The Keillor Reader

by Garrison Keillor

  It appeared to Barbara that something about flying had excited her son—yes indeed that was most certainly true. Yes, that was certainly true—Flo and Al were waving and shouting at Duane to stop, meanwhile Raoul in his distress had pressed the PLAY button and Andy Williams sang “Moon River, wider than a mile, I’m crossing you in style someday” as the naked young man flew in the clear blue sky and the parasail banked and now a hot-air balloon came drifting at low altitude over the tree line.

  “Oh dear God,” said Barbara.

  It was blue and green, silver and gold, a magnificent silken bag from which hung a golden wicker basket and the kerosene burner on a frame above it, a man in a white naval outfit and officer’s cap, his hand on the rope that pulled the switch that fired the burner, scanning the water below for the wedding couple he was to scoop up and carry away, descending, descending. The naked Kyle spotted the balloon as Duane made the turn and the parasail appeared to be on a collision course with the balloon—Kyle let out a high-pitched yelp, but Duane was busy steering around the pastors floundering in the water and the giant ducks paddling in circles and the crewless pontoon boat.

  Suddenly, there came a monstrous roar and a mighty flame burst from the burner of the balloon, the pilot attempting to ascend, but alas he overshot with the throttle and the flame ignited the bag, burned a hole through the top of it, and the rigging caught on fire, all in a few seconds, as the naked young man flew on, towed by the crazed Duane, and the ropes parted. The basket and burner and pilot dropped into the water with a great ker-shroommm—big pieces of burning silk drifted in the air like fiery sails and the naked boy heading straight toward them threw his weight to the left and the parasail banked and missed the flaming silk by inches—a little burst of dark cloud appeared where he emptied his bowels—and flew on.

  The two giant ducks came aground nearby. The Danes came straggling out of the water—one of them, stepping on a chain, fetched up the bowling ball and brought it to shore, where Raoul took it in his arms, weeping, Andy Williams still singing about the river and the huckleberry friends—and finally Duane saw his friend, naked, flying helpless, and he made a beeline for shore. He promptly caught the edge of the sandbar and ran aground, shearing the pin, and the towrope snapped, and the naked man glided overhead on his parasail. He glided over the mourners, a great shadow passing on the ground, and cleared the spruce trees behind them, and set down in the field beyond, where Mr. Hansen had his raspberry bushes. He yelped twice and then was silent.

  Al turned to go to the rescue, but Barbara put a hand on his arm and said, “Let him be. Kyle likes to do things himself.” She looked out at the lake strewn with wreckage and dotted with survivors and thought that it was the most exciting day she had spent in years. She was exhilarated. Most memorial services she’d ever attended were quiet sodden affairs and Mother’s was nothing but gangbusters. Pastor Ingqvist was hauling these foreign men out of the water slopping and dripping and muttering things in their singsong guttural tongue and Duane waded to shore pulling his speedboat behind him saying that he wished people would watch where they were going for Chrissake and the Ingqvist twins climbed out of the giant duck decoys and explained that Debbie paid them $25 apiece to do it and what were they supposed to do with these ducks now? And the man in the white sailor suit towed his basket and burner up on the rocks and said that whoever had planned this wedding had done a pretty lousy job of it and he regretted ever having agreed to be in it. It would be the last favor he would ever do for anybody, that was for sure.

  The chaos was marvelous, Barbara thought.

  “Are you all right?” It was Pastor Ingqvist, his hand on her elbow.

  “Never been better in my life,” said Barbara.

  7.

  WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED SO FAR?

  When I attained my maturity, people started addressing me as Sir, and when I spoke, they got all hushed as if it were the invocation, which was deeply gratifying and also slightly unnerving. A person ought to know a few things by this stage of life. My life is a series of bad moves, interrupted by occasional bursts of good luck, and I am not so much wiser for it, but the things I’ve learned are more impressive if I put them in a list and number them.

  1.There isn’t a lot you can do but you ought to do that much and if you do you’ll likely find there is more you can do and you should try to do that too. When all is said and done, there is more to be done and that goes without saying.

  2.Acts have consequences and we are responsible for them even if we didn’t intend them. Be kind and exercise caution. Step on a crack and break your mother’s back. Who knew it could happen? Anyway, it’s your fault so quit your job and take care of the old lady and don’t complain.

  3.Don’t stick beans up your nose. Life is too short for that and it’s getting shorter every day. On the other hand, don’t buy cheap shoes.

  4.Be hospitable to strangers. You have been a stranger yourself and you will be again. Extend yourself. On the other hand, your home is your home, it isn’t the bus station. Scripture says to give all you have to the poor, but if you did, then you would be poor and they’d have to give it back, and so on and so on. But anybody can afford to give 10%.

  5.Your brain thinks it is smarter than you and when you go down a road you cannot resist and it turns out badly, your brain mocks you, heaps abuse on you, says “You should have listened to me.” No. Good judgment is born from experience, especially experience that results from poor judgment. Only a fool tries to outsmart himself.

  6.It’s good to dream, but the urge to perform is not in itself an indication of talent.

  7.You can’t live life all at once so take it one day at a time. The lust for domination does not make for a good life. The urge to be No. 1 leads to an echo chamber in a house of mirrors. Charisma is an illusion, and brilliance depends on who’s writing the test. Find work to do that gives you pleasure and be prepared to be very lucky.

  8.Put a big dish by the door, next to an electric outlet, and when you come home, put your car keys, your billfold, your extra glasses in the dish and plug your mobile phone into the outlet to recharge. In the time you’ll save not looking for them in the morning, you’ll be able to write War and Peace. Or the Mass in B minor.

  9.Don’t discuss a personal relationship with the other person. And don’t refer to it as a relationship. Either it’s a friendship or it’s a romance or you’re married or you’re in business together or you’re related or you’re neighbors. Intimacy is a mystery so don’t treat it like an investment.

  10.The rules for mothering and fathering are: keep your voice down; no sudden moves; don’t crowd the child. Keep all thoughts of disaster to yourself. Find out how to enjoy being with your child and do that as often as possible even if it almost kills you.

  11.Don’t think ill of crazy people, you may be one of them. The same is true of Democrats.

  12.No matter how much you want to keep your secret secret, you know that eventually people will find out so you should start now to think up a good story. The secret may be shameful but if you can make it interesting you’ll be less an object of pity and scorn and that is good.

  13.Take care of your friends, because there will come a time when you’re not much fun to be with and there is no reason to like you except out of long-standing habit.

  14.Do unto those who don’t like you as you would have them do unto you but you know they won’t. Do this before they can do the shameless devious dirty deeds to you that they would do if given the chance. Shame them with goodness. Kill them with kindness. Cut their throats with courtesy.

  15.Flattery is the reverse side of malicious gossip and this coin is very quickly flipped. Beware.

  16.Be cheerful. It could be worse. Someday it will be. Be glad that it isn’t yet.

  17.Don’t beat up on yourself. Endless contrition is a pain. Make your apology, repair the damage, hold your
head up, and march on.

  18.There is a lot of human nature in everybody, so if you’re an idealist, don’t go into politics or teaching. Try copyediting or library science. Cartography. Flower gardening.

  19.People have made perfectly rational decisions that turned out to be dumber than dirt. There doesn’t seem to be any way around this.

  20.After the age of eighteen, if you want a big birthday party, you need to make it yourself. At twenty-one, you should start forgiving your parents for how you were raised. When your first child comes along, you will know why.

  21.Tall people cannot count on short people to look out for things they might bump their heads on. They have to take care of that themselves.

  22.Never marry someone who lacks a good sense of humor. She will need it. It is a challenge to live intimately with your best-informed critic. Look before you leap.

  23.Most tragedy is misunderstood comedy. God is a great humorist working with a rather glum audience. Lighten up. Whatever you must do, do it gladly. As you get older, you’ll learn how to fake this.

  24.Your friends are very fond of you but there are limits. Sadness is tedious. When discussing your troubles, be concise. Five minutes and then change the subject.

  25.The way to get something done is to do it. The way to stop doing something is to not do it anymore. Not drinking is easy so long as you don’t drink. If you can’t make yourself do what you tell yourself to do, it’s all over.

  26.The best cure for a disastrous day is to go to bed early and wake up fresh in the morning and start over. In fact, I am going to do exactly that right now. Good night.

  8.

  CHICKENS

  My family really did slaughter chickens as described here, which, believe me, was highly unusual in Brooklyn Park Township in the early fifties. The neighborhood was getting built up, the cornfields divided into acre and half-acre lots, lovely lawns planted, patios, and here, in the midst of suburbanization, stood my father, axe in one hand, a chicken in the other. He had bought about two dozen birds from a farmer, transported them in gunnysacks in the back of a station wagon, kept them overnight in the garage, and in the morning he and Mother and I proceeded to kill them in the yard and clean and butcher them, wrap them in brown paper, and take them to a locker plant—where you could rent space in a walk-in freezer—and keep them for eating. My father had his own ideas about saving money and that was one of them. He’d grown up on a farm and slaughter to him was as ordinary as shoveling snow. The neighbors, I’m sure, looked on it as savagery, and my mother was sensitive to their opinion, even unspoken. So that part of the story is truthful, and also my family’s sensitivity to anesthesia: it makes us hallucinate. And who can say where hallucination may lead? And it is also the truth that my ancient mother was highly amused by this story about her and made a point of asking for a copy so she could hear it again.

  Today is my mother’s ninetieth birthday, and she called this morning to make sure I’m coming up for supper. Two years after Dad died, she misses him but doesn’t talk about it, at least not to me. We talked about chickens instead. She wants filet mignon for supper and would I pick up some on my way? She hated it when we butchered chickens—she had the miserable job of plucking them and cleaning them. I was the chicken chaser and Dad chopped their heads off. Dad was a farm boy but Mother and I grew up in town and were more sensitive about killing. We were the last family in town to slaughter chickens, everyone else bought theirs at Ralph’s Pretty Good Grocery, big white cold oblong things in plastic bags, but Dad said that store-bought chicken never tasted right to him. So we butchered, in our backyard, a chopping block by the garage, two big pots of water boiling in the kitchen, the axe blade sharp, and me with a clothes hanger to hook them by the ankles. Small neighborhood children gathered to watch, much as people used to gather for public executions before Minnesota got civilized. The chickens had been herded into the garage the night before, to settle them down, and I could hear them grumbling in there. When I opened the side door of the garage, a volunteer chicken flew up in my face and escaped but I grabbed its companion and there was the first victim. I handed it to Dad and turned away and heard the whack and went for the next one. All the chickens had to die, so it wasn’t like I had the power of clemency, but they seemed to think I did. They milled away from me where I stood in their midst, hook in hand, and I snagged one and she cried out, “Oh no, gosh no, please no, don’t do this,” and I carried her to my dad and turned my back, not wanting to watch as this creature, who had been alive in my hands just a moment before, now—whack—was gone from the face of the earth. Dad handed the corpse to Mother, who had filled a big boiler on the back step with steaming hot water, and she dipped the body in and ripped the feathers off and laid the naked corpse on newspaper to be cut open and gutted.

  The crowd in the garage got smaller and smaller, six and five and four, and Dad dispatched them one by one, holding the legs in one hand, flopping it down on the block, the axe in the right hand already on the backswing and whack and the head drops like a cut flower and the blood trickles out in the dirt. We were down to the last chicken, and Dad said, “You do the next one.” Okay, I said. I caught the chicken, the last witness to the massacre. Dad said, “Want me to hold it for you?” I shook my head. My mother said, “You be careful, now.” Imagine going to bat against your first chicken, you cut your own foot off and walk funny the rest of your life, a stiff walk, like a chicken’s.

  I got a grip on the chicken’s legs and swung it up on the block and hauled off with the axe and swung hard and missed by two inches. I had to pry the axe out of the wood and now I was mad. I swung again and missed and again and down it came dead center whack and at the same time I let go and the chicken took off running. It had no head. It dashed across the yard and out in the street and was gone—I never saw a chicken move so fast. I guess without the extra weight they can really go.

  My dad explained afterward that when I missed the first time and planted the blade in the block, the blade got hot. So when I cut the chicken’s head off, the blade cauterized the wound and stopped the flow of blood, and you had a running chicken in pretty good shape except with no brain.

  We ran after it down the street and around the corner and spotted it racing through the flower bed and bouncing off a fence. Ran past a dog, who looked up and decided not to get involved. My dad and I were falling behind. The chicken was fast, heading downtown. We heard the squeal of brakes—two cars stopped and the headless chicken flapped across Main Street and up behind the Chatterbox Café toward Our Lady church, losing momentum, and Mrs. Mueller, loading up her garbage can, was able to grab it. “This your chicken?” she said. “What happened to it?” She didn’t believe us when we told her. She thought we were carrying out a perverse experiment. Whenever she saw me after that, she shook her head and muttered something in German. And then a chicken with a head walked by. It was Chicken No. 1, the escapee, and we chased her, and she managed to fly up into a tree, a major achievement for a chicken. She was all tuckered out from the exertion and I climbed up and got her and she came without a struggle. Dad killed her. It was quite a morning.

  It was around this time, or soon after, when he found a story I’d written in which I had invented a new dad for myself named Al who was a writer of adventure stories. It hurt his feelings—Dad’s feelings, that is—and he didn’t speak to me for weeks. He wanted me to do something useful in the world, like slaughter chickens or fix cars. “Aren’t you curious to see how an engine works?” he said. No, I wasn’t. I was curious about places I could go in a car, but not the car itself. He asked me once, “Whatever is going to become of you?”

  • • •

  It was a lovely birthday supper, just me and Mom. She had a glass of white wine, which was pretty bold of her. Had my siblings been there, she probably wouldn’t have ordered wine, but dining with her prodigal son, she allowed herself a little slack. And for the first time
in her life, she broiled her filet mignon medium rare instead of well done.

  I asked her if she remembered the time I went to the hospital to sit with her while she went under the anesthetic for the operation to inject camel cartilage in her knee so she could go to the gun range again and shoot clay pigeons. People in my family don’t react well to painkillers. She did not remember that, though she remembered how well the knee worked after that. And of course she remembered trapshooting. It was an emotional release for her. She had six children and no hired help and did the washing and cleaning and cooking, and at the end of a long day, she’d take the shotgun and a bag of tomatoes out behind the barn. She’d toss them one by one, left-handed, high in the air, and blow them to bloody shreds, a couple dozen tomatoes in rapid succession, and she came back feeling much better.

  “You told me all sorts of secrets when you were going under,” I said.

  “Oh, I doubt that very much. I don’t know any secrets. Do I?”

  “You talked about how you used to go out to Annabel’s farm near Cottage Grove with Elsie and Genevieve and Flora and danced to a Victrola and stayed up late talking and made a vow that none of you would ever marry and break up the gang and to defend yourselves against men you learned how to shoot. A hobo named Helge Gobel lived in Annabel’s barn and he had a rifle and showed you how and he fell in love with all four of you and he drove you four out to California in Annabel’s Model A with a rumble seat and got to Santa Monica at midnight and walked across the beach and a woman in a green spangly suit came out of the water and it was Marion Davies the movie star and she knew Helge and invited you to stay at her beach cottage—and the next day you found out that Helge’s younger brother Claus was Clark Gable. You went to his house for a party and Howard Hughes flirted with you and Helge socked him in the jaw and the next morning Mr. Gable put the four of you on the Super Chief to Chicago and the Empire Builder to Minneapolis.”