Buddha rocks project ~ take two, number 4

The little boy couldn't WAIT to get to school today. Yesterday, he caught a praying mantis in the back yard. He wanted to show it off to all his friends in school especially since today was show and tell. Wouldn't everyone want to see the martial arts bug? Oh, yeah! After breakfast the little boy was off and running.

On the way to school, the little boy saw several squirrels gathering nuts. They seemed to be working hard but were having fun jumping over a few different trees. A bird pulled a worm out of the ground in the abandoned lot on 8th street. The little boy saw several birds do this and wondered if he could eat a worm. Yep. Most likely. So long as it was cleaned. There was a bus stop along the way and today, old man Jenkins had his new seeing eye dog, a big ole yellow lab the boy thought. How cool was it that that the dog was helping that old guy get around. Jenkins was a good guy, as far as old folks go, so 'pretty cool' figured the little boy.

Just as the little boy got to school, he looked at the praying mantis. He didn't want him to have to work. His parents worked really hard, yet they had fun. The little boy surely didn't want the bug to get eaten by a bird. And yet, the little boy wasn't doing the bug any favors by caging him up and showing him off to a bunch of like minded, little kids. Martial arts or not, the praying mantis was still a small bug who might be better off taking its chancing in the world.

So, the little boy let the praying mantis go just before the morning bell rang. When it was his turn to show and tell, the little boy said that he had forgotten and asked it he could bring in his Lego Pirate ship tomorrow. He didn't hear the answer as he had already turned to look out the window.

Buddha rocks project ~ take two, number 3

I borrowed my
step-dad's car
Fuck it!
I stole the damn thing.

My parents were out of town
and I wanted to go out
tool around
IN STYLE

1980 something
Custom Lincoln Mark IV
Colored to match his
alma mater - Maze and Blue

Can you imagine?
A pimped out
University of Michigan
gas hog!

Sweet! I know

I pushed it, too
through the subdivision
up to friend's homes
who weren't even around
losing track of time

And that's when it happened
Holy Hell!
I really didn't care
just wanted a joy ride
you know

But not really knowing
how to drive
14 you see
and small
I backed the beast up against

A mailbox

SHIT SHIT SHIT
I raced home
faster now,
smart! I know

Parking the
University trophy
back in the garage
and forgot about it
Phew!

until...
My parents called me
downstairs

My room was way, way up top
3rd floor really
I used to imagine
living in a castle
but that's a different tale

They called me down
out, into the garage
and showed me
The Damage

A tear in the vinyl top
bout a foot long
My parents then asked
If I had left the garage door
open

Can you imagine?
They thought someone
broke in
and exacted
OHIO State revenge

The Bastards!

That's why
to this day
I root for the
Michigan Wolverines

Go Blue!

Buddha rocks project ~ take two, number 2

In the ravine
water
rushes by

some bare trees
a green basketball
an old, decomposing
dog house
and a shoe

what's it all mean
I ask myself

the trees are bare
cause it's winter

I remember that basketball
getting away from my daughter
so angry and still
she shoots perfect
free throws

I just put down
my dog so
who cares if that dog house
housed a loving friend
well... I do

it's all discarded
few but the garbage man
or some do-gooder
college kids
will ever see

but the richest
of memories
no matter the pain
is the richness of
memories

So I
clean up the stuff
and consider
the shoe

who knows who's
memory
it's rushing through
now

Buddha rocks project ~ take two

Beauty outshines
but a few
thunderous times
been 16 years since
I said
I do

Not too hard
to believe
we'd make it
and
I’d still be here
with you

Buddha's photo prompt 2 - John's bucket of water

I dig holes. Not just any ole hole but important holes - the everlasting kind. Well, I have to fill em back up so maybe not so everlasting. You see, I dig holes in cemeteries. Someone has gotta do it, ya know, and since I done hung out at the cemetery since I was a wee little, it seemed natural. Used to use shovels, way back when, and let me tell you! Using dem dirt slingers was hard work. Yes sir. Well, it took a long time but I liked it.

Seemed natural for the cemetery to grow as time went on, and when it got big, the people in charge bought me a mechanical shovel, a backhoe. One of dem nice green ones too, named after some deer in dat dar movie Bambi. Now, I don’t member no character named John, but John made my job quicker. And wouldn’t you know it, soon as I could work faster, more people seemed to die. Way it is, I guess.

Only thing I don’t like about ole John is after digging a hole, I’d have to wait around with him until the dead person’s family left the cemetery. And you know what, death don’t know no time and folks don’t know nothing bout getting dirt back in the ground. People die all times of the day, throughout the year, and regardless of the weather. Yep! I’d dig a hole and it would snow or the sun would blister down or the rain would just pour all over me and ole John. We’d wait, right thing to do I guess, and the rain would just pour on down. I’d like the rain, more than the snow or sun, cause sometimes the rainwater would collect in John’s bucket.

Oh, I liked when that happened. Yes I did. Sure, I was surrounded by a cemetery with loads of dead folks and sometimes their sad families. There was a job to be done too. But when it rained and water collected in dat dar bucket of John’s, I’d sometimes see the pretty blue sky and cotton white clouds reflected in the water. And ya know what? I’d wonder if there wasn’t something more than just a dug hole needing to be filled back in.

Buddha's photo prompt 1 - Grasshopper and Fly

It was the beginning of the end, I knew it. I just knew it!

I had spent hours on that car, cleaning it, making it purdy, bringing out its inner Delta. I used the finest dish soup money could buy; a lemon, orange mix only the Gods of dishpan hands could come up with. Enough Turtle wax that I'd swear I single-handedly put the whole turtle population on the endangered species list. And toothbrushes... BOY! did I use enough toothbrushes. I don't have to tell you about toothbrushes and cars, do I? The detailers secret weapon.

After all that and the better part of my Sunday spent making mom's old Galaxy Blue Delta 88 sparkle like the finest cubic zirconia a hundreds bucks can buy, and the INSECTS OF DOOM come out of the desert to sit on my car's windshield. It's a sign, I tell ya. A deadly sign of DOOM!

If it is the End, guess I'm going out in style. I'll ride off into the Hollywood sunset in my shinny, like-new 1972 Delta 88 with a grasshopper and fly sitting on its windshield and you know what? I'll speed along the highway collecting the splats of as many innocent insects as I can without a care in the world. If they're coming to warn me of the end, I am sure as HELL gonna take out as many of those nasty buggers as I can. Me and my Delta 88, that is. An insect's worst nightmare.