Jerry's Shadow

So one time I was yanking on this heavy duty orange power cord to see if it was strong enough to hang myself in the garage when I heard a knock. Verizon guy. There to fix the phone, but when I opened the door it wasn’t just any Verizon guy. It was Jerry the Verizon guy. “Having problems with your phone?” he asked. We reeled through our mental files of people we used to know in search of composure for that vague sense of instant recognition. When it finally hit, Jerry had more than a phone to fix. “I’m drunk. So what’s the what with all that?” I slurred. Jerry smiled at the deranged verbal construct. “You tell me, brother.”

The thing that impressed me most about that morning and afternoon was that Jerry was supposed to be working. But instead he sat with me on my front stoop and we talked. I don’t remember what we talked about. That wasn’t the thing. It was the form of the thing, the outline: a guy going out of his way to help just because he wanted to help.

*

Jerry used to tell this story about being 6 feet from his 4-year-old daughter when she fell off her bike, hit her head, and died. People never really move past these kinds of stories. Thorns in the soul. Pebbles in the shoe. They always jangle around the brain and on occasion they need to be spoken. Some stories, like waves on a beach or the constant round of the seasons, need to keep finding themselves in language. So Jerry would tell this story and eventually he’d get caught in this rut of trying to comprehend the distance between his daughter’s life and death. “6 feet.” he’d say and barrel into your eyes to make sure you were getting it. “6 feet.” He might then extend his arm and cut the distance in half. “6 feet?” He would go on like that unless someone, usually me, intervened. “That’s a fucked up story.” I would say and chomp down on my bottom lip. “I’m sorry that happened. That’s some heinous shit, Jerry.”

*

Santa Claus brought Lucy a bike and she’s 4 and loves it like a junkie and of course it reminds me of Jerry. The problem with my invisible 6 foot leash is that she loves to go faster than Daddy and she laughs like a lunatic fleeing an asylum while I run and clamp down on her with my eyes. You don’t really see until you’re a parent. I gauge her speed and the angle of the bike with my eyes while somehow constantly assessing street traffic, cars in driveways, the danger of dogs, weather to clothing ratios, and great photo ops.

And yet no matter how many precautions I take that little bike is riding on a high wire. In the end all our bikes are precariously suspended above abysses.



After all the defiant sparkle wears off the notions of atheism and agnosticism, you realize that something gets you through the Night. Something must. But to hell with Guardian Angels. I like to imagine that Lucy and her bike have a Guardian Shadow and his name is Jerry. But he doesn't beckon her into his nightworld of death and darkness. He shuns her. Keeps her in the day. Keeps her bike steady and flashes her ruby shoes in the eyes of all drivers.


And he's a lot more relaxed when she's off that damn bike.