Little Stories
(in this case reacting to places other people have been. or are going to be)
The Worm
She woke up every night at 4 am from a sound sleep because this was when the worm emerged. By this time, it had snaked its way out from under her nightgown partway down her leg. If her husband knew about it he would be angry or terrified, she wasn’t sure, but definitely disgusted and concerned. She lay there immobilized under the covers, feeling the thing slithering its way down to her ankle. There it would rest for a while as she watched the clock ticking away until a mysterious cue would prompt it to retreat back into her intestines.
She had read in a big medical book at the library that if she soaked in the healing and highly salinated waters of the Great Salt Lake she would be cured. But how to get there and under what pretense? She was over two thousand miles away.
She woke up every night at 4 am from a sound sleep because this was when the worm emerged. By this time, it had snaked its way out from under her nightgown partway down her leg. If her husband knew about it he would be angry or terrified, she wasn’t sure, but definitely disgusted and concerned. She lay there immobilized under the covers, feeling the thing slithering its way down to her ankle. There it would rest for a while as she watched the clock ticking away until a mysterious cue would prompt it to retreat back into her intestines.
She had read in a big medical book at the library that if she soaked in the healing and highly salinated waters of the Great Salt Lake she would be cured. But how to get there and under what pretense? She was over two thousand miles away.
Not Amsterdam |
|
The Falls of Adrintha People say the rocks in Adrintha began weeping after a very tired and grumpy 4 year old Louise Snow screamed at her parents “ WHAT DO YOU MEAN THIS ISN’T HOLLAND ???!!!”, when she heard they were in Amsterdam, New York, not the Netherlands. Apparently this was news to The Falls of Adrintha as well. |
The Dam at Crescent Park
On sending a postcard to Miss Gladys Williams in Gilbertville, it is supposed that Jennie failed to notice the imminent demise of the two people in rowboat number 1, which
changed the scene from
bucolic to ominous.
“ Wish you were here!”
On sending a postcard to Miss Gladys Williams in Gilbertville, it is supposed that Jennie failed to notice the imminent demise of the two people in rowboat number 1, which
changed the scene from
bucolic to ominous.
“ Wish you were here!”
The Ship
Traveling by plane robs one of the anticipation,
over a period of days, or weeks, of arriving in a strange land, with unfamiliar customs.
My cousin Elik once took
the Nieuw Amsterdam to
France and has never
stopped talking about it.
Fortunately he lives in
California.
Nice lines on this boat though.
Traveling by plane robs one of the anticipation,
over a period of days, or weeks, of arriving in a strange land, with unfamiliar customs.
My cousin Elik once took
the Nieuw Amsterdam to
France and has never
stopped talking about it.
Fortunately he lives in
California.
Nice lines on this boat though.
Zeeland
Zeeland, in the West of Holland, is
a world unto its own, where if one does not
shell the nuts properly, one’s bonnet is
promptly lit on fire.
Onder het Wandelhoofd
My grandfather once told me that the Dutch
take both napping and skin cancer very seriously,
which is why the beaches are all cluttered with
basket chairs.
Nobody risks getting burned, and after
a hefty lunch of cheese and cheese and
more cheese, one can relax in one’s
very own basket chair for a good long snooze,
or a private smoke.
The Post Office
These days, with the overwhelming popularity of electronic
mail, trips to the Post Office seem antiquated. And yet
at the small Post Office in our town, I learned from
the stalwart clerk named Thom that the postmaster
once attempted to throw away a box of live day old
chicks that hadn’t been picked up.
This horrified me.
Thom took them home and brought them to
a nearby farm. He will be one of my chicken heroes forever.
Now the Post Office in Amsterdam, New York, is a
National Historic site because it was designed by a
famous guy, under the Office of the Supervising Architect
of the Treasury and Louis A Simon. There are currently
1826 Post offices in NY State but only one in Amsterdam, NY.
While in Holland there are no longer any actual
post offices, Postal Service has been replaced by PostNL
service points. The last Post Office in Holland
was in Utrecht, closing its doors in 2011. PostNL
still prides itself on being very efficient as of course
does the U.S. Postal system.
