Practice post
April 16, 2008
We’re in Houston for my great uncle’s funeral. We’ve just dropped our luggage at our hotel room near the airport, and walked across the parking lot to a sports bar, where we pack ourselves (mom, dad, sister, brother, me) into a booth. We’ve ordered our dinner. We suspect this meal will be about as good as one can reasonably expect from a sports bar in a hotel parking lot on the edge of Houston, but we’ve been in transit for hours and just want to eat. Our conversation turns to the subject of my brother’s left index finger, the tip of which he recently severed while cutting limes in a bar. He peels back his bandage to show us the carnage. It looks like a raw cartoon steak. My sister, to our delight, is horrified1. I grab the salt shaker from our table and begin to mime the act of throwing salt upon my brother’s wound2. I cease to mime the act when the cap becomes dislodged3 and a heap of salt pours out onto my brother’s fingertip, eliciting a guttural howl that draws the attention of all the patrons in the bar. He is rocking, holding his own hand, sucking air through his teeth. I try to apologize, but he isn’t listening; he’s staring through his teary eyes at the shaker with a look of incomprehension. The shaker has fallen on its side. Affixed to its bottom4 is a sticker that reads, simply, “LYE”. In a tiny, throaty voice, my brother moans, “Oh, why is there lye on the table?”5
