Tag: bag

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Storyteller

Late snack on the island

Ahhhh my favorite, Crix biscuits, man how I loved those. I would sneak a bag of it from the kitchen, tip toed to the fridge, got a jar of Guava jelly, humming softly with delight. Spread the jelly on the Crix biscuits, do a little dance, but stopped as the wooden floors creaked, looked around to make sure I would not get caught in the act. Before I knew it the bag was almost empty, I thought about putting some of them back in the bag, too late, that Guava jelly was all over them. So I wrapped up the rest and tucked them in my pants pocket, maybe this bag will be forgotten. I snuck into my room, cringing every time the floorboards creaked. I would sit at the window, looking out at the ocean crunching on Crix, covered with Guava jelly.

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Parts Dirty Immigrant Storyteller

What you mean I eat Possum From the novel I am a Dirty Immigrant

I worked a lot of hours and I always worked the night shift. Thank God for Mountain Dew; I drank enough of it to fill up a bloody Olympic-size pool.  One of the places I worked was an apartment complex on Eleven Mile road. One night I was working when a rodent started screeching in the darkness.  I stepped out of the guard hut and saw two yellow eyes staring at me. It walked into the light and I thought, damn, this beast looks like something I’ve seen before. When the beast realized I was walking towards it, the bloody beast charged at me.  I turned and ran back to the hut and dove into the small window, landing on my head, my size seventeen feet sticking out the window. For a second everything went black. I dragged my feet off the window sill, my hip bouncing off the concrete floor. I stood up and looked out the window, joints cracking and head throbbing. This strange but familiar screech escaped from the beastly monster, echoing through the complex, sending chills down my spine. It stood on its hind legs looking up at me. Bloody thing looked like it was trying to climb in. I made sure the door was closed, sat in the chair and waited as the beast stood at the window most of the night, taunting me. Every time I looked out, it snarled, showing its rows of sharp teeth. The whole time I thought, “Damn, that bloody animal reminds me of home.”

The next day I told my brother about the incident. He smiled and then told me that he had seen a possum out there. That was the first time I realized that I had eaten the infernal animal. I had heard about people eating them in Kentucky and West Virginia but never realized what it was; back home we call it a Manique. Here I was laughing at rednecks for eating those nasty beasts. Here I am, a man who once feasted on the same meat. In my defense, my father had tricked me into eating the thing. I even used to go hunting them. We used to go to the woods at the back of the prison. One person would have a flash light and the others would have a Bangonet, a long bamboo spear. The person with the flashlight would shine the light into the possum’s eyes as it ran across a tree branch. We would poke at the beast with the Bangonet as another person with a burlap bag waited for the beast to fall into the bag. The point is, we are a lot alike. It is the bloody ideologies that make us believe we are different.