Stephen rose from where he was sitting. The words that had plagued him all day still echoed in his mind. As hard as he had tried, he was unable to rid his mind of them. Yes, there had been many times when he thought of the poem, but never to the extent he was just then. What did it all mean?

He just couldn’t understand it. Over the years, especially as Stephen grew older, he was now in his 60s, he found that certain things like music, classical music in particular, would come to his mind first thing in the morning when he woke up. He would invariably have a tune playing in his mind and over the years he had tried to make sense of those pieces of music but had failed. It was only in the past ten years or so, but more strongly in the last three years, that he found that there was in fact a logic to the music he heard. Invariably the music was either something that one of his parents had enjoyed, or a piece that he himself thought of as a favourite. But it was the music that played on the radio when he first got into the car that seemed the most meaningful.

I hate horses! And that’s not a strong enough statement in my opinion. I think they are such dumb animals. I have never understood how anyone could find them handsome, as I’ve heard some people say they are. No, they aren’t and neither are their cousins ponies or donkeys. I don’t find anything redeeming about them. My idea of the best place for a horse is in a can of Alpo, period. Yes, I know they are popular gifts for birthdays and Christmas, but not me. I know many children ask for a pony, but I wanted a bicycle with rockets strapped to it. But I didn’t get one until recently.

Every time I had a birthday, I would be asked what I would like and the answer was always the same, a rocket bicycle. That would be greeted with a roll of the eyes and then followed up with the words, be serious.

“What are you doing here?”

“Well, I could ask you the same question.”

“Jury duty!” replied John holding up a piece of paper.

“Same here,” replied his friend David, holding up a similar piece of paper.

John got up from the hard wooden bench he was sitting on and shook his friend’s hand. They both sat down.

“What case do you have?” asked John looking around the room filled with an assortment of humanity. Some wearing nice suits and jackets and dresses, while the majority were wearing jeans and, in some cases, tee shirts, and a few sporting large head turning tattoos, including one whose tattoos covered his entire head and face.

“Costco?”

I looked at the large man wearing a silly smile standing across from me on the train platform. I furrowed my brow because at first I didn’t know what he was talking about. He noticed my concerned look and smiled, “Costco?” he repeated but this time pointing to my pants.

“Yes,” I replied surprised by his question. The platform was packed and there was no place to sit. I pointed to his shirt, “Costco,” I asked.

“Yes,” he replied enthusiastically and then pointed to my shirt, “Costco?” he asked.

“Yes,” I replied brightening up. I was beginning to like this game. I pointed to his hat, “Costco?” He smiled and pointed to mine, “yes,” I replied.

“You know she used to be a streaker,” remarked John pointing at a rather pretty woman probably in her late 60s standing in the middle of a crowd discussing something rather animatedly.

Richard looked over at the little group and shook his head. “Nah, she wasn’t a streaker.” And then to make sure his friend was talking about the same woman he asked, “who was a streaker?”
“Her,” replied John, again pointing carefully making sure he didn’t spill his gin and tonic. “You’re talking about Anne, the, the woman over there?”
“Yup,” replied John taking a sip of his drink.

“Impossible!” said Richard shaking his head. “You know who that is don’t you?”
“Yes, of course I do. That’s Anne Brisbane….”
“Dr Anne Brisbane PhD,” interrupted Richard, “a PhD in Astrophysics. The woman who’s in the newspapers constantly nowadays because of the discovery she just made.”

I pulled into what looked like the last parking spot in the grocery store car park without having to walk half a mile or so. I pulled out the grocery list from my pocket to glance at it before putting it back. It was a mental test I had developed for myself over past few the years and at which I must admit, I fail miserably.

As I was taking the keys out of the car in preparation of getting out and fighting the hordes in the food aisles, there was a series of sharp knocks on my window. I looked up to see a pint-sized man with sunglasses wrapped around his entire head staring at me. I lowered my window and before I could ask him why he was interrupting my preparation, he blurted out, “you’re parked illegally!”

“You love that song, don’t you?”

“What, the one I’m whistling now?”
“The one and only song you whistle.”
“Don’t fence me in?”
 “Yup and I bet you don’t even know who wrote it.”
“Irving Berlin wasn’t it?”
“See, what did I tell you. No, it was Cole Porter, and who sang it and made it popular?”
“That one I know. It was Frank Sinatra.”
“John, before I correct you yet again, why is it you whistle the song?”
“Well, I would sing it but I don’t know the words. It’s just a very pretty tune.”
“And very old. I think it was composed back in the 1930s.”
“Wow! I didn’t realise it was that old.”
“Yup. Can you believe it, there’s something in the world that’s older than you.”

“Sir, sir, excuse me sir. We’re closed now, you need to leave.”
I looked up the man addressing me. He looked very stern as he stood by the door with his left hand on the light switch. I remained seated in a large room where about half an hour ago it was filled with people. I looked down again. “Sir, sir,” he addressed me again, “you need to leave. I have to lock up the place.”
I looked up again and he could tell by the look on my face that I was sad, very sad. “No more dogs?” I asked in a voice just louder than a whisper as if I was afraid me would hear me.

“Where’s Joe?”

“Went running.”

“I thought he went running yesterday. Does he run every day?”

“No, only once in a while.”

Sam drew in a deep breath, “what are you trying to tell me?”

“That he hasn’t returned from his run.”

“The run from yesterday?”

“Yup. He headed down the road and disappeared.”

“Disappeared? How can he disappear?”

“Oh, that’s very simple. He began running and hasn’t been seen since.”

“Where does the road lead?”

“Belgium.”

“Belgium? Don’t be daft, Belgium is in Europe.”

A little about myself before I talk about my favourite pastime of roasting almonds.

I was born in June, though there are in some quarters the feeling that I was actually born in July because someone had forgotten to turn over the month on the calendar, which was glued to the wall in the kitchen of the trailer I was born in.

Even the year is in slight dispute, but for the sake of my sanity let’s say I’m somewhere around 52 years old give or take a few months. My earliest memory is waking up one morning and feeling the trailer was moving. I opened my eyes and looked out of the window, and indeed we were moving. That had never happened before. I was quite confused. I was around 3 or 4 years old. I looked across the cupboard which doubled as my bedroom and saw that the bed next to me, which housed my sister and her dolls when she wasn’t there, was empty. It was obvious that my sister was up.

One of the things I love to do, and have done for many years, is to take the Sunday newspaper and go out on the deck if it’s a warm sunny day, and spend the morning reading and dozing off until lunch time.

Lunch time on a Sunday is a tradition begun by my mother when I was a child. No doubt inherited from her mother, before which the origin of the tradition becomes murky. Even now, with my children grown and with families of their own, when they are in town they look forward to Sunday lunch. In fact, some have decided to carry on the tradition in their homes. I am sure my mother is looking down from heaven very pleased that her little tradition has multiplied over the decades.

There isn’t much that can be said about Edith, that hasn’t been said already. Throughout the annals of history, Edith whether she knew it or not or in fact approved of it or not, had been the one person who everyone who knew her thought was bonkers.

She had her entire universe upside down. She thought North was South, left was right and anything one said she always took the opposite position, whether it warranted an opposite position or not was superfluous.

Dipping back into his memory bank, John closed his eyes for a brief moment to allow himself some time to sort through his memories. He opened his eyes a few seconds later, “eight days a week,” he said emphatically, which caused his friend, David, to raise his eyebrows.

“Eight days a week,” David repeated.

“Yes, eight days a week,” confirmed John.

“You asked me what my favourite song was when I was growing up, and it was Eight Days a Week sung by the Beatles.”

David found that hard to believe. “With all the songs we grew up with, the one that’s your favourite was Eight Days a Week, but why?”

Whenever I went to stay with my grandparents in their old farmhouse, which was situated at the end of a five mile unpaved driveway, which in turn was off a second rate lane which in turn was off a second rate road which in turn was off the main road in a town which time had forgotten, I would always have to park my Land Rover about half a mile away from the house itself and walk the rest of the distance. Whenever I took people there for the first time, their jaws would drop when I pulled up my Land Rover next the carcass of a cow called Bessie, who had died generations ago but nobody felt it necessary to bury, “let nature do it,” was my grandfather’s answer when asked, and he would continue, “If I had to bury every cow on the farm that died, then we would be nothing but a cemetery and wouldn’t be a farm.”

“What do rabbits and humans have in common?”

I looked at my friend rather perplexed. At first, I didn’t understand his question and then when I took a stab at answering it, I got even more confused. I repeated the question back to him. “Yes,” he replied, “what do rabbits and humans have in common?” I decided not to engage my brain and instead treat the question with the disgust it deserved.

“Nothing!” I replied and then went back to the ham sandwich I was eating and quite enjoying until he had asked me that asinine question.

“We have a lot of rain here in June.”

“Oh dear,” I replied, “I came here with the intention of seeing if this was a place to move to and according to everything I read, it doesn’t rain a lot during the year.”

“That’s correct,” continued the real estate agent as we walked around the large house with seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms, 2 half bathrooms and a beautifully large kitchen, fully equipped with an AGA stove and other such high quality appliances, situated in the side of a mountain overlooking the bright blue Pacific Ocean.

“It doesn’t rain at any other time of the year, just in June.” I felt somewhat relieved.

Olivia died yesterday at age of 56, about a year after receiving the devastating news from her doctor of a disease that was ravaging her body.

Olivia was, and in my opinion still is, one of the most beautiful people anyone has ever met. She had her entire life to live for. She was excited. She was going marry the love of her life in October 2026, after decades of living alone. Her fiancé wasn’t at her bedside when she passed way in the company of her parents and siblings and indeed, some neighbours.

About a year ago while preparing dinner for Paul her fiancé, she was in the kitchen of her small apartment trimming a brisket, when she dropped the knife she was using. Thinking nothing of it, she picked it up again and began using it. She shook her head at her clumsiness and put it down to her excitement.

Over the years I have collected club memberships as if they were going out of style. Akin to people who buy things because they’re on sale, whether they truly want them or not. Well, I collect memberships in a similar fashion.

I belong not just to one gym, but three. Why three, I am sometimes asked. Well, I reply that’s because I have three very good friends who call me up occasionally and ask if I want to go to the gym together, so they can have someone to talk to whether they are on the treadmill or the stationary bicycle. Because of the type of personality I have, I usually agree to accompany them, unless of course I have better offer.

They came from two completely different backgrounds. Erin grew up in New England in a large seven bedroom home, even though her parents only needed two. She was an only child. The other bedrooms gathered dust, though her father’s rationale was that, “one day I’ll come across an advertisement in the paper,” he proclaimed more than once at a dinner party, “that someone or the other would love to move to our glorious part of the country but couldn’t, because they had five children and everything he has been shown was for a much smaller family and I’ll jump up and say ah ha, I’m your saviour. Please move here I have a seven bedroom home and I’ll sell it to them at a premium.”

Every seat in the house was filled. Not only that, but there wasn’t any standing room either. The place was so packed that a fire marshal who happened to be in the crowd, clapped his hands and told people they had to leave at least the centre aisle open.

As he was doing that, someone sat in his seat and refused to move when asked to. “There isn’t any assigned seating,” the man, a small impish looking loser, who knew he probably needed to leave soon before the fire marshal a man of considerable heft with a frame of 6 foot 8 inches sat on him. He oozed out of the seat and slid along the floor disappearing through a connecting door which he soon found led to the boiler room. A scream a few seconds later brought smiles to the fire marshal’s face.