While out for a walk today, from behind me I heard the approach of something really massive, like those star destroyers in Star Wars, but it turned out to be, of course, only one of those obscenely oversized SUV's people drive to soccer matches and Starbucks and, eventually, Hell. It passed me by in its seismic wake, pulled over with its break lights on. I slowed down, stopped. A man's arm reached out of the window. He was holding a loaf of bread.
"Would you like some raisin bread?"
He was holding raisin bread out the window. Sunmaid raisin bread in its distinctive red plastic bag. Nevermind I'd stopped a good ten feet behind his vehicle.
Call me crazy, but that just seemed strange. Who decides to tool around offering raisin bread to guys in wheelchairs?
Luckily, I could turn right down a side road. And I did.
"Sir?" I heard him call out. I sped up.
About Me
- Paul
- Paul Guest is the author of four volumes of poetry and a memoir. His debut, The Resurrection of the Body and the Ruin of the World, was awarded the 2002 New Issues Poetry Prize. His second collection, Notes for My Body Double, was awarded the 2006 Prairie Schooner Book Prize. His third collection, My Index of Slightly Horrifying Knowledge, was published by Ecco Press/HarperCollins in 2008. His fourth collection, Because Everything Is Terrible, was published by Diode Editions. His poems have appeared in Harper's, The Paris Review, Poetry, Tin House, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. His memoir, One More Theory About Happiness, was published by Ecco in May 2010 and selected for the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Program. The recipient of a 2011 Guggenheim Fellowship and a 2007 Whiting Writers' Award, Guest lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.
9 comments:
That is a strange story--the first part very funny, the last part very weird. But recently I was on a plane and I noticed the guy sitting in front of me was chewing gum so I asked for a piece. The person flying with me called it "ballsy," I believe. I don't know. I just wanted a piece of gum. It didn't seem inappropriate to me. Anyway, maybe that guy just really wanted to share his bread. Still, the SUV suggests his motive could not have been something so generous. Okay, this post is getting unnecessarily long. You'd think that would mean I'd go back and edit, since I have the opportunity to do so, but no . . . I'm just going to post all of it. You can delete it if you want.
so bizarre--i just was offered a whole loaf of bread (French bread)the other day! and you know what? i surprised myself and took it! it cracks me up how similar people act towards you and i, for verrry diff. reasons...
I want people to start handing me cookies. I'll gladly accept their offers, SUV or no SUV.
Money works in the same way. If they started handing out money, I'd be quite happy.
C., you make an excellent point. We should co-write an essay about it.
Essay? Hell no! Don't you realize you just pitched the opening scene of "Conspiracy Theory II"?
You're right, BP. Or a new direction for Mission: Impossible -- "This loaf of raisin bread will self-destruct in ..."
Oddly enough, last week at rehearsal someone gave me a loaf of "artisan" bread. He just said here, I brought you some bread. I took it because I didn't know what else to say. The loaf of bread weighed about 47 pounds and I kept it on my kitchen counter until I got nervous and threw it away three days later. The weirdest thing is that the end of the bread was sliced off. He must have tasted it and decided it sucked so he offered it to me.
whoa, this bread giving trend is truly odd. And that artisan bread coulda had a bomb in it. You've heard of shoe bombs...well, why not bread bombs?
Paul -- I love these bizarre stories you write in your blog about peculiar reactions that people have to you in your wheelchair. I would love to see you gather them together & make a chapbook out of them (...I mean the stories, not the weirdos who you run into). The stories are disturbing & funny at the same time.
-Lbehrendt
You know, that's not a half bad idea....
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