Jim Continues His Written Assault on Skokie, IL

I already blogged about a free verse poem I wrote to support an art exhibit at the Skokie Public Library starting next month. Well, you can slap my ass and call me a patron of the arts, because I contributed another written piece. This time, it is a very silly micro story about this still life painting of peaches.

Much to my surprise, these still life paintings apparently are not just about fruit but about very serious themes in life. Listen to the artist here …

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But what if there was no heavy backstory? What if the painting was just about three peaches hanging out? That concept resulted in my goofy story called “Peach Life.” You can link to it by clicking here. Or, for those of you underachievers for which clicking a link may require too much effort, “Peach Life” follows in all its inane entirety.

Peach Life

“Why does the knife have to be pointing toward me?” asked the peach on the left. “I’m definitely the least ripe of us three.”

“Maybe it’s to cut off your hoity-toity stem and leaves,” the middle peach snidely suggested. “You always thought you were better than us. Well, let’s see how you look without all your fancy foliage. Hey, what do you think?”

The peach on the right seemed startled. “Please don’t drag me into this. I’m not even on the napkin. I don’t think they plan to eat me.”

“Eat?” questioned the center peach. “Is that what this is all about? I got the chills when you said that, and my fuzz stood straight up. What are these people, barbarians?”

The peach on the left replied, “What are you so worried about? The knife’s pointing at me. And what did you think would happen to us? Do you think we’re posed like this for someone to do a still life oil painting of us?”

“That might explain the easel standing there,” chimed in the peach on the right.

“Oh, great. I hear these artists can take weeks to do an oil painting,” groaned the middle peach. “We’ll rot.”

“Maybe the artist will use the Bob Ross technique and be done in under an hour,” offered the right-side peach.

“And then what happens?” the left peach asked rhetorically. “I’ll say it. They eat us.”

The right peach gazed wistfully out the window and pondered, “Maybe they will savor our juicy flesh and plant our pits in the backyard. We’ll sprout and live again to someday produce offspring who will honor our legacies.”  

“Or, maybe our pits get dug up by squirrels, cracked open, and eaten,” posited the center peach.

“Our futures are as fuzzy as our skin,” the right peach opined.

“Here she comes, and she’s holding a paintbrush. Yay!” noted the left peach.

The middle peach relaxed and said, “I hope she gets my good side. You know, without the bruise. Damn produce guy dropped me.”

And with that, peach life went still once again.

It looks like the writers are supposed to read our creations at an open mic on December 8th at the library. That’s a Thursday night, and it will conflict with Thursday Night Football. But I checked the schedule, and it’s the Raiders at the Rams. Both teams don’t look too good this year, so I may head to the library that night. Of course, my biggest concern is if they validate parking.

For more funny stories, check out my book of short stories about the afterlife titled Beyond: Tales of the Afterlife, just one click away on Amazon.