2011 Issue - Santa Fe Community College

By the Basin
by William C. Blome
The plumbers plainly weren’t wild about Andrew standing there,
hawking over them, as they took turns pushing their snake down the
basin drain. What absolutely would have galled me was Andrew’s weird
gesturing with his body and his almost-chanting call of instructions, like
“little to the left, little to the left, that’s it, put your backs into it, fellas,
keep going, keep going….” After just less than a minute or so of this,
one of the plumbers—the burly, blonde-haired guy with a long stem plastic
rose growing out of his back pocket—stood aside from the snake and
his partner, faced Andrew directly, and said, “What would we do without
you here, huh, pal Talk about your crucial, your indispensable, your
vital: why, you’re all of those in one, swivel hips, all of those in one goddamn
one!” I surmise Andrew certainly sensed the plumber’s annoyance—oh,
I absolutely know he did—though the plumber never raised
his voice. But the oblique side of Andrew (which can be quite a sizeable
side) continued to predominate (just as dirty water continued to slosh in
the basin), and Andrew next said (with peacock pride), “Not to worry,
men, not to worry, I’m here for as long it takes, till we break through, till
we see this thing completely through.”
Santa Fe Literary Review 107