The Expansion Chamber

Her dad came to visit us in Vermont. It was our first winter there and he drove up from Boston while on a business trip. It was minus 4 and he wanted to go to Montreal for some Polish food. Drive three hours to another country in sub-zero temps for a few pierogis and a bowl of borscht? What the heck?   Yea, that was Dad.  He didn't plan on us leaving unprepared. He took her to a outdoorsy, sporting-goods store in Burlington and they came back with two of the finest down jackets money could buy. He probably spent eight hundred dollars on those two coats.  I named mine Big Red. It is the warmest thing on planet Earth. The astronauts could wear it on Pluto if there was an airtight helmet attachment on the collar. Well, if Pluto was actually a planet. Who decides this stuff anyway? [authors note: I wrote a stern letter in 2016 and they changed it back] After thirty years, the thin, outer layer is now shredded and dirty. One outer sleeve is now gone, exposing the s...

The angel is generally accepted to be a spiritual being, believed to act as an attendant, agent or messenger of God.  In our world of dirt, smoke and noise, many assume an angel to be simply, a person of exemplary conduct or virtue. I can see that. When you are desperate and someone bails you out of a jam, gratitude can sometimes cloud your vision. A few weeks ago I was waiting to pay for my gas and the woman in front of me dug in her purse and put a fist full of coins on the counter. The clerk had the audacity to say to her, "Oh, no you didn't." Like it wasn't hard enough for her to be driving a beater white Dodge minivan, filthy and dented. Her total pre-paid gas purchase was $1.47. I almost cried. I followed her back to her pump. When she turned around and saw me standing there, she screamed and jumped a little. I apologized and handed her a bill. It was really not much, but she took it and asked God to bless me. I was optimistic, but felt it was more a tes...

The last time I visited Pennsylvania was for my Pop's funeral back in 2003. There was a 21 gun salute.  Even when I’m  expecting it, guns firing at a funeral startle me and put a lump in my throat. I began thinking about other funerals, old buddies, and their own pop’s military service.  Od dly, in my mind, I rode around my old neighborhood like I was doing my paper route as a kid. Funny. I’d done a similar thing the last time I was visiting here. Back in the summer of 1983, I rode an old Harley I’d built all the way from Tybee Island near Savannah to Pennsylvania to be best man in my buddy Phil’s wedding.  For the week I was there, I thumped around the the side streets on that red Shovelhead chopper stopping for a bowl of Capaletti soup, a Porketta sandwich and a Stegmaier Gold Medal beer. Perfection. Bruce ’ s house sat across the street from a neighborhood Italian bar and grill and at the end of those three rounds  of seven gunshots,  I found myse...

Back in the seventies, when a two-tone brown polyester/acrylic wool scarf was quite fashionable, my doting sister knitted me one for Christmas. Diligently, she repeated the knit-one-pearl-one process, in all likelihood for a week or two longer than necessary for an eight or nine-year-old boy, but I wore it proudly nonetheless. I’d wrap it around my neck two, even three times and still have enough left over for the neighbor’s German Shepherd to chase and use to take me down. He did so on multiple occasions. What I really wanted was a white silk aviators scarf, just like the Red Baron, to go with the mini bike I really, REALLY, wanted, but that’s just not how Christmas worked during my adolescent time slot in Coledump PA. Back then there was some secret code that changed continually. It was invented by the Navajo. The same Navajo that worked for the US government during World War II, in fact. Here's how it worked: If you asked Santa for a mini bike, he’d bring a harmonica. ...