Threads

So many stories—threads to follow. The fellow who plastered the walls of our closet after ice dam damage used my vacuum to clean up after plastering.

He had done a good job plastering, expressed himself in colourful language, and lacked a sense of time.

"I vacumn for my mother every week."
"She's on dialysis twice a week and can't do any heavy work."
"That's nice of you."
"Yeah," he said. "I was going to give her one of my kidneys,went through the blood tests and then she had a minor stroke and they said she wasn't a candidate."

"That's quite a gift."
"She's my mother. Of course I'd give her a kidney."

We speak in stories. Once upon a time...I had a student in my class whose ancestor was one of the Salem women accused of witchcraft. Once upon a time...I found myself two feet away from a coiled albino timber rattlesnake.

To be alive means to be part of the story, a player in the tale, a holder of one of the threads.