Attitude Adjustment Center

 

A Prize - perfect for regifting

 

Maybe it was our fault.  We had gone there with very low expectations.  We’d been to this restaurant years ago and it was bad back then, so why should we think they had improved?  Here’s the thing… we won a gift card to this place during a contest. 

And I'm not talking about the food, although it would have had to come up several notches to achieve mediocre.  No, I’m referring to the continuous bombardment of hideous music.  Truly, it was a seemingly endless collection of the worst noise ever pumped through a cheap sound system there ever has been.

The record producers must be the same people who make those little gadgets that send out sound waves to repel rodents.  Those were actually my thoughts as I sat there poking at my food with a fork, this is awful, they must be trying to chase me away. 

If they had been brave enough to have suggestion cards at the table, I believe I may have said, know your audience.  99% of their customers were in their 70’s or more.  Hardly the folks who enjoy heavy metal or off-key rap.  But hey – what do I know?

 

zc 

 

Side note:
        There is a reason the place is empty during the lunch rush. 

 

 

 

The Score for this one is in the High C's

 

Without wheels the fog can still roll in.  A drunk can be rolled and yet he also is without wheels.  This following story is about a wheel.   It has never touched the ground and yet has traveled to the far edges of over there and back again. 

If it ever touched the ground, it would be a very bumpy ride, because the wheel I’m talking about is not smooth.  It is the one used to steer the ship.  It is rotated by hand, by the captain whose ability to navigate, make decisions and ultimately corrections to those decisions while wearing a little Captain’s hat determines the outcome of the adventure.

 

Here’s where the rolling fog comes in.

 

 

***

 

The fog doesn’t roll in like a wheel, of course—no tidy geometry, no spokes, no hub. It arrives like a rumor that forgot who started it. It seeps. It sidles. It curls around corners as if it already knows the layout of the ship better than the captain does. And that’s the trouble.

Because a wheel—that wheel, the one polished by a thousand decisions and a few regrets—depends on sight. On horizon. On the faint line where “over there” becomes “here.” But when the fog comes in, the horizon is erased as casually as a chalkboard wiped clean by a bored substitute teacher. The captain turns the wheel anyway, because that’s what Captains do. They steer even when steering becomes a philosophical exercise.

This is where the fog becomes mischievous.

It doesn’t just obscure. It suggests. It whispers possibilities that weren’t there a moment ago. A darker patch might be an island or a cloud or the memory of a cloud. A lighter patch might be open water or a trick of the eye or the ghost of a decision the captain hasn’t made yet. The fog is not content to simply exist; it wants to participate.

And so the wheel—your wheel, the one that has never touched the ground yet has traveled everywhere—begins to feel different in the captain’s hands. Not heavier, not lighter, but more… interpretive. As if the ship itself is listening to the fog and offering its own opinion about which way to go.

The captain, wearing that little hat that confers both authority and the burden of pretending to know what’s happening, rotates the wheel a few degrees. The ship responds, but the fog responds too, shifting in a way that feels almost intentional. Almost helpful. Almost mocking.

Because here’s the secret the fog knows:

Steering is never about certainty. It’s about choosing a direction when the world refuses to show you one.

And the wheel—bumpy, wooden, imperfect—was built for exactly that kind of moment. It was never meant for smooth roads or predictable terrain. It was meant for the in‑between places, the half-seen waters, the days when the fog rolls in without wheels of its own yet somehow manages to move everything.

 

 

 

 

A Statue in Winter

 

A statue in winter

when no birds sing,

without scarf or gloves

against winter’s sting,

 

No mug of hot chocolate

no band in the park

frozen in place

alone in the dark,

 

How it longs to be summer

from harsh winter’s dread

with the tickle of feet

from the bird on it's head.

 

 

          zc

 

but how long ago?

 

This fell from space and eventually washed ashore.
The material has yet to be identified
and it's function is unknown.

A Day at the Beach

 

        Sandy’s second trip down to the soft sand gave her another little pail full to bring back to where her mother sat on their blanket.  She carefully dumped it out next to the edge of the blanket and with her little shovel began to spread it out searching for tiny treasures from the ocean.

She had already collected three small shells and a broken sand dollar.  As she ever so gently spread the pile of sand out, she noticed two feet right in front of her.  She slowly looked up and saw a seagull standing watching her sort through the sand.  He seemed very curious.  Sandy mumbled something that sounded like, this is mine.  Go away.  But the seagull just kept watching her look through the pile of sand.

It was almost exactly at the same time that the sun sparkled off of something in her pile and the gull reached forward and pecked it out.  He quickly took two steps back and dropped the item on the sand in front of him.  Sandy saw it was a shiny ring, with what looked like a good-sized diamond.  

Annoyed at the seagull stealing her treasure, Sandy gave the ground a sharp whap with the back of her shovel.  The seagull took another step back, but didn’t appear too concerned, as again he reached forward, picking up the ring and this time flying off towards the water.

“What are you doing with that seagull?” asked Sandy’s mother.  “He was trying to take my shells, but I chased him away.” 

“Good for you, honey.  Don’t let those things get too close.  They're full of disease and stuff.” 

Later that afternoon, Maryann and her husband returned to the beach with their rented metal detectors, searching for her lost engagement ring.  I know this because I’ve been sitting watching all this activity since right after breakfast.  I would have said something right when the ring first appeared, but like I said, that seagull was quick.  Hopefully he dropped it before he was out over the water.

 

PS
        I was just guessing the lady's name was Maryann.  I have no idea who they are, but I did hear them talking about the ring. 

 

zc

 

 

 

 

 

A Rather Odd Story

 

Barry Bolinski had a secret he could never tell.  It was an ability that he didn’t understand for many years, and then he did.  By making various comments and asking questions, he came to realize no one else had this ability or would ever believe him if he said that he did. 

Barry’s unique ability was that he could see stress.  He could see it in steel structures, in cement and even in wood.  He’d see it as a different color from the surrounding material.  He first noticed it in a freeway overpass.  One supporting leg of the structure was red, as if it had been painted.  When Barry mentioned it to a friend, his friend looked at him like he was crazy.  “Barry, there’s no paint on that.  What are you talking about?” 

Occasionally he would see streaks of red on sections of bridges and once on the foundation at the post office building downtown.  The corner of that building eventually collapsed.  It was on a Sunday, and nobody was hurt.  The one time he did speak up was when he noticed one of the welds on a swing set at the elementary school.  It was bright red and he knew it was going to fail.  He told the school principal he had heard it crack when one of the children was swinging on it.  Of course he hadn’t, but it was enough to convince the principal to have it rewelded. 

Barry wasn’t sure what would happen should he ever announce his gift to people.  Most, of course, would never believe him, some would call him a freak or weird.  But who would actually address an issue they didn’t see for themselves.  No one was about to tear down a bridge just because some guy named Barry said he saw something going on with the material. 

It was the thump of his morning newspaper landing at his front door that reminded Barry it was finally the weekend, and he didn’t have to rush off to work.  Sitting on his back patio with his coffee and Saturday’s news, he propped his feet up and listened for a moment to the birds singing.  

As he opened the paper, the first thing to catch his attention was the full-spread photograph of the new ball stadium.  Never before had he seen anything red like this.  It had always been the actual thing that he saw, not just a picture of it, but here it was, a large section of the stands was red.  He saw it very plainly.   There was no way he could keep this to himself.  He wondered if the contractor had cut corners, or used inferior materials, but whatever the reason he had to say something to somebody.

 

 

zc

 

 

 

 to be continued