Deflection of Pig-Ponies

DEFLECTION OF PIG- PONIES

A Novel By

Joan Laurie Anderson

iUniverse, Inc.

New York Lincoln Shanghai

Deflection of Pig-Ponies

Copyright © 2005 by Joan Laurie Anderson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording,

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Any similarities to people or places in this book are purely coincidental. With the exception of child molesters, the author wishes to apologize to anyone who may have been offended when reading this novel.

ISBN-13: 978-0-595-34906-7 (pbk)

ISBN-13: 978-0-595-79622-9 (ebk)

ISBN-10: 0-595-34906-4 (pbk)

ISBN-10: 0-595-79622-2 (ebk)

Printed in the United States of America

Contents

Computer Trash

Pig-Pony Prints

Dark Angel, Can I See You?

Shark Sin Confession

Postcards from Munich

Swiss Reunification

It’s Raining Swiss, Hallelujah!

Return of the Compact Disc

Computer Trash 

Great ideas need landing gears as well as wings.

—C.D. Jackson

* * *

Darn! If only I’d followed correct Swiss procedures for recycling obsolete computers, my nearly new laptop that had been lent to me by Father Frank probably wouldn’t be ridden with a virus called Meredith. Not only is she maneuvering the keyboard with the skill of a self-playing piano, creating screensavers of her favorite New York City delis, and barking out editorial suggestions from behind the miniature speakers, now her voice has shown up in my life. I knew Father Frank had holy connections, but this is too much!

Jeepers creepers, if I hadn’t already been released from the mental institution, I’d think I was still nuts. Especially when, after having trashed my childhood computer in a heap of metal and megabytes, I witnessed a junkyard German shepherd steal my floppy diskette that I’d accidentally left in the computer; then the mutt proceeded to urinate cobalt blue all over the outmoded tower! What in the world had that canine eaten for breakfast—Rembrandt acrylics paint? While I was getting fined for computer trash without a license, the junkyard dog pulled a Christ Himmel Fahrt, sprouted wings and flew up to heaven with my floppy in his mouth. Luckily, Newton’s theory, What goes up must come down, applies not only to apples, but also to my floppy that fell back to earth a few years later in the form of a silvery round compact disc.

Pig-Pony Prints 

How many of our daydreams would darken into nightmares if there seemed any danger of their coming true!

—Logan Pearsall Smith, Afterthoughts * * *

If, according to Quality of Life surveys, Zurich, Switzerland, is ranked number one in the world, then why the heck am I contemplating suicide?

My name is Marlene D. Morel. Tonight is Christmas Eve. Tomorrow I turn sixteen. Although I am honored to have been born on the same day as Jesus Christ, I am, nevertheless, disappointed that every year I only get one present instead of two. Jesus received three gifts: gold, frankincense and myrrh, so why not me? I would even take the myrrh. I like stinky African shrubs.

According to the centuries-old Chinese calendar, I was also born during the Year of the Monkey. The smart monkey sees, hears, and speaks no evil. Just like the Swiss, which I am fifty percent…in an ethnic sort of way: I have Chinese eyes. They say madness is reflected in your eyes, even if they’re shaped like almonds. Look into my big brown eyes. Do you see a flicker of insanity or are my contacts covering my few loose screws? Just because I talk to inanimate objects and our dog Jack, and have a naughty personality named Bad Egg living inside of me, doesn’t mean I’m totally crazy.

At the moment, my mother Jo Ann Mark and my half-brother Benjamin Question Mark are in the living room trimming the Christmas tree. It has become a mother-son tradition ever since the little rug rat accused me of draping the tinsel too thick. It looks like sheets of aluminum foil, not sparkling icicles, he had screamed in hysterics at the age of seven, then karate-kicked the tree down. To please precious Benjamin, that is our mother’s lifelong goal, she has permanently banned me from Christmas decoration detail.

Because Jo Ann is an ex-B-talent soap opera star from Las Vegas, Nevada, she prefers everything bigger than life, which is why our family Christmas tree is slightly shorter than the Eiffel Tower. And steadfast to family tradition, the Morel Christmas tree will stay ablaze with tiny white sparkle lights and gold ornaments the size of plastic gymnastic balls until the fire department nails a fire hazard fine on its brittle limbs. Jo Ann and Benjamin just love the atmosphere of Christmas and what it represents—receiving presents. Have you ever been more interested in being on the receiving end of Christmas rather than the giving side? I’m afraid I have.

For the last three Christmas Eves, I’ve sat at Papa’s Irish pub inside Morel Theatrical Costumier planning my cinematic suicide. Jacques, who’s staring at me at this very moment, thinks I’m a total nerd. I’m computing with my left hand (and right lobe) while simultaneously reading a novel with my right hand (and left lobe). He’s always too drunk to notice that I never turn the pages of any book I read.

Tonight, I’m pretending to read One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez. My attention appears to be focused on the Buendía/Iguaran family tree. But behind the folds of this novel, much too complicated for a teenage girl, I am, in fact, working on the sequel to my first novella, which I’ve decided will begin with my death. And since I’m soon to be a was, I guess it means this will be the shortest novella in the history of novellas. I reckon my death will take place at Lake Zurich when I find the courage to do it. Unfortunately, I’ll probably reenter my next life as a cabbage patch sold for sauerkraut. This is what happens when you take your own life. You come back as food no one likes. I believe in reincarnation, otherwise how can I explain why I’m more knowledgeable than my sixteen-year-old britches? And how else can I justify such weird and funny things happening to me? For example, I’m sure in a former life I was the dummy Charley McCarthy in Edgar Bergen’s 1930s nightclub ventriloquist act. Why else would I wake up in the morning dressed in a man’s tuxedo and top hat, wearing a monocle, and going to breakfast talking like a lad from England! At least it’s better than waking up as the Bad Egg who wants Marlene’s personality permanently erased.

Why so much mental rehearsal for something as easy as suicide, you might ask? I’ve just got to get it right the first time! There’s nothing more embarrassing than failing hari-kari when you’re an Oriental. Leave it to me to screw it up! Marlene does everything in life wrong, so my mother says.

Later tonight, mother and son plan to attend midnight mass at St. Peter’s church, even though neither of them is Catholic. Jo Ann is a Jewish American Princess. Twelve-year-old Benjamin, who looks like a Jamaican reggae singer, worships only himself. Nevertheless, he loves this hands-on religion that is full of things to do: kneeling, standing, sitting, crossing yourself, counting rosary beads, kissing Jesus’ crucified body that’s dangling from the rosary, more up and down, communion (that’s my favorite part—eating), saying lots of prayers, singing, lighting candles, true confession, visiting the Stations of the Cross, etcetera, etcetera. But Benjamin will never become an altar boy. He’s a fake. And like many Catholics, he only goes through the motions.

Have you ever said the Lord’s Prayer and not really meant it? I have on one of my un-concentrated nights before going to bed. ‘Our Father’s art in heaven halibut be thigh name. King Kong is dumb thigh will be dumber on earth until you get to heaven. Give USA Today our daily bread and forgive us our debts so we can spend more at the mall.’ Stop the press! This isn’t the way it’s written. The Lord’s Prayer, no matter what religion you profess, is the most beautiful prayer in the world. ‘Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.’ Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every Christian who said this prayer really meant it?

Yes, it would. Especially when you’re Jewish, says a female voice whose tone sounds rougher than steel wool.

Wow! Did my nearly new computer from Father Frank just talk to me? Cool! Pressing my nose into the liquid crystal screen, I look around for the face that’s homesteading that scratchy voice. Hum? I only see words and punctuation of the text I’m currently writing. I whisper into the screen so Jacques, my father, won’t hear me. You think you’re shocking me because I can hear you. But I hear voices all the time. Mannequins even talk to me! And their lips even move!

I’m not a mannequin. I’m just answering one of your questions, says the voice wheezing from the speakers.

Hum…this is very interesting, I think. A new voice in my head or in my computer. I probe further. Who are you?

My name’s Meredith.

What are you doing in my computer, Meredith? And why are you in my sequel?

I’m not really in your sequel. I’m reading your first novella.

Wow times two! I didn’t think anyone would read my potential bestseller. Every agent I sent it to on both sides of the Atlantic rejected my manuscript. Then when I finally found an agency called Ashcroft Associates in Hertfordshire England, they disappeared—left without a trace. That’s why I’ve decided to self-publish. After that rude experience from the ever-polite British culture, I figured I’d be my only reader.

Now you have two.

Readers?

Agents.

You’re an agent! It’s my lucky day! How’d a scratchy voice like yours get a hold of my manuscript?

The female coughs out cactus needles through the speakers then admits, Well, you might say it was Fed Dogged up to me and landed on my head and not in my lap.

I ponder the wonders of Fed Ex, remembering that special-delivery German shepherd that had pissed cobalt blue. Suddenly, I grow a little paranoid about this kind of special service I didn’t pay for at the Computer Recycling Center and say, This delivery must have been expensive. Did that junkyard dog hand over my floppy or the real McCoy?

There are no computers where I am, she answers, only billions and billions of stars and white copy paper.

No computers! There are computers everywhere in the world. Even Uganda where only apes live.

Everywhere on earth maybe, but I’m a heavenly creature now stationed atop Mount Reject reading tons and tons of manuscripts and movie scripts. I was just starting to read a rejected movie script called Cry of the Seagulls when your first novella bonked me on the head.

I look up into the wood rafters of our ancient warehouse, imagining this heavenly creature somewhere out in the universe. Goose pimples prick warnings on my arms saying that Marlene D. Morel is about to be chosen for a starring role in the X-Files. Fantastic, I mumble, then ask failing to curb my excitement of having a reader from Mount Reject actually read my memoirs starting from birth to age sixteen. So what do you think of my book?

It’s hard to say. I’m having a problem with vertigo today. I can’t seem to focus on reading. I feel like I’m going to fall. What if I die…again?

Dead again! I gasp. How tall is Mount Reject?

Ten million four hundred and sixty manuscripts tall—that’s over one thousand kilometers high.

Jeez-Louise, Meredith. You must be a patient person or have very bad karma.

Let’s just say I’m doing penance.

For what sin?

Before I got mowed down dead by a yellow cab on Park Avenue, I was considered one of the most aggressive literary agents in New York City. I represented the crème de la crème and hustled top dollar for my elite pack of authors. Apparently, since I didn’t care about hurting the feelings of peon writers like you, I got sent here when I died. According to my Custodians, my official job is to light a spark of hope in every writer’s eye, she announces with sarcasm then yells, Even if their manuscripts are worthless!

Say, I answer suspiciously back at the computer screen, I think I might remember you, Meredith. May I ask your last name? She tells me. It’s a Jewish name that’s a combination of a Swiss town and a rock. And a name a peon writer like me will never forget. I get a little curt with my one and only reader. Hey, you’re the lady who cut out the address from my own letterhead, taped it on my own envelope and sent it back via snail’s ship when I had prepaid airmail back to Europe! You couldn’t even be bothered to write a rejection letter. The envelope was empty! You’re a tacky person, Meredith.

Now I’m a tacky spirit, she admits. Listen, I want to make it up to you. What do you say I really read your novella and give you my honest opinion, not just the official flame of hope? Take it at face value.

Do tacky spirits even have faces?

Meredith gasps. She’s apparently just seen her reflection in a plastic cover attached to a movie script. I wouldn’t call it a face. More like cake ingredients in a bowl when you’ve just begun to stir. My nose runs into my eyes runs into my chin runs into my lips…I won’t be whole again until Mount Reject reaches sea level.

That could take a lifetime. Oops, sorry, I giggle, I forgot you’re dead. Sweet as pie, I ask, Do spirits have feelings to hurt? Meredith thinks about it for a moment and finally says yes. Good! I bark. Cause you really hurt my feeling with that letter you didn’t write. So buzz off!

Wait. Give me a chance. I can work off some extra bad karma if I help you, she begs then adds with a snobby air, even though I don’t do novellas. Then she yells out loud enough for her Custodians to hear, The great Meredith Swiss town and a rock, is happy to help this peon writer.

No thanks, I answer. You’ll probably lie. Anyway, who cares what you think about my first book. Save the writer’s flame of hope for someone else. I start to hang up then realize we’re not on the telephone. So I whisper at the screen. And in the future, keep your cake mix out of my memoirs and get your vi-rass out of my computer!

That’s not very Christian of you. Her scratchy voice disappears.

Speaking of Christians, I usually attend my riding friend, Father Frank Lee’s English-speaking Evangelical Reformed Church. But tonight I’ll force myself to tag along to St. Peter’s so I won’t be left home alone with my father, Jacques Morel, famous international playwright and drunk. This ex-communicated Catholic doesn’t dare go to Mass, especially confession. If he did, the good priest would certainly flush him down the confessional toilet, which is okay by me. Jacques Morel has no scruples. This handsome Eurasian drinks too much alcohol, knocks around his wife and kids, and gambles—all with no regrets and conscience-free. Nice role model, eh?

Speaking of bad role models, behind his well-stocked bar, my dad’s just mixed himself his second scotch of the evening and is sitting down at the opposite end of the bar scanning the magazine, The Hollywood Reporter, which he has flown into Zurich daily. Word has it a big Hollywood producer is interested in buying the film rights to one of his stage plays. So every evening, he catches up on the buzz of the biz. Normally, he likes reading How-To books like, How To Beat The Monte Carlo Odds, How To Drink Yourself to Death and Remain Alive, How To Divorce Your Wife and Still Keep the Cash and his alltime favorite, How To Molest Your Teenage Daughter in Five Easy Steps. The only How To book that’s on my shelf is, How To Find a Loving Family Before I Die and Come Back to Earth a Homeless Vegetable.

Back to planning my suicide, I have decided that Mr. Spielberg is my chosen director for the event. Wow, Steven Spielberg, you might add. Why the heck not? For once in my life, I am going to be the center of attention—the star of the show. He’ll personally choose my wardrobe for this very short docudrama: beige-color jodhpurs to flatter my narrow hips that are covered with stretch marks from my fat days, white stock to complement my yellowish complexion that’s always flustered red with anxiety, the red velvet show jacket to accentuate my voluptuous breasts that I hate, and shiny black equestrian boots to heighten my small frame that forever shrinks in the presence of my dad.

In spite of the cold temperatures, I’ll wear no goose-lined coat. We need to see our protagonist suffer, Spielberg will say. As always, my pride and joy, my long black hair, will be in a French braid. I always wear it back. Bad Egg, my naughty personality wears it long and straight. It reminds me of a greasy, stringy black mop. Naturally, I’ll have no safety hat for protection or sunglasses to protect my brown eyes speckled with gold that are usually blurry with tears.

I begin writing the chapter.

I ride along a familiar stretch of rare undeveloped lakeshore near Zurich, Switzerland, on my pony named White Sox.

I stop. What a silly name! I think. My choice would have been something more romantic like, Quest for Love. Instead, the gelding’s oddly named after an American baseball club whose home plate is located in the windy city of Chicago. Really, I should hate my Haflinger-bred pony with his fleece of gold and creamy mane and tail. He had been gift wrapped and black mailed. A few years ago, after my first riding lesson, Jacques had popped a loaded question, asking, What will you do for me if I buy you White Sox? Of course, I squealed, Anything, Papa! Jacques purchased White Sox that very same day. Over time, his twisted mind, filled with bitter hatred, had manipulated his daughter’s innocence right out from under her. Eventually, I would sacrifice my virginity for a four-legged beast that jumps beached whales and chews sports mints.

Surrounded by acres of frozen pampas grass is a one-story hut filled with what looks like gigantic marshmallows. Actually, it’s harvested hay that’s been vacuum- wrapped in plastic. Mr. Spielberg, the film equipment and his camera crew are positioned beneath the overhanging rafters in full view of the star. I gallop by. Spielberg nods his approval. It’s a nice cinematic touch—woman and beast together unto the bitter end. The camera pans over to a wrecked rowboat just ahead, half-buried in snow. Only the rudder is exposed. It looks like a dead humpback whale, whose general positioning system steered off course and migrated to the Swiss Alps. My pony’s hoof prints are still deep in snow from yesterday and the day before.

In reality, no one rides this stretch of shore in winter because of the icy winds. Except for munchkin Father Frank and his miniature pony, Sammy, who closely resembles a pig! Those faded pig-like hoof prints curving to the right of the rowboat belong to Sammy, the original Pig-Pony. This lucky fur ball had been barely rescued by Father Frank just before Sammy became adhesive on the back of a Swiss stamp. The single shovel of snow between his hoof prints is really his droopy belly dragging through snowflakes.

Hum…a psycho-engineering class in Pig-Pony Deflection would be fascinating studies at school, I think. Pondering this subject, I actually read page one of Márquez’ book One Hundred Years of Solitude that begins with, ‘Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.’

Pass me some ice cubes, demands a male voice.

Caught in an unpleasant thought brewing in my mind, I don’t hear my father’s command. Instead I mentally accept the fact when I finally crack in two, I’ll be stuffed and mounted on a wall at Zurich’s Children’s Petting Zoo. Children, this is a female Pig-Pony, the zoologist will say. They’re not as rare as you think. One out of nine children will end up abused. The innocent kids will quickly do finger calculations hoping not to be the chosen one.

Are you deaf? I said pass me some ice! shouts Jacques.

Irritated, I stop computing and slide the ice bucket across the smooth varnished bar top then watch with horror as the bowling ball of frozen liquid approaches Dad’s pins at the very moment he decides to bend over the end of the bar to retrieve his fallen cigarettes. The contents of the ice bucket fly over his head, extinguishing both his reasonable mood and his Marlboro.

Damn you, Marlene!

I quickly defend myself, saying, Bad Egg did it, not me, even though I know it isn’t true.

Ignoring Jacques I return to the keyboard. Allow me to officially introduce you to my other self, Bad Egg. I, Marlene D. Morel have a mental mate. We’re Zurich’s soap opera of London’s Gothic horror, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Because of my erratic behavior, I am not very popular at home or at school. I’m afraid I give new meaning to the term getting up on the wrong side of the bed! You see, my two personalities are complete opposites in every way. And in this case, opposites don’t attract! I have proper Swiss table manners. Bad Egg belches when food is passed to her. I wear light pink lip gloss. Bad Egg wears lipstick in shades of violent, violet black. I use contacts and wear glasses. Bad Egg’s vision is perfect. I never swear. The F word is Bad Egg’s favorite. I just want attention. Bad Egg craves sexual attention. I attend church. On Sundays, Bad Egg secretly watches X-rated films.

Looking on the bright side, Bad Egg is very smart, whereas my brains are full of mashed potatoes. Knowing this, Bad Egg charges me for the right answers in school. So disturbed by my unbalanced mind, I recently visited the public library and looked ourselves up in the medical book, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and concluded that I have a classic case of Personality Disorder—with a Bad Egg Complex. Is this bad seed the naughty side of the good fairy? If we would be described as footwear, am I a pair of Birkenstocks and Bad Egg a pair of spiked golf shoes? My ultimate fear is that she is an uncontrollable part of my wild imagination, as I have been accused, more than once, of being the mastermind of creating non-existing persons, places or things! My real world is Mannequin Land; my life inside the warehouse, stuffed full of props and costumes, where I reside as the compassionate governess to all mannequins living there. My virtual world is my nightmare called life, and Bad Egg’s participation in it.

Seeking spiritual help, I often conjure up the image of my best friend’s refrigerator. She’s from America and also lives in Zurich. Actually, she’s now my ex-best friend. Bad Egg tied her up in the cellar, bound her mouth with duct tape then went off inline skating. My non-friend collects refrigerator magnets for her mom’s huge Sub-Zero. The door is tattooed with spiritual trivia, which explains why the entire family has an eating disorder. They can’t find the refrigerator. A year ago, I found this wonderful inspirational message stuck to a can of Pet Milk and recite it whenever I feel lost and alone. It goes something like this: When you’re mega-depressed and you feel like the Main Man has abandoned you because you only see one set of footprints on Malibu beach, you are not walking alone, God is hauling you around on His almighty back.

Unfortunately, today and everyday, I only see hoof prints in the sand. My God