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"...all deep, earnest thinking is but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea; while the wildest winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous, slavish shore..." —Melville, Moby Dick

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Ducks Rowed (More or Less)

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Q: Hold down a job?  A: Check.  Q: Pay bills (on time)?  A: Check.  Q: Save money?  A: Check.  Q: Obey the Rules of the Road?  A: Check.  Or, mostly check.  Or, rather: Check -ish .  Q: Recycle?  A: Check.  Q: Observe common courtesy? (Exempli gratia, holding doors open for those who follow behind, allowing others to lead the way onto or off of an elevator, giving up a train seat to those who are less steady or heavily burdened, et cetera.)  A: Check. Q: Charitable?  A: Check.  Q: Keep in shape? A: Check.  Q: Avoid junk food?  A: Check.  Q: Find someone to love you back? A: ... Q: Find someone to love you back? A : Pass.  Q: Find someone—  A: Shut up. There’s always a rub. Exempli gratia: You’ll have love, but you won’t have money. Love, but your lover’s unfaithful. Love, but you’ll be sick with AIDS, MS, or cancer. Or, they’ll be sick with fill–in–the–blank. You’ll have love, but you’l...
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The Paint Job

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The wallpaper as you go up the stairs was fraying, so Pop called up Martin to pull it all off. Pop wanted new wallpaper, but he didn’t want to choose, so he told Martin to paint all the wallpaper-less walls “buff.” Martin and his wife did the job over two Saturdays. On these two days, unless you were Martin or Martin’s wife, you weren’t going up or down the stairs. The planked apparatus that Martin had rigged up made it possible to reach the highest parts of the walls that flank the staircase. Martin propped open the front door, which is several feet from the bottom of the stairs; he also opened the window several feet from the top of the stairs. He’d done it to let out the paint flumes. [Indeed, the flumes, if any, but especially the fumes .] But doing it also let in the horseflies. Or maybe they were only houseflies. Whichever sort they were, they were eager to pester me, all of these flies were. But just me. Martin painted nearly every room on the second floor of the house, save for...
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Shut?

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The concern for whether or not you’ve shut the refrigerator door completely, or whether you’ve completely shut the refrigerator door, always, always, always strikes once you’ve completed your climb up the stairs. So, then, you do what you’ve always, always, always done: You descend and you return to the kitchen and you press a hand against the refrigerator door. Sometimes, yes, it’s still a bit open by a little bit; sometimes it isn’t. No, MOST TIMES it isn’t. Most times, it’s shut. Really, if you really cared, you’d draw up a chart to chart the validity of this recurrent concern. But if you really, really, really cared THAT much, then your madness would be confirmed. Hencethus, you won’t be drawing up a chart for the aforementioned porpoise. Rather, PURPOSE. Why can’t you simply confirm the ceiling—rather, the SEALING—of the refrigerator door whilst (still) in the kitchen? Exactly what exactly prevents you? Why is it so difficult? What makes it such a challenge? But soft! Perhaps you ...
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