THE FAN (a free verse poem by Al Sturgeon)
The memory arrived unprompted as a tender gift.
I had been sunburned yet again.
It was night as I lay in bed, miserable,
motionless, and cursing myself
for an apparent inability to learn a lesson.
I was a teenager, alone in that tiny bedroom,
alone with my restless imagination, naked
as a modest kid in a modest family could get
to ease the pain, limbs sprayed like a
hopeless summer attempt at a snow angel.
My mother had tried her best to provide
some lotion as a remedy but to no avail.
I would simply be miserable until I wasn’t;
there was nothing more to do but listen to
the silent sound of time passing.
But squeezed into the corner was an oscillating fan.
It stood watch through the night, keeping me company,
marking time with its fluttering whir, rhythmically sending
a breeze both soothing and not across my blistered skin—
a welcomed sensation in solitary confinement.
The rhythm led to a mindless world of nothingness.
No thought of the terrible fate of dressing in the morning.
No self-loathing. Just staring into dark eyelids with
my sweet parents next door; at peace, listening, awaiting
the consistent and predictable relief from the oscillating fan.
The memory arrived out of nowhere.
For a brief moment I was a kid again
with a mom and a dad who would answer
if I simply called their names. It was so real
that I could hear the whirring fan and feel the gentle breeze.
Jewelry. A spa package. Something for the house. A lovely dinner. One might have guessed such an answer to my innocent question: What do you want for your birthday? But my wife said: Trapeze School. That was her immediate response. Like it wasn’t crazy at all.
Listen. This is a story that has to be told.
It was a crazy idea, but I am generally a fan of crazy ideas.
“I do not at all understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are but does not leave us where it found us.” – Anne Lamott
I never did like St. Patrick’s Day, primarily because I was a poor kid without many color choices in the old closet and was therefore a regular pinching target for older kids who took advantage of the opportunity to warn me of sneaky leprechauns. In retrospect, I’m pretty sure that story was a cover for simple assault.
Last night I attended the iHeartRadio Music Awards at The Forum in Inglewood with my oldest daughter, Erica. The celebrity-studded awards show featured mega-stars like Bon Jovi, Eminem, Cardi B, Chance the Rapper, Maroon 5, Camila Cabello, Charlie Puth, and N.E.R.D. Surprisingly, I had heard of a couple of them prior to last evening. And maybe not surprisingly, me and Jon Bon Jovi aren’t teenagers anymore.
On an amazing trip to India a couple of years ago I experienced an unfortunate illness in the magical city of Shimla in the southwestern ranges of the Himalayas. It was awful. Altitude sickness was a potential culprit given the location, timing, and some of the symptoms, but that never was confirmed. Just to be safe I concluded that I should avoid higher elevations for the rest of my life. Such drastic solutions come to mind more often as one ages.
My body apparently dropped a note in the old Life Suggestion Box requesting that I explore alternative activities to running. The suggestion is under consideration given recurring and depressing minor injuries, but I haven’t thrown in the proverbial towel just yet. Distance runners are notoriously bad at giving something up. And I like to run.
Starting to Look Up 