Dray
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Snooze was a funny word. Who thought of it? He’d have to look in Mrs. Mueller’s dictionary and see if they gave an etymology for it. He’d get to think about it for the next nine minutes. Why nine minutes? Odd number. And it’s an odd number! He didn’t have nine more minutes, though. More like four. Not a Fantastic Four, either. Just four. He’d hit the funny-worded button on his alarm clock twice already, so he knew it was time to get up. Like the old man in the movie with the house and all the balloons. Except his dog wasn’t named Doug. There was a kid at school named Doug. Nope, his dog was Rusty. Like mom’s Buick. The Buick leaked oil on the driveway like Rusty slobbered all over his mat – every morning you can tell where they’d slept. So they do have some similarities. Except Rusty doesn’t need warming up in the morning. Or his windows scraped. And he can start right away on rainy days. Maybe the Buick would start right away, this morning? It was spring, after all. Finally. Spring has sprung. “A leak,” mom always says after. Sorta like Rusty and the Buick. Everything around here leaked. Speaking of, there’s a reminder of something he needed to take. Not yet, though. It’s so warm under the covers, and it’s still dark out, and he had… two minutes left. Left right left. Left to his own devices he’d have more than two, but he could sleep in on Saturday. Being sleep deprived was okay as long as you knew when your next sleep was coming. Oh, damn, nope, he had 4-H on Saturday. Is that the right way to swear in this circumstance? He was just learning, very tentatively, and trying it out at school, very cautiously. No one in his class had graduated beyond damn, but he’d heard some sixth graders using other, worse, words. None the worse for wear. Though maybe they did get worse for wear. Everything wears down with use. Maybe every damn word does too. There’s a place over in Greene County that has the tagline “Best restaurant by a dam site,” right there out in the open, right on their sign. It’s a sign. Why wouldn’t it be out in the open? He saw it when he got to stay over with Mark last summer, and they went camping over there on the lake and fishing below the dam. It took him a while but he got it. It had to snow twice but he got the drift. There’s not much left to the snowdrifts now. More like snow berms. Or snow mounds. Mini mounds. Snow speed bumps. Dirty snow driftlets. Driftlettes? They were all iced over and shot through with “dirt from three counties” as his grandma would say. Not really snow anymore. Ice drifts. Dirty ice drifts. But ice didn’t drift, it just hangs from the gutter. Where we were all told to keep our minds out of. Why would Mrs. Mueller care if our minds were up in the gutters? She cared, though. When Mark or Brigid or Robbie would say something dirty, she’d get red and tell us to get our minds out of the gutters. I guess our minds would get dirtier with all those dead maple leaves and all that gross water that’s stuck up in our gutter. And we don’t want dirty minds. What makes some things dirty? What makes a mind dirty? Why are some words dirty? Does the word make the mind dirty or the mind make the word dirty? Or doesn’t making them dirty make them dirty? It seemed suspicious. He really had to take a leak now. Some people thought that was dirty. The having to or the saying of? Or both? Why, though? Was anything about everything down there dirty? Grandma said our dirt was beautiful. She’s right – the dirt is so black after a rain after a planting, it’s about the most beautiful thing ever. And that dirty smell. Dirt-y smell. Why was that dirty dirt-y and the body dirty dirty? It was time to get up. Maybe he’d ask about it today at school. Or after Mass. He figured it would just be him and father, since Chris never showed up. Like that house with the old man and all the balloons and the dog named Doug. Damn, Rusty had to take a leak, too. No more funny-worded alarm clock button-hitting. Up!
.
.
Snooze was a funny word. Who thought of it? He’d have to look in Mrs. Mueller’s dictionary and see if they gave an etymology for it. He’d get to think about it for the next nine minutes. Why nine minutes? Odd number. And it’s an odd number! He didn’t have nine more minutes, though. More like four. Not a Fantastic Four, either. Just four. He’d hit the funny-worded button on his alarm clock twice already, so he knew it was time to get up. Like the old man in the movie with the house and all the balloons. Except his dog wasn’t named Doug. There was a kid at school named Doug. Nope, his dog was Rusty. Like mom’s Buick. The Buick leaked oil on the driveway like Rusty slobbered all over his mat – every morning you can tell where they’d slept. So they do have some similarities. Except Rusty doesn’t need warming up in the morning. Or his windows scraped. And he can start right away on rainy days. Maybe the Buick would start right away, this morning? It was spring, after all. Finally. Spring has sprung. “A leak,” mom always says after. Sorta like Rusty and the Buick. Everything around here leaked. Speaking of, there’s a reminder of something he needed to take. Not yet, though. It’s so warm under the covers, and it’s still dark out, and he had… two minutes left. Left right left. Left to his own devices he’d have more than two, but he could sleep in on Saturday. Being sleep deprived was okay as long as you knew when your next sleep was coming. Oh, damn, nope, he had 4-H on Saturday. Is that the right way to swear in this circumstance? He was just learning, very tentatively, and trying it out at school, very cautiously. No one in his class had graduated beyond damn, but he’d heard some sixth graders using other, worse, words. None the worse for wear. Though maybe they did get worse for wear. Everything wears down with use. Maybe every damn word does too. There’s a place over in Greene County that has the tagline “Best restaurant by a dam site,” right there out in the open, right on their sign. It’s a sign. Why wouldn’t it be out in the open? He saw it when he got to stay over with Mark last summer, and they went camping over there on the lake and fishing below the dam. It took him a while but he got it. It had to snow twice but he got the drift. There’s not much left to the snowdrifts now. More like snow berms. Or snow mounds. Mini mounds. Snow speed bumps. Dirty snow driftlets. Driftlettes? They were all iced over and shot through with “dirt from three counties” as his grandma would say. Not really snow anymore. Ice drifts. Dirty ice drifts. But ice didn’t drift, it just hangs from the gutter. Where we were all told to keep our minds out of. Why would Mrs. Mueller care if our minds were up in the gutters? She cared, though. When Mark or Brigid or Robbie would say something dirty, she’d get red and tell us to get our minds out of the gutters. I guess our minds would get dirtier with all those dead maple leaves and all that gross water that’s stuck up in our gutter. And we don’t want dirty minds. What makes some things dirty? What makes a mind dirty? Why are some words dirty? Does the word make the mind dirty or the mind make the word dirty? Or doesn’t making them dirty make them dirty? It seemed suspicious. He really had to take a leak now. Some people thought that was dirty. The having to or the saying of? Or both? Why, though? Was anything about everything down there dirty? Grandma said our dirt was beautiful. She’s right – the dirt is so black after a rain after a planting, it’s about the most beautiful thing ever. And that dirty smell. Dirt-y smell. Why was that dirty dirt-y and the body dirty dirty? It was time to get up. Maybe he’d ask about it today at school. Or after Mass. He figured it would just be him and father, since Chris never showed up. Like that house with the old man and all the balloons and the dog named Doug. Damn, Rusty had to take a leak, too. No more funny-worded alarm clock button-hitting. Up!
.
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