WAL-MART WONDERLAND

 I haven’t been to Wal-Mart in months. I’m not a Wal-Mart shopper to start with, and not in any snobby kind of way. I’m seriously not a fan of the general shopping experience, anyway, but I am especially averse to crowded spaces where people push and clog up aisles for no seemingly logical reason and generally make themselves obnoxious. In other words, I prefer not to be inside a warehouse with people of questionable sanity, many of whom are wearing pajamas.

So, when a friend asks if I’d like to go to Wal-Mart, I figure, hey, why not, I haven’t been in months (perhaps longer). We are only searching for a few list items, so it shouldn’t be too torturous. We circle the inside of the store a couple of times trying to locate the things we need. At one point a woman asks if I know where the wrapping paper is. I don’t, but I send her in the direction of school supplies and hope for the best.

After finding some of the things we need and not finding others, we end up in the pet section. My friend needs kitty litter and cat treats (yes, for her cat – we are the sane ones shopping in W-ville). Suddenly, a quick but strange movement catches my eye. I look up to the end of the pet food aisle where there is a large sign for a particular brand of animal chow.

Squatting on the sign high above the oblivious shoppers, a bird has landed. The pet food sign, of all places, proving that there really is intelligent life in Wal-Mart. Of course, that intelligent life would be a bird, but it restores my faith in Wal-Mart.

Best of all (yes, even better than the pet food mascot), we don’t see anyone wearing their pajamas as we weave our way into a check-out lane . . . directly behind the woman I ran into earlier.

“Did you find the wrapping paper?” I ask.

“Exactly where you said it might be!”

“Oh,” I say, “thank goodness. And thank you for thinking I might look smart enough to know. That really means a lot.”

She nodded knowingly. These are the little treasures of Wal-Mart, little nuggets of alternate reality that Wal-Mart may not be the portal to the complete and utter failure of humanity (or the bird population) as we know it.

KING'S BEACH AND SUICIDE POETRY

 I don’t usually go to the North Shore beaches around here. I used to. When I was a kid we spent a lot of time at Crane’s Beach (it may officially be Crane Beach, but that’s not what we’ve ever called it) and Wingaersheek Beach, which is actually on the Annisquam River. I’ve been to Singing Beach a few times, West Beach in Beverly, and some small beach in Rockport. I’ve even hit Salem Willows once or twice, and have walked the Palmer Cove area when I was a grad student at Salem State.

As a teen I partied on some giant rock in Magnolia or Manchester-By-the-Sea or someplace around there. I just remember that it was a bitch to climb up that rock and even worse coming down, especially at high tide. In my teens I fluctuated between Salisbury Beach in northeastern Massachusetts, and my weekend jaunts to the South Shore: Wollaston Beach and the infamous Nantasket Beach, where I made myself a staple (along with a core group of various North and South Shore friends) at Jimmy’s Irish II Pub/Bar (with walk-throughs of Paragon Park back in its heyday).

I’d never been to Nahant until last year when a friend took me there a few times. I grew up with that whole “Lynn, Lynn, the City of Sin, you never come out the way you went in” crap. So going to Lynn on my last day of freedom before returning full-on to school (for the first time in six months) wasn’t even on my radar. My friend and I intended to go to Revere Beach (another place I’ve never been, believe it or not).

Instead, we ended up at King’s Beach in Lynn. Yes, that Lynn.

Oh, I’ve been to Lynn plenty of times. My brother used to march in and direct the drumline for a couple of DCI (Drum Corps International) regiments, and they’d always play the Lynn Manning Bowl (and it always freaking poured rain, like buckets and buckets for the whole time we’d be there). I’m not going to lie – I had zero knowledge that there was such a lovely stretch of beaches in Lynn.

We parked along Lynn Shore Drive for free (FREE … it’s like a beach miracle), made our way to the sand in about ninety seconds, set up our chairs, and noticed way out in the water there is a large rocky island. Upon researching quickly via Google, we discovered the place is called Egg Rock. There are many creepy and cool things about Egg Rock. For example:

Ø  In 1832, more than 150 people witnessed a sea serpent cavorting between the beach in Nahant and Egg Rock.

Ø  The first lighthouse on Egg Rock began operation in 1856 after a terrible schooner accident in 1843.

Ø  The lighthouse keeper’s big dog Milo could fetch birds and other items set out for him by fishermen over a mile from the island, and Milo rescued several children.

Ø  One of the lighthouse keepers was awarded 85 cents for a rescue.

Ø  In 1922 during a move of part of the lighthouse dwelling, a cable snapped and the building hung precariously over the edge. Several workers inside had to break and escape out windows while hanging over the ocean.

Ø  The lighthouse was destroyed in 1927 and the state took it over as a bird sanctuary.

The strangest fact about Egg Rock, however, is that madwoman poet Sylvia Plath wrote a poem about it called “Suicide off Egg Rock,” a poem that appeared in her book The Bell Jar (about her time in an insane asylum). I read The Bell Jar when I was fourteen. I wasn’t impressed.

What does impress me is Egg Rock itself and this beautiful beach here in Lynn, tucked away with barely a soul here, with free parking and seagulls and plovers and steady but restful waves.

Okay, I’m still partial to my New Hampshire beaches: The Wall and Jenness and Wallis Sands. I may continue to recite the old rhyme about Lynn, Lynn, the City of Sin. Truth is, I wouldn’t mind heading back to King’s Beach for another day, before school, after school, whenever. I mean, for real: If it’s good enough for Sylvia Plath’s sanity, it’s certainly good enough for mine.

HYBRID POETRY

 

Hybrid year, this hybrid year.

Do you like this hybrid year?

I do not like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will you hybrid here and there?

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will you try in-person teach

While those home you also reach?

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will the bathrooms be yours, too,

Monitoring those in queue?

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will you walk kids in and out?

Hall and lunch and never shout?

In and out and ‘round the hall,

I will watch them, one and all.

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will you make sure hands are washed?

Will those Covid germs get squashed?

I will fight those germs, you bet,

Watching little hands get wet.

In and out and ‘round the hall,

I will watch them, one and all.

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

Will you sanitize the desks?

While performing arabesques?

In a tutu, do you mean?

Wipe ‘em down like Mr. Clean!

I will fight those germs, you bet,

Watching little hands get wet.

In and out and ‘round the hall,

I will watch them, one and all.

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

When the children puke and bleed,

Will you see to every need?

Though I’m not a legal nurse,

No one here will need a hearse.

I will keep them safe and sound

Fighting Covid germs around.

I will fight those germs, you bet,

Watching little hands get wet.

In and out and ‘round the hall,

I will watch them, one and all.

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

We may find more jobs for you,

Even ones you cannot do.

You are super, you are great!

You can carry thrice your weight!

 

Flex those brain cells. Never frown.

Teaching! Covid! Wear you down.

If you’re sick, just teach from bed.

No one cares if you’re near-dead.

 

Hybrid model’s here to stay.

Teach it! Teach it every day.

Work your fingers to the bone.

Lucky you – you’re not alone.

 

If you take a closer look

Here’s the part of Seuss’s book

That I say, “I like this much,”

Other things that may sound such.

I cannot believe my eyes.

I don’t have those words so wise.

If I make it through the day,

Here is what I have to say:

Though I’m not a legal nurse,

No one here will need a hearse.

I will keep them safe and sound

Fighting Covid germs around.

I will fight those germs, you bet,

Watching little hands get wet.

In and out and ‘round the hall,

I will watch them, one and all.

Yes, I’ll watch the toilets, too,

For the kids who pee and pooh.

I will teach both home and live

(I don’t know if I’ll survive).

I will hybrid here and there.

I will hybrid anywhere!

I don’t like this hybrid year.

It’s one gigantic pain in rear!

 

 

 

IF YOU DON’T LIKE THE WEATHER . . .

Look, kids, I understand that you think it is fall. But, it’s not. It’s still summer until mid-late September. Furthermore, I understand and share your angst about 2020 and wishing it to speed up and be over already. I get it.

However, it’s September 6^th, okay? The sixth.  06. Any way it is written, it’s still NOT fall.

So, what’s with the snow blowers and the pumpkins?

Home Depot, it’s okay to have Halloween displays out. That makes sense. But, really. Fresh pumpkins with fifty-five days (and counting) to go? With summer still raging on? With green leaves still securely on the trees?

I certainly don’t expect pools to be on the sidewalk out front, but, I have to be honest with you, I wasn’t expecting this. So bear with me if I have a tough time not so much with the pumpkins, but with the snow blowers for certain. That’s just a slap in the head, if you ask me.

Enjoy the dog days of summer and prep for second summer when it arrives after the fake first fall. After all, this is New England. If you don’t like the weather . . .