100TWC - Day 2: Complicated

Now don't you go gettin' the wrong idea. I ain't tryin' to make it complicated. Heck if it wuz complicated I couldn't tell ya nothin' about it. Fact is I'm just sittin' out here on ma stoop tryin' to get ma head around it maself.

Mr. Murphy always used to say "Kid, it don't take no genius to complicate things. The genius is in keepin' it simple. So you're about as close as a body can git round here to fuckin' Einstein."

Well that made me colour up to the top of ma head. I could feel it, heatin' right on up there. I mean, far as I know, Einstein was a guy. I ain't gonna fuck no guy. But Mr Murphy was right about one thing. I AM good at keepin' it simple. The boys down at the store tried to tell me one time there ain't no black or white, only shades of grey. I just laughed at 'em. I mean there wuz a black stallion sat right outside in the street for starters. And what about them black folk? They's black all right. And we's white. And you never see no-one any shade of grey. Well, 'cept Mrs Hardcastle some times, when she can't get her breath, but she ain't always grey. Far as I can see, there's a lot of things that are black or white. Them boys just don't know what the heck they're talking about.

I know they wuz probably only tryin' to trick me. I don't mind. I just ignored 'em. It's simpler that way. I like things when they's simple.

Which is why I'm in a bit of a pickle right now. I mean, it's not exactly complicated - you know? But it sure as heck ain't simple neither. I wish Mr Murphy was still here. He could do that thing where he just sat down and got on with his whittlin' while I talked it through and you know what? Half the time he never had to say nothing. I wouldn't be much more'n half way through the telling about... well... whatever it was, and the answer would just pop right into ma head. All by itself! How do you like that? Nothing complicated about that.

I tried it with Ma once, but it weren't no good. She jes wouldn't keep still. And talk! Lord sakes. She's ma Ma an' all but I sure wish she'd hush up now and then. Seems like every word I said she'd come out with a question. Now THAT was complicated. I never had no time to think at all. I'd no sooner answered one question and then picked up ma threads and got the next word out, and there she'd be with another dang question. I said "Ma. Hush your mouth and jes listen to whut I'm sayin'" But she wouldn't. That wuz the first time I ever realised what the boys at the store mean when they say "Yadda Yadda Yadda." Fact I should call Ma that, I reckon. Yadda.

Anyways where was I? Yeah, so I ain't got no Mr Murphy to sit quiet, and Ma ain't no good for the job, so who'm'a gonna ask? An' I wuz thinkin' and thinkin' when little Martha May came walking by, smiles at me from under them pretty yeller curls of hers and sez "Hey there Joe, watcha doin'?"

Well THAT made me colour up too, same as when Mr Murphy said that about, you know, doin' it with Einstein. Only this time I sure wasn't thinkin' about doin' it with Einstein. No sir. But you can guess I WAS thinkin' about doin' it. An' then I got to thinkin' about talkin' it through with Martha May and that made me colour up some more.

And Martha May's sayin' "Jesus Joseph, what did I say? You're as red as a beet!" and I'm jes startin' to realise that this ain't the kind of thing I can talk out loud about... with a girl.