How I feel.

This is exactly how I feel right now. Exactly.

The Christ Hammer

When I heard the news about this today... it made me feel safer.

Thank God. Literally.

-M

The Budget

This was a play written in 2004, later produced and performed live at Middle Tennessee State University. It's The Budget. I can't really say anything else... besides that I really, really enjoyed writing this. Let me know if you dig it.

-M

___________________________________________

SETTING: We are in a small room resembling a living room, but not quite authentic enough. There is a couch in the center and a few generic pictures on the walls behind it. There is no coffee table, no chairs, only the couch and a big potted plant in the corner.

(Two men, RODNEY OUTLAW and PEDRO are sitting on a couch. RODNEY, who is around 35, skinny, and intense, is diligently concentrating on a piece of paper. He has a calculator, paper and pencil and is extremely focused on his work. PEDRO, who is 23, mexican and bald, curiously stares at him. PEDRO wants very much to talk to him, but can’t bring himself to say anything since RODNEY is in such deep focused concentration. Finally after a few moments he decides to speak. RODNEY never looks up from his work.)

PEDRO
Hey Rodney?

RODNEY
Yes Pedro?

PEDRO
What are you doing?

RODNEY
Working on my budget.

PEDRO
What’s a budget?

RODNEY
I have to see what my financial limits are, and I have
to be sure that I don’t cross those limits.

(Pedro says nothing, just stares at the paper)

RODNEY (Continued)
(politely explaining) If I were to go beyond the
bounds of my financial limits, then I would surely
exceed my account balance and I would have a bit
of a problem on my hands.

PEDRO
So how come you have a...what’s it called again?

RODNEY
A budget.

PEDRO
Yeah, how come you have one?

RODNEY
It’s important.

PEDRO
For what?

RODNEY
For my finances.

PEDRO
What’s finances?

RODNEY
Finances are money.

PEDRO
Cool.

RODNEY
Yup.

PEDRO
How much finances do you have?

RODNEY
Right now my account balance seems to be at a
grand total of 37 dollars and 52 cents. But I still
have to add that money that we found under the couch
last Tuesday, so it should roughly come to around
38 dollars and three cents.

PEDRO
Cool.

RODNEY
Yes it is.

PEDRO
I found some money over there by the plant the
other day.

RODNEY
What?

PEDRO
Over there by the plant.

RODNEY
And you didn’t tell me?

PEDRO
I forgot.

RODNEY
Pedro. Are you telling me that you found money next
to the plant and you didn’t say anything to me about it?

PEDRO
Yeah, I forgot.

RODNEY
Why wasn't I informed about this money?

PEDRO
I told you I forgot.

(Rodney puts down his pencil and paper, and turns to Pedro, putting his hands on his shoulders, looking into his eyes like a parent to a child)

RODNEY
Pedro, listen to me. Are you listening?

PEDRO
Yeah.

RODNEY
If you ever find money like that again, it’s very
important that you tell me right away, okay?

PEDRO
Okay.

RODNEY
If you’re playing, you better stop whatever you’re doing
and bring me the money as fast as you can, is that clear?

PEDRO
(Nodding) Yes.

RODNEY
Now how much money was there?

PEDRO
I don’t know, I forgot.

RODNEY
Pedro. Listen. Are you listening?

PEDRO
Yes.

RODNEY
Okay, listen closely.

PEDRO
Okay.

RODNEY
Was it a quarter?

PEDRO
I think so, it’s so hard to remember.

RODNEY
Concentrate, Pedro. Was it a silver quarter?

PEDRO
Yeah, I think so.

RODNEY
Excellent. Where is it now?

PEDRO
I don’t know.

RODNEY
PEDRO!! Are you insane?

PEDRO
NO!

RODNEY
You don’t know where the money is???

PEDRO
Nope.

RODNEY
Son of a bitch.

PEDRO
Hey!

RODNEY
What?

PEDRO
You can’t say that!

RODNEY
Yes I can, in times like this. This is a quarter
we’re talking about, Pedro.

PEDRO
You can’t say that.

RODNEY
It’s a quarter.

PEDRO
You can’t say that.

RODNEY
Oh yeah? Son of a bitch.

PEDRO
Stop it.

RODNEY
Son of a bitch.

PEDRO
I’m gonna tell.

RODNEY
Try it. Son of a bitch.

PEDRO
I’m telling.

RODNEY
Shit head.

PEDRO
YOU are.

RODNEY
Son of a bitch.

PEDRO
YOU are.

RODNEY
No, Pedro, I’m not.

PEDRO
Yes you are. What are you doing with those
finances?

RODNEY
Saving up for my big purchase.

PEDRO
What is that?

RODNEY
It’s a secret. A secret purchase. Sorry, I’m not
telling.

PEDRO
Okay.

(The both sit in silence for a few seconds, Rodney goes back to his paper and pencil.)

PEDRO (continued)
It’s still over there by the plant, I think.

RODNEY
Excellent.

(Suddenly a man walks in wearing a white coat. He goes to each man, examining them closely with a flashlight in the eyes, the throat, the ears and nose. RODNEY and PEDRO say nothing. Finally DR. WEATHERSPOON speaks.)

DR. WEATHERSPOON
So gentlemen, you seem to be doing very well.

RODNEY
We’re doing good.

PEDRO
Yup.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Sounds good. Have you had any nosebleeds at all?

RODNEY
No Dr. Weatherspoon, not one.

PEDRO
Rodney had one.

RODNEY
Shut up, no I didn’t.

PEDRO
He did.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Rodney, this is serious. Did you have a nosebleed today?

RODNEY
No sir.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Is he lying Pedro?

PEDRO
No, he isn’t.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
But you just said he had a nosebleed.

PEDRO
Yeah.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Well did he or didn’t he?

RODNEY
I didn’t.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Pedro?

PEDRO
He didn’t.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Well. Okay.

RODNEY
Yup.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
If you have one, Rodney, be sure to let us know.

RODNEY
Yup, no problem Doc.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Very good. Hey, what’s that you’re working on there?

PEDRO
Finances.

RODNEY
Finances.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Interesting.

RODNEY
It’s for my secret purchase.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
And what would that be?

PEDRO
It’s secret.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Do you know what it is, Pedro?

RODNEY
He doesn’t know.

PEDRO
I don’t know.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Well, I see. Is it a new pair of pants?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A kite?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A new calculator?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Pie?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A rope?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A Cucumber?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Drumsticks?

RODNEY
No.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A pellet gun?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Underwear?

RODNEY
Nope.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A video camera?

RODNEY
No.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A Kenny Loggins CD?

RODNEY
Who?

DR. WEATHERSPOON
A new stick of deodorant?

RODNEY
No.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Some candy?

RODNEY
No sir.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Porn?

RODNEY
Yes.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
I knew it!

RODNEY
Just kidding, no.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Dammit.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
(pause)....(loudly) A hawkbill knife?

(RODNEY freezes. His eyes are locked into his paper and he is speechless. PEDRO looks at him nervously.)

PEDRO
Rodney?

(RODNEY says nothing.)

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Mr. Outlaw? Are you okay? Are you going to buy a
hawkbill knife?

RODNEY
I remember.

DR. WEATHERSPOON
(sudden realization)
OH NO!! NO!!! NURSE!!! NURSE!!

(Before he can utter another word, Rodney springs to his feet and punches DR. WEATHERSPOON in the face. The doctor falls backwards over the couch, out of sight.)

PEDRO
RODNEY! What’s wrong?

RODNEY
Dammit, Pedro! None of this is right! This is all
wrong! We don’t live here! You’ve not always been
bald!! As soon as that bastard said “Hawkbill Knife”,
everything came back to me! We’re trapped in here like
lab rats, Pedro! We’ve got to get the hell out!!

PEDRO
But what about the finances?

RODNEY
Dammit, Pedro! Don’t you hear anything I’m saying??
My name is RODNEY OUTLAW! Last year I got into a
fight with my girlfriend, who was a “PRETTY BIG WOMAN”.
She ran me down on an old country road in Alabama, and
sliced off my rectum with a HAWKBILL KNIFE!!

PEDRO
You don’t have a rectum?

RODNEY
No, you dumbass! That’s why I’ve been stuck with this
goddamn colostomy bag!!

PEDRO
I always saw it, but I was afraid to ask.

RODNEY
Never mind the finances, we’ve got to get out of here!

PEDRO
But Rodney, this is our home, remember? What about
the quarter? It’s still over there by the plant!

RODNEY
Dammit, Pedro! Nevermind the quarter, we’ve got bigger
fish to fry! The nurses will probably notice that
Dr. Weatherspoon has been gone for so long, and they’ll
be coming for him soon. We have to prepare! We’ve got
to somehow construct a devious plan.

PEDRO
Hey Rodney, what was your secret purchase going to
be, anyway?

RODNEY
I told you, it’s a secret.

PEDRO
Why did your girlfriend cut off your rectum, anyway?

RODNEY
I have no idea, I can’t remember.

PEDRO
What’s a hawkbill knife, anyway?

RODNEY
It’s a very long and sharp knife in the shape of
a hawk’s bill, Pedro. It’s extremely dangerous.

PEDRO
I guess that really hurt, didn’t it?

RODNEY
Like the fiery pits of hades, Pedro.

PEDRO
That’s terrible.

RODNEY
It sure was. I’ve never seen a hispanic woman get
quite that mad before.

(Upon saying this, PEDRO is taken aback. He’s stunned. He stares into space, trying to remember something.)

PEDRO
What did you just say?

RODNEY
She was a hispanic woman. The only thing I remember
about her was the quote from the papers. She was
arrested, and the only thing she said was—quote— “This aint right.”

PEDRO
A hispanic woman.

RODNEY
Yeah. She was a “PRETTY BIG WOMAN” too.

PEDRO
I remember.

RODNEY
You remember how big she was?

PEDRO
I remember everything.

RODNEY
Well it’s about time! Dammit, Pedro, we’ve got
to get out of here!

PEDRO
Not so fast, OUTLAW. Maria was my sister, you
motherfucker. I remember everything!

RODNEY
Oh shit. But, uh, Pedro, what about that quarter
over there by the plant?

PEDRO
You can take that quarter and stick it up your ass,
OUTLAW! You’re the man who was fucking my sister up
the ass!!!!

RODNEY
But Pedro! I...I...

PEDRO
You WERE! You were fucking her up the ass, man! She
cried about it every night! I couldn’t count the nights
that she cried herself to sleep, tasting her tears as
they ran down her face, all because of your horrible
ass fucking!!

RODNEY
I’m so sorry, Pedro, I REMEMBER NOW!! I’m so sorry!!
I paid for it, though, dammit!! For the love of
Christ, she sliced off my rectum with a hawkbill knife!!

PEDRO
True. That colostomy bag is punishment enough. We’ve
got to get the hell out of here.

RODNEY
Yes we do. Wait a minute. Where the hell are we
anyway? How long have we been here, and why the
hell can’t we remember anything?
DR. WEATHERSPOON
I can answer that.

(DR. WEATHERSPOON slowly arises from behind the couch, rubbing his jaw and cheek)

PEDRO
Dr. Weatherspoon! You son of a bitch! Why the
hell am I bald??

RODNEY
Yeah! And why the hell can’t we remember anything?

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Please, one question at a time.

RODNEY
All right, so for starters, why the hell is Pedro bald??

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Unfortunately, it was a side effect of the serum.

PEDRO
I knew it! Son of a bitch! Not only that, but my
dick never grew one inch! Not one goddamn inch!
Those bastards at G.N.C. will PAY DEARLY for this!!!

DR. WEATHERSPOON
No, no, the memory-serum. We injected you both with
an experimental memory-losing serum.

RODNEY
Why the hell are you developing a memory-losing serum?
and why the hell did you choose us to experiment on?

DR. WEATHERSPOON
For the government. We were looking for volunteers,
but no one wanted to do it, even after we offered them
cookies, watches, and Kenny Loggins CDs.

RODNEY
Who?

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Nevermind. Anyway, we needed volunteers, and when we read about your exploits in the newspapers, Rodney, we thought you’d make a fantastic test subject, being as how you don’t have a rectum anymore.

RODNEY
Bastards! The newspapers made fun of me!

PEDRO
Man, they sure did! It was great, especially that
hilarious quote from that District Attorney, Chris
McCool. If I remember correctly, he said, quote, “It was
the most horribly disfiguring injury I’ve ever seen in
my entire career that didn’t end in death.” (laughing)

RODNEY
Shut the hell up. Dammit, Pedro!! This is serious!
We were USED! Dr. Weatherspoon, why the hell did you
kidnap Pedro too?

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Who said anything about kidnapping?

PEDRO AND RODNEY
What????

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Ah, just kidding. Yeah, we kidnapped you both. We
decided that a white guy with no rectum wouldn’t be
enough, so we picked up Pedro since he was Mexican.

PEDRO
Just because I’m Mexican??

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Yeah, our turkish guy died.

PEDRO
DIED?? JESUS, Rodney, let’s get the hell out of here!

DR. WEATHERSPOON
I’d like to see you try. I bet you can’t even
remember where the door is!

RODNEY
Stand back, you bastard. I know where the door is!

(Rodney looks around the room like he’s just lost his keys. He has no idea where he is.)

RODNEY (continued)
Son of a bitch! I really can’t remember! You remember
where the door is, Pedro?

PEDRO
Shit man, I can’t even remember where my dick is.

RODNEY
I can’t believe this is happening!

DR. WEATHERSPOON
Rodney, what was your secret purchase going to be, by
the way?

RODNEY
You know...(pause) I...can’t remember! Damn you!
Damn this memory-losing serum!! SHIT!!!

PEDRO
...But the budget!

RODNEY
I know! This is all some kind of twisted nightmare!

DR. WEATHERSPOON
HA! Yes, gentlemen, now if you’ll excuse me, I’m
going to get the nurse.

RODNEY
I’ll be damned! No chance, fucker! I’m RODNEY OUTLAW!

(At this, Rodney grabs his colostomy bag and slaps Dr. Weatherspoon in the face with it. Pedro instinctively grabs his feet, which topples the doctor to the floor. Suddenly Rodney looks over and spots the door on the far side of the room.)

RODNEY (continued)
Dammit, Pedro!! Look! There’s the door!! We’re
saved! We’re free!

PEDRO
Holy shit, OUTLAW, you’re right! Let’s go!

(They run to the door, and before they can make it there, two large affeminate male-nurses burst in. They tackle both men to the floor, and pull out large syringes. They male nurses hold the needles high in the air as Rodney and Pedro struggle, and suddenly the lights go out.)

LIGHTS UP.

(Two men, RODNEY OUTLAW and PEDRO are sitting on a couch. RODNEY, who is around 35, skinny, and intense, is diligently concentrating on a piece of paper. He has a calculator, paper and pencil and is extremely focused on his work. PEDRO, who is 23, mexican and bald, curiously stares at him. PEDRO wants very much to talk to him, but can’t bring himself to say anything since RODNEY is in such deep focused concentration. Finally after a few moments he decides to speak. RODNEY never looks up from his work.)

PEDRO
Hey Rodney?

RODNEY
Yes Pedro?

PEDRO
What are you doing?

RODNEY
Working on my budget.

PEDRO
What’s a budget?


CURTAIN.

Cora

The dirty white clock above the door to the restrooms read 2:30 a.m. when Jack walked into the Waffle House.

The little bell above the door jingled and he expected some loud waitress to scream a hello at him, but it never happened. There was no one behind the counter, nobody at the grill and nobody wiping down tables.

He walked past the creepy old man sitting alone in the first booth, the arguing mother and daughter in the second, and made his way to the very back of the restaurant, where he sat down in the last booth. His jacket was soaking wet; he took it off and threw it into the seat across from him. For a few seconds, he frowned and stared at the wood grain pattern on the table. After running his fingers through his thick wet hair, he wiped his hands on his pants. As he dug around in his pocket trying to get a grip on his cell phone, he noticed the sign above his table that read, “Thank you—serving you good food fast is a real pleasure.”

He pulled out his cell phone and looked at the tiny digital screen. No missed calls, no new messages.

The smell of grease and smoke rampaged through the building like a juggernaut, but there wasn’t a server or a cook in sight. He began to wonder if anyone was even working. Under a sign that read, “Turn Gas Burners Off When Not In Use,” Jack could see heat coming off the grill, a steady blue flame causing leftover pieces of bacon and egg to steam and smoke.

Suddenly he caught the old man in the first booth staring at him, but didn’t make eye contact. He was bent over a small cup of coffee wearing an old gray “Members Only” jacket, the kind his grandfather used to wear when they’d come here to eat together when he was a kid. He was wearing a large hat that read, “Suzy Boggus.” The man looked lonely. Jack knew how he felt.

“Lord have mercy, this rain sucks, don’t it?” the waitress surprised him; she seemed to appear out of nowhere.

“Yeah, actually,” he said, “it does. It’s been raining all day.”

She looked to be around 50; she was an abnormally wide woman with big cheeks, thick, messy red lipstick and too much red blush. Part of her white striped blouse wasn’t tucked in to her loose-fitting dark pants, so a long strip of skin hung from her left side, just below her apron. Under the black visor with the little “WH” on the front, her hair was obviously dyed an unrealistic dark brown. When Jack really concentrated, he could see the hint of a mustache on her wrinkled upper lip.

“I know it, I been here since noon. Some stupid girl called in sick and I had ta work this double shift crap; you believe that?” She had finished wiping down the table with a dirty white wet rag and then she placed a single napkin, fork and knife in front of him with professional precision.

“That must suck, I’m sorry to hear it,” he said.

“S’all right. Whatcha drinkin?”

“Sweet tea,” he said, this time looking directly into her eyes. They were a dull brown color; she looked exhausted. He noticed her pronounced underbite, like an annoyed bulldog.

“Be right out,” she said, and walked away.

The mother and daughter’s argument seemed to be escalating, they were screaming out random curse words now and their hands were waving around in overtime. Jack pretended not to notice.

“Sweet tea, right?” she said, sitting the glass in front of him.

“Damn, that was fast. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten my drink that fast here.”

“You’d be surprised, honey. What can I get for ya tonight?”

“Hey, uh, I’m just kind of curious,” Jack said, pointing to the arguing mother and daughter, “is that normal?”

“Lordie yes. They just live up here on Maple. That’s Shirley and her daughter’s name is Desiree. They fight like cats and dogs. Desiree’s got some black boyfriend or somethin’ and it just eats Shirley up. God, they don’t ever get along.”

“I hear you. Man, they were just starting to scare me. I’ve never seen a daughter cuss at her mom like that. She just called her a cunt. Did you hear that?”

“Oh God yes,” she said, “the other night she called her a motherfucker. I just thought that was so funny, ‘cause she called her mother a motherfucker. ‘Aint that crazy?”

“Yeah,” he said with a laugh, “that IS pretty crazy.”

Suddenly Jack tuned in to Shirley and Desiree’s conversation closer.

“…a condom or you’re just being a goddamn dumbass!” screamed Shirley.

“Mom, this is so fucking lame,” muttered Desiree. “We use a condom every single time! I’m not gonna fuck up my life and get pregnant like YOU did when you were my age. Just chill about it.”

“Well when you have that little mixed baby, don’t expect me to raise it. You’re on your own with that one. You’ll have to go live in some fucking halfway house for all I care.”

A lump formed in the back of Jack’s throat, and he sank further into the bench seat. He suddenly realized Cora was staring down at him, looking confused and waiting for his order.

I’ll have a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich, scramble the eggs, and some hash browns with cheese.”

“Comin’ right up,” she said with a big smile.

“Hey,” Jack said as she was turning around, “you never told me your name.”

“It’s Cora,” she said. “Sorry, I forgot that part, I reckon. It’s Cora. Let me know if you need anything.” With his yellow ticket in hand, she screamed out to an empty kitchen, “Bacon, egg and cheese plate, scrambled, scattered, covered!”

Everybody seemed to quiet down, Shirley and Desiree stopped arguing for a minute, and the old man looked up from his coffee.

“I SAID, BACON EGG AND CHEESE PLATE, SCRAMBLED, SCATTERED, COVERED!”

The bathroom door suddenly burst open and a short, unshaven, hairy, overweight man came running out in a horribly dirty t-shirt with a dangling cigarette in his mouth and a paper towel under his arm. He was quickly putting on his bright yellow-and-blue-striped cook’s hat as he screamed back at her, “Bacon, egg and cheese plate, scrambled, scattered, covered!”

He ran behind the counter and with lightning speed, pulled out a large basket of eggs from the small refrigerator just beside the grill. He went to work with all the speed and confidence of a surgeon.

Shirley and Desiree resumed their argument and the old man looked back down into his coffee.

Cora turned to Jack and smiled with a nod. “It’ll be right up.”

Jack smiled back at her. He reached over and checked his phone again. Even though it hadn’t rung, he wanted to be sure. No missed calls, no new messages. He considered calling her and leaving another message, but decided against it. He replayed his last message in his head over and over again, “Hey, it’s me. Listen, I know things are pretty messed up right now, but I want you to know that I love you. I love you so much. When you get this message tonight, call me. Call me and let me explain to you how everything is going to be okay. I know things will work out. From the first time I met you; I knew you were the one that I was always going to be with. I love you, please call me.” Jack sat and privately mouthed the words to himself.

“So why ain’t I ever seen you in here before?” asked Cora as she came by to wipe down a nearby table.

“My girlfriend doesn’t like this place,” he said. “We never come here much, I guess.”

“Don’t mind me, but she sounds like she’s not worth a damn.”

Jack laughed, “No, she’s okay, she just doesn’t like grease.”

“Well, how is it that you can come in here by yourself? Did ya get your permission slip signed?”

“I have no idea why I came in here. It’s just been a really rough day. I was sort of waiting on a phone call and I was just driving around. Y’know, I wasn’t really even hungry until I walked in here.”

“Yeah, that grease’ll put the cravin’s in ya, won’t it? How do ya think I got this ‘ole spare tire here?” Cora grabbed the side of her stomach and shook it like a sack of flour while she giggled like a little girl. Jack just laughed; he was scared to say anything. “But naw, I’m just kiddin’ with ya. I’m glad you stopped by to see me; I was gettin’ pretty bored in here. ‘Ole Shirley and Desi, they only entertain me for so long, ya know?”

“So what about that guy?” Jack pointed to the old man in the first booth.

“I don’t know who that guy is,” she said quietly. “He’s never been in here b’fore either, and he’s been sittin’ there with that same damned old cup of cold coffee for the past two hours. Hell, he won’t even let me freshen it up for ‘im. After the third or so try, I just gave up.”

“He looks so familiar to me. I think I might know him from somewhere. I guess if he’s happy, that’s cool, huh?” Jack said.

“I reckon. I hope he’s happy. Y’know, I think I’ll go try to give him another refill, bless his heart.”

Cora carefully reached over and took the coffee pot, and like a hunter sneaking up on her prey, approached the old man. Jack watched this spectacle like it was a movie. Just as she started to speak, the old man put his hand over the cup and brushed his hand at her, motioning for her to go away. Cora shook her head at him and laughed.

“Suit yourself, honey.”

Suddenly the cook screamed out, “Cora! Order up!”

He sat Jack’s sandwich on the counter and quickly ran from behind the counter, put a cigarette back in his mouth, took off his bright yellow-and-blue-striped cook’s hat and hurried back into the bathroom. Cora reached over and grabbed the plate of food and sat it in front of Jack.

“Here ya go, honey, be careful, it’s hot.”

“Hey,” he said, “what’s the deal with him?”

Cora just smiled and shook her head. “Don’t even ask me, I got no idea. Alls I know is that he’s fast as hell and don’t hardly ever get complaints. I reckon whatever he’s doin’ in there is his business. Does everything look good to ya? Need some more tea?”

“No, I don’t need any more tea and everything looks really great, thanks.”

Before he took a bite, he noticed that Cora was staring at him and grinning. He rolled his eyes towards her and took a huge bite anyway, looking up at her. “It’s goooood,” he said with a full mouth.

“Good to hear it,” she said. “So tell me more about this girlfriend. What are ya, havin’ problems with her?”

Jack grabbed a napkin from the dispenser and wiped his mouth.

“Yeah, you could say that.”

“She’s gotta be some kinda dumbass, givin’ a good lookin’ young man like you trouble. You seem like such a nice guy. What’s her problem?”

Jack couldn’t help but notice the huge mole on the side of Cora’s nose. He smiled again, grabbed a saltshaker and sprinkled his hash browns. “Thank you for saying that, that’s really nice of you.”

Cora flipped the dirty rag over her shoulder, scooted Jack’s coat over and sat down in the booth across from him. The table creaked and moved as she squeezed under it.

“Tell me what happened.”

“I don’t know,” he said, “it’s kind of a long story. I don’t really want to talk about it. ”

Suddenly Shirley screamed out from the register, “Okay, Cora, when you’re done flirtin’ with that boy, we’d like to pay our damn bill, if that’s okay with you?” Desiree was already walking out the door.

“Fuck this stupid shit,” Desiree said under her breath, slamming the door closed with a jingle.

The old man giggled to himself.

“I’ll be right back, don’t go anywhere,” Cora said, slowly unsqueezing herself from the booth. Jack smiled at her, nodded and shoveled another load of cheese-covered hash browns into his mouth.

While he chewed, he reached over to look at his phone again. No missed calls, no new messages. It still hadn’t rung, but he needed to look one more time to make sure. He stared at the phone for a minute, thinking maybe he could will it to ring. He looked up and the old man was watching him again.

“I ain’t never been married, you know,” Cora said as she came back and squeezed into the booth again. “I mean, I had sorta a boyfriend one time but he dumped me. Well, we were supposed to go on a date, anyway. It’s cause I’m a fat ass, I reckon.”

“Oh come on,” Jack said. “You don’t believe all that, do you?”

Cora looked at him like he was a complete moron. “You been drinkin’ tonight or somethin’?”

“No,” he said, “but you’re really cool. Don’t say that some guy dumped you just because you’re overweight. That’s awful.”

“He stood me up really bad one night, he left me sitting by myself at the Ponderosa for hours and hours. I just felt so stupid. I was wearing this really pretty dress too; it was my mama’s. It had flowers on it. Even a little bow.”

They sat in silence for a few seconds; Jack noticed the old man was still watching them.

“What did you do?” asked Jack.

Cora wouldn’t look at him. She took the rag from her shoulder and started scrubbing on a crusty spot on the edge of the table. “I didn’t do nothing. I just sat there by myself all night, hoping he’d come. And he never did. He never even called me.” She scrubbed the crusty spot harder and harder and finally it came off, and then threw the white rag back over her shoulder. “But that’s okay. Those things happen.”

Jack looked down at the other half of his sandwich and shook his head. “I haven’t told anybody this, but last night, my girlfriend told me that she’s pregnant.”

Cora sat back in the booth, her eyes widened.

“Oh my God, honey,” she said. “Do you love her?”

“I thought I did for a long, long time,” he said, “but lately, it’s been really, really hard.”

Cora reached into her pocket and pulled out a cigarette. “Are you finished eating, do you mind?” she asked.

“Not at all,” he said. “Go for it.”

“Thanks.” She pulled out a Zippo lighter and with a click, lit it up. She took a long, smooth drag and exhaled thick smoke into the air. Jack watched the gray mist escape her puckered, wrinkled lips and concentrated on it as it floated up above the signs and the grill and disintegrated above the old man’s booth.

“We’ve been together for years. Sometimes we’re really happy and other times it’s really hard. She’s all I have, really, she’s like my best friend.”

“Well I don’t get it,” Cora said, “why don’t y’all get married? Sounds like y’all are really happy.”

“Because,” Jack tried to swallow the lump in his throat and sat back in the booth, running his fingers through his hair, “the baby isn’t mine.”

“Oh my God,” Cora said, leaning forward. She took another drag from her cigarette and made a face like it burned her throat. “Bless your heart. What are you gonna do?”

“I have no idea. You’re the first person that I’ve told about this. She’s been cheating on me with this guy for months. She says that she’s going to do the ‘right thing’ and marry this guy. I don’t even know his name. It’s like some weird, goddamn surreal science fiction movie. I would have never in a million years thought that…but anyway…I can’t let her go. I have to figure out a way to work this out. She still loves me; I know it.

“Earlier tonight I called her and left a message. I know she’ll call me back. It’s just a matter of time. When she does, we’re gonna work this out.”

Cora didn’t respond. She took another long drag from her cigarette and blew a steady stream of smoke out into the restaurant. Jack stared at the wood grain in the table again, and the leftover salty hashbrowns next to his half-eaten sandwich. They sat there in silence for a long time.

All of a sudden, Jack’s phone rang. He’d set it on the highest possible volume with vibrate, and it shook the entire table. Cora looked down at it and then watched Jack’s eyes. The number on the tiny digital screen was unmistakable.

“It’s her.”

His whole body seemed to tense up. He stared at it for the first ring and then looked up at Cora.

“Don’t answer it,” she said, shaking her head at him. “Don’t.”

“What?” Jack started to reach for it, but when he did, Cora quickly reached over and grabbed his hand by the wrist. Her grip was tight, like a scolding mother’s grasp on a misbehaving child.

“You don’t deserve to be treated like this.” Cora squeezed his wrist tighter. The phone kept ringing. “Believe me, I know.” She shook her head at him and her eyes swelled. “Nobody deserves to be treated this way. Nobody. She wronged you. Don’t you do it. You just let that girl go. Let all of it go. Do you hear me?”

“But…” Jack tried to speak and reach for the phone again, but Cora’s grip tightened and she leaned forward, close to him. The pounding vibration from the phone shook the silverware next to Jack’s plate and the ringing seemed to get louder and louder.

“Look at me,” she said.

Jack stared into her sad, brown, exhausted eyes and saw bit of tears beginning to swell up under her eyelashes.

Jack stopped trying and left the phone lying on the table. The ringing stopped. Cora slowly let his hand go, and Jack leaned back in the booth and ran his hands through his hair again. His heart was beating a million miles an hour, his palms were sweating and his head pounded with confusion and sadness. His eyes tried to make tears, but he wouldn’t let that happen. Not here. Not in the Waffle House.

“Okay,” he said, sniffing his nose and wiping his eyes.

Cora covered her face with her hands. “Honey,” she said, “I didn’t mean to…”

“Thank you,” he said, nodding his head at her. “I’ve been a moron, Cora. I really have. She’s…why do I do this to myself? I have to walk away. God, how do I get myself into shit like this?”

She took a final drag from her cigarette and put the butt in the ashtray, forcefully over-patting it until they both could smell the thick ash. Then she slowly scooted her way clear of the table and squeezed her way out. Picking up Jack’s plate, she walked back behind the counter. She returned with his yellow ticket and placed it face down in front of him. “I’ll take that at the register whenever you’re ready.”

Jack reached into his wallet, pulled out a ten-dollar bill and threw it on the table. He turned his phone off and put it into his pocket; brushed his damp coat off and slipped it back on.

“How was everythin’ tonight?” she asked as he handed her his yellow ticket at the register.

Jack nodded, “really good.”

“That’s good to hear, that’ll be eight fifty-two.”

Jack dug through his wallet and pulled out a twenty, just in time to notice the old man watching him. He hadn’t recognized him before, but from this angle he could see now that it was Hampton Garrett, one of his grandfather’s old friends. When he was a kid, he remembered his grandfather telling him about Hampton losing his wife in a car accident. He was a well-known alcoholic and didn’t talk to anyone anymore.

“How’re YOU doing there?” Jack asked him.

The old man didn’t reply, but slowly began to smile.

“You’re Hampton, right? Enjoying that coffee?” he asked.

The old man nodded his head and his smile got bigger, he didn’t have a single tooth in his mouth.

Jack smiled back at him. “Everything’s gonna be okay, right?”

His smile widened even further and his lips finally began to move. “Oh yeah,” he slowly said. “Everything’s gonna be fine.” He gave Jack a thumbs-up and then took a big sip of his cold coffee. “You’ll see.”

Jack laughed. Maybe being lonely isn’t so bad, he thought. There’s always the Waffle House.

“Here’s your change, sweetie,” she said.

“My name’s Jack, by the way.”

“Well hello. It was really nice to meet you, Jack.”

“You too,” he said. “I appreciate it, Cora. I really do.”

He put his wallet back in his pocket, gave Hampton another nod, and walked towards the door.

“I always work this same ‘ole shift,” Cora said before he pushed on the door. “I mean, you know, in case you ever need an ear. I’m here. Every night. I’ll be glad to listen.”

Jack looked back, grinned and nodded his head at her.

Cora smiled and watched him closely as he walked out the door.

Remember the Kevin Robertson Profile?

This is another feature story written in 2004. This time I focused on a genius guy I knew named Kevin Robertson. This guy was one of the most interesting human beings I knew in Murfreesboro, and this is his profile. Enjoy.

___________________________________

Kevin Robertson wants to finish reading the Book of Mormon and building his life-sized Geodesic metallic woman before he starts school in the fall. He has high aspirations of being a weatherman and finding his uncle’s murderer. But tonight he has to help publish more than 18,000 copies of The Daily News Journal.

“Yeah, weathermen have to be some of the most two-faced people in the world,” says Robertson as he checks a large stack of metallic plates in the back of The Daily News Journal’s camera room.

Before he can elaborate, a phone rings from the distance. Like someone who’s just heard a favorite song on the radio, Robertson smiles and heads for the exit.

“My food’s here,” he says while running out the door.

After a few seconds, the ringing stops and Robertson returns carrying a brown paper sack with a Sun Drop cola.

“I’ve got my mom tricked into thinking I can’t leave while I’m at work,” he says with a grin. The 30-year-old DNJ employee produces a carefully wrapped bacon, egg and cheese sandwich from his sack and begins to unwrap it. The mixed-chemical odors in the newspaper’s camera room are overpowering, yet Robertson savors every bite.

Robertson’s friends say he looks identical to Vladimir Lenin. His dark eyes, adorned with black-framed glasses and a shiny bald head, are the perfect ingredients used to cook up this communist dictator look-a-like.

“It’s funny to think of what I used to do here compared to what I do now,” he explains. “I went from electronically putting this paper online to working with these big metal plates.”

In 1998, Robertson left a short-lived career as an auto-shop mechanic to become an advertising graphic designer at the DNJ. Robertson says that after a month the “computer guy” left, leaving a void that needed to be filled.

“There was no computer guy,” he explains. “I went from working on computers, to being told to work on computers. Pretty soon I was being called everything from an ‘Online Sales Person’ to ‘Network Administrator’ to ‘Webmaster.’”

Robertson exclusively solved all of the DNJ’s technical problems, and was responsible for uploading all the news and advertising content onto the Web nightly. He designed and sold Web sites for the newspaper’s advertising clients and maintained the newspaper’s Web site, www.dnj.com.

In late 2003, he was laid off for unexplained reasons. After several months, he was rehired in the pre-press department.

Without warning, a press operator rushes through the door shouting Robertson’s name. His eyes search the room as he rubs the black ink from his hands onto his gray pants and shirt.

“You got those last plates burned yet?” the operator asks.

“Not yet,” Robertson replies, finishing the last bite of his sandwich. “But I’ll have ‘em soon. How long before you start this next run?”

“About an hour,” the operator explains.

“No problem,” Robertson says with a nod.

Putting aside his sandwich wrapper, Robertson returns to his job.

With his technical responsibilities behind him, Robertson now makes his living taking film negatives of finished DNJ pages and burning them onto metallic lithographic plates. The press operators mount these metallic plates on the press’ giant rollers, and through electrolysis, the ink is adhered to newsprint.

Realizing he has a sharp deadline to meet, Robertson hurriedly scurries around the dark, dingy camera room illuminated with orange-yellow florescent lights. He pulls off an old negative page from the plate-burner and tosses it into an overflowing garbage can nearby. He walks across the room and crosses through a page number on a long, white dry-erase board.

“Yeah, I can fill a lot of slots around here,” he says with a laugh. He can recall times when he had to electronically correct ads, reprint full pages to film and develop the negatives all by himself after everyone had left for the night.

“A lot of my job is just problem solving,” he adds. “You’ve got to do whatever it takes to meet that deadline.”

When he’s not meeting deadlines and solving problems for The Daily News Journal, Robertson enjoys listening to talk radio and reading books.

“This summer I started reading the Bible,” he says. “When I finally made it through the Old Testimate, I had to take a break.”

Before finishing the New Testimate, he read the Quran, the Muslim holy book.

“I really enjoyed reading the Quran—in fact—I’ll probably read it again soon if I have a chance,” he explains.

“I think he said he was going to start the Book of Mormon soon,” says Chad Mason, friend of Robertson and fellow DNJ employee. “He said he was going to roll a joint with one of the [torn out] pages.”

“Don’t forget about his metal woman,” interrupts Jeff Weems, another DNJ employee. “He’s building a woman out of metal parts. He started on the head and it looked really good, so he thought he’d make a body as well. It’s come together pretty well, it’s almost finished. It looks kickass.”

Inspired by the Geodesic Dome founder and inventor R. Buckminster Fuller, Robertson takes three and four inch pieces of plumber’s metal tape and binds them together into triangles and squares with nuts and bolts. He adds isometric triangle after isometric triangle until he’s formed an almost flat-planed surface. The result has been a life-sized woman forged out of pure ingenuity lying on his kitchen table.

“She’s pretty hot,” Weems says, “for a spikey metal chick.”

Suddenly another press operator wonders into the room.

“Seen Kevin?” the pressman asks.

“Probably outside smoking,” Mason replies.

“We need the rest of those plates,” says the operator.

At least 100 yards away from the DNJ’s back loading dock, Robertson is propped up on the curb with a cigarette. He takes a long drag and exhales into the warm night air. He isn’t in a hurry.

“I think I’m going to start posting a column on a Web site,” he says. “Just to spite Barb Ford’s damn stupid cooking column. It’s going to be called, ‘Cooking for Bachelors.’ It’ll be all about how to cook peanut butter and jelly burritos, and how to cook Ramen Noodles without burning the Styrofoam plate. I’ll even put little gourmet pictures on there of my bowls of microwaved soup and sandwiches.”

He smiles and gets up, walking back to his dark camera room.

Robertson has an 8-year-old daughter who lives three hours away. He proudly supports and visits her as often as he can. He says the girl’s mother is a vampire.

“She doesn’t know that I know,” he explains. “But she’s part of some group called The Order of the Crimson Tongue or something like that. Okay, she’s not really a vampire, but she wishes she was.”

Now Robertson is feeding a chemically coated, newly burned metallic newspaper plate into the plate-washing machine. The washing is the last process the plates go through before being sent up to the pressroom.

As if on cue, a different press operator walks into the room and takes a small stack of newly washed plates. Without saying a word, he nods and exits.

Through the past four months, Robertson has been desperately seeking information about the murder of his uncle, David Robertson. Robertson, 57, was found dead in his driveway on the morning of April 6, 2004.

The authorities have ruled out robbery, never located the murder weapon and have no leads or motive.

Trying to help however possible, Robertson volunteered his time to build a Web site, daverobertson.org. On this site, Robertson has included a message board where visitors can anonymously give information. People can also learn about Robertson’s life, view photos of his family and read breaking news about the case.

“People in my family have been praying, going to psychics, all kinds of weird stuff. I guess I just trust technology more than that kind of thing,” he says.

Robertson hopes that leads will turn up, and he wants to reach a few of the aforementioned goals before he starts back to school this August. It’ll be the first time he’s sat in a classroom in five years. He plans on pursuing a major in radio and television.

“I think being a weatherman would be a great way to break into the business,” he says. “That’s how David Letterman did it in Indiana. You just have to be whatever the people want you to be. When it’s raining, you have to pretend you hate rain and want sunshine. When it’s sunny, you have to hate sunshine and want rain. Like I said, weathermen have to be the most two-faced people in the world.”

For the final time, one of the press operators casually strolls through the camera room door.

“It’ll be just a second,” Robertson tells him.

“No rush,” the pressman says with a smile.

“Yeah man, this is a pretty decent job, really,” he explains. “I work nights—so my friends can come by and talk to me. I get to smoke cigarettes. I have a computer, so I can check my email. If I want I can go out there and watch some 30-minute cable TV show. And the best part is since I work at a newspaper, my dad doesn’t give me any shit.”

Woah, he's back.

So when I saw this photo today, I got a little happy.





Seriously, this is simultaneously the coolest and weirdest thing I've seen in a while. In 1989, when Harrison Ford wrapped the last of the original Indiana Jones Trilogy, I was 11 years old and managed to hurt myself with a homemade whip no less than 30 times in one night.

Now the filming has officially begun on the fourth film, nearly 20 years later, and Ford looks absolutely awesome back in the fedora. Sure, it's being directed by Speilberg... starring John Hurt (genius), Cate Blanchett and this Shia Lebeouf guy.

Yeah, I was pretty disappointed that Sean Connery announced that he wouldn't be coming out of retirement to reprise his role as Indy's dad, but I did get this genius quote from him online somewhere:

"Demand that the critters be digital, the cliffs be low, and for goodness sake keep that whip by your side at all times in case you need to escape from the stunt coordinator!”

Filming is happening as I type this and the release date is all set for May 22, 2008.

I'll have my handy homemade whip on standby.

-M

Gone Fishin'

I thought I'd throw down some photos I shot of my dad and I on our recent fishing trip. Man, you've gotta scope out that awesome 4lb monster he pulled in just after daybreak. Those photos of us riding in the boat were taken at like 200 mph or something on the water. I told dad to slow down but he just looked at me and said, "You can't be a pussy all your life. Sit down, shut up and hold on, son."

(Just kidding, but that's what I pictured him saying in my head.)

Enjoy the pics!

-M

Fajitas and Peanut Butter

In 2004 I wrote a short story called "Fajitas and Peanut Butter." Having just dug that thing up tonight, I think it might be pretty fitting to post it right here for your enjoyment. Or terror. Whichever you think works for you. Enjoy!

______________________________________

“We may not pay Satan reverence, for that would be indiscreet, but we can at least respect his talent.”

— Mark Twain



When I was eleven years old, I made a deal with The Devil.

Looking back on it, it was the best thing that ever happened to me.

Before I made the deal, I talked it over with my mother, and she told me it was a bad idea. She told me that The Devil could never be trusted, mostly because of that awful mustache he has. She also told me that if I spoke to him in person, I shouldn’t turn my back on him because he’s a notorious pickpocket. Also, she said, he might stab me in the ass with that stupid pitchfork he always carries around. I remembered what my mother told me, but I still wanted to meet him anyway.

I didn’t know the easiest way to get a hold of The Devil, so I tried the phonebook at first. There was no listing for The Devil in there, so I also tried Lucifer, Beelzebub, Satan and Mephistopheles. That son of a bitch is smart; he probably had his name withheld from the phone book in order to avoid those annoying telemarketers.

He didn’t fool me, though, I was finally able to crack his code. It took me several days, but I finally discovered that the devil had secretly spelled his name backwards in the phone book. Right there he was, in full glory, Mr. Gary Natas. I might have been in special education classes my whole life, I might have had to ride on that short bus more than a few times, but I was still a pretty smart kid.

When I finally got in touch with him on the telephone, he was a lot nicer than I’d expected.

“Hello, this is Gary,” he said. I remember thinking how cool that was. You’d think with having such aliases as Mephistopheles, Beelzebub, Satan and The Devil, he’d want to be called one of those. He didn’t, though. He just wanted to be called Gary.

I made up this huge excuse to get him to come meet me; I told him I was suffering from a rare disease and desperately needed his help. Even though he was all confused, he agreed to meet me at the mall that next day.

When I met him, I just kept thinking to myself; I’ll sure as hell never have a mustache that looks like that. That damn mustache was awful. Fortunately, he left his pitchfork at home. I had worried that he might bring it with him, and I was so relieved that he didn’t have it when he approached me at that bench outside the electronics store. He was a lot older than I had expected, too. He had grey hair, this hilarious beer gut, a ton of wrinkles, and a genius-level dark blue bow tie. He looked like a dork.

“Hey, how’s it going?” he asked. He looked down at me with this big smile, and I noticed his right front tooth was chipped really badly. It wasn’t just a little unnoticeable scratch, this guy’s tooth was almost totally gone. Man, it was creepy stuff.

“Pretty good,” I replied, “except for this problem I’m having. I was wondering if I could make a deal with you.”

“A deal? Where is your mom?” he asked. “I thought I could talk to her too.”

“She’s over there in that department store buying my aunt a birthday present,” I told him. “She’ll probably be out here any minute, so we have to hurry up and talk.”

“Okay,” he said. “Fair enough. Your phone call really scared me; I’m not sure what I can do to help you. I’m not a doctor or anything. In fact, I’d like to know how you even got my name. I don’t get a lot of phone calls at home; I don’t have very many friends.”

“Yeah, you probably don’t get to have too many friends when you’re an evil warlord from the pits of hell,” I said.

“Say what?” he asked.

“I mean it’s probably hard to have any friends with the kind of life that you have,” I explained.

“Yeah, you have a point there, I guess,” he said. “My life is pretty boring, I guess. Anyway, you sounded really serious on the phone. Is your condition serious? What can I do to help? I’m in this Bible study class every Wednesday night, so I can put you on the prayer list of my church if you would like that.”

Man, The Devil doesn’t mess around. This had to have been the coolest cover I’d ever seen. Nobody would ever expect The Devil to be going to church. This guy was brilliant. I knew that if I were going to get my deal made, I’d have to just come right out and say it.

“I want a bigger penis,” I said.

“What—what do you mean?” he asked.

“I mean I want a bigger penis, Gary,” I told him again. “I think it’s really small, and when the time comes for me to use it, I’d really like to have a big one, you know? What would it take for you to magically make my penis bigger?”

“I don’t…I mean, I’m not…I can’t,” he stuttered. He looked very uncomfortable.

“Son, I’m a Mortgage Originator,” he said. “I work at a bank. It’s, uh, just not, uh, possible for me to, uh, make your, uh, your body any different. I’m not like that; I’m not that kind of a guy.” He stood up and looked around to see if anybody was watching us again. “Listen, if I knew that was the reason you called me, I wouldn’t have…I mean…I thought you told me you had some kind of disease…”

The way he was stuttering around just made me even more pissed off. I didn’t know what in the fuck a Mortgage Originator does, hell, I still don’t. I was absolutely positive he was making it up, stalling for time. I was losing my patience with this guy.

“Son, I’d like to speak to your mother, please, can you get her for me?” he told me. To hell with that. There was no chance I was going to introduce my mother to The Devil.

“Fuck you, Gary,” I said. “Either you make this deal with me, or you can go back to the fiery pits of hell!”

Gary looked down at me with terrified eyes. His lip started shaking and he was fidgeting with his tie. “I promise I’ll pray for you,” he said, turning around and walking away. I couldn’t believe that The Devil had turned me down, but he did. I was extremely pissed off.

Over the next few days, I couldn’t get over it. I felt shortchanged and betrayed. I wanted to do something to hurt The Devil. It was only a matter of time until I figured out the perfect way to get back at him.

I only had to consult my map four times on the way to the old woman’s house. I’d set off on my bike on a Sunday afternoon with a pack of firecrackers and lighter, my trusty Aztec-warrior knife that I called “The Peacemaker,” my small penis, an eye-patch for a disguise, and a canteen half-full of my mother’s sweet tea.

I’d called Gary’s wife that Saturday and told her that I was taking up money for the local senior citizens center down on Maple Avenue. I’d given that stupid bitch an Oscar-worthy performance, and asked if she had any old people in her family. Not only did she give me her mother’s name, she told me she lived on Garner Street. My trusty phone book did the rest.

I knew that I didn’t stand a chance going up against The Devil himself in a fight, and his wife would have been pretty tough too. But I knew that old people are easy to beat up.

I looked in that window and saw her sitting there in this old-woman chair watching some old-woman show with these knitting needles all working back and forth. I could practically smell the mothballs. She was wearing some kind of weird socks with little fuzzy balls on the toes. She was obviously insane from being old.

I adjusted my eye patch and then knocked on the door.

“Yeeessss?” she screamed. Jesus, she sounded like some weird plastic witch from some cheap haunted house yard sale.

“Hello ma’am,” I yelled in my best boy-scout voice. “I’m just taking up money for the local volunteer fire department.”

“Okay?” she screamed. “I don’t have any money for you today, goodbye!”

My God, the sound of her voice was like a fingernail across a chalkboard. I couldn’t stand it.

“Hell, bitch!” I screamed. “When your house burns down, you’ll be screwed! You don’t fuck with the local volunteer fire department!”

“Whaaaat?” she said as she slowly pulled her ancient alien-looking skeleton of a body up from the chair. “Now hold on now!”

When she finally opened the door, I quickly lighted the firecrackers and threw them at her face. When she saw the sparks and smoke, she screamed like a sixteen year old and tried to close the door. That didn’t work, because her old feet with the little cotton balls on the toes were in the way. Unfortunately, I didn’t throw the firecrackers hard enough and they flew right into her huge creepy, saggy boobs. Pop, pop, pop!

While she was struggling to regain her balance from all the smoke, I ran right up to her and tackled the old woman like a linebacker. She hit the ground screaming and she wouldn’t stop.

“Your son-in-law is The Devil!” I screamed at her. He wouldn’t make a deal with me to make my penis bigger and now you’re gonna pay!” With The Peacemaker firmly in hand, I reached back and stabbed the old woman in the mouth.

I didn’t know that some old woman could bleed that much, but she did. It was really crazy how much blood shot up through her mouth when that knife sliced right down through her lips and tongue and found its way into the back of her throat. The blade rattled against her teeth when I pulled it back out. Her skin was so soft; it was like sticking a hot knife through butter. The blood bubbled and spewed, air came out too, which mixed with the blood, so it was like some kind of crazy geyser. I stood there for a few minutes, just watching it spill out onto that awful shag carpet. I noticed the little air bubbles around the edges of her mouth where all the wrinkles were. She must have still been alive for a long time, lying there hacking and vomiting up all that dark red blood. I had to move my eye patch over to be sure—but yeah, right there in the middle of her throat, where the wrinkles were, the blood had formed in a pool. In the middle of this pool of blood, I swear, was the Nike logo.

Before I left, I put my note on her stomach that said, “Fuck you, Gary. You didn’t make my penis bigger, so see what you get?”

The eye patch disguise didn’t work out like I’d planned; somehow they found out that it was me that killed The Devil’s mother-in-law.

That youth detention center place wasn’t that bad, until the day The Devil himself came by to see me. It had been six years. The mustache was as creepy as ever, but it had turned a lot more grey. He looked a lot skinnier and his front tooth was totally gone. He left his pitchfork at home again, which I was kind of sad to see. I’d imagined how cool it would be if he stabbed that dickhead guard in the ass with it.

“Where’s the pitchfork, Gary?” I asked him first thing, through the Plexiglas window.

“What pitchfork?” he said.

“Your pitchfork, man,” I replied.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

“You could have stabbed that dickhead guard guy in the ass with it,” I said.

“Listen,” he replied, “I’m not here to talk about some pitchfork. I want to talk to you about that day in the mall when you asked me to meet you. Do you remember what I told you that day?”

“Not really. I just remember you not making a deal with me.”

“Before I left that day I told you that I’d pray for you. Well, son, I have. I’ve prayed for you just about every single day. I wanted to come and talk to you about something that’s very important to me: Jesus Christ. I want to try and work with you on this; I came here to try and introduce you to his touch.

“You’ll probably get out of here in a few weeks,” he told me. “I’ve checked with your supervisors, and they told me that you’ve had an excellent behavior record. When you get out of here, I want you to come see me. I want you to come by my house so we can talk about this. Do you understand me? I really, really want to help you. I think there’s a promising young man in there somewhere, and I think I can help you find him.”

The funny thing about The Devil is the way his awful mustache moves around on his lip like a big damn charcoal grey caterpillar. I started laughing my ass off.

“Yeah,” I giggled, “I gotcha, Gary. I’ll come and see you.”

“I don’t understand, what’s so funny?” he asked.

“The mustache, man,” I said.

Then The Devil got up, shook his head and walked out of the room.

It had been almost a year after I got out of that youth detention center before I remembered the promise I’d made to go see The Devil. I was out driving around one day in my mother’s ’89 Toyota Corolla when I saw him. I had just picked up some French fries from McDonald’s when I saw Gary in his front yard, trying to mow his lawn. He looked even skinner than the last time I saw him, and most of his hair was gone. He was pushing this push-mower around like it weighed as much as my mom’s ’89 Corolla. It was pretty sad. I parked in his driveway and walked up to him with my delicious fries.

“Hey Gary, you want some of these fries, man?” I asked.

“No,” he said, out of breath. He started coughing like he was sick.

“Nice lawnmower,” I said. “I figured you’d just blow fire and shit out of your eyes or shoot some kickass red lightning bolts out of your hands or something to cut your grass.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said, out of breath. “Let’s go inside where it’s cool.”

Even though it was really messy, The Devil’s house was pretty nice— except for the weird giraffe paintings. He also had these funny lamps shaped like some giant whale’s teeth.

“After my wife’s mother was murdered,” he said, “she left me. My wife left me. I haven’t seen her in years.”

He was right. I kept noticing all the beer cans and frozen food boxes lying around. Hell, he even had these plates sitting on his coffee table that were caked in ten-day old Spaghetti noodles.

“There’s nobody left,” he said. “I really miss her, you know? I don’t really have any friends, I got no kids, my family is all dead, even my pets have all died; I retired from my job three years ago. I’m all alone in this house.”

I didn’t understand why he was telling me all this, so I just kept staring at him with a completely blank expression.

“Don’t you get it?” he said, “you’re the only one left. You’re the only thing I have left in this world. You killed my mother-in-law; you’re the one responsible for all this. I’ve been praying for you a long time, and for a long time I wanted to help you. But now…now I think I’m the one that needs the help here.”

I kept staring at him, completely lost.

“I want you to be—oh, Jesus help me. I want you to be my friend. I just need somebody to talk to, somebody to help me mow my yard and take care of my house. I’m an old man. I know you messed up. You messed up bad, but I don’t care about that anymore. I’ve forgiven you, and I know in my heart that Jesus has forgiven you too.”

“What does Jesus have to do with this?” I asked him. “Aren’t you guys arch-enemies and stuff? Don’t you guys have arm wrestling contests and get in bar brawls and joust each other on horses and stuff like that?”

“No, son. I don’t know who you think I am, but Jesus Christ is my father. It’s with his help that I’m able to forgive you and ask for your help.”

So it all started to make sense. Just like Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker, Jesus was The Devil’s father. This was the coolest thing I’d ever heard; it completely blew my mind.

He put out his hand, like he wanted me to shake it. I had to think about this one first, though, so I just sort of zoned out for a second and thought about boobs. He seemed really confused.

“What are you thinking about?” he asked.

“Boobs,” I told him.

Gary sat back on his couch and stared up at the ceiling. After a second, the son of a bitch started laughing. He really started laughing a lot. He put his hands over his eyes and rubbed his face. He was hysterical.

“Boobs?” he asked.

“Hell yeah,” I said. “Those things are awesome, huh?”

“Yeah, I guess they are,” he said, laughing. “They really are.”

Sometimes, after meeting with my parole-officer and my psychologist guy, I’d drive down to the grocery store for The Devil. I’d always pick up our favorite snack, fajitas and peanut butter. One time I was in the checkout line when I met this really good-looking girl named Sam.

She had blonde hair and a tattoo of a moon behind her right ear. She was in line buying tampons, which was sort of weird for me, but I acted like I didn’t notice.

“I see you’re buying tampons,” I said.

“I noticed you acting like you didn’t notice,” she said. “They’re not for me, they’re for my sister. She just started her period.”

“Oh yeah,” I said. “That must suck for her, huh? I read all about that period stuff when I was in that youth detention center, so believe me…I understand.”

“What did you go to a youth detention center for?” she asked.

“Oh hell, I stabbed this old woman in the mouth when I was eleven. It was a big misunderstanding, really.”

“I see,” she said.

Before I had a chance to explain, the cashier was asking her for money. She paid up, but instead of leaving right away, she stood there and waited on me to buy my snacks. It was unbelievable.

“Are those fajitas? With peanut butter?” she asked.

“Yeah, my friend loves ‘em,” I explained.

“Well, that’s really nice of you to buy them for your friend,” she said. She had this big smile that made me want to make fists, hold my arms out from my body and spin around like a helicopter, just knocking everything and everybody down. Except her.

We stood out in the parking lot of Wal-Mart for a long time talking, and I told her all about The Devil. She laughed and laughed when I told her about all his weird powers, his pitchfork, his awful mustache and his amazing pickpocketing talents. She didn’t believe me when I told her that Jesus was The Devil’s father, though. Before I left that parking lot, she wrote her phone number down for me on the back of a receipt for tampons.

“You can’t take her out in your mom’s ’89 Corolla,” Gary said. “Take my car. It’s your first date, you should impress her.”

Gary took me to his garage and showed me his Mercedes car. It was all shiny and new looking; I’d never driven any car other than my mom’s ’89 Corolla in my entire life.

“Are you sure about this, Gary?” I asked.

“Absolutely, son,” he said. “Have a great time.” He slapped me on the back and winked at me. He stuck out his hand for me to shake; only this time I actually shook it instead of thinking about boobs. It was a good handshake, a firm handshake. For the first time, I felt like a man instead of a dumbass kid. I felt grown up.

I got in the Mercedes car and backed it out of the driveway. The interior was shiny too; it had a ton of weird buttons and switches. On the dash was some kind of stitched lettering that read “Gary” in cursive handwriting.

The Devil was standing there on his front porch waving at me, for the first time since that day in the mall I saw him smile at me with that big missing tooth. It was really nice to see him so happy.

I’d picked up Sam from her apartment place and we drove around for a while. It was wild how the lights from the streetlamps would reflect across that hilarious cursive “Gary” on the dash and bounce across Sam’s face. Sometimes she’d catch me watching the lights and she’d smile at me.

“What are you looking at?” she asked.

“I wasn’t looking at your boobs, that’s for sure,” I said.

“Well that’s fantastic,” she said, laughing. “Your friend sure has a nice car. I’ve never been in a Mercedes before. He must really trust you to let you drive around in something this nice.”

I didn’t answer. For some reason, I thought about that old woman lying in the floor all those years ago. I don’t know why I thought of her, but I did. I thought about that shag carpet. I thought about all that dark red blood and those little air bubbles. I thought about that little pool of blood on her throat and the Nike logo. For the first time, I realized that what I’d done was horrible. Nobody deserved something like that…even The Devil’s mother-in-law.

Sam knew I was thinking about something terrible. She asked me if I was okay, and I just smiled at her and told her I thought she looked really pretty under all those streetlights. She reached over and ran her fingers down my ear, around my jaw, up my cheek and down my neck. She tilted her head to the side, leaned in close to me and whispered in my ear, “let’s park somewhere.”

It was the very first time I’d had sex, the first time that a girl had seen my penis, and it was in the back seat of The Devil’s car. I kept hoping that she wouldn’t be disappointed, the thought of it made me embarrassed. I always had this feeling like it was really small, but I guess I never really had anything to compare it to. Afterwards, she told me it was the best sex she’d ever had. I was shocked.

“How do you do it?” she said. “Your dick, it’s just…well, God, it’s just enormous. I’ve never felt anything like it.”

I couldn’t stop smiling; it was unbelievable. The Devil had come through after all. After all these years, he’d finally made my wish come true. Maybe I didn’t even realize it. Maybe it was the handshake.

“When I was eleven years old, I made a deal with The Devil,” I said. “I got a bigger penis.”

She laughed. “Oh yeah? So what did he get out of the deal?”

I thought about that for a second. I thought about firecrackers. I thought about that old woman coughing up blood on her shag carpet and that Nike logo. I thought about my old eye patch. I thought about fajitas and peanut butter. I thought about Gary’s handshake. It was a really good handshake. Then I started to smile.

Remember the Parish Patch?

In 2004 I wrote a travel feature story on a place in Wartrace, Tennessee called the Parish Patch Farm and Inn. This was an insane trip, and reading this again brought back some pretty hilarious memories. Dig in to The Parish Patch... and if you get a chance, I'd totally recommend going for a visit. That place was insane! Enjoy!

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Even though the jokes around the office made the situation seem ridiculous—maybe even fun—I was secretly nervous about sleeping by myself in a haunted room.

Many of my coworkers, including myself, were baffled when the announcement came that this year’s annual overnight retreat would be held at the Parish Patch Farm and Inn.

“I could understand a hotel in Nashville or Murfreesboro, but when they told us we’d be driving out to the middle of nowhere to some bed and breakfast, I flipped,” said Todd Pitts, a fellow employee.

The Parish Patch is located in Normandy, Tenn., which is 60 miles southeast of Nashville. For us, that meant more than an hour drive through rolling pastures, very few homes and an endless blur of thick roadside trees.

It wasn’t the drive that intimidated me, or the idea of being 60 miles from civilization; it was the room I was assigned to stay in. The general manager came around to inform us of our accommodations and room numbers. With this information we were presented with a brochure, brandishing a large slogan at the top reading, “Peaceful Privacy of a Country Estate.”

I was smiling when I read this slogan, until the manager laughed out loud and announced to the people in the office that I would have to stay in the “Mill Loft.”

“When I called, they told me that the loft is haunted,” said the manager. “They weren’t too specific or anything, maybe they’re just kidding. Or maybe not.”

After making this announcement, he looked at me with a deranged smile, as if to imply inevitable doom.

Leaving for the Parish Patch, I was prepared for the worst. I had received plenty of threats from coworkers. Some told me they’d have a bucket of water ready for when I fell asleep. Others said they planned to put worms or bugs in my bed. Some weren’t very specific, but promised untold surprises.

Being the subject of haunted-house humor actually gave me a sense of comfort. What really scared me was my own brain, creating untold scenarios of terror. Thought-up images of deep shining red eyes glaring at me across a darkened room littered my mind during our long drive.

We’d pass a barn and it would shine like a lighthouse against acres of hayfields and dairy cattle. We passed a field inhabited by lamas, emus and beefalo. The folks at the Parish Patch are well known for their beefalo, herds of large Tenn. cattle bred with rugged buffalos from the west.

The smoothly paved one-lane driveway leading to the Parish Patch’s main office is more than half a mile long. The pavement winds up and down curvy hills, through trees and over a tattered wooden bridge, turning any vehicle into a slow-moving roller coaster.

“The driveway has got to be one of the creepiest things about that place,” Pitts explains. “After driving miles into nowhere, you hit a one-lane road that takes you even farther.”

The Parish Patch’s main office stands at the top of a hill like a fortress. Appearing as a cabin, farmhouse and hotel all at once, the exterior blends the rustic feel of aged tree bark and feeble barn-door siding.

Large windows with thin curtains concealed a silhouette of human movement inside, which made me hesitate and wonder if there was really anyone there at all.

Strolling out to greet us was Lane, the golden retriever who “owns the Parish Patch, and who-knows-what-else,” according to our brochure.

Lane’s slow, calm steps and wagging tail served to calm my nerves. I could have misinterpreted his lips and dangling tongue, but I’d like to believe that Lane smiled at me as I passed him by. Before I turned the doorknob, I glanced back into the window and noticed that the silhouette had vanished.

Upon entering we were greeted by David Hazelwood, the owner and innkeeper. Hazelwood’s relaxed demeanor and sarcastic smile made me uncomfortable, especially when it came my turn to check in.

“Oh, you’re the one staying in the loft,” he whispered to me. “You’re in for a treat.”

Hazelwood grinned as he handed me a key marked with a bloody-red dot. His posture changed slightly and he suddenly took on a serious tone.

“This isn’t the key to your room, this is the key to the Cortner Mill Restaurant,” he said. “This key will get you in the restaurant door. Go through the restaurant to the back of the room and look for the small staircase.”

I interrupted him and asked where this restaurant was on the property. He wasn’t pleased with my interruption, but seemed amused to tell me it was several miles down the road, away from the farmhouses and cabins that my coworkers had checked in to. It suddenly occurred to me that I was not only going to be sleeping by myself, I was going to sleep by myself miles away from everyone.

“After you find the small staircase,” he continued, “go up to the second floor. Go down the hallway and look for another staircase. This staircase will take you up a flight of stairs and then to another. At the top of this set of stairs is your room.”

He winked as he handed me the actual room key.

“Whatever you do,” he said, “don’t lose the key to the restaurant or lock yourself out. You don’t want to be stuck outside the restaurant after dark.”

I asked him why and he chuckled.

“It gets creepy out there,” he laughed.

Out of embarrassment or negligence, I never asked Hazelwood about ghosts, demons or evil creatures that might have been seen at the loft. If there were demons in that room, I wanted to meet them with no expectations.

I was able to convince two of my coworkers to give me a ride to my room at the Cortner Mill.

We turned the final curve on a dust-filled gravel road and a bushy vine-covered tree line gave way to the dusk-illuminated tin roof of the mill. A large gravel parking area surrounded the antique of a building that looked as sturdy as a house of cards. My eyes wondered upward, to the third floor, where the darkened Mill Loft window looked down on me.

The small single window of the loft was equipped with its own fire escape—a rust-infested pipeline—which ran straight down into the depths of the mill.

Two of the mill’s front windows had been busted out, and the one that remained had a large “666” spray-painted clearly across the glass. A pentagram symbol was spray-painted in a dull blue across the gray wooden paneling.

It took minutes for me to stop staring.

My red-dotted key easily opened the heavy steel door of the restaurant, and we stepped inside. Before we had time to admire the décor, the door swung shut behind us with a heart-stopping crash.

“The owner wasn’t kidding about being shut out,” said Pitts. “That door will slam shut on you fast.”

A destructive flood destroyed the mill’s first floor in 1929, and the original owners of the Parish Patch, Charles and Martha Parish, began renovating in 1974. From this renovation emerged the Cortner Mill Restaurant, which is still in operation today.

There were no restaurant workers present when my friends and I made our entrance. If there had been, they would have looked curiously at us as we wondered around the room, examining the old-fashioned bar, paintings, fireplace and rocking chairs. The thunderously loud Duck River quickly traveled by, delivering a stampede of mist and spray against a nearby window.

We ventured towards the back of the restaurant and found the staircase, which was chained off with a metal sign reading, “Guests Only.”

After ascending the three sets of creaking stairs with my room key in hand, I finally stepped inside the Mill Loft.

The room was large, divided into two sections. We entered into the sitting room, equipped with two trundle beds against opposite walls. Old photographs of unknown families hung on the cracked walls in antique wooden frames. In the corner of the sitting room sat an antique phonograph.

My friend became wary of the antique items in the room.

“They say that ghosts stick to the antique stuff like glue,” Pitts explained. “They want to stay near the things they loved when they were alive.”

I was shaken by his warning, but quickly disregarded it when I noticed the bathroom. Two swinging doors ripped straight off some spaghetti western saloon only half-covered the restroom, allowing little privacy. Walking through them gave way to a cramped room with a bright-white crow’s foot porcelain bathtub. There was no shower in sight, only a small toilet and sink with an unnoticeable shaving mirror.

My friends decided to leave me to my room, and we agreed to meet in the downstairs restaurant in a few hours with the rest of our coworkers. I could hear their car pull away and I realized that I was alone.

In the back of the Mill Loft was the bedroom. One double bed sat in the center, accompanied by a chest of drawers and small television stand. In the corner of the bedroom was a rocking chair.

I slowly walked over to the rocking chair and lightly pushed it with my fingertips, listening to the long, squeaking creak that echoed throughout the room. Even though the chair was unmanned, the sounds that bounced off the cracked drywall told me that some unseen weight was bearing down on the wicker seat.

The seat was taken.

I placed my suitcase elsewhere, finding a spot on the bed, deciding not to look at the chair again. I told myself to look elsewhere.

But it looked at me.

It watched me as I unpacked my bag, and then pulled back the thin curtains at the window. Several wasps, desperately trying to get out of the room, were smashing themselves blindly against the glass. I happily opened their prison cell window and granted their freedom.

After changing clothes and shaving, it was time for dinner. As I turned off the lights in my room, the chair sat silently and watched me lock the door on my way out.

The restaurant downstairs was teaming with excitement. My coworkers had arrived for their meal, and our entire staff barely filled the large dining hall. White tablecloths lined the thick wooden tables and the chairs moaned with exhaustion when sat on. Only one server could be seen, an elderly lady scurrying around from table to table unnoticed by most.

There was only one chef in the rustic kitchen and she kept out of sight. I caught a glimpse of her once, before she dove behind a metallic refrigerator door.

Candlelight shimmered from table to table, illuminating imperfections in the paneling and tiny cracks across the windows.

The word “beefalo” appears at least five times on the menu: the beefalo t-bone, beefalo porterhouse, beefalo kabobs, beefalo stroganoff and beefalo ribeye.

I ordered my beefalo ribeye medium-well, but when I cut into the succulent piece of meat, a raging river of blood spilled out onto my plate. The elderly server moved slowly through the great room with a look of anxiety on her face. She looked like she desperately wanted to leave. I wondered if it was because of us…or some other reason.

I ate my bloody steak raw.

One by one, my coworkers got into their cars and pulled away from the restaurant. Soon the elderly server woman departed as well. Before I could walk down the stairs to wave goodbye, the cook released her grip on the steel door and it slammed shut behind her, shrouding me in darkness.

Again, I was alone.

The cook had left a single candle burning on the edge of the bar. The tiny flame danced and flickered against the dusty wine bottles and golden trim that lined the shelves behind the bar.

I didn’t dare blow it out. I ran all the way up to my room to retrieve my flashlight, ignoring the rocking chair in the corner. Again it watched me as relentlessly dug through my bag.

When I finally had found my flashlight I walked down the creaking stairs again, but when I turned the last corner I was terrified.

There was no light. The candle had been blown out.

I spun around in a circle, my flashlight’s trembling beam skimming over dusty shelves, country framed paintings of scenery and old chairs and I stopped suddenly when I saw the eyes.

A jack-o’-lantern sat on the top of an old bookshelf, staring directly at me with its large carved triangular eyes and daunting eyebrows bend inwards to imply madness.

I ran.

I made it up the stairs and locked the flimsy door behind me. There was a single lamp at the edge of my room, across from the rocking chair. I switched the light on and resolved not to turn it off again until morning.

Crawling into the double bed, I found it to be quite comfortable.

“Don’t look at the chair.”

I pulled the soft covers over my chest and stretched out my toes.

“Don’t look at the chair.”

I lay there motionless for hours, only blinking. I was too scared to close my eyes.

“Don’t look at the chair.”

At some point I finally passed out. I never looked at the chair.

In the night I woke one time. Before opening my eyes, I imagined there to be a man sitting in the rocking chair watching me sleep.

It would be too dark to see his face; the hat he wore would cover his eyes and nose. Only a toothless grin would be seen peering out from the shadow. Old, tattered clothes would sour the room and smell like rotting plants, the nostril-burning stench of decay.

He would slowly push backward on the chair, causing an ear-piercing creak that would echo down the staircase to the abandoned restaurant below and back again.

Some disgruntled mill worker from the 1800’s, he would rock back and forth in his favorite chair and whisper to me that he could smell my fear. He would stand up and lean down to my uncovered face; his icy-cold breath would chill my cheeks. His rotten stomach-acid breath would burn my skin and surely make me gag.

When I opened my eyes there was nothing there. I looked at the chair, sitting unmoved in the corner by itself.

Sweat beaded down my cheek. It took some time, but I fell asleep again and slept until morning light shone through my window.

I walked downstairs and then outside to see the mist rolling across the Duck River. Tall oaks, massive hickory and broad vine-covered sycamore trees cast long shadows across the river basin. Beefalo cattle strolled quietly through a distant field.

The Parish Patch seemed like a different place in the daylight. The dark and sinister edges had been smoothed over by the sunshine.

Even the Mill Loft window seemed to be brightened by the sun’s touch.

My coworkers would soon come to give me a ride back to civilization, but not before I took an icy-cold bath in the crow’s foot tub.

I was almost disappointed in my fellow employees for not harassing me through the night; I would have welcomed the company. Even though I never saw a ghost, I thought I could feel them there; the room resonated with some mysterious energy.

After I’d packed my bag, I sat down in the rocking chair. It was comfortable for its age and the sunshine made it seem less menacing. I walked to the door and said my goodbyes to whoever was listening.

There was no reply.

Remember the One-Dollar Employee?

In 2004 I wrote a short feature story on one of the most interesting women I'd met while living in Murfreesboro. You can read her story here: The One-Dollar Employee. Enjoy!

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Most people wouldn’t be too happy making just $1 a year.

But Dr. Mary Tom Berry, who serves as the communications coordinator for the Tennessee Center for the Study and Treatment of Dyslexia, is delighted with her annual $1 salary.

Rolling around her spacious office in a large black cushioned chair, Berry reaches across numerous file folders and spreadsheets to point out her nameplate, which rests at the back of her desk.

“Several years ago they gave me a title here, and for Christmas they gave me a nameplate,” says Berry with a laugh. “That’s supposed to be my title here, communications coordinator. One of the reasons why I’ve always loved it is that I haven’t the slightest idea what it means.”

Berry, who just turned 80 years old, has been volunteering her services to the center since 1995, when she retired from teaching at Middle Tennessee State University.

Berry strongly supports the services and programs the center provides and has dedicated the last nine years of her life to assisting the administration.

“Being around a staff so dedicated to professional development…so well informed…so delightful…so creative…people who have such a delightful sense of humor—it’s a pleasure for me to be here,” Berry says.

At the center, Berry keeps track of statistical information, assists with public relations and keeps her fellow employees thinking positive.

“She never focuses on anything negative,” says Janet Camp, supervisor of Educational Services. “We’ll get all mucked down, and she pulls us out every time…by always saying something positive. She sees so much potential here, and that gives her awesome energy.”

One would think all this work would deserve a large salary, but Berry happily explains the reasons behind the dollar.

“A lot of people in major corporations who do this kind of thing are like dollar-a-year people,” Berry says. “They are CEOs, or who represent—by the status of their title—that they have definitely made it.

“I’ve had no objection whatsoever of wearing the title of being a dollar-a-year person.”

At the back of Berry’s office—displayed proudly on her desk—are three documents framed and signed by Dr. Diane Sawyer, director of the center.

One of the documents reads: “An anonymous donor has made it possible for the Tennessee Center for Study and Treatment of Dyslexia to tender you an annual salary of $1. Your contributions to this facility are greatly appreciated; however, these are difficult times. While I can assure you the coffee will continue to be available, I cannot guarantee your salary for 2003.”

Inside this framed document, attached with a crude piece of Scotch tape and inside a tiny plastic covering, is a shiny gold $1 coin.

“For $1, I have always said this is the best job in the world. I come as I please, go as I please, and the coffee’s always good,” Berry jokes.

After 35 years of employment, Berry says she’s never had an office as nice as the one she currently occupies on the MTSU campus. She takes a second to look at her surroundings and laughs out loud.

“Goodness gracious,” Berry exclaims, “I’ve worked all my life for something like this, but I had to retire to get it.”

On the morning of Berry’s 80th birthday, she arrived at the center to find a large banner draped across her office door that read, “Mary Tom, Queen of the Center.”

Her office was filled with food, balloons, gifts, hot coffee and smiling coworkers. The walls were adorned with bright white pieces of paper with some of Berry’s most infamous catchphrases printed on them.

The first of these flyers read: Do you need me to come around and crack the whip? Another read: It just so irritates me when the coffee’s not hot. And, of course: It is so disappointing that my salary cannot be guaranteed for another year.

Luckily for Berry, the state of Tennessee granted a 3 percent pay raise to its employees, effective July 3.

“One of the gifts that I got for my birthday this year was this piggy bank,” Berry says, proudly displaying the small porcelain container. “The note I got with it was precious. It said this is to encourage others to contribute to my salary, since there’s a good possibility that the center won’t formally recognize my raise.”

One by one, employees at the center have been coming by Berry’s office and putting three pennies in her new birthday bank.

“Every once in a while one of them will come in here and ask if anybody’s contributed to my salary,” says Berry with a heart-warming smile. “I just say, I don’t know—let’s shake it and see.”