BOOM! WHOOSH!; or I Wonder If That Garage is Heated

You know, like so many people, I used to wonder – sometimes aloud! – about what may or may not happen next. As you can imagine, this made me quite a favorite amongst the feet-on-solid-ground types, leading, occasionally, to conversations regarding wood grain alcohol and whether or not it's meant to be consumed.

Well no more, my friends! For as I believe I’ve proven – time and time again – my iPod, set on “shuffle” and played during my morning commute, has prophetic qualities, not just for me, but for you as well!

No, really! I’m serious!

Shhh. Let’s listen.

Best Friends, Right? by Amy Winehouse
New Orleans is Sinking by The Tragically Hip
Believe by The Bravery
Demolition Man by The Police
Dramastically Different by The Beastie Boys
Barracuda by Heart
Effigy by Creedence Clearwater Revival

And there you have it. This weekend is so new, so fresh, that some of it has no reference point.

The rest of it is, of course, old hat. If I were you – and I believe that we’ve agreed that in some ways, I am – I’d stop at the liquor store. I’m thinking margaritas.

Oooh. And how do you feel about Pad Thai? I’ve got a hankerin’.

So! Weekend approaching and all, do we have time for a quick story? Just a little one?

Because Mary was more than a little concerned about Jon the other day.

Not that that is unusual. Mary’s a worrier, and if anybody can make you worry, it's Jon. Of course, Mary comes from a long line of worriers, and we’ve agreed, just between us, that there’s little she can do about it. Accordingly, when there’s worrying to do, we try to let Mary do it.

Makes her feel special.

So when Jon went out to the garage to turn its furnace on, and then she heard a BANG followed by a swift-moving WHOOSH, she didn’t know which way to run.

After the briefest of delays, she chose to run toward the garage.

“Jon! Jon!”

“I was frantic,” she tells me. “Am I going to find body parts? Car parts? Will it be bloody? Frankly, I didn’t think I was going to be equipped for it, if it was going to be bloody…”

She runs down the gently sloping backyard, calling his name, pulls up short just in front of the door. Not the one the car can pull into, but the door the humans walk in and out of.

“Jon! Dammit, Jon!”

“I’m ready to lose it,” she says to me. “I can’t decide if I should burst into tears or throw up or what.”

“Jon! Jon, answer me right this minute!”

“He’s not answering!” she says. “There’s no sound coming from inside the garage, but I can't bring myself to go in there! I’m yelling Jon! Jon! Answer me!”

She takes a breath. “And that,” she tells me, “is when he pops his head out the door. HULLO! he says!”

She shakes her head, smiling in that mystified way she has. Jon is her rock, her amusement, and her cross to bear.

“Pearl, there’s a great big patch of his beard missing, his eyes are blood-red, and his eyebrows look like they’re either melted or were originally part of one of those Mr. Potato Head games.” She smiles. “So I yell at him: Jon! Dammit, Jon, what the hell are you doing?”

She pauses.

“And?” I say.

“And nothing,” she says. “He just smiles at me, wants to know what’s for dinner.”

She shakes her head. “What’s for dinner,” she muses. “Why I oughta…”