Catching the blue

George drove down one of the last of many streets he took every morning to work. His thoughts were about maintaining his popularity. His kind of popularity came from the shock value of vulgar statements. His mind raced as he conjured up scenarios for breaks and lunch time. His eye caught a young woman jogging down Delmar a Last Street on his morning ritualistic commute. She was slim and wore tight jogging clothes. He watched her ass and thought how much he would like to get himself some of that. Then, the thought came to him that saying something to her would “set" the day and give him material that he could use for days. He rolled down his window and wolf whistled and added an, “Oh yeah honey!”. George’s day was made; he would be on a roll today.

Beth had her headphones on and was deep into what National Public Radio was saying about the state of wetlands in Florida and the developers who wanted to slice it up like pie. From her peripheral vision she saw a man drive by in a blue Ford truck. The man inside was leaning towards the open passenger side window. She saw his lips moving; didn’t hear him although she was positive it was something stupid, something disgusting. Even though the man was long gone she mouthed the word asshole. Her emotions began to pick up on what the brain was developing. She kept jogging and retreated into her thoughts. As she did the outside world grew dark and she imagined herself inside her head. She was dressed as she was now and standing alone in what would seem like the darkest abandoned airline hanger. This is how she made decisions, mulled over situations.

Inside the dark hanger Beth was furious. A light shined on her yellow jogging suit. She raised both hands clenched in a fist. Men are so . . . ASSHOLES! she screamed. As if I went jogging today for that assholes amusement! I have a right to do anything, go anywhere and look anything like I want. As if on cue the two sides of the hanger lit up. Each side hand 12 chairs, four chairs per row with the second and third row higher than the one before. All chairs were taken with duplicate Beths and all were shaking their fists and screaming encouragements to everything that had just been said. As the cheering, hooting and fist shaking went on the Beths on the left side were transforming, morphing into the likeness of Beth’s dead father. He had been an influence in Beth’s life in how a man should behave and treat women. He was a kind and gentle man and adored by his family.

The middle Beth turned to see the transformation, but not all the Beth’s were changing just eight out of the twelve were her father. When the fathers opened their mouths all Beths were immediately silent. The fathers said, “But Beth you do look good. In fact you’re beautiful. Why wouldn’t a man admire that?” All the Beths rallied and began to speak at once and for awhile all that that was said was incoherent until they became one voice that replied, Men should have respect for women and what that ass did was NOT respect! The Fathers disappeared faster than they had appeared and once again there were only Beths in the hanger. Now the 12 right side Beths were changing, but they were all turning into Beth’s mother.

All twelve mothers had something to say, but this time very few of the Beths were quietly listening. The mothers struggled for control and finally in one loud voice they said, you feel better because you jog. That’s why you do it. You know that. That guy was just a dumbfuck! Beth’s mother had never in her life used such words but in her head she wasn’t at all surprised. Both her mom and dad took on her traits inside the hanger and Beth had been using terms like that when describing men for years. The mothers changed back into 12 Beths and all 24 of the Beths sat in their chairs looking at the Beth in the middle. That Beth moved her right hand up to her chin and her fingers pinched the skin there. Finally the middle Beth said, you’re right. In an instant the hanger was empty. Now the real Beth, the Beth that had been jogging through the whole meeting in the hanger was paying close attention to the sidewalk on which she was running.

Remembering what transpired in the "courtroom” inside the hanger she decided mom was definitely right. She bought the suit she was wearing and she was aware that it could be revealing although she never considered anyone wanting to see what it revealed. Dad was right too! All the jogging had made her clothes fit better; she did feel “toned”. Her husband had mentioned how good she looked. She just ignored him. He’d say anything because he was such a dog for sex. Thinking of sex, that had been better. The more she thought about what had been said in the courtroom inside the hanger the more she felt a feeling of happiness wash over her. She jogged ¼ mile extra that afternoon.

Beth showered, changed and was now in the car to pick up her son from day care. She was thinking about how much she loved him, how cute he was. She couldn’t imagine her son David any other way. He would always be her beautiful and beloved son. She was getting anxious to see him and drove a little faster than usual. By the time she parked she had worked herself up so much she bolted from the car, slammed the door and quickly walked up the sidewalk to the day care’s door. She would have ran, but she thought people might think her weird for doing so. She could contain herself that much because after all she was David’s mother and she wanted the best for him.

The baby named David was lying on his back in a crib when he saw his mother come through the door. He saw blue. That was the best color; it was the opposite of red. He had seen red and didn’t like that at all. Mom had blue all over her; much more than he usually sees. In fact the blue was so big and brilliant it touched the others as she walked by them. She was approaching quickly. David felt his body relax and the gas that had been building up in his intestines came out in his diaper. Beth didn’t know it yet, but she and her husband Mike would have an almost full night of sleep that night.

Beth bent over to pick up David and when she did David let out a coo that was sweet as a bird's song. He had a big smile with a little baby spit around his lips. He let out a gurgling noise. Instead of picking her son up Beth got even closer until her head was on David. She started kissing his pink little belly. David wrapped his pudgy arms and legs around his mother. No one could see it except the very young, close to newborn young in fact, but there was a blue glow around Beth and David; bigger than what David had seen on his mother not seconds ago. The blue touched everyone in the room; it shined through open doors and through the windows and anyone that was touched by it could feel it although they couldn’t describe it.





Mary Langston pushed on her shopping cart like it was a coal car full of lead. When she stopped in the grocery store's isle to look at an item she leaned on the cart. Now it became her support. Support for an old and heavy body that’s gone past it usefulness. She hated the world she found herself living in. As she grew older she relied on it more and since her husband died two years ago she bore all burdens alone. She had stopped at the spice section and found herself in the mood that needed some inner strength just to get moving again. Why is it worth it? She thought. Why should I keep going? I’d like to just die here in front of the spices, the spice of life she thought. With that thought the very ends of her mouth twitched.

Everything was horrible, the news, the children, their parents the whole world had gone to shit. She thought about her generation. Men and women had an understanding for what lasted and what should last. She and her husband Phil had lived through a time when one didn’t know if the other was still alive or not. She remembered when Phil was overseas fighting in the war and how much she missed him. There were times she thought she couldn’t make it without making love to him, without smelling, touching just holding him. The memory of him stayed sweet in her mind all two years he was gone. He had come back alive, that was the important thing. She didn’t let herself imagine what it would be like without him.

She had watched the Oprah show not an hour before she called the taxi to go shopping. The topic had been about people who had made mistakes when they married, how they weren’t ready. Through Mary’s 32 year marriage with Phil wherein they had raised three boys they never took each other for granted. They understood how much the other counted in their lives because they knew what it was like to be without each other. There was never consideration that if they parted life would be better without the other. Marriage wasn’t about a person it was about each other. She detested the idea that someone asked for and received a divorce because they needed freedom.

She stood there by the spices pretending to be searching for something she needed. She didn’t give a rat’s ass if she saw another jar of dried green onions for the rest of her life which she hoped would be short. She thought about how children behaved in her neighborhood and how polite children had been when she was a wife and mother. Those damn kids next door run the streets without an adult stealing, breaking things. How would her grandchildren live in such a world as this? She felt herself falling deep into that dark place they call depression. No such thing she had thought, you could just think yourself out of being unhappy. Now, she felt no amount of thinking could help her.

Mary heard some laughter from the isle over. She sneered. If they come this way I’ll just ignore them. The thought of someone being happy disgusted her. She was miserable. She heard the laughter again and realized it was coming closer and she knew they would round the corner and see her. She hated them. She saw the front of their cart. It was full of vegetables, bread, bananas and a few cans of soup. Something about that eased her mind to a small degree. As the cart made more of the turn she saw a baby in the cart’s seat. In his hand was some zwieback and by the look of it the baby had most of it soggy and smeared on his cheeks. Mary couldn’t stop looking even though a small part of her wanted to keep pretending an interest in dried green onions.

The baby was David; his mother Beth was pushing the cart. Her husband, David’s father, had his arm on Beth’s hip and just before he noticed Mary he kissed Beth’s cheek. The baby turned just then and all three looked at Mary. When Mary saw their faces she saw the feeling she once knew. It was like a kick start that ran through her mind and as it reached into her memories the feeling washed over her like water from a broken dam. She felt her lips move; it felt like they weren’t her own. She said. “Bless you.” The baby looked at Mary and smiled with his cheeks covered in zwieback and baby spit as they passed. Beth said, “Thank you.”







Mary Langston called the cab service from the grocery. She knew she was in for a wait and disliked the thought of how dependant on strangers she had become. Her anger grew, but before it blossomed she stopped it dead in its tracks. The memory of the young family she had seen came back to her like some knight in armor and slew the beast of anger before it grew too big. If she could do that by remembering something promising, something . . . good she could do it again. The thought came to her that what she had been doing was dwelling on the negative. She vowed to dwell on positive things. She imagined her husband Phil had something to do with this. He was gone to the world forever, but if he could she knew he would find a way to help her, to take care of her. The thought wasn’t something to share, people think you’re crazy if you tell them things like this, but maybe it was true.

The cabby honked the horn. Mike was 24 years old and had been driving a cab for about 7 months now and if there was one thing he hated doing is picking up little old ladies from stores. They all seemed so bitter and short tempered. He was under the impression that they didn’t tip because, “It’s you job to drive, so drive, you shouldn’t expect something extra for it” kind of attitude. He could imagine them saying it as they left. He was convinced that some had actually said as much, but couldn’t put his finger on any exact incident. The old lady he awoke, from what he thought of as “an episode”, wasn’t going to be any different. She had just been staring at her feet sitting on a bench. The bench’s advertisement showed a young woman’s face, quite beautiful of course. It was for some hair care product or something, it didn’t matter. It was the juxtaposition between the two women that bothered him, one real the other nothing more than a dream.

Mike put out extra effort for this one. Pretending to be patient and caring was getting harder with every old lady he picked up. She was taking her time getting up and moving to the cab. “Yeah, that’s right. Don’t break a hip lady” went through his mind like a bullet through bread. Finally she got in the cab with her two bags of groceries and managed to close the door by herself. “Oh crap I should have helped her” he thought, but all through his disdainful thinking it never occurred to him. Even if she was going to be an exception to the mean old lady rule she wouldn’t be now, not after that kind of neglect. Now if the lady on the bench advertisement wanted to get in he would have jumped to help her. He felt a tinge of shame and regret. This drive was going to suck.

Mary had already started to see the world in a different way, the way she had seen it many years ago. The cab driver asked her for her address, which she gave politely even saying thank you though it occurred to her he should have said the thanks. It wasn’t any thing she felt concern for. All she could think about is how the driver looked, he looked . . . sad? Maybe he was she thought. After all it can’t be all that great being a cab driver. Phil was an electrical engineer and both she and Phil were always proud to tell people that. She decided to start a conversation, “Young man, are you married?” Mike was startled, “Um no, no I’m not.” “Oh that’s a shame, having a family is such a blessing.” What followed was an uneasy silence.

Mike drove on desperately thinking of what to say. Mary sat in silence desperately thinking of how to continue. Finally Mary gave up trying and wished she hadn’t spoken. The silence became more tolerable for both after a few minutes. It began to rain outside and both people switched their attention to the new weather condition.

The cab pulled up to the curb in front of Mary’s house. Mike was determined to help this lady, she hadn’t been hateful at all and he felt a need to make up for his prejudiced thoughts. He grabbed the small cheap umbrella some rider left in the cab months ago, opened his door and stepped out into the rain. Before he closed his own door he opened Mary’s and held the umbrella over her so she would have a dry exit. He made it a point to be patient and he thought he could stand there forever until this lady grabbed her bags, purse, fished out her house key, check book and pen. “How much do I owe you?” Mary asked, “Forty dollars Mam” Mary wrote her check as Mike watched. She wrote beautifully and he wondered how she could do that. It must have taken her lots of practice and a good school. Mike's opinion of Mary improved even more.

Mike held the umbrella for Mary until she got to her door, even carried one of her bags for her. When she had the door unlocked and open slightly Mike said, “Have a nice day Mam” “You too” said Mary. To that mike said, “and thank you.” His step towards the cab was lighter now. He discovered ha had never closed the driver side door. He didn’t care he’d just wipe it off with the old towel he kept on the front seat floor. Mike looked down at Mary’s sidewalk and saw a worm. The rain had been hard and must have drawn the worms up towards the surface. It wasn’t too far out of his character to pick up the occasional insect and let it go outside his apartment. He bent down and carried the writhing worm to a newly mulched tree planted in the common ground between sidewalk and curb. There you go, you’ll stay dryer there and have something to eat.

Inside the cab Mike realized he hadn’t even looked closely at the check the lady had written, Had she even given him the right amount he asked for? He looked at the check; it had two puppies with a butterfly between them. Mary had written beautifully true enough and she wrote the check for eighty dollars. Mike smiled and not a minute later he drove off to his next job.

The blue had passed from the baby’s family, to Mary, to Mike but for each contact these people made they passed on more of the blue. In all cases the blue diminished in intensity and in some was replaced by red. That is the nature of things. The blue would return again and the cycle would begin anew. The blue is even carried in animals and plants. In the case of Mike’s earthworm, the worm was gravid and laid eggs in the earth below the mulch. The blue hibernated in the worm or took a vacation from humans for nearly two years. Through all that time a colony of earthworms developed around the soil of the tree.

The worms digested the Mulch the street department put there every spring, some worms were destined for food for hungry songbirds but at the end of two years the blue spread and was on the move again. The worms had nourished the tree that grew above them. It was a winterberry and its blossoms were beautiful that spring. By winter, bright red berries developed where every blossom had been.





Kevin sat at his desk composing a love letter for a woman he hardly knew. Kevin thought that she was lovely; he had a strange connection to her. He could tell when she wasn’t happy or didn’t feel well. He noticed she was cold a couple of times and offered different seats to her in warmer parts of the room. He pulled out chairs for her too when she needed one. He could tell she noticed. He could tell she wasn’t interested. He didn’t care.

He had noticed that she wasn’t happy for some time. It kind of creaped her out that he could read her so well. Two weeks before Valentines Day he found out she had lost her boyfriend and was available. Kevin was 45, 25 pounds overweight and she was young, slender and had a great figure. He knew he wasn’t going to get far with her. He asked if he could write her a letter for Valentines and she had agreed that it would be ok. When you work with someone Kevin felt he had to be careful about his intentions.

He began writing the letter and soon it turned into a love letter, one of the best and most sincere letters he felt he had ever written. Now it needed a special envelope, he made one by hand from thick red paper, carefully creasing the folds with a special tool made for just that. Looking too plain to him he decided the envelope needed something more. He made a heart stamp from molding clay, melted an old crayon on the envelope and stamped it with the heart. It worked. Next he cut small branches from an evergreen tree and some winterberry. Those he tied on the top of the envelope with ribbon.

On Valentines Day he gave the letter to Rachel. Just walked in and placed it on her desk, turned and left. As he left he heard her sigh and say something pleasant. Not hearing what she said, it didn’t matter she sounded happy. The next day Kevin got an email from her. It congratulated him on his wordsmith abilities, how nice it was, but she wouldn’t be pursuing what the letter suggested; getting to know each other better. Kevin sat at his desk wondering how he should feel. Should he feel relief, embarrassment, depressed or happy? Finally he chose, “none of the above” it was enough that he tried and he enjoyed writing and making the letter and envelope.

Two people had the blue now and it passed on to more. It’s time underground, in blossoms and finally in berries was over. It continued its cycle through humanity, once it was passed to a different continent via email and spread to thousands of new people. Finally the thought that gave life to the blue had gone full circle and it’s time had come.










One the platform of the city’s light rail and old man lay on a bench. He had taken what refuge he could under a shelter. It was good enough for a rest until someone ran him off. He smelled of unwashed body, clothes over clothes unwashed and dirty. His thick beard peppered with grey and over his long greasy hair he wore an old cap whose letters faded into smudges of black grease. A section of his forearm showed and its skin was dark, burned by the sun. To look upon him one thought of a life’s struggle come to defeat with a weary loser left in its wake.

The blue came down the steps that led to the platform. It traveled unseen and unheard towards the sleeping man, landed on his forearm and melted into his skin as a snowflake would. Once inside a question was asked, “Where have you been? What do you bring us?” A larger white light consumed the blue.

Back on the platform a young man slipped a ten dollar bill in the sleeping mans shirt pocket.