All Summer in a Day

I drove down the pollen covered streets with a hundred pounds of cow shit weighing down the trunk of my car.  Well, composted manure.  Poo.  A trunk full of poo.

I walked through the dark, foreign home and back to the "bird room" of my neighbor.  I dodged attic stairs and boxes, but didn't want to turn the lights on, though I had never been in her house before.  We have a bird room too.  Momo's cage is in there, some of Alec's guitars and his desk.  As I approached the back of the dark house, the room came into view.  A large, white bird stood on top of its cage, wings spread, in a rather Christ-like, yet intimidating, pose.   I stepped into the room.  Several huge birds stared at me from atop the twenty-odd empty cages of birds that were being taken care of in others' homes.  The "amazon", a large green parrot thing clutched the top of the cage with his human size talons.  This was not a bird room.  It was a pet store.

"You're a hybrid!" one the kids exclaimed.
"What do you mean?"
"You're English and Spanish" he beamed back.
I liked that.  I am actually neither, but it sounded nice.

My sister and I stared out at the trimmed and poo covered flower beds.  It was twilight and I was pretty proud of the homeowner-style work I had done in the yard.  A women with a large butcher knife crept through the weeds and beside the fence of the condos next door.
"Just checking things out" she called to us, casually.
The knife shined in the moonlight.

"You have to pick the color of shingle you want" our roofer informed us.
"They come in different colors?" I asked.
"Oh yeah" he said, producing a huge book of various colored shingles.
I have no idea how to pick a shingle.  

"I have something serious to tell you." kinder Serena said solemnly.
I braced myself.  Death.  Divorce.  Molestation.  Or something I couldn't imagine.
"Last night, I almost threw up in the shower" she continued, eyes wide. 
"You know what, Serena, I actually did that once.  Cheetos, so the, you know, was orange" I laughed.
Multiple hands shot up.
"I threw up in my mom's car!"
"I threw up on my mom!" another kinder added.
"I saw a baby throw up.  It was white".
"Sometimes I throw up and swallow it".
"In your mouth?" I asked.
"Yeah"
"I threw up in the middle of a restaurant once".
"So did I!  Golden Corral!"

They left fifteen minutes later, after exploring every possible way to throw up.

I love my job. 





*Title lifted from Ray Bradbury.