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The following is a
list of the contents recently found in my junk drawer.
CONTENTS:
· One (1) roll of 'best buy' clear plastic wrap, sans box.
Without the saw toothed metal strip, it is near impossible to
cut in any useful way, but that's alright because you probably
can't find the leading edge in any case. If you do, and manage
to rip some off without stretching it so badly it becomes
useless, it will only cling to itself anyway.
· One (1) 'card' of thumbtacks, white. Less than half are left.
The provenance of this item is unknown. Surely you never in your
life bought this 'card' of thumbtacks, and yet here it is. It
seems, somehow, antique, perhaps a living fossil, migrant from
some long dead other person's junk drawer. Should you attempt to
remove a tack, the rim will slide painfully under your
fingernail.
· One (1) wire coat hanger, unwound. This universal tool
promises infinite possibilities; unclogging drains, unlocking
cars, flogging recalcitrant children and pets… but in fact it
only has one purpose, to fall into such a position that that one
end jams into the floor of the drawer above it so that opening
the drawer more than a fifth of an inch becomes impossible.
There is only one tool that will allow you to reach through that
tiny crack and move the obstructing wire. A wire coat hanger,
unwound.
· One (1) Partially used book of 'series E' stamps, meant to be
used until the new stamps came out when the price went up an
undetermined number of price changes ago. Think briefly of the
postage they might have paid for, the letters that they have
said things to change people now forever beyond your reach.
· One (1) Nutmeg Grater. You have never ground fresh nutmeg in
your life and you never will. You have no idea what unground
nutmegs even look like. Perhaps one day a tiny person will come
to you needing to grate a tiny piece of cheese, but that's
unlikely. Where did this thing come from?
· One (1) package of baking chocolate, unmarked, partially
unwrapped, nibbled at edges. Who will it betray next? You?
Again?
· Thirty-Eight (38) tarnished pennies. Some rainy day you might
sort them by date. Maybe there will be a few so old they have
pictures of wheat on the back. Won't it be fun to see?
· One (1) Baby Food Jar, label removed, containing three (3)
screws of varying lengths, One (1) bent nail, One (1) picture
hanger and a small snippet of wire, partially clad in blue
insulation. frayed at the end. What has become of the baby?
Where is it now? Almost certainly it had some connection to you,
you didn't pick the jar out of the trash. Lost, lost, all lost
to time.
· One (1) Heavy-duty hammer, paint spattered rubber grip. Like
the unwound wire coat hanger, the heavy-duty hammer does an
excellent job of keeping the drawer from opening any more than a
quarter of an inch, but it is more useful as an object of
pondering. Can one can kill oneself with a self-administered
blow to the head from a heavy-duty hammer? How hard would you
have to swing to get the job done in a single blow? Could a
second blow even be accomplished? Might the pain of the first
blow make it impossible? Might one be too impaired to deliver
the second, fatal blow? What if a third blow was required? How
much nerve would that take?
· One (1) Tap Hammer. A 'Tap Hammer' or 'Lady's Hammer' is a
petite version of the Heavy Duty Hammer and is perfect for
hammering tacks, brads and very small nails used in decoration
and upholstery. It is very, very hard to kill yourself with a
Tap Hammer, as it requires hundreds of blows and a great deal of
determination. But sometimes it's exactly what you deserve.
· Three (3) Holograms of three pronged adapters. The very item
you need, right where you thought it would be, now at last the
fan can turn, the bread dough can be mixed, your guest may dry
their hair in the guest bathroom, and there they are, right
where you thought they'd be, but your fingers pass through them
like a dream you are already forgetting.
· Three (3) Flashlights of varying sizes, all of which are dead.
· Three (3) D cell Batteries, Seven (7) C cell batteries, Six
(6) AA cell batteries and 9 (Nine) AAA batteries, all dead.
· One (1) Mummified moth, dead.
· A bunch (132) Of Q-tip swabs held together by an old rubber
band. For Crafts!
· One (1) Photograph of us together in happier times, slowly
changing color unseen in a drawer as the years go by.
· An assortment (assortment) of old dreams, all unrealized, one
shattered.
· Two (2) Petrified sticks of paper thin dusty pink bubble gum,
the kind that used to come in baseball cards back when the world
was slightly hand tinted and far more worth living in.
· One (1) pair (pear?) Needle nose pliers, rusting.
· Three (3) two pronged plastic things to stick in outlets not
in use, as a means of baby proofing. Is this implied baby the
same baby whose empty jar now holds bits of hardware that are
useful but will never be used?
· One (17) odd possibly mechanical doodad that will be briefly
puzzle over during your estate sale, pinched between the
calloused thumb and forefinger beneath the incurious, boiled egg
eyes of an antiques dealer before being dropped and eventually
thrown away.
· One Hundred Twenty-Four (124) Small, shiny, dark brown dots
that if seen under a microscope might reveal themselves as some
sort of insect.
· The memory of the sound the playing card you clipped to the
spokes of your three speed made, probably the ace of spades,
pretending it made your Schwinn a Harley, as if an ersatz
motorcycle could erase friendlessness.
· A bunch (36) of Popsicle sticks, bound together by an old
rubber band. For crafts!
· A (1) 'Tot's' mini stapler that never ever worked even once.
· Two (2) Opposing parentheses for placing numbers or
demoralizing clauses in.
· One (1) Elusive feeling you haven't had in a very long time
(because it isn't in you, it's here, in this drawer) that there
was some unknown thing, answer, person you could eventually get
your hands on that might fill the bleak gaping hole you've come
to understand isn't so much in you per se, it is you.
· One (1) rotten Peanut so that someday you'll have found a
peanut, found a peanut, found a peanut last night.
· One (1) Ring of keys to things that won't get unlocked again
because you don't know what these keys or for or who's they are
or where they came from.
· One (1) manky old tube of lubricant, partially rolled at the
end, leaking in places, almost certainly for mechanical use but
only there so that nosy guests can convince themselves you have
some sort of horrid sexual difficulty.
· Several (23) old books of matches from various disappointing
places you've been that could be used to burn it all down, down,
to coals, to glowing embers, so that it would all be gone,
purified, if not for the fact they are too soggy and old to
ignite let alone burn.
· One (1) False back that when removed opens upon and endless,
empty, sucking void, vast enough to hold every pointless piece
of crap you ever clung to for bad reasons and all the pedestrian
memories and emotions associated with them.
· One (1) Bright yellow, circular happy face sticker.
If you enjoyed this piece, be sure to check out:
Let's Laugh At Death!
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