"I am an Eve in this northern garden"
Honoree Fanonne Jeffers, "Philly in the Light"
As the semester has gotten away from me and prevented my original plan of steadily posting book reviews and literary commentary on this blog, I have instead begun collecting these snippet pieces of flash fiction from daily life here in the Driftless Region of Wisconsin, a Midwest in which I live and to which I often wonder if I do, can, or will belong.
Here I present the first five slides for this speculum of driftless Midwestern life, as told from the queer perspective of this Southern flower following the movements of his particular sun (and I don't hate [Wisconsin], I don't hate it I don't hate it I don't hate it). Oofta, y'all.
#1—Bar, 9/16/2020
So, I'm sitting at the bar tonight. A guy comes in, mid-40s,
khakis and button-up, a little rumpled, like Willy Loman before he goes home to
his loving kids. He strikes up a conversation; he's a high school science
teacher near Madison. Kids these days. Oh, you work at Platteville? What do you
teach?
I tell him I'm an English professor. He starts telling me
about how he read Flannery O'Connor in high school and Lord of the Flies,
"A Rose for Emily," and do I think kids are prepared for college and
do I just have to dumb down everything for them?
I mention I study Faulkner. He explains how he really loves
Vonnegut, which leads him to explain how when he was younger he was at this bar
and the bartender was hot . . . at which point he starts using feminine
pronouns for this hot bartender and continues ranting about books that he seems
to think are important and are all by white guys, except O'Connor. I manage to
get in a word or two, that I study southern lit. I've written a book on
Faulkner actually.
He keeps going, finally explains how, "You know, we all
turn into Willy Loman" and gives me that smile of solidarity among men or
whatever.
And I look back at him, and say, "Well, or Blanche
Dubois."
And he doesn’t get it. He just keeps smiling that
pathological smile of solidarity, keeps on insisting we are all Willy Lomans.
Finally, his pizza is ready; he finishes his Bud Light and leaves.
I fucking hate Arthur Miller.
#2—Porch, 9/19/2020
It is a cool Fall evening in Platteville, Wisconsin, in the
state that supposedly supplied the most troops to the Union army in the Civil
War. I'm drinking my Evan and Sprite on my wraparound porch and watching
YouTube videos because I am classy. It is not quite 11:30.
While texting friends who live in Arkansas and North
Carolina, I hear a loud crash, the distinctive sound of cars colliding at high
speed. I live two blocks from Water Street, which is also a state highway,
which is also a few blocks north of Historic 2nd Street and all the bars.
Whatever has happened, it has happened there.
I sit my drink down on the porch table I inherited
from a friend. I sit my computer beside it. I rush down Madison to Water. As I
do, I hear a car driving through the roundabout clearly dragging its bumper as
it flees the scene. While I do not see the car, I make a note of what I've
heard and what direction it sounds like it is going.
A block down Water towards downtown, a car is across the
road, completely shattered.
However, by the grace of God, it was just parked on the road
and empty when it was hit. No one is injured. The police are arriving. Several
folks have come out to see what has happened, many have called the cops. I
immediately tell the officer that the other driver headed north dragging their
bumper. A second police car rushes north to track them. Others verify what I've
said.
At which point I look at the house that this now shattered
car was parked in front of. It is plastered with Trump/Pence signs. The owner
of the shattered car walks out to talk to the police officer.
He is wearing matching stars-and-bars sweatshirt and shorts.
He had been sleeping when the crash occurred.
And I think, "OMG, it's Miss Rachel Tension and I've
just stepped into To Wong Fu!" because that is easier than thinking,
"@#$%^&%$@*@#*%" which is what actually crossed my mind.
#3—Bar, 10/24/2020
And he walks into the bar and bears hugs me and says, “I’m
in a wedding. And they were like, ‘we’ve got coke!’”
So I make the obvious joke: “Oh, it’s like all those parties
I went to in Mississippi in my youth.”
And he hugs me tighter. The night had started out around 8
with pizza and beer while the Badgers played. By morning, we will all be kings
and the world will be perfect.
“Bohemian Rhapsody” comes on the jukebox. Planets align in
the driftless stretches of Wisconsin tonight.
#4—Parking Lot, 11/1/2020
So yeah. That moment when you pull up to Wal-Mart and have
no sooner opened your door—still in the parking lot—when you hear the married
couple getting out of their car next to yours talking about somebody at her
work or something and the first words you hear are “f*g f*g f*g” and so you
remember that right now those usually simmeringly anti-gay microaggressions
from your own work that have been going on a debauch lately towards macro
toxicity levels and LGBTQ+ rights are again on a ballot for an election in two
days that may or may not lead to wholesale fascism in a country that also locks
kids in cages and gasses protesters and shoots unarmed people in addition to
not being too keen on queer identities even if we don’t make the first story on
the news.
So you walk up and down the cookie aisle for 10 minutes,
leave without groceries for the week, and find yourself wanting to explain to
people “this is why I sleep so much right now” because if it wasn’t already too
much then it started to feel like too much when today of all days I had to hear
that word one time in the Wal-Mart parking much less three times in a row and,
so, for today at least, I’m done.
#5—Bar, 11/14/2020
When you are sitting at the bar on a very slow night. And
then the farm boys come in. And they are lit. And for about 30 minutes it’s a
party even if the Badgers game is sort of boring. But one of the farm boys
gives you that look. And that’s okay ‘cause you had already been giving him
that look. And he looks. And you look. And he looks again. And you still
lookin’. And you are like, hey. And he’s like, I’m here with these guys.
And you are like, I know. And he’s like, cool. And you are like, I’m here a
lot. And he’s like, uh, yeah. And you are like, just saying. And he’s like, “What’s
the score of the Badgers game?”
And they leave to go to the next bar. And nothing was said
except that thing about the Badgers game. But the whole conversation really did
take place in about three seconds of gestures with eyebrows and innuendo. Just
another Saturday night.
To be continued . . .
