Some unnamable juice.

~joneworlds

My old dad knew some things. Not so much about any one thing, but he could take the measure of whatever came. If you brought something broken, or someone's name, or what you heard, you'd know he'd have a place for it. Not the details, but a slot. He'd move through this world grounded in what he knew. And enough bones to hang and carry whatever he found. Most of the old folks I knew was like that.

And I wonder now, what he'd make of what I got to steer through now.

I have this early memory, of when I was small. Back then there was barely any of the Olds come in yet, although they was something he could reckon with. But this one day, I go to fetch dad to come around. I'd found one of his dogs dead on the lower field, just laying there in the dust with the flies, its head about all gone. We go along the fence and find this jelly lump creature about two foot long, heaving along and trailing blood behind. So my dad puts a boot on it, and it bursts out this blue-colored bile as it dies. It's running down that wind-parched dirt, some unnameable juice, but it don't run like blood or anything, it pulses with a rhythm. Like it's its own thing. Never saw nothing like it.

And I looked to my dad, and he's staring at it too. But it's like a piece of him was missing, like he's not firing right, like something's wrong. Ain't saying nothing. And I'm small and scared by that look, so I ask him, what was it, dad? Like he'd be back okay again, if I just nudged him some. He turned to me with this confused look, and what I judge by now to be fear, but all held down with a kind of sadness I'd never saw before. Like he'd been beat, outclassed, or like something deep inside him just got brought up and put out in front of him. Mumbled something about having no name. Went and buried it, never talked about it again. I'd never saw my dad like that, but he wasn't the same man afterwards. Or maybe that's just the way it seemed, to a child.

He never had no slot for something like that, or of those to come. Never would. By now I'm so used to skating around not knowing what's going on, just accepting and shrugging and getting by. It don't barely phase me. But I don't think dad ever could do that. He'd turn away, turn in. But it must've been hard for him. Or maybe he's the wiser.