Red Wheelbarrow 2008 text FINAL REVISED.indd - De Anza College

what you want? Cuz seriously, apartheid is no laughing matter.”
A cheer arose from the front of the line and we inched forward.
That was awkward. Especially when I laughed. But mainly because
of the cheering. And the laughing. Audibly. Out loud. Maybe we
were talking about rock-climbing or Don Cheadle (Why do I always
have to mention Don Cheadle all the time?!) and that led to South
Africa, somehow. I think she forgot, but with any luck the World
Cup in South Africa and its economic situation will deter her from
thinking ill of me. Jess must have said something to her to rectify
the slip of the tongue. Or not.
I read a few lines from the middle of Thom’s short story that
he had entitled “Queuing.” He gave me a look and I heard Kate say
something about the sovereignty of the East Timorese.
“Queuing,” by Thom Yakovovich.
Inspector Vainstain had a below-average height whose
demeanor, however, repelled many at many a function. We
attended the same school, but obviously at different times.
However, we did share some exchanges during our time in the
Young Pioneers, he a senior member and I a junior. I heard that
his step-daughters hate him more than the civil service, and
that he knows the martial arts with unrivaled comprehension.
Despite this, he greeted the Chukchi professor emeritus with a
bow, as though he were speaking to a Japanese fellow! He got
a degree in Leningrad, and I expect this impacted his superiors
at the state police bureau very much. That, and possibly his fists
and knowledge of explosives.
We both admired the Courbet lithograph above the
window. Perhaps it was at the side of the window, for I remember
the details on the left vanished in the midst of the right side. We
were told it was called ‘The Artist’s Studio.’ On a vacation abroad,
I, and possibly he as well, learned that it was known to the painter
himself as ‘The Allegory.’ An Irish woman kneels at the easel, and
there’s a rabbi, and there are the painter’s friends and a dog. I
expect they await the completion of the painting that Courbet is
about to finish. Why put a painting inside another? The more I
think about it, the more it feels contrived.
Now why did I think of that, just now? Oh, yes. That
woman there, outside my window. She looks like the painter’s
widow. How strange the resemblance. Perhaps she was waiting
to see the Siberian landscape, dissatisfied with the landscape of
Siberia that surrounded her as she moped. Inspector Vainstain
Red Wheelbarrow | 63