Sheila's Dribs 'n Drabs

It was morning — time for her friends to call. Silver tapped the window. His head as bright as hers, he was always a delight. The reverend’s stiff white collar looked tattered round the edges, and Armless ‘Arry stumbled into Jed with the crooked leg. She fed them all. “Keep the noise down. Dirty creatures,” shouted the neighbor from downstairs. “One day. One day.” It was a threat, probably, but she smiled back, thinking “One day, one day.” And one day Jed did what birds do, all over the neighbor’s smart shoulder, but it wasn’t her fault. “Here Jed. More bread?”

“Lucky in cards – unlucky in love,” her grandma said. So Kathy, longing to be lucky in love, learned to mistrust every other type of good fortune. When offered full-ride scholarships to famous universities, Kathy chose community college instead. When offered a place at her first-choice high-paid job, she decided to stay on as a check-out girl. But when the failed financial analyst proposed, Kathy mistook his bad luck for good-heartedness. Kathy’s husband blamed Kathy for his poverty every day till he won the lotto. Then, mistrusting good fortune’s wiles, Kathy buried spouse and ticket together, and enrolled in poker school.