“Don’t you ever check out any books beside books on baseball?” “Try saying that three times fast while holding your tongue.” “Excuse me?” “You said something sarcastic to me, so I thought I’d return the favor.” “But you’re like 8 years old.” “And you’re like 88 years old. Let me check out the kinds of…
Seamus was 31 years old when he stole his first Big Boy statue. Drove it 180 miles south and dumped it in a river. It was big and heavy but no match for his pickup. He chained it down nice and good and took off around 3 in the morning. If anyone had seen him,…
Before gentrification, two rival gangs divided South Newburg. They were the Shirts and the Skins. The Shirts shopped at Banana Republic. The Skins did not. The Shirts consumed large quantities of Orange Julius. The Skins did not. And the Shirts used rocket-propelled grenades while the Skins threw rocks. The Skins were losing until Rambo showed…
Whenever I eat School Days early variety peas, my mind wanders back to when I played football at Bard Military Academy. Pushups in the rain. Coach above me grinding his boot into my back. My face plunging headfirst into a puddle. I cannot feel my toes. Fans trickling in with umbrellas. Mother and Stepfather (Stepfather…
EFG Window Washing, LLC. Cleveland, Ohio. A clear summer day overlooking Lake Erie. Do you like books? One of the things I like about books is their ability to tell stories that make people want to read them over and over again. I studied history in college because history majors are required to read a…
I remember a fortune teller on Pulaski Street named Philomena who pulled in some pretty good business. Her clients were from the neighborhood: teachers, construction workers, stay-at-home moms, never-at-home dads — even Mayor Farley went there during the riots. Philomena was an interesting fortune teller and genuinely nicer than the ones you see on TV.…
“So you see officer, the customer told me he was looking for a fast running shoe. I said, ‘that’s strange, a fast running shoe just came in this morning. I laced it up and put it over there with the rest of the shoes on the wall. Then I left the other one in the…
The street vendor on Literary Road sold three things: hot dogs, Lay’s potato chips and Pepsi-Cola. Four if you counted lively conversation, five if you had the privilege of listening to his radio when Indians games were on. The last two were free as long as you bought one of the first three. In May…
Things weren’t going well for Sigmund, a caricature artist who lived above the bicycle shop downtown. He had very little money. He had no one to love or to be loved. And no one wanted to buy his art. “Quite frankly, it stunk!” said priest and part-time art critic for the Neighborhood News, Father Flanagan…
HELLO PORTLAND! (A pin drops) You have no idea who I am, do you? (Nervous laughter) That’s okay. Neither did I before I came up with what I’m about to tell you. To best understand who I am, I need to tell you about who I was. In order to do that, I need to…
The fireplace kept us warm while we sat on the couch and drank bottles of Little Tom. We would open presents soon. One of the perks of being Polish is that we always open presents on Christmas Eve instead of waiting until morning. In ’65 I would’ve been 6. When you’re 6 years old, anticipation…
I woke up early this morning and wrote a story in that little box they have on Google Translate. Then I sat back and listened to how it sounded in both English and German. Ah, Sundays! After years of trying to eke out a living as a writer in the United States, I went to…
i make words go vroom. 