Temptation vs Opportunity

On By Jerry BrothertonIn flash, Short Stories8 Comments

“But Wait, if you order it now, we’ll send you a second one free.”

“Act now for this limited time offer.”

“Let me talk to my manager and see if I can do a little better.”

There are so many so-called opportunities that bombard us every day that we have an entire industry built around ‘temptation’…it’s called marketing strategy.

It usually involves offering something for little or no work and risk free. But remember my friends, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

For example, let’s look at one of the biggest scams there is…the lottery. It offers the “opportunity” for instant wealth (at only the odds of 300,000,000 to 1). Think about it…If I could save $1 per day for 50 years (18 years old to 68 years old) and put that money into a jar in my back yard, I’d have $18,250, not counting leap days.

In a Money Market savings account at just 1% interest it would leave me with $23,646.

Now, if I invested that same $1 in an ETF (Exchange-traded Fund) at 11.23%, I could have $698,450.

That my friends, is a true opportunity.

Happy Mother’s Day Moms

On By Jerry BrothertonIn Non Fiction, Short Stories2 Comments

I’ve said this a thousand times and still I can never say it enough. Being a mother is the hardest and most thankless job there is and yet they do it for free.

In my mother’s eyes, “the needs of the family would always outweigh the needs of the one.” After all the bills were paid, the groceries bought and safely stored away in their larders, you might see her in the store, eyeing that new dress, or new pair of shoes or whatever items that she would have like to have. She would even go so far as to pick it up, turn it over in her hands and possibly even put it in her cart. But by the time she left the store, it would still be setting on the shelf. Because, in her words she could get by with what she had. Besides, one of the kids might need something between now and next payday.

I think that most mothers are pretty much the same. So this is why we have a special day set aside just for them. So pick up the phone, give them a call. They don’t want fancy presents or flowers. They just want you to tell them you love them.

Trust me one day you’ll wake up and find that there’s no phones in heaven.

 

A Beautiful Soul

On By Jerry BrothertonIn Free Verse, Poetry9 Comments

To my wonderful wife on her birthday (happy 30th dear).

A Beautiful Soul

Your beauty
Does not need to wear a skimpy bikini
Or hide behind a painted mask of vanity
Your beauty
May bulge over the edges of the mold
But that is a mold, cold men created blindly
Your beauty
Does not yield to the encroachment of time
But transforms to embrace reality
Your beauty
Is in a smile with crooked lips
The tears shed in sympathy for others
Your beauty
Is in arms outstretched for a hug
And in a heart filled with dignity
Your beauty
Reads my words before they are written
It inspires my poetry, hopes, and dreams

My First Funeral

On By Jerry BrothertonIn flash, Short StoriesLeave a comment

 

I wondered why people felt the need to express their opinions about his appearance. They strolled by the casket like they were out shopping the fresh produce isle at the market. I watched as a few gathered the bravado to touch a hand; some patted his chest and one old women, I had no idea who, even place a kiss on his forehead.

 “Doesn’t he look nice?” “He looks so peaceful.” “He looks so natural.” “Well, at least he’s in a better place.”

When my turn to peek over the side came, my excitement faded.

Uncle Elmer just looked dead.

The Drowning

On By Jerry BrothertonIn flash, Short Stories3 Comments

How in the hell the news got to us so quickly is still a mystery. One minute, we’re in the middle of the street playing our childish games then, what seemed like only a moment later, we’re standing at the water’s edge. Red lights slashing through the early evening dusk.

We watched as Sheriff Rankin and his brother Will maneuvered their boat around the middle of the lake. Casting a snagging line out like it was just another evening of spoonbill fishing.

Everybody from town was standing around in little groups whispering to each other. Speculating on what, then how, it happened. It seemed that seventeen year old Terry Bowman had tried to swim across the lake by himself. He didn’t make it.

All us guys were standing a few yards away from the somber faces of the adults. We were jabbing each other in the ribs and joking with one another like we had just come out of the movie theatre. Even there in the face of death, our youthful immortality poked its head out. We knew one thing for certain, whatever hand fate had dealt to Terry, it had nothing to do with us.

But the moment they lifted Terry’s body from the boat and laid him gently onto the shore, his blue lips highlighted against his pasty whiteness, his eyes wide open and staring toward the night sky. His mother kneeling over his wrinkled body and crying for God to give him back. That’s when I knew death for the first time in my life. And my youthful naiveté abandoned me.

As I stared into his face, I strange curiosity overtook me. I wondered what thoughts went through Terry’s mind the moment he realized that he was never going to make it to the other side of the lake. As he looked back and saw his friends, highlighted against the setting sun, dancing, singing and making out; when did panic set in?

Was it when his arms turned to rubber and he struggled to just stay afloat that he started looking for some miracle to get him out? Or later when his first gasp for air brought him nothing but a mouth full of water? At what point did he stop fighting and just accept that death was going to take him. Or did he struggle to the very end, never giving up hope?

So as I stood there in silence, watching his mother cradle her son. Her tears dripping into his unblinking eyes and her sobs choking out any words she tried to give to him, my knees buckled and I fell to the ground. I watched her gently rock her baby in her arms and I suddenly hated God for taking him away from her.

That evening, those flashing red lights slicing into the stillness and the sobbing moans of Terry’s mom burned a memory deep into my innocents that I was sure I would never forget.

But the next morning found us all gathered at the ball park laughing and joking like any other summer day. Like nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Except choosing up side was just a little harder now that Terry was gone… but hey, the game must go on.