Category: A Very Short Story

From the Short Story Vault

Stone…d

Did you know that:

Schoolchildren in the UK are now being taught that black people built Stonehenge and that the Roman Emperor Nero married a trans woman. He, Nero, was so happy with his choice that he lit a torch of enlightenment and we all know what happened next:

As Rome burned, Nero sat on his balcony composing a poem stock image | Look and Learn

“Hey, does anyone know how to play this thing?” He was heard to say.

And….

Spring ahead at Stonehenge.

Time change at Stonehenge Meme Generator

I did not know that. One can only laugh.

Hey, is Canada dead? Just asking, as Prime Minister Carney always dresses as if he is a mortician / undertaker.

Quote of the week:

“Women who are slightly overweight tend to live longer than the men who comment on it.”

“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.

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.

In today’s world, that park is bereft of young boys and girls
playing. Sadly, it is deserted all year long. Its lifeblood is a
distant memory.

Taken from:

I Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven

An irreverent look at growing up in a parochial, conservative environment in pre-woke era Toronto of the 1950s and 60s.

Just click on “Buy on Amazon” to purchase on line. You can also get this book in audio format. Go to Amazon.ca (Canada) or Amazon.com (US Residents) and type in audible and the book title.

Real cheap. Buy one and support a struggling Canadian author.

Shakeyjay is out of sight, out of my mind and out of here.

Have a great day, or week, or month, maybe a year.

My Values

Money for nothing and your kicks for free. I heard that this band was in dire straits but they seem to be doing okay to me.

Prayer for the weak:

Lord, today’s music sucks. Please take Bieber, Beyonce and Swift and give us another British like music invasion. Hey, we’ll even take one from Canada. Please dear Lord hear my prayer.

I keep reading or hearing about some guy here in Canada that wrote a book called Value(s). Interestingly boring I am told. Well here is my take on values:

“Take the word value… please. How I hate this word. There
are so many variations to the theme that surround this word that
any smart-minded non-English-speaking immigrant to our
country would think twice about trying to learn or understand the
English language. For example, an individual or group’s perception
of worth, based upon personal or collective experiences in a
shared environment can only define or measure value. Value is
illusive, as there are more perceptions of value out there are there
are cars on the road. Let me try to exemplify exactly what I mean here:

In 2005, I picked up my dear ole mother’s car: a 1979
Mercury Zephyr, something akin to a Falcon or Fairmont—Ford
only knows. My mother could not drive anymore. She was
ninety-one, for heaven’s sake. The car had about 56,000 kilometers
on the O.D. Mint condition! Lime green with a sickly,
yellowed tan interior. Now the market value of that car in 1979 was $6,500.
Twenty-six years later the book value was about zilch. The
insured value—who knows, but the assessed value was about
$3,000 and climbing, as long as it didn’t disintegrate during the
long hard winters. Its value would continue to rise in value as
long as its condition remains, well, valuable.

Obviously my mother had considerable sentimental value for
that automobile. As I pulled away from the big city for the drive
back to my hometown, I came to understand the hereditary value
of this gift to me and the intrinsic value of the trust she placed in
me to take good care of Betsy.

I made it back home in one piece although the water pump
went out around some godforsaken country hick town.
Between that and thinking about the local Elvis sightings, I
was beginning to ponder the meaning of life and the mechanical
value of the car, the emotional value that this machine may
have had, and its effect on my own sense of value and
well-being.

Arriving home I thought about its economical value as it had
taken over a tank of gas to cover the three hundred miles from
the really big city to my hometown. Had I been taken for a ride?
Were there aspects of this car that were known only to my
mother, the parish priest, her hairdresser, and the bagger at her
local supermarket? I had to contemplate its utility value considering
the other two cars I had. Yet, thinking of my dear ole mother and somewhat excited about the possibility of getting perhaps $3,000 for the car’s
assessed value, I thought hmmm, but quickly shook any thought
of that out of my mind, for if I valued my life I dared not even
think about selling dear ole Betsy.

Trying to define value can be problematic, which in itself is
an extremely overused word. It’s like common sense. Something
that is taken for granted yet is extremely rare in today’s world.
And trying to make sense out of value—as in “What are your
values?” as opposed to someone else’s values—is like an academia
nut trying to make sense out of common sense and coming
up with pure nonsense.”

Taken from:

I Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven

An irreverent look at growing up in a parochial, conservative environment in pre-woke era Toronto of the 1950s and 60s.

Just click on “Buy on Amazon” to purchase on line. You can also get this book in audio format. Go to Amazon.ca (Canada) or Amazon.com (US Residents) and type in audible and the book title.

Real cheap. Buy one and support a struggling Canadian author.

Shakeyjay is out of sight, out of mind and out of here.

No One Escapes From Here!

I watched the Mariners / Blue Jays game in Seattle over the weekend.
I heard in passing from one of the 30,000 Canadian fans in attendance:
“Oh, I will never visit the US as long as that bad orange man is in the white house.”
“What are you doing here then?” someone asked. “Did you take a wrong left turn somewhere?”
“Oh I don’t consider Seattle part of the US!? Just like Hawaii, where I go and visit every winter. Hawaii is not part of the US.”
Canadian logic or did she fail geography and history in school?? Or is she a passive aggressive Canadian.
Quote of the week:
Heard in passing on the observation deck of the CN Tower: “heck, even when viewed from 1800 feet in elevation, Toronto still sucks.”
My continued book pick of the month, although I may be biased.

I Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven

An irreverent look at growing up in a parochial, conservative environment in pre-woke era Toronto of the 1950s and 60s.

Just click on “Buy on Amazon” to purchase on line. You can also get this book in audio format. Go to Amazon.ca (Canada) or Amazon.com (US Residents) and type in audible and the book title.

Another excerpt:

“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.

Cool! Yesteryear

Today-year

Someone isn’t impressed. There is no escape. It is a mad, mad, crazy world out there.

Have a great day. Now buy a book. Real cheap through Amazon.ca

Shakeyjay…out of sight and out of here.

 

Holy, Holy

 

Holy smoke!

And not an old fart either. Well, not quite an old fart. After all 70 is the new 50…so they say.

Hallelujah

The new pope is an American, Robert Francis Prevost, who has taken the name Leo XIV. 

“Those damn Yankees,” a Canadian was heard to say. “I am never going to visit Rome ever again…until that new American pontiff is….is….is…..well….is. So there.”

On another note:

To celebrate Cinco de Mayo I went out and bought a case of mayonnaise….Whaaat?…..Whaaaat? Did I say something wrong here??

Quote of the week.

Went into an organic health food store the other day and picked up a case of shingles.

Love this:

“No it isn’t,” says Bill Nigh, the science guy. “Who are these fools anyway? It will not be nigh until I says so.” Greta nodded in appreciation, as she sails away on her “Boat to Gaza.”

Love this:

After hearing and seeing this…now, the end is nigh, huh Bill?

Bill Nye Saves the World

You got that right Shakeyjay.

Song for the new pope.

May God bless him and I wish him good luck.

My Book Pick

I love Spam! I have three tee shirts to prove it. Y’know I have never received as many comments as I have received when wearing one of my “I Love Spam” tee shirts.
I love processed cheese too. Nobody can make a grill cheese sandwich better than those made with Kraft processed cheese slices. Be honest with me now. You feel the same way too.
I love hot dogs. When I was younger I always felt that my dream job was to work in a meat processing plant, processing my favorite food groups.
Who says I am not an enviro-mentalist. I love plant food. I am well preserved going into my 74th year.
Quote of the week:
What happens when banks lose your money?They charge you a finder’s fee of course.

My continued book pick of the month:

I Thought I’d Died and Gone To Heaven

An irreverent look at growing up in a parochial, conservative environment in pre-woke era Toronto of the 1950s and 60s.

Just click on “Buy on Amazon” to purchase on line. You can also get this book in audio format. Go to Amazon.ca (Canada) or Amazon.com (US Residents) and type in audible and the book title.

Another excerpt:

“The second shift comes out, more of the same. A little better
coordination perhaps as both coaches are screaming at the
players from the bench. Suddenly, a shot from us. Wide, puck
ricochets into their corner. A Royals defenseman picks it up and
slides it over to the opposite side. Another player fires the puck
off the boards and down the ice. Icing is called. Line changes,
puck is back in the Royals’ end. Just then their wooly mammoth
comes off the bench and takes his place on the right side of the
circle. Puck drops; the Royals’ center wins the face-off and hacks
the puck back behind their net. Suddenly their man gets the puck
and skates with it behind their own net and just stands there,
weighing in on all that surrounds him. The rest of our team begin
to skate backwards in rapid succession, some of us lining up on
their blue line, the rest of us at centre ice. None of us would even
dare to challenge this guy. He was not a normal twelve-year-old
kid at six feet tall—with his skates on. Skinny, lithe, slippery as a
snake, one would think that being that tall and that skinny that
one could just puff in his direction and down he’d go. Unfortunately
for us, he was not the gangly uncoordinated klutz. Far
from it.

At this moment in time, I had no idea what must have been
going through McDink’s mind. For he surely had to know what
was coming his way. He did seem to back up way into his net as
if he thought doing so would offer him some form of protection.
Nope. Then out he slides, centred in the goalie crease and
crouched with blocker and stick out to this left side with his
glove hand to his right and arced slightly upward. McDink did
look the part.

Art, the wooly mammoth of a player began to move, slowly at
first, then accelerating. He deeked around a couple of his own
teammates, then turned on an oblique angle across his own goal
toward his own blue line. Faster and faster he went, with every
cut of his blades. He leaned his tall frame expertly to his right,
pulling the puck with him as he went. It was a sight to behold.
Then he leaned to his left until he was on a straight trajectory to
our goal and our goalie, McDink. The only thing standing in his
way was about four of us, but we were in such a state watching
this unfold that we couldn’t move a muscle, not that we would
even try of course. From the centre line where I was standing,
looking back at his end with him coming at us full tilt, you could
see, sense, then feel the thrusts of his skates as he came straight
for us. Like a rocket—whoosh! His eyes ablaze, his face
contorted as if his every move generated g-forces. Woosh, woosh,
woosh, as he flew past his own teammates, then past us one by
one as if they, we, were standing still. Crunch, crunch, crunch,
the sound of his blades cutting into the ice, leveraging and transferring
that energy up into his entire being.

We let him be. Like Moses parting the Red Sea, we opened
up a lane for him by moving backwards toward the boards on
both sides of the ice surface. He had a clear and straight path to
our goal. The only thing standing between him and hockey
glory was McDink. What must he have been thinking, McDink,
especially seeing us, his teammates, opening up the lane for the
enemy such that there was no impedance between the
mammoth and himself. In what must have been a nanosecond,
McDink came out of his net ever so slightly; he looked to his
right, then to his left, then straight ahead, his legs, his pads,
forming an A-shaped hole that a Mack Truck could have driven
through.

The fans were going nuts. The rafters seemed to be shaking.
The ice was melting due to the friction and fire coming from the
blades of the Royals’ star player, as he was crossing centre ice in
a flash. McDink made his decision after a split second of determination,
analysis, and assessment of the situation. McDink
again turned to his left and then to his right and in another split
second turned and ran on his blades to seek the protection of the
net. Not inside mind you but the back, outside portion of the net
itself—BEHIND THE NET. And there he crouched; no, he
kneeled, as if praying to his Lord to protect him, to save him
from this terror on ice.

There was stunned silence throughout the arena. The Royals
star couldn’t believe what he was seeing. From his perspective,
all he saw was an open net with a large blob-like mass crouched,
kneeling and blubbering, behind the net. He stopped, looking
around as if he was not quite sure on what to do. He shook his
head a few times as if in comical disgust, then sauntered ever so
slowly down to the goalie crease and tapped the puck, gingerly,
into the net. All of a sudden, laughter broke out from the fans.
The players on both benches banged their sticks against the
boards, screaming and hollering in their amazement. The referee
and linemen raced toward the net, expecting some sort of scuffle
between the Royals player and McDink. McDink seemed to be in
total shock and scared shitless. I am told they had to pry him
away from the backside of the goal. But they couldn’t get him
up. He was a blabbering, blubbering nincompoop. I do believe,
though I can’t be entirely sure of this, that he pissed himself and
soiled his shorts. In due course they had to carry him off the ice.
The game was over.

But before all of that happened, Art skated up to McDink and
in a loud, sarcastic, but assertive voice told McDink in no uncertain
terms: “Remember the Royals.”

And he did, and we did, for years to come.

In a few years’ time, McDink discovered religion and became
a born-again Christian. Like so many of his comrades. Perhaps it
was atonement for the summer of love. Nevertheless, in his
newfound passion and state of grace, he really became
obnoxious!

I lost track of him after I joined the Navy.”

No helmets. In the US they have “Friday Night Lights.” In Canada, we have “Friday Night Fights.

I believe this was around the last time the Toronto Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup. I was in diapers then and I truly believe I will be in diapers when they win the cup again!

Have a nice day.