I am writing this from an airplane en route to Brooklyn (New York; not Wisconsin), where I am on my way to a conference. I opened my computer with the plan to write a story about PowerPoints, but instead found myself digging through an old folder of crap I had written in November 2019 right before my grandma died and thought, “You know, this is the week to release this crap out into the 20,000-foot universe.” I’m sorry to those of you who were like, “Ooooooh, POWERPOINTS?!”; I’ll make it up to you next week.

Before I hit print on these stories, I need to tell you three things:

1. None of these are my usual type of story; two of them aren’t even that nice. Please don’t unfollow/unsubscribe. If you’re still like, “No PowerPoints and now this?!” shoot me an email before you dump me forever and I’ll send you a little shortie about three things I like.
2. If you’ve been around here for a while, you’ll know that my Grandma Marion was my writing buddy. I’m honestly not sure what I was thinking when I drafted these three short stories because, like I said, I wrote them in the same month and they are…random. Random. Random tones, random topics, random voices, random random. My only thought (now) is that I was so all over the place with my grandma’s decline that I took every word in my head and dumped them out into three Word documents.
3. The only thing that’s not random about these three stories is that they all originated from a notebook of ideas I carried back and forth on the train from Boston to New York when I was in college between 1998-2002. The story about Anna Wintour (Editor of Vogue) was a single sentence in the notebook that read, “Anna Wintour finds a Wendy’s coupon.” The story titled “Tough Love” is a word-for-word recounting of the life and times of a teenage girl seated in front of me who spent the entire ride vigorously texting her boyfriend on a Nokia flip phone that she wore like a necklace. And “The Cottonwood Grove” originated from a hymn printed in one of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books that used to play over and over in my head whenever I was tired.

Anyways, here we go. I’m sorry they aren’t better. I hope you like at least one of them (and, if you don’t, please don’t tell me).

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Anna Wintour Clips a Coupon

“ — his use of an old truck bed cover as a capelet was absolutely fearless – hold on, what’s this?  See, right here next to this story on Taylor Swift’s pillowcase exhibition at the New Museum: ‘Buy one, get one free.’  Wait, there’s more: “Purchase any lunch item and get the second of equal or lesser value free.”  And look, it’s the Polo Bar’s insignia.

What does it mean?  Don’t lean over my desk, please, walk around.  Is it saying that if I order a lobster roll, hold the lettuce, hold the mayo, hold the roll, and you – but not you, of course – order a corned beef sandwich, we wouldn’t have to pay for your sandwich?  Amazing.

A cou-pon?  Is that what you call it?  Cou-PON.  Must be French.  One must hand it to the French; first Coco, now this.  However, you’re not pronouncing it properly; the “N” sound should be held in the back of your throat.  Repeat after me: tres bon.  Cou-pon.  Better.

So, we just bring this newspaper into – don’t interrupt me.  But yes, I see the dotted lines now, like a sewing pattern.  Don’t be ridiculous; those scissors once belonged to Cleopatra.  They were a gift from Nigel for cutting through Domenico’s bullsh-t, ha ha.  Also, it’s in the middle of the page.  Go get someone from the Art Department.  Wait, get Mario Testino.  And a coffee.  And send in Kay, please.

Kay, see here?  Have someone run to the newsstand and get me as many copies as they can find.  And get Jessica.  Jessica, I asked for a coffee and Testino.  I see neither.  Set a meeting for tomorrow morning for you, Kay, and I to discuss accountability.

That’s my phone.  Is someone going to answer it, or has that gone out the window, too?  Thank you, I’ll take it. 

Rhianna!  I was just thinking that if Cleopatra were alive today, she would only wear Fenty.  Yes, I’m looking right at it!  If you bring your coupon and I bring my coupon, that’s four meals.  You, me, Serena, and Naruhito, naturally.

Wait, there’s an asterisk.  ‘Plus the purchase of a beverage, excluding Pepsi products.’  Well, that shouldn’t be a problem; it wouldn’t be lunch without champagne.  We’ll toast the brilliant French!  Kay will call your assistant and set something up.  Kisses, goodbye.

Mario, finally.  I need the same steady hand that trimmed two pounds off of Cindy Crawford’s thighs to pull some coupons off the page.  No, not figuratively, literally.  Get your X-acto knife and Kay will give you my instructions.  For goodness sakes – move out of the way, Jessica, and let Mario through.  The coffee can wait ten more seconds, since apparently you had to fly to Ethiopia to get it.  Goodbye, Mario.  I often think of our Ramazzotti three-way in Milan.  Set the coffee there, Jessica, and hand me my cell phone.

Bonjour, Bee!  I’m calling about the – exactly!  Yes, you, George, Amal, and me – where did you read that?  ‘Only one coupon per visit.  Cannot be combined with other offers.’  What, Jessica?  Bee, apparently, we can have the waiter bring us two different checks.  What a world.  Incidentally, Marc said the same thing to me after a cocaine-fueled pedalboat down the Thames, ha ha.  Quite helpful, Jessica, thank you.  You can cancel our meeting tomorrow.

Listen, Bee, I have to run.  Also, I can tell by your tone that you’re wearing that old McQueen.  Green is out.  As are blue, red, and brown.  The colors this season are aubergine, saffron, bubble, and grey.  No, not gray, grey.  Kisses, goodbye.

Kay come in here, please, and bring a notebook; I’ve had an idea.  We are going to build our next issue around the coupon.  But not just one coupon; three or four.  Buy one Marchesa gown, get a second for free.  Okay, then buy one Marchesa gown, get a keychain.  Spend $50 on The Row, get a cigarette signed by Mary-Kate. 

We’ll gather up all of these coupons into a little book in the center of the magazine.  A livre de coupon, if you will.

You know, a book of these coupons would be quite popular.  If you only printed a limited run, for example, you could sell them.  Millie Bobby Brown told me after tennis that she was looking for a way to fund her next movie.  Send her a complimentary copy of the coupon issue with a note suggesting it.

I’m incredibly excited.  This is going to change the fashion industry.”

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Tough Love

The train lurched, the snack car closed, and her stupid boyfriend was ruining her life.

“i luv u,” he wrote.

“SO WHAT.”  She punched the numbers – 9, 44, 2, 8 – as hard as she could so he would understand.

“i want 2 see u.”

She flipped the phone closed so loudly her mom looked up from her magazine.  Britney Spears was on the cover.  Justin would never do anything like this to Britney.

“Everything okay, Bits?”

She scoffed and looked out the window at the rush of greens and reds and oranges and browns.  She hated being called that baby name in public, but she had more important things to worry about right now.  She scoffed again, to prove her point.

Her phone beeped from inside the glittery necklace case her mother had bought for her in New York.  She wished they had never gone to New York.  Wait; that wasn’t true.  She wished he didn’t know that they had gone to New York.

An old man in a Red Sox hat sat down in the empty seat across from them.  The conductor made his way down the aisle, repeating, “Next stop, Providence.”  He stopped at the man, punched his ticket, and took the two tickets belonging to her and her mother from the clips.  “Next stop, Providence.”

She opened her phone.

“i missed u.”

She closed her phone.  It beeped again.

“y r u mad”

She scoffed again, again.  He must be joking.

“if u dont go to practice, u dont get to play in the GAME.”  She threw up her free hand for emphasis as she typed.  Had he forgotten?  He was kind of a dumb-dumb.  Hot, yeah; but still, like, way dumb.  She tried to remember if she had ever seen any of his grades in their Econ class.  Whatever, everyone passed Econ, it was total cake.  They were probably watching a movie today or something.

“no big deal.”

She dropped her phone in exhaustion.  She thought of the dress, sparkly fluffy perfection, in the luggage rack above her head.  What was even the point of going to New York, if this was what he was going to do?

She looked to the old man for an acknowledgement of his stupidity.  He smiled at her.

“He’s such a child,” she said telepathically to the old man, shaking her head, pushing any thought of crying up into the luggage rack with their Bergdorf’s shopping bags.  Did he even think of anyone besides himself?  She and the other girls had planned this all week.  They were going to iron on their boyfriends’ jersey numbers on t-shirts and spray paint the tips of their hair red.  Like, they were supposed to go buy the shirts tomorrow, for eff’s sake!

She also thought of her mother.  She had taken a day off work and surprised her with a day trip to the City.  A whole day of shopping!  How could he be so selfish?

She sniffed.  Her mother opened a bag of M&Ms, took a few, and handed her the rest.  She leaned against her poor mom’s shoulder and ate them in order of luck: greens, reds, oranges, dark browns, light browns, yellows.  Her mother kissed her on the forehead.

What was his plan, to watch the game from the bleachers?  She sat straight up in her seat.  Ha!  As if she would hang out with him!  She wouldn’t even go to the game.  Maybe she wouldn’t even go to the dance!  He could sit at home and watch TV with his dad.  Wait, he was up for Homecoming Court.  If he won, she’d have to go with him.  He wouldn’t dare take someone else.  Like, for sure he wouldn’t, right?

“if u luv me u will go to practice,” she texted.

“i luv u 4eva,” he replied.

The conductor walked by.  “Five minutes to Providence.”  Her mother put away her magazine.

She stared back out the window as the trees came into focus, green and red and orange and brown.  The train slowed, rolling past a smattering of people on the platform.  She scanned the faces.  None were his.  She, and the train, sighed.

They stood up and began gathering their things.

“Was it a good day, honey?” Her mother asked, handing her the garment bag.

A flash of red and gold at the station caught her eye.  She leaned over the seats.  Outside, her boyfriend ran up the stairs to the platform, two at a time.  He carried a bouquet of yellow carnations.

“No,” she said, and began to cry.

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The Cottonwood Grove

The sun played its evening song across the prairie.  It rolled and dipped as far as the eye could see, shaking loose fireflies and turning the rows of golden wheat stalks a brilliant ruby red.  Charley and Louisa Tollefson walked up from the slough, carrying a basket of saplings between them.

Soon enough, their house would be full of babies to pound out a path through the homestead; but for now they waded through the tall green grass to a pretty corner at the edge of their claim.  They worked with a steady rhythm to replant the saplings, and while they did Louisa sang softly,

            Sowing in the morning, sowing seeds of kindness,

            Sowing in the noontide and the dewy eve;

            Waiting for the harvest, and the time of reaping,

            We shall come rejoicing, bringing in the sheaves.

They finished before the neighboring mourning doves had settled in for the night, and Louisa sat down and waited while Charley went for a bucket of water.

One day she would rest beneath a shady grove of cottonwoods.  The lacy roots they had so carefully gathered would dig deep into the earth, holding tight as the tender sapling stalks above ground stretched and grew in the crisp, clean air.  Today the newborn tree trunks were smooth as its bright green leaves; but each season would add rough edges here and there until the bark was as wrinkled and tanned as an old bonanza farm washerwoman.

And from those strong trunks, branches would grow.  They would stay close to home at first; quickly reaching in every direction, creating new leafy worlds for birds and bugs to build their own families.

In the winter those branches would dress themselves with the morning’s glittering hoarfrost and catch the afternoon snowfall, sprinkling it down to the ground with each shivery gust of wind.

In the springtime those branches would produce a wonderland of fluff.  Like baby birds leaving the nest, cottony tree seeds would leap into the world in search of their own patch of ground.  They would settle across the prairie, springing up forests of cottonwoods whose leaves would twinkle like bells in the summer breeze and turn a brilliant orange to usher in the fall.

And one day, Louisa and Charley and those cottonwoods would be no more; replaced by the next generation of seeds and saplings.  But for now it was only the beginning. Charley returned with a bucket of water, from which he and Louisa gave each tree its first drink in their new home.  They walked back to the house hand-in-hand.  Tomorrow there would be swathing and baking and rooting and growing.  Around them, crickets warmed up their wings in anticipation of the sun’s final crescendo across the horizon.

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The photo above is what I look like in New York, which is the exactly the same as how I look in North Dakota.

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This week on North Dakota Today we talked about Susie’s Beanie Babies and Safe Kids Grand Forks.  Check it out!  (Valley News Live)

Get yer game face on: It’s Christmas candy time at the J Mart! (Facebook)

Bottineau’s Travis Rybchinski (a super-nice dude) is now the winningest coach in Dakota College at Bottineau history. (KX Net)

When Fargo’s Jania Thomas went into labor 10 weeks early while at Pride of Dakota in Minot, the community stepped up to help the new family start off on the right baby feet. (Valley News Live)

North Dakota problems. (KFYR TV)

“America’s Best Small-Town Race” will have a section dedicated to Fargo’s Mark Knutson. (Valley News Live)

If you haven’t had a chance to hike to the top of White Horse Hill, lace up your boots because there’s no time like the present. (Only In Your State)

Fargo’s Jayce Hall’s artistry made it to the small screen on the Fox NFL Kickoff Show. (Jamestown Sun)

As a reminder, I’ll be appearing on North Dakota Today on Monday mornings. Tune in, and send me the people and stories that are nice.  Thank you in advance!

ALSO as a reminder, Kyle now has a North Dakota hockey podcast on Pulltab Sports. It’s called “North Dakota After Dark” and he hosts it with our friends Kelly and Corey. Episode 11 with Margo Miller is now up. Click here to listen.

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