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2002-06-16 | 8:49 a.m.

The weekends are not terribly promising for e-mail, but at least I get News of the Weird, which is such a treat to read. Each item is like a tiny short story, breeding fascination. Example:

A 54-year-old school guard was accidentally shot to death by a colleague as the two demonstrated quick-draw techniques to each other outside a school dance (New Orleans, April).

The story unfolds in my imagination. I can see them there, in New Orleans, lit by faraway incandescents, mosquitoes arcing in the glowing spheres of yellow light, warm and muggy even in April, harsh throbbing dance music (kids these days) borne out of the auditorium into the night air, across the street and into the neighborhoods. These two, uniformed, not so old that they can't remember their own school dances, are entertaining each other, imploring each other to "watch this, watch this": then an unexpected gunshot that is both quieter and louder and certainly more terrible than you would ever imagine is followed by a piercing shriek and an endless murmur of Oh-my-God, Oh-my-God!

Now I'm thinking of a rhyme I learned in grade school.

One fine day in the middle of the night
two dead boys got up to fight
back to back they faced each other
drew their swords
and shot each other.
The deaf policeman heard the noise
and went and killed the two dead boys.

Today is Father's Day and we have a modest celebration planned. I will cook breakfast and the kids will present homemade gifts. I also got him (Duff, not my father; my father died in 1999) a couple of survival books, to help him if he ever gets on Survivor. Silly, but that's the sort of person I am.

I used to enjoy buying presents and I guess I still do, but I don't get around to buying them much. Except for the kids' birthday party presents, an act even I have managed to refine into something like efficiency. I'm not truly depressed but I find it hard to drum up enthusiasm for anything like that. Between no money and no time to think things over (I do have time but it never feels like enough), not to mention the way the commercial culture makes any official act of gift-giving feel yucky and embarrassing, there is not much desire left over. Sometimes I see things and think, That would make a good gift for So-and-so, but the thought is almost entirely theoretical.

I don't want to be this way. I want to be a generous person, give presents and enjoy it, instead of just bagging up my unneeded crap and trying to foist it off on people.

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