Spitball Army

We watch the garden vigilantly, waiting for red on tomatoes and yellow on banana peppers. The bugs wait, too: pacing on leaves.

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The promise of a fledgling’s life of flight, extinguished in the crook of a bamboo stem: struggle, entrapment, exhaustion, death. (BlackBerry photo: spitballarmy.com)

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Sister and I meet in my garden. Tomorrow is my weekly fertilizing day. “The Feast of All Plants,” I say. She chuckles, like a nun.

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Aisle 14. Walk toward the display of security lights. As you pass, they light your profile. Pause. Turn. Vamp for the paparazzi.

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On break, discussion has veered to the predicted May 21 end times. “I won’t hear Gabriel’s trumpet,” she says. “I’m tone deaf.”

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He carts a framed door to the hardware store returns desk. Wrong size? No. “It doesn’t fit the hole my wife measured,” he says.

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The tornado drops bits of Tuscaloosa in Birmingham yards: shingles, chunks of insulation, a bank deposit slip, a woman’s swimsuit.

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Electricity courses into the house, waking after a four day nap: the AC vent yawns, ceiling fans stretch, the refrigerator groans.

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He’s been without power for days, complaining. At work, people buy flashlights, tarps and chain saws from him. Now he feels lucky.

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Post-tornado, people shop for replacement storage sheds; clerk diverts their attention from the crumpled one in the parking lot.

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