Christians that went to the Christmas Eve Candlelight Service every year, and some years, when they were feeling especially pious, the Easter Sunrise Ceremony too. Still, I got used to the before meal prayers, the Christian songs around the campfire, the bible study, and the Sundays spent in church. I got used to being at summer camp with boys too. Every other camp I had gone to was girls only, but this one, well, it wasn’t as exciting as it seemed, the boys were in a different dorm, sat at a different table for meals, and took part in different camp sports and activities.

Well, the boys and girls were separated for almost all the activities. The only one we co-mingled in was horseback riding. It was the camp’s specialty, and the reason why I had gone here after aging out of my last horseback riding summer camp. Only, the horseback riding might as well have been segregated, because all the boys were automatically placed in the advanced class, and all the girls were automatically placed in the beginning class. So even though I had been taking horseback riding lessons since I was eight, I was stuck walking in slow circles on lazy pony that couldn’t even be bothered to flick the flies off his own haunches with his wispy tail.

Even though my roommate told me to stop being such a big crybaby and chose a different activity if I was so unhappy with horseback riding, I sucked it up, at least I got to be around horses. Now, though, it was almost over. First the camp horse show, and then my parents would take me home. I was warming up my horse in the ring, waiting for the advanced class to finish and the beginning class to begin, when a man in a bolero and cowboy hat ambled over to the gate and motioned for me.

“Young lady, what are you still doing in the warmup ring? Your class is about to start.”

“Oh no, I’m in the beginning class,” I stuttered.

“To hell you are, come with me.”

The look on the riding program leader’s face when I walked into the ring was only bested by the look on his face when I won the blue ribbon because the judges he brought in for the show didn’t get the memo that girls cannot ride better than the boys, actually made the whole crappy summer worthwhile. Okay, not really.

If It Quacks Like A Duck

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

 

There was a commotion in the far corner of our office suite. Whispers, steadily building in excitement, drifted through the rows of cubicles. Little snatches of conversation wafted across my desk, “I can’t believe they did this,” and “we have to do something”, and, “there hasn’t been water in there for months”. Just as I was about to get up and see what was going on the entire data entry team, half of member services, one of the accountants, and the CEOs EA rushed passed me with umbrellas, a mop, a broom, and several trashcans. I got up and followed the business casual mob as they hustled out the front door and made a beeline for the little park area that separated our office building from the one next to it. They were all crowded around what used to be a rather large, pond like fountain, but had been just an empty, fake rock lined hole in the grass since the drought of 2018.

The group was standing there, excitedly pointing at the hole while waving their chosen implements around. Kathy from accounting was lurking around the back of the group, trying to keep her heels from sinking into the wet grass, as I walked up to her and asked her what was going on. That was a mistake, Kathy was great with numbers, but words tended to compound exponentially when she was speaking..

“Oh, Roberta” she said, surprised to see me there, “well, you see, this morning Data Entry had their bi-weekly huddle, only Shari was running late, because of the rain. You see she doesn’t like to drive in the rain, so she gets her husband to drive her in, but her husband… oh wait, I’m getting off track, anyway, so by the time Shari got here everyone was already in the meeting . She went to her desk to drop off her umbrella and rain coat before going into the meeting, then she just happened to look up, and that’s when she saw them.”

“Saw what?” I asked, but Kathy didn’t get a chance to answer, because that is when I saw them, “OHMYGOSHBABYDUCKS!” I exclaimed.

“Yes, they're trapped in the pond, without water they have no way to get back out.” She replied as she shifted her feet to unstick herself from the grass again.

“Okay team, lets do this” the CEO’s EA exclaimed as my co-workers poured into the empty pond and began to heard six small, fuzzy little yellow poofs of quacky cuteness. Armed with our makeshift herding implements, one by one, we scooped up each duck in a trashcan and deposit them on the bank, close to their wary, worried mama. Finally, after about 20 minutes, we finished entertaining everyone who’s offices looked out on the park, and mama duck was hustling her ducklings to a nearby bush, we congratulated each other for a job well done and returned back to our desks. It was by far the best teambuilding exercise I’ve every participated in.

Third Times the Charm

 

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

He stared out of the bug splattered windshield of his Shelby GT350 at the whitecaps as they formed on the Pacific Ocean just over the edge of the cliff. As much as he wanted to blame his assistant, he knew it was his own damn fault. If he didn’t want to end up stranded on a desolate highway perched on the sheer edge of the continent, then he shouldn’t have been driving a 56-year-old car. He looked down at his cell phone one last time, yup, still no bars, and with a sigh he extracted himself from the car and started walking down the shoulder of the road towards the little cluster of buildings he had passed five miles back.

It started the moment he walked in the door; he could feel all eyes upon him. He knew what they were thinking, he knew, despite his sunglasses and his hat, that they recognized him. He knew it was only a matter of time, and there was nothing he could do about it.

It was quiet in the store, despite the seven or so people that had stopped their shopping to stare at him. He ignored them and turned his attention to the slack jawed clerk standing behind the counter.

“Excuse me, it seems my car has broken down a few miles up the road and I cannot get a signal on my cell, do you have a phone I may borrow?”

He braced himself for the words he was sure he was about to hear, but instead the clerk grunted and pulled a phone out from under the counter. He took the phone from the clerk’s hands and frowned down at the keypad. “Fuck,” he muttered under his breath, “what was the number?”

The first one he dialed ended in a message “the number you dialed is incorrect, or is no longer in service.” He hung up and tried again. The second number he dialed ended at an answering machine for a woman who’s name he didn’t recognize. “Shit,” He whispered as he punched in the numbers again. This time a familiar voice was on the other end.

“Dave, finally!” he exclaimed.

“Hey,” a voice hollered from the back of the store. He turned and made eye contact with the person who was so rudely interrupting his phone call, before he realized the mistake he had made. The yokel smiled, “sounds like third time’s the charm” he exclaimed, clearly pleased with himself.

“Oh,” came the voice of the clerk behind him, “you’re that guy!”

“What guy?” one of the other customers asked.

“The ‘third times the charm’ guy,” her shopping companion replied.

“Come on’” pipped up the yokel, “say it! Say ‘Third times the charm”!”

“Where are you?” came Dave’s voice through the headset.

“I don’t know, some tiny town in the middle of nowhere on Highway 1.”

“Wow, how about that, even in the middle of nowhere they’ve heard of your tv show.”

“It would seem so,” he sighed.

It's The Cheesiest

 

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

It was supposed to be a three-hour tour. Bryson had gone with his parents on a sightseeing flight over the Grand Canyon. Sure, the plane was small, but Bryson wasn’t scared, or at least he thought if he pretended like he wasn’t scared, then he wouldn’t be. His parents didn’t seem concerned though, so he climbed aboard and buckled his seatbelt. Once the plane was in the air he started to relax, plus the views below were amazing and helped distract him from the loud whirring noise of the propellers.  He had just spotted the rim of the Grand Canyon looming in the distance when he realized the loud whirring noise had stopped. He looked wildly around the cabin until he made eye contact with his mother, and then the plane dropped out of the sky.

Bryson woke up still strapped in his seat, only the rest of the airplane was gone. Instead he was surrounded by red desert and scrubby hills. He unlatched his seatbelt and stood on shaky legs. He stumbled forward a few steps, then called out for his mom, his dad, anyone, but the only reply was from a hawk soaring overhead.

He had been stumbling through the desert for what felt like hours in the hot afternoon sun when he finally found a cave who's shade beckoned him to rest until nightfall. When he woke up the sky outside had darkened, and an impossible blanket of stars created a canopy overhead. He rubbed the sleep out of his eyes and decided he had better get moving. He needed to find a town soon, he’d never been so hungry and thirsty in his life. Through the darkness he walked, towards the ever-retreating horizon. He tried to count the stars to distract himself from his growling stomach.

The sky was just starting to turn pink when he found another cave. Or at least he hoped it was another cave and he had not been walking in circles all night. He could already feel the heat of the day begin to smother the land and thought he had better hide out in the shade of the cave again. As he approached the entrance, he swore he heard a tinkling noise, like water trickling over rocks. Could it be? He hurried into the cave just as dawn broke, sending a beam of light into it’s black mouth, and he was astounded by what he saw. A pool of water sparkled crystal clear and cool, and next to it? A cooler filled with Cheetos and Twinkies. He descended on the cooler, and just as he was about to rip into a bag of chips, he heard his name being called.

“BRYSON!”

He woke with a start and was surprised to see the four walls of his bedroom instead of a desert cave. Then his door flew open and his mother burst in.

“Bryson, what are you doing in here, it smells like a Grateful Dead concert!”

Shit, he thought, busted.

Whatever Floats Your Boat

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

The first thing I noticed when I woke up was that I couldn’t breathe. Okay, that’s an exaggeration, I could breath, but the air was thick, like I was in a very small room filled with far too many people who were all talking and exhaling their hot breath and had probably just came from the gym, oh, and also really needed to brush their teeth.

The second thing I noticed was I couldn’t see. I was pretty sure my eyes were open, but I blinked a couple of times to to check. That’s when a voice suddenly cut through the darkness.

“Relax,” it said, “your eyes will adjust.”

I tried to sit up, but a gentle brush of a hand across my forehead encouraged me to lie back down. “Where am I?” I whispered.

“You’ll find out soon enough” the voice replied, “but for now go back to sleep, you still need more rest.”

I was about to reply that I felt fine, but the words never came out.

I woke up again with a start. I didn’t know how much time had passed, but I was surprised to see the room was now bright, too bright. I rubbed my eyes with the back of my hands and slowly the room came into focus. I was sitting on top of a table, but there was nothing else in the room except the curved wooden boards of the walls and a small round porthole like window. Whoever had been talking to me earlier was no longer there. Carefully I swung my legs around but just before I jumped down a door I hadn’t noticed swung open and a rather unkempt woman appeared.

“Careful,” she scolded as she reached out and grabbed my shoulder, “make sure you have your balance before you step down.”

“What the hell is this, why am I…” but my sentence was cut short when the room suddenly shuddered and tiled at an odd angle, nearly sending me crashing to the floor. “Wait, are we on a boat? Did you kidnap me and put me on a boat?”

“Well...”

“No, I’ve heard about this, you ship captains, you drug people’s drinks, and then when they pass out you load them on a boat and force them to work for you!”

“It’s not exactly like that”

“What do you mean its not exactly like that?”

“Go, get up, look out the window, just be careful, walking is going to be a bit trickier than you are used to.”

I slid off the table, and leaning against the wall I made my way to the window, but when I looked out, instead of the endless blue horizon I was expecting, I saw blackness, and stars. I turned and looked at the woman, but before I could say anything she spoke.

“While this is a ship, as you can see, we are not at sea.”

“We’re, in space?” I stuttered.

“Yes, now sit, there is much to discuss.”

 

Music to my Ears

 

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

When Shelly thought about it, she realized the real mistake was agreeing to keep the secret in the first place. That is where it all started, with that stupid secret. Ever since she heard it, that was all she could think of. If anyone else knew… but they would still find out, there was no way they wouldn’t find out, unless…

Shelly walked into the living room, saw Maddy, and immediately turned and walked out. Shelly had been avoiding everyone all day, she was afraid of being cornered, of being questioned. How much did they know? It was too horrible to contemplate, she ran back up the stairs to her room, where she was safe.

She hid in her room the rest of the day, trying to keep herself busy, but she couldn’t avoid family dinner. She picked at her vegetable beef soup, not because she was nervous, more because she didn’t really like vegetable beef soup. The fresh baked bread was good though, and she downed three slices, dripping with butter.  This was why vegetable beef soup was her favorite dinner, even though she hated vegetable beef soup. She was just savoring her last slice of bread, when she suddenly remembered, the secret. She put the last bite of bread down on her plate. She suddenly didn’t feel very hungry anymore.

It was then Shelly noticed her dad had left the table, she was about to ask her mom where he had gone when he reappeared, holding a pink cake box. I large lump formed in Shelly’s throat, and no matter how hard she swallowed, it would not go away. Then her dad started to sing.

“Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you,” he bellowed, taking one step with each line, like he was walking down the aisle at a wedding ceremony, “happy birthday dear Maddy, happy birthday to you.”

He finished the song and set the box on the table. “Even though your birthday was yesterday, I think even leftover cake deserves a song,” he said with a big dad grin.

He was about to open the lid when Shelly cried out “wait, I have a secret!” Everyone turned to look at her. “Well, it’s not really my secret,” she stuttered, suddenly shy, “its Eddy’s secret, he made me promise I wouldn’t tell!”

“Eddy’s secret?” Shelly’s mom was looking at her with one eyebrow arched.

At that moment Eddy walked into the room, and a shower of pink vomit erupted into a puddle on the floor.

“Oh no, my cake!” Maddy cried out, as she stood from her chair and flung open the pink box to reveal nothing more than a few stale crumbs and some sad greasy streaky remnants of pink frosting.

“I’m sorry, Eddy ate it this morning and made me promise I wouldn’t tell!” Shelly screamed, as she ran back up the stairs to her bedroom, with the dog following closely behind.

 

A Bird in the Hand

 

Photo credit: Robsalot (that's me!)

The worst thing about mornings was the fact they were so darn early, and she was so not a morning person. The good thing about not being a morning person is it was easy to trick herself into getting up and doing things, as long as she set the alarm early enough, the grumpy part of her wouldn’t be awake yet to protest.

The sun was just rising at her back as her feet pounded the gravel to the rhythm of her breath. She didn’t like to admit it, but she loved these morning runs. It was how she meditated on the day to come.

There weren’t many of the regulars out on the trail this morning, probably because of the rain that passed through the night before, but it was kind of nice to have the path all to herself. Just her thoughts swirling in the lapping waters of the Bay Shore as she was serenaded with the morning calls of the birds. Actually, there seemed to be quite a lot of birds. As she rounded the bend in the path, she discovered why. Ahead of her was a man, walking down the trail with a swarm of birds fluttering about him. She contemplated the strange scene, all of those birds, swooping down on the man, and then she saw why. He removed his hand from his pocket, and stretched it out in front of himself, a half dozen birds swooped down and accepted the seed from the palm of his hand. She smiled at the scene as she jogged by.

She saw the man a few times that winter, always the morning after the rain, always on a lonely stretch of trail, but as spring set in and the sun started rising earlier, the trail became more crowded, and soon she forgot about the bird man. That was until late summer. She had been working on her endurance, running a bit further down the trail each morning,  until one morning she turned a corner and found a bench overlooking the bay, and sat down to take a rest.  After a few minutes, she stood to leave just as a woman approached her and asked if she could sit.

“Of course,” I said, “I was actually just leaving.”

But as a rose she noticed a plaque on the bench “For Jim, the bird man of San Leandro.”

“Oh no,” she sucked in her breath.

“Dearie, did you know my husband?” The older lady said, noticing the expression on her face as she looked at the plaque.

“No, not really, I just saw him a few times, out here feeding the birds,” she stuttered, “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you dear, but it has been ten years now, still I like to come out here and sit with him.”

“Sorry, ten years? Well that couldn’t have been him then, the man I saw was out here a few months ago.”

“Tall, white hair, green jacket and a purple baseball cap?”

“Yes, that’s the man I saw.”

“How lovely, it was him! It’s been a long time since I met someone who has seen his ghost!”

“Oh,” she said, stunned, “well, I should probably go.” And she turned and jogged back down the path toward home.

The worst thing about mornings was the fact they were so darn early, and she was so not a morning person. The good thing about not being a morning person is it was easy to trick herself into getting up and doing things, as long as she set the alarm early enough, the grumpy part of her wouldn’t be awake yet to protest.

The sun was just rising at her back as her feet pounded the gravel to the rhythm of her breath. She didn’t like to admit it, but she loved these morning runs. It was how she meditated on the day to come.

There weren’t many of the regulars out on the trail this morning, probably because of the rain that passed through the night before, but it was kind of nice to have the path all to herself. Just her thoughts swirling in the lapping waters of the Bay Shore as she was serenaded with the morning calls of the birds. Actually, there seemed to be quite a lot of birds. As she rounded the bend in the path, she discovered why. Ahead of her was a man, walking down the trail with a swarm of birds fluttering about him. She contemplated the strange scene, all of those birds, swooping down on the man, and then she saw why. He removed his hand from his pocket, and stretched it out in front of himself, a half dozen birds swooped down and accepted the seed from the palm of his hand. She smiled at the scene as she jogged by.

She saw the man a few times that winter, always the morning after the rain, always on a lonely stretch of trail, but as spring set in and the sun started rising earlier, the trail became more crowded, and soon she forgot about the bird man. That was until late summer. She had been working on her endurance, running a bit further down the trail each morning,  until one morning she turned a corner and found a bench overlooking the bay, and sat down to take a rest.  After a few minutes, she stood to leave just as a woman approached her and asked if she could sit.

“Of course,” I said, “I was actually just leaving.”

But as a rose she noticed a plaque on the bench “For Jim, the bird man of San Leandro.”

“Oh no,” she sucked in her breath.

“Dearie, did you know my husband?” The older lady said, noticing the expression on her face as she looked at the plaque.

“No, not really, I just saw him a few times, out here feeding the birds,” she stuttered, “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you dear, but it has been ten years now, still I like to come out here and sit with him.”

“Sorry, ten years? Well that couldn’t have been him then, the man I saw was out here a few months ago.”

“Tall, white hair, green jacket and a purple baseball cap?”

“Yes, that’s the man I saw.”

“How lovely, it was him! It’s been a long time since I met someone who has seen his ghost!”

“Oh,” she said, stunned, “well, I should probably go.” And she turned and jogged back down the path toward home.