by Ralph Bowden
*****
May 2nd, a large bucket loader arrived at seven and started work carving a basement excavation out of the hillside, probably 100 feet beyond the log pile. Ed went out to watch for a few minutes as it ripped at the rocks and dirt.
Marge was up when he got back. “Have they moved their log pile yet?”
“Moved? What? Do you suppose they’re going to burn it? They can’t burn it where it is! It’ll light off my pine trees.”
He went out and flagged down the loader operator to warn him to move the log pile before trying to burn it. It seemed he’d done it before, sometime, or dreamed he had.
After weeding and mulching the garden all morning, Ed came in at noon. The loader had just shut down for lunch, and Marge was winding up her group piano class. After the children left, he and Marge walked out to the road and looked over at the huge, gaping hole in the slope next door.
“Damn near a quarry,” he said.
“At least they didn’t have to blast.”
“I wish they’d haul off those logs. I’m afraid some idiot will try to burn them right there. I’d better warn that yoyo driving the loader.”
Marge looked at him a little funny. “Didn’t you do that this morning when you went out?”
“Oh. Right. But this looks like a different guy; I think they must have switched off sometime since. Well, maybe the other one told him.” It was a really lame cover.
That night, as Ed tossed and tried to relax his restless legs, all he could think of was how his little island of sanity would be drowned as a sea of everything stupid and pernicious rose around him. Strange thoughts mixed with not quite dreams that he forgot as soon as he was aware of having them. Being unable to grasp and track what was going on in his head terrified him.