A Writer's Tale

“Right. My Harold, just the same. Never does a thing first time I ask him. I usually end up threatening an allowance cut. That hits him were it hurts the wallet. Ungrateful! He won’t go out and get a job, either, and he’s sixteen. Simply disastrous! I really quite think he’s afraid of the Cruel World. Afraid he can’t get hired or might have to get a job where he has to work. I mean, this problem is reaching disaster stages. Oh! Hello, Sidney.”

“Yeah. I think I’ll walk the dog,” he told his mother.

“You haven’t done that in years!”

“It’s sort of a nice day today. Anyway, I figured Rex would get a kick out of it.”

“Well, don’t walk too close to Jefferson. We don’t want Rex run over, do we?”

“No, Mom.” Sidney clipped the chain onto an iron ring on the dog’s collar, then opened the door.

The dog burst out of the house, pulling Sidney close behind. They ran together down the dark, deserted street. “Slow down, boy.” Sidney slowed his own pace, but the dog pulled on. “Come on, would you slow down!” Finally, half running, the boy reached the highway, Jefferson. He walked the dog up the sidewalk, which was blue in the dim street light, and slippery, until he came to the crossroad sign.

“Time to go home, fellow. Let’s go. Come on!” The strong boy did not want to pull at the leash for fear of hurting the dog’s neck, but the gnawing wind convinced him that he had better pull. He could not let the dog run around smelling every what not in sight. “Come on.” He jerked the leash. Rex planted his paws firmly in the snow-spotted mud.

“Doggone. Let’s go.”

“Aw, I’m sorry, old fellow. That was pretty mean. You can stay out here as long as you want. It’s a lousy business, having a chain on you. You’re a real good guy.” Sidney bent over and patted the terrier.

This seemed the cue for the dog to start being cooperative. It led Sidney down Jefferson and up the lonely side-street to their home. Sidney pushed open the heavy, brown door to the kitchen.

“And then she had the nerve, the nerve, mind you, to say I shouldn’t of laid down the king!”

“She sounds quite nasty.”

“That’s the gospel. Just doesn’t have any regard for other people’s feelings.”

Sidney replaced the leash on its hook in the utility closet and hung up his jacket. He smiled at Mrs. MacHony as he squeezed between her chair and the counter. Past the woman, he went up the stairs to his room. He switched on the light over his desk, then set the portable tape recorder he had been given for Christmas, on the desk. He turned it to “play.”

“… that melancholy burden bore

Of never nevermore.

But the Raven still beguiling

All my fancy into smiling… ” and Sidney turned off the tape recorder.

He laid his head on his hands. On the ink blotter covering his desktop he noticed an epitaph he had copied from Bartlett’s. He read the scratchy print out loud.

“It is so soon that I am done for;

I wonder what I was begun for.”

Sidney stood slowly, pushing away his chair. He walked to his closet. He opened the door and pulled out a bulky leather case. He unzipped the case. He pulled a .22 caliber rifle from it, and walked with the rifle back across the room to the window above his desk.

Then, Sidney aimed the rifle and clicked the trigger at automobile headlights pushing bleakly through the darkness of far-off Jefferson.

the end

 

Postscript

When I first wrote “365 Days a Year” and submitted it, there was a different ending.

Either Sidney shot himself (committing suicide), or he actually fired his rifle out the window at cars passing on the road (committing mass murder). It was one or the other.

Whichever ending I used, I was told by my English teacher that I had to change it.

A sign of things to come.

Also, most of the story (though being a blatant imitation of J.D. Salinger) is extremely autobiographical. My parents were not happy about it.

My mother, in particular, had a problem with the story. She apparently suspected that she might be the inspiration for the mother in the story.

Also, Sidney’s strange behavior made my English teacher and parents fear that I might have some sort of psychological problems. There was speculation that maybe I needed a shrink, but I was never actually sent to one.

Oh well.

You can’t please everyone…

More “Early Poems”

 

Running Away(1965)

A city-boy sits against a corn shock Underneath the street lamp of the moon Knowing that alone on an Autumn evening

Is no better Maybe worse In a wigwam cornfield Than in muggy-aired Chicago Where at least you can see her Passing by, saying hi Once a day. Maybe. If you’re lucky.

 

Gull(1965)

A sea gull slipping across the moon

In the Sierras Shrieks a lonesome hunger For a far-off sea-place.

 

Night on a Lake(1965)

I would have it night on a lake our pale painted boat riding silence on the water under us smooth with the wind

all warm from the breath of sleeping reeds near the shore. There I would stand, free myself, and feel the wind lick

where I want you, now, stand slowly