The Loneliest Number
by Jace Daniel (b. 1969)
Ten minutes late going on eleven, and he was still stuck at the red light with one block to go. Please don’t call your mother again, he thought.
Pulling up to the curb in front of the school, he saw her, finishing up a good laugh with friends in their pre-teen silliness. Without tapping the horn, he leaned over the empty seat, opening the passenger door.
She threw her backpack at her sneakers and pulled the seatbelt over her growing body, as he had taught her on a yesterday not so long ago.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said, pulling from the curb. “You hungry?”
“Not yet.”
“We can get a pizza or something if you want.”
“It’s all good,” she said, so grown up. “Let’s just make nachos later.”
“Good enough,” he said, smiling. “So how’d the week go?”
“Great,” she told him with a proud metal grin. “I’m happy to say, I can now run a fifteen-minute mile. Without stopping!”
“Are you serious? Without stopping?”
“Fo reals.”
“I don’t think I can even do a fifteen-minute mile on a bike. Downhill!”
She laughed. The most beautiful sound in the world. If he could make her laugh for the next forty-eight hours straight, he would. It would be the perfect weekend.
“So how was the interview on Wednesday?” she asked. “Did it go good?”
“It went great.”
Distracting himself from the guilt of his white lie, he turned up the radio a notch, tapping his hand on the steering wheel to the classic rock song he’d heard so many times. He adjusted his rear view mirror, shifting uncomfortably in his seat.
“You know,” he said, “One really is the loneliest number.”
“Is that the name of this song?”
“Yeah, listen,” he said, singing along quietly. “One is the loneliest number, one is the loneliest number…”
“One’s not the loneliest number,” she said.
“One’s not the loneliest number?” he said, surprised. She was so bright. “If one’s not the loneliest number, then what is?”
“Zero.”
He smiled, aching to understand her blossoming sense of logic. “How so?”
“Well,” she said. “Zero is less than one. So zero has to be the loneliest number.”
He laughed, turning the radio volume down. “Zero has to be the loneliest number?”
“Yep,” she said. “One can’t be the loneliest. At least one is something. Zero is nothing. So zero has to be the loneliest.”
They drove in silence. He thought for a few moments, then nodded.
“That’s good logic, Pen,” he said. “But I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. Zero’s not the loneliest number. One is lonelier.”
“How so?” she asked.
“Well, like you said,” he explained, “Zero is nothing.”
“Yes. Zero is nothing.”
He smiled at the obvious.
“If there’s nothing, there can be no loneliness.”
And she never forgot that.
(inspired by a true story; thx, PaGo)
A palindrome is a word or a phrase which is the same when read forward or backward. The words wow and racecar are examples of palindromes.
Via Andreas, here’s a mind-blowing masterpiece of a palindrome weighing in at 224 words:
“Dammit I’m Mad”
by Demetri MartinDammit I’m mad.
Evil is a deed as I live.
God, am I reviled? I rise, my bed on a sun, I melt.
To be not one man emanating is sad. I piss.
Alas, it is so late. Who stops to help?
Man, it is hot. I’m in it. I tell.
I am not a devil. I level “Mad Dog”.
Ah, say burning is, as a deified gulp,
In my halo of a mired rum tin.
I erase many men. Oh, to be man, a sin.
Is evil in a clam? In a trap?
No. It is open. On it I was stuck.
Rats peed on hope. Elsewhere dips a web.
Be still if I fill its ebb.
Ew, a spider… eh?
We sleep. Oh no!
Deep, stark cuts saw it in one position.
Part animal, can I live? Sin is a name.
Both, one… my names are in it.
Murder? I’m a fool.
A hymn I plug, deified as a sign in ruby ash,
A Goddam level I lived at.
On mail let it in. I’m it.
Oh, sit in ample hot spots. Oh wet!
A loss it is alas (sip). I’d assign it a name.
Name not one bottle minus an ode by me:
“Sir, I deliver. I’m a dog”
Evil is a deed as I live.
Dammit I’m mad.
We lost Louie Bellson this week, the pioneering godfather of one of my favorite sports, double bass drumming.
Here’s a vintage clip. Kick in peace, my friend. And thank you.
At McSorley’s, the oldest bar in New York City, still cheering strong on its 155th year.
McSorley’s Old Ale House has been a gathering place, a watering hole, the subject of art and literature and even a supreme court controversy. Established in 1854 – McSorley’s can boast of being New York City’s oldest continuously operated saloon. Everyone from Abe Lincoln to John Lennon have passed thru McSorley’s swinging doors. Woody Guthrie inspired the union movement from a table in the front – guitar in hand, while civil rights attorney’s Faith Seidenberg and Karen DeCrow had to take their case to the Supreme Court to gain access. Women were finally allowed access to McSorley’s in 1970!
