Politics Sunday

  Politics Sunday 

 The phone rings — early. Interrupting the West Brom – Tottenham match. It’s Bart.*
     “You want to talk to your mother,” I say, eager to get back to the match so I can hear over and over — and again – what a great player Harry Kane is, the Jesus Christ of English football.
     “Eventually,” Bart says. “Did you watch the speeches last night?”
     “Whose?” I know whose, but I ask anyway as if I wanted to prolong the conversation, not get back to the match. I regret it instantly.
     “Kamala’s and Biden’s,” Bart says.
     “No.”
     “Did Mom? Why not?”
     “She may have. I didn’t want to. I find political rhetoric . . . ” I pause because the first word that comes to mind is “ass-clenching,” as in it grabs my sphincter and sucks it two-and-a-half inches up my colon. “. . . ass clenching,” I say because I can’t think of a better word. “Let me get your mom.”
     “Oh,” Bart says. “Okay.”

Jackass Jones decides not to
concede Donald Trump his putt.**

Thank God, he doesn’t ask me to elaborate, but I could have. Political rhetoric hurts my ears though its predictability may be worse than its clang. (This is why Trump was such an initial success: he did clang, but he was not predictable. [Yet.])
     “But you listen to the same songs over and over,” my better angel interjects.
     “Maybe, but songs that sing not songs that carp and whine.” (Caw, howl, bark, bray; squeal, squeak, hiss, hawk and spit).
     “Bossa nova not George Crumb.”
     “Actually, I quite like George Crumb. He’s not spewing clichés like ‘Now every girl can believe she can be vice-president,’ or ‘I’ll be the president of all the people; I’ll unite not divide.’ Tell me she didn’t say that, tell me he didn’t say that, and I’ll be disappointed I didn’t listen.”
     “Well,” my better angel said, paused a moment, then stopped altogether.

10.08.20

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* Dominga’s significant other, Alfredo’s step-whatever. See here.
** He’s informed on the next tee he won’t be playing with the ex-President again.