“Did you hear? Jublient is rising.”
Kevin had heard it on the lips of every walker and sop-seller trying to build a quick, profitable rapport with the village. “He’s bringing back the fun times, the gravy train will return.” Now would we like a tamlic neck bead to help complete our set? How about a bottle of claymore, guaranteed to get the native girls a-buzzing round your head like botflys? Mo always told him to steer past these oil traders and snake merchants with their split tongues and big hats, steer past and keep on walking to the well and back. Fetch the water, pop the seems and bring us back some time. Mo always used the old words, older than she had much right to use; she wasn't grey and she wasn't crooked and she didn't sit by the fire with the children because she was kept out of the smoke house. Some of the children didn’t even know that she was Kevin’s mo, she belonged to them all and gave them stories and stories. Stories about the Mountain Carnival and the fat-dark-thick winds, stories about the Uncles and what they did when they went to the lakes after the freeze. She knew stories, and she knew a hokey story when she heard one, which is what she claimed the sleeveless travellers sold us, “they can cut their sleeves until all that’s have left is a bra, but they’ll still have something up it.”
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To sustain my blithering withering mind during a large-ish project I'll be returning to making these tiny cries for help every day or so. It's hard when the times between being able to say "screw it, that's good enough" are long, and this has been months. My brain is falling away like wet bread under the constraints of having to return to the same stubborn piece of work, where the troubles of the day before are also the troubles of today and more than likely tomorrow.
It's so nice to abandon things again.
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