Dinner Plans

"So what time are we eating tonight?"

"Huh?"

"I just thought you'd at least buy me dinner before you'd screw me over."

My Uncle, The Superhero

Uncle Marcus was a constant in my life, a bigger brother who was decades older than I was. My mom tells me it was like having two kids in the house when he came over. For about a week when I was a child, I believed he was a superhero. He told me he had the power to burn things just by touching them. All he had to do was think it. I was skeptical, but when he rubbed his hands together and then placed them on my forehead, I felt myself warm up. He said that it was just a demonstration. If he thought about it any harder, he'd turn me into a cinder. Later on, when I discovered I could do it too, he claimed that the power must have passed onto me. He said grandpa had it too and it must have skipped my dad. I was on top of the world, a kid with a super power. It wasn't until I went through a whole loaf of bread without being able to turn one slice into toast that I realized I was tricked.

Lions, Oh My!

In Chinatown in January, it is cold, but there is electricity in the air. The parade has begun. A group of young kung fu students march in procession down the the closed off route. Thousands of people peer over the barricades and shoulders to watch them perform their routine. A pair of lion headdresses follow them. They are bright red with white, green, black, and many other colors. The performers who don the heads wriggle this way and that, executing acrobatic jumps and flapping the eyelids. Another person trails behind him under the red cloth body. Their legs stick out from under the costume. Children giggle and even adults clap and applaud. Cameras click. Flashes go off. The policemen guarding the borders of the parade route whistle in appreciation.