The dragon smiles at me. It bounces to the music while children play underfoot. It does not devour them. It refrains from stomping about and blowing fire at wayward passersby. It is tame. Tired. A degenerate reflection of what it once was. No longer majestic and terrible. A circus attraction. Wings clipped, stricken to paved parking lots and child saliva - to the rough and rigor of playful children who will never fear it. The forgotten ghost of a monster. Bouncing. And smiling at me. *** We’re driving across the bridge and into downtown New Albany. I can already see the celebration below us - all the curious people milling about; the smiling, stupid-happy couples and intrepid tykes; and everyone else. There is a song stuck in my head. It won’t go away....    [read more]            The establishment had become quite unruly by now. Much of New Albany’s finest Captain Morgan had already been imbibed by us, and I’m fairly certain our newfound enemies – who had all too quickly degenerated themselves from the prospect of modern civility – had taken in their share of that terrible drink as well. Every bar patron was looking at us now with a certain degree of fear and loathing at our behavior, and I knew pretty soon we’d be fucked. *** We had arrived sometime that afternoon. It wasn’t until we crossed that mighty and majestic bridge and entered the city that... [read more]            Today, I had lunch with my future self at Frisch’s Big Boy Family Diner and Restaurant. When I came in, he came in. I was promptly seated near the window, as always. (Having been a frequent guest of the establishment for over seven weeks, the staff already knew my personal preferences when it came to dining there.) When the server began to seat my future self along the wall, however, he insisted that he sit near the window as well. Thus, he came to occupy a booth adjacent to mine; and by some measure of interest, he sat facing me. Now, this was somewhat peculiar. On any other occasion, I would have... [read more]            I remember the day we scoured my grandmother’s old Portland home, not two days after her funeral. I was twelve years old, and it was the last time my mother’s family ever stood all together under the same roof. Being at the ripe age of twelve - and looking more like seven - I knew I had no voice to be heard. Everyone zipped through the halls and across the rooms like clockwork, pulling out drawers and rifling through cabinets, and looking both ways before slyly snatching family portraits off the walls. It felt awkwardly mechanical, like some commercial score to be settled between weeping and saying goodbye. My entire childhood disassembled, sorted, and carried off... [read more]            I stepped up the tall metal stairs and onto the travel bus, scooting carefully between the cluttered rows of church women who had already begun whooping and making a general commotion. Nights like these just didn’t come often enough for the sweet, gentle “followers-of-God” sort, who used the outlet to throw all the usual hallway gossip right out onto the proverbial table. No subject was too vulgar, too taboo, and I knew that this sexually-repressed social behavior would only escalate into the next few evening hours. Being the only male present, I realized my chances of being drawn into such a vortex of perversion were outstanding, so I hastened to the rear of the bus. “Kyle! Right here!” Near the last row sat Sarah, patting her hands over the adjacent seat and smiling. I gave it only a moment’s thought before sitting. Sarah was 24 and fairly attractive. She was thin but animated, and... [read more]            I’m thirteen years old, and it seems like only yesterday. I’ve decided to spend the morning and afternoon with Andrew, my best friend; and we’re already eating pancakes by the plate full. It’s no secret that life has finally hurled us into adolescence, that wonderfully awkward period during which our voices will mutate so much that we’ll sound like drowning donkeys, and we’ll boast that our intellects are so abundantly astute that we deserve doctorates. We’ll ogle girls and consume excessive quantities of junk food. We’ll adopt a small collection of four-letter words to our vocabularies, and generally make asses out of ourselves... [read more]

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