That Mystery Floating Alongside

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  “The side of the ship made an opaque belt of shadow on the darkling glassy shimmer of the sea. But I saw at once something elongated and pale floating very close to the ladder. Before I could form a guess a faint flash of phosphorescent light, which seemed to issue suddenly from the naked body of a man, flickered in the sleeping water with the elusive, silent play of summer lightning in a night sky. With a gasp I saw revealed to my stare a pair of feet, the long legs, a broad livid back immersed right up to the neck in a greenish cadaverous glow. One hand, awash, clutched the bottom rung of the ladder. He was complete but for the head. A headless corpse! The cigar dropped out of my gaping mouth with a tiny plop and a short hiss quite audible in the absolute stillness of all things under heaven. At that I suppose he raised up his face, a dimly pale oval in the shadow of the ship’s side. But even then I could only barely make out down there the shape of his black-haired head. Howev...

These Dreams

 What goes on behind closed eyes? Whatever it is, it’s strange. Dreams are places you live another life. For example, at that place between asleep and awake, there is a sudden flash of understanding, then it’s gone. That place is called Never-never Land. Some people remember their dreams, few are inspired by them. But dreams are not relegated to sleep except by common usage. Dreams are synonymous with thoughts, ideas. I can’t say I’ve fallen out of bed inspired to do much except check the plumbing, but I’ve had ideas. 

Once, while still in my single digits, I made a Monster-Kicker. The idea came to me after unwelcome monsters that snuck through my door while I slept. Necessity is the mother of invention, after all. A boot mounted to the end of a stick was affixed on a hinge. The contraption activated by a pulled string tied to the doorknob. When the door opened, the intruder would be subsequently booted back into the hallway. Well, that’s how it was supposed to work, anyway.


One dream I’ve had was to write a book. I can’t think of how many pages I’ve written over the last 35 + years, but I’ve filled entire volumes with handwritten material (the pic is only a sampling of six years—other journals are in storage or lost). While nothing is intended for publishing, I’ve written a pile of books. I can somewhat relate to Benjamin Franklin, who while writing his autobiography, often failed to remember if he’d written this or that because he was not near his personal library at the time to check. And he was no slouch when it came to making his ideas come to fruition.




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