2003-03-20 12:05 p.m. The canary is dead, the one we brought with, so our four man crew drops for lunch and Larry puts in a call to the Men In Labcoats to let them know what's up. The life of a miner is a hard one, is why I quit. You wanna know where the money is? Biotechnology. Yup. Me, Blacklung Billy, Larry and the Toad are the world's greatest brain miners and if you don't believe me, I'll prove it to you by pointing out that we're the ONLY brain miners in the world. We all got our starts in Pennsylvania, working on coal veins like normal miners, like our parents and parents' parents. We didn't go to the same schools or grow up together, but when you spend years underground mining, twisting your tunnels to follow the money, every once in awhile you'll stumble across other crews. You just go punching through their walls, maybe pissing 'em off by dropping loose rock onto their lunchboxes or something, but all you have to do is whip out the thermoses full of instant belly fuel and everyone's friends again. Anyway, due to health concerns and the nightly weeping of our women folk (all of whom suffered nightmares of us drowning somewhere underground-- and what could they be eating before bedtime to share that dream, I don't know), we all moved to San Mateo, California on the payroll of this new science company. How it works is they shrink us down and set us on the scalp line with our also-shrunk equipment. Blacklung Billy (whose lungs aren't really black, they're grey & artificial) fires up the Digger and we get our waders splattered with the broken capillaries as we journey into the cranium. So far, we've mined out the tumors of three multimillionaires who could afford the whole procedure. A four man crew, plus the labcoats and electricity used ain't cheap. We were working on Mr. Hernschaft when the canary dropped off his perch, which was new for us, so while we munched our sandwiches (I had American cheese on cracked wheat), Larry called up to find out what we should do. "The canary's dead," said Larry. "You should bathe more often," said the Toad, but no one laughed. The joke was old. "Dead?" came a voice over the radio. "How?" "Dunno," said Larry. "Heartbreak? Old age? I thought you might know, that's why I called." Do all miners want to be stand-up comedians? I don't know. We'd all need new wardrobes if we were gonna try. "Okay. How much tumor is left?" "Hard to say," said Larry. "You can't really tell until you've followed the vein to its end." "What is that, cheese sandwich?" Billy asked me. I said yeah and he made a face. Meanwhile he's eating pastrami with bean sprouts, no mustard no nothing. "All right, make your way back out. We'll have to x-ray him again then send you guys back in maybe." "Are we at least gonna finish lunch before we go?" asked the Toad. "The canary's dead," said Larry. "We don't know what that means, but that's why we bring the canary. If it's dead, we might be next. So pack your stuff, let's move." On the long hike back up out of Hernschaft's head, the Toad told us a story to pass the time: "You guys heard the one about the Downingtown Dozen? They were two squads of miners who were about a mile and a half underground, right, and it was Halloween. Working independently, they both broke through different walls at the same time and stumbled across this ancient crypt. Inside the crypt, in the middle, was a skeleton wearing overalls and holding a pick. The twelve men looked around the crypt, but there were no trace minerals, so who knows what the skeleton was doing there. "Anyway, they left the room alone and didn't tell anyone, but within a year, seven of the miners had died in freak accidents, four of them had gotten divorced and one of them... one of them... I--" "You were the last miner of the twelve?" I asked. The Toad sobbed and nodded his head. Larry didn't even look back, he kept leading us out, swinging the cage with the canary so its body kept smacking against the sides of the cage. "What happened to you?" I asked. "Did you escape the curse?" "I got it worse than any of them," he said. "They died or lost the loves of their life, but I was doomed... doomed to live with the nickname 'The Toad!'" "Why?" I asked. "That's the curse!" he said, rubbing the backs of his fists against his eyes. "There's no reason! Why do you guys call me the Toad? There's nothing toad-like about me? Huh? But every day I have to find the strength to get out of bed and face the day knowing you're going to call me the Toad." Blacklung Billy sighed and looked thoughtful. I put my hand on the Toad's shoulder. "Your courage in the face of adversity is an example for us all." Then we emerged into the light among the follicles and waited to be enlarged. I like to think we all learned something that day, something about friendship and mining and what it means to be human. But I don't think we did. We had to re-enter his head the next day. Turns out the canary was dead before we left, some pet forensic scientist told us. Life goes on, tumors are dug out, our wives sleep well. What more could we ask for? |
1. today is nice 3. happy yesterdays 8. thanks for hosting 4. doing other things |
(Proof that I am the only one reading.) |