HOLY OAK
“Saw you,” she says. Maria’s an ‘I’ dropper (although she did sort of saw me in half). I’ve called her because imagination won’t let her go. I can imagine her changing her mind, again. I can imagine us together, again. I imagine she’s missing me like I’m missing her, again. Anyway, an update / gut check is needed before I lose a grasp of reality.
“Saw you and your buddy. What’s he doing in the road? Could’ve killed him.”
“That was you!” I was right.
“Went to seven-eleven, saw your car at Oceans and thought I’d peek in behind the Bud Light sign. You were shouting and making a scene so I got back in my car.”
“Why didn’t you stay?”
“-- and do what, watch you piss? It convinced me I made the right choice.”
She’s not convincing. The month separation has merely been a pause, a blink to think.
“Maria, that’s unfair. Did you ever see me drunk? My friend’s got a similar situation and it opened the scars I’ve got from that barbed wire around Maria-ville.”
“I need to go.” She’s softening.
“Well, then…” I start to say. Maria’s still a possibility. Talking with her definitely reduces the craziness of not knowing, of having feelings with nowhere to go. I hang up. It’s a nanosecond decision, a spontaneous test to see if she cares enough to call back.
She doesn’t call back.
Roman’s plight is much worse.
“There’s a significant hole in my chest,” he’s saying, “no, not in my chest, in my head.”
“That -- when our eyes lock it’s like docking into soul -- started because some of the women in the office noticed that my eyes change colors. They had a game -- that’s why Brenda kept looking. I thought it was me. She’s looking at the color of my fucking eyes! The women get together and talk about how my eyes change with the weather. Blue, hazel, or turquoise – she completely bamboozled me.”
“How’d you find that out?”
“Pat, our office manager, had a fortieth birthday party at lunch today. I tried to do something that might impress Brenda with my cleverness. I made a large sign –
PAT: HAVE A THOUGHTFUL AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
All four of the letter T’s are exaggerated, you know, to visually show forty, four T’s. I also gave her a cup with four tea bags. Four teas, forty. Duh! I felt like a fucking jerk. Thanks for the tea, Blake. When I explained the visual pun, the joke, that didn’t help any. Blake, that’s interesting. Want some cake? I didn’t bother to take out the four golf tees. Instead they got squished quietly in my hand until it hurt as much as I felt.”
“Where was Brenda?”
“Right next to me. Didn’t say a goddamn thing, except …your eyes are funny… Am I that out of touch? You were right, I should have told her straight on. Subterfuge doesn’t work. I’m obscure, a ridiculous imbecile. I don’t know how to withdraw from such a misunderstanding. I thought she was looking in me, not at me. All I see is how kind and gentle and beautiful she is. I don’t see that she’s married, that she’s not interested, that she sees me as a weather vane!”
Now we’re at Holy Oak, a poetry joint / dance performance / art center. It’s open mic night. Inspired by our Saturday night howl, Roman asked Max and me to come along for his first public reading so we can watch him Blake everyone with his “magical misery tour,” as Max calls it.
Max has his own problems, his own battle. He has an Achilles heal kidney that was CT scanned today. The radiologist found a cluster of calcium deposits in the center of his kidney. It’ll be non-stop kidney stones from here to eternity.
So Max’s down, I’m feeling lowly, and Roman’s even lower. Our newly organized MSG (movable support group) is going with the flow though; we’ll be cresting at Holy Oak tonight. This is only the second time we’ve been together outside of Oceans, the first being last night. For three non-joiners, it’s a significant step forward socially. Lamenting losers incorporated.
Holy Oak is named after a tree that withstood a direct hit from a lightning bolt. That very tree is the center pillar of this wood and glass (and leaky) building, built around 1960. Tonight’s Holy Oak clientele is a mixture of the depressed, the repressed, the regressed, the overstressed and the underdressed. Essed. It’s a shelter for sensitive survivors. It’s a tree house above the flatlanders who steamroll dreams.
Roman in his blue Hawaiian shirt, white khaki pants, black Addidas all-purpose gym shoes, steps up to the platform stage and finger taps the mic like he’s knocking on a door. The audience looks to see who it is.
“Good evening,” he says, a slight echo reverberates. “I’m Blake and I have ah some poems I’d like to ah share with you…” He coughs, clears his throat, stares out into the thirty-headed crowd, “Most autobiography crashes with reality – so most writing is ah little fact, a little fiction –“
The crowd seems to open its collective screen door but I make a mental note to tell him to drop the cleverness and get to the point. Roman’s tone is soft and genuine and seems to go over okay. There’s a bit of reflective quiet in the room.
He reads a poem called, “Spring Hunger,” ending with --
… winsome clouds erase blue from above
the day is hazed with a need to …
He pauses to let the listeners fill in the rhyme, above/ love, but then proceeds to substitute “eat.” This maneuver causes a nice reaction, a muted crowd pleaser at being different. I watched the audience’s mostly focused listening which ends with their sporadic, exhaled I-get-it sounds, the kind that comes out of the nose staccato-like. Above/love is clichéd and overused, but it still works, even when not used.
Roman points to the moonlight shafting through the skylight, and becomes more animated --
full moon high
It’s a snow cone moon; it’s an egg white eye.
It’s a mashed potato, it’s a cauliflower spy,
it’s a round of cheese, it’s a Pillsbury guy,
It’s a meringue disk, it’s a cream puff rye,
it’s a cracker balloon, it’s a macaroon pie.
it’s a vanilla scoop in a blackberry sky.
It’s a confectionary face of a dish to try
It’s a big fat teat for a hungry I
This one goes over much better. He had it memorized and delivered it with a sense of humor. The audience prefers this beat and rhyme. The sand dune dolly’s are right after all. He’s a hit with a couple of the clit crowd. I wonder if they can see his eyes.
“This was finished just last night,” he says waving to us, leading into the next poem. He is relaxed and confident. The barrier to the broken-hearted disillusioned is open to his charms now.
The Goal
Bursting bud beautiful, Fragrant and fragile,
Genuine and gentle smile.
You are where I want always to be.
The balm in a breeze, the calm of the seas.
The far-reaching, ever-close, forever-more isle.
When our eyes lock it’s like docking into soul.
To be with you is privilege, for you are the goal.
Is this goal, this longing that never seems to be fulfilled, is it worth the trouble? I’ve loved and have been loved, but that just seems to be a meeting point, a common ground, a ring to hold on to while life continues its spin out of control. Is it centering that’s important? Is love the quest to find a safe zone apart from the boundless, haphazard collection of possibilities? When we need centering, we fall in love. When we are centered we can lean out into the heavy traffic of illusion and not get injured seriously. How has Maria become my centering?
Roman extends a brief, humble bow that marks the end of his performance. The Holy Oakies give him a dignified applause. People appreciate the opportunity to improve their sensibilities at the expense of someone else’s unrequited misfortunes. Real art comes from real suffering.
Max and I clap like trained gorillas, palms thudding loudly, awkwardly overshadowing the polite tapping of the other spectators. He is our friend, they are not, yet. Roman gives us a wave as he leaves the stage and almost cracks his head on one of Holy Oak’s knobby elbows.
The next poet emerges from the audience. There’s no set order here. When you’re ready, go. She’s gothic, black leather and silver rivets, and has trouble adjusting her bootstraps. She eyes Roman returning to the folding chair between Max and me. All roads lead to Roman. The three of us converge in a hushed discussion.
“Bring it on!” Max says, winks at me, as we greet our slightly red-faced friend.
“The Sounds of Love,” Ms. Gothic announces calmly and begins a performance piece that starts with the swelling breaths of foreplay, moves into orgasmic joy, and then metamorphoses into an extended scream sounding like brakes being slammed at Daytona.
She collapses on the stage and gets a standing ovation.
Almost immediately a young man, picture a clone of Ms Gothic, and evidently known to her from the way they exchange tongues on stage, announces his own vision:
Basic Instructions:
The things I do for me (like poke, poo, and pee) come so naturally.
But the things I do for you (like stroke, feel, and fool) takes a mental tool.
You need to tame and train my brain, Jane
He ends with a Tarzan scream Ah ah ah…. This also gets the audience rocking. There’s a bit of an inside joke and a wink between Jane Gothic and Tarzan on stage. We are ready to leave, but he starts into another –
To be perfectly Frank
Men need to fuck.
A woman pulling pleasure
Silky skin in and out, especially in
Breasts like mounds of morphine.
Hormone-driven joyride
Species deliverance
Survival of the fuckers
Men will marry, will vary, will cheat, lie, deceive,
Will destroy themselves for sex,
That’s what Frank says.
I’m not like that, he says, I love you, you’re special honey.
And she believes him…
Jane Gothic and Frank Tarzan. Nude voices for the 21st Century.
Wishin’ and hopin’ and prayin’ and plannin’… an oldie goldie is playing on the car radio. Its bottom-line wisdom: stop dreaming and do something …squeeze her and tell her that you care…
“Maria!”
I’ve shouted suddenly, alone. It helps. No one’s looking. Roman’s riding in Max’s beat up-but-reliable-with-ongoing-loving-maintenance Toy(someone has scratched out the ota) truck; we’re to meet up at Oceans to celebrate. But first I need to do something --
“MARIA!”
This scream is much louder and more dramatic. At 65 miles per hour, that’s about a quarter mile long. Not good enough.
“MARIA!!!”
Vein popping, jaw dropping, diaphragm depleting, as-loud-and-as-long-as-humanly possible scream. There. Easily a record-setting thoroughly-bled thoroughbred distance. I’m sweating.
A kid in a passing blue Lexus did a double-take wondering what kind of weird song I’m mimicking. I’m screaming down the interstate, pal. Romantic Road rage radio. Personal private performance piece. Where else can you release such hot gasses without hurting anyone? A car is a portable screaming booth. There must be a law about this type of vehicular behavior, but I don’t use a cell phone while driving, so we’re even in my book, officer.
I’m a little less stressed, but my throat is raw, like the craving I have for Maria.
I’d love to cry. Crying is nature’s way to lubricate the senses, rinse out the eyes. I try to oblige, but tear ducts seemed to have dried up from an unknown drought. The best I can do is whine, which sounds like a kicked puppy moaning Maria.
So here we are at Oceans. Sports Round-Up is muted on the hanging monitor; ticker-tape captions ribbon with the movement of the announcer’s lips. We stand at the bar and try to put the past few days into perspective.
“Three days of the contour” Max says, referring to the outlines of our current lives. Max and his rolling stones. Roman and his mannequin muse. Me and my marvelous Maria. Roman sums it up: Win some; Lose some; Lonesome. He thinks Kurt Vonnegut may have written that already, if not, he’s adding to his own collected works.
Max has been telling Charlene, the Sunday/Monday bartender and nursing school drop-out, about his ailments. Charlene says to him, “They’ll obliterate the stones with shock waves and that will be that. No need to worry. It’s not life-threatening. And I think PSA constantly fluctuates. Just keep an eye on it and you should be fine.”
Max smiles at this prognosis and says, “You’re a first rate bar doctor. You phd in nicely – that’s P H D phd – phd in nicely. Let’s have another round for my friends here.” Max looks noticeably healthier suddenly.
“Was Brenda worth the trouble?” I need to know. What I’m actually saying is – can you tell me if Marta has been worth the trouble?
“Of course.” Roman says with a smirky smile. Muses are there for the taking.
“Writing will always outlast relations.” Max notes.
“Brenda’s not the enda things,” Roman says buoyantly while bobbing at the top of his draft, “Confidence is an interesting phenomenon.”
“You did real well, gladiator,” Max says, hand on Roman’s shoulder.
I watch the two of them, strangers a few days ago, and I feel good, I feel a part of something, I feel connected, I feel hopeful, I feel. I’m feeling again, that sonar cell for love and truth is up and running.
Maria had rejected me, us. But what is rejection? Sometimes when we are rejected it’s because the other person fears rejection. If a father has left during childhood, the abandoned child will fear male rejection as an adult, will often take an easy route to a relationship rather than risking rejection again, will often seek out someone like her father to mend the past hurt. But once that therapeutic relation’s uncovered, the marriage loses its binding power. And if that couple has children of their own, it’s flashback difficult to leave this ‘safe’ marriage, even though, in Maria’s case, she realizes the deepest part of her heart wants to be elsewhere. That’s Maria. That is her situation.
I know that she loves me. I know it. Just as she knows that I love her, that the sun hides at night, that the earth will rotate, that soon, sooner than later, if Charles and Camilla can do it, if the Red Sox can do it (and they did!), so can we.
Sometimes it takes a thrillion rotations to work out the bugs.
ROTATIONS, Chapter Three: Holy Oak © 2005 by John Kirkmire, © 2013 KIRKWORKSHOP, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
return to stories page
“Saw you,” she says. Maria’s an ‘I’ dropper (although she did sort of saw me in half). I’ve called her because imagination won’t let her go. I can imagine her changing her mind, again. I can imagine us together, again. I imagine she’s missing me like I’m missing her, again. Anyway, an update / gut check is needed before I lose a grasp of reality.
“Saw you and your buddy. What’s he doing in the road? Could’ve killed him.”
“That was you!” I was right.
“Went to seven-eleven, saw your car at Oceans and thought I’d peek in behind the Bud Light sign. You were shouting and making a scene so I got back in my car.”
“Why didn’t you stay?”
“-- and do what, watch you piss? It convinced me I made the right choice.”
She’s not convincing. The month separation has merely been a pause, a blink to think.
“Maria, that’s unfair. Did you ever see me drunk? My friend’s got a similar situation and it opened the scars I’ve got from that barbed wire around Maria-ville.”
“I need to go.” She’s softening.
“Well, then…” I start to say. Maria’s still a possibility. Talking with her definitely reduces the craziness of not knowing, of having feelings with nowhere to go. I hang up. It’s a nanosecond decision, a spontaneous test to see if she cares enough to call back.
She doesn’t call back.
Roman’s plight is much worse.
“There’s a significant hole in my chest,” he’s saying, “no, not in my chest, in my head.”
“That -- when our eyes lock it’s like docking into soul -- started because some of the women in the office noticed that my eyes change colors. They had a game -- that’s why Brenda kept looking. I thought it was me. She’s looking at the color of my fucking eyes! The women get together and talk about how my eyes change with the weather. Blue, hazel, or turquoise – she completely bamboozled me.”
“How’d you find that out?”
“Pat, our office manager, had a fortieth birthday party at lunch today. I tried to do something that might impress Brenda with my cleverness. I made a large sign –
PAT: HAVE A THOUGHTFUL AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY.
All four of the letter T’s are exaggerated, you know, to visually show forty, four T’s. I also gave her a cup with four tea bags. Four teas, forty. Duh! I felt like a fucking jerk. Thanks for the tea, Blake. When I explained the visual pun, the joke, that didn’t help any. Blake, that’s interesting. Want some cake? I didn’t bother to take out the four golf tees. Instead they got squished quietly in my hand until it hurt as much as I felt.”
“Where was Brenda?”
“Right next to me. Didn’t say a goddamn thing, except …your eyes are funny… Am I that out of touch? You were right, I should have told her straight on. Subterfuge doesn’t work. I’m obscure, a ridiculous imbecile. I don’t know how to withdraw from such a misunderstanding. I thought she was looking in me, not at me. All I see is how kind and gentle and beautiful she is. I don’t see that she’s married, that she’s not interested, that she sees me as a weather vane!”
Now we’re at Holy Oak, a poetry joint / dance performance / art center. It’s open mic night. Inspired by our Saturday night howl, Roman asked Max and me to come along for his first public reading so we can watch him Blake everyone with his “magical misery tour,” as Max calls it.
Max has his own problems, his own battle. He has an Achilles heal kidney that was CT scanned today. The radiologist found a cluster of calcium deposits in the center of his kidney. It’ll be non-stop kidney stones from here to eternity.
So Max’s down, I’m feeling lowly, and Roman’s even lower. Our newly organized MSG (movable support group) is going with the flow though; we’ll be cresting at Holy Oak tonight. This is only the second time we’ve been together outside of Oceans, the first being last night. For three non-joiners, it’s a significant step forward socially. Lamenting losers incorporated.
Holy Oak is named after a tree that withstood a direct hit from a lightning bolt. That very tree is the center pillar of this wood and glass (and leaky) building, built around 1960. Tonight’s Holy Oak clientele is a mixture of the depressed, the repressed, the regressed, the overstressed and the underdressed. Essed. It’s a shelter for sensitive survivors. It’s a tree house above the flatlanders who steamroll dreams.
Roman in his blue Hawaiian shirt, white khaki pants, black Addidas all-purpose gym shoes, steps up to the platform stage and finger taps the mic like he’s knocking on a door. The audience looks to see who it is.
“Good evening,” he says, a slight echo reverberates. “I’m Blake and I have ah some poems I’d like to ah share with you…” He coughs, clears his throat, stares out into the thirty-headed crowd, “Most autobiography crashes with reality – so most writing is ah little fact, a little fiction –“
The crowd seems to open its collective screen door but I make a mental note to tell him to drop the cleverness and get to the point. Roman’s tone is soft and genuine and seems to go over okay. There’s a bit of reflective quiet in the room.
He reads a poem called, “Spring Hunger,” ending with --
… winsome clouds erase blue from above
the day is hazed with a need to …
He pauses to let the listeners fill in the rhyme, above/ love, but then proceeds to substitute “eat.” This maneuver causes a nice reaction, a muted crowd pleaser at being different. I watched the audience’s mostly focused listening which ends with their sporadic, exhaled I-get-it sounds, the kind that comes out of the nose staccato-like. Above/love is clichéd and overused, but it still works, even when not used.
Roman points to the moonlight shafting through the skylight, and becomes more animated --
full moon high
It’s a snow cone moon; it’s an egg white eye.
It’s a mashed potato, it’s a cauliflower spy,
it’s a round of cheese, it’s a Pillsbury guy,
It’s a meringue disk, it’s a cream puff rye,
it’s a cracker balloon, it’s a macaroon pie.
it’s a vanilla scoop in a blackberry sky.
It’s a confectionary face of a dish to try
It’s a big fat teat for a hungry I
This one goes over much better. He had it memorized and delivered it with a sense of humor. The audience prefers this beat and rhyme. The sand dune dolly’s are right after all. He’s a hit with a couple of the clit crowd. I wonder if they can see his eyes.
“This was finished just last night,” he says waving to us, leading into the next poem. He is relaxed and confident. The barrier to the broken-hearted disillusioned is open to his charms now.
The Goal
Bursting bud beautiful, Fragrant and fragile,
Genuine and gentle smile.
You are where I want always to be.
The balm in a breeze, the calm of the seas.
The far-reaching, ever-close, forever-more isle.
When our eyes lock it’s like docking into soul.
To be with you is privilege, for you are the goal.
Is this goal, this longing that never seems to be fulfilled, is it worth the trouble? I’ve loved and have been loved, but that just seems to be a meeting point, a common ground, a ring to hold on to while life continues its spin out of control. Is it centering that’s important? Is love the quest to find a safe zone apart from the boundless, haphazard collection of possibilities? When we need centering, we fall in love. When we are centered we can lean out into the heavy traffic of illusion and not get injured seriously. How has Maria become my centering?
Roman extends a brief, humble bow that marks the end of his performance. The Holy Oakies give him a dignified applause. People appreciate the opportunity to improve their sensibilities at the expense of someone else’s unrequited misfortunes. Real art comes from real suffering.
Max and I clap like trained gorillas, palms thudding loudly, awkwardly overshadowing the polite tapping of the other spectators. He is our friend, they are not, yet. Roman gives us a wave as he leaves the stage and almost cracks his head on one of Holy Oak’s knobby elbows.
The next poet emerges from the audience. There’s no set order here. When you’re ready, go. She’s gothic, black leather and silver rivets, and has trouble adjusting her bootstraps. She eyes Roman returning to the folding chair between Max and me. All roads lead to Roman. The three of us converge in a hushed discussion.
“Bring it on!” Max says, winks at me, as we greet our slightly red-faced friend.
“The Sounds of Love,” Ms. Gothic announces calmly and begins a performance piece that starts with the swelling breaths of foreplay, moves into orgasmic joy, and then metamorphoses into an extended scream sounding like brakes being slammed at Daytona.
She collapses on the stage and gets a standing ovation.
Almost immediately a young man, picture a clone of Ms Gothic, and evidently known to her from the way they exchange tongues on stage, announces his own vision:
Basic Instructions:
The things I do for me (like poke, poo, and pee) come so naturally.
But the things I do for you (like stroke, feel, and fool) takes a mental tool.
You need to tame and train my brain, Jane
He ends with a Tarzan scream Ah ah ah…. This also gets the audience rocking. There’s a bit of an inside joke and a wink between Jane Gothic and Tarzan on stage. We are ready to leave, but he starts into another –
To be perfectly Frank
Men need to fuck.
A woman pulling pleasure
Silky skin in and out, especially in
Breasts like mounds of morphine.
Hormone-driven joyride
Species deliverance
Survival of the fuckers
Men will marry, will vary, will cheat, lie, deceive,
Will destroy themselves for sex,
That’s what Frank says.
I’m not like that, he says, I love you, you’re special honey.
And she believes him…
Jane Gothic and Frank Tarzan. Nude voices for the 21st Century.
Wishin’ and hopin’ and prayin’ and plannin’… an oldie goldie is playing on the car radio. Its bottom-line wisdom: stop dreaming and do something …squeeze her and tell her that you care…
“Maria!”
I’ve shouted suddenly, alone. It helps. No one’s looking. Roman’s riding in Max’s beat up-but-reliable-with-ongoing-loving-maintenance Toy(someone has scratched out the ota) truck; we’re to meet up at Oceans to celebrate. But first I need to do something --
“MARIA!”
This scream is much louder and more dramatic. At 65 miles per hour, that’s about a quarter mile long. Not good enough.
“MARIA!!!”
Vein popping, jaw dropping, diaphragm depleting, as-loud-and-as-long-as-humanly possible scream. There. Easily a record-setting thoroughly-bled thoroughbred distance. I’m sweating.
A kid in a passing blue Lexus did a double-take wondering what kind of weird song I’m mimicking. I’m screaming down the interstate, pal. Romantic Road rage radio. Personal private performance piece. Where else can you release such hot gasses without hurting anyone? A car is a portable screaming booth. There must be a law about this type of vehicular behavior, but I don’t use a cell phone while driving, so we’re even in my book, officer.
I’m a little less stressed, but my throat is raw, like the craving I have for Maria.
I’d love to cry. Crying is nature’s way to lubricate the senses, rinse out the eyes. I try to oblige, but tear ducts seemed to have dried up from an unknown drought. The best I can do is whine, which sounds like a kicked puppy moaning Maria.
So here we are at Oceans. Sports Round-Up is muted on the hanging monitor; ticker-tape captions ribbon with the movement of the announcer’s lips. We stand at the bar and try to put the past few days into perspective.
“Three days of the contour” Max says, referring to the outlines of our current lives. Max and his rolling stones. Roman and his mannequin muse. Me and my marvelous Maria. Roman sums it up: Win some; Lose some; Lonesome. He thinks Kurt Vonnegut may have written that already, if not, he’s adding to his own collected works.
Max has been telling Charlene, the Sunday/Monday bartender and nursing school drop-out, about his ailments. Charlene says to him, “They’ll obliterate the stones with shock waves and that will be that. No need to worry. It’s not life-threatening. And I think PSA constantly fluctuates. Just keep an eye on it and you should be fine.”
Max smiles at this prognosis and says, “You’re a first rate bar doctor. You phd in nicely – that’s P H D phd – phd in nicely. Let’s have another round for my friends here.” Max looks noticeably healthier suddenly.
“Was Brenda worth the trouble?” I need to know. What I’m actually saying is – can you tell me if Marta has been worth the trouble?
“Of course.” Roman says with a smirky smile. Muses are there for the taking.
“Writing will always outlast relations.” Max notes.
“Brenda’s not the enda things,” Roman says buoyantly while bobbing at the top of his draft, “Confidence is an interesting phenomenon.”
“You did real well, gladiator,” Max says, hand on Roman’s shoulder.
I watch the two of them, strangers a few days ago, and I feel good, I feel a part of something, I feel connected, I feel hopeful, I feel. I’m feeling again, that sonar cell for love and truth is up and running.
Maria had rejected me, us. But what is rejection? Sometimes when we are rejected it’s because the other person fears rejection. If a father has left during childhood, the abandoned child will fear male rejection as an adult, will often take an easy route to a relationship rather than risking rejection again, will often seek out someone like her father to mend the past hurt. But once that therapeutic relation’s uncovered, the marriage loses its binding power. And if that couple has children of their own, it’s flashback difficult to leave this ‘safe’ marriage, even though, in Maria’s case, she realizes the deepest part of her heart wants to be elsewhere. That’s Maria. That is her situation.
I know that she loves me. I know it. Just as she knows that I love her, that the sun hides at night, that the earth will rotate, that soon, sooner than later, if Charles and Camilla can do it, if the Red Sox can do it (and they did!), so can we.
Sometimes it takes a thrillion rotations to work out the bugs.
ROTATIONS, Chapter Three: Holy Oak © 2005 by John Kirkmire, © 2013 KIRKWORKSHOP, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
return to stories page