I’m sentimental at times. In 1983, when my baseball hero, Carl Yastrzemski, said farewell to Boston and trotted around the perimeter of the Fenway Park field shaking hands, I cried when I watched the video. I never felt more stupid. It was a highlights video of Yaz’s career, and I didn’t expect to cry. Watching …
Tag: writing
One of My Daddy’s Days
This was a Daddy Day, which is not to say I am one. It is a subset of what my late father called “one of them Dutton deals.” To me, a Daddy’s Day is one in which very little gets done. My father, who died nearly 22 years ago, could waste a day as …
Them Ain’t Got No Coffee Blues
Supposedly drugs do not really make a person creative. They merely make him think he is creative. On the other hand, supposedly, image is reality. I don’t feel creative this morning. I feel listless. I feel dull. I need drugs. The drug is caffeine. I didn’t realize I was addicted to coffee until the apparatus …
The Smart Kid
This is sort of a “Man Bites Dog” story, or, perhaps, “Girl Bites God.” Macy McMahon awakened before the alarm went off, as per the usual. She turned it off, got up, rubbed her eyes, gathered her wits, and strode down the hall, where she knocked on the door and yelled, “Rise and shine!” …
The Inevitable Descent
Here's the full short story previously posted in four segments. I hope you enjoy it. 1.THE FEELING BOTTOMS OUT The first observation of Clyde Barns on his birthday was that his Facebook timeline was crammed. Some just cut and pasted “Happy birthday,” some took the time to add his name, some attached cartoons with rabbits …
Turn It Up
This short story about changing times in a man’s life began with “The Feeling Bottoms Out.” The second episode was “The Mercy Killing.” Here’s the third. Clyde Barns was no regular at Henny’s Farm and Tractor, which was a sports bar occupying what once had been a Massey Ferguson dealership. For twenty years, most …
The Feeling Bottoms Out
I didn’t plan on tumbling right back into another short story, but today really is my birthday. When my job was eliminated, it wasn’t on my birthday. Obviously, this is total fiction, and any similarity to actual events … you know the drill. The first observation of Clyde Barns on his birthday was that his …
The Writing Sanctions
I have to protect myself. From myself. The world provides too many things to do. It’s too easy to while away a day dragging a finger across an iPhone screen on a Twitter scroll. It’s too easy to wonder what made that dog seem so happy, or that cheeseburger so succulent, on Facebook. Plus, too …
Paydirt and Paved Roads
Last night I learned that the term “paydirt” wasn’t invented by some overheated local sports writer who decided that the dirt underneath the grass in the end zone was dirt that paid, even though it was probably a high school game and the only payoff would have been “under the table.” It was the term for …
Little Things Mean Too Much
At this stage of life, one considers strictly important matters. One questions matters he has blithely accepted for decades. For instance, the word “like” is often used to mean “lack,” as in the great line from Roger Miller’s “Dang Me”: “I like fourteen dollars having twenty-seven cents.” One thinks, why is it “like”? And, then, …
Nightrider's Lament 