"OH MY GOD! SVEN IS DEAD!"
the new neighbor Jack Krag said, running from his car to the swing set
in Sven's yard where Sven Guyson laid prone on the ground, one foot
still afloat in the seat of the swing, his face against the sod, his cap
ajar.
"SVEN! SVEN!" Krag
repeated plaintively, gently turning Sven over onto his back; the
imprint of grass and dirt stuck to Sven's open-eye slobbery face.
"HE'S JUST A'FOOLIN' YOU, bon ami!"
shouted Monique, Sven's wife of two years and some months from the
porch. "He's just workin' up to his expiration date and wants his death
to be just a part of our normal routine. He doesn't want to surprise
anyone by dyin' unexpectedly. You know what a shock a death can be. He's
just tryin' to ease us all into it, one act at a time.
"WHAT??" Krag fairly hollered in disbelief, looking at Monique, then back st Sven, and back to Monique.
Sven
sighed and smiled. Krag looked back to Sven, and eased him back to the
grass, perplexed at his neighbor's antics -- and even more perplexed at
his wife's.
"He does this all the time?" he said to Monique, as though Sven was already the dearly departed.
"Well,
only since he turned sixty-one last month. He's been at it since about
the middle of July. The first time was on, lessee ... July 14th. Yeah,
the 13th was on a Friday ... I had come out of the house to shovel some
ashes out of the campfire pit, that old tractor tire rim there, as we
had had a fire going in there for several days and nights ..."
"Wasn't it in the 90s that week?" Krag replied in amazement. "Why on earth would anyone sit around a campfire in that heat?"
"It
wasn't for the heat, bon ami ... a campfire in Minnesota is more than
just logs burning, it's spiritual. It's the fragrance of the past, a
visual of our ancestors leftover from ancient times. I am a fire keeper.
Do you think I am crazy?"
"Uh why, no, of course not," Krag said rapidly, back-pedaling. "It's just, well, I didn't understand completely.
"Here,"
(Monique gestures with both her hands). "I had let the fire go out
because the forecast was for rain that evening, and I had taken the
opportunity to shovel out some ashes. I had gone into the cabin for
something and when I came back out, there was Sven face down, drooling
from his hairy lips at the plastic picnic table, his shoulders forward,
an empty beer bottle on the ground. I was mortified!"
"I'll bet you were! Krag said, eyes wide, his full attention now on Monique.
"Well,
I rushed to him and thrust my hand against his jugular where I could
feel a hearty healthy pulse to my great relief, then I slid it down his
back and grabbed the waistline of his under shorts -- and THEN I GAVE
THEM SUCH A JERK! that he fell backwards off the stoop and took
everything with him. Still, the tosser didn't move a lick."
"Even with his shorts against his chin?" Krag asked his eyes wide in question, his mind reeling against the possibility.
"Even with the name tag against his ponytail!" Monique confirmed. "He just laid there, playing possum."
"NO!"
Krag chortled, the thought of Sven playing dead with a wedgie choking
off his blood flow was 'way too much hilarity for him to remain stoic
about. He could see these two were to be fun neighbors even though his
closest neighbor, Ula Josephson, seemed quite a card in his own right.
"So
I rolled him over on his back and tickled him 'til he laughed!" Monique
said, pushing the bill of her cap back on her head. "That's when he
explained to me what he was doing."
Sven reminds me, 'Death is just a part of life and often comes when we least expect it. No foolin'."
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