Beach Stuff
by Albert Russo
Every second day I force my
uncle to go to the beach. What’s the use of
getting stuck on a forced vacation, when the only
thing you are allowed to do is to dip your toes
into the sea, which here is quite loverly.
Even though it’s not really Bonka’s
thing, on account that he has the skin of a
plucked ostrich, too pale for his own good. If
you remember, he has carrot-color hair, so thin
that the least lil wind makes him look like an
albino golliwog. That’s not what bothers him
though, coz it reminds him of when he was young,
spending part of the summer vacation in Montauk,
while he was studying in New York. Then, he felt
like a bobo hippy, coz someone told him that he
was the spitting image of Montgomery Clift - poor
Monty who apparently was a nervous wreck in real
life and hated acting.
Yeah, my uncle has all the
oldies of the 1950’s, and he runs them every
time - at the turn of each new season - he has
pangs of nostalgia -, which I have to look at, if
I want him to take me to the movie theaters on
the Champs Elysées, where they feature the
newest movies. No, what gives him goose - I
should say ostrich - pimples, is the bald pate
which then resembles an airstrip for critters,
specially that, I dunno why, mosquitoes love to
land on it, leaving their pinpricks. Then you
should see how he scratches himself, making it
worse, as if suddenly a bottle of ketchup had
accidentally fallen on his head, spreading its
goo down to his ears. And he has to use a whole
box of Kleenex tissues to wipe out the mess
… too disgustingly siss for words.
When he does that, moaning and grumbling under
his breath, I slip away, tiptoeing, pretending I
don’t know him. I go and hide in the shade
of a tree, two blocks away. He catches up with me,
on account that he has the flair of a Labrador,
but there at least, we don’t risk
encountering people.
One bright afternoon - the
skies here are always so blue - we were sitting
under a beach awning, shedding our city clothes,
under which we wear our swimsuits, when, hearing
us speak French, two hunks, who were lying on the
sand, twenty meters away from our shelter,
greeted us in their Hebrew-accented English with
big smiles.
“Which parrrt of
Frrance do you come frrrom?” asked the
blonde stud.
Taken aback, coz when my
uncle undresses, he is so purr-nickity
and takes so long that a grenade could be rolling
near him that he wouldn’t see it. When his
eyes roamed in their direction, his face turned
radish-red, and all he could udder was a
bleating behhh, which I had to immediately cover
by saying, with a sudden and unwanted bark:
“Parrris”, imitating their accent, even
though it wasn’t my intention to make fun of
them.
CoronaZapy
10 / Beach stuff 1 Albert Russo
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