I’ve never worn shining armor and ridden a white horse.
As I child, I did have a plastic sword and a metal shield. The shield had a picture of Prince Valiant, with sword and shield. But his shield had a picture of a horse, not an infinitely regressive picture of himself holding a shield with a picture of himself ....
One day I was walking on Briggs Avenue with my shield and sword, and saw the Hardy Twins, Timmy and Tommy, who were about my age. One had a Prince Valiant shield, and the other one a sword. I thought how sad is was to be twins, and only have half the outfit.
(Someone -- maybe it was me -- started a rumor that the twins’ names were Thimas and Tomothy. Then again, maybe it wasn’t a rumor. There are identical twins where I work, much more identical than any other adult twins I’ve seen. One of them, when asked “which one are you?” replies “the other one.” Or maybe they both say that; how would anyone know?) But, the point is, I had toy armor, but never shining armor.
I did own a horse briefly, although I never rode her, or even saw her. Her name was Rosie, I think. See “Chapter Six: Lesley’s Horse”. My friend Marty Lesley wanted a horse in the worst way. The worst way to want something is if you can’t afford it. So I ... but that’s a story for another time. In any event, I was repaid in full, and Marty’s broken leg healed. I don’t think Rosie was white, but it’s no less likely than the Hardy Twins being Thimas and Tomothy.
But I keep getting off the subject, which is supposed to be heroics. My lack of shining armor, a white horse, and the courage to use them properly occurred to me a few weeks ago. I was in a local restaurant and bar, talking to a waitress of whom I’ve grown quite fond. She mentioned getting off work early for a change. Afterwards, I wondered how late she worked ordinarily. The place is open till four in the morning, and has a reputation for being quite rowdy around closing time, long after the respectable customers like sages and wizards and librarians have gone.
I thought, if she works till closing, maybe I should start showing up a little before four, to protect her. I could picture the scene: words would be exchanged, a fight would break out, glasses, bottles, and finally chairs would be thrown. I’d be beaten bloody, and my friend the waitress would have to rescue me.
I mentioned this to her the next time I was there. She gave me her most thoughtful look. “I could do that”, she said.
And since then, an opportunity arose for me to protect her. I was passing the place. She was by the outside tables, with another waitress. One of the waiters came by, and hit her in the back with a bunch of menus. The other waitress laughed. My friend saw me coming, and said “they’re all picking on me.”
“Good”, I said, “you must have done something to deserve it.”
“No, I’m innocent!”
“A likely story”, I told her. I said to the waiter “Keep up the good work.”
(I did say that an opportunity had arisen, not that I’d taken it.)
I was a hero once, though. Cora -- see “Chapter Six: Saving the Indians” -- was feeding a friend’s cat, Vito, while the friend was on vacation. She decided that rather than detouring to her friend’s apartment every day on her way from work, she would bring Vito to her place, where she already had five cats, so that Vito would have company and she would avoid the detour.
My phone rang. It was Cora. “Can you come over? Please? I thought I’d take Vito here. I thought he’d have fun, and my cats would have fun, and I’d have fun. Well, nobody’s having fun.”
When I got there, in spite of the hot day, Cora was wearing her roommate’s leather jacket. There was blood tricking down her wrist. Her cats were nowhere to be seen.
In the middle of the living room, next to an open cat carrier, sat Vito, a very large tuxedo cat. His tail was thumping against the floor, and I think I only imagined that the floor was shaking.
Cora said “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I can’t get him back in the carrier.”
If I had thought about it, I wouldn’t have known what to do either, but fools don’t stop to think. I walked over to him, and said “What’s the matter, Vito? Aren’t you having any fun?” and picked him up and put him in the carrier before he had time to think. That was the high point of my image in Cora’s eyes. Shining armor and a white horse would have been a nice touch, but putting Vito in his carrier was good enough.
We drove Vito home, with him making pathetic, kitten-like sounds all the way. As soon as we got him back in his familiar apartment and let him out, he started walking around very importantly, as if nothing had happened. But he didn’t walk near me.
My hero’s reward was a meal at a nearby Chinese restaurant. We both accepted the waiter’s suggestion of “Phoenix Nest Surprise.” Cora was very surprised indeed when she bit into a small dark thing, some evil relative of peppers. Her face turned red. It turned purple. It turned green. Finally, it turned a deathly white. It was all she could do to gasp “don’t eat the black things.”
I looked at the black things on my plate, and wondered what they could be like.
But I’m not that brave.
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