Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4189)

Sitting Forty

Macklin Harrisonburg took a moment to catch his breath from the climb up the hill. While he was puffing out some air to keep from hyperventilating, the voice from inside the Port-a-john spoke again—more emphatically. “Who is it?”

“It’s the ice cream man,” answered Macklin, mustering some cheer. “What flavor would you like?”

A pause—a long, thoughtful delay. “No!” came the voice again. “Who is it really?”

Harrisonburg grabbed another large breath of air and inquired, “Have you ever heard of Mackie’s Ice Cream?”

There was what seemed to be a little giggle as the door was quickly opened and Iz appeared, staring at the man in yellow. “Where’s the ice cream?” he asked. Iz was standing next to Pal inside the toilet, each of them holding a small pink stick.

Macklin sized them up for a quick moment, peering at their little pink sticks. “Hmmm,” he began. “I sure hope that isn’t your preference in ice cream flavor. If you want my opinion, those are pretty pitiful looking cones.”

“It’s poison!” spat Pal. “We are not going to let them take us!”

Iz gave Pal a small punch in the arm as they gazed at one another and nodded their heads. Pal reached over to shut the door, but the big ball of Yellow Wonder stepped in the way. “I don’t know why you’d want to eat poison when you can come to my ranch, where I have barns and barns of ice cream. You see, my name is Macklin Harrisonburg—but most people know me as the Ice Cream Man, and they call me Mackie.”

With this, the portly gentleman removed his hat, made a short bow and continued. “I have come here to rescue you and take you back to meet the sweetest woman the world ever made—my dear wife, Marguerite. I tell you gentlemen—she cooks meals that make children screech in delight, and I make ice cream that causes them to smile until their ears slide to the back of their heads.”

Iz and Pal laughed. They didn’t want to—the man was corny. But he sure seemed fun. They had been wondering if they would ever see fun again, so they chose to invite him into their little enclosure. Once inside, Pal looked down at the toilet and said, “Mr. Ice Cream, that’s the only seat we have. But we didn’t do anything on it.”

“Or in it,” Iz added.

“Thank you, fellows,” said Macklin, easing down onto the small space. Iz and Pal did their best to wiggle and shift to make room for the large man to spread out.

“Now listen, my friends,” Mackie explained. “Here’s my plan. Why don’t we go ahead and get out of here? If you don’t mind leaving your homes here in the Middle East, I’d love to have you come and live at my ranch. I’ve already adopted ten other children from all over the world. I guess you could say we’ve got every flavor of them, too.”

Macklin grinned at the boys, who peered at him in disbelief. He shifted his bottom on the seat and resumed. “In a minute, they’re going to come and pick up this little building and carry you away. Don’t be afraid. Just hang on the best you can—and we’ll take you to safety, far away from this crowd. Once you’re there, you can decide what you want to do.” He paused. “Do you have any questions?”

Iz glanced over at Pal and replied, “That’s your plan?”

Macklin couldn’t help himself. He burst into laughter. “Well,” he said, “that’s the shortened version. Maybe we can call it the traveling version since you’re gonna be moving out of here real soon.”

“Listen,” Pal interrupted, “I don’t want to be mean, but why are you doing this?”

“Because I can,” said Macklin. “Because someone should. Maybe just because I will. But mostly because I can always use two new friends.”

Iz shook his head. “Well, what’s in it for you? Nobody does nothin’ for nothin’ for nobody.”

Macklin took a long moment to make eye contact with Iz, in search of the young man’s heart and soul. He wiped some sweat from his brow. “I don’t think about that anymore, young sir,” he replied. “I guess I’ve got so much in my life that I don’t have to get something out of everything. I mean, money or fame. Here’s what I believe: when God blesses you with more than you need and you don’t have to worry about cash anymore, then there’s only one thing left for you to do…”

Macklin paused so long that Pal asked, “What’s that?”

“Well, that’s easy,” Macklin smiled. “Have fun, love everybody you can, and get rid of your last dollar by the day you die.”

He laughed again, and Iz and Pal decided to join in with him. After all, even if the old man was crazy, crazy sure sounded better than where they were.

“Now,” Mackie said, “are you ready, boys?”

“We’re ready, Mr. Harrisonburger…large-burger,” said Iz, giggling.

Pal stared at him. “That’s not right.”

Harrisonburg pulled himself up, using a piece of nearby wall and stood. “You can just call me Mackie,” he replied.

“Alright, Mr. Mackie,” Iz said. “We’re ready.”

Mackie looked down at Iz and Pal. “Before I leave,” he said, “would you do me a favor and take those little stinky pink sticks you’ve got in your hands and throw them in that toilet?”

Pal glanced at Iz nervously. “No, no,” Macklin continued. “It’ll be alright, son.”

The two boys carefully threw their suicide sticks into the toilet. Pal was relieved. So was Iz, but he tried to act reluctant. This accomplished, the ice cream giant stepped out of the Port-a-john and descended the hill.

And the worker bees came a-buzzing.

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4182)

Sitting Thirty-Nine

Seeds meticulously planted weeks before suddenly came to bloom in the blazing desert sun.

For Macklin Harrisonburg was not your garden variety genius. He was an audaciously wealthy man, the founder and director of Mackie’s Ice Cream—the one with all the cavalcade of flavors.

Well, you see, Macklin opened up his newspaper one day (which he read religiously despite the current preference for receiving such international information via the computer). Peering through the paper, he came across the picture of Iz and Pal—the one taken by Matthew Bradley. Although there was nothing more than a small caption, he was deeply moved by the tender embrace of the boyhood companions. He decided to call Mr. Bradley on the phone, get details about this Middle Eastern pair, and also, in the process, offer Matthew a job.

“How would you like to make $80,000 a year taking pictures of ice cream?” posed Mr. Harrisonburg.

“Cones or sundaes?” Matthew inquired with a chortle.

“Both,” quickly retorted the billionaire.

Matthew agreed to accept the deal and join Mr. Harrisonburg at his one-hundred-twenty-two-thousand-acre ranch in Nevada. The place was big enough to apply for statehood. The ranch included five thousand head of cattle, two thousand sheep, one thousand hogs, two hundred buffalo, fifty camels, thirty llamas and one unicorn (which was really just a llama vexed with a large wart on its head).

It was from the headquarters of this ranch that Macklin Harrisonburg devised a plan. His secretary informed him that he had received a call from the editor of the local newspaper near the campsite of the boys. He returned the message and in doing so, learned more about the story, including a secret part—about the buried hand grenade.

Macklin loved to plot, so this got him thinking, which led to some chuckling, and ended up with the ice cream mogul hatching a master delight.

First, calls were made to the International Environmental Agency, telling them about the hazardous waste possibilities at the desert location. Then he contacted Armistice International, informing them of potential buried weapons. And finally, he called some friends he knew in the Israeli Army. He quickly created a coalition of allies—cooperative, willing, and determined to secure the space.

One final thing—Macklin decided it would be best if he owned the surrounding property so there wouldn’t be any furor with the locals over trespassing. Through some careful negotiation and bizarre translations, Harrisonburg purchased a kilometer of the desert in all four directions.

He wanted to do what was right—not an easy thing. Often what’s right gets in the way of what’s expedient. But he placed calls to the father of each boy, to explain his intentions, but they would not speak with him except to claim that they had no sons—since the young men birthed from their loins were in “devilish rebellion.”

He checked for additional relatives, studied local law on the custody of children, and finally, he made a personal call, to Nevada—to a little lady who had been his wife for nearly thirty-five years.

“Marguerite?” he sang. “I have found me two more boys to work our ranch and to love back to life, if you think we have room at the table.”

There was a brief delay on the other end, and then a sweet reply. “I’ll get Jose and all the boys gathered, and we’ll just begin building a bigger table.”

He laughed—the kind of laugh a man emotes when he knows he’s with a good woman and his soul is tickled by the fingers of blessing.

When Macklin arrived at the desert scene in his yellow limousine, he was immediately intimidated by the large hill. Physical exercise was rarely necessary for an ice cream executive, but he was determined, and steadied himself on the arm of a friend who walked by his side, and with a little extra oom-pah in his polka, he made it up the hill, breathing heavily, and knocked on the door of a Port-a-John.

At first there was no answer. And then, a boy’s voice crackled from inside. “Who is it?”

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4140)

Sitting Thirty-Three

Wednesday night in the desert, although the unforgiving wasteland knows no season or hour.

Iz and Pal sat and watched as the sun set behind the hill. A burgeoning, chilly breeze whizzed its way past their ears, tingling their spines, causing them to draw closer to one another. It was the night before the day when everything…

Well, it seemed that everything would happen.

Wednesday had been a glorious day, chock-full of soccer, food and laughter, wrestling with each other, and questions designed to “stump your friend.” It was an ongoing Olympian marathon, trying to outdo the other fellow—gleefully making fun of each other—short of humiliation.

They had come to terms with one realization. This would be their last night in the desert, one way or another. Tomorrow they would either be overtaken by the brute force of the interfering mob, forced to return to their homes, or they would select their final option of dying together in the sand.

Emotions were colliding—joy desperately trying to keep its head up as sadness was tugging away.

Iz suggested they take this last night to eat up all the remaining food. He posed a provocative question. “Is it possible to eat until you puke?” he asked Pal, sporting a grin, but trying to maintain a certain decorum of scientific intrigue.

Pal did not know.

So the two boys were on a mission. They ate and they ate. It was not long until they were full, stuffed to the top of their eyebrows. Further eating was becoming painful. Actually, the sight of food began to make them sick. But still—they pressed on.

They devoured.

At length their throats were reluctant to swallow so they drank until their bodies sloshed. Managing some huge burps, they tried to eat some more. There were cramps, and attempts at laughter, which quickly turned into moans of pain from stomachs that were bloated from overuse.

Food supplies were lessening, and they were down to cans of provisions which were unidentifiable or deemed distasteful. At this point, Iz dug into the pile, pulled out a can of sardines, peeled back the tin lid and held up one of the yellow, drippy fishies. Reading the can, Iz proclaimed, “This one is in mustard sauce!”

That’s all Pal required. The thought of a fish swimming around in mustard was enough to cause him to unleash the burden lurking in his entrails. He threw up, laughed, coughed, threw up again, giggled—and went for a third round as Iz dangled the nasty little fish in front of his nose.

Yet it was when Iz actually ate the sardine that Pal exploded with what would be his final deluge of urping. This prompted Iz—overcome by both the scene and the smell of the fish—to join in the party, uncapping his own barrage of bellowing bounty from below.

It was a sight that would cause a mother to weep, a priest to fast and pray, and anyone feeling the least little bit queasy to join up and join in.

But to Iz and Pal, the brothers in the desert, it was the greatest fun in the world.

Regaining their composure, they shoveled sand over the remains and lay down on the desert, trying to recover from the ache of regurgitation. Breathing heavily, staring at the night sky, they still managed an occasional giggle.

This was their moment. They were desperately grasping onto it with all their might.

 

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4112)

Sitting Twenty-Nine

A priest, a rabbi, a mullah and a professor of psychology went out into the desert.

Although it sounds like the setup for a joke, it was the actual makeup of a committee which had been formed to handle the situation created by an Israeli boy, dubbed Iz, and a Palestinian lad, Pal.

It was Tuesday—two days before the rally—and the four gentlemen of distinction, who had received permission from the town council to go out and try to reason with the boys so as to avoid a public display of confrontation, lending itself to shame, prepared themselves for what they might encounter.

Everyone agreed it was a noble venture. Blessing was given to the team, a few prayers uttered, plans made, provisions collected, and a scheme devised.

On that same Tuesday morn, Iz and Pal woke up to view four over-dressed grown-ups ascending their hill, breathing heavily and already perspiring in the heat. One was wearing a black shirt with a little piece of white collar. Another, a robe and turban. There was a younger one in blue jeans and a loose-fitting t-shirt, and the final gentleman sported a navy-blue suit with a striped tie.

When the entourage was within ten feet of the boys, the suit and tie spoke up. “Good morning, young men.”

Staring at the four intruders, trying to restrain a giggle because they all looked so very serious, yet appeared like a quartet of Frosty the Snowmen melting in the sun, all the two young fellows could do was shake their heads. They said nothing, so the robe spoke out.  “We’ve come to talk with you boys about what you are doing here.”

Pal held up a banana. “What we were doing was having our morning fruit. Did you know that this one has potassium?”

“Fruit, huh?” said the blue jeans. “What do you guys like to eat?”

Iz chuckled. “Are you here to become our friends, so you can talk us into going back home?”

“Why would home be such a bad thing?” asked the white-collared one in a soft voice.

Pal piped up, tossing his banana peel to the side. “I suppose yours would be just fine. So feel free to return any time you’d like. To your home, that is.”

Both of the boys laughed and gave each other high fives. There was a tightness—an inflexibility—in the air. Iz and Pal were gleeful over their tart responses and precocious language, but the foursome of invaders seemed less than impressed, and absolutely determined to demonstrate their control.

Blue jeans spoke again. “Hey, guys. My name is Mel Rollins, and I’m a professor of psychology at the college.”

“A head doctor!” Pal poked in an attempt to keep things salty.

Mel paused. “Okay,” he said. “That would be fine. I just want you dudes to know that I’m not here to change your minds or get you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

Iz smirked and nodded his head. “Good. Then this should be easy. We want to stay here. We thank you for coming, and please pass the message along that we’re just fine.”

The robe interrupted, absent any civility in his tone. “You children know we can’t do that. I am the mullah at the mosque, and I have a responsibility to carry out the wishes of our people. We cannot allow wayward sons to do as they please.”

“Why not?” asked Pal. “You certainly allow grown-ups to do as they please.”

“Listen, I am Rabbi Molstoy,” spoke the shirt and tie. “What has possessed you boys to do this?”

“Where do you get ice cream?” asked Pal.

The one with the white collar spoke. “Well, first you get milk and sugar…”

Pal interrupted. “No, no! I didn’t ask you how to make ice cream. I asked you where you get it. You see, that’s the trouble with you guys. You want to find the hardest way to do everything—anything that makes you feel miserable enough to appear like you’re really smart. We’re kids. We know you go to the store and buy ice cream. Our goal is to get the ice cream, but not have to make it, or even wonder if it’s got too much sugar in it. That’s you. We just want ice cream.”

Blue jeans eased in. “So, this is about ice cream?”

Iz burst out laughing. “No,” he said. “Get a grip. It’s about us. We want to be friends. Our families won’t let us because one of us is a Jew and one of us is a Palestinian.”

“Now, that’s not true,” said the shirt and tie. “Mullah Tianza and I talk together all the time. Enjoy a meal.”

Pal clapped his hands. “Great, Iz! Did you hear that? We can go home, because there’s no longer a separation between our faiths! There is no mosque and synagogue. There is no killing in the street. The rabbi and the mullah are eating together! So everything has changed. What are we thinking? Maybe we are just crazy boys. Maybe the sun has scrambled our brains. While we’ve been out here the world has reformed and everyone loves each other. How foolish can we be? We should listen to them. Right? Right, Iz? We are absolutely out of our minds.”

Iz looked over coldly at his sarcastic friend. “Wrong,” he replied.

There was a moment of silence. The committee which had come to gather up foolish boys was left standing in the desert heat, staring at one another. Now they had a choice.

Were they going to listen, or had they just come to talk?

 

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4092)

Sitting Twenty-Six

Two weeks passed.

Uneasy time.

Karin went out to the desert on multiple occasions. The boys seemed fine. There was plenty of food, plenty of play. She brought along soap and suggested they use some of the water to wash off the dirt and grime. They seemed better, and they also smelled better.

Iz and Pal had even begun to read some of the books that had been offered to them. They schooled one another by creating math problems and brain teasers. Everything seemed weirdly normal—eerie. Yet deep in her heart, Karin knew this brief hiatus from reality would certainly not continue.

And then it happened. The worst possible scenario.

Somebody was campaigning for some sort of office in a nearby district, trying to win a seat in some sort of assembly. This candidate decided he needed a cause.

For the picture taken by Matthew had gradually eked its way into the news media, even gaining the attention of some of the larger wire services.

Even though initially the Iz-and-Pal-escapade had been viewed by the public as a lark—a feature story—all at once things changed. It was no longer just two boys cavorting in the desert until they grew tired of each other. Politics entered and changed the scene.

Certainly it only takes a politician to turn an innocent situation into a global fiasco. The candidate, who was desperately seeking a cause, blew the whole matter out of proportion. He was convinced that a combination of issues prevailed: children’s lack of respect for their parents mingled with Jewish and Palestinian frustrations about unresolved causes, aggravated by threats from young ones who needed to be returned to a subservient profile. “Someone should do something about it!”

This statement is often the beginning of much that troubles us in the world. Who knows? Maybe many of the things that bother us would soon disappear, either through boredom or just the changing of the guard. But when someone takes on these things as a cause, then we are propelled on a merciless journey of discovering what’s right and what’s wrong—an odyssey fraught with bantering, bickering and eventually, Bolshevism. After all, Fascism is just some ugly, opinionated adult way of stealing someone’s toy and forcing a new way to play with it.

The candidate railed until it was decided there would be a rally held in the desert near the encampment where Iz and Pal had established their playground. At the rally, speeches would be made, followed by an active attempt to “rescue” the boys from their irresponsible outing. The police would be there, and the parents of both young men would be encouraged to take the children back to the safekeeping of hearth and home.

It was a disaster in the making.

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4029)

Sitting Seventeen

The desert has little to offer—mainly the presence of persistence.

After Karin left Iz and Pal, they were suddenly overtaken by the sleep of exhaustion—just two boys, lying flat on their backs in the ragged remains of a tent, deeply asleep, overcome by worry and woe, welcoming the needed rest, yet nervous about the pending dreams.

And there were dreams.

Iz floated, his body upheld in a liquidy glue of moisture, suspended a few meters above his family’s home. He tried to flip himself over, to look into the windows and see Pada, but he was held down, some force holding his arms, squeezing his legs, forbidding movement. Then it was as if the glue became thicker and oozed around his nostrils, threatening to suffocate the life from him. Struggling, he loosened himself and fell, landing on the roof of his home, hearing the crack of a bone in his right leg.

Voices ascended to the rooftop where he was impaled, writhing in pain. They were mentioning his name. It was “Jubal this” and “Jubal that.” Nothing he could actually discern, nor words that were perceptible. More an angry, disapproving tone.

He was in pain. Then, all the bones in his body started to break, one by one. Gradually the agony was displaced by oblivion. He melted like a piece of ice on a hot summer’s day, his body dribbling down the walls, through the window, pooling in a puddle on the floor of his home. It seemed he was all there—eyes, nose, hands, ears. But each part separated—a toe where an ear should be, a mouth replacing a knee. Gleaming, watery, flat against the ground, he was trying to see, attempting to find Pada.

Then there was a sound—a whoosh of a broom. Dust flew around his puddle of life. He choked—coughing, wheezing. The broom was sweeping him, pushing him toward the door. He splattered down the steps of his home, gushing his life away and landed on the bottom step in a splat—but somehow, once again, whole. Free of all broken bones and molten flesh.

Iz tried to stand but could not. Instead he walked backward on his hands like a crab, reconnoitering his way into the street, which was busy with cars and buses. Yet no one saw him. No one noticed the crab boy creeping along. All at once, a giant hand wearing a yellow shirt-sleeve reached down and picked him up by his right arm, yanking him into the air and placing him at the gate of what appeared to be a great shining city—an ancient site. There was carvings of gold and statues of granite and cedar. He did not know any of the figures, just that they were large, massive and overwhelming.

The gate suddenly opened, and he heard laughter. No—giggling. It was much younger. Free, absent of trouble, broken bones and gelatin flesh. Then a dog, barking at the gate, and men with beards who came and packed him up, carrying him into the city, as a beautiful woman with long, black hair stepped forward and kissed him. It was not the smooch of a sister, but rather, the caress of a friend who would be a lover or at least as much as a twelve-year-old mind could conjure.

He was giddy with the sights and sounds. He was stimulated even more by the woman’s lips. The bearded men carried him on to a huge castle, where he entered the portals and seemed to disappear forever more.

Iz awoke with a start. It was nighttime.

There was a single candle lit, and Pal sat in the shadows, staring at him. “Did you have a dream?” he asked.

Iz was not sure whether he was awake, or if this was part of the continuing saga.

Pal spoke again. “I had a dream.”

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Iz and Pal (Bedouin Buddies)

Jonathots Daily Blog

(4015)

Sitting Fifteen

Karin made the quality decision to stop off at her apartment in the city to shower, change clothes and gather her wits before cruising back to the newspaper. She didn’t realize how frazzled she was until she was sitting, riding back into town, and saw her right hand twitching without her permission. She needed to calm down. The last thing she wanted to do in front of her editor was appear rattled—or by his definition, female.

She had once read that feeding the belly calms the soul, so she nibbled on a bit of cheese and took a sip of wine to ease her nerves, attempting to feed a much deeper hunger, which would have to wait its turn for the time being. There were important matters to be taken care of—at this point, much more urgent than a tasty meal.

She ended up arriving at the newspaper office very late, but as far as Karin knew, the editor was always there. Matter of fact, she was convinced that he had been sitting in a chair, and people came and built his office around him. When she walked into the office, the man didn’t even look up from the daily reports he was perusing.

“Do you have a story?” he asked. He was never much for formalities. He had once explained it to her. He found cordiality to be useless, prohibiting anyone from finding out what they really wanted to know in the first place.

Even though Karin knew he was in a hurry to receive an update, she was savvy and well aware that she needed to pace herself and remove all breathiness and frantic from her telling. She sat down, nice and slow, in a chair in front of his desk.

“I have a story, but I don’t,” she began. “And before you ask me what that means, let me tell you. Sometimes I think even though journalists are not supposed to become emotionally involved, our stories can transform us into missionaries.”

The editor looked up with a threatening frown. “Koulyea, you aren’t some damn nun. If you want a ministry, go hunt down the Pope. I need stories, and I need people who can get them, write them clearly and go out and find more, instead of discussing how good the last one was or musing over whether their hearts were moved.”

Karin was offended. “I know that,” she spat. “Don’t talk to me like some cub who’s coming into the first day of work. It’s just that I’ve uncovered something that may be worth more than eight column inches and a byline.”

The editor eyed her for sincerity. “All right,” he said. “I’m listening.”

Karin leaned forward, her elbows on the desk. “I came across two boys in the desert. Two twelve-year-olds who defied their parents and their friends so they could be together. You see, one is Jewish and one, Palestinian.”

“Jubal and Amir? So I heard. Right?” The editor sprouted a grin.

Karin could not hide her shock. The editor laughed out loud, greatly satisfied that he had bettered his subordinate. “Listen, I’ve heard all about it. You should know that raging parents are louder than stampeding elephants.”

He picked up a stack of papers on his desk. “I’ve had ten messages just today about these two rascals,” he explained. “But you know, I don’t see a story here, unless we’re in a mood to do live coverage of a spanking.”

Karin was tired of being thwarted. “They have a hand grenade,” she pronounced, trying not to be too emphatic.

She couldn’t believe herself. But it was like the words came out on their own. She would never have given them permission to leave her mouth if she had known what their intention was. But she was tired of being treated like a nobody.

Still, in the scheme of things, she had just lied to her editor. There was no longer a hand grenade. But it caused the aging newsman to lean back in his chair. “Hand grenade, huh?” he said. He took a sip of his drink and swallowed slowly, and then continued. “I guess it’s useless for me to ask where they got such a thing. Would you tell me?” He gazed at Karin and shook his head. “Of course not,” he decided. “Okay. I guess it would be better to ask what they intend to do with it.”

Karin decided she needed to take some heat off of herself. She rose from her chair, stomped across the room and punched the door with her fist. “My God, man! They’re twelve years old! Do twelve-year-olds ever intend to do anything? A hand grenade, on the other hand, knows exactly what it is primed to do. We’ve got to do something for these kids.”

As she finished, she inched back toward him, reached out and rapped her knuckles on the desk. She was breathing heavily, full of anger.

Karin wanted to know how serious he would be about this serious situation. Or for that matter, if he, a man trapped in the Middle East, had the foresight to take a young woman seriously.

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