Posts by Jonah

[August 1995. Exact date unknown.]

Berck, you may be heating and cooling the whole darn neighborhood.

I was talking to Jenifer the other day at the kitchen bar thingy. I was
in the middle of the story of how I met Eric the Awful for the first
time, when she inturrupts, looks me right in the eyes, and says, “Jonah,
you may be heating and cooling the whole darn neighborhood.” My face
freezes for a moment in a look that has to be as blank as possible
before contorting into a human question mark as I squeeze out the word,
“WHAT?” At this, her deadpan expression shatters, broken by convulsive
laughter. My face still displays an interrogative mask as my mind flips
through any and all connections to the subject at hand only to come up
empty. Then I search the dark reaches of every conversation I’ve ever
had with anyone that would have anything to do with the words she has
uttered. Nothing again. After the five seconds or so it takes me to rack
my brain, apply logic, and apply things that have nothing whatsoever to do
with logic, I repeat my inquiry. “WHAT?!” Jenifer cannot speak. An
entirely plausible expanation enters my mind and exits through my lips,
“Do you have a problem?”

Though her body is still writhing from under the influence of laughter, she
manages to lift an envelope up to my line of vision. It is a piece of
junk mail, advertising something like airconditioner pipes or things of
that sort. Suddenly, with that one motion, everything makes sense, and
the hilarity of my bafflement with absurdity engulfs both of us. Her
eyes widen to mirror mine before almost closing as we fall to the floor
in tandem, laughing too hard to control most bodily functions.

After we had sufficiently recovered, I spoke to her, “Jenifer?” She
turns and give me her whole attention. But I can’t do it. I can’t say
it with a straight face. “You may be heating and cooling the whole darn
neighborhood!” I manage to exhale between laughs.

Later when Max came in, Jefiner subjected him to the accursed phrase
also. He got an incredibly puzzled look on his face, mingled with a
quizzical smile. His eyes wondered over to a corner of the room as if
to aid the search going on inside his head. I knew exactly what he was
going through. And I couldn’t help but laugh.

Jonah

I awoke this morning to an envelope hitting my face. Mom’s voice punctuated my rather realistic dream by saying, “It’s afternoon now, so you can get up.”

My eyes fluttered uncontrollably as I made the transition from sleep to wakefulness, the scene before me alternating between an empty pool surrounded by shady oaks and puzzled hospital workers to my mom’s form standing beside my bed (or what I could see of her from behind the envelope covering half my face). I grasped frantically at the paper resting on my head and struggled to sit up, as if that action would aid my emergence from slumber. I stared at the object clenched clumsily in my fist. It was one of those envelopes that you have to fold and tear along the edge to open. The return address read “University of Mobile.” I knew immediately what was inside. This envelope held my last semester’s grades.

My hands shook, either out of anticipation or uncoordination as I creased the edge of the paperalong the dotted line, first one way, then the other. Then my fingers came together over one corner, pulling a strip of paper off. It took me several tries to free the sheet guarded by the envelope, but I finally managed to get a hold of it and pull it out a bit. I paused as I read the course titles that had become so familiar to me over the last few months. Pulling it out a little further, I read how many hours each had credit, and something meaningless about honor points. Then came the important part. I pulled the paper the rest of the way out to find one, two,three, four, five…six A’s, all in a row. I looked back at the course titles. Yes, even chemistry had an A after it.

I looked up at Mom who had stopped her impatient pacing and was now sitting at the foot of my bed, searching my face for a tale-telling reaction. Instead of giving her one, I handed her the envelope with the grade sheet inside, but she refused to look at it. “Are you happy?” she inquired. I looked her in the eye, but then unable to lock my face, I pulled the my sheetover my head and grinned uncontrollably underneath.

“All A’s,” I heard her smile. I emerged out from under the covers. “I’m proud of you,” she said, and I smiled openly.

Chemistry was a battle I had almost given up. But I stuck through it and worked very hard. And all I have to show for it is a bit of carbon on paper, another A, lost among the rest.

I made my way casually to the fountain today (still empty as Christ’s tomb),
and looked around. The thing where they had to replace the bricks looked
promising, but when I got closer, I noticed that it was clamped down and
screwed in. I didn’t want to fool with anything that required hardware, so I
moseyed on over to the place where they are constantly digging up and peered
at the lids protruding from the ground. After scouring the area for
maintenance workers, I stooped down and lifted the one marked “Irrigation
Valve” up. Inside, ants scurried around and something that looked like it
required a lug wrench poked out from the bottom. It had a couple of things
that looked like electrical wires emanating from it, however, so I’m not
really sure what it is for. Everything was covered in mud, which made
identification difficult. The other lid was marked “WATER METER” or
something, and all I could see inside was blackness. I gave up.

Ah, yes, the socialist award. Last Thursday my History and Politics of
Modern Russia class had a end of course party. People brought snacks, our
instructor (who is a lady from Russia) made tea, and we watched Russian
singing and dancing on a video while munching on Russian Tea Cakes. Then our
instructor (I never use her real name because I can’t pronounce it, let alone
spell it) reminded us about how when Stalin was bringing about rapid
industrialization, people would be awarded medals and stuff for hard work.
So she said that it was fitting that we recognize the person with the best
attendance (the guy on my right piped up, “That’d be Joanna,”) and the person
with the highest grade on the midterm (a girl over to my left added,
“Joanna.”). “So I think we can agree that Joanna (she pronounces my name as
one syllable. You know, Russians are used to shortages) should get this.”
Our personal minister of propaganda came over and handed me a cheap medal
that said something in Russian and bore the date 1977. I stood up, shook her
hand, and put it on proudly. Then I wore it for the rest of the day. I
asked her what it meant, and she said it was for the best socialist. So…

I had fun last night. Jobie Watson spent the night too. She’s a freak, but I
like her. Her father’s a pastor and her mom’s a school teacher. She changes
the color of her hair every so often. She wears weird clothes. She swears
and is trying to quit smoking. She just graduated with a theater degree and
is going to graduate school in Hattisburg.

First we went to the mall and ate at Ruby Tuesdays. I had this fetticinie
thing that had vegetables but it was greasy. Then they dragged me shopping.
I got this neat light over sweater jacket thing that they said I needed at the
Express. It was on sale for 6 bucks.

Next we went to B&N. I put on the jacket thing because all I was wearing was
a stained t-shirt. We perused the books and then met Matt Humphrey in the
cafe and drank coffee. The fall is probably going to be his last semester.
I’m going to miss him.

After that we all returned to the apartment and flipped through the channels. Jobie started playing her guitar but didn’t have pick so she found a hair pick lying around and played with that. After Matt left, we made our way over to Sting’s place, but no one would answer the door. We returned and played around on the modem some and even called up DS9, but only Beren and Ocean were there, and I still haven’t been validated. We went back over to Scott’s after calling them onthe phone because Jobie wanted to meet this guy who could play the guitar awesomely since she plays too.

I played on the NZ while Elizabeth talked to Sting about CD’s and he played the guitar. Then we went out and watched Army of Darkness with Ron and Jonathan. I’d heard so many lines from Eric that I could predict what Ash was going to say before he said it. “Good, Bad… I’m the guy with the gun.” Sting had to go take some girl home but told me to stay until he got back. This was because he wanted to show me his car. Very nice.
Elizabeth, Jobie, and I went back to the apartment and played on the modem some more. Jobie thinks it’s the neatest thing.