Fran sat hunched over in the old red car with his eyes clenched shut, shivering just a little as he considered what his next move should be. When he finally looked up again……there was that damned omnipresent time machine waiting for him!!!
But this time when it cryptically manifested out of nowhere to seize him, Fran discovered with no small amount of relief that the strange contrivance didn’t grab him quite so roughly and then proceed in reverse at hyper-drive speed as it had done before, but rather just gently nudged him back in time a mere few hours..…to when he awoke this morning and subsequently lay in bed thinking:
……..damn right, Fran considered himself to be something of an armchair expert on genetics!
That came from his uncommon exposure to pedigree matching when he worked in the dairy industry milking cows years before, first evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of the dam (cow or heifer) to be bred, and then working closely with his herd’s artificial inseminator–in this case older brother Joe Blahnik–in trying to find a satisfactory bull they could breed the cow to that would help offset those obvious physical deficiencies.
In fact, Fran had worked at a small artificial insemination stud–Tri-State Breeders in Westby, Wisconsin–one erstwhile semester when he was attending technical college in Waseca back in the early 1970s. Somewhere along the way he had even learned how to artificially inseminate cattle himself.
Once he started breeding cows on the Blahnik home farm, Fran got even more keenly involved in the selection of the A.B.S. (American Breeding Service) sires he would utilize to improve the quality of the family’s dairy herd. His younger brother Fred—still in secondary school–was also rabidly intrigued by the process, and those two would often sit down and hold long, spirited discussions in the evenings on the strengths and weaknesses of each cow in their herd. The dairy animals’ length, their overall size, their productivity over the course of a lactation, the strength of their hindquarters, their fore and aft udder attachments, their ease in calving, their disposition and relative docility–every aspect of a cow’s body and temperament was thoroughly evaluated and discussed by the pair of Blahnik herdsmen.
A.B.S., for their half of the equation, kept remarkably detailed records for each of their bulls, rating them on all those aforementioned specific categories plus countless more. Therefore when it finally came time to purchase large batches of semen from brother Joe to store in their shiny liquid nitrogen tank adjacent to the milkhouse, Fran and Fred both had a clear understanding of each bull in the A.B.S. stable and what they might rightfully expect it would do to improve the quality of the offspring born to one of the cows in their dairy herd.
Anyway, from that valuable experience Fran Blahnik knew that virtually every imaginable trait which exists among living organisms is, at its very core, inherited and passed along from one generation to the next……and his thoughts then drifted tangentially to mental illness—a condition presumed but not proven to be distinct among the Homo sapiens species. He knew there was some evidence of mental illness in his own family, especially on his Mom’s side, but thank God he had so far been spared the humiliation of contracting this dread, inscrutable affliction.
Or had he……???
Fran stared at his bedroom ceiling and pondered that transcendent question for minutes on end, while a simple algorithm kept tracking back and forth in his brain: Every genetic trait was passed along in some physical fashion, however tiny; there was incontrovertible evidence–albeit not widespread–of mental instability in his own proud Blahnik/Snyder lineage; others in his immediate family kept gently yet vehemently insisting that he personally suffered from some variation of mental illness……yet he knew deep down in his heart that he had somehow been insulated from the possibility of ever inheriting this gene or–more likely–cabal of genes which contributed to the embarrassing mental and emotional anomalies that relentlessly plagued others.
No—–NO, NO, and NOOOOOO!!!!!!..….…the gratingly persistent bastards who shared a last name with him kept pointing a polite but accusatory finger in his direction while at the same time trying to brand him a lunatic and a nut case—if not so much to his face, then surely by whispering nasty, innuendo-laced things about him behind his back whenever they gathered and invariably got around to gossiping amongst themselves akin to a gaggle of lonely, love-starved widows.
But HE wasn’t mentally ill, for Christ’s sake; his mind was as fuckin’ stable and unchanging as the Rock of Gibraltar, just like it’d always been and forever would be in the future too……..HE WAS AS ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE OF THAT FACT AS A DAY IS LONG!!!!!
Yet again……still…….as much as he hated to admit it—–he didn’t have logic serving as his ally on this particular subject…….
Fran shook his head and grunted softly through clenched teeth.
Son of a fuckin’ bitch!!! Jesus Christ Almighty and the Blessed Virgin Mary too, for Godsakes!!!!! GODDAMN IT ALL ALREADY!!!!!!!! Why do things always have to be so fuckin’ complicated and difficult to wrap your arms around?!?! Why can’t life just be simple and stuffed with happiness?!?!?!
Though Fran would have loved more than anything in the world to deny the hideous allegations he knew were floating around behind his back like a toxic cloud and at the same time prove conclusively that the rest of those condescending, smirking assholes were a misinformed pack of liars…….the pieces to this infuriating puzzle weren’t all adding up to his satisfaction……..
What if they had been right all along about his mental instability and he, by definition, then obviously must have been wrong all along and still was???
What iffffffffffffff…….??????????
Fran turned his head and stared out a window at the rising sun. It was radiant and beautiful, as was the brilliant azure sky framing it, as were the magnificent one-hundred-year-old white oak trees dotting his farmstead as they poked majestically toward the heavens outside his bedroom window. There was so much to live for out there, so much to breathe and see and touch and enjoy…….or was there?
And then the issue of mortality, the same issue Fran had been grappling with mightily for the past several weeks, crept into the back of his mind.
He had always enjoyed life…….but he didn’t now. He had always looked forward to each new invigorating sunrise…….but he didn’t now. He had always relished the taste of a refreshing cold beer on a hot summer’s day…….but he didn’t now. He had always savored any opportunities to get together with members of his original family to converse and just share mutual affection……but he didn’t now. He had always assumed he would play a prominent role in helping his three cherished namesake sons grow up some day to become reputable men and noble citizens……..but he had difficulty foreseeing that outcome now. He had always planned on growing old with dignity and self-respect and élan, with allegiant wife Julie forever at his side…….but, try as he might, he couldn’t imagine that happening now. He had always considered the blessing of life itself to be the ultimate expression of love from the Almighty God who had miraculously created him from nothing back in the late 1940s……..but………but………
Fran closed his eyes to block out the annoying bright sun shining through his window; couldn’t a wall of clouds at least form to shield him from that blasted thing’s radiance and fake cheeriness?! He had a new day stretching before him now, an undisputed gift from God–putty in his hands–a small fragile temporal vessel in which to behold and celebrate this unique thing we call consciousness–twenty four brand-spanking-new hours in which to do exactly as he pleased.
Fran thought long and hard about how he would spend his next few precious finite hours on Earth’s surface. He then slowly dragged his body out of bed before tediously beginning the task of getting dressed for the new day sprawled out before him not unlike the offertory gifts at church.
Yeah, just like the offertory gifts presented to God down at St. Ignatius Catholic Church in Spring Valley every Sunday morning.
Immediately prior to Holy Communion…..pay special homage to God by presenting Him with the ultimate offertory sacrifices—the symbolic body and blood of crucified Jesus Christ–on the supreme altar of the church…..every Sunday of every year, without exception…..over and over and over again, just like clockwork.
Tomorrow is Sunday, isn’t it?
A day reserved for offering appreciation for the glorious things in life and for rejoicing and for praising and for sincerely thanking God who in his infinite wisdom and compassion chose to honor a select few human beings with the indescribably generous gift of consciousness.
Fran stopped what he was doing for a second to reflect. What is so indescribably generous about consciousness anyway? He had no say in his creation; why should he then be so obnoxiously grateful to be alive? What exactly makes life so special and inviolate in the first place? Why are some people favored with only happiness while others, through no fault of their own, are condemned to a lifetime of misery? What is the underlying purpose of life if authentic happiness can never be found? What…..why…..what…..why…..WHAT…..WHY…..????
Fran shook his head in despair and tears welled up in the corners of his eyes.
Just one more sunrise out of the multiples of thousands he had already experienced in his forty six year lifetime and Sunday, that traditional temporal shepherd overseeing solemn thanksgivings and offertory dowries and millennials-long worshipping of some pluperfect but unseen deity, will be here before you know it…..
Or will it?
Can it?
Does the sun actually rise if you are not personally present to witness this daily yet eternally transcendent event? Can age-old rituals truly be maintained if you have moved on to another plane of consciousness…..or absence thereof? Will the earthly world go on as before if you no longer own a seat at its banquet table? Is consciousness real or just a cruel hoax? Is happiness a real entity? If happiness truly exists, is it grossly overrated? Does anyone really care about the future when it’s actually little more than a cruel mirage—a repository for dreams that seldom if ever come true? Are you better off being alive or dead? Do dead people still feel emotional torment once consciousness ceases to exist? What constitutes a good life? What constitutes a full life?
The middle-aged man shook his head in frustration while staring blankly in the bedroom mirror at this gaunt, hollow-faced stranger who was in turn staring straight back at him. The guy looked extraordinarily despondent—tragic almost; he bore no resemblance to anyone Fran knew.
Oh well, those are questions for another day and another person, Fran finally decided as he turned away from the mirror and dabbed at his eyes with the heel of his right hand and next began shuffling listlessly toward his kitchen.
For, you see, Francis Edward Blahnik already knew deep down in his heart what the fateful day facing him held in store —this otherwise unremarkable Saturday staking claim to its own two dozen hours well past the midpoint of September 1995 A.D. on the Roman calendar—because, barring a last minute change of heart, he had been meticulously rehearsing in his mind the actions he planned to perform during its afternoon bloc for some time now.
Fran let out a deep sigh and laid his sheet of paper on the empty passenger seat of the car he was sitting in. He next climbed out of the vehicle and gently slammed its door shut behind him. Fran walked to the front of the car, glanced mournfully through bloodshot eyes at the late afternoon sun ritualistically descending to his left, then slowly closed those haunted, sorrowful eyes a final time…..before inhaling one last giant, drawn-out breath as fully and as deeply into the furthest depths of his lungs as human physiology could possibly allow……..
Fred's Soapbox 