BULLWORKER!
© 2004 Jeff Grimshaw. All Rights Reserved
Reprinted at the Henry County Web, by permission of the author.

I’d just returned from a visit to my parents and I had the feeling that I’d left something behind, something vital, something...

"The Bullworker!" I screamed, and I ran back to the car and looked behind the seat, and in the back, and on the floor, and it wasn’t there. I’d left the Bullworker at my parents’ house, 70 miles away.

My first thought was to hop immediately in the car and go back for it. A man without a Bullworker... can he really call himself a man? For more than a few days, anyway? After which time the muscle tone acquired through daily use of the Bullworker for 15 years quickly fades, and he slides from buff to bluff to bleff to blech to Chris Farley? But time, despite the Bullworker, has taken its toll on Your Reporter, and I was not up to hopping immediately in the car and going back for it; I just called, confirmed it was there, and said I’d pick it up next weekend.

The next weekend I got up early and drove back to my parents’, and they told me Low-Low had borrowed my Bullworker. I said "Why? Did he think it was edible?" Low-Low is my cousin and is also called Mr. Five-By-Five, after the Johnny Mercer song that describes his appearance perfectly. He has a real name, too, but I forget what it is.

"No, he just want to try it out. I thought it would be okay, since you weren’t coming back till today." I pretended it was okay-- these are my PARENTS, after all-- and I went over to Low-Low’s to get the Bullworker. As soon as he opened the door, I saw the Bullworker sitting on the coffee table. I was so relieved I actually smiled at Low-Low.

"Really work up a sweat with that thing," said Low-Low. I nodded happily, picked up the X-5, checked it for teeth marks, kept smiling, backed up towards the door, and then Low-Low’s wife said:

"Low-Low, did you ask him about the cat?"

"Nooooo, honey," said Low-Low. "I’m s’posed to ask if you can go get the cat. Colleen’s worried about the cat. The cat’s up on the roof for, I dunno, three days? Colleen’s worried."

"Um," I said, and Low-Low continued:

"See, I’m sort of too big for the ladder?"

"Even after a week using the Bullworker?" I marveled.

"Colleen’d really like it if you could go up on the roof and check on the cat."

"You got the ladder set up?" I said.

"See, I’m sort of too big to set up the ladder."

So I set up the ladder and went on the roof to check on the cat. Colleen stood at the bottom of the ladder twisting a kerchief. The cat was curled up near the base of the chimney. It blinked its eyes.

"Cat’s alive," I said. "Can I come down now?"

"He must be terrified," said Colleen. He didn’t look terrified. He blinked again. "Could you bring him down?"

"I think if he wants to come down, he’ll come down."

"PLEASE!"

I advanced on the cat, who continued blinking. I reached out and gently picked him up. "Good kitty," I said hopefully.

My hope was misplaced. He immediately grew about seven extra claws and began aiming them all towards my face. He was like a Cuisinart with fur. I held him at arm’s length and backed up, congratulating myself that he hadn’t scored a hit. I was still congratulating myself when I took another step backwards and found that I had run out of roof.

Even as I found myself in mid air, my only thought was of the poor kitty. "If I can just twist like so," I thought, "I’ll land on the cat, and he’ll cushion my fall." To my eternal regret I lost my grip and the cat did not cushion my fall. Instead he dropped to the ground in slow motion, landing about 7 minutes after I did. I stood up. The cat was nonchalantly licking its paws.

"Don’t stand up!" cried Low-Low. "You just fell two stories! We gotta get you to the hospital!"

"I’m okay."

But Low-Low wouldn’t take no for an answer, and I soon found myself in the emergency room, getting x-rayed. "Your blood pressure is very low, considering you just fell off a roof," said the doctor.

"Bring the cat here, and I’ll show you some blood pressure," I said. Since nothing hurt, they x-rayed everything. Then, when the x-rays came back, and showed nothing amiss, the attending physician decided that they must be the wrong x-rays. So they x-rayed everything again, and got the same results. Then they yelled at me and sent me home, and returned their attention to a young man who had had some sort of mishap involving a peppermill.

"Geez," said Low-Low, "I can’t believe you fell off the roof and didn’t break anything." At that moment I wanted very badly to break something, but restrained myself. I slid the X-5 behind the seat and headed for home, reflecting on my miraculous two-story fall. How to account for it? Was it due to the hours spent working with the Bullworker? To an exemplary existence? To thinking happy thoughts on the way down [all concerning the cat]? Personally, I lean to the exemplary life theory.

If I had my entire life to live again, I’d do everything the same except next time I would go back and get the Bullworker right away. Also I wouldn’t rent "Billy Madison." But getting the Bullworker right away would be the main thing.

~ % ~

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