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December 24, 2003 vicissitude It is Christmas Eve and I stand here in Fiction feeling literate and calmly merry.  Unless a book hurls itself into my hands and magically opens to a passage that speaks directly to my life, I may not buy a book at all.  I stand here bearing only the thought of reading. Between a row of books, I walk laterally, like a crab.  Sometimes I extend a leg and let the other slide to meet it.  Occasionally, I use a crossover-step as though dancing a minuet.  But always I move sideways, never forward or back. From the corner of my eye, I detect the figure of another.  She is large and looming.  I refuse to look directly at her and, thus, I cannot determine whether she is six-legged or dependent upon a walker.  Regardless, her presence irritates me.  Perhaps I should face her and speak, suggest a different section.  I could tell this mutant (disabled?) interloper she belongs in Inspirational.  Surely she would consider this a compliment! But I do not speak and the woman does not move.  I am less merry than before.

©  2003 by the beastmaster