One Kind Favor

"One kind favor I ask of you.

One kind favor I ask of you.

One kind favor I ask of you...

Won't you see that my grave is kept clean."

One Kind Favor

Herb brought the single edged razor blade down smoothly and straight down the front of the suit jacket. From the shoulder to the bottom of the jacket, over and over until the garment hung in thin ribbons on the hanger. There were bits of thread and one button lying on the floor of the closet beneath the jacket. He then pushed the hanger over to the side and he began on the next one. Slice, slice, slice. In fifteen minutes he had shredded all three of his suits and his only sport jacket, even though the jacket didn’t fit him any more he wasn’t taking any chances. After the jackets he began on the pants. These he had more of so it took him a lot longer—half an hour—but soon those too were ribbons on hangers. Almost an hour’s work. He sat down on the edge of the bed in order to try to get some of his strength back. He looked out the window and did a mental inventory of his wardrobe just to see if maybe he had missed anything. Outside the dark season was sneaking in on the back of the fall. It was taking the color out of the leaves on the trees by the lake and the dark green summer algae was sinking to the bottom leaving the cold, clear, gray water ready to ice over in a month or so. Herb hated, and loved this season of change. It had always scared him but it also awed him with its beauty and relentlessness.

Rested, he got up and went over to the closet once more. He picked a pair of faded Wrangler jeans off the shelf and took a wine colored fleece sweatshirt off a plastic hanger. He folded each of the garments into quarters and set them on the bed. The jeans had a couple of white threads hanging from the cuffless bottoms of the legs. He made a note to trim the loose threads off and then he went to the dresser where his underwear and socks were kept. Taking one pair of his favorite knit socks and one perfect, clean white pair of jockey shorts he opened the top drawer and looked for his small pair of scissors to trim off the threads of his jeans.

His top drawer was like a museum. He thought of all the men in the world and all the top drawers that they must each have and what kind of junk would be found in each of them. What would Hitler have had in his top drawer? And Martin Luther King? What an idea, thought Herb, a coffee table book with a photo of the top dresser drawers of the most famous men in the world. Perhaps an inventory would accompany the photo. Or a short essay describing the contents, in the words of the owner himself!

Of his own drawer there would be listed:

1. note books, various, journals, sketches, bad poetry

2. knives, various including switchblade found in grandfather-in-laws work shop in Germany, small lock-back bought from John Fallon in 1973 (blade broken and reground twice) etc.

3. a pair of reading glasses—too weak. a pair of Foster Grant black sunglasses—scratched.

4. oak box constructed out of boredom 1982 full of pennies and foreign coins of no value.

5. paycheck stubs from the last year

6. back up computer disks of journals, bad poetry etc

7. keys-untagged and otherwise unidentifiable. Not discardable due to deep uncertainty of future value.

8. dry cell batteries including 4- D cells, 2- C cells. 11- double A’s. 4- triple A’s. and 1- 9-volt.

9. three yarmukas

10. two wristwatches

11. two magnifiers-including 1-10x loupe and 1- 3x in plastic frame

12. political pin-on buttons-various

13. other miscellany

Herb began to mentally sum up the contents in some philosophical context but it was a losing battle. The contents described the disconnected and random matter of his life and that was all. There was no message contained in there. He could only hope that the president of the United States and the other leaders of the nations of the world took more pride in their top drawers and that the contents were more significant.

He could not find the scissors. Instead he took out one of the pocketknives and carefully trimmed the loose threads off the cuff of his jeans. He then took the pants, shirt, underwear, socks and a pair of scuffed tan boat shoes that he had picked up off the floor of the closet, and put them all into a red nylon gym bag. He had found the bag years ago on the job before he began the demolition of a floor of offices in a building on Fifty-second Street. In white letters on the side of the bag it said “ABC Sports”. He had used it as an over night bag on trips he had taken to Canada and Florida and up to the mountains to visit his friend Stuart. It was just his style. Lost. Found. Used to within an inch of its life.

He put the un-zipped bag on the bed and he sat down next to it once more to rest. He was becoming more easily fatigued each day. What was he forgetting to put into the bag?

He had made up his mind as he lay in bed this morning that he would take the time needed today to insure that he would travel through eternity in the manner to which he had all his life become accustomed. He had actually made the decision to do something like this several weeks ago but had not settled on all the details until this morning.

He had collided quite accidentally into the reality of his own life and death. It was when Dan and Shirley and Lou and he were in the City Last month. They had had time to kill before their dinner reservations. Herb had said, “Follow me. I have someplace really fun to go to. We’ll get out of the wind and kill some time.” He refused to tell them where they were going but led them across Fifth Avenue and Broadway to a shop on Twenty-first Street that dealt in costumes and masks and all the things that belong to the Halloween season of witches and ghouls. Fake blood and spider webs. Rubber bats and iron masks with spikes in the eye sockets. Herb stopped short in front of a display of coffins. Rough hemlock boards crudely nailed into the classic coffin shape. People streamed past the display but Herb just stood there, jostled by the crowd, grimly imagining an eternity encased in one of these coffins. He imagined himself dressed by someone else in his best suit and shoes, arms crossed, facing forever, looking up at the rough plank top of a coffin covered with black, black earth. After several minutes Dan came up behind him. “Hey, what cha doing? Come on the girls are bored and it’s almost time for our reservations. You okay?” “Sure. Yeah. Sure.” said Herb but all the way to the restaurant he kept humming a song that would not leave him alone. “One kind favor I ask of you…One kind favor I ask of you…”

They ate like pigs and after went for a subway ride down to The Village where they walked off the meal. Herb felt vague and disconnected as they looked into the lighted storefront windows and walked down shadowy alleyways. At the intersection of Houston and Sullivan streets another song came back to him from his youth and he began to hum it quietly as he walked. “In a pad without heat, down on Sullivan street the last of the hipsters lay a-dyin’. He wore his shades so no one would know whether or not he’d been flyin’.” All the way home that tune ran through his head and he began to wonder what he would wear into eternity. The train full of weekend revelers streaked through the cool fall night towards the suburbs. The last game of the World Series crackled on a tinny transistor radio but before Croton station the Marlins had taken the Yankee crown home to Miami. Disappointed Yankee fans disembarked at Croton and Cortlandt and finally Herb and Lou and Dan and Shirley got out at Peekskill. By that time It was clear to Herb that he could not rest in his grave in a dress suit and a tie. He had to make up his mind what he would wear.

It took a month before it became obvious that he wanted to rest in that coffin in the clothing that he had felt comfortable in all his life. He got out of bed this morning and put his plan into action. When his suits had been shredded and his kit packed with his favorite clothes he sat before a blank piece of paper on his desk top. He wrote:

“These are the clothes

I want to wear

when they lower me into my grave.

No fancy suit

or expensive silk tie

no slick hair do or shave.

I know what you’re thinking

I’m off of my rocker

and I’ve finally gone over the brink

but I’ve thought this thing through

and I hope you will do

what I ask you to do

regardless of what you think.

I love my old jeans

and my scruffy old shoes

and jockey shorts and socks.

just wash my face

and comb my hair

and lower me into my box… and...

‘Bury me in my shades, boys

Bury me in my shades.

Burn my guitar

down in Washington Square,

but bury me in my shades.’”

He folded the paper into quarters and pinned it to the outside of his red gym bag. Before he put it on the floor of his closet (he was sure that it would be found when they went looking for one of his suits to dress him in) he searched through the pile of belongings in his top drawer one more time. When he finally found what he was looking for he placed the pair of thick, black, plastic Foster Grant sunglasses on top of the contents of the bag. He was sure they would never put them on him. He put them in the bag anyway.

Cold, Cold, Cold, Cold Ground

Look out that window

Or step right outside

There is snow as high as your knees.

Wind is whipping the dark north wind and

Winter’s come like a disease.

Some people love it

Some people don’t

I’m one of the latter kind.

I’m here to say “that if winter’s come

Than spring is way behind”.

No tooth paste no propane

No latkas no cocaine

No cruises to Zanzibar

No VW cars

No deodorant bars

No donations to NPR…

I’ll leave all my collections

And all my connections

That paycheck I busted my ass for

My delicate feelings

All my squawking and squealing

When I’m standing in front of the master.

I can do without all the worldly goods

I can weather the eternal storm.

Just one thing I ask

I’m a southern boy

Plant me some place warm.

Somewhere the Trade winds are blowing

Somewhere the sun’s beating down

When my time has come

Bury me not

In the cold cold cold cold ground.

Don’t pack pinochle cards

Or Hershey bars

Where I’m going I won’t need ‘em.

James Joyce’s tomes

Or Wordsworth’s poems

‘Cause there won’t be no light to read ‘em.

Just dress me up warmly

With two pair of socks

When they lay me into the ditch

Long Johns and boots

And flannel lined jeans

From Abercrobe and Fitch.

Somewhere the Trade winds are blowing

Somewhere the sun’s beating down

When my time has come

Bury me not

In the cold cold cold cold ground.

[“Bury Me In My Shades” by the song writing genius—Mr. Shel Silverstein (1930-1999). I hope his eternal soul will not be displeased with my use of his verse nor my own poor rhymes.]

[“See That My Grave Is Kept Clean” adapted and performed by Mr. Bob Dylan (still alive as hell)]

[“Snow” by Jesse Winchester-a quote or two used with admiration and reverence.(I think still alive and mean as hell)]