Making popcorn again, huh, Snoopy? Keep it up. Sounds like pure nostalgia, especially with the way this year’s been going.
I bet Linus would’ve called those popping kernels “little pangs of painful joy,” or something equally poetic, but of course, he’s not coming this year. Not after his meaning-of-Christmas bit took a turn to the right last winter. I guess the community access TV video went viral, and he’s booked solid through the spring with CPAC.
Good grief. This year feels heavier, doesn’t it? Heavy in the air, in the bare grocery aisles, in the empty pit of our stomachs. Heavy in the way people say, “It’s okay, we’ll make do,” but their eyes say they’re ready to boil their best friend alive for sustenance.
Sorry. We’re not there yet. Although I do wonder why we haven’t seen Frieda’s cat, Faron, in a while. And sometimes I look at Woodstock and think, just academically, “Rotisserie ready.” Lucy charged me ten cents to work through that one.
Anyway—we need a bird, right? So, I went to the store. Yeah, the one by the old, abandoned mall that’s an immigrant detention center now. Still no turkeys, so it looks like we’re improvising again. Everyone’s on board. Scraping things together in their own way.
Lucy, bless her heart, said we can boil the football, or at least let me kick it a few times to tenderize the leather. Apparently, if you shred a ball down real fine, it’ll pass through our digestive tracts a bit easier.
Franklin’s in dire straits. He’s bringing a jellybean. Just the one. Schroeder’s got paper cups handled because he found some wedged in a drainage culvert outside the community center where the water trucks line up.
Look, radical honesty: At my lowest point, I did think, “Woodstock is right there.” That happened. I’m not proud. The thought passed like a cloud. A hungry, flappy cloud. But it passed. He’s cherished. Not a garnish. Cherished, not garnish. That’s the mantra Lucy gave me. Then she said we should probably be meeting more than once a week.
Someone said the Little Red-Haired Girl secured cranberry sauce, and I turned the same shade of red just thinking about her. Right, the canned kind. With the rings, like a tree marking time in years of abundance. Then she texted that she’d found a place with working electricity and potable water and was going there instead. I’m coping. Suppose it helps that Spike is rolling in an empty oil drum so we can burn the sweaters and heavy coats we don’t need now that it’s eighty-five degrees in November. It all balances out.
Peppermint Patty committed to bringing “meat” without going into detail. She’s been in a tree stand for the last few days with a .30-06 and hollow points she got for her seventh birthday. I started to ask her about the cat, but then Frieda started tearing up, so I put a pin in that for now.
Our teacher, Ms. Othmar, may swing by, though I’d prefer she not. I’m having trouble understanding her now too. It’s all “Wah wah slavery never happened, wah wah inflation is a psyop, wah wah Maduro controls the weather.” And the Ten Commandments were an interesting choice. Nothing like reading “Thou shalt not kill” on the wall as your teacher cleans and oils her Beretta at snack time.
To quote a pre-manosphere Linus, it brings me great joy to see everyone contributing. The refurbished Solo cups. Football leather consommé. A lean protein source that remains, at this moment, theoretical. Haha! I’m kidding, Woodstock. I’m kidding. What a blockhead.
Gah! I should head out. Get some air. Maybe head over to Lucy’s. I’m gonna be out fifteen cents this time, but it’s for the best.
