My old buddy’s heart attack—he swam laps alone in a pool—left him floating face down like William Holden in Sunset Boulevard, only without the bullet holes and sleaze. He’d been self-made, was now self-finished, and would have liked that symmetry. The living map of my world shrank. We’d run out of shared laughter. I stood on a road somewhere, waiting.

At the funeral, the priest said, “We’ll hear a poem by an old friend of the deceased.” His eighty-six-year-old mother stared at me. The poem they waited for, I didn’t know I was supposed to create. I came to the podium slowly. Incidents from my buddy’s life were all I had to work with as I improvised a stanza:

He could walk on his hands for a full city block
and leap over a couch like a fox disappearing,
but his ex-wife claimed he didn’t know how to love 
and blamed it on inappropriate child rearing. 

Mouths hung open as if people were gargling with tennis balls. “Did you hear what that nincompoop said about me?” his mother exclaimed. “That I didn’t know how to nurture. Me, who cooked my son eggs every morning for breakfast, kissed him each night before bed, and smacked him silly whenever he screwed up. That’s love, mister! The problem with my son’s marriage was not him, but that thing over there”—she pointed at his ex — “who doesn’t even know enough not to wear a beige halter top to a funeral!”

His ex shot me a look that said, You had to open this can of worms? I’d forgotten that every eulogy must be of a saint. I quickly improvised a second stanza:

You could trust him with secrets, money and jewels. 
He would tell you the truth and never tried scheming.
I miss the sides of him I knew very well,
and those I never knew that were off somewhere dreaming.

I heard some sobs, stifled my own, and stepped away from the podium. Passing the coffin, I tapped it gently. Nothingness was all we had between us now. I smiled at his mother. She glared back and said, “Wait until you hear the poem I read at your funeral.”

Douglas Collura lives in New York City

My urologist straightened up out of his distracted slouch and got excited. “The procedure that I propose to do to you is the fun part of my job. I’ve performed it as least as many times as, say, I’ve made love to my wife in the last year, and let me tell you, my wife and I, we still have the magic. Do you read me?” he said. “Almost more than I want to,” I said.

“I’ll snake a laser into you, aim and blast that bad boy to smithereens. I never miss. Around NYU Hospital, I’m known as the Wyatt Earp of the bladder,” he said.

“I hope you’ll leave the O.K. Corral intact. I’m not finished with it yet,” I said.

“A sense a humor. Good. In the short run, you’ll need it. In the long run, you’ll be singing my praises in toilets all over the East Village,” he said.

Coming out of the anesthesia in the hospital, I muttered long remembered sonnets, as if I could put myself back together word by word. “Would you like some apple juice and graham crackers?” a nurse said. I thought, what a disgusting combination. Then I remembered: that’s what they used to give me as a snack in kindergarten. My teacher wore her brown hair wrapped up atop her head and skirts that ended above the knee. She had her own name early on, and a married one later. I hadn’t really looked into any blue eyes before. I can still see hers.

I went to the urologist for follow up. He was in a mood. “One of the tragedies of our time is that patients are over informed about the procedures I do. You should hear the questions. One clown asked me if he might be left incontinent,” he said. “That was me!” I said. “Oh. Well, then you know what I’m talking about. I’ve never left anyone incontinent. I repair the human plumbing using tools that Einstein himself would have marveled at. These hands” — he held them up in front of him — “aren’t here. They’re ahead in the future,” he said.

“Shouldn’t you keep them close in case your wife comes looking for the magic?” I said. He ignored that comment.

Halfheartedly, he said, “I can give you something for pain.” My pain bored him. He’d done his job. He peeled off his examination gloves and tracked each toss into a pail across the room.

Douglas Collura lives in New York City

Editor’s Note: I wrote this back in 2016 but nothing’s changed, only gotten worse.

So I’m having drinks with good friends at a new microbrewery…

Wait, is that my niece’s new profile picture? Cute.

Anyway, you were saying how there are so many of these new brewpubs cropping up and…

Dogs on trampolines! So funny. The boxer looks like he just discovered he has four feet. Hysterical.

So these brewpubs are like everywhere. It seems like a new one opens every week. What’s up with that anyway?

Oh, look! Here’s that picture of us at the beach that I posted a year ago today. Great memories.

I’m thinking that this artisanal beer thing has got to level off. There just are not enough beer drinkers to support this many breweries, don’t you think?

Wait, look at this! Who knew you could dice an onion like that? I’ve got to try it.

Now if there was a bar that specialized in margaritas….that I would definitely go to, wouldn’t you?

This is hysterical….a picture from my high school class. I don’t even want to know what they look like now.

But where was I? Margaritas, yes. Imagine a bar that only serves different kinds of margaritas. And maybe mezcal tastings too. That would be great.

Hey! Is this Vladimir Putin riding a tricycle bare chested? That’s very cool Photoshop work.

Have you ever had mezcal? I read that it could be the next big thing. Bigger than tequila. Only there may not be enough to go around. They make it in really small batches.

Ha! This cat is afraid of seeing its reflection in the mirror. Funny!

Maybe we should just go to Mexico, you know, go to the source and get some mezcal before they ship it to the states.

Huh? I don’t get these Yoko Ono quotes, do you? They go right over my head.

I hear that Oaxaca is one of the best places to go to try these small batch mezcals.

Listen to this! Do you believe this kid is seven years old and he can play the drums like that. Unbelievable!

Well it was great seeing you again. Think about the Mexico mezcal trip. It could be a lot of fun.

OMG! Look at these tacos!

According to a 2015 Nielsen survey, 52 percent of Baby Boomers (ages 50-63) and 42% of Silent Generation (ages 65+) respondents say they use technology during mealtime.

Jay Harrison is a writer and creative consultant for DesignConcept. You can also visit his author page here. His newest mystery novel, Rio Puerco Demise is available on Amazon. His first mystery novel, Head Above Water, is also available on Amazon. But that’s not all. You can also purchase the Best of BoomSpeak on Amazon.

First Dream: I’m back in the COO’s weekly meeting, taking the minutes and fading over my laptop (meetings put me to sleep even when I am asleep). Keys blur. Words crash into each other. I bite my lip to stay conscious, tilt over the side of my chair, and balance on one ass cheek.

The COO stands behind me, reading my screen, glowering. He says, “These minutes are supposed to be the sacred road map of our decision making. Look at that sentence. What I said was ‘I’m talking about a flagrant breach of etiquette.’ What you typed is ‘I’m walking along my favorite beach in Connecticut.’ Not only have you obliterated my meaning, but you’ve put me in swim trunks in Connecticut!”

“It’s a first draft. I’ll hone it,” I say.

The COO has discovered my secret: I don’t want to be in charge of words; I want them in charge of me. I’m useless to him now. I wake up, relieved to remember that I’ve already escaped.

The dream leaves me groggy. At the gym, I swim my laps. As I get out of the pool, the young woman sharing my swim lane says, “You swim pretty quick for a—” and catches herself. In the locker room, men in their eighties and nineties stagger around naked as if both proud and stunned to still be around. I admire them, although they remind me of how lucky I am not to be able to see my own ass.

Second Dream: I sit before the Head of HR. “The guard says you’ve been harassing him. Remember: HR stands for Hit and Run, and I can take you out in a heartbeat,” she says.

“All I say to the guard each morning is ‘How’s it going?’ Monday, he answers, ‘It’s Monday, that’s how’; Tuesday, ‘It’s going’; Wednesday, ‘Halfway there’; Thursday, ‘One more day’; Friday, ‘I made it.’”

“In other words, you’re murdering him, which is against company policy,” she says.

She is not a friend. I have to go. I wake up and ask myself, why are my dreams out to get me?

Douglas Collura lives in New York City