The Viking

I told my wife that, upon my death, I wanted to have a Viking funeral.

That they were to drag my body down to the Hudson river and dispose of my earthly remains.

But first they were to place my flag draped body into the row boat, douse me with a sufficient amount of gasoline, shove the boat over the calm waters till I was a good distance from shore, and then they were to shoot fiery arrows at me and my destiny.

“Where the fuck am I going to get a bow and arrow?” said my wife.

I told her that after my death, she was to go to Dick’s Sporting Goods and purchase seven bows and seven dozen arrows of my choosing.

I also told her to get a little something for herself. I was always good that way. No matter how she behaved toward me.

I didn’t want to purchase the items before my death, for fear I’d get too excited over the prospect of a Viking funeral and decide to off myself with a twenty gauge. That would only piss her off, and I’d never get my Viking funeral.

She’d put me in a box and, out of spite, and lay me along side her hideous mother. Oh, what a vile creature was her mother!

“You’re marrying him?’ she once said at the dinner table. “Did I raise you stupid, or did you manage it all on your own?”

I then told her to band the group of our friends together. That I was to be laid out on the dinning room table holding a lighted candle. That she and our friends were to gather ‘round the table, drinking beer and singing happy tavern songs.

“You’re fat, ugly carcas on my antique dining room table?” she said. “Over my dead body, you fucking loon!”

But I didn’t let it deter my ambitions. So I told her that after they were all sufficiently tanked, they were to hoist me onto their shoulders and carry me down Main street, placing me in the row boat at the river’s edge.

“Seven drunks carrying a dead man down Main street in the middle of the fucking night?” she said.

“At sunset,” I corrected.

“Well, excuse me while I scratch my ass and think it over,” she said.

That was all she said. After that she slammed the door behind her and went who knows where. I never saw her again.

During that time, I entertained myself by doing what I always did when she’d leave me. I donned my Viking gear and ran about the house smashing things with my big sword.

Then it happened. One night, after one too many tankards of grog, I tumbled out the bedroom window and fell, head first, into my neighbors rose bushes.

What a sight I must have been! Me in my fur boots and horned helmet and nothing else.

You see, before tumbling out the window, I was about to take advantage of a steamy young maiden. But, as I stood on the bed, sword in hand, towering over her like a lion about to devour his prey, I heard the dreadful hissing.

It was then I realized that I had punctured the fair maiden in her over-inflated thigh!

No longer would the fair maiden with the red pouty mouth feel the warmth of my hot air blows.

It was while I was rolling her up for repairs that I lost my footing and tumbled out the bedroom window.

And now here I wait. Reveling in the gentle sway of the rowboat. Adrift on a starry night. Waiting for a sign.

"Hey!" I hear my wife shout from our lakeside cabin. "Get your sorry ass out of that boat! Supper's ready!"

But that's not the sign I was looking for. I was thinking more along the lines of a nibble.

So I reel in my tackle and hope to have better fishing tomorrow.

Fully recovered since the fall, I forge ahead. Determined to make the most out of my life.

But I still have my Viking dreams, and my rowboat.

The rest is in the hands of fate.