Housing
Careful, Justin Bieber
I’m surrounded by lots of nasty newspaper and magazine articles and insulting letters and want you to understand this deluge on my doorstep is the same or worse than cyber bullying. Not many understand. I’m nineteen and make fifty million a year and fans love me and I’m doing things most my age would do.…
Read MoreBack Yard Hole
What’re you doing home, Fred, wife said. Sick of job. How’ll we live. Fred didn’t answer. He grabbed shovel in garage, put on work gloves, walked into back yard, and started digging. He dug fast, heaving dirt far as possible, and hole got wide and deep by sundown. What in God’s name, said wife. Fred…
Read MoreOcean View
From patio on highest hill endless ocean rolls green back onto hill. Other way city sits in smog. Damn four story house next door ruins view, owners say. Not bad, I note, three in ravine. Suppose we’re lucky to live here fifty years. Used to be in tract house below.
Read MoreTrash Can
Old man eased across street to knock on iron security door and was ignored till stepped to bedroom window rapping to force another old man out. Did you pull trash can down street and fill with shingles and nails? Hell no. Then I wonder who. You see anyone? Just those guys on your roof.
Read MoreSavings
Pushing hand between armrest and cushion of ragged sofa, I searched for unknown artifacts and pulled out faded savings pass book revealing thirty years ago had opened account with hundred dollars, inauspicious total for man in twenties. Two weeks later I needed ninety dollars. That happens when make few hundred monthly. I still rebuilt balance…
Read MoreGarden Party for William H. Johnson
(A major feature about painter William H. Johnson, 1901-1970, will be posted later this spring.) I wish William H. Johnson, gifted painter of a unique world, were at this party honoring young African American artists, staged by the foundation bearing his name, at an elegant old two-story home near the Wilshire district in Los Angeles.…
Read MorePruning
Alice liked to save money. She scoured newspapers and tabloids to find coupons. She drove across town to pay few cents less per gallon of gas. She never dined in restaurants or went to movies. She hadn’t taken vacation since husband died twenty years ago. She mowed lawn until arthritis forced to have dug out…
Read MoreDeadbolt Rules
(This vertical prose was rewritten horizontally and posted September 22, 2012.) hell of hot day fishing in thin mountain air sun scorched harold and he drank too many beers didn’t matter he caught no fish he had to return to rat hole room at rear of house in bad area rusty deadbolt jammed and impatient…
Read MoreShooting Baskets in Dreams
Generation after Hal moved from two small dingy rooms connected to old house in battery-stealing part of town, he thought dreams had disappeared so was saddened to see himself there shooting baskets. Old friend sat behind and watched errant shots. Damn ceiling’s too low to shoot right. Friend should’ve agreed but only stared as Hal…
Read MoreTear Down those Nice Houses
I wish I were a member of the growing juggernaut of elite achievers who can afford to buy beautiful houses in wonderful areas then raze the structures and build something much grander. This whole process either bespeaks a society of great wealth, energy, and imagination or foretells doom on the scale of sybaritic Romans who…
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