Doggone

Brat Boy switched to the sports channel. A beer commercial came on. Young people played on the beach.  Drinking beer had given all the men washboard stomachs. The women stood up perfectly straight to avoid tipping forward and implanting themselves into the sand.

“You ever miss drinking?” Brat Boy asked.

“Sometimes,” I said. “But, I know I’m like that dog in Aesop’s fable.  He finds a bone and he’s happy as hell until he comes to the river.  The dog thinks his reflection in the water is another dog with a bone.  He tries to get the other dog’s bone and drops his own into the water.”

“You can have this life or you can have the booze, but you can’t have both,” Brat Boy said.

“In my teens and my twenties life threw a poor kid a bone. I dropped it chasing an illusion. Won’t do that today.”

Today I’ll hold onto what I have.

 

Jury Duty © 2020 by Ken Montrose

Jury Duty is a work of fiction. Any similarity between the characters and anyone you might know is purely coincidental.

Other works by Ken Montrose are available at: www.greenbriartraining.com https://www.pinterest.com/kenmontrose/mt-rose/