Manic Monday #9: Spring

Just going to make this one in. It's been a rough week, sick and still having to work, but I don't want to go into that here. This week's Manic Monday is Spring. It made me think of a story I had written years ago, my homage to the great Ray Bradbury in effect. I've posted the beginning of the story, I'm revising it as I go, it's been a long time ago and while it actually is holding up better than I thought, there are a few corrections I need to make. It's actually one of the first lines I posted in a previous Thirteen Thursdays about hookers. I recycle everything. I hope to finish the story, it's a fairly long one and post it soon.

The Oscar Zoroaster Phadrig Isaac Norman Henkle Emmannuel Ambroise Diggs Traveling Circus And Unusual Sideshows

It was a special type of day, because it was a special time of year. The day was the tenth, which had nothing to do with it; the month was April, which had a lot to do with it. It was not yet summer, the season was the midst of spring, the icy fingers of winter had been left behind. It was that time of year when the weather was caught in transit; the sun did not burn and the wind did not chill. Rather the sun did what it was created for; the rays of the huge golden orb in the sky provided warmth. The winds that always blew at this time of the year were made of half of the sun's warmth and half of the remembrance of winters gone by. The cool wind was just enough to offset the heat of the sun and make you glad to be alive.

There was more to make this day different, this season of spring wonderfully special. The beauty of the land was highlighted like at no other time. The grass was the color of joy and the sky the color of happiness. The clouds in the sky were big and puffy, they looked more like islands in the sky than an accumulation of water vapor. The lake was as clear and perfect as an unblemished mirror.

Birds sang merrily overhead. The sound of the family of beavers that lived at the other end of the lake reached my ears. Further off in the woods sounded the roar of some wild beast.
It was spring eternal.

Here in the midst of all this beauty and joy I sat with a scowl on my face. With all this life surrounding me I brooded. What was I doing here? I wondered such thoughts for the ten thousandth time since dawn. Alone I was, in a cabin in the middle of the woods by a lake, which in itself was in the middle of nowhere. Only ten miles or so from here as the crow flies was Cowley, my hometown, which was nowhere itself.

This had all started out as a return to the place of my birth. The conquering hero returns home. And that was me, the conquering hero in a nutshell. Local boy makes good the headlines would have read if the people had cared. I had left Cowley poor as beggar and returned as a millionaire. But in the process I had lost something, and I was now on a backwards search through my life in hopes of finding it, whatever it was that I had lost. But Cowley provided only a resting place in my search, and a poor one at that. The people were indifferent to my success and thus to me. All they wanted to talk about was of the years that I had lived there and nothing of the time spent away from the town.

So I had hired a jeep, and a cabin, and came here, in solitude. I was close enough to Cowley in my mind to believe that I had kept my promise to myself to spend a couple of weeks there and far enough away that I didn't have to deal with it.

I sat in a rocker that had been there when I arrived and stared out across the lake. A duck flew down and alighted on the surface of the water and I was glad I was not a hunting man. I watched in something akin to the fascination of a child as the duck paddled around on the mirror surface of the lake. What was so unusual about a duck I asked myself? And I knew the answer lay in the not asking of the question, so I cursed my city breed cynicism.

The wind shifted from the east and the smell of daisies blooming to the west and new smells. Smells that baffled my inquiring nose and yet still managed to make my mouth water with anticipation. Smells that I could not place, smells that I knew but could give no name to. It was then, when I realized that the smells were familiar yet unrecognizable that I placed them. Popcorn and cotton candy, straw and sweat. Smells from a country fair that Cowley was putting on? But I thought that Cowley lay to the North of my cabin. Ah, no matter where the smells came from the memories they brought back were enough to satisfy me. I remembered when I was eleven, or perhaps twelve, and the month was the same as it was now. School was out, which is in itself enough for boys to celebrate, for Easter vacation, but we had more to be glad about. The Turner Five Ring Traveling Circus and Freak Show was coming to Cowley. There is nothing in the world that excites a boy as much as a circus.

It was the first day of vacation and my best friend, Jimmy and I were watching them set up the tents for the show. We could not wait for the show to begin, just imagine five rings! That was always the pride of Mister Turner, that his circus had five rings. What he did not tell you was that the five rings contained no more than the normal three and probably not as much as the average sideshow. The six or seven hours till the first show seemed an eternity to our youthful minds, so we did what any boys would do in our situation and sneaked down among the circus workers. While we were sneaking around we passed a trailer with the door ajar. One look at Jimmy and I knew that he was thinking the same thing I was. Using all the skills we had acquired within our twelve years we crept up the open door and peered inside. It took our eyes a few seconds to adjust to the gloom the inside of the trailer was, when they did we gasped in shock.

There seated at a dressing table was a man making himself into Leo the Lion Man. My child mind recalled that a few of the circus performers were supposed to appear downtown today and Leo was among them. Thus his early preparations. But Leo was supposed to be half lion and half man, and all crazy; when he appeared downtown he would do so in a cage. As we watched Leo took a drag on a cigar and put it in an ashtray as he applied more makeup. Leo, one of the best exhibits was a fake.

After a minute or so of watching this man apply the mane to his neck we left. We broke and ran, leaving the circus far behind until we came to our favorite hiding place deep within the woods. We sat for long minutes without speaking, the shock had been too great. We were at an age that we openly disbelieved in all the wonders of the circus, but secretly longed for them to be true. Jimmy was the first to speak. “I knew it all along.”

I stood from my chair and rubbed at my eyes. My though patterns were chaotic. I had begun with a pleasant memory and it ended up with one of the worst moments of my childhood, when I realized that there was no magic in the world. I walked down the steps of the cabin and headed towards the lake. My mood was terrible, but the world did its best to cheer me up. The air sparkled and to my trained eye there seemed to be magic in the clouds. Except I stopped believing in magic when I was twelve.

I was watching a duck struggle with a fish as I approached the lake. My gaze was ahead, which explains why I did not see my visitor approach. It was not until I was at the shore of the lake when I heard a sound to my right, the noise of a chicken scratching the ground for food. I turned and that was exactly what stood before me. A chicken.

“You're a long way from home, chickie.” At least ten miles, as far as I knew, there were no farms between here and Crowley. And this chicken did not look wild, she was too well kept to look the part of even a farm bird. She looked more like a pet, she even had a bow wrapped around her neck, and for the life of me I could not understand how a pet had wandered this far from home. Or to be honest who would have a chicken as a pet.

“A lot farther than you think, Bud.”

My thoughts stopped. Any word that I was about to utter died on my tongue. Had this chicken actually talked? No, impossible. I've been by myself too long. Talking to myself and now I'm hearing chickens talk.

“Didn't your Mother teach you any manners? Where I come from it's considered polite to speak when spoken to.”