Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Wakefield Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
Denise is the host and places only one requirement on us: the story is to be exactly six sentences in length.
The prompt word:
MESS
“Clean this mess up else we’ll all end up in jail.”
“What? Did you think we Proprietors don’t enjoy listening to oldies?”
The tall, thin man tipped himself from a half-recline against the main bar in the Six Sentence Café & Bistro and, holding his phone with two hands, finger-tutted the volume down from: ‘You might want to make an appointment with your otologist’ to ‘oh, so you were trying to speak to me’.
The Sophomore stood, right hand on a sun-warped stack of out-of-date copies of ‘The Watchtower’ covering half of the top of the cigarette machine in the vestibule: leaning cautiously into the eternal evening of the Bistro, “No, man, I was just surprised to find myself here, for a second there, hearing Fagan’s voice, wasn’t sure where,” drawing closer to the man at the bar, amended, “when I was, ya know?”
“Too well, young exile, all too well,” the Proprietor, more formally dressed than normal, rotated on the bar stool a non-verbal welcome and invitation to sit, “The coast is clear for the moment, but then I don’t need to tell you, the river of time is available to all and controllable by none.”
*
About clarkscottroger
Finally! The Sophomore and the tall thin man converse.
Surely, the Sophomore has a clue? (I contend he must)
And now all you have to do is increase the entropy of the system, avoid temporal paradoxes, maintain causality…fun.
lol
ikr?
It’ll be interesting, whatever else it is. May i trade those Watchtowers for a pile of old and new Reader’s Digests? ;)
by all means, but, if I recall, the RDs had (or perhaps still have) glossy cover and back pages… be lucky to have two stay stacked! Say what you will about pulp paper, it’s slow to slip.
Maybe trade those Watchtower mags for a timeless guitar riff?
Ah, the river of time.
I had a cigarette machine in my pub and I placed a fart machine inside it. What fun I had.
remotely controlled, I trust
Nice phrase: “the river of time is available to all”
A cigarette machine, a stack of The Watchtower… and “the eternal evening of the Bistro” … words which paint pictures.
I’m still trying to picture the Jehovah Witnesses parading through the Bar and Bistro.
If it helps, my. experience with that particular missionary is they will stand outside the door unless invited in. I’ve had colleagues who have been Witnesses and, perhaps I was an exception, they did not push. Plus they tended to be well dressed and… and!! they are willing to ‘knock on doors’ (or, at least they did, maybe it’s not a thing any longer) which is quite deserving of respect. Most of my work history has been in sales of one manifestation or another and I’ve tried to knock on doors. Could not get myself to, other than enough to say I tried. That was for money. Witnae do it on faith. ayiiee (My respect extends to LDS in this regard. What a tough way to ‘make a living’ lol) But, of course, as the Wakefield Doctrine reminds us, reality is personal to a certain degree for all of us. I would not presume to claim to know how they feel walking up to houses, well-dressed, pamphlets in hand.
that being said, the experience of those who left the magazines on the cigarette machine would surely have varied depending on the Proprietor they encountered (though not greatly, as evidenced by the fact of the magazines being there).
the tall, thin man would have listened politely to the extent that it did not conflict with other demands on his time and…
would be an interesting Café post!
Hey! there’s a premise for a walk-on if you find yourself in the mood to visit the SSC&B somme week!
Excellent! And a new word – ‘otologist’ 🦻 (nice change 🧠)
ikr?
(half the fun in writing is having an excuse to read the dictionary)
“…the river of time is available to all and controllable by none.” Great closing line!