Can You Hear Me Now

From the prompt (I think): A wish for someone else is granted.

by Dan Steinbacher

"I just wish you understood!' she had yelled at him, partly in anger, partly in exasperation. The argument had been going in circles for an hour and they were both physically and emotionally exhausted. The problem, as far as she could tell, was that not only did he not get "it", he didn't WANT to get it. He was actively choosing to not care, avoiding empathy at all costs and forcing ignorance onto his brain. And it worked. After a lifetime of willfull eye-closing, he couldn't understand a damn thing about anyone that wasn't him. You could see the apathy taking hold of him in the middle of a conversation, watch his eyes glaze over and functioning conciousness retreat into the background.

But after she had shouted at him, a strange look had dawned over his face, his forehead wrinkling as if he was trying to complete Chinese quadratic equations in his head. Then, without a word, he had left their apartment and that was the last she'd heard of him.

How could she have known that her wish would come true? How could she know the scope of what she wished for? Because now he did understand. He understood everything far, far too well. The man was paralyzed with understanding. He couldn't sleep, as the endless chanting of the millions and millions dustmites in his bed, pillow, and eyelashes kept him up with their unceasing choruses of "yum yum, eat 'em up" repeated over and over. And yet, the mites weren't enough to drown out the non-sexy come-ons from his lamp ("Oh baby, turn me on!"). Clouds told bad jokes, rainclouds just made awful puns. He comprehended the cosmic significance of cracks in the sidewalk, the meaning of the fluid shapes of puddles (mostly sad dirges), the long rambling conversations about wind patterns encapsulated in the flutterings of butterflies. Trees yawned constantly, counting their leaves and prattling on and on about soil moisture. And he understood it all, at full volume, all at once. Life was void of mystery, and as it turned out, the answers were fucking boring. Birds talked of nothing but air/weight ratios and berries. Grass just shouted "LIGHT!!!! WATER!!!!!" at the top of their chlorophyll lungs. Flowers were pretentious, vain assholes. Lightbulbs, looking down on everyone, were full of sarcastic judgment, and mountains just groaned like old people, forever complaining of this cliff aching, this hill landsliding. He became glad that he could not sleep, for he was terrified to fully comprehend his dreams. Nothing stopped talking, and her wish translated it for him in real time. The night sky was awash with the manic, grandiose lies of the stars, and the moon sang terrible Italian operas.

Safety First!

From the prompt: Take the phrase "Safety first" to the next level

Safety First!

by Dan Steinbacher

His father was an internationally famous crossing guard. His mother was a seatbelt designer for Volvo. They believed in prolonging their lives and preventing injury through whatever means necessary. It was only natural that they would name their child "Safety". In truth, his Mom and Dad didn't like Safety (the child) as much as they liked safety (the concept). And Safety the concept was unattainable, but they just simply ignored this fact. His, like most well-meaning but ultimately shortsighted parents, adopted "Safety First!" as the unofficial family motto. This meant that anything that seemed to them to be remotely dangerous would be tested by Safety first, to make sure it would not imperil his parents. The reasoning was that while the mother and father were safe, the family unit could continue to produce more test subjects, er, children, which kept their family bloodlines safe. To assuage what little guilt they might have felt, they got him a dog named Caution ("Safety first, use Caution!")

So when Volvo called upon his mother to design seatbelts for a space shuttle, it was Safety who blasted off into orbit by himself (well, nearly by himself, Caution came along) and did the field report for his mom. It was Safety who filled in for his scared father during a particularly difficult street crossing assignment in downtown Ho Chi Min City during rush hour. And it was Safety who had to take a bite of every meal the family ate to make sure it wasn't poisoned. And to check the house for lurking murderers when the family got home late. And to get rid of spiders that might be poisonous. And stick his head out into the road to see if cars were coming.

Safety didn't really mind this---it didn't occur to him to mind, since it had been that way since he was born. He had never been told he couldn't do something because it wasn't safe, he had been told TO do things specifically because they weren't safe, and consequently had a much different approach to the world in general. He just sort of went headlong into things…Safety as a concept didn't really apply to him, ironically enough.

Which is why it was so strange when he died. You'd have thought that with parents as terrified of the world as his, Safety would have been warned about pools and the ocean, or at least been taught to swim. But no, in their fear, his parents had avoided all water completely, and never told their son about it either. So when Safety finally came to the ocean one day after getting kicked off the boardwalk for unsafely juggling chainsaws at Venice beach, he had no idea what it was or what it did. He just walked straight in, without Caution, and drowned.

His parents named their next child--a girl--Curiosity, in the hopes that a subject, er, daughter with a voraciously inquisitive mind would be a little safer. They got her a kitten, too. Surely nothing could go wrong this time.

The Meaning of Life

Free Write from April 25, 2010 - Lindley Karstens

Like coffee grinds in the bottom of the mug, my brain is full of unfinished debris; outstanding research, stories that need endings or beginnings, pages and pages of verbal diarrhea requiring ruthless editing into some semblance of coherency, paintings in various stages of completion.  Nothing finished.  Nothing to give me that satisfied glow, that “aha!” moment when it’s all tidy and printed and done. 

Done.  That’s one of those concepts that compulsive souls like my own cling to in desperate hope that whatever it is that I’m getting up to do in the morning will come to have more meaning than the production of numbers in a bank account that permit me to continue to drag my bag of goodies through life without having to give anything back. 

Perhaps it would be a positive experience, this “giving it back”.  What do I need all the stuff for anyhow?  I have no idea but I'm convinced I need all kinds of things to organize more things.  Even with my Kindle I obsess about the need for a larger archive.  It holds a thousand books.  Is that all?  But in the wonderful world of floating electrons, magnetic charges, ones, zeros, on, off, I can possess all kinds of things and no trees have to die. 

Is that really true?  I guess not.  It takes energy to power servers, and fuel to keep mines going to produce the metal ores and minerals necessary to create skinny hard drives and raging chips.  Though I suppose I could make myself feel better by comparing the volume of resources consumed to produce a physical book versus an electronic book.  But in truth it’s all just stuff.  Maybe I should be practicing non-attachment, playing the toad in the middle of the room working out the perfect questions so I can get my damned cookie and go home having accomplished something.  Right?  Right.  Sure.

With gratitude to Sukha Gee for her fabulous Zen fairy tales and the toad that wasn't.