Endangered Species

"What's stranger," she asked, "projecting human qualities onto a tortoise, or projecting tortoise qualities onto a human?"

Way Up There

I helped my brother build this bike a couple months ago. If I were about four inches taller, I'd have said, "Sorry 'bout your birthday present" and ridden this steed all the way to Maine. By now I'd be there, shucking oysters in a flannel shirt, awash in the hues of fall. In the evenings I'd don the neck muffler my loving wife knit with her delicate hands, button up a tweed coat, eat clam chowder and watch the sailboats drift in. I'd procure a block of briar and follow the grain with my knife while I puffed Peterson Sunset Breeze in a front porch rocking chair. Evening prayers would be completed to the crackling of a fire and Dostoyevsky would send me off to bed. If only I were four inches taller.

I feel like the Joker every time I lick my lips.