Category: A Very Short Story

From the Short Story Vault

Father Knows Best

Continuing on from yesterday’s post, another excerpt from my first crack at writing a novel: I Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven. You can support my effort in purchasing a copy. Click on the link above and / or check out my other two attempts at being an author. Every little bit helps this poor Canadian author.

In today’s vernacular, what had just occurred was all shock
and awe for the rest of us. We were agape, our mouths wide
open, our eyes and minds in disbelief at what we had just seen,
witnessed, and processed. “Holy shit,” these words being
mouthed in silent unison. This was going to be really different
from elementary school and all that the nuns could ever muster.

This was not corporal punishment but major pain. Now I understand
the reasoning and the escalation of pain from the Sacrament
of Confirmation through our elementary days to high
school. Sister Mary Bernice’s punishment would pale in comparison
to Father Stack’s ingenuity and that of the other priests and
priests in waiting here. Nevertheless, it was considered a natural
progression of discipline in the overall Catholic scheme of things
and a transition from the rudimentary slap on the face by the
priest during the Sacrament of Confirmation, to the more classic
Catholic penance of major punishment and pain for the slightest
transgression. Self-sacrifice, flagellation, for better or for
worse. Whoa!

Thank God again for the geniuses at Hilroy. They produced a
school classic in the “Hilroy Scribbler.” These innocuous-
looking writing books were an essential part of any student’s
toolbox at St Basil’s Catholic private high school for boys. They
had an important role to play in the classrooms of St Basil
Catholic private high school for boys and the survival of its
students’ backsides. Flexible and malleable, these scribblers were
more than just a tool of record. No, they provided the perfect foil
against Father Stack’s unique method of class management and
control. Not knowing who or what might set Father Stack off
during any given class or who might find themselves at the
receiving end of his methodology of good order and discipline, it
was absolutely prudent that one protected oneself appropriately.
Consequently, prior to entering his classroom and domain, it was
necessary to stuff one or two of those scribblers down the rear of
one’s pants. Personally I preferred just one as two or more scribblers
were difficult to control. They would separate, move
around, or slide down one side or the other, especially after
sitting down on them during his discourse. Any one of us could
be caught and snared into his devilish trap so it was absolutely
essential that these binders worked but in a stealthy kind of way
as we did not want Father Stack to have any inkling that his
punishment was being met with some resistance and was therefore
ineffective. The nice thing about these Hilroy scribblers is
that they could conform to the contours of one’s backside. Even
bending over, and we did test this out, they were difficult to
detect. The tails of our blazers overlapped the upper portion of
our backsides to such an extent that, on closer inspection, the
outline of the hard spine of the binder could not be seen. It was
even better if one’s trousers were baggy in the crotch area.

This stroke of adolescent ingenuity and genius only worked
once, I’m afraid. Thinking back, it was insane for us to believe
we could outsmart these priests and their corporal ways. They
had seen it all before and no amount of creative effort on our part
could outsmart them. When they did discover our inspired inventiveness
and resourcefulness, the punishment only got worse. At
least Father Stack had a sense of humour about the whole thing:
smirking and chuckling as he was giving it out whenever we
were found out. Yet after awhile, after few months of suffering, it
became evident that Father Stack’s bite was worse than his bark.
We began to respect him, enjoy his lectures, and admire his way
of expressing himself. While we were constantly trying to
outsmart him in a juvenile sort of way by playing with his form
of corporal punishment, he never belittled us or made us feel
insignificant. Funny too, as with the feeling of being recognized
by an adult by the use of your first name, it felt really great when
Father Stack would dispatch one of us to the local corner smoke
shop during class to pick him up a carton of smokes. Keep the
change, he would often say. You had the sense that you were
trusted and respected by him. Over the course of the school year,
each and every one of us made that trek across the street to the
smoke shop to get him that carton of Camels. Good thing he was
a chain smoker.

There always existed a bit of cat and mouse play in Father
Stack’s class. We would attempt to mitigate our circumstances by
trying to undermine the tool of his trade. More than once we
addressed that bookcase by placing a multitude of objects on the
empty shelf. To no avail. He would just go over to the bookcase
and with a broad sweep of his arm scatter everything that was on
that shelf over a wide expanse of the classroom floor, then carry
on. The poor sod who was the victim of the day would then have
to clean up the mess after he received his punishment. We even
tried to hide the shelf itself. He was nonplussed about that
because, to our consternation, he would somehow produce an
exact replica of the delinquent shelf. Our most daring bit of espi-
onage was to nail the shelf into its cradle, doing so before class
and before the great inquisitor arrived. This worked to some
degree but was again thwarted. Quite ominously as it turned out.
For when Father Stack went over to grab the shelf in his
customary fashion, the shelf would not budge. But the resulting
flash of his kinetic energy caused the entire bookcase to come
crashing down, missing him by a hair’s breadth. The cacophony
of the resulting noise attracted some of the other priests in the
adjacent classrooms to come running. He just waved them off.
More importantly and more ominously for him, the action and
momentum of his arms was suddenly squelched. The causal effect
on Father Stack was equally momentous as the energy released
was oriented toward him and his entire body mass. This was unexpected
and resulted in an unflattering predicament as he found
himself off balance, falling, and landing squarely on his ass. We
were all shocked, fit to be tied, and laughed ourselves silly.
Fortunately Father Stack was not hurt except for a toss of
wounded pride. To his credit and our growing admiration for
him, he got up, brushed himself off, and continued the lecture
without missing a beat. The poor lad who was about to be the
focus of this latest cause and effect sauntered slowly and
cautiously back to his seat for he was still unsure of the consequences
to occur to him as a result of this latest student transgression.
Nothing. The next day the bookcase was back in its normal
state, the middle shelf intact, empty as always. We did have a
short respite but, in time, we were, and he was, back to our
normal selves and our normal state of affairs. We did detect that
there seemed to be a hint of mutual respect in the air in his
manner of teaching because the punishment never seemed to be
as harsh as it was at the start of the year. The whacks were bit
more subdued. Father Stack always seemed to chuckle as he was
giving it out as if to say to all of us:

“Hey, you may have won that battle, good on you, but you
will never win this war.”

Over time Father Stack met a woman, fell in love, and even
got married. He was then excommunicated.

Thought for the day:

If things need to be so diverse, why is diversity breaking up my country.

Leave well enough alone.

More of the blues: Moody Blues

SJ…Out

 

Righteousness In The Classroom

A little bit more from my days at a Catholic High School.

Read all about it in my book: “I Thought I’d Died and Gone to Heaven” Click on the link at the top of the page for more details:

Father Stack was our Religion teacher. He was a tall man,
broad shouldered, strong and tough with big calloused hands and
a roughhewn face with roughhewn features. He always seemed
to need a shave. He had dark black wavy hair, cropped very short
on the sides, which appeared to be as thick as a steel wool pad.
He had that Irish Catholic bipolar temperament of being pious on
the one hand while being a religious rogue on the other. You
knew full well that he wasn’t one to mess with. His class was the
last class of the day.

Father Stack’s classroom was as sparse as the subject itself
except for his desk, his chair, our desks, and our benches.
Nothing on the walls except for the time clock, which was situated
high up on the wall above the door. This round, black rimmed
device with its white interface, interlaced with black
numbers and black hour, minute, and second hands was standard
issue and could be found in all of the classrooms, in the hallways,
the cafeteria, gymnasium, everywhere. I am sure the same
standard time piece could also be found at St Mary’s. It was
Catholic standard time and issue and, much like the STRAP,
these clocks were probably produced in the diocese somewhere.
And its impact on us was entirely psychological. Psychological
torture for that clock was strategically placed in such a way that
you could never take your eyes off of it. There it was, front and
centre, all of the time, in your face with its hands ticking away
ever so slowly in its pragmatic, precise manner: tick, tock, tick,
tock, tick.

Will this class ever end? Father Stack sensed this, but he
didn’t have to look at the clock for it was behind him. I often
wondered what he was thinking as he looked at all of us from his
perspective. We were watching him, listening to him, and trying
without success not to shift our glance up to the clock then back
to him again, hypnotically, trance-like, and straying so far away
from his center of attention as to render the opinion that this class
was really, really boring and it was really, really difficult to stay
awake. This was indeed torture.

There was also a large, heavy wooden bookcase situated at
one end of the classroom. This bookcase was unique in that all of
its shelves were chock full of books, magazines, papers, and the
like except for one shelf, the middle of five, which was as barren
and as empty as the warmth and cuddliness of Sister Mary
Bernice’s charm. It wasn’t long before we were apprised of the
true nature of this bare-faced entity. Funny, but not so funny, was
that the clock was also inextricably linked to the bookcase.
That effin’ clock. Invariably, that clock and the monotonous
tone of Father Stack’s lectures would cause many of us to fall
asleep or nod off. That was Father Stack’s cue for action as we
soon found out.

“(Insert last name here),” he would yell. “Front and center,”
he barked again like the Holy Roller that he was. Why he picked
that individual is lost on me for there were many of us nodding
off at the same time. Our eyes becoming as heavy as lead. The
head rocking forward then back, then forward, forward, down,
down then back up again in a jerky fashion. The eyelids so
heavy, like being hypnotized, followed by that whiplash motion
of awake-fullness, followed by a deep breath of consciousness,
only to begin the torturous routine and rhythm again. Man,
oh man!

Startled, the young boy, whoever he was, not me, would limp
up to the front of the class, somewhat forlorn, standing there like
a wet noodle, downtrodden and pathetic in front of Father Stack’s
desk. His whole body seemed to shake in nervous trepidation.
Father Stack would then slowly rise up from his chair, then take
the young lad aside but away from the desk and out of reach
from the front row of students. He would then tell him, no, order
him, not to move an inch.

Walking over to the wooden bookcase, Father Stack latched
onto the empty middle shelf and with his two hands pulled the
shelf up and out and away from the bookcase itself in one fell
swooping motion. Returning to the scene of the crime with said
shelf in tow, he would then order the lad to bend over but to look
straight ahead, not down.

The shelf itself measured about one foot in width, two and a
half feet in length, and approximately one inch in thickness. And
like everything else in the nun’s or priest’s arsenal, it was proportionately
attuned to the task at hand for they had years and years
of experience and lessons learned over centuries of practice.
After all, the Catholic faith, unlike other religious orders, had the
Inquisition to fall back on. And unlike a straight-edged stick or a
shortened wooden pole, the length and breadth and thickness of
Father Stack’s shelf required a bit more dexterity and skill from
the handler when meting out punishment of this order of
magnitude.

Father Stack stood athwartship, his legs apart, beside the lad,
well balanced and straight, grabbing on to both sides of the shelf
itself. Like a golfer lining up a shot, he took a couple of short
arched practice swings, being ever so careful as to not actually
strike the target. Stopping just shy of the target itself, millimeters
I would guess, took a great deal of discipline on his part. You
could tell that he was a real pro at this sort of thing. Satisfied that
he had the right angle of attack, Father Stack raised that wooden
shelf about shoulder high then came down hard in a cossacked
whirl-winded arc, robes flaring wildly, meeting his target ass on
and at a perfect right-angled trajectory to the backside of the poor
student. Whack! Well it was more like a thud really, of wood to
the cloth-covered ass. Even the tails of the student’s blue blazer
softened and mitigated the full force and pain of the strike to
some degree. The student lunged forward with his head and his
eyes focused straight ahead rather than down at the floor, as
Father Stack instructed. There was no danger that the student
would crash headlong into something or someone unseen given
the momentum unleashed by the shelf upon his pathetic frame.
Yes, Father Stack was a real pro. His follow through was Bobby
Jones–like in its execution. He had thought of everything. We
were witnessing a real lesson here in practical physics. Unfortunately,
this class was religion.

“Sit down.” Father Stack placed the shelf back in its cradle,
clapped his hands a few times, and then carried on with the class,
as if nothing had happened.

“One whack? Is that all?” we all thought, questionably. It was
enough, for it took some time for the lad to fuss up and return to
his desk. He gait was somewhat laboured, bowlegged, and when
he reached his seat he sat down slowly, methodically, and
gingerly. Red-faced, embarrassed, but somehow just a bit cocky
as his punishment was the first of many more to come. I think he
realized that and felt some pride in being the first student to
receive this lashing and to share this corporal experience with the
rest of us after class.

Thought for the day:

Given the “so called” toxic and racist nature of being white, why do Americans  call the White House the White House? Just askin that’s all.

Happy Tuesday

Oops, sorry, It’s Wednesday.

SJ…Out

Whack, Whack And More Whack

More from my halcyon days at a Catholic High School for boys: I Thought I’d Died and Gone to Heaven.”

SEPTEMBER 1964. High School. We had arrived.
St Basil’s High School no longer exists in its current location.
I don’t know why. I haven’t been there for many, many years.
Run by the priests, it was a Catholic private high school for boys
of some note and right adjacent to it, only separated by an elongated
playing field, a football field, was St Mary’s Catholic
private high school for girls. In essence the two schools represented
a real separation of church and dates.

Tuition by today’s standards was laughable, about $150 per
year. But back in the late ’50s and early ’60s that was a lot of
money to come up with year over year. Especially if you were
part of a fine upstanding Catholic family with a large brood of
boys and girls to contend with to populate these schools, as no
legitimate Catholic family would ever think of sending their
offspring to a public—code for Protestant—high school. On top
of that there were the school uniforms, the books and other
miscellaneous religious stuff to pay for. In my own family’s case,
my mom and dad had to come up with about $175 per year per
child—times three at some point in time, totaling $450 per year.
And with Dad making less than about $70 per week before taxes,
well, do the math! I know I couldn’t. It was as painful as it was
sinful.

I didn’t really know or care. I do remember travelling on the
bus with my mom, or in the car with both parents and as we
passed St Basil her telling me, proud as punch, that one fine day I
would be going there. One fine day indeed. I could not wait. That
was how the indoctrination went. To make ends meet we all had
to work part time during the school year and full time all summer
long to come up with the necessary bucks to offset our parent’s
financial woes due to those bloodsucking school tuitions. In all
honesty, however, I didn’t mind. Funny thing that, guilt. It
instilled in me a weird sense of justification for the privilege of
being physically and emotionally abused at a Catholic private
high school for boys.

Father Stallony, baloney; Father Sullen, the melon; Father
Stack, the wrack; Father Rourque, the dork, and on and on it
went: a faculty of priests sprinkled with a few priests in waiting,
and a smattering of lay associates, or civilian teachers, as well.
One lay associate in particular, a Mr Lord, our geography
teacher, had the weirdest of legs. He suffered from a bad case of
bowlegged-ness but in reverse. Turns out that a wicked football
accident literally crippled him with two bad breaks in both of his
legs. Permanently shackled with pins and metal joints and fasteners,
he was a sorry sight to look at, especially from behind, as it
appeared he was always holding back a large dump as he walked
down those hallowed halls of higher learning at St Basil’s
Catholic private high school for boys. We could be cruel.
Initially scared and intimidated by this new environment, it
was not long before I felt comfortable in my own skin and fit
right in. Remembering Mr O’Brian’s words of wisdom and
advice, we did have a lot of laughs. So much so that I went from
A grades to B grades in the course of a year and was falling still
as the months went by during my second year at that school.
Smoking while laying down the one side of the football field
with our backs to our own school pretending to be looking at the
female students of St Mary’s while in reality we were trying to
mask our drags and the exhaled smoke from the prying binocularized
eyes of the priests and brothers equated to a couple of
whacks from Father Dork, er Rourque.

My parents were a tad worried given their financial investment.
I did look rather Catholique in my uniform and tie, and
dirty black oxfords. That was all that really mattered to the
priests and our family. Pay the rent and play the party line.
Looking back on those days and knowing what I know now,
yes, there was a great deal of discipline but it was the wrong kind
of discipline. Instilling a sense of fear through physical abuse as
punishment was not real discipline as far as I was concerned.
Except perhaps in the creative sense of belonging to a brotherhood,
a cause, as me and my mates adapted extremely well, stuck
together, and did everything possible to forestall and undermine
the priests and the brothers of their dastardly ways.

Cool, white satin sheets.

SJ…Out

Trans…I Am

I am, therefore, I am… a Trans…Am

Of course you are my bright little star:

I am free. I am free. I am free at last for….

I was a Trans…Am…living in a Prius body:

See the source image

But now I am free because I have come out of the garage and I am really….

A TRANS…AM

Or a Turbo Charger trapped in a Nissan Leaf. I am….Free at Last:

Or perhaps I am….heaven help me…a Trans Political… just like JP Sears here:

Of course you are…………………..my bright little star.

SJ…Out

A Lot of Laughs

First: Is this the “Mark of the Beast?”

France’s President Macron delivered a 27-minute speech to the nation on television. Macron announced a full-blown authoritarian measure that takes France off the tourist list. He has made vaccinations MANDATORY for caregivers, store clerks, waitresses, and all other workers “in contact with the public” with no exceptions for health or religion. On top of that, he has made it also MANDATORY to have his Gates-inspired health pass to enter all restaurants, cafes, theaters, and cinemas. In other words, without a vaccination, you are not even allowed to go to the store and buy anything.

As if this was not bad enough, Macron also announced a pension reform after the epidemic. This is the real reason for all of this. SOCIALISM is dying and what they are really afraid of is an uprising where like in ancient Rome, the mob storms the palaces and beheads the emperor. Their solution – TOTALITARIANISM and there will be a subtle move to eliminate democratic elections in 2022.

Wow.

Consider this. It is not only the Indigenous people you know.

I remember one evening, a school night, it was about midweek.
I was running late and it was as cold as ice outside. I had
been at my friend’s house and was now on my way home, taking
a shortcut through the park, alone with my thoughts and my
futile attempt to stay warm. There was a cruel frost in the air that
froze one’s breath into that visible plane of CO2 stillness:
opaque, inert, foggy, dull whiteness that seemed to just hang
there in mid-air, motionless, wafting for a second or two, then
disappearing wistfully until followed inexorably by the next
sustained exhaled breath.

I sauntered down to the area of the rink. The usual bandits
were not there. In fact no one was there except a lone figure
holding a fire hose emitting a jet-streamed rush of water over and
on to the ice surface. The natural light of the half moon and its
reflection off of the snow and ice surface made it somewhat
surreal watching this stream of water jet forth from the nozzle
like liquid crystalline, then arc its way up and over some invis-
ible barrier, then down and out it went splattering onto the
surface of the ice, flowing and emanating outward in what
appeared to be rippled waves of smooth liquid velvet sheets
across a frozen yet clear, rejuvenated expanse. Ironically, that
cold blast of water resembled a cauldron of steam, exploding like
an expansion crack when it made contact with the surface and
frigid coldness of the ice.

The caretaker just stood there, like an automaton, as if
watching and admiring the outcome of his work from afar. He
would move the hose from side to side, then up and down a few
times, as if coaxing, then directing, the stream to do its magical
work, somewhat like a maestro conducting a movement. He was
old, about forty I would guess, crusty, with the wrinkled face of
someone who made his living working outdoors. He had a low
forehead from what I could see just shy of his toque. His was a
square face with a set strong jaw and a bulbous crooked nose
masking a dark, brooding inset pair of eyes. From time to time
one could see a slight glint but that only came to light as part of
the draw on his rolled cigarette. The exhaled smoke, combined
with his frozen breath, gave the impression of a magician’s folly
with nature’s illusion of turning water magically into ice.
He saw me, looked down at me, smiled I think, or perhaps
smirked. The cigarette was burning red hot ashes from the corner
of his mouth as both hands were needed to control the pressure
of the water hose.

“What can I do for ya, young lad?” he offered in a lyrical
brogue.

Somewhat embarrassed and off guard I returned: “Just watching,
sir, that’s all. Tomorrow this will be an awesome piece
of ice.”

“Aye, with any luck, if the weather holds.”

Silence.

“So, this must be some neat job you have here, looking after
things at the park?”

“Yes, but this is only part of it. I have three other rinks to
look after besides this one.”

“Wow” was about all I could muster. Then, continuing on:

“When I grow up, I want to have a job like this. So cool.”

He chuckled. “No you don’t, and no it ain’t,” he said rather
emphatically. “I have to do this. You don’t. I have no other
choice. You do. So stay in school.”

“But school sucks. I hate it. The nuns, the priests, the rules,
and the strap.”

He chuckled somewhat.

“It’s not funny.”

“Oh, I know. I know it’s not funny. But thinking back, I got it
good too from those nuns and priests. Real good. But not here.
Over in Ireland, where I come’d from, where I grew’d up—those
priests and nuns were the devil’s own, the devil’s fire brigade.”

“Really,” I thought aloud, “just like here?”

“Sure, sure,” he said. “They’re everywhere. With fire and
brimstone they spoke, with the brimstone and fire they breathed.
And they sure set the standard for all of the physical pain and
grief that a Catholic young lad or lass could harbour, without
being dead, the world over.”

“What school do you go to?” he asked.

“Our Lady of Peace,” I answered.
He looked right down at me and into my eyes, into my very
soul it seemed.

“Is that so,” he said. “Well, I think they had a school for it
over there as well. Our Lady’s School of Perpetual Abuse, I
would think. For they knew how to give it and we got it good,
day and night. Black and blue we was, then black again. The
thing is though we fought back, but in such a way that the bastards never knew they was being conned. We had a lot of
laughs outsmarting them, doing that. That was the key for us to
survive in these schools.”

He chuckled but in remonstrance, remembering perhaps that
it would seem to be a memory hidden or repressed.

“Listen to me, young lad. Adapt, and don’t let them get you
down, or get to you emotionally, in your thoughts, and if you do
it right you will have fond memories of your and your mates’
experiences and a lot of laughs. But I’m sure it isn’t as bad as
when I went to school. That was day and night back then. No rest
for the wicked boys and girls, as they said. We was all orphans.”

He paused, as if to let that last comment sink in. Then he
turned, slightly, to blanket another part of the rink with water.
Silent! I followed him around.

“Orphans? In Ireland? Wow.” It seemed so far away, and too
much to sink in.

“Orphans, yes. I don’t remember my mother or my father.
Just the school, the orphanage, the nuns and priests. But I got out
of it. Ran away and joined the Navy.”

And as if sensing my next question. “I was fourteen.”

“Yup, Royal Navy, the Senior Service, as they say.” He
volunteered, “It was also harsh discipline thar, in the Navy, but I
thrived on it cause I was already used to the abuse… Aaaargh.”
He laughed out loud.

“But in the Navy they had free rein to kill ya if they so
choosed. For being out of line, AWOL, or desertion as they
called it. But again, my mates kept me sane and my wingers safe.
And justice? For the smallest infraction, there was shipboard
justice… before the mast, before the Captain… the Coxswain
would cry out in his loud and booming voice: ‘MARCH THE
GUILTY BASTARD IN!’ As I said, I loved it. Rum was dirt
cheap and the cigs even dirtier cheapier. Clean sheets and three
squared—if you liked kippers and hard tack that is. But
compared to the boarding school, and the Army, I thought I had
died and gone to heaven.”

He paused, while directing the water to another section of the
rink. The was a moment of dead silence except for the crackling
sound that the water made when in contact with the frozen
expanse of the ice. He then continued with his story.

“I came through the war unscathed though. Only once did
providence come to my side.”

“What’s providence?” I interrupted

“Providence is a sort of destiny’s luck,” he continued. “Like
something that happens to you in the present that makes no sense
at all except that it has an enormous impact on something in the
future.”

He looked at me whimsically, quizzically, probably knowing
full well that I didn’t have a clue of what he was getting at.

“Let me explain it this way. I was transferred to an oiler—
that’s a ship that refuels other ships at sea, like a floating,
moving gas station on water—and just before boarding that ship
to leave port and to go out to our war station at sea, I was called
back. Some sort of emergency at home. How could that be, I
thought? I had no home! So the ship sailed without me and
when I arrived back in the town where I had lived at the
boarding school, it turned out that I did indeed have a younger
sister who was quite sick, had been given last rights, and had
asked for me. Turns out she, like me, had also been given up and
had been sent to another boarding school, but in the next village.
Damnation, I thought. I had a sister. As it turned out, her school
was a front for the so-called Magdalene Laundry Houses—or
asylum. You wouldn’t know about those places, but there was
nothing asylum about them I can tell you that. They was an
affront for sure, those sweathouses. An affront to humanity,
human kindness, compassion, empathy, everything civil and
just. The Irish nun’s laundry school from hell. And that’s all I’ll
say about that.”

He paused briefly, then continued.

“But, as unluckily as it was for her that this was, it was also
luckily for me because that oiler took a hit and being so full of
oil went up like a some heavenly torch, burnt the sky crimson, in
spectacular fashion it was with shades of reds and oranges and
yellows, before being doused to eternity’s sleep as she slipped,
stern first, into the sea, breaking up below the waves to the
bottom below but with one last glorious belch of sea salt from
old Neptune himself, or so they told me after. No one survived.”
He let that sink in for the moment.

Then continued, “I survived the war though death really hit home. I cried and I cried and I cried. I don’t know why I cried so hard because I didn’t
really know anyone on that ship, thank God for that. And I didn’t
know my own sister either yet I cried so hard for her.” He made
the sign of the cross with a free hand.

“What happened to your sister?” I asked, politely.

“Died… a lung disease. But she really died from one of life’s
broken hearts, and broken promises. I never knew her but I think
I loved her. Funny that. Not knowing somebody but still loving
them, potentially I guess, unconditionally perhaps, for I never
knew, I never knew her. The ties that bind, I think. You understand
me, boy?”

“I think so,” I said. I didn’t.

“Good, ’cause I’m not sure if I do… understand myself or
my life, that is.”

Silence again. Much longer this time as the time was needed
to take in this account of his.

“You should be getting home,” he said as he turned again to
strike out at another area of the rink.

“Stay in school, and don’t let them penguins get to you. By
the by, what’s your name?”

“John,” I answered, awkwardly.

“Well, John. I am Desmond O’Brian. Des for short, but not
for long.” He guffawed. “You can call me sir.” He guffawed and
guffawed again. Then he was suddenly snorting, snorting then
coughing, coughing hard, a bronchial, nicotine-laced cough that
went deep into his own form, shook his entire physical being
relentlessly before dying down and out through his throat.

“Glad to make your acquaintance, John.” He choked again
and waved me off with one arm, coughing again.

I left, turned away toward my street, and off I went, carefully
as the ground was extremely icy.

It always seemed weird, but nice, to me when an adult with
whom I had no association at all called me by my first and given
Christian name. John… John, yeah John. A simple name, yet the
sound of it from someone else’s voice directed at me and at me
alone gave me a sense of well-being and a confidence in myself
because the adult had the respect and acknowledgement of my
own existence in this world, however small my own worldly
horizon or vision might be. It was as if we shared some of life’s
experiences, good or bad, in some sort of way, synchronicity
perhaps. It was always a nice, heartfelt gesture to hear one’s own
name in that manner by a relative stranger. Instead of the usual
… MORRISON, PAY ATTENTION OR I’LL PAY IT
FOR YOU!

Before I was out of sight I stopped, turned, and looked back
at the rink. I could see Mr O’Brian ever so faintly, or should I say
his silhouette, which really resembled a dark, lifeless shadow in
the stillness of this winter’s night. The stream of water continuing
to rise, then arc, then cascade out and down and out again in
a frost-like icy fog over the surface of the rink. Tomorrow that
ice surface would be an awesome shade of greyish blue, a
smooth virginal sheen of ice, as fragile as frozen glass, bordered
by the brilliance of clean white snow, until the inevitable cut and
crunch of the first set of cold steel blades hit its surface.
I never saw Mr O’Brian again.

Have a great weekend…

SJ…Out