The Car Bumper

You try to be everything but what you really are. You bounce around like a bumblebee in a nest of flowers but really only one of those flowers should interest you.

Justin‘s wife’s words stung now, especially as he found himself in a very uncomfortable predicament.

Standing in an auto body shop, he was trying to sell a car bumper to a man who seemed like he could care less.

‘Splain to me why I should spend more money on a bumper made in America when I can get one for half that price that was made over in China. Tell me that Mister.

But the truth was Justin couldn’t tell him why. Do it to be patriotic? Support made in America? When he opened his mouth, stupid words came out.

Ugh, well, I mean, yep, well. Then Justin laughs thinking, maybe he came up with the best answer after all.

Well, it would help me out a bit. Keep my wife off my back, show her I can do this and help pay some of the bills. You know what I mean?

When he came home from his sales job a few weeks later, his wife was sitting at the kitchen table, smoking a cigarette.

There’s a pretty little piece of paper in an envelope on the coffee table for you, she said. Guess it goes without saying you know I’m keeping the trailer and I’m taking the kids. You keep doing what you’re doing or do what you want. OK, love you, baby. Bye.

Three months later, Justin’s ex-wife parked across the street from the auto supply company. When she saw Justin pull up to the curb in a brand new Ford Dually pick up truck her first thought was what idiot let him borrow that? He spotted her, smiled, waived and walked over to her.

Remember those bumblebees you were talking about a long time ago he asked. Well, it turns out I ain’t no bumblebee, and you should’ve known I don’t give a hoot about flowers.

***

That’s What We Do

There are important people in the world, very important people in the world, and then my uncle Jimmy. He’s from Scranton, where everyone thinks the world revolves around them. You know how some people are possessive about their neighborhood? Uncle Jimmy thinks he owns his neighborhood, an average blue-collar setting of three bed two bath numbers in which he lives with his wife, my aunt Gladys in the very back on a cul-de-sac. He’s an ironworker and likes to show anyone who will look, the photo of him and his buddies sitting on a steel beam in New York City sixty stories above it all. He never tires of telling me I copped out by going to college and that I can make a lot more money doing a real man’s work. He hates what he calls desk jocks, but confided in me that at a certain bar in Scranton where blue-collar workers compete with white-collar’s for bar stools and tables, he doesn’t mind it that most of them wear neckties.

“When they mess with ya, just grab that little piece hanging under the front tie, and pull. Talk about some red faces, dos guys,” he laughed, “they don’t believe in fighting, just spewing their intellectual crap.”

Uncle Jimmy liked to drive like a bat out of hell, and he didn’t like getting stuck behind a slow driver either. On this particular day he picked me up from school and we were going to have aunt Gladys famous spaghetti and meatballs. But as soon as we pulled into their neighborhood, a large delivery truck was in front of us. While it wasn’t an 18 wheeler it was big enough you couldn’t pass it and the driver was moving along at snail pace. It didn’t take long for uncle Jimmy to lay on the horn and sling his arm out the window to tell the driver to pull to the side and let him pass.

The truck driver was having none of it. In fact, he stopped at one point and uncle Jimmy was about to get out of his car and run up to the driver when he finally started to move again. Now uncle Jimmy laid on his horn and cursed and hollered, which was not unusual for him. “I’m an ironworker, boy,” he told me. “That’s what ironworker’s do.

Finally, uncle Jimmy couldn’t take it any more. Even though we were almost to his cul-de-sac he decided he was going to get that truck driver, show him who the boss was.

“Uncle Jimmy, I can practically see your house now. What’s the use of stirring anything up now? You probably will need a new horn. You laid this one the whole time,” I told him.

“I’m an ironworker, boy. We gotta do what we gotta do.” Then, as the trucker pulled into the cul-de-sac, uncle Jimmy was finally able to swerve in front of him. Now the trucker came to a stop since he couldn’t move. He got out of the truck and uncle Jimmy jumped out of his car. The trucker threw up his hands.

“Are you crazy? You have laid on your horn the whole time I’ve been in this neighborhood.”

Uncle Jimmy laughed. “That’s what ironworker’s do.”

“Huh?” said the trucker.

“Why were you driving so dang slow?” asked Jimmy.

“Because there is a $25,000 antique curio cabinet in the cargo. It’s tied down but I ain’t taking no chances.”

Suddenly aunt Gladys comes running out of the house. “Do you have it? Is that it?” she hollered.

“Have what?” replied uncle Jimmy.

“Not you dummy!” said Aunt Gladys. “The delivery driver.”

“Do you have the cabinet?” she continued.

“What cabinet?” asked uncle Jimmy.

“The cabinet I inherited from my grandmother. She died, remember?” said aunt Gladys. “Remember I told you she left me the cabinet?”

Uncle Jimmy looked down at the street and kicked at something imaginary. Probably himself.

Then I saw a broad smile come across the delivery driver’s face.

“Yes lady, I have it but I’m not delivering it!’ he shouted.

“Why not?” she asked.

“Because that’s what delivery drivers do,” he answered, and then got in his truck and slowly drove away.

***

The Garbage Man Poet

by Preston Brady III

Harold could be inspired by an empty potato chip bag:

The air is gone now

speckles of salt flash upon the foil

a hunger was half satiated

the feeling of being cheated permeates

Or one he wrote about a garbage can

Your plastic mouth opened

Body splattered with refuse

Containers of ingestibles

Whose contents find another

More unpleasant exit

Harold Dimpy didn’t like the newfangled way of calling garbage truck drivers sanitation workers.

He was a garbage truck driver and proud of it.

He was young and handsome in his bright green vest driving through the neighborhoods and businesses long before many people even woke up. He took his job very seriously: without men like him neatly trimmed lawns, idyllic two story homes with loads of curb appeal, would have to coexist with piles of rotting leftovers, plastic and paper soaking in coleslaw, baked beans, catfish and spaghetti that didn’t make the cut - some of which secretly made its way into trash bags when the cook wasn’t looking. Frankly, he was an urban hero, and it showed in his face as he drove his route, window down, strong arm resting on the door frame.

On his lunch breaks he would sometimes scribble words:

No one wants to follow

this emperor of trash

lest their nostrils get insulted by

an odor too organic

Not one will wave, for such a gesture

is a surrender to the mundane, the chore

we don’t want to think about

and the commander of such a brigade

must have low self-esteem, be a nobody

for what child wants to share in show and

tell my daddy drives a garbage truck?

Then one Christmas Eve a resident on his route ran out to the curb waving an envelope.

It’s a card and a lottery ticket, hollered the old man over the roar of the truck. My father was a sanitation worker, exclaimed the man. Harold decided not to correct him.

I got you a lottery ticket, explained the man. Got you the same numbers I get every week, that I’ve gotten for the last fifteen years.

Why thank ya, said Harold. Have you ever won?

Not yet, answered the man. But I have a good feeling about the drawing this Saturday. 2, 5, 7,22, 23, 24.

Very interesting, replied the garbage man.

***

On Monday morning Harold Dimpy, standing in his boxers had turned on the TV, and was listening to the news as he shaved in the bathroom. He caught the tail end of a snippet.

And there were two winning tickets for a share of the 25.5 million dollar prize. The winning numbers: 2,5,7,22,23,24. Since both tickets were purchased at the same Ice N Stuff, there may only be one winner. Time will tell. In other news, Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey tied the knot in Paris yesterday…

The numbers sounded familiar to Harold. His face still covered in shaving cream he found the Christmas card and lottery ticket inside. He had a winner.

***

As Harold emptied the cans of the man who had given him the lottery ticket, the man ran so fast to his truck he almost fell.

We won, we won, my God we won, said the man, grabbing Harold and hugging him. Did you claim your money yet!? I took the cash out of 6.7 million after taxes.

Harold looked at the man and then took his own ticket out of his wallet. The man watched in horror as the garbage man slowly ripped the ticket into several pieces and then tossed it into the back of the truck and pressed the compactor button.

***

Harold went home that night and microwaved a Gordon Ramsey frozen chicken pot pie. He scribbled as he ate:

Riches shall not rob the worker with integrity

wealth will not, can not alter the path

to happiness.

the garbage man will not be tricked into

a false world of complacency

what looks like bounty from currency

is nothing more than a facadish largesse

here here for the garbage man

here here for the life!

***

The end

The Routine

His mama once told him the Swiss could set a clock by him. You’re as predictable as a roach in a kitchen sink, she laughed. Mama I don’t know if I like that comparison but okay, I git cha.

While most people were just getting deep into their best sleeping Z’s, he was getting up to go to work. If he happened to wake up a little bit early, he could quietly take care of the morning wood and still have time to get to work before the sun rose in this Deep South city.

Sometimes he thought I’m only a flagman, but then he considered the dangers and the importance of his job. The dump trucks couldn’t bring gravel to the job if it weren’t for him. The steamrollers couldn’t pack the asphalt if he didn’t stop the traffic and direct it in such a way as to make everything work smoothly.

As he stood there, young and handsome in his bright orange vest, he waited for the car he knew would appear: a white old Chevy Bel Air. It fit her like a glove.

He figured her to be a waitress, probably serving breakfast at a nearby restaurant. What a beauty she was. If he timed it just right, he could stop the traffic with her as the first car, to allow the heavy equipment operators to do their job, and gain her attention as he stood proudly and performed his work. He was still trying to get the nerve up to talk to her one morning when on this particular morning, he stopped her when there was obviously no good reason to do so. There were no dump trucks pulling in or out, there were no steam rollers coming that way. When she laid on her horn like she did it stunned him. He stepped out of the way and muttered I’m sorry, even though she didn’t even hear him as she sped past him into the early morning dark.

The next morning, when his alarm clock went off, it was about as important as a fly on his arm. He rolled over and went back to sleep, waking up after his mother pounding on his door incessantly hollering get up boy get up boy what’s wrong with you?

For three days in a row, he didn’t go to work. On the fourth day, his mama gently knocked on the door this time.

Son, get up, put your clothes on. There’s some woman out there on the front porch to see you.

***

Helen and Frank

Helen Ann had an incurable penchant for trouble, especially if he was built and blond, with

mischievous emerald eyes. She went through them like a young dog teething chew bones.

She liked a man in clay smeared dungarees, a white muscle shirt and mud-caked, steel-toed

work boots. The idea of a corporate ladder climber in a white shirt and what she cleverly called

a silk noose dangling from his tightly buttoned-up neck, made her shudder. She didn’t do

sissies. Real men need only apply.

And then one day she met Frank. Frank made Clark Kent look wild. He was tall, with gray

overtones in his straight short hair and five o’clock shadow beard. Absurdly, he was an

accountant. He did her taxes and then did her. Although he had the charisma of a baby frog, he

had this electricity that, as Helen Ann told a girlfriend, bolted out of him and wrapped me up like

a Christmas present, bow and all.

One year in, they tied the knot. A honeymoon in Costs Rica and nine months later little Frankie

Jr. popped out. Gradually, Frank changed. It started with him wearing dungarees and cowboy

boots instead of his trademark navy blue polyester knit slacks. The next thing Helen knew Frank

had ditched his professorial eyeglasses for contacts, and come winter he stocked up on

lumberjack-ish flannel shirts. One night he strutted into the living room in his long johns, drinking

a Schlitz beer - and he never drank beer because he was a Chardonnay man - and plopped

down beside her and began grunting like a working-class man. Helen scooted away, appalled

by this sudden alpha male transition.

I’m thinking of switching careers, he announced. I bought a hardhat today.

Three years later he came home on a hot August afternoon and kicked his work boots across

the room and sank into his recliner.

Get me a beer, babe. What’s for dinner? Your man has an appetite. The next time he pulled that

stunt Helen dropped a stiff Banquet chicken pot pie on his TV tray with a slice of white bread on

the side. She then slumped deep into her chair and yawned, Oh, I forgot the butter for your

bread. Can you get it? I’m pooped.

Yeah, it must have worn you out to throw a frozen pie in the microwave and press start, said

Frank, guzzling down the entire can of beer.

Not long after, Helen got custody of Frankie Jr. and a nice child support check arrived every

month. Last she heard, Frank was shacked up in a motel near a construction site, his new doll a

waitress at the Neck Red Diner. One night she put on her favorite bar dress and bee-lined it to

the rotating bar atop the Sheraton, where distinguished men sipped on Jameson neat and coyly

scoped the premises for a woman who could appreciate their style. There she met Wendall

Gavin McCaney IV, an independent attorney specializing in real estate transactions.

Promise me you won’t change, cooed Helen Ann, that you won’t go alpha male blue-collar

redneck on me.

Never, he exclaimed. Those men all stink. Perish the thought. But apparently some thoughts

don’t actually perish and lo and behold, de ja vu and all that, Wendall announced he preferred to

be called Wen, and in a snap he switched from tighty whities to diamond patterned boxer shorts

and started dipping Skoal and spitting into empty coke bottles he stuffed into his back pocket.

After three months of therapy Helen Ann’s shrink rendered a verdict. It’s you, he said. You have

that effect on men.

Several years later she ran into Frank at the mall. He was back to being a white-collar door

stop, crisp white shirt and dull black tie. His eyes gazed through her as they exchanged

pleasantries. Then without warning he spotted a western clothing store.

I’m craving me a skull cap and a big buckled belt he exclaimed, looking surprised at himself for

blurting such a thing. Then he looked into Helen, deep into her steady hazel eyes.

Ohh, he muttered.

Ohh.

The end

My Name is Hal

It was a beautiful sunny morning when dockworker Brandon Stanley showed up for work as he did every weekday morning. His boss had a weird smile as he pointed to a large machine that resembled a forklift on steroids.

What is that thing? asked Brandon.

Not what that thing is, replied his boss. Who is that thing?

Brandon laughed nervously, shuffled his feet.
Its name is Hal said his boss. Hal is going to help you out today.

Do what said Brandon.

You heard me, he's gonna help you out today, now get to work.

Brandon watched as Hal lifted large crates and placed them onto a nearby container. When he leaned in to try to help, that’s when Hal spoke up.

Assistance not required. Please step back for safety.

***

A few weeks later, Brandon sat in a chair and watched Hal load all of the crates onto the container. His boss walked up.

How is he doing there Brandon?

Brandon shook his head and stared at the ground.

***

A group of young women opened the door to the apartment, and immediately pulled in the man who was standing in the doorway in daisy duke blue jeans, and a tank top. As the music blared out of his portable speaker, he began to dance, to gyrate his hips and entertain the birthday girl and her friends who thought they surprised her. One of the women noticed what appeared to be a spot of water under one of the performer’s eyes. He must be sweating already, she thought. But it was then a lot more sweat poured down from his eyes.

Awe, said some of the girls, handing him a box of Kleenex. What’s your name, a cheerful blond asked.

He could barely get the words out, but he answered them.

Hal. My name is Hal, he whispered, wiping his misty eyes.

***