Old Cathay: Or the Essence of Communications
A telephone with wings made a certain kind of sense to Ken. But the wings might have been better attached to the long distance call speeding across space to a shop in Cathay.
“Can’t you get hats locally?” asked Sherri.
“Yeah,” said Ken in between leaps, trying to snare the winged spawn of AT&T. “But not like the hats Chu Yin makes in Old Cathay.”
“China, you mean? No one calls it ‘Cathay’ any more.” Sherri made those “quotation marks” in the air with her fingers as she spat out the word “Cathay.”
Ken rolled his eyes back in disgust and almost fell over the low glass and mahogany of the coffee table. Sherri plucked her herb tea from the jolted table and stroked the warm ceramic of her orca-shaped mug. Ken sprinted to the hall closet and grabbed a Pepto-Bismol pink bath towel. If he did not capture the escaped phone soon his call would be completed without him.
He could imagine Chu Yin sitting in the dark clutter of his small Rug & Clothing Shop. The old man’s pre-WWII rotary phone would beat its clapper against its rusty bell. Yin would put down his needle and thread, pick up the great curved receiver and squint his eyes to better hear the muffled voice of the telephone. His phone, being so heavy and lacking the modern conveniences of wings would of course sit perfectly still on the cluttered work bench.
Ken swatted at his cordless escapee with renewed frenzy, the pink towel thwapping the ceiling and upsetting the balance of the brass and oak ceiling fan. Sherri, massaging the ceramic blubber of her drinking whale, let the truant phone wing past her nose without lifting a manicured nail to capture or divert the frightened device. She was watching motes of dust fly from the twirling blades of the recently upset fan and thinking about scolding the cleaning person.
“You still have a few Chu Yin hats left at the store,” she said, looking down at the herbal guts of the whale. “You could send one to Chico in the Philippines and have him copy a few thousand for you in half the time it takes old Yin to make two dozen.”
Ken stopped the phone’s escape into the kitchen by throwing the latest Tom Clancy novel at it. Surprised, the phone bounced off the wall and got its antenna momentarily caught in the lace window curtains. It let out a few anxious clicks and pops and darted out of the curtains just as Ken came speeding to the window.
“Shit!” Ken spun on Sherri, towel again in hand, panting as he took his eyes off the phone for a second. “These hats are made from the wool of an ancient breed of sheep that only lives in the highest mountains of Cathay.”
Ken could almost feel the air thinning and the temperature dropping as he imagined those high secret places. He could hear the sheep bleating reverent chants to the Dragons of the Air while being herded by shaggy and wise Foo Dogs.
The phone beat its wings furiously and rose up to bang against the sunroof. A tiny Chinese voice broke forth from the Korean-made speaker in the phone’s head; it was the slow venerable voice of Chu Yin.
“Shit,” Ken cursed, jumping up onto the coffee table, scattering the current issues of Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and Barons.
“Hold on Mister Yin,” Ken pleaded, swinging the pink towel. “It’s me, Ken. I need some of your special hats, but I’m having trouble with the new phone.”
Sherri, fearing the destruction of her glass table top, put down the steaming killer whale next to the green-shaded reading lamp and pulled the power cord from the AT&T phone base.
Its red light going dark and its wings falling limply to its bone-white plastic sides, the phone fell spinning to the plush stain-resistant carpet. Ken knelt down before the now quiet messenger and stammered, “Chu Yin, Chu Yin…”
Watercolor mists obscured the magnificent peaks of Old Cathay. The Taoist sheep and their Foo Dog companions faded into a hazy rice-paper static which settled into a prolonged sepia black silence.
“I’ve lost my connection,” Ken said, cradling the fallen phone in his hands, the towel forgotten on the floor.
Sherri smiled, sat back in the leather couch and sipped the cooling essence of killer whale.
A telephone with wings made a certain kind of sense to Ken. But the wings might have been better attached to the long distance call speeding across space to a shop in Cathay.
“Can’t you get hats locally?” asked Sherri.
“Yeah,” said Ken in between leaps, trying to snare the winged spawn of AT&T. “But not like the hats Chu Yin makes in Old Cathay.”
“China, you mean? No one calls it ‘Cathay’ any more.” Sherri made those “quotation marks” in the air with her fingers as she spat out the word “Cathay.”
Ken rolled his eyes back in disgust and almost fell over the low glass and mahogany of the coffee table. Sherri plucked her herb tea from the jolted table and stroked the warm ceramic of her orca-shaped mug. Ken sprinted to the hall closet and grabbed a Pepto-Bismol pink bath towel. If he did not capture the escaped phone soon his call would be completed without him.
He could imagine Chu Yin sitting in the dark clutter of his small Rug & Clothing Shop. The old man’s pre-WWII rotary phone would beat its clapper against its rusty bell. Yin would put down his needle and thread, pick up the great curved receiver and squint his eyes to better hear the muffled voice of the telephone. His phone, being so heavy and lacking the modern conveniences of wings would of course sit perfectly still on the cluttered work bench.
Ken swatted at his cordless escapee with renewed frenzy, the pink towel thwapping the ceiling and upsetting the balance of the brass and oak ceiling fan. Sherri, massaging the ceramic blubber of her drinking whale, let the truant phone wing past her nose without lifting a manicured nail to capture or divert the frightened device. She was watching motes of dust fly from the twirling blades of the recently upset fan and thinking about scolding the cleaning person.
“You still have a few Chu Yin hats left at the store,” she said, looking down at the herbal guts of the whale. “You could send one to Chico in the Philippines and have him copy a few thousand for you in half the time it takes old Yin to make two dozen.”
Ken stopped the phone’s escape into the kitchen by throwing the latest Tom Clancy novel at it. Surprised, the phone bounced off the wall and got its antenna momentarily caught in the lace window curtains. It let out a few anxious clicks and pops and darted out of the curtains just as Ken came speeding to the window.
“Shit!” Ken spun on Sherri, towel again in hand, panting as he took his eyes off the phone for a second. “These hats are made from the wool of an ancient breed of sheep that only lives in the highest mountains of Cathay.”
Ken could almost feel the air thinning and the temperature dropping as he imagined those high secret places. He could hear the sheep bleating reverent chants to the Dragons of the Air while being herded by shaggy and wise Foo Dogs.
The phone beat its wings furiously and rose up to bang against the sunroof. A tiny Chinese voice broke forth from the Korean-made speaker in the phone’s head; it was the slow venerable voice of Chu Yin.
“Shit,” Ken cursed, jumping up onto the coffee table, scattering the current issues of Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and Barons.
“Hold on Mister Yin,” Ken pleaded, swinging the pink towel. “It’s me, Ken. I need some of your special hats, but I’m having trouble with the new phone.”
Sherri, fearing the destruction of her glass table top, put down the steaming killer whale next to the green-shaded reading lamp and pulled the power cord from the AT&T phone base.
Its red light going dark and its wings falling limply to its bone-white plastic sides, the phone fell spinning to the plush stain-resistant carpet. Ken knelt down before the now quiet messenger and stammered, “Chu Yin, Chu Yin…”
Watercolor mists obscured the magnificent peaks of Old Cathay. The Taoist sheep and their Foo Dog companions faded into a hazy rice-paper static which settled into a prolonged sepia black silence.
“I’ve lost my connection,” Ken said, cradling the fallen phone in his hands, the towel forgotten on the floor.
Sherri smiled, sat back in the leather couch and sipped the cooling essence of killer whale.
----------------------------
Credits:
Story (written in 1993) and Collage by Jay Larsen
That sense that technology has a life independent of what its creators intended brought to you by the fact that technology does things we did not intend and cannot predict.
No comments:
Post a Comment