Jun 17
Slave Labor We’re into the second day of chrome shop training with Fernando, and I’m still not entirely sure he understands a fucking word I’m saying. I continue speaking what passes for English in Alabama accompanied by frenetic hand gestures, pantomime that becomes increasingly agitated with his every expression of surprise and disbelieving shake of …
Jun 03
Every Idiot is Somebody’s Son When my son loses his job as he invariably must, he won’t admit it right away, but I always know. He gets a squirrelly look in his eyes. I’ve no better way to describe it. His eyes get squirrelly. Now, I’ve been told squirrels can be stupidly industrious. I don’t …
May 27
I May Not Control the Narrative, But Occasionally I Supervise It For four and a half years I supervised the assembly plant at Hydra Hydraulics. It wasn’t what I set out to do with this life, but I settled into it easily enough. I even grew to like it. The job appealed to the lazier …
May 20
If You’re Reading This, Then I Must Have Managed to Write a Column Yesterday So, my plan for last weekend ideally involved relaxing for hours on the front porch with my feet propped up and a book in my lap. I even had my clothes picked out, white linen trousers and a thin sky-blue button-down …
May 13
You’ve Been Milted I’ve managed to escape the factory for two whole days and I’m intent on wiling the hours away in as lazy a manner as I can muster, sitting beside my wife on the front porch, watching the world pass by. For this brief moment, I experience the closest sensation to contentment the …
May 06
Everybody Else is Stacking Cash, So Why Ain’t I? How much money you got stashed in your bank account? What’s your 401K looking like? Do you have at least four months’ salary put back in savings in case you lose your job? These are the sort of questions my wife bombards …
Apr 29
The Unpredictability of Fate Or An Open Letter to Billy Zane A wiser man than I once said that fate was a monkey. I’m inclined to agree. I read a news article the other day about a local man who died of a hatchet chop to the throat last week while on “a journey …
Apr 22
Pierogi Queens and The Polish Precision Lawn Mower Team It was so fucking hot, Chicago melted. Lake Michigan evaporated leaving behind three startled carp and a land-locked yachtsman, half-crazed from the heat. Fifteen miles to the southeast, the annual Pierogi Fest was gearing up in defiance of the sweltering sun suspended ten feet above …
Apr 15
Splitting Heirs It occurs to me, probably more often than it should, that I have yet to see my twenty-two-year-old son in the company of a female. His life is his own, of course, to do with as he sees fit, but I see a lot of me in a lot of him. So, why …
Apr 08
Hey, Did I Ever Tell You I’m a Writer? On casual Fridays while most of my co-workers on the office side of the factory wall eschew collared shirts for Tees emblazoned with the insignia of their favorite sports team, I pimp a shirt advertising the cover of my latest short story collection, Thrift Store …
