monizing, and there was still the
Communion to be administered, but God knew it had been a long time since the
congregation was engaged so thoroughly with coming to grips with God and what
their faith meant.

Afterwards, when Art was returned to his scandalized, thin-lipped Gran, Father
Ferlenghetti made a point of warmly embracing her and telling her that Art was
welcome at his pulpit any time, and suggested a future in the seminary. Gran was
amazed, and blushed under her Sunday powder, and the clawed hand on his shoulder
became a caress.

3.

The theme of this story is choosing smarts over happiness, or maybe happiness
over smarts. Art's a good guy. He's smart as hell. That's his schtick. If he
were a cartoon character, he'd be the pain-in-the-ass poindexter who is all the
time dispelling the mysteries that fascinate his buddies. It's not easy being
Art's friend.

Which is, of course, how Art ("not his real name") ended up sitting 45 stories
over the woodsy Massachusetts countryside, hot August wind ruffling his hair and
blowing up the legs of his boxers, pencil in his nose, euthanizing his story
preparatory to dissecting it. In order to preserve the narrative integrity, Art
("not his real name") may take some liberties with the truth. This is
autobiographical fiction, after all, not an autobiography.

Call me Art ("not my real name"). I am an agent-provocateur in the Eastern
Standard Tribe, though I've spent most of my life in GMT-9 and at various
latitudes of Zulu, which means that my poor pineal gland has all but forgotten
how to do its job without that I drown it in melatonin precursors and treat it
to multi-hour nine-kilolumen sessions in the glare of my travel lantern.

The tribes are taking over the world. You can track our progress by the rise of
minor traffic accidents. The sleep-deprived are terrible, terrible drivers.
Daylight savings time is a widowmaker: stay off the roads on Leap Forward day!

Here is the second character in the morality play. She's the love interest. Was.
We broke up, just before I got sent to the sanatorium. Our circadians weren't
compatible.

4.

April 3, 2022 was the day that Art nearly killed the first and only woman he
ever really loved. It was her fault.

Art's car was running low on lard after a week in the Benelux countries, where
the residents were all high-net-worth cholesterol-conscious codgers who guarded
their arteries from the depredations of the frytrap as jealo