The old morality was still hanging aroun

Hannah Morgenstern was the most
succinct example of instant karma
I'd ever known.


In fifth grade, she handed me a book
during recess entitled,
"A Search for the Proper Discipline."


When I asked her what it was about,
she said, "Rage, toil, guilt, and boredom."


As she walked away,
she seduced the wind
with her hair and
colored herself a blue funk.


I opened the book about midway through and began reading.


"I realized I would have to find a faraway place where nobody could talk to me. I'd bring along a tape recorder, of course, to record the sounds of an attic room somewhere far above the train station, where I would jot down my observations of ashes curling up and taking a power nap in a recent urn. I'd have no alarm clock to reunite with, no bellowing voice announcing my mortality, simply a gentle breeze squeezing through a keyhole of a locked door at the end of a hallway to greet me. Naturally, there'd be a synagogue mouse there; they're always there, and maybe even an indifferent, yawning feline..."


Then the bell rang,
signaling an end to recess.


I closed the book and went inside
to give the book back to
Hannah Morgenstern,
but she wasn't at her desk.


"Where's Hannah?"
I asked Rachel, her best friend.


"Her mom picked her up,"
Rachel said.


"Is she sick?"


"No, she's moving to New Mexico."


"How come?"


Rachel shrugged.


I sat down at my desk,
opened the book to the last page and
read the final paragraph.


"Half-shy, half-arrogant, I awoke in the middle of the night with the cold sweats, the hot flashes, and the ugly truth taking over. It wasn't until two o'clock the following day that I began to renew my faith in the power of the delicate high-wire act, which was my life. Unable to hold my peace any longer, I sat alone near a picture window, nostalgic for my boyhood, listening to my instincts and the mice building shelter behind those gloomy walls. I got up, lit a cigarette, had some gin, noticed the thinning rug beneath my callous soles, and called out to the jangled young woman in the next room, studying for a mail-order course that would one day award her an associate degree in business administration. Laughter was simply out of the question for me. The only thing I found even remotely humorous was my Lord, my Savior. 'It is finished.' (The greatest one-liner in comedy history)."