Tag: fate

The Station Sparrow

~ Richard Schulte ~ 2 Comments

It was funny how birds often walked into the enormous waiting room at the city train station. They waddled right through the open door. The birds seemed fearless as they roamed about the tile floor looking for food, deftly avoiding the feet of passengers.

Two or three pigeons liked to strut among passengers near the snack kiosk, cooing and pecking at crumbs. A chirping sparrow hopped along the rows of varnished wooden benches where passengers sat quietly, thinking or looking at their phones as they waited for trains.

The tiny sparrow, which actually seemed to live in the cavernous waiting room, was very brave for its size. It easily outmaneuvered the gigantic humans. It was also surprisingly strong, able to carry away a whole cracker with ease.

Sometimes one of those big, clumsy humans would be startled by the flight of something near the train station’s high ceiling. “What the–?”

When anyone observed that the sparrow was building a nest up in a hanging light fixture, a laugh was sure to follow.

“What a perfect place for a nest,” one gentleman chuckled. “Lots to eat. All sorts of messy people.”

“Messy birds, too,” his friend frowned. She motioned toward fresh droppings on the floor.

“I’m sure there’s much worse than that around here,” asserted the gentleman, nodding with exaggerated disgust at the many bedraggled strangers who sat on the varnished benches, clutching their baggage, staring dully out the large windows at the station platform.

With a rumble a scheduled train arrived. Passengers stood up, formed a line, filed out. New people trickled into the waiting room. Every passing soul chose one particular spot on a wooden bench, sat down.

Few would look around with curiosity, until they noticed that endlessly busy sparrow.

The sparrow hopped about the tile floor, gathering bits of material to build its nest. A leaf blown through the door would be flown up to the nest. So would a discarded candy wrapper.

The small sparrow, as it moved among the feet of several sitting passengers, cocked its head right and left. It hopped up onto a bench, moving in small, effortless hops toward one lady who sat talking on her phone. Suddenly it flew up to her shoulder, grabbed a loose hair from her sweater, and flashed up to the ceiling and its nest in the light.

The lady shrieked and looked about. People jumped, turned. She was gazing up at the ceiling. Suddenly she broke out in happy laughter. “A bird was on my shoulder!” she told the person at the other end of her phone. A passenger on the bench facing her was smiling.

Up near the ceiling, the station sparrow weaved its nest.

The precocious bird emerged from under a bench and made a dash for another passenger. It attacked a loose shoelace, gave it a tug.

“Oh my god! Look at that bird!” exclaimed the owner of the shoe. “It’s crazy! What’s that bird doing?”

A child sitting nearby joined in the laughter.

The sparrow moved mysteriously from bench to bench, its chirp heard at one end of the large waiting room, then the other.

A quietly sobbing passenger sat in one corner of the waiting room. She daubed her eyes and carelessly dropped a tissue. Like a sudden bolt of lightning the small sparrow swept down from somewhere and stole the tissue and carried it up to its nest. Her sobs were relieved by a lighthearted laugh.

Later in the day the bird flew down to the ticket counter and stood cocking its head right and left as it watched a transaction.

“I want a one way ticket for the next train to Los Angeles,” demanded a passenger.

“A one way ticket?”

“Yeah, I don’t intend to return to this place.”

The passenger carefully counted out bills and placed them upon the elegant wooden counter.

In a flash the thieving sparrow swept past. It easily stole a twenty dollar bill and flew up to its light near the ceiling.

“A bird stole my money!”

“They better return that money,” the next person in line said angrily. “You have the legal right to get it back. If they don’t give you back every penny, you should call the police.”

But the paying passenger, staring up at the small nest in the dirty old station light, suddenly smiled and exploded with laughter. “Oh, does it really matter? That was actually hilarious. That little bird is going to have the most fantastic nest ever built!”

As passengers sat on the waiting room benches, or stood in line for arriving trains, the station sparrow stealthily gathered scraps for its nest. Those who noticed enjoyed a laugh. Some, peering up toward the ceiling, wondered what the nest contained.

A Monument to Remember

~ Richard Schulte ~ 1 Comment

I’m not exactly sure why I spent Sunday mornings sitting on a cold bench near that monument. It seemed a suitable place to read a book. I suppose my attraction to the place had something to do with words engraved in marble. A feeling of permanence.

Those mornings I wasn’t the only one drawn to the park. Rested and ready, fresh out of nearby hotels, tourists hurried past beds of flowers in order to conquer the city.

The shining monument, in the shape of an erect, pointed obelisk, was so conspicuous that eager eyes couldn’t possibly miss it.

Legs inevitably turned. Feet halted by the solemn black plaque at the obelisk’s base. Selfie sticks rose. Satisfied poses were effected.

If I really wanted to hurt myself, I lowered my book and opened my mouth to play a simple game. “Do you know why that monument is there?” I asked.

Most couldn’t say.

Sunshine

~ Richard Schulte ~ Leave a comment

slow
arriving

too soon
leaving

silver
morning

golden
evening

Another Page

~ Richard Schulte ~ 3 Comments

Becky turned another page of her scrapbook.

She peered into a faded photograph.

Flying that kite in the backyard on the green grass. A small yard bright with summer sunshine. The day she found an Indian arrowhead under a stepping stone. Ants in the picnic brownies. That silly dog–his silly name–what was it–Wiggles, and the waving armlike branches of the old crooked oak tree.

That slow rope swing, and cool, satisfying shade beneath wind-rustling leaves. That crazy squirrel. Darting around and around, between the trees. That funny, unstoppable squirrel. The shy small sparrows in the azalea bushes. Dragonflies like green jewels, ethereal pale moths.

Billowing white clouds shaped like sculpted marble, or towering castles high in the sky, shining exactly like heaven at the edges.

A clay pot full of cheerful dahlias. Dandelion fluff that rose like momentary dreams. Sudden hummingbirds. That friendly robin. Diamonds of early morning dew. Gentle waves of tall unmown grass in a soft summer afternoon breeze. The oh-so-sweet smell of green grass.

Her kite, so bright, almost touching the sun.

Becky’s thin fingers turned the pages.

Birthday parties, picnics on the lawn, hide-and-seek, cutting beautiful red roses under the kitchen window, arms twirling wide in a warm summer rain, lying flat on the lush grass, meeting that friend, drinking lemonade from a glass bright with clinking ice, watching for the gopher, painting at a tipsy easel, laughter, idle chatting, repeated bad jokes, learning the guitar, nodding, teasing, stealing kisses, daydreaming, talking with long-vanished best friends on a magic carpet blanket, feeling the so, so soft caress of those passing summers.

She turned through every page. Her scrapbook was just about full.

Becky closed the heavy book and with difficulty set it down on the end table near her wheelchair. Sitting alone, she gazed about the empty, curtained room. It was cold. The room was dead.

Her great-granddaughter flew through the door.

“Hi Great-Ma! What are you doing?”

“Resting. I’m very tired.”

“Why are you tired?”

“Because I’m so very old.”

“Won’t you please come outside with me?” the tiny girl asked. “I’m going to fly my new kite!”

Becky smiled. “Okay.”

One Magic Bubble

~ Richard Schulte ~ 3 Comments

Every morning, during my walk to work across the East River, a man would be standing on the bridge conjuring bubbles. I never saw such fantastic bubbles. He produced them by dipping a loop of string at the end of a long wand into a bucket of his own secret concoction. Then he’d lift his wand up to the breeze and watch the bubbles fill and grow exactly like living things.

Then, woosh–there each would go! Lifting into the sky, undulating like crazy. Bending the morning sunlight into spherical rainbows.

Out across the sparkling river the bubbles flew. The bubble man and I got to know each other after awhile and we’d make preposterous bets.

“I bet it makes it to the next bridge. That’s got to be at least a quarter mile,” I offered with a smile.

“Farther ‘n that. I had one go all the way to those roofs, over by that silver building.”

“You could actually see it that far away?”

“It was a big one. I saw it pop.”

Most of the time the man just silently conjured bubbles, and we two would stand on the bridge watching them birth and take flight. Some burst too soon. The duration of their flight seemed completely unpredictable.

The ever-shining river welcomed bubbles along its endless path. Our backs were to the rushing cars.

I’d slip a few dollars into the man’s hat when he wasn’t looking. I always meant to ask him if there was anything he needed.

“Check this one out!” Holding his wand above the river, he suddenly became enthusiastic. An impossibly gigantic bubble filled with the wind’s breath, taking form. Somehow, without bursting, the quivering globe launched from his upraised wand.

It must have been a world record. It was at least six feet in diameter. The conditions must have been exactly right. The living bubble rose into the sky and floated on the unseen wind out over the river. Its changing colors were fantastically vivid.

The once-in-a-lifetime bubble rose and rose and rose, became smaller and smaller as it vanished down the river. We stood very quietly and watched.

One morning I passed over the bridge and the man was gone. I never did ask his name.

A Steep Hill

~ Richard Schulte ~ Leave a comment

The old man bent slowly. He set a heavy black garbage bag down on the sidewalk. He stood on the hill and rested. The five block climb to the church seemed more steep than ever.

I can’t do this forever, he told himself.

The shadows from downtown buildings were cold. The old man zipped his jacket all the way up. He gazed down at the sidewalk and the garbage bag.

He lifted the bag and resumed his way up the hill. One careful step after another. He waited on a corner for a traffic light, even though there were almost no cars about on a Sunday morning. Litter blown by the November wind had collected in the gutter. On the opposite sidewalk several people were sleeping among discarded bottles.

The apples in his bag felt like stones.

He wondered why he carried them.

His parents had built their modest house a long, long time ago, decades before the city swarmed around it. When he was three years old, his mother had planted an apple tree in the backyard. Now, suffocated by high-rises, it was a miracle that tree grew at all. It was a miracle the harvest remained bountiful. No sunlight now reached the tiny house.

For a painful instant the old man barely recalled the radiant face of his mother: her shining eyes and bright fiery curls. The apple tree was just as generous as her unpent heart. Pies, cakes, muffins, cobblers, jelly, sauce, cider, enough for a large happy family. But those years were long dead. The only hands that remained were his own.

He now despised apples.

A smiling man in a sideways baseball cap hurried rapidly down the steep sidewalk. The smiling man stopped a few feet above the old man and stared down at him.

“What you got there buddy?”

“A garbage bag.”

“Find anything good?”

“No, just garbage.”

“Too bad. Look what I got. The idiots at City Church give them away for nothing.” The smiling man pulled a red apple out of a pocket. “They don’t even care who you are. You can take as many as you want.” The smiling man suddenly pitched the red apple across the street. It struck the side of a cold building and exploded. He laughed loudly.

The smiling man pulled out another apple, tossed it onto the street, watched it roll down into the gutter.

The old man shrugged, continued up the hill with his garbage bag.

. . .

The tree was unrelenting. Those beautiful apples seemed infinite.

The old man ascended the hill to church Sunday after Sunday, transporting a terribly heavy bag, one careful step following another. He often wondered why he did it.

It was fate, probably.

An Encounter With Santa Claus

~ Richard Schulte ~ 2 Comments

The wait at the shopping mall’s coffee kiosk was unusually long. Mary’s mother looked up from her phone. “Don’t unwrap your cookie until we get home. I don’t want crumbs all over my new car. You remember what happened when you spilled that sticky soda last weekend? I really don’t think I could stand another headache.”

Mary said nothing. As she stood beside her mother, she quietly watched thousands of Christmas shoppers hurry into and out of stores, into and out of elevators, up and down escalators.

An army of people hustled wrapped presents to and fro. Everybody was in a terrible rush.

Mary turned around in a circle to explore the dizzying mall with her eyes. Strings of Christmas lights blinked about the windows of every inviting store. Dozens of merry Santa Clauses with jolly plump faces stared out from signs, shopping bags and the dazzling window displays. Beyond one cascade of escalators, shoppers in a very long, twisting line waited in the food court to have their pictures taken with Santa Claus. ‘Tis the Season a nearby banner proclaimed in big letters.

“Didn’t you hear me? Let’s get going!” her mother said.

The two stepped into a river of shoppers. It was a torrent of urgency that felt irresistible. Mary marveled at the unending lights and the press of humanity.

Mary continued to search about.

Two pant legs were outstretched on the ground. The two legs stuck out from behind a trashcan near the front door of a busy store.

Mary and her mother neared the trashcan. A man was collapsed behind it, his back leaning against a wall. The man was asleep.

The man was fat and wore very dirty clothing. His stomach bulged out from under his torn shirt. His bare feet were black with dirt. An enormous white beard was splayed across his chest. Atop his nodding head was a Santa hat.

Shoppers hurried past him without noticing.

Mary stopped to look at Santa Claus.

She bent to place her wrapped cookie by his feet, then hurried to catch up with her mother.

Returning the Ball

~ Richard Schulte ~ 1 Comment

“Try one more time! I know you can catch it!”

Randy’s father tossed the ball a bit too high. The ball sailed through the sun and bounced off a rusting patio chair.

“I got it!” Randy shouted.

The four-year-old boy scampered after the rolling ball. The ball bumped off the patio and accelerated down the sloping lawn. The boy pursued it with eager legs.

The ball wouldn’t slow down.

It zipped past the startled cat.

It rolled past the spot where Randy was destined to celebrate his fifth birthday on freshly mown grass with laughing friends.

The ball rolled down the steep hill, past the grassy spot where Randy would one day rescue a hummingbird. And learn to fly a kite.

The ball rolled past the sprinkler head that would break his leg.

The ball kept going. Randy chased after it.

It rolled past the pepper tree where he and his father would build a treehouse. But that was still a few years off.

The ball rolled down the green slope, past the sun-facing garden where he would be taught by his mother to plant cherry tomatoes, green beans and sunflowers.

The boy ran at full speed.

The ball rolled past the garden bench where, sitting quietly one day, it would dawn on Randy that he would grow old.

The ball rolled past a year and another year.

The ball rolled through the grassy spot where he would lie on his back looking up at the clouds, dreaming about winning an Olympic gold medal.

The ball rolled past the tire swing where he would dangle reading a favorite book.

The ball rolled past the dirt patch where his father would ask why he ditched class.

The ball rolled past the old stump where he would sit very close to a girl.

The ball rolled and rolled and rolled all the way down to the fence next to the busy street, where his parents would stand waving as he drove off to college.

“I got it!”

With a shout, Randy was sprinting back up the long hill with all of his might, his small legs flying. He smiled up at his father. “I got it, Daddy!”

Life Made Easier

~ Richard Schulte ~ 1 Comment

Book burning didn’t destroy every book.

Voice recognition did.

Printed words vanished.

People still spoke, of course. And viewed pictures. But the pictures were always in kaleidoscope motion. Exact words were unnecessary.

Spelling was forgotten. Grammar was forgotten. Structured truth was forgotten. That made life easier.

. . .

Tracy took a wrong turn because a machine had catastrophically failed. Walking a great distance was strange enough, but now she was walking where no flesh-and-blood legs walked. The city’s Forgotten Zone.

Even the machines disregarded this place, she observed. She slowly turned her head, looking about. The deserted streets were lined with broken windows, broken doors.

Above one broken window hung a broken sign. The remaining word: LIFE.

What’s that for? Tracy wondered, staring at the old sign with blinking eyes.

. . .

Fortunately, a functioning machine soon located Tracy and retrieved her, returning her to her proper place.

“Thanks,” she said.

“You’re welcome,” replied the polite machine.

Elvis and the Time Machine

~ Richard Schulte ~ 1 Comment

You’ve probably seen Elvis–with that ridiculous hair, upturned collar and sequined jumpsuit–riding his Time Machine up and down Main Street every single day. I’m not sure where in town the guy lives. But he’s out there riding the Time Machine up and down the street and, I’m positive, savoring every minute of it.

Everyone laughs. Many shake their head. That absurd Time Machine is impossible to miss.

Bright silver-painted cardboard panels envelope the rickety little bicycle. It’s like the rocket ship dream of a child–with fins, and a whirling red police light mounted behind the bicycle seat, and flying streamers on the handlebars, and a galaxy of painted stars, and spelled out on the cardboard on both sides in big glittery letters: TIME MACHINE.

Veering with abandon, good old Elvis steers his Time Machine up and down Main Street all the live-long day. Pedaling forward, moving through time.

First Street.

The traffic light turns green.

Second Street.

The church clock strikes the quarter hour.

Third Street.

The sun moves higher above the horizon.

Fourth Street.

A woman opens the window shades, breathes in and gazes across the land.

Fifth Street.

Secret lovers behind the gas station kiss and part.

Fourth Street.

A boy forgets his school books and sprints back home.

Third Street.

A man remembers how his uncle burned the casserole the night before and laughs.

Second Street.

A wrinkled hand wipes away sudden tears.

First Street.

A nearby dog barks.

Second Street.

A rocking chair rocks.

Forward through time Elvis travels, his preposterous Time Machine shining brightly like a shooting star.

Back and forth, up and down Main Street he pedals.