They Can Call me Dr. Puck

Monday, May 7, 2012

Puck had found his stocked children’s Red Cross bag that morning in the linen closet.
“Can I use this, Mama?”
“Sure. You may save it to help your baby brother when he comes.”
“Well, Mama, you will have to teach me how to use this. Because he will be mine forever, and I have to take care of him.”
After some time pondering the contents…
“Can I be a doctor forever and ever?”
“Sure, if you want to…”
“And I will be other things too, right?”
“Well, you said you wanted to play for the Cardinals and be a pastor like Daddy’s going to be, right?”
“Yes, I will be all of those things. And a musician.”
“What kind of musician?”
“A musician that disappears things.”
“Ah…”
“I want to be all that, and God will have to help me, because that’s a lot of work to do. You can’t be all that at the same time, without God helping you. I’m going to be Doctor Puck. Octavian Puck Theodore Silverspoon. So everyone’s going to be calling me that from now on. Doctor Puck. Doctor Who didn’t quit saving people. And I will not eeder [either]. And God will take care of all the bad people so I can concentrate on being a doctor.”

The rain was in again, nice and soft like.
Puck stuck out his tongue in deep concentration, his bare feet stuck under the kitchen table, as he wrote a birthday note to Anneliese.
And Collette proofed OLeif’s next sermon.

Rose called around two. She had scheduled another dentist appointment regarding her wisdom teeth which now seemed to be coming in. Puck had words for her too…
“Tell Onion that I am going to be a doctor. And nothing’s going to stop me.”

He requested handfuls of dry spaghetti to snack on in the afternoon.
Just like Rose.
Collette read to him from his Bible as he snuggled up beside her on the couch with the fistful of pasta…
“Mama, make sure me chomping on these noodles doesn’t interrupt you,” he informed her carefully.

OLeif returned in time for a late lasagna, hot out of the oven.
Meanwhile, Puck was pushing into Question #47 in the First Catechism, whose answer involved a notation about the “human race”.
“What’s a race?” Puck asked.
“Like a group of people,” Puck explained.
“So… every person in the world is racing?”
Later, Collette explained to him that OLeif had been up very late the previous night writing his sermon. Puck was concerned for him, that he might fall asleep at work…
“If Daddy gets in trouble at work for falling asleep, I’m going to have to call the police to take away everyone at work, the whole building. I just don’t want to talk any more about his day at work.”
The wind and gray ruffles kept in, on a 1930’s-like overgrown garden world.

As Puck was put down to bed that night, Collette noted the pile of Playmobil magazine, cigar “suitcase”, Calvin & Hobbes, St. Louis arch cube clutter on the rug…
“Puck, you need to clean that stuff up when you’re finished with it. Spiders like to collect in those things when you leave them on the floor.”
“Well,” he replied. “I want it to look like Uncle Francis’ room.”
“Exactly. Uncle Francis gets all kinds of spiders in his room.”
“He needs to turn around his sin and clean up his room. Doesn’t he?”

Meanwhile, Joe was having a big send-off bonfire that night with friends, before his escapades into the southwest.

And OLeif… crashed at ten, finishing up his sermon.

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Jamie Larson
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