A Coffin Is A
Wondrous Thing
by Michael A. Kechula
Randolph loved
coffins. He didn’t know why. He also loved
Barbie dolls. He didn’t know why that was so,
either.
One day, while
looking at a coffin he’d bought for a dollar at
a garage sale, he thought, “I’ll bet
there’s a use for a big box like this.”
He tried
filling it with popcorn. But somehow filling it
to the brim, and adding salt and butter to the
contents didn’t satisfy him. He began to
think the coffin was meant for something far more
noble.
Next he filled
the coffin with cigarette butts that had been
smoked exclusively by European nobility. He found
he could tuck thousands inside, but several
hundred less when the butts were filter-tipped.
And though he took many digital pictures of the
coffin’s contents from various angles, he
still had the nagging feeling that the coffin
wasn’t fulfilling its true existential
purpose.
Coffee grounds,
carefully selected for their delicate aroma and
collected from the city’s Starbucks, were
next. The coffin nicely accommodated a hundred
pounds worth. And yet, after photographing the
results, Randolph felt that something was still
missing.
Then he
thought about the bikini-clad Barbie doll that
sat on the fireplace mantle. He’d always
wondered what use such a thing could have, though
he loved it so. It didn’t work as a floor
mop. It didn’t improve the taste of his soup
when he dipped the doll in a steaming bowl, and
it didn’t speed up his Internet service no
matter how many times he sat the doll atop his
computer monitor.
After much
soul searching, his rusted frontal lobes shed
their rust. Immediately, his brain filled with
wondrous images. “Eureka!” he hollered.
Taking a
handful of popcorn, another of unfiltered
cigarette butts, and another of coffee grounds,
he quickly tossed them into the coffin. Then he
gently laid the doll on top of the grounds with
its head pointing toward the foot of the box.
After closing the lid, he spread his arms, and
spun around a hundred times while singing several
choruses of Three Blind Mice.
He got so
dizzy, he passed out.
When he awoke,
he found he’d shrunk. Running to a mirror,
he was pleased to see that he was only eight
inches tall. Though he easily climbed the coffin,
he found he had to expend thousands of calories
trying to open the lid.
Looking inside,
he saw the Barbie doll puffing on a cigarette
butt, chomping on popcorn, and lapping up coffee
grounds.
“May I
join you?” he asked.
“Please
do,” she said,” as she slipped out of
her bikini. “I thought you’d never ask.”
“Now I
know what a coffin’s for,” he said, as
he leapt toward the giggling doll.
|
