A Childhood Memory

My new best friend, Larry. I was only five or six,
new to the neighborhood, and living in the first house

my family ever owned. Oakland Avenue. Larry rode

his bicycle past me standing in the front yard. Hey,

kid, I yelled out to him, where did you learn how to

ride that bike? Larry stepped on the peddle applying

the breaks, spiraling around on the gravel until he

came to a stop in the flying rocks and dust. Cool!

I said laughing. Been riding since I was three or four,

he yelled back at me. Wow! I said impressed, especially

because we were about the same age. And from my

perspective (not yet able to ride a two-wheeler), I

thought that was really something. Want to try,

Larry offered? Sure, I replied. And I did. Straddled

the seat, put one foot on the peddle, held tight on

the handle bar, and with a mighty shove from Larry

I was off. It was a wobbly ride for the first twenty

feet or so before I chickened out and put my feet

back down on the ground. Cool! My first try and I

managed not to crash. Pretty good, Larry told me.

And from that moment on we became best friends.

Larry had an older brother, Teddy, and an older sister,

Teresa. His mom was named Vivian, and his dad was

Theodore. Their last name was Hummel. His parents

had come from Germany during World War Two.

They fled their home there because they were Jews.

It would be years latter before I would learn all about

that period in history. For now, I was very happy to

be in my new neighborhood and having made my

first best friend who let me ride his bike. Larry in-

vited me often over to his house which was just

across Oakland Avenue and a few doors down. I

remember his mom and dad spoke differently than

anyone I knew. And they had a shepherd dog like Rin-

Tin-Tin. Her name was, Vickie, who was also very

friendly. Never once did she growl at me or bite. I

remember believing that she too must have been a

German Jew. But then, I was just a little kid and being

raised a Catholic at the time. Larry, and his family were

very friendly to me, and they didn’t seem to mind.

Chris Hanch 7-7-19

Apartment 711

My apartment number was 711,

and although mostly the studio

was kept neat and clean, its nu-

merical designation was not nec-

essarilly lucky for me. I never

believed in the good fortunes

associated with rabbit’s feet,

horse shoes or numbers on dice

anyway. I stepped on more side-

walk cracks than I could ever

count for my mom had passed

away many years before. I was

separated from my second wife

due to years of friction and strife.

Seems we never could manage

seeing eye to eye. So, I moved

and found a place of my own in

a city far away. 711 was the nu-

merical designation of my place.

Some might call it a lucky sign;

others would relate it with a

convenience store chain. Hey,

some would ask, you open 24/7

too? Smart ass, I would answer

back. No, it’s just a secret hide-

out, a safe place where I can act

like the writer Hemingway and

quietly drink my way through

the lonely days. 711, a damn

good view of the city from up

there, especially on cold and

rainy days. Luck or good fortune

have nothing to do with that.

And no, my mother didn’t die

from a broken back.

Chris Hanch 7-6-19

Something About Survival

Ever wonder what it has taken for us

as a species to get here where we are

today? When you think about it, the

whole generational progression has

been a complex and amazing transfor-

mational undertaking. Think about the

polarities in personalities; some folks

get along; many folks don’t. But in

order to survive and thrive, we have

mostly developed a desire to see that

in most cases things work out. Nature

has it’s ways of propagating the con-

tinuation of the species. Many only

make it so far and are eventually for

one reason or another relegated to the

scrap heap of extinction. Given wars,

famine, epidemic, disease and blight,

given natural disasters, knife, gunshot,

automobile, shipping, rail and airline

casualties, lion and tiger maulings

and venomous snake and spider bites,

given divorce, separation and abandon-

ment and suicide, and when I consider

my own failed relationships with others,

I am truly amazed that the human race

has managed to survive on Planet Earth

this long. I suppose an unwavering faith

in our better angels, or a sincere if not a

wishful naivete that goodness and unity

of purpose in us will somehow prevail.

And to get to this point in our tenuous

and topsy-turvy history of evolution,

I pause to wonder, how many times has

one person looked at another square in

the eye and said, Let’s give this thing

one more try?

Chris Hanch 7-5-19

Celebration

This 4th of July, the President will break

with precedence and give a speech on the
steps of the Lincoln Memorial, the greatest
event in all history, he claims. There will

be Abram’s tanks in the streets of DC, and
flyover formations of fighter jets and a
stealth bomber from Missouri. Fireworks
and music won’t cost anything because those

were scheduled anyway. The tanks and jets
are already ours, so basically they will be on
display for free. Children and adult refugees
from Central America at our Southern Border

shall remain crammed into cages without
basic humanitarian necessities. Aren’t the
fireworks spectacular this year?. Doesn't
the military armament on display show the

world we’re a power to be reckoned with?
Indeed Land of the Free and Home of the
Brave. For shame, America! For shame!

Chris Hanch 7-4-19

2008, Prehistoric Utah and Me

I pull the car off the Interstate, I-70, miles past

Green River, not even close to St. George yet,

somewhere laid out in No-man’s Land, rocks,

sand and pinion in between. I step out to view the

awe-inspiring scene before me. Here, from horizon

to horizon, sweeping from the front, around the

sides and to the back of me, from one mesa to

another, there are no buildings, not a car, nor a

semi to be seen, not a person to be found. Here,

except for me, Utah is devoid of every trace of man-

kind. Here, beneath the rocks, over there behind the

stunted bristly pine, snakes, lizards and scorpions, I

am sure. Not a whisper of wind even, nothing else

here to see, but a deep blue sky forever and me.

I like that.

Chris Hanch 7-3-19

A Dog's Life for Me

Here’s a thought which may seem strange

to some; others may have pondered such a

thing, and may acknowledge having had the

same idea cross their minds occasionally:

I live in a modest apartment with my two

small dogs as I have for years. I rarely get

out or go anywhere without them. So, to

say we have become resolutely attached

would be stated accurately. So much so,

that at times, I may tend to treat them as

I would little human beings—considering

that our thoughts and feelings are alike,

that we are on the same wavelength so to

speak. We are not the same, and I find I

must correct my egocentric human thinking

from time to time. Dogs do doggy things

like poop and pee when need be. And should

they do it on the carpet occasionally, then it

was either unforeseen, an emergency, or I

had neglected to take them out in time. My

little girl dog barks a lot at all the other ani-

mals she sees on TV. Instinctively and inher-

antly, she is merely protecting me and her

territory from undesirable intruders. Rather

than believe my scolding her will affect a

change in her attitude, I am the one who

must realize, I need to switch the channel

in order to keep her from going crazy. I

think you see where I’m headed with this.

I have become sensitive to learning much

more from my pooches than lessons they

are capable of acquiring from me. With time,

I have come to understand that some of their

finer attributes, no matter how hard I try, I shall

never be able to achieve. Born and bred as a

human being, scratching behind the ears with

my feet, and the dispensing of unconditional love

and loyalty, I find, are out of the question for me.

Chris Hanch 7-2-19

Choices Made

When I was a boy, I never planned for my future

as a young man. I never had expectations that a

formal education would get me anywhere. Still,

I went where I was told to go, and did or did not

do what I was told to do (come rain or shine, and

depending upon my attitude on any given day).

When I was a young man, I got married and had a

child early on. At the time, I had no plan for that. I

simply took each day as it came, and somehow

muddled through. I had no designs or thoughts of

fortune or fame. And so it was no surprise to me

that neither of those ever came. I managed to get

by on that which I earned. As a middle-aged man,

I had neither desire nor plans to retire. I’d simply

quit or move along whenever my mood or the

muse inspired me. The other day at the clinic the

nurse asked me to rate my pain level on a scale of

one to ten. I snickered my reply: When I’m quiet

and motionless, about a two or three; when moving

around, I’d say a seven or eight; some days or situa-

tions may strap me with a nine or ten. It was then I

came to realize that I am a simple man who over a

lifetime had no precise and defined plan. I never was

any good at math either, but given the advanced age

age which came over me with a swift and pronounced

certainty, my situation has been reduced to evaluation

on a scale between one and ten. Without any prior

consideration or planning for that, I reckon that given

my present condition and position, a scale not exceed-

ing ten seems quite reasonable to me. At this point in

my life, what in hell choices do I have, anyway?

Chris Hanch 7-1-19