Meanwhile, The Men

by Gayle M. Petty

     an excerpt

CHARACTERS:

ERVIN BIGG: USA CONNECT, TECHNICAL SUPPORT FISHING CONTEST HOST. (AGE 33) LIVES IN A COMPUTER WORLD OF HACKER SPEECH

HARRIET: ERVIN'S HAMSTER

ISAAC EDMONDSON: FISHING CONTESTANT (AGE 53) NICKNAME-- ITCHY

SWEET SWENOWSKI: FISHING CONTESTANT (AGE 30)

LENNY LEWIS: FISHING CONTESTANT (AGE 30) A SOUTHERNER

RALPH RILEY: FISHING CONTESTANT (AGE 53)

The Action: occurs on a Friday evening, winter, in the present time. It is the evening before the first annual USA CONNECT ice fishing contest.

Setting: Lucky Lake (Somewhere near Lake of the Woods)
Time: Twilight, Friday.
The stage is a center interior of a one room cabin and outdoor regions on either side.

Exteriors: There are fishing holes, dark house fishing hut (used for Muskie spearing), and a woodpile area. The tip-up (ice fishing pole) is rigged witha Strike Sensor alarm tip-up fishing pole-- which is a pager alarm that signals a biting fish.

Interior: The kitchen sink is serviced by a pump. There is a great mantle with a Moose hanging over it with a rolled paper note in the mouth. There is a bear skin rug in front of a pot belly wood stove.

(Ervin Bigg enters the cabin wearing a backpack as the lights come up. He is holding his coat shut protectively over a hamster cage and a laptop computer. He locates the Strike Sensor pager on the mantel. He reads aloud from the rolled paper note)

ERVIN:

Ervin, if you can see your breath, then it is probably too late. (tenderly to the hamster) See smoke, Harriet? Put another log on the fire? I will.

(He prepares a fire )

Let there be light!

(Ervin continues to mutter through the letter)

If you don't keeping the fire going, the pump will freeze. Plenty of wood. Baited one hole and augured the others for your contest. Cabin's yours 'til Sunday. Appreciate this arrangement so I can get into town. Though, I am not a sentimental guy, I feel like a father to you Erv, and know that someday, I'm going to leave you this cabin. Just don't bring electricity or running water here. Call me a Ludite, if you will. I prefer the wild to stay wild. However, in the name of fishing, I make an exception for that remote control Strike Sensor. For I am faithfully in pursuit of muskie,
Your Uncle Merle
P.S. If it's not nailed down, you can eat it. If you catch Moby, don't take a picture son, get him stuffed and on my wall!

(ERVIN removes HARRIET from her cage, unpacks, and examines the room as if giving her a tour. He stops at the picture of Uncle Merle)

Mother always said I looked like Uncle Merle, worried I'd grow up a hermit. 'Ervin, you don't have to give up your computer! You could get a merit badge in electronics with the Boy Scouts. You could do an exhibit with the 4-H club. Make friends. Come out of your room.' Then, she would end up screaming: 'You love that computer more than me!' I did. I still have that old TRS-80 and every computer that I have ever owned.
Sometimes, the USA CONNECT owner looks a little like my father. Our I.S.P. was cozy until he started surfing the Net. He came to me face to face--- and said: 'Ervin, we need a promotion. A contest. A social event. User base-- mostly men. Winter. Do something. It's up to you, Ervin.' Of course it's up to me. I am the techno-wizard. He is Mr. Moneybags. USA CONNECT is run out of my second bedroom. I am the internet service provider.

(Ervin moves a chess set and proceeds to open up his laptop computer with a solar panel cover)

This remote location should discourage everybody. Activity: ice fishing:---- they will be out there. I will be in here with my computer. All I have to do is weigh, measure, take pictures for the web page, and award ridiculous consolation prizes. It is only one weekend. With fellows who own computers, things should click together like a simple, simple, software program.

(He installs his hamster wheel generator")

Battery Low. Harriet, it was a long ride. A little exercise will do you good.

(Ervin puts her inside the cage on her wheel. The audience's view of the hamster activities is obstructed. The illusion is preserved by the sound of whirring wheel and a light on the generator box burning brightly. Harriet is a furry Beanie Baby prop that through velcro and creative attachments rests on Ervin's hat, shoulders, arms, and hamster wheel. He connects a modem to a cell phone and plugs it into the laptop)

(Computer voice: "Check the mail!")

Face time, not good with strangers.... even those who own computers. I've got, you Harriet, this laptop and.... apparently sufficient charge.... if only we could harness the Northern Lights with this solar panel, we could blaze the galaxy.

(ERVIN takes a moment to coax HARRIET up and down each of his arms and then she rests on his hatted head.

Lights come up on the woodpile that lines the exterior wall. We see ITCHY hiding a large frozen fish in a secretive place under several layers of logs. ITCHY speaks as he enters from behind ERVIN)

ITCHY:

Computers Are Like Old Testament gods, a lot of rules and no mercy!

ERVIN:

Crippling bogosity. What logic?

(ITCHY comes forward and places his arm on ERVIN's shoulder. They look face to face with HARRIET perched atop ERVIN's hat. His clerical collar is visible from the opening of his dress coat. He is carrying an overstuffed briefcase and garment bag)

ITCHY:

Isaac Edmondson, Reverend Isaac Edmondson. You can call me Itchy. You are?

ERVIN:

Ervin Bigg, USA CONNECT fishing host. This is Harriet.

ITCHY:

We're kind of at a stand off here. Wore these vestments to sneak out of the house. Don't mean to be intimidating with my collar. Told my wife there was a hymnal conference that I was required to attend

(ITCHY removes his collar and vestment and carefully hangs it under his coat. He begins removing his boots)

My wife Judy has me well trained in taking off my boots in the house. Feet that sweat, catch cold.

ERVIN:

The map was good?

ITCHY:

Downloaded it and printed it right out. Since my church got that web page, my computer skills have truly picked up. It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Ervin. I've appreciated your online help. It is further proof to me that the Lord works in mysterious ways.

ERVIN:

It's rustic here. Icebox is iced by ice. S-S-S-Something to drink? I don't cook but a guy who does is coming. Three other fishing contestants. They all use USA CONNECT.

ITCHY:

Computers, in common. And you, married Ervin?

(ERVIN shakes his head 'no')

I married right after I came home from Vietnam. Married my work thereafter.

(ERVIN brings two beers and a paper wrapped smoked fish. ERVIN flounders, breaks the flip top from the can of beer, from first one and then the other can)

ITCHY (cont'd):

Here, let me take care of that.

(ITCHY pulls out a church key)

Relax, sit down. I've had this church key since it saved my life in 'Nam. (Scratching) My wife starches too much, aggravates my eczema. Got the nickname Itchy in the service, Itchy-trigger- finger. Get it? Well, that and the jungle grows fungus on the underside of your balls. The church key was a revelation in itself sort of my sign to go into the ministry. Another round?

(He opens more beers with his church key and gestures with his church key as he reminisces)

My platoon got word to saddle up, pack a light ruck. Headed out. Formed up for evacuation.. Moved off our hill. Abandoned trail and put out flanks. Night fell and we spread out near a rice paddy berm. A year, in country, you might call this routine.
I was FIGMO, so short, I felt invisible. Meaning, I was going home in a week. A week to WAKEY, the Fini Flight back to THE WORLD.
Easy to imagine movement in your kill zone. Thought I was hallucinating when I finally saw him. Had my shit wired tight and my M -16 raised for one clean shot.
Now that gun's not called a widow maker for no good reason. It jammed. A signaling click. Kill or be killed. (pause) I grabbed him from behind and slit his throat with this very same church key. A grenade went off. Let's just say, it's not terribly important for a peg-legged minister to dance. In rehab, the other guys got to calling me "Itchy" by their consensus that I got myself there with my eager, twitching, trigger finger.

ERVIN:

Well, like um, say, fandango---dump on core? Programmers say, "fooed-up." Your legend makes you a demigod, heroic like Ken Thompson, inventor of UNIX.

ITCHY:

No, the explosion did not make me a eunuch. That's what wives are for. Ervin you're a likable guy. Strangely jargoned but likable. The military would just say SNAFU. But, I need to confess this.

ERVIN:

Sir? I am technical support but in computers. Mainly, I support the technical.

ITCHY:

I am man of the cloth, recipient of a purple heart, hiding out in the remote north woods from the two real and ever present dangers in my life.

ERVIN:

I'm trying to say, aside from Harriet, I don't have a lot of friends besides computers. If it is a computer matter .. . technical, mathematical. . problematic in the abstract . . .
Do you chop wood? We're heated by wood stove. The pump can't freeze. The outhouse is north of the dark house--- by the dark house...

ITCHY:

How far north? This hollow leg of mine is figurative.

ERVIN:

Just north of the fishing holes. Did you bring bait?

ITCHY:

I don't fish. I just came to get away. Been trying to explain my predicament. I'm used to confiding in you. It was all so natural online. Like a confessional with a computer priest. Bless me Ervin, but I just have to tell you.---My wife, Judy's become unreasonable and henpecking in mid-life. I was attracted to the part about the free Cake Keeper in your "win the fishing trip" ad.

ERVIN:

My ad suffered from creeping featuritus designed to attract men with browsers set to plastics, ice fishing, area codes for Minnesota. Surprised to attract anyone. My boss forced me to host this contest.

ITCHY:

Right. You prefer computers to people. But back to the free Cake Keeper. I need one badly. In my wife's Cake Keeper --she sent it with me with a cake to the church council meeting, I have frozen, in the trunk of my car, seven pounds of fully cooked Lute Fisk.

ERVIN:

You did bring bait?

ITCHY:

No, I forgot the Lute Fisk in the trunk all winter. Meant to smuggle a taste of the Norwegian to Father Flanagan across town. But Flanagan suddenly up and met St. Peter. Forgot the Lute Fisk. Put the snow chains on during that big blizzard. Found it. JUDY WOULD KILL ME if she knew how I ruined her Cake Keeper. Been waiting for a thaw to bury it. My web search led me here--- away from my wife, to a free Cake Keeper, you are a sort of Cyber salvation.

ERVIN:

It could be bait. Lute Fisk, strong smell. Lute Fisk might work. We should chop wood. Uncle Merle has spare hunting clothes in that closet.

ITCHY:

OK then. Roughing it. 'S what separates us men from the boys. If the axe slips and hits my left leg, let's say, I'd be feeling no pain.

ERVIN:

It could be bait. I have to check the fish hole. Back momentarily.

(ERVIN crosses a short distance to fishing holes and returns. ITCHY has found a two man saw hanging on the side of the cabin.)

ITCHY:

Ervin, the two of us, working this saw will get a start on the wood situation.

(The two fall to a rhythmic seesaw cutting wood. ERVIN is propelled like a rag doll as if an unwilling playmate on a teeter totter)

Marriage is like this two man saw. One gives. One gets. Give. Get. Give. Get. Give. Get. Back and forth. Back and forth. So on and so forth to eternity. Back and forth. Give. Get. When a marriage goes bad, not that mine is....

ERVIN:

Programmable options? Garbage in, garbage out?

ITCHY:

You're getting my drift. I knew we'd have this natural affinity for each other from our online connection. Your technical support is technically supportive. You're a pal, Erv, a real pal. Now, let me get exponential: the good book says, "Physician heal thyself." I counsel couples on marriage. I marry them. Bury them. Pat them on their back for their faithful church attendance. Judy and I are many decades together, empty nesters---the epitome of "the couple who prays together, stays together."
And "there by the grace of God, there go I," I mean, I see so much divorce.

(The ice fishing tip-up pops up as the pager signals)

ERVIN:

Priority interrupt! Did you hear the pager?

( He checks again)

ITCHY:

After, I split more of this wood, I'll see what I can chisel loose from the Lute Fisk. You've made me curious.

ERVIN:

Bait then?

(ERVIN gathers wood and goes into the cabin. Itchy continues to chop. He rants as if ERVIN is still within earshot)

ITCHY:

Bait then.

Nothing is sacred anymore. Certainly, not my church web site. THE HACKERS, Ervin! Hackers tweaked the links to "LAY" minister and added pornographic links to "Missionary Positions." That's not all of it. Some search and replace worm changed "sects" to s-e-x--all throughout the download document, named, "Everything you wanted to Know about Sects." That's S-E-C-T-S. And favorite hymns--- spelled H-I-M-S connected to naked men.
Nothing is sacred. Nothing is sacred!

(A car door slams. SWEET enters carrying grocery bags from behind the muskie dark house. He also carries a Cake Keeper by the handle)

SWEET:

Hey---Pal, the door. Lend a hand, maybe?

(SWEET is a well muscled man with a true woodsmen's experience. He looks in the cage at Harriet)

Live bait?

ERVIN:

I'll move her. My hamster, Harriet. You a-a-are ?

SWEET:

Steve Swenowski, master baker, your chief weekend cook, and proprietor of "SWEET'S SWEETS." So, who's in charge here, hamster helper or axe man?

ERVIN:

USA CONNECT, ice fishing host. I am Ervin, technical support .

ITCHY:

Isaac Edmondson, Reverend Isaac Edmondson, but please forgo titles, just call me Itchy, a nickname I've had since the service. Are you a vet?

SWEET:

Nope. Wrong era. (Takes axe) First rule of chopping, sight down the axe blade to make sure it aligns with center. In cold weather, warm the blade before chopping. You know, a six inch blade is long enough for anything, including murder. (Returns axe) So Reverend, you have a web site on USA CONNECT, too?

ITCHY:

Sure, another, "Go Ye therefore," or as they say on Star Trek: "Space, the final frontier." Though, Hackers have found my sight, and given new meaning to "Oh Holy Night." The big emphasis is on "hole-y" with enough holes to make Swiss cheese look solid as the screen dissolves in an acid eaten screen saver.

SWEET:

I cruise the recipe forums myself. Take it all in from sweet breads to sweet broads. Ervin's helping me set up my Cyber-bakery. I'd like to get into a select home delivery market.

ERVIN:

Food. Cake! Any Szechuan? I live entirely on carry-out food.

SWEET:

That kettle hooked there would make a great Booya pot. Learned to cook Booya at the East Side Polish American club. The cake's for later, a specialty from my bakery.

ERVIN:

Booya? Flavored like Szechuan?

SWEET:

Booya's a unique stew. Different, evertytime, a melting pot, like the internet. Snow in the pot is better than well water. Any other food contributions?

ITCHY:

Spam.

ERVIN:

SPAM?!

SWEET:

Al right. C'mon, I'll show you how to really swing an axe.

ERVIN:

(To SWEET as he exits after ITCHY)

Don't mention his church key. He'll go nonlinear for hours.

SWEET:

The blade of an axe should not chew up the wood it strikes. You take a swing with the maul at a block over a foot thick. Feel that perfect pop of a centered hit? Split in two neat half cylinders. Two halves clean and aromatic. Nothing like it, symmetry, aroma, as good as baking bread. A well stacked wood pile looks almost like a bakery with loaves and loaves of bread. It is a sacred pleasure to chop wood. Here, you try.

ITCHY:

The virtue of incompetence is that it teaches you to keep your head bowed and your ass covered. I take you get your expert swing from being single-- as in swinging single?

SWEET:

All women love me. All fish fear me. It shows?

ITCHY:

Confirmed bachelor. Experienced outdoorsman. You must drive a truck.

SWEET:

You're married then. No truck.

ITCHY:

It's my wife's car. Her other car is a broom.

SWEET:

So, how's the gas mileage?

ITCHY:

Twenty, twenty-four city, thirty freeway.

SWEET:

I meant the broom. Not the car.

(The two men saw with the bow saw)

ITCHY:

As I left, I kiss my wife goodbye, she says: "Honey, hang your wrinkled suit in a closet with a wet towel." Not, I'll miss you but wet towel. Women are perpetually God's mystery.

SWEET:

Love 'em or leave 'em. What'd you know about our host, the hamster-man?

ITCHY:

Ervin is a very good listener, very intelligent. I've been eternally grateful to him helping with my church web page. Very grateful for this get away, feel like a new man already.

SWEET:

What's he up to?

ITCHY:

Looks like he's at it on his laptop.

SWEET:

Not a sign of a serious fisherman. Strikes me as a guy never separated from his computer. Bet he's never held a fishing pole or a woman for that matter.

(SWEET digs out a broken canoe paddle from the wood pile. Uses it to pile snow and knock a few icicles into the big black pot. )

Time to cook. Concentrate on that that perfect pop of a centered hit. Almost as satisfying as great sex.

ITCHY:

I'll check the tip-up. Erv wanted to try my bait.

(SWEET exits. ITCHY retrieves his Cake Keeper of Lute Fisk and takes it down to the tip-up hole. He mumbles to himself)

That Sweet is about as saccharin as they come. Reminds me of the confused confirmand that thought one of the ten commandments was, "Thou shall not commit a dog trick."

(Lights dim over exterior and come up in cabin)

SWEET:

So, what's your take on the limping lumberjack?

ERVIN:

Take?

SWEET:

Yeah, scratch man----the Rev, Itchy, the guy at the wood pile.

ERVIN:

Any man with eighty column mind will be buried face down nine edge first.

SWEET:

That some programmer parable?

ERVIN:

Itchy was saved by a church key, a cuspy, and raving tale.

SWEET:

Looks like you were saved by a hamster. What's this?

ERVIN:

Interface. The wheel generator charges the battery. Harriet amps at (read as: point -oh-two-five) .025. It keeps the laptop battery alive. A continuous low trickle charge.

SWEET:

Trickle charge, even with these solar panels? Which came first the hamster or the generator?

ERVIN:

I amped off: asleep with my eyes open in the middle of debugging code. I often run in background mode; attached by modem to work.

SWEET:

So, the hamster?

ERVIN:

Came through the heating duct behind the desk. I live in an apartment building. My office is at home.

SWEET:

Ah! She saw your computer mouse and decided to mate? And a hamster in hand....

ERVIN:

'Hamster' is slang for a slick piece of code. Harriet is the goddess of good programming.

(SWEET puts his hand in the cage, holds HARRIET, and speaks to her)

SWEET:

And a steady .025 amps. Got a beer for your buddy, your pal? Ervin might? Might be a good host? A beer for his buddy?

(SWEET puts HARRIET back in her cage and tosses the rest of the hamster food remaining in his hand into the big black pot)

ERVIN:

A beer for a FOAF.

(ERVIN experiences broken pull tab failure. SWEET rescues both cans)

SWEET:

Here, whenever that happens, I squeeze the can sides like I'm going to crush it. The pressure pops it out backwards from the inside. Helps some if you shake it a little. FOAF? You calling me a friendly oaf?

ERVIN:

FOAF --- Friend of a friend. Your USA CONNECT contest entry said you knew...

SWEET:

..Oh yeah.. Gwendolyn Goodwin, Susie Swanger, and Gloria Goodligs. I can see you're interested in my close encounters of the female kind. I'm practically a magnet.

ERVIN:

Harriet likes you.

SWEET:

Now, you're cooking.

(Steam rises from the suspended Booya kettle. SWEET stirs with the canoe paddle. Lights darken on the interior. Lights come up as LENNY trudges to the stage from an aisle path. Northern lights illuminate the night sky on the backdrop. He is wearing a Minnesota Vikings cap complete with Hun braids, is bundled in multiple layers of ostentatious and elaborate winter costumes worn frequently by the uninitiated and the ignorant enduring "the north" for the first time. He pulls cases of beer on a Tug and Tote ice fishing sled. ITCHY attempts to bait his hook.)

ITCHY:

If only there were a way to attach the faith of a mustard seed.

(As ITCHY attempts to attach a hunk of Lute Fisk, he drops it in the hole. He drills with the sharp tip of his church key and begins threading fish chunks on his leader. It begins to snow lightly)

LENNY:

In rooted joy, I stand in tracks... carelessly blooming in immensity... wild with mysterious truth. Golden hysteria of heaven.... black holes of obsidian

ITCHY:

Are you going to share what you're on?

LENNY:

Is this Lucky Lake?

ITCHY:

You're in luck. Now, if that's a case of beer you are sharing, you're in better luck. I'm carrying a church key.

LENNY:

Car's in the ditch. So enthralled seeing the Northern Lights, I lost the road. Sky lighted like before a hurricane. Can't think of a better reason to kill a brew.

ITCHY:

Killebrew. Harmon Killebrew, you ever watch him play?

LENNY:

Not much for baseball, but I sure like this baseball poem:

Third Base Coach by Bob McKenty

His loins are girt, his teeth are grit
His jock itch he'll conceal
He knows that if he scratches it
He'll start a double steal.

ITCHY:

If only, I could incorporate that into a sermon. Isaac Edmondson, minister.

LENNY:

You might try a sermon on 'temptation.' Lenny Lewis, reformed.

ITCHY:

Call me Itchy. Fish much?

LENNY:

Never ice fished. That was the draw of this USA CONNECT expedition. (Enthralled by winter) Once again the night. Once again the snow.

ITCHY:

With the Northern lights, this is spectacular.

LENNY:

Aurora Bur-r-r-r-y Alice! Cold. Can't get used to the cold. Here I am near Lake of the Woods, south of Manitoba, east of North Dakota.

ITCHY:

Aurora Borealis--- Minnesota, home of Aquavit and good warm feet.

--end of excerpt--

© Gayle M. Petty
Reading at the Playwrights' Center, 1996