Dear Editor,

From the moment I wake up until the moment I drift off once more into sleep’s comforting, death-like embrace, I am consumed by fear and rage. As a younger man, I felt a host of emotions, such as joy, love, and even, on rare occasions, humor. Now, in my advanced age, fear and rage are the only two lenses I have left through which to view the horrible world around me.

I have questions, so many questions. I shout them at anyone unlucky enough to pass through my terrible ambit. Please understand: I do not expect answers to my questions. I have all the answers. I only want to share my sarcastic questions so that everyone I encounter is filled with the same anger and fear I experience, even if only briefly.

Five generations of my family were born in this same house, in the same spot in the den. My dog barks at the stain constantly and houseplants wither when they pass its boundary. I only leave my chair to buy groceries, go to Hardees, and personally hand these letters to the mailman so I can have an opportunity to yell at him about how terrible it all is.

I am so God damn angry, and afraid also.

I worked 43 years at the clothespin factory before it closed down. I could clean and lubricate seven clothespin lathes per night if I wanted, but the clothespinners union only let us clean two. Now my clothespins come from China. How did China take all of our jobs? What does the Chinaman know that I don’t?

I used to make $1.70 an hour and support a wife, four children, a house, two cars, a boat, and another house for my secret family. Now people make $7.55 an hour and live in apartments and when I order my senior coffee, they charge me full price. Why are people dumb and lazy now? 

Everyone at Hardee’s agrees with me. I go there every morning at 5 a.m. to sit with other old, angry people and drink senior coffee and talk about how bad it is. When a person we don’t recognize comes in, we fall silent and stare at them. One time a young person took my seat. Didn’t he know it was my seat? I stared at him.

On Thursdays a band comes to play for us. Everyone in the band is old and feeble, but if you listen close, you can figure out which songs they’re playing. They only play bluegrass music, which is the only good music. Bluegrass songs are about women and murders and selling illegal substances. I don’t know why anyone would listen to that hip-hop garbage. 

I am concerned. A black man walked past my house yesterday. He was carrying a fishing rod. What was he up to? Doesn’t he know I’m a veteran?

I fought and died in Korea. I made sure that this country would remain the greatest country on Earth. Now my back hurts and everyone is too fat. Why won’t anyone listen to me?

TV shows are terrible now, but during my formative years when I paid attention to popular culture, they were very good. Remember that Andy Griffin Show where Opie got the quarter from Mr. McBeevee, and Andy didn’t believe him, so he threatened to beat the everloving shit out of his own son? You laughed and you learned something. Now television is violent and confusing and I don’t understand the jokes so they must not be funny.

The President is a socialist. I don’t know how he got elected, because none of the people I talk to or get my political information from voted for him. He wants to socialize health care. I don’t understand. The next thing you know, the President will be wanting to socialize other things, like the Armed Forces, the Interstate Highway System, the FBI, federal waterways, the U.S. Mint, the National Park Service, the Library of Congress, the Bureau of Prisons, the Census Bureau, Congress, Social Security, or the Departments of Labor, Agriculture, State, Education, Interior, National Intelligence, Commerce, Energy, Treasury, Transportation, Homeland Security, Justice, Energy, Housing and Urban Development, and Health and Human Services. Can you imagine? 

My children won’t speak to me anymore. I think they’re taking the drugs. It makes me sick. It’s enough to make me choke on the 73 pills I take each morning to keep me alive for another miserable God damn day. I just don’t understand.

I have done everything right. The choices that have led me here are sacrosanct. I drive a Chevy Malibu. I buy my slacks at J.C. Penney. I only listen to terrestrial radio. I grow tomatoes every summer. I don’t tell racist jokes if one of those people is in earshot. I use a shoe horn. I don’t litter much.

Why is everything going wrong? I am an American. I am a Patriot. What has happened? Why? 

In closing, fuck you.

Tom Larva

Smuckleberry, Va.

Upon entering La Parisienne, I was immediately concerned that I was at the wrong restaurant, as the odd, curly-haired maitre’d welcomed me to “Frenchy’s.” Thankfully, he confirmed that my reservation was accurate, and, as he ushered my party to our table, informed us that the restaurant was under new management.

Based on my experience, I have dire concerns about this new management.

The restaurant’s decor is a bit showy — I would go so far as to call it pretentious — conjuring the impression of a parlor favored by French aristocracy. The surroundings clashed jarringly with the appearance and bearing of my waiter, a gruff, weathered man with a bowl-cut hairstyle who asked, “What can I get for you bums?”

Though taken aback, I ordered a bottle of Nouveau Beaujolais, a bowl of ragout d’huitres, and the oie rotie avec lardoons.

The waiter stared at me, dumbfounded, until I explained my order in English. When I mentioned the entree, the roast goose, he asked how I wanted it cooked.

“Properly,” I retorted, at which point he shouted into the scullery that “Frenchy wants the gander cooked properly.”

“Oh,” the rotund, bald cook shouted back, “a proper gander,” causing our waiter to shake his fist with barely concealed rage and mutter, “Quiet, you.”

Already, my guests were growing concerned, and it was clear that no one had much interest in discussing the merits of director Michael Haneke’s catalogue, as was our original intent. 

The waiter departed and returned with the Nouveau Beaujolais and my ragout. He opened the bottle of wine, which I realize now that I should have noticed was unmarked, and poured a glass. As he handed it to me, I noted that a strange mist was rising from the wine’s surface, akin to dry ice, yet the waiter insisted I drink. Fearing retribution, I took a sip.

So potent was the “Nouveau Beaujolais” that suddenly, as if by forces beyond my control, I began spinning in my chair, my bowtie flapping about! Never before or since have I experienced anything similar, and I often lay awake at night poring over the incident. 

I sent the wine back, poured myself a glass of water, and attempted to cleanse my palate with the ragout.

I delicately placed a single cracker upon the surface of the thin oyster stew, and, when I turned to lift my soup spoon from the table, I heard a small snapping noise. Upon rotating back to the stew, I discovered that my cracker was gone. Undaunted, I placed another cracker upon the surface, again turned to retrieve my spoon, and once more heard the snap. Again, the cracker was gone.

After this continued seven or eight more times, I discovered that the chef had somehow managed to prepare an oyster stew containing a live oyster, which, rather than feeding on plankton, as is the oyster’s custom, had developed a taste for the small, octagonal soup crackers which bear its name. 

After the oyster comically spit a stream of stew into my startled face, I summoned our waiter and demanded he dispose of the ragout.

As he wandered away, quietly referring to me as a “dope,” our maitre’d returned and began to play the violin, quite loudly, directly into my ear, in order to “set the mood,” as he put it. Though he was skilled with the instrument, it had become clear to me that I would not be recommending La Parisienne.

Before my oie rotie avec lardoons could arrive, a series of events took place which I can only describe by that hackneyed cliche of “the perfect storm.” Firstly, the scullery door banged open and the cook emerged, merrily pushing a tray of banana cream pies and singing to himself in a high-pitched falsetto.

Secondly, an aged dowager entered the restaurant, a pair of opera glasses at the ready, and began berating the three staff members, claiming that they had “bungled (her) restaurant just as they had bungled (her) painting project, (her) plumbing, and (her) ostrich farm.”

Within seconds, the three began hurling pies at the dowager and each other, driving her screaming to her knees between shouts of “Well, I never!” and “You dunces!” and so forth.

It was at this point that my guests and I left La Parisienne.

While I cannot recommend the fare, it is perhaps worth pointing out that several of the male customers at the venue seemed to enjoy the spectacle of the place if not the cuisine. However, I do not recommend it to women, as the few female patrons I saw did not seem in the least amused by the antics of the three restauranteurs.

I was driving to Roanoke today, and as I drove past a used car lot, I saw out of the corner of my eye a pale green 1974 Cadillac Coupe Deville on the lot. I knew I had to stop and check it out on my return trip.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a Cadillac man. As best I can figure, my love affair with Cadillacs began when I was a little kid watching Ghostbusters multiple times per week. Over time, my love of the ECTO-1 — which of course began life as a 1959 Miller-Meteor ambulance/hearse Cadillac professional chassis — gradually morphed into a love of all things Cadillac. To this day, the 1959 Cadillac remains my dream car, followed by the 1967-1978 Eldorados.

Whenever I see a sweet old Cadillac, I often stop just to find out how much the owner wants for it. I don’t know why I do this. I think I’m hoping to find an owner who will say, “Yeah, this old gal runs like a top, but I gotta get rid of her, on account of she’s haunted. She’s yours if you tell me a story about a man who tried to do something that ended poorly for him but hilariously for those observing him.”

The ’74 Coupe Deville isn’t necessarily one of my favorites, but it’s still a beautiful piece of American iron that would look pretty good with me behind the steering wheel. I pulled into the parking lot of the used car dealership and struck up a conversation with the owner, a barrel-chested man of 75 who chain-smoked menthols and told me the tale of the car.

His great uncle, he said, was a bootlegger and timber man who bought it brand-new. He kept the car in his temperature-controlled garage, driving it only occasionally, until he sold it to another relative (also a bootlegger) in 1995. That relative also kept it in a temperature-controlled garage and only drove it once or twice. Every few months, he’d change the fluids, pump the brakes, and add some fuel stabilizers. His wife was a paraplegic, and one of her favorite past-times was retiring to the garage and wheeling herself around the car, waxing and buffing it to a high sheen. Then that relative died, and the barrel-chested man inherited it.

It was, quite possibly, the most pristine 1974 Coupe Deville in our universe or any parallel universes. The paint was immaculate. The interior looked untouched. 

It had 9,000 miles on the odometer.

“I’m thinking $15,000,” the owner said.

I am possessed of an almost encyclopedic knowledge of Cadillacs manufactured between 1950 and 2000, along with their Kelley Blue Book values. This was a reasonable figure.

“Yeah,” I said, “that’s about right. You probably won’t get that here, though. I expect you might be able to sell it locally for nine, maybe ten.”

He swept an arm across the Cadillac’s endless sea-foam expanse. “What would you give me for it?”

“Sir,” I said, “any honest answer I give you would be so insulting that you would want to punch me in the face.”

He then announced that his cellulitis was acting up and he needed to sit down. He folded himself into his Buick and proceeded to tell me about his career as a minor country music star, his love affair with the 1941 Ford, and also his cellulitis. This went on for perhaps twenty minutes or so.

“Sure you wouldn’t give me ten for it?” he asked, puffing a menthol Marlboro.

“If I had ten, I’d buy it,” I said.

“Almost too nice to drive, isn’t it?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I don’t have a garage or anything.”

“Aw, shit,” he said. “I wouldn’t sell it to you, anyway.”

I was sitting at my desk at the newspaper when I got a phone call about the wind.

The wind, the caller said, had come down across a section of county road and blown down a building. It had happened in the early morning, the caller said, and they didn’t know anything else about it, but I should look into it.

I called up the public safety director, who confirmed that wind had taken place, and also that it had blown down a building. I then called up my guy at the National Weather Service, who is always excited to talk about freakish weather.

What it was, he said, was a microburst, or straight-line wind. What happens sometimes, he said, is that under certain atmospheric conditions, the sky will belch out a single gust of wind with the power of a tornado. He didn’t know how fast this particular wind was moving -- there was no monitoring equipment within its path of destruction -- but well over 100 miles per hour was not uncommon for these microbursts.

I asked him if this was rare.

No, not particularly, he said. It happens sometimes, often in the woods where no one knows about it. Occasionally, without any sort of warning, a tremendous blast of crushing wind just rumbles down from the sky and destroys anything in its path. It’s just one of those things.

I hopped in my car and drove out to the site.

When I got there, I discovered that the wind had caused damage on both sides of the county road. On the left side of the road, it had hit a church, blowing out a stained glass window which, according to the gentleman outside the church cleaning up the glass, cost $30,000.

It had then passed across the road and hit the garage.

It was a private garage, perhaps 40’x40’, surrounded by a cyclone fence, which was not aptly named. It had been absolutely obliterated. The fence had been ripped from the earth and tangled. The garage looked as if a C4 charge had gone off within it. Twisted corrugated steel lay in the field surrounding the garage. Only the cinderblock foundation remained. Fiberglass insulation hung from the pine trees like tinsel. Other pine trees lay on the ground, not uprooted, but snapped off at the base. A man, a boy, and a dog wandered the property, surveying the damage.

Bent go-kart frames and small engine parts littered the ground.

I struck up a conversation with the man.

This had been his garage, he said, holding the boy’s shoulders. The boy was young, no older than 9 or 10. He struggled to look unaffected in front of me, but it clearly took effort.

The garage, the man said, had been where he and his son built and tinkered on the boy’s go-karts. The boy had racing in his blood, the man said, and he hit the go-kart track almost every weekend. 

The man and the boy’s mother had separated some years before, he said, but they remained friends. In fact, he said, he considered his ex-wife’s new husband to be a great friend as well, and he, the ex, and the new husband often spent time together at the boy’s races. 

People think we’re crazy, he said, but it works for us.

They were bound by their love of the boy, who loved his go-karts, or did until God’s finger had ground them into the earth with a destroying wind.

I asked the boy if I could talk to him for a moment. He nodded.

“I’m sorry about this, young man,” I said to him. “I’m sure this has been a rough morning for you.”

The boy said he had wept all morning. He would survive, but it was hard.

“I lost my life today,” he said in a soft southern accent. “Go-karts is my life.”

I have interviewed a governor, three senators, two attorney generals, and countless doctors, lawyers, and theologians.

That remains the most profound artistic statement I have ever heard.