[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,…
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…
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…
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…
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…