I’m sitting in the burnt orange fake-leather recliner that we got for Pete just before he got orders for warrant officer school. Dean Martin’s show is on TV and he’s singing some country song about loss and pain. My mind slips away from the show and into my own personal loss and pain. Pete has found someone else, he wants a divorce. So he said in his letter. A letter, the bastard! Can you believe it? Not even a phone call, much less in person. A damn’ thin letter! A thin letter. That alone gave me a premonitory sinking feeling. Something bad was in that envelope. I for once didn’t rush to open it but slowly walked back to the house simply noting the Chicago postmark and reading my name and address over and over like a mantra.

He still loved me, he said, but she was pregnant and needed him more than I did. How could he know that? I needed him desperately. After six years I’d finally let myself believe that maybe he really did love me, that it was safe to let down my guard with him, that he would stay with me like the wedding vows said. I should never have done that. If I’d kept my defenses up, the pain couldn’t have got through, couldn’t have struck so deep, couldn’t have hurt so bad.

I hung on to his almost incidental phrase, “I still love you, but…” and thought that maybe I could get him to hang on to that, too, to realize that there was still a base for us to stand on. So, no divorce, I said, let’s try again. But he was adamant. So was I. Then, “She thought she was pregnant, but she wasn’t.” It didn’t change his mind. I guess she still needed him more than I did, pregnant or not.

So, he’s sent to Viet Nam before anything can be done about a divorce, and for a whole year I send newsy letters, nearly every day, as if I expect him to care about what’s going on back here. No complaints, no how much pain I’m in, no how difficult it is to do this, just pleasant, newsy news that he probably has absolutely no interest in. Two or three letters come to me: How can you do this? How can you act like nothing’s different? I love you, I said, that’s how. Maybe I should have said, I need you. Oh, well, live and learn.

One pleasant early spring afternoon I’m recuperating from major surgery and the sheriff’s car pulls up in front of the house. I sit on the porch in my rocker, curious but unwilling to feel the pull on my stitches if I rise to greet him. The deputy, a kind-faced older man in a starched khaki shirt and matching pants, droopy white mustache, tall, slightly paunchy, strides up the walk, stops at the bottom of the steps. He nods to me, pulls off his Stetson, hands me some folded papers. What’s this, I ask. He shifts uncomfortably, then replies in his soft Texas drawl, Well, looks like divorce papers, I guess. I just look down at them dumbly. He leaves quietly. Boy, Pete really knows how to time things. In a rare letter I got today he says he’s glad I didn’t die in surgery, then he shoves the knife in with a twist.

I’m not supposed to drive yet, but the next day I drive to see a lawyer Pete had once said was who I should go to if I ever needed help. Well, I guess I can be forgiven for not thinking too straight at a time like that.

Some time later, and quite a bit of money, too, the lawyer announces he can’t handle the case any more. No explanation. When I go to get some papers from him that I’ll need to send to the Chicago lawyer he referred me to, I spot a letter in Pete’s handwriting as he riffles through the file. I tell myself that it means nothing, but deep down I know better. Denial is a big part of my life. Without it pain can grab hold too easily.

We’ve been living in Texas but the divorce is, inexplicably, to be handled in Illinois where he was temporarily stationed before Viet Nam. The lawyer that I was referred to there drops the case suddenly, too. After I paid him, of course. Then I accidentally – accidentally, mind you – find out that I have to be in court up there at nine o’clock tomorrow or lose by default, and I’m still in Texas, and I have no lawyer. I’m a mess. Can I even get a plane ticket in time? What to do? My priest calls in some markers and I have a new Chicago lawyer whom I’ll meet two hours before we have to appear. Why am I doing all this? Why don’t I just let it go? Let him go?

On the redeye flight I keep remembering when my TV broke a while back how I took to listening to the local Public Radio station all the time. It’s a poorly funded station and they play the same tapes over and over. There was soothing, numbing, ignorable music until about 8 p.m. each evening, then would come a song we’d sung in chorus in high school – You’ll Never Walk Alone. When it came on I’d stop whatever I was doing and let its power wash over me. “Walk on through the wind, walk on through the rain, though your dreams be tossed and blown. Walk on, walk on, with hope in your heart, and you’ll never walk alone. You’ll never walk alone.” So I walk on, to the bitter end. (Bitter end. That’s a Navy term, you know – the end of the rope.) In the end, after all, I give him his divorce. I can hang on to him, but I can’t make him love me. I never hear the song again after I get back. I get my TV fixed.

Now I’m back home and I sit in the orange fake-leather recliner that we got for Pete just before he got his orders for warrant officer school, and I hold his letter in my hand (”I still love you, but…”) and I listen to Dean Martin sing a country song of pain and loss. All around me everything disappears as I drown in feeling. My head drops back against the chair, my eyes close. Suddenly I hear this low, loud primal moan, a rough sound of pure unassuaged pain, pain so deep it’s beyond words, beyond tears, beyond time. It startles me. I open my eyes, raise my head, disoriented. I can’t tell where the sound is coming from until I feel the involuntary spasm in my throat cut it off. My God, did that come out of me? Shaken and dazed, throat raked and burning, I sit in the burnt orange fake-leather recliner we got for Pete just before he got his orders for warrant officer school. Dean Martin’s show is over. I turn the TV off, fold the letter back into its envelope, and go to bed.

Well-used, forgotten
Unearthed, donated, reborn
I am a thrift store

UNTITLED

Tests! Every student who has sat at a desk knows the anxiety of taking a test and the worried anticipation when waiting for results. As a teacher, I always tried very hard to make my students feel comfortable about tests. Incentives to encourage studying were used to by way of bonus questions for extra points. Extra credit was also a tactic employed to motivate students to study their notes and read their text books. Even so, there were always those that failed a test even with all my efforts at imparting all the necessary knowledge needed to be successful.
I forgot how stressful a test could be until the shoe was on the other foot. My payback as I began to call it occurred when I decided to go back to school to pursue my master’s degree in school library media. In order for me to enroll at the university, I had to take the dreaded Graduate Record Exam.
Nearly twenty years had passed since my college graduation. Over the course of those years, I had spent most of my days imparting knowledge to the minds of young fifth and sixth graders. I taught them skills from how to read a map to subject verb agreement. Not once I had used Shakespeare or the Pythagorean Theorem. Words like obstreperous, abstemious, and obfuscate were not used. Never did I need quadratic equations or geometric proofs. Now suddenly, I was going to be tested over mathematics and vocabulary I hadn’t used in nearly two decades.
I tried to study but wasn’t quite sure where to start. I knew there would be no extra credit questions, no bonus points earned for good behavior, no grading on the curve. It was my brain against a computerized test that would tell me immediately if my aspirations of furthering my education would commence or be crushed. I suddenly felt like a fifth grader taking the Georgia Criterion Referenced Competency Test, the test that determines if a fifth grader moves up to middle school. It was a nauseating feeling.
The day of the test came. I left the house early. I gave myself a pep talk. I got lost. A very good thing that I left with half an hour to spare. Once I finally found the testing center, my optimism rose. I had my identification, my verification papers, and a pencil. I was ready!!
After verifying my identity without providing a DNA sample, my purse and keys were stored away in a locker. I was ushered into a small room with a dozen or so computers. There were a few other test-takers already working away at a computer station. I was told I could press a button to suspend taking the test if I needed a break. I would get only one. I took my place at the assigned computer and busied myself with reading the instructions.
The first part of the test was a timed writing segment. I had one hour to pick a topic and defend it. Luckily for me, I was familiar with the topics so writing a defense would not be a problem, but about half-way through the writing, a problem arose. Apparently, driving around for an extra half hour made me forget all about my bladder. I didn’t have time for a “potty break” before test time and now my bladder was letting me know that I had made a dreadful mistake.
The digital clock on the upper right hand corner of my screen seemed to stop tracking time. I shifted. I squirmed. I lost concentration. Time stood still and I thought I would be running out the door in embarrassment at any second. I tried hard to focus on the written discourse in front of me, but my words could not convey my thoughts, for the only thing on my mind was finding a bathroom.
After what seemed an eternity, I finished my written segment with three seconds to spare. I pressed the buzzer that told the proctor I needed a break. I nearly tripped over the chair in my haste to exit the computer room. I found my small plot of heaven that day in a five foot by five foot room with a porcelain receptacle.
Once I resumed testing, I found it very easy to concentrate on synonyms, antonyms, and theme. I recognized the math problems with the Pythagorean Theorem and solved for x and y. I was confident that I was doing well. My perseverance was rewarded when I ended the test and saw my scores. I qualified for admittance into the doctoral program had I a desire to put myself through hell on Earth. I was going back to school!
It’s been several years since I took the Graduate Record Exam. I have since received my master’s degree and embarked on a career as a school librarian. But, once again, the halls of higher learning beckon. I will begin on my education specialist degree in two months. Two more years of homework, research, term papers, and of course, tests!

When I was a very young lad, my parents would sometimes give me some pocket change — usually an odd assortment of dimes, nickels and pennies, with the occasional lucky quarter — and we’d run off to the local store. Now, we rarely had more than, say, 50¢ or so, but that amount was usually good enough for a brand-name candy bar — my favorite was Snickers — plus a few pretzel rods, some Swedish Gummi fish, or maybe a Jawbreaker or Fireball. Collectable cards with bubblegum were also a prized item. Without getting into unimportant details like exactly which decade one could purchase that amount of junk food for 50¢, we will instead focus on the scene of a bunch of rug rats standing by the cash register, counting pennies and straining their nascent mathematical skills to budget for the maximum sugar hit while the cashier/store owner stood by with a expressions ranging from boredom to amusement. While all of this was going on, we paid scant attention to the other people moving around us, accepting our lack of manners as part and parcel for those of our age group, but as I think back now, I can remember them grabbing milk, or nails, or thumbing through records. Occasionally we’d be asked to clear way for some elderly woman, and the stock guy would come and carry her bag of stuff to her car or down the street where she lived, though the cashier would be careful not to take an eye off us.

Now, by this point you may have the theme music for the Andy Griffith Show going through your mind, but we kids really didn’t understand at the time that we were patronizing the commercial equivalent of the Dodo, The store was a local 5¢ and 10¢, a historic one, in fact, and though adults like my parents did their “serious” weekly food shopping at a nearby food market or headed for the local hardware store for repair needs, they still used the old 5¢ and 10¢ like a convenient corner store for quick stuff. People bought mostly basic foods items—milk, eggs, butter, chips — that ran out during the week, or they bought greeting cards, light bulbs or the latest LP from, well, I won’t say because I don’t want to date myself more than I’ve already done, but they still treated it in the utilitarian sense as a functioning store that fulfilled some part of their local shopping needs. Today, that store still stands, but it survives as something of a museum. Instead of practical stuff it is now filled with quaint Americana like rustic decorations, scented New Age candles, post cards, etc., for tourists who want to experience what life was like when the 5¢ and 10¢ was really the main shop in town. The candy shelves by the main cash register — now a computer — are still there, next to mousepads with pictures of the 5¢ and 10¢ on them. All the signs in the store are written in this annoying Playbill font type; when I was a kid, the signs were usually hand-written.

This isn’t a nostalgic trip or one of those “The Old Days were Better” stories, just some memories, that’s all. Times change, things change. It was that store that I thought about when I read the writing prompt, however. Today 5¢ and 10¢s are seen as cute, quaint, rustic, but there was a time when they were as utilitarian and functional as your local Walmart or Home Depot. They can no longer compete commercially; your local food or department store today survives by managing a very complex web of supply chains that stretch all over the globe to bring you affordable stuff. A 5¢ and 10¢ relied on goods usually made within a hundred mile radius. The few who survive do so by morphing into museums that describe their past roles in the local community. That’s about how I feel, like a store that straddles different ages, and often find my future very different from my role in the past, but still strangely defined by that past. I am not a chain or franchise store; I’ve spent a good chunk of my life trying to convince others around me that I’m really not completely insane. This isn’t a sad comparison, only to say that when I’m gone, my hope has always been that they’ll say something like: “Well, it’ll probably be a long time before we see anyone like him around again…”

They told me to open the closet

so I did.

Never open the closet.

There was deep within it a creature I cannot explain.

It was covered in papery skin

with teeth like broken pencils

and claws that ripped apart books.

Its eyes were huge

they beckoned in gaudy words

and useless scribbles

and from within its throat it regurgitated

failures

accidents

hopelessness.

I didn’t trust it

it seemed ready to catch me

and bring me back home

to feed me to its children.

I stared transfixed for a long time.

This is my writer’s block.

JUSTICE SERVED BY: Lynne Elliott

Making sense of it now would never happen
I now know that I had stepped into the lions den.
Women with stories and pain and sorrow,
Most growing up wondering if they will eat tomorrow.
I entered this place unsure and with child
Knowing this process will be anything but mild.
I had heard the phrase ’going thru the motions’
It feels like you’re walking, and on your shoulders are 20 tons.
My charge is conspiracy, a charge they don’t have to prove,
The only solace I get is when I feel the baby move.
The sentence was harsh and I am so confused,
Twelve years for that, the prosecutor wasn’t even amused.
The girl next to me murdered her child,
But, she’s only here for a very short while.
Justice served? I think not!
But, that’s what the Judge says I’ve got!
My sentence was cut, it’s five years now,
My son has grown, but, I wasn’t there to see how.
Instead I was here, but not in vain,
I studied hard so not to go insane
I earned two degrees and finally got out of that place
I made it through the nightmare, but only by grace.
The statistics and society say a felon will never be much
What most don’t realize though is that education is my crutch.
My son is with me now after all these years,
His resilience always seems to bring me to tears.
Life is good now and I have started to smile
I must admit though, it took quite awhile.
Strength, it seems, comes from very deep
The rewards I get are all for me to keep.
Justice served? That’s pretty lame,
But, whatever they threw at me, I no doubt overcame!

MY OLD ROOM AT MOM’S

“Junior!” I heard my mom yell to my dad. “It’s time to eat!” The aroma of mom’s fried chicken and potato salad filled the air as my bedroom door opened. In walked a tall slim brunette wearing a Black Sabbath T-shirt, Levi jeans and bare feet. The young version of myself standing timelessly in front of me did not see me staring at her. She didn’t know I was there, for we are one in the same. Her youthful reflection in the mirror brought back feelings of many years ago. The brown mirrored dresser that held her likeness was covered in scratches and missing several knobs. The photos of friends and relatives wedged in the left side of the mirror frame were separated by a white saxophone neck strap that was waiting to be snatched up at any minute and rushed off to band practice. The stiff wavy sheet music of Louie Louie and Proud Mary on the dresser haled the tale-tale signs of practicing in the damp bathroom with the water running full force to drown out the musical sounds as not to annoy the parents. The cluttered area of the dresser consisted of colorful braided friendship bracelets, silver hoop earrings, cherry cough drops, a banana clip and a Chemistry book from her 10th grade class. As I look closer at this apparition of myself, there is sadness in her face and emptiness in her eyes. She has a longing to be loved by her parents and accepted by others. The desire to be a normal teenager, go places and do things her friends do has overcome her. She looks to her music for comfort and her room, this room, my room is her sanctuary. It is the only way she is allowed to express herself. As I look around the dark room, she is everywhere and she is nowhere.
Seeing that my ghost of the past is fading before my eyes, my sight takes hold of the walls in this cool place of voluntary confinement. The walls are covered with posters from the top of the almond colored ceiling to the stark white baseboard just above the floor. It is my wallpaper, courtesy of ‘Hit Parader’ magazine. The faces of the band members look back at me. Mötley Crew, Black Sabbath, Warrant, Poison, Bon Jovi, Guns N Roses, Tesla, Alice Cooper, Metallica, and yes, even a couple of the Doobie Brothers. It was the music I looked to for comfort. I felt like I was in a time machine taken back to those awkward days of uncertainty. But here in this room I had a feeling of security and a sense of being. I was in a room of my peers and they were always staring back at me listening to my worries and celebrating my joys. There was no judgment passed within these walls. These were my friends, my wallpaper of allies.
In front of me is my old bed with the dark blue comforter that rarely smelled of fabric softener. It is a double bed, large enough to get lost in with my little sister who was 5 years younger when we stayed up playing lightening tag on the walls with flashlights in the dark. The almost flat pillows have Sesame Street pillowcases, a symbol of a teenager not wanting to grow up, yet being thrust into adulthood by the world around her every waking moment outside this space. The dense bed is adjacent to the carefully covered wall. It is a perfect stepping stool to the small window in the middle of the posters. There are yards and yards of light blue country curtains covered in miles of huge white ruffles on the unfinished wood curtain rod. It was my mother’s touch of course. I always felt it was her ideal of a cruel joke on me. Her way of adding a “girl’s touch” to my cold overcast space she tried so unsuccessfully to pull me from.
In the middle of the ceiling is the white ceiling fan with gold trim. The blades ingeniously decorated with sticker photos of all my school friends. A closer look reveals stickers such as ‘YOU SUCK’, and a hand revealing the middle finger and lightening bolts with clouds.
A cool breeze sways the Looney Tunes necktie and the keyless Tinker Bell key chain necklace hanging from the light fixture next to me. As I look to the right in the room towards the largest yet identical window to the smaller one, I can see the outsized peach tree in the tall grass of the back yard. As I walk closer my hand touching the postered closet beside me, my attention has shifted. I open the closet door to expose the suede and leather jackets, some with tassels some without, all masked by the scent of youth. Black T-shirts featuring Harley Davidson, White Snake and Kiss along with ripped blue jeans populated the wire hangers in front of me.
My antique tenor saxophone lay forgotten with the musty old blue and white Reebok sneakers and black combat boots on the brown shag carpet on the closet floor. All of these images that once lay dormant, resembling the feelings of my youth have now been awaken.

If I could talk to myself at 13, the first thing I would tell myself is to stop fighting so hard! I would say:

“I know you are struggling to be different, but realize that everyone who looks at you can see your uniqueness just by looking at you. Think of all the people who stop you to ask if that is your “real” hair color. Less than 2% of the population has natural red hair. It doesn’t get any more “different” than that.

Remember when you tried smoking last year in the playhouse with Angela? You’re going to want to try it again this year. You’ll be looking for a way to express your anger and you’ll want to try smoking again. Don’t do it! Smoking despite your asthma doesn’t make you a rebel. If you keep smoking, 10 years from now you will try to quit and it will be the hardest thing you’ll ever do in your life. It will be so hard that you will fail, over and over. It will take seven failures and thirty total years of trying to quit until you finally stop for good. Please don’t start.

What really makes you different is your sensitivity. Don’t people tell you that all the time (as in, “you’re too sensitive”)? Remember this: your sensitivity is a gift. You can’t teach someone how to be sensitive in the way that you are. Other people don’t experience “knowing” and “awareness” in the way that you do. Just listen to, honor and trust your instincts. Also, all those crazy dreams mean something. Remember them and write them down. You’ll be amazed at what you learn.

At some point this year, you will get some other kid’s allergy shot and it will put you into anaphylactic shock. You’ll pass out and after some more shots you’ll be able to breathe again. Don’t worry, that’s the last allergy shot you’ll ever get. When you wake up, it will be about 3:00 am and you’ll be back home in your bedroom with the pink bedspread up to your chin. You’ll be wide awake, hungry and bored out of your mind after the 12-hour drug-induced sleep, but please don’t turn on your flashlight because it will wake up your Dad in the next room and his angry flashlight-lit bodiless head will haunt you into late adulthood.

Finally, some random thoughts going forward:
• It’s still ok to get excited about going to Disneyland. Even adults get excited to go to Disneyland.
• Don’t black out your yearbook picture with a marker. That is the only record you will have of yourself at that age and you’ll be sorry. By the way, you’re cuter and skinnier than you think you are.
• Occasional mediocrity, stability and familiarity (in other words, “standing still”) won’t kill you.
• When you don’t know what to say, it’s because you’re not really listening. You are a great listener and people are drawn to that.
• We, as people, are more alike than we are different. That goes for blacks and whites, athletes and handicapped folks, popular and unpopular kids, great philosophers and mentally retarded people, priests and murders, children and grandparents, etc. Keep looking for the common ground.
• People need other people. You will always need other people. Treat them the way you want to be treated.

Oh yeah, and tell Dad that the little garage startup company in Cupertino with the apple logo may be worth looking at.

Nineteen somethin’

I howled along with Linda Ronstadt’s rendition of Blue Bayou on the 8-track cartridge that played on the requisite eight-track tape player. “It was 1970 somethin’ in the world that I grew up in.” Store shelves stocked record players alongside LP’s and 45’s. Broken and dirty needles had nothing to do with drugs. The songs skipped in all the best places from “shaking my cool thing” in the living room, as I watched my reflection in the picture window. I went to my first concert at the Kalamazoo County Fair and was convinced Shaun Cassidy was singing Da Doo Run Run just for me. Donnie and Marie ruled the air waves and the lunch boxes, and the hip kids wore ponchos, gauchos, and clogs.

I agonized over the purchase of my first 45 rpm record, finally deciding on “Don’t you want me baby?” by Human League. “It was 1980 somethin’ in the world that I grew up in.” Santa delivered a tape recorder with “Air Supply’s Greatest Hits.” It was “like totally bitchin’.” I could do all the Solid Gold dancing I wanted without missing a beat. Brooke Shields didn’t let anything come between her and her Calvin Klein’s, and after two years of relentless begging, my mother finally agreed to buy me a pair. I was entering junior high and those jeans were my ticket to popularity.

I spent a lot of time at the mall squandering my McDonald’s paychecks on clothes and music. “It was 1990 somethin’ in the world that I grew up in.” The cassette tape was being overrun by the latest and greatest technology: the compact disc. It took me a while to get onboard the CD train, but after buying my first dual function CD/cassette player, I relented and sent my penny in to Columbia Records. Soon I had my first twelve CD’s, and I was once again on the cutting edge.

Now it’s 2000 somethin’ in the world that I’ve grown up in and the advancement of technology has once again made the way I listen to music obsolete. Gone are the days of the big stereo systems and the even bigger speakers. Now it’s who has the biggest gigabyte that rocks! I’m not quite ready to part with my collection of discs, so I’ll just stick the buds in my ears, wear my MP3 player on my arm, and dust them from time to time as I shake my humps, my humps, my lovely lady lumps!

“If only you could understand what it means to be me,” Character lamented, reclining in a soft leather chaise, her face forming into a melodramatic pout. “It is so very difficult to go through what I have to. These writers think that they could put me through anything. They need someone to be kidnapped, they need someone to be the villain, they need someone to be ridiculously funny. And who do they choose? Me. Always me.”

Conflict raised his dark eyebrows and laughed, “Please Character, you are not that important. Without me you would sit idly in a room and do absolutely nothing. You couldn’t even think coherent thoughts. I’m the one who dictates where the story goes and what you do and what goes through your head. Without me you would be nothing.”

Character shook her head fervently, “But without me you would have no one to do those awful things to.”

Both of them turned to a light airy chuckle coming from the other side of the room. “You see,” the speaker said, “that is where you are both wrong. Neither of you could exist without the other. You build off of one another to create stories, and, granted, get the most attention for it. But I can stand on my own. I don’t need Character or Conflict. I can simply exist.”

“Oh, Setting, I didn’t think you would join us,” Conflict drawled.

Now it was Setting’s turn to raise his eyebrows, “I’ve been with you the entire time Conflict. But that is what you’ve failed to notice. I am the room you stand in, the chair that Character is sitting in, the world outside these walls. Just face it. I can exist without you, but you can’t exist without me.”

“That’s true Setting,” Character said sitting up. “But writers normally write Settings for Characters and for Conflicts, not just for some pleasant scenery. If they do, then it’s for exercise only. You could never be published just as you are.”

“What Character is trying to say,” Conflict said condescendingly, “is that you can exist but you would be incredibly boring without us.”

“I think,” Setting said, his tone matching Conflicts, “that we would all fail miserably without the other. Conflict needs Character, Character needs Setting, Setting needs Conflict, etc. A story wouldn’t be very good without any of us. We are all needed to suceed.”