Category Archives: Prose
My Secret Life
My Secret Life By Jay E. Bates
Now that I have been retired for 15 years I can divulge some of my
previous government employment secrets. At one time, in the sixties, I
was employed by the Advanced Research Force to develop a super dog that
could detect any lies or inconsistencies in peoples statements. We were
headquartered in an old farm house in Kansas know as Area 9.
In the 19th Century, dog breeders invented all sorts of highly useful
breeds. Since that time dog breeders have mostly done nothing but make
more adorable the existing breeds. What kind of breeds would be useful
in the 21st Century? In one of my more lucid moments, it struck me that
maybe somebody could breed a canine assistant, a dog with such a refined
sense of smell and of detecting human body language, they could detect
whether a person was lying or stretching the truth and would bark
accordingly. I put together a prospectus of my proposal for the
Department of Good Products of Outstanding Potential (DOGPOOP), which was readily accepted.
In due course, we had inter-bred many varieties of the more intelligent
working dogs and produced a super dog, Combined Ultimate Retriever,
or CUR for short. This beast could detect the slightest hesitation or catch
in the voice or a slight movement of the eyes that was a tipoff of any
stretching of the truth. We soon had a pack of these useful animals
ready for the super-secret group known as Bureau Investigative Technical
Cryptological Happenings.
We were very proud of our accomplishment, as you can well imagine, and
decided to show off the CURs to the Senate Intelligence Sub-Committee behind
closed doors in a secret meeting. Everything was going well with all the
CURs behaving themselves as we make our presentation to the
sub-committee. The sub-committee sat there is rapt silence, stunted by
the brilliance of our efforts. At the close of our presentation, the
distinguished head of the Senate Intelligence Sub-Committee, a well
known Senator known for his appreciation of good
liquor and young ladies , rose to his feet to thank us and heap
accolades upon our heads. However, as soon as he opened his mouth, all
Hell broke loose, with the whole pack of CURS howling and barking at the
top of their lungs. Needless to say, that was the end of our project.
All funding was ended and we were banned from any further government
contracts.
Now you may think that is the end of my sad story. However, unbeknownst to
us there had been a Russian double agent employee of the Senate
Intelligence Sub-Committee working as a doggerel interpreter. She had
passed on our secrets to the Russians, and their secret group,
Proletariat Order of Committed Heroes. In due order they had produced
their own super dog known as Fierce Interceptor Defective Observations,
or FIDO for short. Now the Russians did not have any such silly thing as
a legislative oversight committee, so they were able to complete their
project and produce a whole series of FIDOs for all the members of the
Politburo. Now you all know that a distinguished member of the
Politburo does not stoop so low as to feed his FIDO, and as you might
have suspected as least some of the Politburo members wives ended up
feeding the FIDOs. Once the FIDOs had become the used to the women
feeding them, they naturally accepted the wives as the alpha member of
the pack and began ratting out the Politburo members and their dirty
little secrets. Also members of the Politburo’s select few were
beginning to detect lies and distortions among their contemporaries. As
you can well imagine that was the beginning of the end for the Union of
Soviet Socialist Republics.
Now you all know that while our esteemed former President Reagan may
have gotten most of credit for the end of the Russian Empire, the real
reason shall for ever always be buried like a bone, because of
catastrophic consequences to world harmony and everyday discourse if
ever such a secret weapon such as the CUR or FIDO be unleashed on
mankind again. Thank God for Congressional Oversight Committees!
Down All the Days
Down All the Days By Jay Bates
The mist hung on the hills, wafting in a cold wind blowing down the Diablo Range. We four huddled around our screens and kept moving to hold the in-creeping cold at abeyance. We were screening for that mythical gemstone benitoite. We were washing the dirt off tailings at the Gem Mine in hopes of a facetable stone.
Some weeks before we had been there on a warm and sunny day, basking in the warmth and the aroma of the surrounding incense cedars. It seemed much easier then to find those little electric blue crystals. Now it seemed they had all disappeared. Still, we soldiered on, for we knew not when we may be able to return to this remote location or whether we could even return to the land of Happy Meals over the sodden dozed tracks laughingly called roads on the maps.
The wash water ran out, so Dave and I put his hitch on the back of my Jeep and trailed the water tank trailer down to the creek bottom to pump it full from an underground tank placed there to collect water during to oncoming threatening winter rains. Now in four wheel, I crept back up the pit tracks to the top pulling a ton and half of wash water. All for a tiny blue speck that resembled a bit of blue glass, you would not think twice about picking up on the street.
But we had a bit of good luck! While busy getting the wash water, Bob had done a little sniping around a tailings pile and found some undamaged included crystals of pinky nail size. Not gem quality, but what awesome specimens they are! Maybe Big Ernie was going to be kind after all as a glint of sunlight pierced the mist. No, it wasn’t going to happen, as the mist again closed in and we returned to our dreary screens. Slowly moving with buckets from the coyote hole to the screens on the slippery slopes. Dump, wash, swirl with numb fingers, and now squint with a hopeful eye for that electric blue vision. No, none there. Keep moving. Maybe the next bucketful will reward us for our efforts. Harry and Mary had given up on their singular efforts of moving large amounts of material looking for larger gems and had joined us manning the washing screens looking for any stone justifying our insane efforts. Mary, with an eye of an eagle, was having no more luck than the rest of us. All for naught, on a cold misty drizzly slope.
These hills, wrought from the earth on sliding tectonic plates, have always been realm of the desperado and wild beast; and a man there is always alone. Once it was where bears the size of kodiaks roamed. It is still the home of giant condors, wild boar, and lion; and a man there is always alone. The wild-land firefighters hate the hot burning impenetrable chaparral. The EPA has banned man from the largest asbestos areas known to exist. But there still are those that find solitude in the Elfin Forest and Serpentine Barrens and the hot dry slopes of pines and cedars. Maybe, with a little luck, a glint of electric blue, on some future warm summers day. Not today, anyway, you miserable fool!