Calling Crayon
By ice rivers
- 536 reads
Mark Crayon had several outstanding abilities. Mark was an excellent brainstormer. He was an idea generator with a profound ability to defer judgement when searching for possibilities. Mark was also great at going to the movies due to his almost supernatural ability to sustain disbelief and concentrate.
Mark was of easy faith and willing to be decieived as long as the deception was pleasant and without cost. He was a ready believer in bullshit stories, legends, phony rapprt builds, anecdotes of artists, magicians, musicians, mysterians and local lore.
Mark often urged interrupters to be patient and listen to the whole story.....to consider any alternatives in pursuit of subsequent solutional clarity.
"What difference does it make whether it's true or not as long as we can enjoy the momentary benefit of subscription while we savor the charm of pretense in the face of suffocating hyper realism."
Once upon a time in college, Mark met had met a guy named Hemmingway who claimed Earnest descendancy and used that connection to impress Mark with a parcel of scribbled doggerel which set all belief in Hemmingway consanguinuity into disprepair.
Mark didn't care. He liked the guy.
He relieved the guy of a few bucks in an all night poker game. Mark read the fake Hemmingway like a book and felt fine about bringing a form of vivid relief to the poseurs wallet.
Nothing really bothered Mark unless someone mispronounced his last name Especially if the person doing the mispronunciation was a telemarketer or telefundraiser.
Having spent time as a fundraiser himself, Mark appreciated the satisfaction of philanthropy and often donated to worthy not for profit causes and even a few not so worthy political causes simply because he had money to spare and patience to listen.
But let someone interrupt Mark's concentration with a telemarketing phone call that began with "Hello Mr Kran" and Mark became a different person.
Mark would respond like this: "where do you come from, upste New York? Don't you know how to read? My last name has two syllables not one as if you even know what a syllable is. I'm not giving you shit and take me off your goddamned list.'
Mark would slam the phone down.
He was NOT a Kran. He wasn't to be used in a coloring book. His name was pronounced CRAY-ON.
Mark was fed up with the ongoing mispronuciation of his last name. He had put up with it for way too long going all the way back to kindergarten. That first day in school he was too timid to correct his teacher who continued to call him Kran for that entire year and seemd particularly delighted at coloring time when she always demanded that Mark pass out the fuckin kranz.
And on and on unti the day in third grade when Mark's explosion shocked everybody in his class including the teacher who sent Mark to the principal who sent him to the counselor. When Mark entered the counselor's office, the counselor told young Kran to take a seat.
Mark filipped out again and was sent home for the day.
Mark's Dad, Fred Crayon had a much more tolerant attitude about the mispronunciation of the family name and had even taken the missing syllable into account when he decided to name his kid Mark in the first place. It didn't help that Mark had red hair from birth. Thank God Fred resisted the temptation to name his son Red.
Aside from his breakdown, Mark was well liked in school for some of the qualities that I've alrerady mentioned. A note went into his permanent record that said "Pronounce his name with two syllables....Cray-On."
And they did.
And Mark developed into a helluva nice guy even excusing those who innocently removed a syllable for the pronunciation of his last name unless of course they were telemarketers feigning interest for the purpose of a donation or a vote.
That sent Mark back to a third grade glycerine which ended every such phone call, every time.
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Comments
Great story! Poor Mark, I'm
Great story! Poor Mark, I'm glad his parent's didn't name him RED. This was so funny, I loved it and your comedic timing is perfect.
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