Life, actually…

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WATCHING YOU WHILE YOU WATCH ME WATCHING YOU

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Several generations ago, before your time but during my time, I was actually a small child. Hard to believe, isn’t it?

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Because I, like you, began life as a child, my evolution toward adulthood was an adventure. An adventure worth examining along the way, worthy of examination many years later—like right now, for instance.

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As a young’un, I learned everything the hard way. Each experience was a first-time happening. Each moment was exciting. Each time I closed my eyes, then opened them, I saw something fresh and new.

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I did a lot of pondering back then.

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I punch the rear view button of my time machine. I select Five Years Old.

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And here I am, back in my childhood hometown.

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I’m getting dressed for the day, layering myself with protective clothing, when I realize someone is secretly watching me getting dressed. I look at my bare feet, and there is the culprit. Superman is staring straight at me from the front cover of a comic book.

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This Superman needs to remain safely inside his pages. He doesn’t need to observe my personal life, except when he’s keeping enemies at bay.

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I turn the comic face-down and continue grooming. I’m safe in my room and Superman is safely napping inside the pages I will be turning shortly as I observe his exploits. I always feel safe when Superman is nearby.

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I’m later breaking my fast at the kitchen counter, munching on toast and reading the labels of a cereal box and a Pet Milk container. Suddenly, I realize that the can’s label is illustrated with a picture of a cow peeking out from inside a can of Pet Milk.

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Hmm…

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Looking closer, I see that the picture of the canned cow depicts a picture of a canned cow. I squint to see how many pictures of canned cows inside pictures of canned cows there might be, each one smaller than the one before.

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This infinitude of cows disappearing into atom-sized illustrations is more than I can grasp. Where does it end?

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Years from now, when I read Richard Matheson’s novel The Shrinking Man, I come to understand that the infinite diminishing of anything cannot be dealt with logically, even when I become an adult.

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The Shrinking Man steadily shrinks into infinity, never stopping. Where is he now?

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Maybe he’s enjoying life with the Pet Milk cow, knowing that all is well and safe, particularly while Superman stands guard

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© Jim Reed 2022 A.D.

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Life, actually…

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ONE AHA! MOMENT IN A DEEP SOUTH HOMETOWN

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Clarion is as clarion does…

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A brilliant sunny crystal clear breathable clarion day today, a day to drive to work and reflect upon the wonders of paradox, a day to make me feel guilty for working but work I must because I know I’ll feel guilty not doing it, a day to forget that just recently I was driving along depressed while listening to the squarunch squarunch squarunch of my faulty windshield wipers imperfectly rubbing away rain mixed with aerial scum, a day to remember that life, in all its awesome and frightening variety, can be awful and inspiring at the same moment, that one brief inhalation of beauty, one quick and silent second, can bring unexpected joy in the midst of almost any bad situation.

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If I get just enough of these nice moments of inspiration strung along to separate the cruddy and seemingly insufferable times, I feel I can keep on keeping on, I can continue making one step fit right in front of the previous step, I can take a moment to reflect upon the inner core of of me that is still a bright and happy child, pat it on the head and encourage it to stick around yet another day because I know that tomorrow is going to bring lots of stuff that will require comic relief and joyful distraction to break it down into its manageable components

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–from Jim Reed’s 1998 memoir, DAD’S TWEED COAT Small Wisdoms Hidden Comforts Unexpected Joys

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© Jim Reed 2022 A.D.

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Life, actually…

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THE SANDPAPER RAZOR MEETS THE BARBER CHAIR KID

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I’m riding the Theo A Kochs automatic barber chair, watching the barber foot-pump his metal and leather instrument higher so that he can get at my neck, the neck of eight-year-old me, back in the 1950s South. He has already draped my shoulders and torso in a checkered cloth to keep the hairs he’s about to trim from hiding under my clothes and making me all itchy.

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The barber is efficiently cutting away while continuing his running conversations with various customers who sit in a long row of chairs facing the Theo A Kochs chair. They talk of fishing and hunting and politics and street repair while thumbing through current issues of magazines like Argosy, Esquire, Field and Stream, Collier’s, Look, Life, Saturday Evening Post.

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The shop smells of old cologne and talcum and working man sweat and spittoons.

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I squirm impatiently while the barber plies his trade, his scissors and electric trimmer flashing in the sunbeams that cause the rotating storefront candy cane pole to cast its shadow across my shoes. I gaze at my shoes because I’m required to lower my head while lather is applied to my neck.

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Looking downward, I read and re-read the Theo A Kochs brand name embossed in nickel plated sheen between my feet. The freshly-stropped straight razor makes sandpaper sounds. I cringe, waiting for the barber’s hand to slip. It never does. But it might.

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What is that after-shave perfume the barber laves on my neck? What is the name of the talcum powder he dusts on my neck to ease the fresh-shave sting? Why is he shaving the neck of a pre-beard kid? I don’t understand the ritual of shave and talcum and fragrance and hair tonic, but I do know that I will not feel like I’ve really had a haircut unless I walk away smelling like something other than a real eight-year-old lad.

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The barber dramatically takes away the checkered cloth the way Dracula might swirl his cape.

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I take my feet off the Theo A Kochs brand. The shoeshine man swish-brooms the back of my shirt in an elegant gesture of manners and politeness. I walk past the rotating candy cane pole and onto the sunny streets of my Deep South village, a brand-new kid ready to face a brand-new afternoon.

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I don’t know whether the magazine-thumbing grownups ever tip the barber, though they do tip the shiner of shoes. Kids are not expected to tip, so I get to spend my extra dime across the street at Woolworth for the best bag of popcorn I will ever eat…until the next haircut

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© Jim Reed 2022 A.D.

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