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The Daily Reflections
of Jan Cox

 

During a recent little literary tête-à-tête, the city librarian remarked that "surely" the saddest book she'd ever seen, at least by its title, was A Stool's View Of Life.
(She declined to elaborate.)

 

 

On an island were three different groups:
The first told one another that the gods were always listening; the second group said that the gods hardly ever listened,and the third segment believed that the gods did listen in on men, but didn't particularly care what they said.
Once a year they all got together and played a game called "Where Do YOU Want To Live?"

 

 

Late one night, after a bunch of the younger recruits had been singing folk songs around the fire, an ole camp sergeant looked off into the darkness of the woods and muttered, "IF a revolutionist DID `go down that road feeling bad,' he'd go down that muther fucker feeling RE-ALLY bad!!"

 

 

In that coffee shop near the university bookstore, I overheard one city-looking chap say to his companions that he had once planned to "be a poet," until he took full notice of how many of them apparently come to think of themselves as being "sad, crippled creatures, alone in their room, drink in hand, humming and dancing to imaginary phonograph records." He said he b'lieved he'd just stay in the "funeral trade," where things were a bit more cheerful.

 

 

For normal city purposes,
the best telescopes are those
based on the labyrinth.

In his continuing attempt to save a few bucks, that same guy from last time, instead of writing, stopped me again on the street and said, "Sometimes I like long ideas and sometimes, short ones--can you explain this?"

...(There was once a roadhouse, pretty far off the main bus route, which was known to its patrons as "Who You Gonna Call?!!"

...[And, yes, it was open twenty-five hours a day.])

 

 

J