The library in Pelor, Idaho is all sharp concrete and there’s nothing particularly interesting about it but for an ongoing exhibition in the basement. ‘The Detritus Collection’ features several dozen items scavenged from the side of the road. Each is paired with a story written by the person who found and donated it. The donors are anonymous and they may well all be the same sad person. A handful of dark glass, for instance, is accompanied by this passage:
There is a checkerboard pattern to your windshield that I only see when I’m wearing sunglasses. I noticed it again yesterday when you drove me home, while you were explaining why this wouldn’t work out. I knew we wouldn’t work out and I knew why. I didn’t know about the checkerboard thing. I’m writing to explain.
The internet says the checkerboard is an interaction between two qualities of glass: the polarization of my sunnies, and the tempered nature of your windshield. When a piece of glass is polarized it will only allow vertically-moving light rays to pass through it, reducing glare. A person in polarized glasses might be forgiven for their failure to recognize the light emitted by something that was directly in front of them.
A tempered windshield is created by applying stress to a sheet of glass. Light that filters through the resultant microfractures, that is further filtered via polarization, reveals the predictable checkerboard pattern of stress. Tempered glass is made stronger for the stress but if it breaks it will break wholly, dissolving into a thousand pieces. Regular glass is weak and, in trying to hold its form, it breaks in dangerous, unpredictable ways.
If somebody had asked me to test the strength of glass before this, I may have tried breaking it myself.
A tattered bandana has inspired this:
A cowboy wears a bandana in one of two ways: pulled up over his face or dangling about his neck.
A cowboy, his bandana pulled up over his face, might be hiding his identity. If you recognize him, he isn’t doing a very good job. It may also be an indication that there is dust in the air- that he’s filtering the air to keep from choking. A third, joint possibility is that the cowboy, sensing bad air between the two of you, has chosen to conceal his identity.
A cowboy, his bandana dangling about the neck, might indicate a reluctant willingness engage. The orientation of the bandana’s downward point reflects the cowboy’s level of reluctance. A downward point aimed at the cowboy’s hindquarters suggests he is reasonably willing to engage. The bandana, in this position, protects his neck from the sun and from the prickling stares of strangers. The downward point aimed at his belt buckle serves no purpose but to ready it for raising. This cowboy is experiencing the height of reluctance. He is quickdraw-ready to run.
But he hasn’t run yet.
Hector accompanies me through ‘The Detritus Collection’ and, though I doubt the library wants any live specimens, I start to wonder what I would say about the ruined rabbit if we were to put him up on a pedestal- what the ruined rabbit would say about me. He’s at home among these relics, worn by the Wayside to the point of being unrecognizable. A look in the mirror suggests the same could be said of me.
The Wayside wears things ragged like the ocean wears them smooth. I see it in the way Hector nips when I accidentally startle him. I see it in myself. If I had to write a story about Hector, it would probably sound a lot like the rest of ‘The Detritus Collection:’ regretful and worried about some indistinct loss of humanity.
So maybe I don’t write it down.
-traveler