My Date with the Snow Queen

(Imagine an image of the Snow Queen here: a beautiful, serious woman with blonde hair, ivory skin, a white robe, and eyes that glint like diamonds. I couldn't upload the drawing.)
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We were in The Club, the only gay bar in town. The sexual tension between us was still hotter than a firecracker, but our incompatibility was becoming obvious.

Outdoors, the wind howled and the ground was covered with three feet of packed snow on the footpaths where sidewalks would emerge during the spring melt. It was the 1980s, when Canada still lived up to its image as the home of winter.

She looked Mediterranean. The love of her life had been a girl of Italian descent who had taken her to Italy on a marvelous family visit. “Connie” loved to reminisce about the wine, the sunshine, the family she wanted to join. She had thrown her relationship away by picking someone up at The Club, telling her girlfriend, and not forgiving herself. The girlfriend had married a male co-worker, but Connie still spent as much time as possible in their house, changing lightbulbs and fixing whatever didn’t work, usually when the husband wasn’t home. Connie also continued passing for Italian, playing the accordion (“Santa Lucia,” “O Sole Mio”) whenever she was asked.

Connie had been adopted as a baby. She didn’t want to admit that she was – as she herself put it – a “fuckin Indian.” She tried to make up for her imagined defects and real secrets by being as butch as possible. She had been banned from The Club for six months for fighting.

She usually lost at pool, but this didn’t stop her from accepting every challenge. She leaned across the green felt as though she could control all the balls with her mind.

I drifted out of the pool room, knowing where I didn’t belong. Connie had said she wanted to help me raise my little girl, who was currently spending the night with her grandparents. My little brown angel, the one good thing that came out of my marriage to a Nigerian.

Connie told other people that she wasn’t comfortable around children, not being the motherly type.

Even in the dim light of the bar, I could see Laurel, a red-haired warrior queen of the local Left. She was past president of the organization that lobbied relentlessly against uranium mining, despite its appeal to the government as a cash cow. Luckily, Laurel was alone, and she was always willing to talk. I asked her what was new, and settled in for a sermon.

Connie came looking for me as soon as she lost at pool. Her eyes were red, and barely-visible sparks seemed to shoot out of her aura. She hovered outside my conversation with Laurel like a visible threat. The more I tried to draw Connie in, the more sarcastically she pointed out that some people are full of shit. Laurel looked uncomfortable.

I drew Connie away. I was shocked to see tears spilling out of her eyes and down her face. She told me I might as well be with Laurel, since we were both Fancy Educated Women who were full of shit. “You have to stop putting me down!” she told me. She didn’t care who heard. She was drunk, pickled in beer and grief. Lightning bolts from her eyes showed me how much she hated everything she thought I stood for.
“I’m going home,” I told her. The Club felt too small to contain both of us.

“You can’t go out there!” she called after me. “It’s after midnight and it’s forty below.”

“Watch me,” I answered. I had no driver’s license or cash for a taxi. There were no bank machines in our town at that time. My apartment in the single-parent co-op was about two miles away.

What I was doing was suicidal, but I felt as if I had no choice.

Just as I had hoped when I barged out the door, my rage kept me warm enough for the first block, even while I wondered why no one had seriously tried to stop me from stepping out into air that felt brittle enough to shatter.

By the third block, I had to slow down. Breathing air into my lungs was painful, yet I had to take deep breaths to get enough oxygen to keep going. I settled into a rhythm of shallow-breath, shallow-breath and inhale-two-three-four. It was like the rhythm I used to breathe and push down when I was giving birth.

I was walking down a street near the centre of town, yet I might as well have been on the deserted prairie. The night was dark as hell and as cold as outer space. No one drove by. (Would I have begged for space in a stranger’s car?) All decent people seemed to be asleep in their warm beds.

Inside fur-lined mittens, my hands turned numb, then thawed, making me aware that I still had nerve-endings. Damn, it was cold. The sound of my boots on snow was hypnotic.

I was passing the large park that took up much of the south end of town. Sleep and warmth were trying to seduce me, and the snow banks looked like rumpled sheets in a big, welcoming bed. The wind had died down, or so it seemed. I could just curl up in the snow and take a nap.

I remembered the Snow Queen of Hans Christian Anderson. I could feel her all around me.

I gradually understood what was happening: hypothermia, the first phase of freezing to death. Part of me thought that was an excellent goal. My parents would raise my child. It wasn’t as if I played a necessary role in the universe.

And then my common sense kicked in. My child would be an orphan, and she would probably blame herself. In any case, my sudden absence was almost guaranteed to mess up her life. And I knew so many people with messed-up lives, usually because of something that happened to them in childhood.

It was past 2:00 a.m., but I would have to pound on the door of the nearest house and ask (with frozen lips!) for medical help. It was the only thing to do. If I could keep walking to the nearest house.

A car pulled up beside me, and a young man with a concerned face asked if I needed a ride. I remembered all the warnings I had been given, starting at puberty. Don’t accept rides from strange men!

Or what? I asked the parental voices in my head. Or I might suffer a Fate Worse Than Death? Really? I was tempted to laugh, but my face-muscles were locked in place.
I accepted the rescue. The warmth in the car felt like love, and it entranced me as we rolled quietly over the snow-covered street. Somehow, I managed to let the Good Samaritan know where I lived. And all he wanted was a chance to save someone who needed it.

I stumbled into my apartment, knowing the thawing-out would be worse than the freezing-up. I knew I would see my daughter the next day, and for many days to come. I would see Connie again, and we would both have to make some decisions. For better or worse, it wasn’t my time to go.
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Pack Nothing

LaFourche Parish, Louisiana 1981

It doesn’t feel right, the pickup truck coming down the road in my direction. It’s not doing anything wrong. The cloud of road dust behind it. The guy with the baseball hat in the passenger seat with his arm out the window. The driver looking at me and slowing down. I’m already wondering what’s the right way to play this. Look straight ahead. Keep it on the low down. Look at the road, look at the trees, look at the levee. Just keep walking to the next house.

The fund raising team captain dropped me off here a couple of hours ago. He won’t be back until long after dark. I’m getting low on brandy snifter candles which is what I’ve been selling or offering for donations for my church. There are certain vocations that give you the opportunity to talk to people you normally wouldn’t get to meet. A writer researching a book. An investigative reporter or a detective. Or in my case, a member of a Mobile Fundraising Team for my church, some would say a cult. Whatever it is, its mine and I’m here now.

The truck is slowing down and my spidey sense doesn’t like it. Not at all.

It’s almost night. The sun is delicately dying, the sky changing to sapphire flame giving the levee banks a muted monastic beauty. The air turns to smoke blue space and a shroud of silence covers everything except the tree frogs who have begun to sing. This is country dark and there aren’t any street lamps out here.

The truck stops in front of me, waiting, and I guess I can’t walk past it.

The pickup truck is this orange and white Ford with a gun rack on the rear window which is as standard as a spare tire around these parts. There are two rifles in the gun rack. The guy on the passenger side is definitely looking at me and chewing something. He has a mustache and his hair sticks out on all sides under the cap which says “Paddock Lounge” and has a green clover leaf. He smiles and waves. Hey, boy. A head comes around from the tail area in the back and looks to see why they’re stopping. Three guys. I wonder if this is how a black man feels walking around here alone.

“Need a ride?” says Mustache, smiling friendly.

“Naw, I’m good thanks,”

“You sellin’ them?”

“It’s for my church,” I say in a big voice, toughing it out. I give him my best big shit eating grin and grab a green candle, the least appealing in the box. It’s supposed to smell like Bayberry, whatever that is, but comes out more like Pine Sol. I step right up to the side door and look him in the eye. Thank God I’m chewing gum. Chewing gum is like a lightning rod for nerves, and meeting strangers makes me nervous and it’s all I do every day. Chewing gum hides the nervous tick playing around the middle of my lips right now. I snap my gum loud and he chews whatever he’s got and together we’re just grinning away, perky as rats in liverwurst. I hold the candle under his nose.

“Shit, that’s one nice candle, kid,” he says and take its gently from my hand and shows it to the driver. “Ain’t that a fucker of a candle?”

The driver recoils from it and waves. I silently agree, the Bayberry’s aren’t that great. “Get the fuck away from me,” he says

“Hey,” says Mustache. “I get my old lady one, think she’ll suck my dick?”

I try to laugh. “You’ll just have to find out. But we don’t give refunds on that.”

“She don’t like candles. What you sellin’ candles for anyway?”

“Helping my church.”

“Ain’t you supposed to be selling Bibles or cookies maybe?”

“I like cookies, me.” says the guy in the back.

“Sorry buddy, no cookies. Ever eat a candle? Little hot sauce, they’re great.”

That gets a big laugh all around. Maybe it’s okay.

“You got change for a . . . fifty?”

“Naw,” I say, trying to get my voice just right and failing like a rich Yankee politician trying to win white trash votes. “It’s been bad. Nobody likes candles around here. Guess the Baptists got here first selling Bibles.”

Another good laugh. Hell, I’m a riot.

“Fuck this,” says the guy in the back. “Let’s go.”

Mustache hands the candle back. “Sorry, kid. Come back with some cookies.”

I feel relieved he didn’t just drive off with it. I drop it back in the box. He holds out his hand for me to shake.

I don’t know what to do. Guys get dragged this way. I slap his palm, sort of shake thumbs quick and take my hand back but he doesn’t seem to be up to anything. He’s looking at me, but the smile’s gone.

The truck goes back into gear and sprays a little gravel, pulling away. I hear it leaving. I want to look back over my shoulder, but I don’t want to look scared.

I walk a little ways and I don’t hear the truck. I kneel down and pretend to tie my shoe.

Down the road the truck is turning around. The rear window reflects against the sunset and I can see through it. The rifles aren’t on the gun rack.

If this were a movie this is the moment some poor sucker would run down the middle of a well paved road trying to out run a truck while carrying a load of candles. I know better. I run like hell for the trees.

The mosquitoes whine in my ear and now even nature is after me. I toss the box of clattering glass candles overboard in some bushes near the road. I feel a funny pang of guilt as though I were abandoning my duty to God, like a soldier throwing down his gun on a battlefield and running away. When the van comes around we can come back and look for them, but right now I need to travel light.

The truck has stopped and I hear them whooping back there. A flashlight beam is spanning the trees and I hop through the bushes trying not to make too much noise. But these guys are coming.

Far away I can see it, a house or a building or something with lights on. People. Witnesses. But there’s a dark wide stretch of fallow field between me and there.

I stay close to the tree line to prevent showing a profile. The light is almost gone and I can’t see my feet down below anymore. If I stay in the woods, running blind I’ll twist an ankle or run my face into a tree and I’ll be dead meat.

“Hey little buddy! Gimme me a fucking candle!”

I start running on ground I can’t see, fall on my face and jump up fast. They track my noise and I hear the sounds closing in. We’re all navigating by radar in the country dark. Those lights way over there are all I’ve got going. Maybe these guys live there, what do I know right now. It’s insane to realize that somewhere kids are doing homework and grownups are washing dishes.

I can hear them thrashing around on all sides of me, trying to flank me. I don’t think they can see me, they just know where I am. I take aim at the house lights and launch myself across the field and feel my feet sinking and squishing in the wet ground. The mud grabs my shoe and yanks it off me and my sock sticks in the gunk. It’s like running in a dream where you never get anywhere. I drop down on my face, press down flat on the ground and wait.

One of the guys is coming up beside me. I can’t see much of anything now, but neither can he. The moon comes out from behind a cloud and he’s standing in the moonlight about the length of a dining room table away from me. I hold my breath. As he turns I can see the shadow of it on his belt. A leather sheath. A deer hunting knife. What folks here call an “Arkansas toothpick.”

A mosquito whines in my ear and I feel the sting of it on my neck. I can’t slap. I don’t even dare shake my head. I have to take it. Another on my arm. Sonuvabitch. I have to take it. My nose is pressed against a thistle.

He moves his feet. He turns his head. He’s looking right at me.


Joy is usually thought of as a kind of intensified happiness. But in theology “Joy” is defined specifically as the relationship that exists between a person and God. It’s the presence of God, the confidence that you and God have a bond of love between you. If you pursue God, the image you have of that God is everything, for all Gods are idols in the end. But an idol has power. In the life of Joy, our every moment is bound to our image of God, walking with God, chatting and sleeping with God like a lover and unfailing companion. If your God is a God of love, the heart swells and blooms. Your God will give you wings and show you the beauty of other people. If your companion is a God of fear, that possessive God will clip your wings. Such people live in a world constantly swatting away demons and living for an afterlife of reward shared with no one. Such a person will never be at home anywhere, having forsaken this world and will always be in a state of exile.

The historical Jesus would not recognize himself as he’s presented by preachers today. He’s the fodder of politicians and every imaginable agenda. What gun would Jesus buy? Who would he vote for? The Jesus of the bible told his followers to just go, to pack nothing. Give all you own away and live as the lilies of the field and dwell with all your heart on Joy, on the love of God, to step away from the known and predictable and throw yourself boldly into the unknown. This is the ultimate spiritual alchemy that transforms the heavy iron chains of reality into the gold of that interior world of the resurrection where Man can still walk in the Garden with God. If you have the privilege of living in that interior, movable, mutable Garden, like Adam, or as I once did, you will never be healed of it when you cast yourself out to wear the chains of realism again. This is the secret compulsion behind the making of fiction and poetry and myth. All myths are ultimately our myths. It’s why the myth of Jesus’ resurrection resonates through the ages and inspires the best and worst in Mankind. It gives us the power to bend reality.


I lie in the mud with my God and I’m not afraid anymore. I throb with Joy. I am thrilled by Joy. He casts the shadow of His hand over me and the man turns away, unseeing. I wait a long time listening, following the direction of their voices. They’re looking in the trees. I get up slow, put my shoe on and slink away across the field and into the weeds.

I hop over a barb wire fence, get my balance and run up to that building with the lights. As I get close I can hear it, a rocking gospel choir, the people inside are having a prayer meeting. I put my hand on the knob and turn. The door opens and I’m flooded with light and the weight of human warmth and voices.

As I come down the aisle clods of top soil drop off my clothes to the carpet. Every eye turns to look and the music staggers to a stop. The preacher I guess, a man in a maroon seersucker suit says “May we help you, sir?” They know I’m not coming down the aisle to be saved, not by the likes of them. Though I surely have been. These are all black people.

“Yeah,” I say. “Um. May I use your phone, please?”



C. Sanchez-Garcia

Rip Tide

By Kathleen Bradean

A wave, translucent and gray, stippled with foam, curled above my head. I ducked and went through it. With my back to the beach, I could pretend that I was alone in the world, if I ignored the white triangular sails of sailboats or the deep gray hulls of tankers lurking off the coast.

When I finally tired of swimming, I looked back at the beach. The blue lifeguard hut was tiny and people were small blobs of color and motion. I hadn't planned to swim out that far. I didn't think I had.

That was my first inkling that something wasn't right.

So I headed back to the beach with my less-than-perfect Australian crawl. My swimming instructors always mentioned my lazy left arm, how I never got the most out of a stroke, how it made me drift in lane so I wasted energy correcting my line rather than on forward motion. I didn't care that much. I wasn't built for speed and would never be on a swim team. Besides, I was aiming for the edge of an entire continent now. Accuracy wasn't an issue.

When my arms got tired, I treaded water. It didn't worry me since I'd been swimming for a while and I wasn't in the best shape for a twelve-year old. I could tread water forever in a swimming pool, but in the ocean, it takes a lot more energy. When you get tired, you can't float on your back because waves crash over your face and water surges up your nose. So I figured my energy was better used moving toward shore rather than holding in place and I began swimming again.

My crawl might not have been perfect form, but I never lifted my head to spot the beach. It was right in front of me. Or so I thought. When my arms got rubbery-numb again, I paused to tread water again.

That's when the fear hit me. I was further away from shore than before. It wasn't that I'd headed out for sea by mistake. No. I was still facing shore. I was just really far from it.

A couple years before, at science camp (yes, geek girl) I studied oceanography. During the unit on currents and tides, we discussed something called a riptide. The instructor drew pictures, showing how the water returning from the shore caused a current that could quickly drag you out to sea. And he told us to swim parallel to the beach if we ever found ourselves caught in one since they usually weren't that wide.

Yes, I was deeply worried, but I knew what was happening and how to deal with it, so I didn't panic. I turned and started swimming parallel to the sand.

Now I was lifting my head every four strokes to check my progress. I kept my eye on a cliff at the curve of a beach. I was still getting pushed further out the sea. My arms felt like rubbery, useless things now, so I tried to make my legs take up the slack. Then they got tired. Treading water wasn't an option, so I had to keep on. At some point, utterly worn out, I realized that I was still headed true to the cliffs and not moving further from shore. I'd fought my way out of the current. Now all I had to do was get back to shore.

I didn't think I could. I was past my endurance. At that point, death looked like the easy option. That's when I decided to get truly scared, like down to the dusty basement of my soul. And that's when I realized I had no faith. But that's another story. In this story, that's when I resigned myself to swimming for shore one tortured, half-assed, weak stroke at a time. I had all eternity to get there. The rest of my life.

The breath stroke doesn’t work in the ocean. The waves toss you around too much. So no matter what, you have to try a power stroke. And even though near the beach the water is half churned-up sand, you have to keep your eyes open and let the salt water sting them. And even when you've breathed in almost as much water as air, you have to keep drawing into your searing lungs because that's what will keep you afloat. Stroke. Pause. Stroke. Pause. Like you're climbing Everest. The entire world narrows down to the next stroke.

And wouldn't it be lovely if I would just drop dead right this instant?

Stroke. Pause.

I'm not that lucky.

Stroke. Pause.

A long time later, a gravelly-voiced man shouted "Hey! Are you okay?"

A wave trough opened between us. From their haircuts, I knew they were military. On the speaker's shoulder, a fuzzy old greenish tattoo gave him away as a marine. I chuckled to my half-delirious self. Of course he had to be a marine.

He swam over to me from his friends, lifting muscular arms out of the water in flawless crawl form. He probably would have bit a shark if one were foolish enough to attack him, but one close-up look at my face, and his face blanched white under the tanned crinkles around his eyes and gray and black beard stubble. Great. Twelve-year old girl scares the crap out of a hardened marine.

"Rip tide," I told him. It was all I could say.

"She says it's a rip tide," he shouted to his friends.

He hugged me to his massive chest, which is no way to save someone from drowning. He'd once been a prime physical specimen, but now his chest hair was turning gray and his skin had that crepe-paper look. Still, the warmth of his body felt good and he had strength to spare for me.

"The lifeguard hasn't raised the flag," someone said.

"The lifeguard has been hitting on that girl for the past hour."

And they realized that they, too were being pulled out to sea, but we were in shallower water, and he was tall, so he was able to fight his way step by step to shore, with me in his arms. His friends splashed ahead of us. By the time we waded out of the surf, we were both too spent to talk. I had been shifted into the more classic damsel in distress pose, draped over his arms and across his chest.

The lifeguard looked up as his friends charged the hut, shouting and pointing out to sea. He looked over their heads at the water and jumped to his feet.

"Riptide! Everyone out of the water!"

My marine and I burst out laughing. We laughed so hard that tears trickled down our cheeks. And slowly, oh so slowly, he let my feet touch the sand, but he didn't completely let go of me for a long, long time.

Lost in the Urabamba

By Lisabet Sarai

We went to Peru because, that winter, there was no snow in Austria. That fact scuttled our original vacation plans for a ski holiday. Hustling to find an alternative (I'd already secured time off from my job), we found a relatively cheap package tour to Lima. We'd had positive experiences traveling with this tour company to Jamaica. They provided airfare and lodging at a ridiculously low cost, then made their money on extras. In Jamaica it had been easy to use the hotel as a base for exploring on our own. We found out a bit late that Peru was a different sort of place altogether.

It was the early eighties, and quite frankly, the country was a mess. Vicious bands of Shining Path guerrillas made overland transit perilous. Strikes and civil unrest occurred on an almost daily basis. At Lima Airport, we waited three hours for our luggage because the baggage handlers had stopped work. Rolling electricity outages afflicted the city of Lima, many regions of which we were advised to avoid due to the danger of being mugged or worse. Aside from the amazing gold museum, there wasn't much to see in Peruvian capital. In any case, we had loftier goals: Cusco and Machu Picchu.

The only practical way to Cusco was by air, and that turned out to be almost as expensive as our flight from the U.S. Nevertheless, we decided to bite the bullet and bought non-refundable round trip tickets to the old Incan capital nestled in the Andes.

Arriving in Cusco, we were informed that the narrow gauge railroad to Machu Picchu had been out of service for three weeks, due to a combination of rainy season mudslides and another strike. Apparently the strike had been settled, but it still wasn't clear whether the trains were running. We were devastated. Cusco was an astonishing place in its own right, but to come all that way and not get to see the fabled Incan terraces and the Temple of the Sun...!

Two days before we were scheduled to return to Lima, our guide told us we could catch the Machu Picchu train the following morning. We were up at six AM (a real sacrifice for my husband!) and on the train by seven. By ten AM we still hadn't left; there were new landslides blocking the tracks, we learned, that had to be cleared. When the train finally crawled out of the station, we cheered – but prematurely, as we were halted by a slide after an hour. Bulldozers were mustered, mud was cleared, the train proceeded for an hour or two, before our way was blocked once again.

Normally the trip from Cusco to the base of Huayna Picchu (only fifty miles!) takes about four hours. In our case, we didn't arrive until after four in the afternoon. The heart-stopping bus ride up the steep mountain flank, along the Hiram Bingham Highway, required another half hour. And the ruins closed at five thirty.

So we had less than an hour to explore one of the great wonders of the world. It was worth the journey, but way too short. Some members of the tour planned to stay over at the mountain-peak guest house, but our plane back to Lima left the next morning and we were worried about losing our money. In addition, my husband was showing signs of the flu. We climbed back into the bus, trundled down the side of the cliff and onto the train, and – waited.

The locomotive finally inched forward, into the inky darkness. We hadn't eaten. My husband's forehead felt hot enough to fry an egg. Although we were both exhausted, the hard wooden benches on the train were not really conducive to sleeping. I remember that trip as a kind of endless hell – creeping along the tracks that clung to the mountain side, the rain-swelled Urabamba River audible even though it was seventy feet below us. We'd stop for obstacles, wait, move, stop... My husband was hallucinating. I could have believed it was all a dream myself if I hadn't been so physically uncomfortable.

I finally must have drifted off into some kind of slumber, when an awful roar yanked me awake. The train lurched to a stop, throwing us to the sticky floor. It sounded as a building was collapsing around us.

The terrible racket finally stopped. Echoes of the tumult died away. Along with some of the other passengers, I stepped off the train to check out the situation.

A massive wall of steaming mud blocked the tracks, less than ten feet in front of the locomotive. Trees poked out of the muck at weird angles. Boulders twice as large as the stones of the Incan temples lay scattered on the narrow shelf the builders of the railroad had cut into the mountain side. As I stared in disbelief at the debris, a few more clods and pebbles clattered down from the heights on the right. Far below us, at the bottom of the cliff on the left, the rapids of the Urabamba seethed and boiled.

The railroad crew hurried us back into the train. I was in shock. If the slope had given way thirty seconds later, the train would have been buried. We might well have been swept off the track into the river coiling below.

My husband had fallen into an uneasy sleep, moaning and tossing on the unforgiving seats. As for me, I didn't close my eyes. I heard the grunt of the earth moving equipment they somehow managed to convey from further up the route, the shouts of the workmen, the background mutter of the swollen river. I was awake when the train nudged forward, rocking on its earth-dented tracks. I kept watch on my beloved, giving him water, praying his fever would break. I stared out the open window into the black night, not quite sure we'd really survived.

I watched dawn turn the terra-cotta roofs of Cusco from gray to red as we crawled down, back into the valley. We could have died. With a smidge less luck, we might have been lost in the Urabamba.

As the sun rose over the ancient city of the Incas, I found it hard to believe. I still do. Maybe the old gods were protecting us. Or maybe, that time at least, we were just lucky.

A MODERN FAIRY TALE

Once upon a time there was a family: a Papa Bear and a Mama Bear, who lived frugally with their 4 cubs in a modest home. Papa Bear had always worked and Mama Bear, from the time the youngest cub was 2, worked 2 part-time jobs in addition to taking care of the cubs and baking and cooking meals from scratch. Mama Bear bought all of the cubs' clothes and toys at resale shops and the only vacations they took were occasional weekend camping trips, along with a 1 or 2 week camping trip in the summer, when Papa Bear could get away from his job.

When the cubs got older Mama Bear got recertified to teach because she had done such a great job with her 4 cubs that they were all college-bound, erudite and well-spoken bears that she and Papa Bear were extremely proud of having raised. She reasoned that since she loved to teach teenagers, an age group that few seem to enjoy interacting with, that she could devote the rest of her life to teaching other cubs how to express themselves in an intelligent manner. Boy, was she wrong! The students she subbed for loved her, responding to her respect for them; the powers-that-be, not so much. After many years of filling out applications, all of which had multiple essay questions to answer, she became despondent when her words seemed to disappear into a black hole and interviews rarely happened; the only teachers who got hired had degrees so new the ink hadn't dried yet.

Meanwhile, the cubs were all in college and the only way Papa Bear and Mama Bear could help them out was by taking out a second mortgage on their family home, in addition to taking out parental student loans. Papa Bear continued to work long hours and Mama Bear added a third part-time job in order for them to pay all of their mounting bills; she even stopped dying her fur to same money, and tried to be proud of her silver and gray colors, telling herself she had earned them. Even their vacations shrank down from two weeks in the summer to just one week of camping, and the weekends to de-stress became fewer and farther between.

One day Papa Bear came home early with a cat-that-swallowed-the-canary grin on his face. Mama Bear was concerned that he had become unhinged after losing his job. Instead in a voice choking with excitement, he told her he had bought a lottery ticket on a whim, and had won ten million dollars! Mama Bear burst into tears that he would try to play such a cruel joke on her. But it was true! They had more money than either of them had ever expected to have! They called all of the cubs, leaving messages for them, and Mama Bear called her night job and said she was too ill to come to work that night. Because the real truth was that she was sick and tired of people treating her like a servant, expecting her to put up with their abuse so they could feel better about themselves, when all she was being paid to do was to sell them stuff.

Papa Bear and Mama Bear went out to dinner then talked long into the night about what changes to make in their lives. They called a friend whose cub Mama Bear used to do daycare for, and got investment advice. They resolved to pay off both of their mortgages and sell the family home, since only two of the cubs were still living there, and both were old enough to move out. They paid off all of their credit cards and repaid all of the student loans they and the cubs had already incurred. They bought a piece of land up in the north woods of Wisconsin near a lake, and moved into the small home that had a big enough garage for their 2 trucks and Papa Bear's canoe, as well as the boat he planned to buy.

Papa Bear and Mama Bear quit all of their jobs and moved up north. Papa Bear enrolled in a local college to get the degree he had never been able to afford to get earlier in his life. Mama Bear spent long hours at her laptop, producing novels of romance and sci-fi. Her sales reflected the number of books she was publishing as well as the time she spent promoting them. She still dreamed of one day becoming a best-selling author, but at least she no longer had quarters where her sales were so paltry that it wasn't worth it for the publisher to even cut her a check.

The cubs all graduated from their colleges and got jobs and apartments, to begin their adult lives secure in the knowledge that if they needed help, Papa Bear and Mama Bear had the resources to do so. Papa Bear discovered he had a flair for nature photography and began to sell his pictures to various magazines and e-zines.

And when all of the cubs came to visit for holidays, Papa Bear and Mama Bear would sit in the midst of the chaos of family that their love for each other had created, and smile private smiles to each other, knowing that they no longer had to fear dying at work, apart from each other, from the sheer exhaustion of trying to pay all of their bills.

And they all lived happily-ever-after.

The End.

Money Changes Everything?

We used to play the lottery when we first got married. Our combined income was about a third (maybe a quarter) of what it is now, and yet we found a few dollars to play the lottery. I've noticed it seems to be that way with games of chance-- those who have the least will spend their money in the hopes of winning more. And those who could afford to spend $5 or $10 or even $50 on lottery tickets don't play at all.

I hadn't played the lottery in years until this past week when the Mega Millions (is that what it's called?) was all anyone was talking about. So we stopped by a convenience store on our way home from date night (something we do weekly to the tune of $100, including babysitter) and spent $5 on lottery tickets.

We didn't win. Five sets of numbers and only two of the lottery numbers came up on two different tickets. I wasn't disappointed, didn't even blink. Actually, I forgot to even check the numbers the night of the drawing-- I pulled them from someone's post on Facebook. It was a waste of five dollars, really, and yet we gave into the excitement. The greed? No, because I'm not greedy that way. If I were... well, I wouldn't be a writer if money meant anything to me.

I didn't spend much time fantasizing about how I'd spend the money if I won some crazy sum. Not much would change, just as not much has changed in the twenty-two years since we were making 1/3 or 1/4 of what we make now. I've driven the same car for 20 years, I shop at the same clothing stores, I wear very little jewelry. Vast riches wouldn't suddenly make me a fashion plate, though my husband would most certainly insist I buy a new car. One that doesn't have a leaky roof, at least.

We go out to eat more-- or we did, before two babies entered our lives. Now it's once a week on date night, once every couple of weeks with the kids. That's a lot, compared to the early years when we might have gone out to eat once a month. I can't imagine we'd suddenly eat out every night if we won the lottery. That would grow tiresome, even if we hired a babysitter every night. Which I wouldn't because I like being home with my babies. Maybe a chef? But probably not that, either. I'm not keen on strangers in my house.

Maybe we'd travel more if we had a lot of money-- though with really little children, that also seems unlikely. At least for awhile. Bigger house? Probably not. Someone would have to clean it and, as I said, I'm not one to have strangers in my house. I can't imagine having a staff of people at my beck and call. It would make me uncomfortable.

I'd keep writing, of course. I'll never not write. But I love my computer, I love where I work (the nearby Starbucks), I love what I do. I love my life, mostly. Wealth wouldn't change much for me. Like Lisabet, I'd give away a lot of it. But first I'd pay off the kids' college funds that we've started for them and put money in the bank for them to be secure-- as secure as money can buy. I'd pay off our debts, put more in the retirement fund. Start college funds, build children's playgrounds, create grants for writers, buy a plot of land somewhere and start a writers' retreat. Stuff like that. I'd probably end up being a very eccentric philanthropist, giving piles of cash away like some dotty old grandmother doling out strawberry candies. Sounds like fun, actually.

I'm lucky and I know it. I'm lucky that my life is comfortable. That, even if I have bills and credit card debt, I have a nice house in a middle class neighborhood, plenty of food in the refrigerator and pantry, two cars to drive, health care and a Starbucks gold card with enough money on it to buy my daily coffee. I have clothes and a credit card to buy more. We can afford to take care of our children and buy them clothes and books and toys and too many treats. When they're a little older, we'll be able to afford to take them to Disney World and buy them matching Mickey Mouse ears. I want to take them to London and Paris, too. We can do it, if we put some money aside for a year or so. It won't be a hardship.

I am lucky. The lottery would not change or increase that luck-- you can pour water into a glass all day long and it will only get so full no matter how much water you pour-- and yet I can see the good that could be done with that kind of money. The good I could do with that kind of money. And I wonder why all those who are rich-- the 1% as they've come to be known-- don't realize that. Or do they? I know there are many wealthy people who give their money away. I read recently that J.K. Rowling is no longer a billionaire because she has given away so much of her Harry Potter wealth. Good for her. Warren Buffett has given away much of his wealth, too. There are others. But I think they're in the minority among those who own a fleet of cars and ten houses and gold-plated... everything. Those who think money buys happiness and so they buy and buy and buy.

I'll never get to show the world what I could do with a billion dollars-- or even a million. Not that I lack ambition, but my particular career doesn't make many millionaires and it's unlikely I'll ever be one of them. My luck doesn't run that way and I'm okay with it. But someone did win those many, many millions last weekend. Several people won a lot of money for doing nothing more than buying a ticket for a dollar. And so I hope they realize the wealth they've been given-- the luck they have fallen into-- is more than money, it's a chance to change the world and make it a better place. But what do I know? I don't have a gold-plated anything.

The Red Umbrella

Not all problems can be solved by throwing money at them, but problems caused by a lack of money dissolve like sugar in water when money is added.

Given a large fortune, of course I would take care of myself and those close to me first. (In real life, I used part of my inheritance to make the down-payments on single-story houses for my two stepsons.) Would a luxurious house, frequent trips, fine clothes and a world-class collection of art make me (and my spouse) happy? Not completely.

The world at large needs so much improvement. Spouse has talked about wanting to set up a scholarship program for poor but deserving Latino kids, much like that run by Carlos Santana in the U.S. She also has an interest in those who “fall through the cracks” of systems intended to help them, including those with physical and mental disabilities (to use a label which is often misleading). Those are the people she works with in her current job.

With our unlimited imaginary fortune, Spouse could fund all the causes dear to her heart.

I have my own plan. I’ll call it the Red Umbrella, a foundation for current and former sex workers. Note that this organization would not have the mandate of “rescuing” sex workers from the “degradation” of sex work. Its mandate would be to rescue them from the need for money, a different goal. There would be scholarships for those who want to study or train for any career, including administration and/or accounting (which could qualify them to run successful escort agencies). There would be several conditions: my minions in the sex trade would determine which applicants are really there, and not just money-hungry; scholarship-holders would be free to continue turning tricks while enrolled in academic or training programs, BUT they would have to maintain a certain grade-point average and report their incomes. Quality housing and child-care would be provided.

There would be programs to address the special needs of male and transgender sex workers.

The Red Umbrella would include an educational and lobbying component which would apply pressure to all relevant branches of government to legalize sex work and treat it like other jobs that are taxable and unionized. Health care and pensions should be part of the package.

Do I need to add that the Red Umbrella would sponsor political candidates who include sex workers' rights in their platforms?

The real founder of this movement (me) would not be visible in the media, if it could be avoided. I would do hands-on work while trying to keep my fortune out of the public eye. (This might involve extra expenditures.)

But the Red Umbrella would be all about visibility. Board members would give press conferences about the unsolved murders of sex workers, hire private investigators and keep these cases in the media to an extent that would embarrass communities -- not to mention local & federal police -- into action. (Note: this is how lynching stopped being a socially-acceptable part of the culture of the American South.)

Local chapters of the Red Umbrella would honour the memories of martyred sex workers by naming programs and buildings after them. (Elaine Flowers and Jewel Gambler are two that come to my mind, though even local feminists who oppose violence against women seem to have forgotten them.)

Of course, the ignorati might ask why I’m not using my vast resources to make a dent in all the “isms” (racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, hysterical religious intolerance, etc.). I would answer: Can you think of a better way?