COMPLETED WORKS

THE STRANGE SLEEPER

by Curtis W. Long

He was gruff, inattentive and dismissive of childish quirks. He would come home after work, plop down in his easy chair and drift off into deep slumber, utterly divorced from the household clatter around him--the radio, the comings and goings of the kids, the piano. On the infrequent occasions when he awoke and became a part of his surroundings, the experience was usually unpleasant, humorless and threatening. After the evening was done, he would get up, go upstairs to bed, and rise the next morning before dawn for work. He never missed work.

The children made a practice of avoiding him like the plague. Their movements would be timed to remain out of his line of sight prior to the slumber, to walk pass him with trepidation and remain out of doors during his waking moments.

As the years passed, his temperament did not improve--until one day he went to live with one of his sons. Once the grandchildren appeared, he became a doting softie. The grandchildren ruled! Their slightest whim was his command. He could not be more attentive to them. When they wanted to go to the movies, the fast food place--wherever--they went. He could not buy them enough gifts nor increase sufficiently their savings accounts.

That's how it was with the grandchildren. As far as the now-adults were concerned, those who as children had treaded softly around him, nothing had changed! Implausibly, his attitude with them remained pretty much as it always had been.

He had begun to deteriorate in health, until it got to the point where he was completely dependent upon the father of those adored grandchildren. Now, when his gruffness and disdain were exhibited--seemingly oblivious to the delicacy of his predicament--it was met with a sternness he never suspected of those children he had terrorized at an earlier time. This continued until his demise.

Strange. One wonders how much more pleasant would have been his life had he been able to appreciate the joy of childhood at an age when it could have soothed things for others--as well as for himself.