Superpower

[This conversation happened in the packed hallway of a nursing home on a warm afternoon when I was running so very, very late.  A man stopped in front of me, completely blocking my path through the open space between some immobile residents in wheelchairs and the medication cart. ]

[There are three voices in this dialog.  Two of them are mine.]




What the other guy said: "Whoa! That thing looks like a bomb."

What I thought:  It's weird how often people say that about liquid oxygen tanks.

What I said:  "Heh.  Yeah.  I know.  It really does."

"Do you have any idea what a bomb that size would do to this place?"

Wow.  Weird follow-up question.

"Pssh. Yeah, right?"

"And I don't mean a regular bomb. I mean, like, a nuclear device."

Oh, boy.

"I can't imagine."



"It would just... everything would be obliterated."

I guess it would.

"I guess it would."

"A bomb that size, and they are a little bigger than that, can kill a hundred thousand people."

I wonder how long this is going to take.

 "Yeah.  Wow."



"They don't tell you that.  They don't let people know what kind of power they control."

Well, I don't really think that's true.  They really did want everyone to know the how dangerous the bombs were.  Otherwise what would be the point of...

What the hell am I talking about?  I'm not going to debate this guy.  Acknowledge his insight and lets move this along.

"That's bananas."

"It's liked they WANTED to destroy the world!"

That might have worked.  Do it again.

"That's bananas."

Okay, I didn't mean say EXACTLY the same thing.

"They were willing to end the human race.  Forever.  Over pride and nationalism."

Say anything.  ANYTHING other than "that's bananas".

"That's totally bananas."

Oh.   Good job, dipshit.

"I was watching this show on the Superpower Channel about nuclear weapon stockpiling. I couldn't believe how many weapons we used to have."

Ugh.  He's just getting warmed up.

"Yep.  Seems crazy."

Shouldn't have said 'crazy'.  Shouldn't have said 'crazy'.  That's not cool.

"You'd think they'd stop once each side could destroy the world just once, but they kept on going."

If he was just a little bit nuttier, I could use this for the blog.  It's almost the end of the week and I haven't even started thinking about writing anything.

"Uh-huh."

"The Soviets too.  You figure they had as much as we did."

I have my nine readers to think about.

"Sure."

"Maybe more."

Actually, less.   One of those weekly pageviews is me clicking on the site to copy the url.

"Yep."



"I think this is what Truman wanted all along.  The thing people don't realize about Truman is that he..."

You know what the blog feels like?  It feels like when Dean and I were kids and we made a pretend radio station out of a Mr. Microphone and a Radio Shack tape recorder.   And we'd be eating dinner and one of us would say "did you flip the tape?" and the other one would be like "I thought you flipped the tape" and then one of us would run upstairs and turn the cassette over so there wouldn't be dead air in our nine-volt coverage area.  It's weird how much the blog reminds me of that.  I'm forty-something and doing exactly the same thing I was doing when I was eight.

"... and there wasn't a single person in the whole Pentagon who thought..."

Hold on a minute.  Am I forty-five or forty-six?  This is 2015.  The last digit of my age is the same as the last digit of the year for half of the calander, but is it more or less for the other half? I was born in 1969, and I was "zero" then and zero is less than nine... wait.  That's where the numbers roll over.  That's like that thing where an ace is higher than a king and less than a two.  Okay.  In 1970, I turned one in June, so that would mean I'm older than the year for the second half of the year. This is 2015.  So, I'm forty-five.  Cool.   I'm forty-five.

"...so that's the REAL reason the Cuban missile crisis happened."

Shit.  This is July.  I'm forty-six.  Shit.

 Wait.  He stopped talking.  Did he ask me a question?   I should grunt and shake my head.

"Mmm."  (I shake my head)

"But even if they weren't launched from Cuba, there wouldn't be any real response time for the general population to be ready."

Boy.  This guy is really shaken up by the state of the world in like, 1978.  I can't tell if he thinks the cold war is still going on.  Does he live here?  He might just be a visitor with a lot of passion for history.

[The man turns his attention to an aide that walks past and starts to follow her.]

"There's my girl!  Rosie!  Where you been?"

Wow.  He's really chummy with the staff.  That could mean he's a resident with a little bit of dementia.  Or he could be a visitor who spends a lot of time with a family member.  He's not dressed like he lives here.  He has a vibe of someone who...

You know what?  I can go now.  I'm just going to live with this mystery.

[I make my way carefully through the crowded hall, careful to avoid the stocking-clad feet of the residents parked in their wheelchairs and through the drifting clusters of the fast-moving staff.  I make eye contact with as many as will let me.  I smile.   I nod.  And I make it to the service door, cheerfully pressing the button that suspends the alarm.]

[Someone taps my shoulder.]

"Do YOU ever watch the Superpower Channel?"

Fuck crackers!  He's right behind me!

(Startled sounds)  "MMblah!"



"It's, like, channel 300.  I think.  It might be 302."

I am never...

"I'll check that out."



"They have a lot of crazy shit on there.

...going...

"It sounds like they do."



"Really makes you think."

...home.

"Thanks.  That's exactly what I'm looking for."