Standing behind the elongated stained wood surface she is counting quietly as her hands move swiftly; sorting, collecting, and tossing out. The stains, all different forms and colors, are like elaborate Rorschach inkblots smudged one into the other. The heavy stench of bear adds the last piece to the surreal vision.
I stand in front of her my eyes trying to follow her flying hands, distracted by her tattoos covered arms. Several different shaped hearts, one name scribbled in between abstract colored shapes. I never thought it was going to be a woman, never pictured it like that, so business like and task oriented, but now as I watch the process it makes a lot of sense and its’ efficiency and quick pace have some bizarre beauty.
It feels as if it is not about me at all. I am only a bystander, a pale background. It’s about the heap of tin, plastic and glass being sorted so quickly. Nothing hidden, it is all right there on the open surface naked and fully exposed.
A moving production line, my mind registers a note; I couldn’t have sketched out a better picture of the final moments. Left or right, to heaven or to hell, the mixture of anticipation and excitement heavy in the frozen air, almost touchable, like my breath, a thin white swirl.
Fifteen cans of coke, ten cans of iced tea, few bottles of red wine, some odds and ends shaped bottles tossed to the side, misfits yet redeemable.
Four dollars and fifteen cents, she hands me the bills and with a quick movement sweeps them all into a big box.
You're not going to accuse me of over-interpreting if this--particularly the next to the next to last graf-- reminds me of something that has nothing to do with bottles but a lot to do with sorting, production lines, efficiency categorizing, swift decisions about life or death, heaven and hell, final moments, vapor disappearing into the air, nakedness, redemption and its opposite.
ReplyDeleteThis works beautifully--or would if only there were the tiniest hint leading the reader's mind to that other sorting place. As it stands, only my knowledge about you allows me access there.
But if you give the woman a swastika tattoo or if she were to say, 'You know they melt this glass down to make new bottles....' or something along those lines, then the reader would provide the rest of the bridge.