jonah woke up. he woke up because he was a human being and humans observe a regular cycle of sleep and wakefulness.
when jonah was asleep, his mind inhabited a world which only existed in his own brain, and which was only subject intermittently to rules. when he was awake, he inhabited a world occupied by billions of other people and was subject to a great many rules, many of human invention but many more which were not, and in fact, his body occupied this world even when he was asleep, and was subject to its rules.
one of these rules was , that he was helpless against anyone who might choose to bludgeon, stab, or shoot him . but in practice, nobody ever did, so he got up every day and had his breakfast of grapefruit juice and apple and cinammon flavored oatmeal before going to work.
this was another rule, which applied to many, though not all, humans - that they had to go to work. jonah was one of those unfortunates that it applied to.
after finishing his breakfast, jonah left his apartment and descended seven stories in an elevator which had been recently inspected and found to be in compliance with the rules of the city building inspection department.
he walked half a block to the bus stop.
the bus had a schedule, but because of traffic, weather, and other variables, did not adhere to it very well.
waiting for the bus, in the morning and later in the evening when he returned from work, could often be the high or low points of jonah’s day. if the bus was on time or no more than ten minutes late, both in the morning and at night, that meant it was a good day. if it was more than ten minutes late, especially if the weather was bad, both times, that made it was a bad day.
if it was on time one way and not the other, that was usually a wash. but consider - if it was late in the morning, that meant he had the whole day to wonder if the day would turn out to be a complete disaster. but if it was on time in the morning, then he could get through the day figuring, how bad can it be?
on this particular morning, it was raining lightly, and jonah was approached by a woman - not a bag lady pushing a shopping cart , but just an ordinary looking woman not quite old enough to be his mother, and she told him a long sad story.
(insert story here)
“so, do you think you can help me out?” the woman concluded.
“excuse me, this is my bus,” jonah told her, as he folded up his umbrella. the bus was only two minutes late! that was very good, especially for a rainy day.
jonah arrived for work with plenty of time to spare. he was almost never actually late for work, even if the bus did not arrive at its scheduled time, and when he was early he usually went straight into the store and relieved ernestine, the night manager, and began getting ready for the morning rush.
when jonah had first started working at the store, ernestine had appreciated his punctuality but now she took him completely for granted, and on this morning she just said, “nice day, huh?”, grabbed her coat and handbag and left.
jonah made the coffee and checked the ice machine and the pepsi and mountain dew and other drink dispensers. he checked to make sure there were plenty of packets of beef jerky on the counter. one thing jonah had learned on the job and that still kind of surprised him was how much beef jerky people ate.
the morning papers had been delivered and jonah picked one up. the front page said - plane crash in sumatra - 256 killed.
a man came in and bought a bag of potato chips and a couple of energy drinks. jonah often made small talk with the customers, and he asked the man, “where’s sumatra?”
“how the fuck do i know?” the man responded and took his change and left.
another customer came in, a regular, who bought large quantities of scratch tickets and took his time selecting exactly which ones he wanted. jonah asked him, too, if he knew where sumatra was.
“not around here.” after much thought, the man bought his usual sixty dollars worth of tickets and left.
a woman came in. she seemed to wander around the store a bit aimlessly and jonah kept his eye on her. she finally selected a can of dinty moore chicken stew. as she approached the counter jonah thought she looked familiar. she could have been the sister of the woman at the bus station who had told him the story. maybe it was her! (jonah was not much for noticing or remembering what people wore). maybe she gotten on the next bus or even gotten on the same bus behind jonah and he had not noticed. in any case, she showed no sign of recognizing jonah, and she carefully counted out the money for the dinty moore chiken stew from a fistful of dimes, nickels, and pennies.
“too bad about those people killed in the plane crash in sumatra,” jonah observed.
“yes, it is,” the woman agreed. “but everything happens for a reason.”
“i guess,” said jonah. “would you like a bag?”
“no thank you.” the woman put the can into her coat pocket and left.
everything happens for a reason, thought jonah, looking out at the rain. that makes sense.
|
No comments:
Post a Comment