[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

Woman’s Voice:

This is Behind the Cut. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

In the mid-80s, a friend had a cassette tape of the Dead Milkmen’s Big Lizard in my Backyard. Before long, I had one, too.

My introduction to punk rock mostly came in the form of humorous bands, with the Vandals and The Dead Milkmen at the top for me. A borrowed copy of The Vandals’ Peace Through Vandalism lived in my car’s tape deck, and that friend and I almost wore out our copies of The Dead Milkmen’s Big Lizard in My Backyard.

When the Dead Milkmen released their second album, Eat Your Paisley, I was ecstatic. To this day, I still love every tune on that album. The ninth song on it is called “The Thing That Only Eats Hippies,” a tune about a kid who makes a monster in his bathtub for a 4-H project. The monster breaks loose [in the middle of the night] and then, well…true to the song’s title, it runs around eating hippies.

There’s a lot to like about the song; it’s one of many by the band that still finds its way into my head, where I never mind the earworm. The concept of a kid making a monster in his bathtub stuck with me for years.

Jump forward some time, and that seed of an idea came together one day when I sat down to write. I thought, “What about a story about a kid making a monster in his bathtub to take on a bully…and then things going terribly wrong?” It wouldn’t be the thing that only eats hippies…it would be a lonely kid’s only friend. Then I had to think, “Why is the kid so lonely?” Well, he’s in a messed up, broken family. He’s tired of being picked on by a kid named Chad Earnst. All that, and face it: junior high school sucked!

Making a monster in his bathtub makes perfect sense! And so, Booger became more than just an idea.

* * *

I really released my inner twelve-year-old when it came to the sound design for Booger. I’d seen a video about the sound effects behind one of the Mortal Combat videogames. In the video, the sound designer showed someone at Vox just how gross chewing a banana close to the mic could sound. He showed him how ripping apart green peppers can sound like a chest cavity being torn open with the right surrounding sounds. It was enough to get me really thinking about the sounds in Booger when it came time to record.

One night while cooking dinner, the sound of stirring rice and beans caught my attention. I grabbed a portable recorder and recorded the sounds, but it’s not used in Booger because the ambient sounds of the kitchen really stood out. Still, I knew a similar sound needed to be in the recorded story.

And so, one morning my wife shook her head as I went into a quiet closet at the back of the apartment with some sound gear, a banana, a bowl of oatmeal, and a glass of water with a straw. (Now, my wife’s a very patient woman who often takes part in helping me create sounds, but it still cracks her up at times, the efforts I go to record what I hear inside my head.) I thought the resulting sounds were funny. I figured as ridiculous as Booger is, why not go all-out with vile sound design?

* * *

Sound is a strange thing. You can shoot a mediocre video, but if it has great sound, it’s watchable. But if you watch a strong video with terrible sound…well, most people will move on. Good sound design often goes unnoticed because it helps people lose themselves in a story…whether it’s an audio tale like those on Not About Lumberjacks, or a multi-million-dollar movie.

While I thought the sound design for Booger was simply fun and funny, it really got to people. I heard from more listeners about Booger than perhaps any story I’ve ever told on Not About Lumberjacks. One morning alone, several friends messaged me about how gross the story sounded. During a recent board game night with friends, one of them mentioned about how hard it was for him to listen to, and another friend admitted the sounds got to him as well.

I listen to every story on Not About Lumberjacks multiple times before I let them go online. The reward for me is listening with my wife. By the time we sit down together, it’s more a visual thing for me because I’ve heard the story so many times. I don’t like hovering when people read a story I’ve written because I know it makes them nervous. But watching my wife hear a story for the first time is one of the reasons I do this show.

Watching her listen to Booger, though…I realized what I’d grown used to really was really quite vile. Seeing her face twist into shocked expressions with each new layer of sound made me wonder if I’d gone too far. I don’t talk about it, much, but I’m in the process of querying agents with a “serious” novel. I almost didn’t post Booger in fear that, no matter how strong an agent might feel the accompanying sample of the novel was…if they did just a little bit of research, they’d find Not About Lumberjacks, click the top story, and think to themselves, “Oh…oh, no. No. This cannot stand…This is a very wrong person!”

At the same time, I often think about my life in these terms: would younger me like the adult I grew up to become?

I think younger me would be quite impressed to see that we’re finally skilled enough to pull off the kind of serious fiction we were never quite sure we could write, but aspired to nonetheless. Younger me would be happy to see that we still play Dungeons and Dragons and that we can finally play some musical instruments with at least a vague proficiency. And younger me would think the sound design in Booger is the greatest thing ever!

So, if Booger grossed you out, blame the awkward kid I once was…and, of course, The Dead Milkmen.

* * *

[Theme music fades in]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called Reaper by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, the episodes, and voice talent.

In two weeks, it’s the November anniversary episode in which I go beyond my normal promise to never – ever – tell a story about lumberjacks. Join Cynthia Griffith and me for a tale called…The Lumberjack of Williamsburg.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

Woman’s Voice:

This is Behind the Cut. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

I wasn’t sure about releasing Under the Big Top. Not only is it almost twice as long as the longest episode of Not About Lumberjacks, but it breaks a lot of rules for mysteries.

It’s an older story I’ve let sit for some time, thinking the day would come when I’d trim the long opening and get into the story quicker. I’d tighten up some of the writing that seemed off and improve some issues with its flow.

But I’ve not released a story in some time, so I released it as-is. I figured I could use this episode of Behind the Cut to talk about how good enough is often, well…good enough. (Or to say, “Hey, some of my older writing had issues, but you get better with practice…”)

A funny thing happened with this episode, though: people really seem to love it. Where I see room for so much improvement, others see a story that took them away from everything for an hour. I feel mysteries have an inherent problem of deception, with red herrings and other misdirection placed there for no other reason than to give readers and listeners more to consider, but that’s a big part of the fun for many.

I’ve released other Not About Lumberjacks episodes I wasn’t so sure about, only to realize, when I sit down and listen to them with my wife, that I like them quite a bit.

Sitting down with a splash of bourbon and listening to “Under the Big Top” with my wife reminded me what we’re not-so-sure about often isn’t as big a deal as it can be in our minds.

* * *

While I believe all stories are mysterious—at least in the sense we don’t know everything about them and how they will end—I’ve not read many actual mysteries. A few Tony Hillerman novels, and a couple other things, is about it.

Oddly, while I’m not much of a mystery fan, my second novel—which I tucked away in a drawer—is a paranormal mystery set in Chicago in the 1920s. Two novels ago, it was a story about a recently divorced celebrity chef who moves to a small town in northern Wisconsin right about the time the town’s most-hated resident goes missing.

I think the reason I rewrote the Wisconsin story until it felt right, but shelved the Chicago story, is the point of that one was the mystery. (The Wisconsin story was about so much more…)

When the mystery is the point, stories often feel forced to me. Characters are placed there to give readers options to roll over in their minds. If an investigator is looking for just one person we know did it…well, it’s not very mysterious, is it?

None of this is to knock the genre…it’s just not my preference.

And maybe that’s why I was never so sure about “Under the Big Top”: it’s not the kind of story I normally write. Most tales shared on Not About Lumberjacks have a quirky side to them…and I understand those stories, like mysteries to me, might not be one’s preference.

So why did I write “Under the Big Top”?

It was a challenge in my old writing group. I wanted to see if I could pull off something I wasn’t sure about. Because here’s another thing about mysteries and me: while they are not my preference, I respect good mysteries as much as I respect anything.

I know there’s a different craft that goes into them. In many ways, they’re harder to write than the kinds of things I normally write. There are more rules to follow…and to learn which to bend or break. Mysteries require a different kind of effort than most of the things I write.

* * *

One of the other reasons I don’t prefer mysteries is I don’t like trying to figure things out when I read. This might sound strange to some, because often writers say they can’t enjoy reading or watching movies because they can see where a story is likely to go.

I prefer to lose myself when I read, so thinking, “Whodunit?” is not my thing.

* * *

I have a general rule about stories: I only discuss stories I’m not fond of with a couple close people. I don’t see the point of talking about something you didn’t like in the open when you can spend that time talking about something you loved.

But I’m going to break my own rule and talk about a story, at least in part, that left me flat. And maybe it’s that, “at least in part,” aspect that makes me feel like it’s okay to talk about Dennis Lehanne’s Mystic River, which I largely adored. (Maybe part of where it lost me was in the marketing, which billed it as a master work of mystery and not a literary novel about the past haunting the future.)

The actual mystery aspect of Mystic River felt a bit like a cop-out. The writing and overall story was great, but it was also like, “The murderer was really only there in a passing scene…” (Then again, maybe that’s my fault for expecting certain things from mysteries.)

In “Under the Big Top,” if I had a passing character, say a ticket-taker at the circus, take Crawford’s and Dessner’s tickets and not really give them much more time in the story than that, but later have them confess to crimes…it would seem almost unfair to the reader. It would be like a shoddy magician pointing to the wings on stage, saying, “Oh my God—what’s that?!” and throwing something in his hand to the other side while the audience’s attention is elsewhere.

It seems like a reader should at least get a chance to guess whodunit with enough information to piece things together—not just, “Ha! It was that person you barely saw and learned nothing about!”

In fairness to Mystic River, when I gave it more thought, the mystery wasn’t so much the point. It was more about how a choice made in childhood by several friends came back in adulthood and affected almost every aspect of those characters’ lives. The tragedy of what one old friend does to another hinges on that passing scene where we’re briefly introduced to who killed one of the main characters’ daughter.

* * *

While I don’t like the almost inherent things one must do when writing a mystery (the red herrings and other efforts to avoid revealing whodunit until much later), I understand why mysteries are so loved. I liked the Hillerman books I read because I loved the protagonists. And I even loved many of the characters the reader must consider if they’re trying to figure out who committed an act worthy of writing a mystery…and why they did it.

Again, I cannot profess to be a deep reader of mysteries. I’ve read more than those I’ve mentioned, but not enough that I’d consider myself any kind of expert. But I’ve watched enough cozy mysteries with my wife and my mom to know how important characters are to the genre.

In the end, as much as many like the challenge of figuring it all out and seeing if they’re right, just as many people simply love getting to meet interesting characters.

And there’s no mystery to that.

* * *

I appreciate that people seem to love “Under the Big Top.” In fact, it’s done better than most episodes of Not About Lumberjacks in its initial weeks than most stories, here.

In the world of podcasting, many would say that I should now change my focus and turn the show into a vehicle for mysteries in order to get more listeners. But I will continue telling whatever story bubbles up enough in my head that it gets finished, recorded, and released.

Still…if you hope for more mysteries from me, while it might be some time before I release another, you’re in luck. I have a Halloween-themed mystery in the works tentatively titled “Stopping Monsters,” and another that begins with this line: “The Quaking Bog Man was gone, and Crazy Mike was found dead behind the maintenance barn, covered in grass pink and rose pogonia blossoms.”

Who knows…maybe I can warm to mysteries after all…

* * *

[Theme music fades in]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, episodes, and voice talent.

In a few weeks—FINALLY—it’s the strange father and son tale I’ve been talking about for…well, way too long. But it’s in production as I speak, features several cool people lending their voices (most notably, Rick Coste), and I’m told it’s a bit of a tear-jerker by those who’ve read the story.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Intro music plays]

Woman’s Voice:

This is Behind the Cut. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Music fades out]

Christopher Gronlund:

My good friend, Curtis Hart, requested this episode of Behind the Cut. He noticed there are times I tease an episode and then…well…I release it much later than planned.

Perhaps the best example of this is “Alone in HQ,” a post-apocalyptic office story I mentioned at the end of episodes for well over a year.

Curtis wanted to know what’s behind those lags in planning to release a story…to actually sharing the story with you all.

The simple version is I do this for free, in addition to working a full-time job. On top of that, while I’m not the most social person, I do spend time with friends and family—most notably, trying to visit my mom every week and then spending every other Saturday playing Dungeons and Dragons, which, right now during the current pandemic, I’m seeing everybody online. But when we when I get together with friends in person, that’s an evening dedicated to hanging out. And when it comes to Dungeons and Dragons weekends, it’s safe to say two Saturdays a month are consumed by that…and I can get a lot of writing, recording, and editing done on a Saturday.

I also produce another podcast called Men in Gorilla Suits. It’s a thing I do with a friend—and while its production is very streamlined and nowhere near as involved as Not About Lumberjacks, every other week, it still requires hours I could dedicate to this show.

And, of course, I do write other things.

* * *

To that point, let’s talk about novels. I’m currently shopping a novel around to agents and writing another. Because it’s a story requiring great amounts of research, time is also spent reading books pertaining to the story—and finding videos, photographs, and other material. And it’s a literary story, which requires more focus from me than putting a short story together in chunks.

I’m also a technical writer by trade, and that means I often focus on work a bit more around the software releases I support. Technical writing pays the bills, so it takes priority. And when my day job is more demanding, I’m not as able to focus on short stories AND novels.

Sometimes I spend more time on Not About Lumberjacks; other times, I dedicate all my fiction-writing time to novels. Especially during those times—with novels—it means I’m less likely to put out a new episode of Not About Lumberjacks.

* * *

Granted, there have been times I’ve put in overtime at work, time toward a novel, and still released episodes of Not About Lumberjacks. Here’s my not-so-secret: I started the show with a backlog of stories mostly (or completely) ready to record.

“Pepper” is the 31^st story I’ve released for the show. If you factor in the Christmas episodes, with their multiple shorter works, 41 original stories exist on the site.

Of those, roughly half were already written. Meaning, if I needed to get an episode out during a busy point in my life, I could grab an old story and be well ahead in the most-lengthy part of most productions: the writing!

I’m now at a point that I have no old stories to record. Everything is new, so…I no longer have the luxury of planning an episode, realizing life is getting in the way, and falling back on an existing tale.

With very few exceptions, writing is the longest part of the process, and sometimes I’m not able to focus on new Not About Lumberjacks stories because I’m busy with work or other writing at the time.

* * *

When I factor in the time writing new stories, figuring out the production, recording, editing, creating and finding sounds and music, and then putting it all together, some episodes of the show have likely taken 40-60 hours to produce from that initial idea to something you can listen to for free. On average, I’d guess most take 20-30 hours.

I don’t view the creative things I do like a corporate return on investment. I have fun creating episodes, so…I make them. But when you factor in 40-60 hours spent on a thing that usually gets 40 listens in its initial weeks of release and then creeps up to maybe 75-100 listens—with rare stories listened to by 200 people—it’s not like there are throngs of people banging on my door, demanding episodes.

And while I care about every listener, Not About Lumberjacks comes with a certain reality for me: as much as I’d love it to be my day job (in addition to writing novels), it’s unlikely to ever happen. And that’s not me being gloomy—it’s just a fact: most people who set out to write fiction full time never will. You can wish to be a bestselling novelist all you want—even doing all you can to make it happen—but it’s like being a professional athlete: even some of the best in their fields never realize that dream.

And so…some days when I’ve been working long hours on a release at work, the last thing I want to do is eat dinner with my wife and then sit down to write stories and work on recording them until it’s time to go to bed…only to get up early and write at my day job the following morning.

More times than not, I just want to hang out with my wife. Sometimes I want to meet up with friends on a Wednesday or Thursday night. And other times, I just want to do nothing at all.

Sometimes, you want to have a little break.

* * *

All this is a way of saying that sometimes, stories just require more time.

I try keeping episodes of Not About Lumberjacks around thirty minutes or less. With the story “Alone in HQ,” there was so much more I wanted to do. Because it was framed as both an homage and a parody of Ayn Rand’s ANTHEM, I originally brought in a female character to match the protagonist of that story meeting a woman. But once I did that…I needed to build the relationship up more to pull off the planned ending.

And that added too much to the story, and took away much of what seemed to make the story charming.

In the end, I removed that story line entirely. But I struggled with the decision because there did seem to be something more with bringing in another character. I loved some of the scenes I wrote with the two characters, and what more I was able to say about corporate life with her presence.

But it would have meant the story bloating into novella range, much like the story it was framed around.

* * *

Sometimes it’s the writing that takes a long time. But other times, like “The Other Side,” it’s coordinating with other people and creating more involved effects that adds to how long it takes to create an episode. Mostly, though, it’s just a matter of wrapping up more pressing projects that get in the way of scheduling and releasing episodes.

I’d love Not About Lumberjacks to come out at least every other month. I’d love for the show to be my full-time job.

But that’s not my reality…

Effort doesn’t equal success. If it did, Not About Lumberjacks and everything else I do would be paying the bills.

Right now, the best I can hope for—and you as well—is that stories will come out when I’m able to make something new and set it loose upon the small following the show has.

And if that’s as good as it ever gets, that’s plenty-enough for me. I hope its good enough for you, too…or that at least you understand why it sometimes takes a while to get an episode out.

* * *

[Theme music fades in]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called “Reaper” by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, episodes, and voice talent.

I’m not sure what story’s coming up next, but it’s likely going to be about a virus and dreams…Unless, of course, as I’ve discussed here, that story takes more time than expected and I work on something else in the meantime…

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: this show is not about lumberjacks…

My name is Christopher Gronlund, and this is where I share my stories. Sometimes the stories contain truths, but most of the time, they’re made up. Sometimes the stories are funny—other times they’re serious. But you have my word about one thing: I will never—EVER—share a story about lumberjacks.

This time, it’s the strange father and son tale I’ve talked about for some time. A big thank you to Rick and Mandie Coste for helping my wife and me out on this one! And an extra thank you to Rick for putting this whole episode together.

And…the now-usual disclaimer: This story contains swearing and discussions about family death. You’ve been warned.

All right—let’s get to work…

Pepper…

* * *

Joey Palermo swore he heard his father call his name, but when he turned around, all he saw was the Boston terrier. It sat on the sidewalk, looking up at him as though he were some kind of god. Its tongue curled in and out of its mouth as it gasped for breath; its bulging eyeballs looked ready to fall from its tiny head like sticky marbles.

“You’re a funny looking thing.”

“Must be genetic,” the Boston terrier said in Joey’s dead father’s voice.

Joey looked at the coffee cup in his hand, wondering if somebody slipped something into the drink at Starbucks. Never one to use drugs, he couldn’t blame it on a flashback. He looked around to see if anyone was recording him–it seemed like something a YouTube prankster might do for views. But it was just him and the dog.

“You’re not losing your mind, Joe. It’s me, Dad. I’m back. You’d be amazed at all I went through to find you.”

Joey crouched down to the dog’s level. He read the tag on the Boston terrier’s red collar.

“Pepper?”

“A little girl named me. You know how it is. Remember when you were little and wanted to name the cat Flipper?”

Joey Palermo went through a phase as a kid when he was so enamored with reruns of the TV show, Flipper, that when his mother got a new cat, he begged her to name it after his favorite dolphin. No prankster would know that.

“Follow me.”

Joey led Pepper to the stairway leading up to his apartment. After making sure no neighbors were around, he said, “Can you climb stairs?”

“Yeah, but if you were about to offer carrying me up, go for it. It’s a wonderful way to get around.”

* * *

Inside his apartment, Joey set his father terrier down on the floor before plopping onto the couch. Pepper struggled to leap up beside his son. His stubby front legs searched for a grip on the cushion, while his back legs kicked against the side of the couch. Joey leaned forward and hoisted the dog up the rest of the way.

Pepper looked up at his son. “Thanks.”

Joey shook his head. “This can’t be real.”

“What can’t?”

“This! You! Coming back.”

“It’s real, Joe.”

“All right, so let me guess, then: you’re here to make amends for being a shitty father so you can move on or come back as a human again or something?”

“Nah, it’s not like that. You get a choice to stay or come back. You can come back as a human, an animal…whatever you want. It’s not like serial killers come back as bugs as punishment. What the fuck could a bug learn, ya know? ‘Oh, hey, I’m a mayfly for a day and I finally figured it all out! Just like that–enlightenment!’ Good people, bad people…all offered the same deal. Part of the deal is, if you come back as a human, your memory is wiped. But come back as an animal, and you get to remember your previous life. You get to see the people you left behind if you can find them again–that’s why there are so many strays.”

“If that’s how it worked, the world would be full of talking dogs and cats. Animals don’t talk.”

“True. Most don’t, anyway. I never saw the power or powers that be, but he, she, it–whatever it is or they are–has a sense of humor. Every once in a while, they send someone requesting going back as an animal the ability to talk, just to mess with people I guess.”

“That’s shitty.”

“I guess gods sometimes get as bored with their existence as the rest of us.”

“All right–if you had your choice, why did you come back as a Boston terrier? Why not something majestic, like a German shepherd or an English mastiff?”

“‘Cause Boston terriers are funny. You can’t be sad when you’re around a Boston terrier. I figured you’d be surprised if I ever found you–maybe even mad. Who could get mad at a face like this? Besides, it fits my accent, don’t you think?”

Joey slid his phone from his pocket and started dialing.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling in sick to work. If there is something in my coffee, and this is all the result, it will wear off at some point. But if it’s real–and I’m starting to think it is–then we have a lot of talking to do.”

* * *

In the hour and a half that followed, it became clear to Joey there was nothing in his coffee. According to the Boston terrier at his side, it was his father getting another chance at life. The tiny dog told him only stories his father would know. Pepper told him how he strayed from family to family in an effort to find his son…how happy he was to discover Joey hadn’t moved since his father’s human form died.

“I’m a creature of habit,” Joey said. “I drive into ‘Frisco for work, and come back to this side of the bay the rest of the time.”

The two were talking about one of the few Christmases Joey’s father was home when Pepper said, “Hold that thought–I gotta pee.”

Joey carried him downstairs and set him in the grass. His father rooted around like a tiny pig.

“You should smell this. It’s a whole other world.”

“Dad, shh!”

Pepper sniffed around until finding a spot near a holly bush, where he lifted his leg. Figuring that was it, Joey started toward the stairs. It wasn’t until hearing a neighbor say, “Well, aren’t you a little cutie?” that he turned back and realized his father had more business to attend to. He was squatted in the grass, dropping a load from his backside. Pepper looked up at the neighbor across the way Joey only chatted with in passing. Joey knew her name was Andrea and that she cut and styled hair.

She looked at Joey and said, “It doesn’t bother me, especially with a little dog like this, but property management will come unhinged if they see you out with an unleashed dog.”

Joey didn’t know if Andrea was saying, “Leash your dog, asshole,” in the nicest way possible, or genuinely warning him. It hadn’t dawned on him until then that Pepper was likely there to stay. His life would no longer be his own–he had a new live-in roommate who would require his assistance for so many basic things, all without contributing to bills or much else around the apartment.

“I just found him this morning. He’s a stray.”

Pepper finished making a pile on the ground. He turned back and sniffed the heap before leaning forward and quickly raking his back legs through the grass, kicking up tiny bits of clippings and leaves.

“I hate asking this,” Joey said. “But can you watch him for just a moment? I thought he just needed to pee. I need to get a bag to clean that up.”

Andrea bent down to pet Joey’s father. “Sure.”

In his kitchen, Joey rummaged for something to clean up his father’s mess in the grass downstairs. He wished he used and saved plastic bags from the grocery store. His only option was a Ziploc sandwich baggie from the pantry. He was happy his father came back as a Boston terrier and not as a Great Dane.

Back downstairs, he turned the baggie inside out and picked up the Pepper pile. The warmth of his father’s feces repulsed Joey as he turned the bag back out. He zipped the top shut, imagining molecules of waste covering his hands, seeping into his pores. Seeing the shit so clearly through the plastic, he understood why most dog waste bags were colored. He wondered what he looked like to Andrea, standing with the pile on display, but she was too busy petting Pepper to notice. Or maybe she was trying to make the whole scene a little less awkward.

“It’s so weird,” she said. “The way he looks up at you…it’s like he’s about to say something.”

“You have no idea…”

Back upstairs, as Joey opened his balcony door to set the baggie outside, Pepper said, “This is great–you cleaning up after me! My revenge for all the diapers you filled.”

“I thought you just needed to pee?” Joey said, while closing the door.

“So did I, but these things happen.”

After washing his hands in the kitchen sink, he plopped back down on the couch. His father looked up at him from the floor.

“One of the first things I’m buying at the pet store later today is a set of little doggie stairs so you can get up and down.” With each new thought, Joey realized just how much he didn’t know about tending to a dog’s well-being…and just how much his life was about to change. “I don’t even know what you eat.”

“Dog food. I’m a dog. But I love table scraps.”

“Doesn’t dog food taste like…dog food?”

“Yeah, but it’s not so bad when you’re a dog. My tastes and sense of smell are so different, now. Enough about all that, though…who’s the girl?”

“What girl?”

“The one downstairs. The one who watched me when you came up for my poop baggie. She was something.”

“She’s just a neighbor.”

“What’s her name?”

“Andrea.”

“Knowing her name’s a good start.”

“For what?”

“Getting to know her better.”

“I’m not interested in that.”

“If there’s something you never told me, Joe…I don’t care if you’re a man’s man. I just want you to be happy.”

“I just don’t want a relationship.”

“Get in the way of work?”

“Part of it. It’s just not something I want right now.”

“Gotcha.”

Pepper hunched over and licked his crotch.

“Jesus, Dad–that’s nasty!”

“Gotta clean up, ya know? And trust me, if you could lick your nuts, you would. All day long. It’s a dream come true.”

* * *

It didn’t take long for Joey and Pepper to fall into a routine like roommates; that is, if one roommate were almost wholly dependent on the other for survival. In many other ways, Pepper was better than Joey’s house mates in and after college: quieter, with much more in common than where they went to school. Joey grew used to Pepper teasing him each time their paths crossed Andrea’s. Pepper enjoyed lazy days alone in the apartment, napping, eating, and even crapping on a pee pad in the bathroom.

At least twice a week, he said, “Watching you clean up after me will never get old.”

Their lives settled into a rhythm…until an otherwise typical Wednesday night when Joey’s phone lit up and chimed with a reminder.

“Oh, shit!”

“What?”

“I totally forgot. Mom’s coming over on Sunday for lunch and the 49ers game.”

“What’s so bad about that?”

Joey looked at his father and raised his eyebrows.

“What? I can be quiet and behave.”

“Yeah, but it’s weird. The thought of you and her in the same room again.”

“I suppose.” Pepper got the faraway look that made Joey turn to see what he spotted. It turned out to be an old memory. “How was your mom, ya know…after I died? Was she sad?”

“Of course. She didn’t hate you–she just wished you were home more. She…mourned like I guess people mourn after someone they loved, but rarely saw, mourned. For the record, I was sad, too. But it was weird at the same time. It was like losing an uncle you rarely saw than a dad, ya know?”

“Yeah.” Pepper put his paw on Joey’s leg. “I want you to know something. For all the years I was on the road, I stayed loyal to your mother. I may not have been the best father or husband, but everything I did, I believed I was doing for you two.”

Joey scratched his father’s head.

“I know, Dad.”

* * *

Pepper followed Joey around more than usual as he prepared the apartment for his mother’s visit. It wasn’t that his mother was a clean freak, but he knew she worried about him–even though there was no reason for concern. He carried no debt, saved for the future, and had as bulletproof a job as one can have in technology.

As Joey put the final touches on a football lunch spread in the kitchen, Pepper said, “I’m surprised she didn’t drive down for the game.”

“She used to,” Joey said. “At least until the fight that got her banned from Memorial Coliseum. You know how she is.”

Pepper nodded. “The nicest woman on the planet, until somebody comes between her and her beloved 49ers.”

“Yep. A stadium mostly full of Rams fans is not a good place for her to be.”

When Joey was done in the kitchen, he wandered to the bathroom. He turned to his father and said, “Do you mind?”

“What…? Oh! I thought you were cleaning. Ya know, it would be a shame to mess up such a clean toilet before I get a chance to drink out of it.”

“Tell me you don’t drink out of the bowl, Dad.”

“I’m joking. The urge is there, though…it’s just a thing with dogs. Probably a good thing I’m so small and can’t reach.”

“I’ll be out in a minute,” Joey said.

His father looked up at him. “But you get to watch me shit all the time.” When Joey stared, Pepper’s whole head cracked into that goofy grin with the curled tongue he’d grown to appreciate. “I’m fucking with you, Son. I want none of that.”

* * *

When Joey’s mom knocked on the apartment door, he turned to his father on the floor and said, “Remember…behave.”

“Mom! So good to see you.”

His mother stepped in and kissed him on the cheek.

“It’s been too long. You work almost as much as your father did.”

She removed her San Francisco 49ers jacket, revealing an old Joe Montana jersey beneath. Joey hated the jersey–it was a reminder he was named after her all-time favorite football player. She handed the jacket to her son and looked down at Pepper.

“Aww! And who do we have, here?”

“That’s Pepper.”

No sooner than he turned to put his mother’s jacket up, he heard her say, “Well, he sure is a frisky little fella.”

Joey closed the closet door and looked down at his father locked onto his mother’s foot.

“Pepper! No!”

His father’s front legs had a grip on his mother’s foot, while his back legs kicked and slid across the entry way tile searching for leverage as he humped away!

Joey kicked him off his mother and said, “I’m so sorry, Mom. I plan to call the vet tomorrow to set up an appointment to have him neutered.”

Pepper’s bulging eyes looked ready to pop, wondering if it was a threat or reality.

Joey’s mom bent down and scratched the nape of Pepper’s neck. “This is why I preferred cats. Remember when you wanted to name Boris Flipper?”

Joey nodded and invited his mother to sit down. “Yes. It seems I’m destined to never live that down…”

* * *

After lunch, Joey’s mom turned on the 49ers/Rams game. His earliest memories were of his mother screaming at the TV. Over the years, nothing had changed.

“OH, COME ON! THEY PAY YOU TO CATCH THE GODDAMNED BALL, PETTIS! DEEBO’S GONNA HAVE YOUR JOB IF YOU KEEP THAT UP!”

And then, like the most caring mother to ever grace the planet, she turned to her son and, in the softest of voices, said, “How have things been? I worry about you.”

“There’s nothing to worry about, Mom.”

“You work so much. I worry you’ll…” She trailed off.

“I’m not Dad, Mom. My heart is fine. I work out. When I’m home, I relax more than most people I know. Even when I’m working, it doesn’t stress me out–you know how I’m wired. Except when we hang out on game days, I eat healthy. I–“

“WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU KEEPING HIM IN THE GAME, SHANAHAN?! YOU CAN’T CATCH FOOTBALLS WHEN YOUR HEAD’S UP YOUR ASS…!

(sweetly)

…You were saying?”

“I’m fine and happy. I almost have enough saved for a small house. Outright. And as far as Dad, the heart attack wasn’t even what killed him.”

“You’re right. But don’t you think all that stress from always working–how poorly he ate for decades on the road–contributed to his cancer?”

Joey nodded. “But like I said, I don’t stress about much at all. Maybe you didn’t hear me because of the game, but I eat well. I get a discount on my health insurance at work because I’m so healthy. I’m fine.”

“Okay, Honey. I’m sorry. I just–OH, FOR CHRIST’S SAKE, GET HIM THE FUCK OFF THE FIELD!!!

(sweetly)

… I just want you to be happy.”

“I’m happy, Mom.”

“That’s good. … I’ve always wondered if your father was happy.”

“I’m sure he was.”

“It seemed like he was running from things. From us. It made me feel like I wasn’t a good wife–like I’d done something wrong and drove him away.”

“You didn’t drive him away. He loved us.”

“You’re probably right. I’m sorry, Joe. I don’t mean to be a Debbie Downer.” She looked at Pepper. “Shit, I even made the dog sad…”

* * *

When the game was over and Joey’s mom had left, Pepper looked up at Joey.

“Did you see my little red rocket?”

“I’m not talking to you.”

“Oh, come on. It was funny.”

“You assaulted Mom’s foot!”

“Wouldn’t be the first time. Just call me Tarantino…”

Joey locked the front door and plopped down on the couch. Pepper climbed up the doggie steps and sat beside his son.

“I’m sorry, Joe. I thought it was funny. I thought you would, too.”

Joey cracked a grin.

“I suppose it was a little funny. It was just…weird. This whole thing is. Sometimes it all seems so normal, and that makes it even weirder, ya know?”

“Yeah. It was so hard not to say something when she was right here. I know I got off on the wrong foot–literally–but even seeing your mom yelling at the TV…I miss all that. I wanted to tell her how sorry I was. How sorry I am.”

            (beat)

“She’s right though. Your mom.”

“Huh?”

“You work too much, Son.”

Joey sighed and said, “You’re one to talk.”

“I know, I know. But that was my big regret in the end, that I wasn’t there for your mom. That I didn’t see you grow up. I convinced myself I was providing for you guys out on the road and that it was enough. It wasn’t. Missing out like that…most people I talked to when I died and was waiting to come back…that was their biggest regret in life, too. Probably why so many don’t choose to come back when the offer is extended to them: they’re ashamed.”

“Well, fortunately, I don’t have a wife and kid.”

“True. But you have a world to explore outside of a cubicle.”

“I work in an open office.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. Those things are hell.”

“Yeah…”

“But what about Andrea? Don’t you have at least the slightest urge to get to know her a little better?”

“It’s too much of a hassle.”

“That sounds like the kind of thing someone with a bunch of relationship problems behind him would say.”

“No problems. I just…”

“You just have so much work to do?”

“Yeah.”

“Hear me out on this. What happens when your job goes away? It’s not like it used to be where you worked someplace until retirement. Giving up your life for a place that’s going to eventually show you the door is a dead way of life.”

“I’m aware of these things, Dad. Like I told Mom, I’m nearing a point where I can buy a house outright. I will likely be able to retire early if I want. I’m doing fine.”

“All right, lemme put it another way. Did ya ever make a mistake at work?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“And did you ever see someone else about to make the same mistake, so you stepped in to tell them the lesson you already learned?”

Joey thought about all the people he’d helped at work over the years–how he always took the time to assist anyone willing to ask for a hand.

“I see what you’re getting at. But what nobody seems to get is I actually like my job.”

“I’m happy for you. But don’t you love other things, too? You used to always talk about big adventures.”

“Yeah. But I was a kid, then. Kids are told to think big…and then told by the same people to have more realistic dreams and get a good job. That’s what I did.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“What?”

“What are you afraid of? You act like the only safe places are work and home.”

“I don’t know. I guess…I was pretty much a latchkey kid. I didn’t have a ton of friends because I was scared I’d fall out of trees or drown or something doing all they things they did. If I’m being honest, I guess the world kind of scares me when I don’t know how something works.”

“Andrea’s not scared.

(beat)

If you only had one trip to take in your life, where would you go?”

“Iceland.”

“Really? Same here! I’ve heard it’s beautiful. You should go, then.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

            (in unison)

“Because of work…”

            (beat)

“There’s nothing wrong with being scared, Son. But don’t make the mistake of not seeing someplace special with someone you love.”

* * *

As weeks turned to months, the living arrangement between Joey and Pepper settled into a routine both enjoyed. There were after dinner talks in which all of Pepper’s sins as a father were forgiven. Stories shared and weekend outings. The loneliness at the end of each day keeping Joey at work sometimes late into the evening became a thing of the past; most days he left work on time, even though he still worked from his phone while watching TV with his father.

It became so familiar that it seemed like the way it always was…until one afternoon when Joey came home and said, “So Dad…uhm…”

“What’s up, Joe?”

“What do you think about spending a week in a nice kennel? Like one of those doggie day spa kind of places?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Work needs me to go on-site in Dallas for a week next month.”

“Gotcha. Why do I need to go anywhere? Just leave food and water out. I’ll be fine.”

“Yeah, but that’s a week of pee and poo. This place will reek by the time I get home.”

“Fair point. But I don’t want to go to a kennel. I’ve done time in a few along the way in finding you. They’re loud and uncomfortable. But…I have another idea.”

“What’s that?”

“Have Andrea watch me. Even if she just comes over a couple times a day around her work schedule to let me out and feed me.”

“I’d feel weird asking her.”

“Why? She thinks I’m adorable. Have you ever noticed how she conveniently has to run an errand or something when you take me downstairs?”

“That’s just likely odds. You shit a lot, Dad. So of course there are times we cross paths as much as we go down there.”

“Nah. Sometimes it’s by design. The way she comes over and chats and lingers. I don’t know what she sees in you–maybe it’s just me and my charming ways. But I guarantee this: if you go across the way and ask her to watch me, I’ll bet you a hundred dollars she will.”

“And where are you going to get one-hundred dollars if you lose?”

“I’ll borrow it from my beloved son…”

* * *

Pepper was right—Andrea was happy to watch him while Joey was away. She sat on the couch next to Joey’s father when he returned home from his week in Dallas.

“Oh, hi,” he said. “So…how’d everything go this week?”

“Great. He’s the easiest dog to care for. I hope you don’t mind, but I brought him over to my place the last two nights. I just felt bad leaving him alone.”

“No, that’s okay. Did he behave?”

“Yes. We did yoga together. He’s like a little shadow, following me around everywhere. I had to close the door when I took a shower before work. I know it’s no big deal, but sometimes you look into his eyes and it’s like he understands everything like we do. Anytime you have a work trip, I’d be happy to watch him.”

“I appreciate that.” “I know you refused to take any money when I asked you to watch Pepper, but I really feel like I should pay you for all you’ve done this week.”

Andrea smiled and said, “How about this. You treat me to coffee or a beer sometime soon? Maybe even dinner…?”

It was not the answer Joey expected. He surprised himself by saying, “Sure, that sounds great,” without giving it a second thought.

When Andrea finally left, Pepper said, “See? Told ya she wants to get to know you better…”

* * *

With each successive work trip, Joey and Andrea spent more time together. Soon, she was a regular around the apartment, even when Joey wasn’t away. When their relationship became more than ordinary friendship and Andrea suggested they spend the night together, Joey said, “Can we go to your place?”

“Why?”

Joey cocked his head toward his father.

“We can close the door, Joey.”

“I know. But still…it’s just…weird thinking about him on the other side of the door.”

In time, there were long weekend trips to Big Sur, Yosemite, and Tahoe, places where they could all be free from cramped spaces and enjoy time away from the rush of busy lives. During a trip to the Redwoods, Joey stopped Pepper from humping a cabin neighbor’s pug, half out of embarrassment–half wanting to ensure the strangest sibling he could imagine would never be loosed upon the world. And work became a thing Joey now did to save and pay the bills; it was no longer a sick refuge from all in life that scared him.

* * *

While Joey did all he could to get his 40 hours in each week and put work behind him, there were still occasional week-long trips to other cities required by the job.

Joey’s heart raced when, after landing following a week of work in Chicago, he saw the text message from Andrea when he got off the plane: “We need to talk.”

Despite a life of recent bliss, he reverted to the terrified fragment inside himself he still could not fully expunge. He texted back: “Are you breaking up with me?”

His phone vibrated. “NOPE! We’re stuck with each other. Maybe even more after today.”

In the Uber on the way home, Joey was so nervous that he spent the time doing breathing exercises Andrea had taught him. When he entered his apartment, Andrea and Pepper were on the couch with the television turned off. The world seemed to fall away beneath his feet when Pepper looked at him and said, “Hey, there’s Daddy’s little boy! Why didn’t you tell me Andrea could talk?!”

As Pepper and Andrea laughed, Joey said, “How much do you know?”

“Quite a bit. Scared the hell out of me when he started talking. I thought someone slipped something into my coffee, but the more we talked, the more I knew it was real. Leo broke the ice the night you left for the trip. We figured we’d wait until you were done in Chicago before saying anything.”

It was strange, almost jarring, to hear somebody use Joey’s father’s name. His mother always referred to him as, “your father,” and what family Joey had was small and old and on the other side of the country.

“Why did you tell her, Dad?”

“Because it’s clear you two are serious about each other. It’s not a secret we could keep forever…”

* * *

Leo “Pepper” Palermo was right: without the secret revealed, seeing where Joey’s life with Andrea could go would always have a little drooling black and white bump in the way to bigger things. Their wedding was small–just the bride and groom, Joey’s mother, Andrea’s brother, and Pepper. The day of the service, Pepper said, “Can we tell your mom about me?”

“No,” Joey said.

“Not today–this day belongs to you two. I mean sometime soon.”

“It wouldn’t be fair to her, Dad. She’s moved on…”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

* * *

As the years moved on, Andrea opened her own salon. Joey began consulting on contracts, leaving him more time to spend with the two people he loved most. A small place to call their own was purchased outright, and plans were in place that work would soon become a thing done because they wanted to–not because they had to.

It was a perfect life until the day Pepper wandered into Joey’s office and said, “Hey, Joe. We need to talk…”

Joey saved the file he was working on and said, “What’s up, Dad?”

“I’ve been a bit quiet about it, hoping it would go away, but…I’ve not been feeling so hot, lately. I know this feeling—I think I need to see a vet…”

The vet confirmed Pepper’s worries: cancer. When Joey got the call confirming their fears, he remembered the first time his father had the disease. How he stayed on the road as much as he could, claiming he had to keep providing for his family in between chemotherapy and radiation treatments, despite Joey and his mother doing well on their own. How it seemed like he worked even more, all in an effort to hide his pain from family. When he could work no more, he came home and slept–until the day came when he couldn’t even manage that. He was already mostly a memory in the lives of his wife and son, just a guy from Boston who had a knack for sales–moving up from selling encyclopedias door to door and later, car crushers–who ended up in San Francisco selling software. It wasn’t that Joey didn’t miss his father when he died, but aside from seeing him wiped out from a disease, it was already like he was never there.

But this time it was different; this time, good memories had been made. This time it hurt.

* * *

When the medicine no longer took the edge off Pepper’s discomfort, Joey asked his father, “What’s it like?”

“What’s what like?”

“Dying.”

Pepper looked up, pondering the question a moment. Then he looked at his son and said, “It’s like vomiting. You hold on, refusing to empty your stomach. You bargain and fight against it. Maybe you get comfortable for a moment and think it’s all okay, but that feeling comes back. It’s terrible, but you don’t want to let go. But then that point comes where you do finally let loose, and it feels good when you’re done–so good that you promise yourself the next time you’re sick that you won’t fight. I don’t want to fight this, Joe.”

* * *

On the morning of Leo Palermo’s second death, before the vet arrived at the house, Pepper said, “You know the saddest thing about all this?”

“What?” Joey said.

“That we don’t offer this same dignity to humans. I would have taken this option first time around, before it got so bad and we all suffered.”

“It’s an option, now. At least here in California.”

“That’s good. Needs to be everywhere.”

“It’s still hard, though,” Andrea said.

Pepper looked up at her with his wide eyes. “It is. I’ve loved the hell out of this. Getting to know you. Hell, getting to know my son. It’s weird how normal this crazy-weird life feels. Like this is the way it was always supposed to be.”

Andrea smiled. “Yeah. You may not have been the best father the first time around, but you’re the dad I never had.”

“Same here,” Joey said. “I love you.”

“I love you, too, Son…”

* * *

It was better than Joey imagined: a black beach winding along the crags like a pathway to a magical realm. On closer inspection, small volcanic stones instead of sand. Columns of basalt rose up against the peaked cliff behind, like massive steps meant for an ancient god to ascend to the top of a rocky pyramid. Was that grass or moss growing on the stone walls disappearing high above into layers of mist? A line of white-capped waves formed between the black beach and gray waters of the north Atlantic, dividing earth from ocean in a monochromatic splendor. Stone spires rose up from the water like the hard bones of a dragon that had crashed down from the heavens eons ago. With open water in front of Joey and Andrea, and rock behind, the wind undulated like some unseen force of nature breathing in and out. They waited for a rush of wind to return to the ocean; when it did, they stepped calf-deep into the frigid water and scattered Pepper’s ashes.

The mortal remains of Leo Palermo looked more like kitty litter than the fine dust Joey expected from a cremated Boston terrier. Part of him seemed to dissolve into the water, while larger pieces tumbled along black pebbles before finally being sucked deeper into the ocean. When the wind raced back toward the cliffs, it whisked away tears shed by Joey for his father’s second death. In time, there was nothing else to see; no more tears to be shed. Joey took Andrea by the hand and walked back to collect their socks and shoes.

Andrea was quick to dry her legs and feet with a small towel. When her shoes were back on, and her pant legs rolled down, she hugged herself in attempt to get warm.

“I’m sorry I made you stand out there as long as we did,” Joey said. He stood up and held her, hoping all his warmth would transfer to her. He wanted to feel the biting cold for days, to remember how strange and wonderful the last several years had been. How amazing it was to finally get to know and love his father–and be loved back in return.

“You gonna be okay?” Andrea said.

“Someday. It was a lot harder this time.” He stared at the water, wondering how far Pepper’s ashes would travel. He imagined them circling the globe, but always coming back to this point. “It’s funny how we both always wanted to see this place. I had no idea.”

“That’s because he didn’t.”

Joey gave Andrea the same cocked-headed look his father gave them at times when the dog ruled the man inside.

“He knew you wanted to see it in person, but were always too busy. He told me when he died, he wanted to be scattered here–not because it meant anything to him, but because it seemed to mean so much to you. I guess you mentioned it at some point, and he told you he wanted to see it, too. But he couldn’t care less about this place, other than he knew you’d need a push to finally visit. He said a body is a body, and that you could always visit his human remains in Colma, or come here and think about how strange and beautiful life can sometimes be. He knew you’d only make this trip if you thought it meant something to him.”

Joey shook his head in disbelief, half grinning, but also fighting back more tears.

“And it did mean something to him, I suppose. At least in the sense that he wanted you to finally take this trip.”

“He told you all that, huh?”

“Yep.”

“I love that you two were so close.”

This time, it was Andrea’s turn for tears.

“So am I…”

When Andrea had nothing more to give, she dried her face with a clean, dry corner of the towel. Joey opened their day pack and stuffed it inside. He came out with his father’s dog collar and closed the pack. He watched the name tag flip about in the breeze, a ridiculous name for a father, but a great name for a Boston terrier. He kissed the tag and said, “He was a good dog. A good dad.”

Andrea took Joey’s hand, letting the collar rest across their fingers like a shared bracelet.

“He was, indeed,” Andrea said, before the two turned away and walked off along the Pepper-black sand.

* * *

Hey, this is Rick Coste…I did the voice of Pepper, and my wife, Mandie Coste, played Joey’s mom. I also put this episode together from Chris’s story and narration. His wife, Cynthia Griffith, played the part of Andrea.

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks.

Theme music, as always, by Ergo Phizmiz. Story music this time by Chad Crouch, also known as Poddington Bear.

Sound effects are always made in-house or from my own private library. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the show, the voice talent, and the music.

I’m not sure what Chris has planned next. It might be a story about four people who get a strange sickness while in line at the pharmacy, or it might be a tale about a novelist who moves into her mother’s unfinished house as she struggles with a follow-up to a bestseller. There’s a story in the works about a rag-tag group of warehouse workers, and another about Death making an embarrassing mistake. There’s always something up Chris’s sleeve.

So, no idea which it will be, or when it will be released—Chris is also working on a novel, and he just started a new job. (Congratulations, Chris!) For what he has in store for us? I guess we’ll wait and see…

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen Here]

[Music Fades in]

Female Narrator:

This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

Christopher Gronlund:

I’d be lying if I said there never comes a point each year when I feel like I’ve forced myself into having to write two episodes of Not About Lumberjacks: the November anniversary episode (that is always the most not about lumberjacks tale of the year) and now — the annual Christmas episode. But when it’s over, I’m always proud of the efforts.

I started the Christmas stories on a whim…just throwing out seven very short stories in 2017. Most of ‘em aren’t even holiday related in any way – I mean, hell, there’s only one in the bunch.

Last year, it was two out of three stories that could be deemed holiday-worthy in any way.

This year, the three tales are all based around Christmas.

More than that, this is the first time I’ve not narrated any of the stories. Last year, my wife narrated the first story, and Patrick Walsh of the Screamqueenz podcast narrated another. I narrated the final story.

This year, I was lucky to get three great narrators: Dr. Michelle Booze, Art Kedzierski, and Jennifer Moss.

It was only after listening to the entire episode that I realized it’s one of my all-time favorite episodes of the show. I knew the stories were solid, but it was only after hearing them narrated by others that I realized how strong the episode really is.

I liked the three stories, but I have a confession: every story you hear on the show is a rough draft with a polish. I’m not sure I’ve ever done rewrites on a short story. (What you hear is largely a first draft…or, at most, my wife might catch something and say, “Ya know, this part doesn’t make sense to me,” and I fix things.) The stories knock around my head for a little while, and then sometimes they explode onto the page with little effort, but most times it takes a bit of shaping. Once all the pieces are down, though, the story is all there, and it gets cleaned up a bit…and then I call things done.

Working this way, piecing things together mostly on lunch breaks at work…it can sometimes be hard to know if a story is working or not. Often, it’s only when listening to a narrated episode that I can tell the efforts were worth it.

This year’s Christmas episode was definitely worth it. I was lucky enough to be present as a couple people listened, and my only regret is not putting a little more space between the first and second episode to account for people tearing up at the end of “My Grandmother Wrestled Bears.”

* * *

I’m not sure what 2020 holds for Not About Lumberjacks. I’m wrapping up a story for later this month, and I have a rather long mystery I’ve toyed with releasing. (If I do, it would be the longest episode to date…perhaps twice as long as whatever the current longest episode is.) And I have bits and pieces of other stories in various states or work.

But as I’ve mentioned during the endings of recent episodes, I need to turn my focus back on a novel—the second in a series. (The first is currently being submitted to agents, and I’ve been surprised by some of the interest people have had.)

So Not About Lumberjacks may go on hiatus for a handful of months while working through all that’s going on with books. Of course, it’s entirely possible nothing happens with the novel currently being submitted. If that’s the case, Not About Lumberjacks will likely become the writing focus in my life. (I mean, hell, at that point, you might even get a second feed for serialized novels if that’s your thing.)

It would be very easy for me to view 2020 as a do or die year for my writing. Common sense says if the first book in a series doesn’t sell, you drop the rest of it and you work on something else that might. But the story I’m working on is something I must see through, no matter what…even if it’s only read by a handful of people. And after so many close calls over the decades, you reach a point where you think, “I’ve grown so tired of the chase…”

But I don’t view 2020 as the year writing things happen or I give up not only the chase but writing itself. Because I enjoy writing and…here, I have a place for the stories I write. Going back to common sense, I mean hell, common sense also says Not About Lumberjacks is a futile endeavor. Most people stop a thing that takes the effort this show takes without any compensation. I can’t even say I do it for a large following because it seems there are maybe 50 die-hard listeners…and maybe 100 – 150 over time. (Only a few episodes on the site have over 200 listens.)

It would be easiest for me to just write stories and share them with a handful of friends and family. No effort into narrating and sound design. None of that.

There are moments in every episode’s production when I think, “God, I hate this part of the process…it’s such a slog. Why do I do this to myself?”

But then I hear something I’ve written come to life in a manner it would never sound like in my mind. And I hear from a small group of people about how much they loved it.

I work with narrators who put their own cadence and inflection into these concrete stories I’ve written, shaping them into remarkable constructs I could never imagine them becoming.

This year’s Christmas episode was one of those kinds of shows.

And that’s quite a gift for a writer knocking out stories on his lunch break at work…

And so, here’s to a good year…

* * *

[Outro music fades in…]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called Reaper by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, episodes, and voice talent.

At the end of the month it’s a strange father and son tale featuring a handful of narrators.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: this show is not about lumberjacks…

My name is Christopher Gronlund, and this is where I share my stories. Sometimes the stories contain truths, but most of the time, they’re made up. Sometimes the stories are funny—other times they’re serious. But you have my word about one thing: I will never—EVER—share a story about lumberjacks.

This time, it’s the annual batch of shorter-than-usual short stories in honor of Christmas and other holidays occurring this time of year. Be sure to listen to the end for more information about the wonderful narrators for this episode: Dr. Michelle Booze (yes, for real: she is a doctor, and her name is Dr. Booze!), Art Kedzierski, and Jennifer Moss.

For those wanting a content advisory: These stories contain occasional swearing, discussions about family loss, and…well, maybe even human sacrifice. Okay, so there’s no maybe about that…but it’s at least a humorous human sacrifice, I guess? Maybe? Up to you.

All right—let’s get to work…

My Grandmother Wrestled Bears…

[Piano music plays…]

I told my grandmother I’d get my shit together before she died, but I didn’t. I’ve promised a lot of people things over the years I’ve never done. It’s what I’m known for.

Because my parents only knew each other for a night, and because my mother took off shortly after I was born, I was raised out of time by my grandmother. Every bit of advice she gave me seemed forty years too late, like it was still The Great Depression and not the early 90s. So, on my eighteenth birthday, I did what my parents did before me: I ran away from home and straight into trouble.

Sometimes it was men, and other times it was drugs. Sometimes it was hitchhiking across the country or meeting someone who let me crash on their floor until they could tolerate me no more. And always, there was alcohol.

As much as I ran, though, I always came home for Christmas. It was my grandmother’s favorite time of the year, and the only time her old-fashioned way of looking at the world seemed okay to me. I still don’t know how someone so tiny always found the biggest tree and hoisted it up on her own. And nothing beat reading a book in front of the fire on Christmas morning while my grandmother read on the couch.

This Christmas, I stand in the house where I was raised, wondering where to begin. My grandmother was a quiet woman, but I’m still amazed by how silent this place is without her. Instead of filing cabinets, she kept everything she deemed important in an old cedar chest. So I start there.

I find the title to the house, medical records, and birth certificates before losing myself to photos. It’s frightening how much I look like my mother and how much she looked like my grandmother. I dig through loose moments frozen in time until finding an old diary at the bottom.

It seems like something my mother might have kept when younger, so I’m surprised to discover it belonged to my grandmother. Even more surprising is flipping through and discovering my grandmother was once as wild as the two women who followed her. Bookmarking the racier entries are photos: my grandmother drinking beer on a beach while surrounded by men; my grandmother sitting on a motorcycle and smoking a cigar; my grandmother wrestling a bear in some north woods bar! (And even more: she appears to be winning.)

I look at the empty spot where the Christmas tree usually stands. I fight back tears until I think about my grandmother wrestling a bear; then, I can’t stop laughing. There is so much to get in order, but it can wait. I start a fire, tending to kindling and logs until its roar properly echoes up the chimney. And on my stomach before its glow, I open my grandmother’s final gift and begin reading…

* * *

The Beast in the Back

[Three Tones Sound]

BigBoxMart

[A film projector starts; old instructional music plays]

Narrator:

Congratulations, BigBoxMart manager! You have worked hard, putting the company mission first. Your efforts have paid off! Welcome to the Benevolent Order of the Circle of Thirteen.

What is the Benevolent Circle of Thirteen I hear you say? Well, I’m glad you asked…

Have you ever wondered what makes BigBoxMart so successful? It’s not just happy employees and the greatest managers in the business that make our 13,666 stores the best in the business. We owe all our successes to the Ancient One, Himself: The Beast in the Back.

The Beast in the what, I hear you ask.

The Beast in the Back.

Let me explain…

By now, the tale of Sam Walters is the stuff of legend. Buying a general store in Hometown, Arkansas and expanding to other states in just six short years, the face of BigBoxMart is the face of the American Dream. But there’s more to Sam’s story than meets the eye…

There was so much more than common sundries tucked away in that dusty store Sam purchased in 1962. Now that you are an official member of the Benevolent Order of the Circle of Thirteen, you can know the truth. While assessing that old building, Sam Walters discovered a trap door. The cellar below contained an ancient tome instructing him how to assemble the Circle and summon Pah-a’-Finzhu, the Dark Demon of Commerce better known as the Beast in the Back.

As a new initiate, you get to choose this year’s sacrifice. It’s quite the responsibility, but don’t fret! Here’s Store number 1313’s manager, Susan Grimm, with what to look for in a candidate.

Susan:

“Oh, it is such a blessed fortune that has smiled upon you today, and I am honored to help you with what to look for in this year’s candidate. Seek a man whose loneliness is apparent during what he believes is a normal job interview, a person so desperate to talk with someone that they linger when the interview is over. The kind of man who reveals they have no one at home—not even a pet.

“But you also want someone who is rebounding from a good-enough job that when they stop showing up for their shift and coworkers ask where they are, you can say, ‘This was a stepping stone back to their career for them,’ and it’s believable. Remember: while most companies look for enthusiastic go-getters, timid and weak is ideal for this position. It’s not too hard to find a man who’s been destroyed by a job in a cubicle—someone so down about life that it’s almost charitable to put them out of their misery. We’re not cruel, after all…we’re just trying to hit our numbers like everyone else out there.

“Should you still feel bad, though, remember all you’re doing for the local economy. It’s a dog-eat-dog world, and we all have bills to pay and food to put on the table. Sacrificing one person a year means the 333 people employed in each BigBoxMart can make ends meet. And think of all the gifts purchased here. Some might say we’re the beast, but I like to think we’re in the business of happiness—especially this time of the year. Think of all those happy children on Christmas morning opening gifts made by thousands of workers in manufacturing. Truckers and delivery drivers earning their pay. Our troops coming home to make new holiday memories. When you look at it like that, one human sacrifice hardly seems bad, right?”

Narrator:

No, it sure doesn’t, Susan. It sure doesn’t.

So, there you have it, newest initiate: a quick history about The Beast in the Back.

Now that you know what to look for, get out there and make this holiday season the best one yet!

* * *

Lost and Found

[Piano music plays]

I grew up in a house so large that most of the rooms would have gathered dust were it not for maids. Our family’s start was humble, but along the way—at just the right time—my father’s efforts at work blossomed beyond the American Dream. He believed our fortune made amends for all the years we went without, and he punctuated that notion with a twelve-thousand square foot labyrinth of a house at the end of a gated street. Even as a teenager, it all seemed rather excessive.

The parties my parents held in that house were lavish affairs that put the me-generation of the 80s on loud display. New money acted as though the houses in our neighborhood were always there, instead of fabricated mansions rising up in a town previously known for its pastures and a quiet highway cutting through it all, leading to even more desolate places. I’m not kidding when I say the entirety of our first house could fit in the great room where, in the evenings, my father sat before a colossal stone fireplace like a king before his court.

But sooner or later, even kings die…

With my brother and I grown and long-gone from my father’s palace, it left my mother with too much house to handle. (Even with the four of us and hired help, it was always too much house to handle.) Our father died in December, which meant my brother and I—workaholics following family habits—finally used year-end paid time off from work to return home and help our mother sort things out. Most of the house, down to the furniture, was to be sold as though it were an estate handed down for generations. We were there to help Mom sort through personal items that actually mattered to us.

It was not the way any of us intended to spend Christmas. My brother and I planned to fly into Texas on the weekend, exchange gifts, and get back to work before losing any time. Instead, we spent a week roaming rooms I’d almost forgotten existed, assessing what would stay and what we’d take away.

While sorting through one of four guest rooms in a wing of the house I’d not seen in years—a room I never once saw used by visitors—my brother found a wrapped Christmas gift in a drawer in the closet dressing room. The label read To: Patrick. From: Dad. There was no mistaking what was hidden within: a cassette tape. We looked at each other and laughed, knowing how it got there and why it had stayed hidden for so long…

Patrick and I were never bad kids, but where Christmas was involved, we were at least mischievous. When my father found out the two of us dug through our parents’ closet where he hid gifts, he started hiding them in the attic. When he caught us up there, he threatened to cancel Christmas that year. Of course, he didn’t, but it scared us enough to stop searching for what would await us beneath the tree on Christmas morning.

It didn’t prevent my father from hiding things, though; in fact, knowing we were prone to snooping, he took even greater lengths to ensure if we tried searching for gifts, we wouldn’t find them. After that, it was not uncommon for him to forget where he hid some of the smaller presents. Sometimes he’d later remember, and a week into the new year one of us would finally get the overlooked gift. He was kind of like an absent-minded squirrel, but instead of forgetting where he hid nuts, he’d forget where he stashed gifts. We always joked that one day we’d find things years later. Apparently, we were prophets.

Patrick unwrapped the gift. From the paper, he pulled out the cassette, revealing a cover featuring three red spheres floating against a red background.

“Rush’s Hold Your Fire,” he said. “I ended up buying it with the Christmas money that year because Dad forgot about it…except, clearly, he didn’t. He just didn’t remember where he hid it.”

In another guest room, we found a gift from my father to me: a perfect four-inch cube of a box wrapped in paper featuring little scarf-wearing penguins. I looked at Dad’s wrapping job on the gift—all the skewed pieces of tape and mismatched folds. It looked more like something wrapped by a kid, rather than a grown man with a wife and two children…a man who took our family from nothing to millions. Inside every gift was a display of new wealth, but also the reminder that for much of his life, giving gifts was not within his means. He never got the hang of how to wrap them neatly. He could have easily paid someone to shop and wrap presents for us, but it meant so much to him to stop his hurried pace of life and put time into doing it himself.

I ran my thumb across a crinkled piece of tape he’d obviously struggled with before being pulled apart and affixed to the wrapping paper. I had no idea how long the gift sat hidden. He never got the hang of wrapping presents in all his years, so there was no difference in the quality from when he was at the height of his career to the time when his mind was so far gone that he looked at us all like shadows. I could at least tell by the handwriting on the label that it was from before he got sick.

Patrick said, “Open it,” but my eyes had already filled with tears.

“I can’t.”

I set the gift down and ran like a kid to the other side of the house, to my old bedroom. I wanted to get far away from the memory of my father, but the house had become a 12,000 square foot prison of the past from which there was no escape.

[Christmas music plays]

Before we had money, we spent Christmas Eves at my grandparents’ house. Dad always seemed shamed when the family exchanged gifts, even though no one minded that we came with next to nothing every year. We left loaded up on gifts at the end of the night, including several wrapped presents my grandparents always gave us to open on Christmas morning at home. I always wanted to spend the night at my grandparents’ house—not head back to our tiny apartment in that beat-up Ford Pinto. When we were done opening the gifts my grandparents sent home with us, my father would survey the room, clap his hands together, and say, “All right, let’s go eat some breakfast!” It was a habit he continued until he forgot everything.

[Christmas music stops]

[Knocking sounds]

My brother knocked on the door frame and said, “You okay?”

I wiped my eyes with the corner of the comforter of my old bed. “Yeah. It was that damn wrapping job that got me. Just how he never got things to line up no matter how hard he tried. How we could hear him in the other room, swearing and fighting with tape.”

My brother and I spent the rest of that day searching the house for presents. If it was a room with a closet, cabinet, or drawer, old gifts were hidden somewhere within. By the end of the day, we discovered enough small boxes to celebrate on Christmas morning, but we decided it would be best to leave the holiday on hold that year. I loaded up one of Dad’s dozen cars—the Escalade—and drove home to Chicago.

[Wind sounds]

A year later, I drove the Escalade back to Texas, to Mom’s much more sensible house. I pulled all the gifts from the Cadillac, and my mother, my brother, and I unwrapped the past on Christmas morning. My brother’s earlier tastes in music and play were soon on the ground before him—progressive rock gave way to stranger bands and so much ska; toy trucks and rudimentary robots stepped aside for Dungeons and Dragons modules and computer games.

When I was done, my pile of gifts had become a timeline of what I once deemed important as well: seemingly every Barbie doll and accessory, intricate coloring books with marker sets containing more colors than I knew existed, a butterfly Duncan yo-yo that was all the rage one year, and a charm bracelet with more charms than my wrist could hold.

For my mother, there was jewelry. Her haul looked like a tiny pirate treasure spilled from a small chest and onto the coffee table. Later, my brother and I speculated how much lost money my father had misplaced for years in those gifts to her.

The final gift was the one I couldn’t bring myself to open the year before. I looked down at the penguins and twisted tape and thought about my father.

“I don’t want to open this one. Maybe one day I’ll change my mind, but as long as this one stays wrapped, it’s full of potential. In a way, like he’s still around.”

None of us said a word for a full minute.

[Uplifting music plays]

Patrick broke the silence when he surveyed the room, clapped his hands together, and said, “All right, let’s go eat some breakfast.”

And that’s exactly what we did, while still talking about memories of times long past, brought on by the gifts my father lost along the way.

* * *

A big thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks. And an even bigger thank you to this year’s Christmas episode narrators: Dr. Michelle Booze, Art Kedzierski, and Jennifer Moss.

A little bit about them all…

Dr. Michelle Booze (and yes, that’s her real name, and she has the PhD to prove it) is an avid Audio Drama fan. You can catch her Twitter reviews by following her @DrMLBooze. You can also check out her Audio Fiction merchandise at https://www.teepublic.com/user/houseonalakecreations. And that’s like, “Hey, I have a house that’s on a lake and I create things, so…HouseOnALakeCreations.” And if you’re sitting there going, “I kind of recognize her voice,” you may have heard her on several audio fiction podcasts you love, such as Aethuran, Slumberland, and Magic King Dom.

Art Kedzierski is a cool guy, and I’m not just saying that because I guess I’ve known him for over thirty years. But Art has a BFA in Theatre Performance & Management from UT-Arlington, he interned at Theatre Three, and he served as Managing Director of Pegasus Theatre in Dallas. He’s acted in a lot of things. Here’s just a bit of a list:

Rover Dramawerks’ Chemical Imbalance as Xavier Utterson; ITC’s How to Succeed in Business as Toynbee (and my wife and I saw him in that one, and it was an absolute friggin’ blast); Uptown Players’ Take Me Out as Mason Marzac and The Producers as Mr. Marks (and ten other roles); and he was in the Lyric Stage production of 1776 as Andrew McNair; Pegasus Theatre’s XSR:Die! as Douglas Malory and Full Moon Murders! as John Creighton. He was also in Garland Summer Musical’s The Producers as Leo Bloom. Besides acting and directing, he is also the developer and operator of DFWAuditions.com.

Jennifer Moss is a published author, web developer, and photographer. She was born and raised in Evanston, Illinois and is a graduate of Northwestern University.  (And just so you know: I was born a little bit south of Evanston, in Edgewater Hospital on the north side of Chicago. But I get along with Jennifer for a lot of other reasons than just that.) Jennifer’s works include a series of mysteries with a metaphysical twist. Those books: Town Red, Way to Go, Taking the Rap, and Friend of the Family. Her non-fiction titles include The Baby Names Workbook and Yosemite Home Companion. More information can be found on her website, JenniferMoss.com.

Theme music, as always, by Ergo Phizmiz. Story music this time is by Infinity Ripple, Cody High, Johannes Bornloff, and Heath Cantu, all licensed through Epidemic Sound. And the background soundtrack for “The Beast if the Back?” That’s a Public Domain piece from an old Coronet instructional film.

Sound effects, as always, are made in-house or found at freesound.org. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the show, the voice talent, and music.

In one month, it’s back to the very strange father/son story I’ve mentioned in the past and then…well…we’ll see. I have a long mystery I can go with and other stories in the works, but I also need to get back to a novel. So I guess if you want more right away, share this with some friends — because word-of-mouth matters more than reviews and other things. And there definitely will be a lot more stories in 2020, but I really do need to get back to that novel.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

Christopher Gronlund:

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: this show is not about lumberjacks…

My name is Christopher Gronlund, and this is where I share my stories. Sometimes the stories contain truths, but most of the time, they’re made up. Sometimes the stories are funny—other times they’re serious. But you have my word about one thing: I will never—EVER—share a story about lumberjacks.

This time, lingering coughs be damned, it’s the annual November story a couple weeks later than planned because my wife and I were sick over the Thanksgiving break in the U.S. But…we’re well, again…at least well enough to record this story that IS fiction, even though it sounds real. It’s unlike anything I’ve done for the show, and I hope you enjoy this tale about an entrepreneurial podcast gone rather wrong.

Check out the show notes for the episode’s content advisory.

All right—let’s get to work…

The Lumberjack of Williamsburg

[INSPIRING MUSIC PLAYS.]

HOST: Hi! I’m Brooke Ainsleigh, host of the Creative Ascent Podcast, where I talk with cutting-edge, innovative creatives about their treks to success so you can walk a shorter trail to all your creative dreams. This week, my guest is L. J. Burke, a creative innovator known to many as the Lumberjack of Williamsburg.

Before we get started, apologies about my voice—I’ve been a bit under the weather, lately.

L.J.: I understand, Brooke. It hit me, too. I’ll do my best to not to cough or snarf through this.

[LAUGHTER]

L.J.: I know, I know…

B.A.: All right, let’s get the obvious questions out of the way: Why “The Lumberjack of Williamsburg?” And does the “L. J.” in your name stand for lumberjack?”

L.J.: I get those questions a lot, Brooke, and I wish it stood for something cooler, but it’s my given name: Larry Jayne—and that’s y-n-e. As far as the lumberjack moniker…it was given to me by another podcaster: The Three-Step-Dick himself, Richard Costas. Everyone in Williamsburg was into that ironic hipster look at the time. You know the one with skinny jeans, PBR t-shirts, trucker caps, and mutton chops.

I wanted to stand out from the crowd, so I trimmed my beard and started wearing flannels and hiking boots. It became my calling card, and when I was on The Three-Step-Dick podcast, refining my roadmap to success down to just three things, Cotas titled the episode “The Lumberjack of Williamsburg.” And that name stuck with me.

B.A.: Cool. You’ve become known for your bespoke outdoor gear: waxed canvas bags, restored axes, painted canoe paddles, and more. Were you into the outdoors when you were younger?

L.J.: Not really. I grew up in Brooklyn Heights and moved to The Burg right after its big boom. My dad managed hedge funds and my mom’s a lawyer. After design school, I didn’t want to be just another guy making logos and managing ad campaigns for conglomerates.

When I saw Field Notes take off for Aaron Draplin, I knew there was a market for busy professionals wanting to feel that old-school, outdoor John Muir aesthetic.

I started with waxed-canvas messenger bags, and it took off from there. One of my customers bought a lake house up in Waccabuc, and he asked if I could create some things to make his getaway feel more authentic. And that’s how I got into painted canoe paddles, axes, and rustic signage. I love hand-lettering and weathering things to look like they’ve always existed.

B.A.: You mentioned design school. How did you get into design?

L.J.: Oddly enough, through the J. Peterman catalogue. My parents always got it, and I loved how it was full of paintings instead of photos—just how every item came with a story. It was so different from any other marketing I saw at the time. You’d look at a Sears catalogue as a kid, and there’s someone your age with a bowl-haircut and wet lips playing with a Tonka truck in an over-saturated, high-contrast photo that looked like it was photographed by circus clowns. And that was all accompanied by boring copy.

But the Peterman catalogue made you yearn for a different way of life. You wanted to travel the world in those clothes, carrying all the right accessories with you. It spurred imagination.

It’s the butt of so many jokes, now, but I can still pick up a Peterman catalogue and feel like a little kid imagining all the many ways to take on a big world out there.

B.A.: That’s beautiful. Your story, and that way of marketing. When you can shape the consumer and make them crave becoming something they never knew even they wanted to be, it’s a win. Like inspiring them to be better than they were before interacting with your brand. But anyway…

You just passed the two-hundred-fifty-thousand subscriber mark on YouTube. How did you leverage what you do with that?

L.J.: Well I’ve always loved photography and video. I was lucky that my parents recognized and supported the things that I loved. I used to make little photo comic books and then I started editing video stories. And not just funny things made with friends…because, if I’m being honest, I really didn’t really have a lot of friends. I kind of lived inside my head. And maybe because I was trying to appease adults, I knew I couldn’t just make a video about fighting a monster or something and be told I did something special.

Jump forward, and I saw a mini-documentary on YoutTube about Cut Brooklyn’s Joel Bukiewicz. There’s a guy who started out as a novelist, and he didn’t make it, so he began grinding steel to ease his nerves. He ended up making incredible knives, and his business took off with just a couple video features on YouTube…shot like they were made for TV and not just some little throw-away thing.

So I dragged out the cameras and made a four minute documentary about what I do and I uploaded it to YouTube. I contacted everyone I knew to share it, and it got passed down the line to the right people, who shared it on Twitter. It went from something like twenty-five views to a couple thousand overnight. And then by the end of the week, it was almost at ten-thousand views.

So I vowed to make a video a week, sometimes telling my story, and other times featuring a project I was making. Just sharing how I did what I do.

I know many people think you should hold all your cards close to your body, but I find that sharing how I do all I do shows people that what I make is not just something made on an assembly line. They know it’s me in my shop, making a thing by hand especially for them. I mean, sure, they can try making it themselves, but when they see all that goes into what I create, they’d rather just pay me money.

B.A.: Great point. How else do you promote your brand? Do you work with any influencers?

L.J.: Beyond YouTube, it’s mostly just word of mouth. I don’t really don’t do a lot with influencers. I don’t need to pay someone to hold my product on Instagram or make a video we all know that they’re making because they’ve been paid.

I go where the money is—my parents taught me that. Some of the people I sell product to can afford to pay even more than I charge…and I defintiely charge what I’m worth. My customers, I suppose, are my influencers.

B.A.: Have you thought about offering lower-priced items to attract customers on the way up?

L.J.: That’s a common move for many, but I think it cheapens the brand. I want people to aspire to my products—not work their way up. You can either afford what I offer or you can’t. And that’s part of its appeal.

But I’d be lying if I said it didn’t cross my mind early on. Things like beard oils, hand-carved pipes…things like that. It was more important to stay true to my vision, though.

B.A.: Okay, so you’re not into influencers, but if you could have any celebrity endorse your product, who would it be and why?

L.J.: Man, that’s a great question, I’ve never really thought of that. I sell to some celebrities, and they talk about what they do with their friends. But if I had to seek someone out, I suppose Nick Offerman. I usually don’t go humorous with what I do, but he has that right blend of rugged and serious, but he’s also seen as trustworthy and down to earth.

That fireside video with Lagavulin that he made is a good example. Ya know, it’s not necessarily funny…it’s just him sitting beside a fireplace and drinking product. It’s whimsical at best. So maybe something like that: just him taking a tree down with one of my axes…paddling his canoe with something I made maybe? Or just out hiking and taking out gear from a bag I created.

B.A.: Yeah, he’d be perfect for your brand!

All right, let’s take things back a bit. What’s the first thing you remember selling?

L.J.: Mystery boxes.

B.A.: What are those?

L.J.: It started with me just taking things like old toys, putting them in boxes, and selling them to my friends. You might get an old Star Wars figure or a redemption coupon for a toy truck or something that was too big for a box. I’d sell them in batches to kids in the neighborhood, and they went nuts for it.

I’d look at all the old things I wanted to get rid of, and then I’d figure out a price for it all, and then I quadrupled that. So, say everything was worth about twenty dollars. I’d shoot for eighty bucks…maybe an even hundred. And say it was ten things I was getting rid of—I’d be selling ten boxes at eight dollars apiece…or maybe even ten.

Kids in the neighborhood practically fought to be part of it. I mean, obviously, some things were worth far less than eight dollars, but as long as I made sure that there was one or two decent things in the bunch, it’s like it created a gambler’s reflex. And because I only sold ten boxes…eventually, I had crowds of kids wanting in. It got so big, that I started selling one-dollar lottery tickets to be one of the kids who had the right to buy an actual box. Before long, I started making more money just from selling those tickets.

B.A.: Did any other kids eventually catch on and then try doing the same thing?

L.J.: Oh, yeah.

B.A.: What did you do then?

L.J.: I got better boxes. Better things in those boxes, so my reputation was always the one people paid for. And then I charged more.

Then, one year, I made enough that I started selling to adults. I’d buy boxes from antique stores and other things and do the same thing, just on a bigger scale. I had an uncle who owned a book shop, and he let me set up my little shop there. That’s when I realized how much money adults had, and how much they wanted to A) Help an enterprising kid and B) feel the magic of buying something they couldn’t see. People will pay a lot for a surprise.

Going back to J. Peterman, I think that’s why it worked so much: you never saw the actual product until it arrived. You saw a painted representation, but it wasn’t until you opened that box that the last dopamine hit dropped and you felt like you were part of some elite club.

B.A.: Wow, this is golden.

Any plans to bring back the mystery boxes? Maybe a subscription service?

L.J.: That’s a really good idea, but I’d have to hassle with employees.

B.A.: Okay, let’s talk about that. You do all this yourself, correct?

L.J.: es.

B.A.: And that drives demand?

L.J.: Yeah, it does. I can only do so much, so there’s a waiting time. I turn a lot of requests away. If you’ve purchased product from me before, I’m more likely to take that commission than something new. That’s the thing: so many people spend time chasing influencers and investing time and money in getting more new customers, but you can make a decent living from existing clients without that big investment chasing down more people.

B.A.: So, no plans to expand into a bigger operation?

L.J.: No. I think that would ruin a good thing for everyone involved.

B.A.: How so?

L.J.: I could probably make more money mass producing my work, but at that point I’m like everyone else. If anyone can buy what I’m selling, then really—what’s its worth?

 I don’t say this to sound arrogant, but my customers see me as an artist, and they have a surplus of funds. So, that small base I allow to purchase my creations are part of an exclusive group. And I guess in that sense, it’s kind of like offering the right to only ten kids out of eventually hundreds who wanted to buy one of my old mystery boxes.

The thing with that was everybody knew the agreed-upon worth of what was inside the boxes. If I tried selling the right to purchase for fifty or one-hundred dollars, no one would have bought in because they knew that the whole haul was probably worth eighty or a hundred dollars. But now I can offer something I spent a week making and I end up making thousands in return.

B.A.: All right, let’s just go there. How much do you make in a year? That is, if you’re comfortable discussing numbers?

L.J.: Sure, I can do that. Uhm…I have a small shop space I own free and clear. And then I shoot for a quarter mil a year. I know I could make more, but I’m not my mother or father, who wanted as much as they could make.

And I’ll be honest…so I don’t sound too much like an asshole—

Sorry. Can I say that on this show?

B.A.: You just did.

[LAUGHTER from BOTH.]

But yeah, that’s fine. Occasional swearing is honesty, right?

L.J.: I fuckin’ think so.

[MORE LAUGHTER.]

But anyway, just to be out in the open about things: my parents made sure I’d never want for anything, other than what made me happy in life. They are both very Type As. I guess I have a little of that in my blood, but not like them. I just need enough.

And I seriously love what I make. I love hearing from my customers and…example: Last summer, someone I sell to was hiking in Colorado and a storm came up. Everything he needed to keep dry stayed dry. I got a postcard from him while he was still on vacation, sharing the story. I have a file cabinet over there full of letters and postcards and things like that.

It might sound funny, but if this place ever went up in flames, that particular cabinet is what I’d rush in to save.

B.A.: That’s so sweet. It really is about the relationships we build through commerce.

L.J.: Oh, it is.

B.A.: All right…What do you do when you’re not working?

L.J.: On some level, I suppose I’m always working—at least always thinking about new things and ways to make existing product better. But it’s not like some of my friends who tease me about being a hipster. People can make fun of what I do all day, but I’m not the one answering email from my boss at three in the morning when I wake up in the middle of the night and see my phone lit up from people working from their beds.

When I’m not working and I let my mind go, I enjoy reading.

B.A.: What do you read?

L.J.: Novels.

B.A.: Really?

L.J.: Yeah. I know as an entrepreneur, people expect me to read business books, but almost every one I’ve read is ten to twenty pages of actual decent information, expanded to hundreds of pages just so people feel like they got their money’s worth and accomplished something. There’s no challenge in those kinds of books. I can hone in on all I want to learn with a Google search and not waste a fifteen to one ratio of wading through a bunch bloat.

Fiction does something different to my brain. I not only get a better feel for how to tell better stories, but I learn what different people deal with when I read books written by people I might never meet. Business books seem to break everyone down to just a few things or types because easy sells. Most entrepreneurs I meet know nothing outside their little bubbles because they see everyone as an archetype, instead of an actual human being.

If you’re marketing anything and not reading fiction, you’re probably mediocre at best, and very limited in thought and understanding.

B.A.: I see…

What habits or mindsets make you successful?

L.J.: Well, reading novels. But part of what I love about novels is the time it takes to read one. I’m not sitting there listening to audiobooks at two-times speed just to get them in my head. And along those lines, I’m putting time and deeper, uninterrupted thought into what I create. I give ideas and processes time to incubate. And I don’t mean for a day or a week…some things I think about for years. Most of those may go nowhere if I measured it, but I find that in giving them so much time, other things bubble up along the way that I’d never have come up with otherwise.

I mean, I get where Seth Godin is getting at when he talks about always shipping things, but a machine gun approach is desperate, don’t you think? I mean, anyone can do it. Maybe you hit a thing or two once in a while, but I’d rather take time, dial in my sights, and not miss a shot.

B.A.: So you’re saying you never make mistakes?

L.J.: I didn’t say that. I said I never miss when it’s time to pull the trigger on an idea.

B.A.: You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t believe you.

L.J.: You’re excused. But it’s the truth. So many people just throw so much out there, hoping something sticks. I’m not the kind of guy who thinks about monetizing everything. I mean, shit, people can’t have a hobby anymore without everyone asking when they’re going to make money with it. I find that sad.

 A friend suggested I turn my love of reading into a side hustle. And man, I hate that term: I’d rather make my one thing matter so I don’t have to do other things on the side. I work, and then enjoy my time not working. But to this friend, I have this big YouTube following, so he’s like, “Dude, you need to figure out how to monetize reading!”

No, I don’t need to figure out how to monetize reading because enjoy reading and some of the other things you do simply for the sake of enjoyment. I don’t think people enjoy things anymore, because unless you’re hitting your numbers, even hobbies have become stressful things for people, now.

Again, I know that I’m speaking from a place of privilege in never wanting for anything growing up, but I do know what enough looks like. My dad stopped what he did because it made him sick. You can’t catch infinity, so find enough and enjoy what comes with it.

I can’t tell you the last time I stressed about something or didn’t have a good night’s sleep. That’s worth far more to me than some five-year plan that quadruples my income.

I mean, I appreciate what you do, but I bet you and your audience would be happier if you weren’t always chasing things.

[AWKWARD SILENCE]

B.A.: Well, this has taken a bit of a turn.

L.J.: I’m sorry.

B.A.: No, it’s okay…

[SILENCE]

L.J.: Okay…Can I ask you and your audience something?

B.A.: Sure.

L.J.: What does enough look like to you?

B.A.: I’m…not sure. I guess I never thought about it like that.

L.J.: Brooke, you have over 1.5 million followers on YouTube, and you post three times a week, getting almost a million views each video. Between your ad revenue, money as an influencer, and your products, I’m sure you make considerably more than I do.

B.A.: Yes. About three to four times more each year from the numbers you discussed.

L.J.: Well when does it even become enough, Brooke?

B.A.: Never, I suppose. If I slow down, it all goes away.

L.J.: Well, I think you have more than enough. You need to stop chasing so much. You’d be a lot happier.

[SILENCE]

L.J.: Are you okay?

B.A.: No, I’m really not. I have you on the show to have a nice conversation about what we do, and you pull some almost abusive mentor shit on me. Psychoanalyze me and tell me I’m not happy?

This show is a mutually beneficial thing for both sides, and I really do hope it helps listeners figure out something they’d rather do. So don’t you dare tell me what enough is, because between your parents, you grew up a billionaire who never wanted for anything. You can make nothing at all the rest of your life, and you’re good.

I don’t expect people to know my story, but let me put things in perspective, Larry. My dad was a heavy-equipment mechanic, and my mom worked at a convenience store until I made enough that she didn’t have to work. You grew up here, in the city. I grew up in Flat Lick, Kentucky…and no, that’s not a nickname—that’s the name of the actual town!

L.J.: I’m so—

B.A.: I’m not done!

I have four siblings, and there were times, at dinner, when we were lucky to have pork chops purchased the day of expiration. That, and boiled potatoes and a can of green beans was often it. Not even a big can of beans…just a regular—what…fourteen ounce can or whatever it is? So imagine this: you fucking love green beans, but there are five other people going at it. And if you wonder why I didn’t say six, and include my mom…that’s because I later found out she used to eat Saltine crackers and butter while cooking dinner for us so she could get some fat and carbs and leave something for her family.

You mentioned your dad retired from trading. How is he today?

L.J.: He’s fine.

B.A.: Yeah, well my dad’s been dead for years. Mesothelioma from brake pads and clutches and shit. So imagine how much all that fucks you up. I could be as rich as your family and still worry that one day I would wake up and it would all be gone, even though I know better. But that’s the wicked thing about growing up in poverty—you really can’t escape it, even when you’re rich. I have to try ten times harder than people who grew up with money, and I’m still worried it will all fall out from under me and I’ll end up back in The Gap with nothing again…like that’s my destiny.

L.J.: I…I’m sorry, Brooke. I had no idea.

B.A.: I didn’t expect you to, but don’t pull some abusive, self-help guru shit on me about what enough looks like. Okay? I think we’re done.

L.J.: I’m sorry—I really am. Uhm…Can I say one more thing?

B.A.: Sure, why not. This is a mess of an episode as it is.

L.J.: I have a confession.

B.A.: What’s that?

L.J.: I don’t make even a fraction of what I said I make. I wasn’t kidding about the postcard from Colorado or making things for a client with a lake house up in Waccabuc. But…that guy’s my dad’s best friend.

I kind of sucked at design, even though I did make it through school. Most of what I do isn’t very original, I guess—it’s stuff that I kinda copied from J. Peterman or stuff I learned how to do online. Ya know, I’d probably be happier if I took my friend’s advice and started doing book reviews. Uhm…so there’s that. Uhm…

One more question?

B.A.: Sure.

L.J.: Now that you have money, how often do you eat green beans?

B.A.: [LAUGHTER] I can’t stand them anymore. I made myself sick on them when I was on my own, and I can’t even look at them today.

[LAUGHTER]

L.J.: Nah, I get that…

B.A.: Well, I usually wrap up episodes asking guests what’s in store for their future. Uhm…Want to take a crack at that one before we cut this short?

L.J.: Yeah, sure ’cause that’s a…that’s a really good question and I with I had a good answer. You’ve given me a lot to think about today. I guess…I really don’t know what the future holds for me. I suppose in never having to worry about my future, I’ve never really given it much thought.

And maybe I should start…

[SILENCE]

[MUSIC FADES IN]

B.A.: Okay…

            [CHIRPY ANNOUNCER VOICE]

Thanks for listening to The Creative Ascent Podcast with me, Brooke Ainsleigh. You can learn more about L.J. Burke at nolumberjacks.com…I hear he has time in his busy schedule for commissions.

[L.J. LAUGHS]

L.J.: Yeah, I do…

B.A.: Next week, I’m talking with cellist, Madeleine Clarke about giving up a career with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra following the death of her husband, and how she found her true calling by making music of her own.

Until then, climb hard, and stay creative!

[Inspiring Music]

Christopher Gronlund:

A big thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks.

[Quirky Outro Music Plays]

All music by Ergo Phizmiz and April Moon, from Epidemic Sound. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the show, the voice talent, and music.

Because I was sick, you only have to wait a couple weeks for the annual Christmas show. This year, enjoy three stories: two that are kind of somber, and one that’s…well…it’s rather ridiculous.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen]

[Intro Music Fades In…]

Christopher Gronlund’s Voice:

I want to make one thing perfectly clear…I’ve been sick.

My wife has also been sick.

The week before Thanksgiving in the U.S., I came down with something that’s still lingering this week.

My wife caught it a few days after me, although she seems to have been hit harder in the middle of it all and is rebounding quicker at the end.

So why am I telling you this?

Because, despite any lapses in the Not About Lumberjacks schedule, I’ve never missed a November anniversary episode.

If you’re not familiar with what I’m talking about, the November anniversary story is the most Not About Lumberjacks of all stories not about lumberjacks I tell all year.

This year’s tale is a bit different than anything I’ve ever done for the show, but currently, we can’t get through the recording session without coughing.

Trust me: After the response to the vile sounds of the last episode, Booger, you don’t want to hear my wife and me narrate a story together while sounding like cappuccino machines. We’re hoping to have it released next weekend…December 7^th or 8^th.

The good thing? That means you get two episodes in December, because the annual pile of Christmas stories is coming together rather well.

And while being sick for a couple weeks has affected the recording schedule, I have plans for stories through January…and maybe even February if people want a story longer than most I share, here.

After that…I have a handful of stories in various states of development, but I may take a break in February or March to devote my full writing attention to a novel.

Even though rolling into the last month of 2019 sick was not in the plans, I have a feeling 2020 will be a very good year for my stories.

Thank you for listening. I hope you’re staying mighty…and keeping your axes sharp…

[Listen]

[An ax chopping wood; THEME MUSIC plays…]

[Host: Christopher Gronlund]

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: this show is not about lumberjacks…

My name is Christopher Gronlund, and this is where I share my stories. Sometimes the stories contain truths, but most of the time, they’re made up. Sometimes the stories are funny—other times they’re serious. But you have my word about one thing: I will never—EVER—share a story about lumberjacks.

This time, it’s a story about a kid who makes a goopy monster in his bathtub…and the mayhem that follows its creation.

All right—let’s get to work…

* * *

[Narrator: Christopher Gronlund]

BOOGER

Bobby Simmons took one last look at the cup full of spit he’d been filling for two days before dumping it into his bathtub. He used his older brother’s hockey stick to mix his saliva into the mass of toenail clippings, urine, dirt, dog feces, toilet water, garbage, motor oil, decayed leaves, rocks, and the contents of the vacuum cleaner bag—and then bag itself. He was almost done, except for the final ingredient, the piece de resistance!

Digging deep into his nose, Bobby fished out a huge booger, the kind that feels like they’re connected to the bottom of your brain—the kind that feels good coming out. He balled it up and added it to the mass in the tub, like a tiny, mucous-covered maraschino cherry atop a compost sundae.

He then dropped in two 9-volt batteries, expecting the mass to ooze to life, but nothing happened. He figured the batteries would be enough to jump-start his creation; after all, when he touched his tongue to 9-volt batteries, it tingled and his mouth tasted like he was chewing aluminum foil. He needed something better, though—something more jolting, like lightning with Frankenstein’s monster.

Bobby once heard about a man who didn’t want to live anymore. The man filled his bathtub, climbed in, and dropped a live-wired toaster into the water. A jolt like that, Bobby hoped, would bring the heap to life, but his mother would scream at him if he ruined any kitchen appliances, even in the name of science. After giving it some thought, he grabbed his brother’s portable stereo; Justin wouldn’t need it—he was away at military school.

The cord on the stereo didn’t reach the tub, however, so Bobby got a long, orange extension cord from the garage that did the trick. When he plugged the stereo in, one of his brother’s rap CDs played.

S/FX:   RAP BEAT THROUGH THE JUSTIN SECTION

Justin fancied himself hardcore, despite being another rap-listening white boy living in an affluent suburb of Chicago. When he finally got his driver’s license, he let the whole world know by driving around in his tricked-out Honda Civic, windows down, bassin’ away. Blocks before he drove by a house, its inhabitants heard the THOOM-THOOM-THOOM of an Alpine subwoofer “pumpin’ new shit by NWA.” To complete the image, Justin wore his cap backwards, said “Yo!” a lot, and stopped calling his mother “Mom,” opting instead for “Bitch.”

“Yo, Bitch—s’up?” he said one morning in a bad accent culled from Boyz N the Hood. “Want me some muthafuckin’ Wheaties!”

A week later, he was shipped off to Saint John’s Military School, where drill instructors made Justin the bitch.

Bobby pulled the shower curtain to the wall and dropped the stereo in. Sparks sprayed from the wall outlet, collecting at his feet before going cold. He thought for sure he’d end up electrocuted, just like the guy in the tub with the toaster, but a big POP, followed by the smell of ozone and burning plastic told him the outlet was fried and that he was safe. A thick, foul-smelling smoke rolled over the edge of the tub. a gurgling sound like a carp sucking Jell-O through a straw came from the other side of the shower curtain. He pulled it back and stared in awe at his work.

“Wow…”

Standing before Bobby was a shambling mound ready to take its first sticky steps into a strange new world. It was covered with tiny pores that swelled and burst under pressure, like fissures at Yellowstone National Park. The resulting odor lingered somewhere between sulfur and catfish bait, crossed with the stench of a dead, bloated raccoon Bobby saw on the railroad tracks in the heat of the previous summer. A vile pile come to life.

The orange extension cord hung from its neck, like a ready-made leash just waiting to be used. Justin’s stereo made up the bulk of its head, the two speakers looking like over-sized eyes, the volume knob serving as a nose. Its mouth was a big, gurgling hole, and sticking out from its neck were the two 9-volt batteries, like those from the neck of Frankentein’s monster.

“Hello…?” Bobby said.

He expected a grunt or a growl, but instead, he was met with a wave of bass.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“What?” Bobby said.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

Bobby reached up to the monster’s face and turned the volume down.

“You need a name,” Bobby said, as he noticed something sticking out like a wart beside the creature’s nose—something he pulled from his own nose several minutes before. “I’ve got it: Booger!”

A knock at the door startled Bobby; it was his mother.

“What are you doing in there?” she said.

“Nothing! Going to the bathroom.”

When Justin was twelve, he went through a phase where he locked himself in the bathroom, even though he didn’t have to go. He masked what he was doing behind closed doors by playing his stereo loudly. It drove his mother mad, and looking back, she attributed the beginning of his delinquency to those times spent alone in the bathroom.

“Stop that right now, young man!” She tried the doorknob, but it was locked.

“Stop what?”

His mother was taken off guard; she didn’t know how to say it. “Stop…that! You know…that!”

“Going to the bathroom?”

“I know what you’re doing! Your brother did it, too, and look where it got him.” She rattled the doorknob. “Unlock this door now, young man!“

Bobby pulled the shower curtain shut and cracked the door. He rocked back and forth, acting like he needed to get back to the toilet. When the stench reached his mother’s olfactory system, she crinkled her face in disgust and gasped for fresh air. Bobby capitalized on the moment.

“It’s your meatloaf,” he said, rocking even more. He looked back at the commode and rubbed his stomach. “I think it got to me. I don’t feel so good.”

His mother, defeated, covered her disappointment with anger. “Well when you’re done, clean your room! How many times do I have to ask you? And stop listening to that rap music—I heard you. Do you want to go to military school like your brother?”

Bobby’s mom yelled a lot. Justin said it stemmed from their father’s frequent business trips. Bobby never knew what was wrong with business trips—their father had to work, after all, and he needed to bring his pretty secretary along, right?

“Okay,” Bobby said, shutting the door. When he felt for sure his mom was gone, he pulled back the curtain and looked at his creation.

Booger was created for a simple purpose: to get revenge on Chad Earnst, the school bully. Chad picked on Bobby unmercifully. Whether it was a simple slap to the back of the head in the hallway, to an all-out beating, there was nothing Bobby feared more in life than the mere sight of Chad Earnst.

“We better get you to my room,” Bobby said to Booger, while reaching for the extension cord. He helped Booger get out of the bath tub and checked the door.  

As Bobby scoped out the hallway, making sure his mother was nowhere to be seen, Booger caught site of the mirror, stopping for a moment to admire itself. It reached up and fidgeted with its nose.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“Shh!” Bobby said. Booger turned the volume down and stared at the mirror. It reached out with a dripping pseudopod, touching its reflection, leaving behind a gooey smear, like lumpy oatmeal.                                      

When Bobby was sure the coast was clear, they made their way down the hallway, leaving behind a wet trail like the passing of a four-hundred and fifty-pound slug.

*   *  *

Bobby’s mother was quick to overreact when it came to the tiniest things: microscopic crumbs left on the kitchen counter, the garbage “dangerously” nearing the top of the kitchen garbage can, and stray drops of water left around the sink. To her, the presence of these little everyday messes was a reminder of just how little control she had over life. The day Bobby spilled grape juice on the living room floor, knowing full well that drinks were only allowed to be consumed over the safety of the linoleum floor in the breakfast nook, his mother went over the edge for an entire week, working at cleaning the stain so furiously and often that she ended up rubbing a hole in the carpet. The only thing that could fix the mess that was “all Bobby’s fault” was new carpet. But when Bobby’s mother got on him about cleaning his room, however, it was not without reason.

Plates encrusted with the remnants of old dinners found a safe home beneath piles of dirty clothes. Comic books and video games were stacked in groups resembling ziggurats, and plastic Coke bottles crunched beneath heaps of paper when Bobby walked across the floor. Any mother—even one as profoundly clean as Bobby’s—had every right to demand that their son clean such a dump.

Booger slid to the corner of the bedroom, out of Bobby’s way. The creature seemed at home in the mess, the room so cluttered and dirty that it could serve as camouflage for Booger if Bobby’s mother poked her head in to see what kind of progress he was making. Booger belonged in that bedroom, a tall, upright extension of the clutter on the floor.

“I gotta clean this up. When we’re done, though, we’ll go have some fun.”

Bobby had a simple plan: he’d leave Booger in the small forest on the outskirts of Memorial Park, where Chad Earnst spent all his freetime smoking stolen cigarettes and roughing up sixth graders. Bobby would go to the edge of the park and shout, “Hey Chad, I fucked your mother!” and run for the treeline. Chad, of course, would follow, only to find himself face-to-face with Bobby’s newly created bodyguard. Bobby would explain to Chad that if he ever sucker punched him in the hallway again, or beat him up when they got off the bus after school, that he’d have to answer to Booger. Problem solved.

Bobby started filling the first of what would take several garbage bags to hold all the trash that had accumulated on his bedroom floor over the past couple months. It would be an all-day task, and he debated sneaking out, but his mother had been threatening military school more frequently, and with a brother already at St. John’s, he knew the threats actually carried with them some certain weight.

When Bobby had filled the first garbage bag, he set it near Booger, who had taken a great interest in what Bobby was doing. Bobby shook the second bag open, and as he started filling it, he noticed the first bag was nowhere to be seen.

“Booger, did you do something with the bag?”

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“Huh?” Before Booger could belt out more bass, Bobby shaked his hands and said, “Nevermind, it’s cool.”

Bobby picked up a handful of trash and brought it toward his new friend.

“You hungry, pal? You want some of this?”

Booger’s gaping maw opened, and mixed in with the sticky goo that seemed to comprise much of Booger’s mass were the remains of the first garbage bag. When Bobby tossed the trash in, Booger welcomed the snack.

“Cool…”

As Bobby gathered more garbage from the floor, Booger reached down with a sticky pseudopod, gathering an armful of debris. It raised the mass toward its mouth, before stopping and looking at Bobby, like it was waiting for permission.

“Yeah, that’s cool. Go ahead, eat it.” Bobby gestured toward the room. “Eat everything on the floor if you want.”

In a matter of minutes, aside from the sticky residue left behind as Booger made his way around the room, Bobby’s bedroom was spotless.

“All right!”

What would have taken Bobby all day was done in minutes. But Booger wasn’t finished. As it “cleaned” beneath Bobby’s desk, he didn’t stop at just the pile behind Bobby’s chair. Booger ate the chair before making short work of the final mound.

“No! Booger, not the chair. Only the garbage!”

Booger looked down at Bobby.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“I’ll take that as an apology?” Bobby said.

But his room was now clean, he took Booger by the extension cord and said, “Come on—let’s go.”

*   *    *

Bobby was making his way toward the back door when he heard his mother. He stopped, but Booger didn’t; he bumped Bobby’s back, smearing it with warm garbage. He shoved Booger back, getting even more garbage and slime on him. His mother was walking their way.

“Shh…” he whispered to Booger.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“What?!” Bobby’s mother said as she got closer. “Bobby, is that you?”

Bobby poked his head around the corner. “I’m sorry, Mom—I stubbed my toe.”

She was still walking Bobby’s way; he stepped out to block her, but she walked right by, missing everything. Bobby quickly ushered Booger to the other side of the entry to the kitchen. Just in time. His mother turned around and made her way toward the front door.

“I hope you don’t think you’re going anywhere, young man. Have you cleaned your room? I can smell that pig sty all the way out here.”

“I’m cleaning it right now. I just need to get a couple more garbage bags from the kitchen.”

“Well, if you’d just keep it clean, you wouldn’t have to spend an entire Saturday cleaning, would you?” She pointed to the living room. “Do you see how clean the rest of the house is? It doesn’t take much time…just a little here and there.”

Just a little here and there consisted of practically fulltime work for Bobby’s mother. Most people could spend an hour cleaning their house and be content with the results, but Mrs. Simmons took clean to the molecular level. Bobby’s brother, Justin, blamed it on the medicine she took, but Bobby had a remote feeling that it somehow had to do with his father’s trips away from home.

“Okay, Mom…I’ll start doing that.”

Mrs. Simmons straightened the door mat and left the house.

“Whew!” Bobby said.

S/FX: CRASHING POTS AND PANS

He remembered that Booger was in the kitchen. Alone.

Booger was eating the toaster when Bobby stepped into the kitchen. The creature had already devoured his mother’s mixer and blender, and had also—from the looks of things—eaten two of the four chairs in the breakfast nook. Slime was everywhere.

Booger! No! Come on, stop!”

Bobby rushed over, hoping to save the toaster, but it was too late—it had already gone somewhere deep inside Booger to join its Kitchen-Aid cousins in the belly of the beast.

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

Bobby looked at the mess made in the kitchen, shook his head, and said, “Let’s just go…”

*   *   *

“You wait right here,” Bobby said to Booger. They were standing just inside the treeline on the far side of Memorial Park.

“Don’t go anywhere, and try not to eat stuff, okay?”

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” Bobby muttered as he headed off in search of Chad Earnst. And there he was, just as Bobby expected, terrorizing a group of younger kids, pinning them to the ground and blowing smoke into their faces. Bobby stopped halfway across the field between the trees and the park, making sure he had enough distance between himself and Chad so he could make it back to the safety of the woods.

“Hey…Chad! I fucked your mother!” Bobby bellowed.

As predictable as a Swiss watch, Chad jumped to his feet.

“Simmons? You wantin’ to die?!”

“Yeah, that’s it!” Bobby shouted. “Only I don’t think you have what it takes, you pussy.”

Chad Earnst spat his cigarette to the ground, pointed Bobby’s way, and yelled, “Dead man walking!”

Bobby turned and ran; Chad Earnst followed, making up the distance between the two faster than Bobby had planned. He could hear Chad getting closer—if he could only reach the trees, he’d be safe. He heard Chad’s raspy breath catching up as he pushed into the maples and oaks and rushed to the spot where he’d left Booger. The monster was nowhere to be seen.

“Booger?” Bobby said, but the only answer was Chad saying, “Time to die, Simmons. Time to die…”

Chad Earnst made his way toward Bobby, cracking his knuckles and walking slowly with purpose. Chad was experienced in beating the snot out of anyone who gave him a sideways glance, or looked the other way, and he took great pleasure in dragging the terror of his victims out. It made the beating all-the-more satisfying to him—smelling that fear. Bobby was backed up against a tree, Chad Eart’s smoky breath right in his face, threatening the beating of a lifetime, when Bobby heard Booger eating something in the trees.

“Booger! Help!”

“What’s with this booger shit, bitch?” Chad said.

Bobby smiled. “Why don’t you turn around and find out.”

Even though Bobby was now looking at Chad from behind, he could tell Chad’s Levi’s had gone wet with fear. Urine creeped down his legs as he looked up at the towering mound of garbage lurking above.

“What the fuck is that?”

“That’s Booger. He’s my bodyguard,” Bobby said. “So if you ever mess with me again, you’ll have Booger to answer to. Right Booger?”

Bobby was waiting for Booger’s aggressive bass or hardcore rap lyrics to drop from Booger’s speaker eyes, but instead all he heard was a sickening SLURP as Booger swallowed Chad Earnst whole.

“No! Booger! You weren’t supposed to eat him!”

S/FX:   Bass THOOM THOOM THOOM

“You’re gonna get me sent to military school, just like Justin. I can’t go to military school. It’s not my thing! Booger, come on, cough him up.”

Bobby began pushing on what he figured was Booger’s stomach, but had no luck, and he realized that irritating the mound may result in a similar fate as Chad Earnst’s. Bobby had to come up with something…quick!

He grabbed a branch from a tree and shoved it down Booger’s throat, hoping the creature’s anatomy worked like a human’s and something pushing down its throat would result in a gag reflex, bringing Chad up in a flood of sticky vomit. But Booger ate the branch, too.

“Booger, no!”

Booger looked down at Bobby, clearly not understanding what he had done wrong. Bobby grabbed the orange extension cord from Booger’s neck and led the creature home as quickly as he could.

*    *    *

“You stay here. Understand?”

Bobby shook his head, left his bedroom, and ran for the garage. He didn’t want to do it, but desperate times called for desperate measures. He grabbed his father’s circular saw. He’d never used a powertool, but there was no better time than now to learn than now. He had seen Booger’s stomach convulsing with Chad’s struggles…there was still time to save him.

As Bobby made his way through the kitchen, he heard his mother’s car pulling up out front. From his bedroom, he heard crashing and banging—this was the day his mother would have too much, this is the day he’d be shipped off to military school, he was sure of it.

He ran to the bedroom, prepared to cut Booger open wide, freeing his enemy from the creature’s gooey gut. The thought devastated Bobby—with a specter of a father, a mother who liked cleaning more than her second-born child, and a brother he hadn’t seen in a year, the eight-foot mound of garbage tearing up his bedroom was the closest thing he had to family. He wondered if Booger could somehow be trained; he wondered if the circular saw would kill his new best friend. He heard his mother open the front door open…moments later, he heard his mother screaming downstairs.

“Bobby Simmons, what is this mess?!”

He ran into his bedroom, slamming the door behind. Things were only getting worse—Booger had eaten Bobby’s dresser and was now working on his bed. The creature was swollen like a tick. Booger gobbled Bobby’s bed in two quick gulps; Bobby never had to use the circular saw.

SFX: SPLUT/SPLASH

Booger could hold no more—the bed was one big bite too much. Bobby’s new friend had exploded everywhere, sending bags of garbage, kitchen appliances, and Chad Earnst flying about the bedroom. From a far corner, he heard Chad Earnst moan—he was still alive, at least, covered in goop like a newborn foal.

S/FX: BANG BANG BANG

Bobby’s mother was pounding on the bedroom door. Chad shook his head, regaining his senses.

“Bobby, you open this door right now and explain the mess in the kitchen! If you don’t have a good excuse, you may be taking a trip to Saint John’s before your father even gets home. Do you hear me, young man?!”

He had no choice. He opened the bedroom door, letting the mess that was once Booger spill out his door and into the hallway. His mother grabbed her nose. Retching sounds like the time she found spoiled milk in Justin’s room echoed from her throat. She looked at the mess in Bobby’s room; she looked at Chad Earnst covered in goo.

“What the hell is going on here?! I told you to clean this room and instead, you invite your little friend over and trash the whole damn house? He needs to leave, and you need to get cleaning, mister!”

Bobby and Chad looked at each other—the events of the last fifteen minutes leaving both of them in a daze.

“I’m going to call Sergeant Patterson and let him know another Simmons boy is coming his way!”

She slammed the bedroom door, and when it was clear she was not coming back, Chad Earnst gave Bobby Simmons the beating of his life.

* * *

A big thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks. All instrumental music by Ergo Phizmiz and Yung Kartz. The rap tune was “Whip Yo Head” by Dollar Boyz. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the show, the voice talent, and music.

In one month, it’s the annual November anniversary show that I SWEAR is not about lumberjacks! The title? The Lumberjack of Williamsburg.

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!

[Listen Here]

[Music fades in]

Female Narrator:

This is Behind the Cut with Christopher Gronlund. The companion show to Not About Lumberjacks.

Christopher Gronlund:

“Alone in HQ” is obviously a satire, but maybe just barely.

I once worked with somebody who put so many hours into work that it wasn’t uncommon for them to occasionally collapse from stress and exhaustion. (Once, while they were visiting family in another state and obsessing over email they couldn’t check on their phone as it came in, they stepped away to take a look and…down they went…in front of their entire family.)

I know of at least one woman who was already working on her phone from a hospital bed the day she gave birth. And along those lines, I know of someone else who had cancer and heart issues…who was told not to work at all, but they were secretly working from their hospital bed.

Sadly, that person died…and when they did, someone who didn’t know they died mentioned to others that email to the person was going unanswered. The response?

“Yeah, they died a few weeks ago. We’ll let you know when we hire their replacement.”

It was said in a tone of, “How dare they die before finishing their part of this project!”

In April of this year, I left a company where I worked for almost seven years. Aside from the Chief Financial Officer saying they planned to get rid of technical writers, the spirit of the company had changed. It went from a place where the attitude seemed to be, “We let our work speak for itself,” to one of, “We must crush all others at any cost!”

Suddenly, everyone was an enemy to destroy. In the last company town hall meeting I sat through, leaders talked about how the industry was our birthright and how we must do all we could to take back what was rightfully ours! It sounded more like a meeting of white nationalists than a state-of-the-company meeting.

Most recently, I heard they told employees layoffs are likely coming…and that if you lose your job? It’s nothing to get upset over.

“Hey, ya know, so you’ll lose your income and healthcare, unless you can afford paying for COBRA with no money coming in…and sure — it’s a big wrench in all the plans you have, but…don’t be upset about us taking from you all those memories with family you gave up for us!”

It’s sickening.

I share all this not to attack a company I once felt at least a certain pride working for, but to highlight how strange corporate life has become. Despite so many articles about the biggest life-end regret being, “I wish I hadn’t worked so much,” people now work constantly. I know people who can’t get through a lunch without checking their phone every time it lights up, vibrates, or makes noise.

I can only imagine how many times a day people look at their phones and say, “Just a minute—work.”

So, is it really beyond the realm of belief that if power and connectivity went away that some would seek out some semblance of the routine they’ve been conditioned to follow?

* * *

Steve Jobs once said that he viewed Ayn Rand’s book, ATLAS SHRUGGED, as one of his guides in life. Former ExxonMobil CEO, Rex Tillerson, said it’s a book that shows the positive effect CEOs can make on the world. Other CEOs similarly credit Rand’s THE FOUNTAINHEAD as their guide.

But before Ayn Rand wrote those beefy, rambling things, she wrote a little book called ANTHEM. (If you’re familiar with it, you probably picked up how much I framed “Alone in HQ” around the book.)

For all its faults (and believe me, there are plenty), I will always have a fondness for ANTHEM. It’s a story about a street sweeper in a dystopian future without much technology.

When the main character discovers electric light and brings it before the leaders of the society in which he lives [he’s punished]…Later, he escapes into the mountains with a woman he meets and finds a house high up above everything he knows. He vows there to start a family and show others the literal and figurative light, driven by a sacred word he will carve over the portal of his fort, that sacred word: EGO.

(Yeah, it’s a bit much, but seriously—the book does have its moments.)

Like so many others, I came to ANTHEM through the band Rush’s 2112 album…which mirrors the story in many ways. And hey, were that not enough, Rush also released a song called “Anthem,” influenced but the book as well.

However, framing parts of “Alone in HQ” around ANTHEM is one of the reasons it took so long for me to release. (Well, that…and I was wrapping up a novel.)

In ANTHEM, the protagonist (named Equality 7-2521…so how could I not name the protagonist in “Alone in HQ after an employee number?), meets a woman named Liberty 5-3000 (Yeah: Liberty 5-3000. I mean, come on…that sounds like an old-timey telephone number, doesn’t it?). Mirroring that, I eventually had a woman tending to a nearby financial company wander into Employee #312566’s headquarters.

And that led to…a very bloated story. (Okay, maybe not bloated, but I try to keep stories on Not About Lumberjacks anywhere between 20 to 30 minutes. I do all I can to not go over that 30-minute mark, and this was probably becoming a novella.)

But to introduce a new character and not give her much time in the tale seemed kind of cheap. So…when the novel I was working on was done and I returned to “Alone in HQ,” the solution was simple: keep Employee #312566 completely alone. Strip out all those scenes with Employee #817481.

(I’ll pause here for another aside: the two employee numbers are the beginnings of old phone numbers I once had. 312-566 was the start of my old number up north, and 817-481 was the beginning to the number we had when I moved to Texas from the Chicago area when I was fifteen.)

* * *

I’ve never been a writer afflicted with “This sucks!” syndrome…and by that, I mean when a story is weak, I know it’s part of the process. Your job as a writer is to work with a story until it’s smooth enough to show to others if that’s part of what you want out of writing. Obviously, I record this and release it for free to anyone in the world who wants to listen, so…that’s part of what I want out of this.)

All that said, it wasn’t until I did the first vocal read through of the story that I felt there was something there. When I read it in my head, it seemed a bit ham-fisted. But once I read the story out loud, it worked for me. And…it seems to have worked for others.

“Alone in HQ” had 20% more listens in its first week than any previous episode of Not About Lumberjacks. Now, before you say, “Wow!” know that the reality of that is…instead of 40 listens, it received 50. I’ve put more than 40 hours into some episodes of the show that saw the kinds of numbers that would make many podcasters quit and try another show, or give up podcasting for good.

And maybe that’s part of why I like this story so much.

We seem so damn fixated on measuring everything by numbers. How many retweets something promoted received; how much money people make as a measure of their worth. And, more today than any time before…equating how many hours one works in a week as a measure of how dedicated they are not just to work, but to their lives.

There’s something to be said about doing a thing simply because you love doing it. There are miserable people who can never have enough in life, while others making enough to get by with some degree of security and comfort do their things and live rich and happy lives. But there are many people who measure their worth in how much control they have over others, and those people seem unsettled by those who don’t share their philosophy.

I’m a very hard worker, but I am nothing like Employee #312566. In forty hours a week at my day job, I often do better work than those putting in 60, 80, or even 100 hours or more. Beyond that, I am definitely happier than many people I’ve worked with, choosing not to put my entire value as a person into a place that is likely to lay us all off one day.

How sick or scared must one be to somewhat regularly pass out from work-related stress or exhaustion? How sad is it to be dying, continuing to put in long hours believing it all matters somehow, only to have team meambers see your death as an inconvenience, rather than a thing to mourn?

The way we approach work seems to become more twisted each year. I know somebody who actually had a manager tell him and his group, “If you guys don’t hit your numbers, I’ll put you through a fucking wall!” I once watched one of the good CEOs of a company I worked for step down in front of us all in tears, talking about realizing how off-track his life had become when his family begged him to stop answering text messages from others at work during Thanksgiving dinner with them. He told us all that he missed seeing his children grow up; and they were all about to head off to college, and he barely knew them because he put work before family. It wrecked the guy.

Let’s get back to Ayn Rand…

She glorified the characters in her novels, even the terrible ones. Perhaps the reason I like ANTHEM’S Equality 7-2521 is he’s at least redeemable. The characters in THE FOUNTAINHEAD and ATLAS SHRUGGED, however, are shitty human beings skipping anniversaries, having affairs with others who “understand them and their work” more than their families, and were often handed down the successes they claim to have made completely on their own.

No wonder her work is loved by so many CEOs.

I suppose when all you do is run from life and do nothing but work, you’ll do anything to convince yourself you’re living the best life there is to be lived.

The sad thing is when they expect us to do it, too…

Sadder still: when we actually do…

[Outro music fades in…]

Christopher Gronlund:

Thank you for listening to Not About Lumberjacks and Behind the Cut. Theme music for Behind the Cut is a tune called Reaper by Razen. Visit nolumberjacks.com for information about the music, episodes, and voice talent.

In a month, it’s the strangest father and son story I’ll probably ever write…

Until next time: be mighty, and keep your axes sharp!