In Search of Health

Abstract

reality behind the word, which is a simple enough task. The most healthy place, at least for my pocketbook, is a small cottagelike house. I am surrounded by retired couples, Nebraskans and Kansans and Iowans. My neighbor is named Prescott. He is a small, dapper man, with a trim white mustache. He was a career sergeant in the army, and now, to supplement his pension, he trains dogs. He called me over my third day here. The occasion was that he heard me playing the guitar. I sit before him and humble myself into silence. Here I got this guitar. Now Mother, go get the guitar. Now I got this from my dead nephew. I just like it if you look at her. Now I couldnt handle the damn thing, the neck was too wide. Mrs. Prescott brings out the guitar and hands it to him, saying Here, Pa. In his small red hands he turns it. It pivots about its center of gravity like a mobile, or like something abstract: an idea. Suspended in his hands it shows its form, shows the rich wood, still warm, though unrubbed, unpolished. He points then to the fingerboard, scarred and gouged at the side so that the frets protrude like the heads of nails driven imperfectly. This neck here, you see, was too goddamn wide, I got little hands. So I just planed her down a bit. To make her fit. Yes. Well, my nephew died and I was over to his place and I just figure nobody ud want this, it was stuck in a closet all dusty. So I tuk it. He told me it was a good guitar. Well I aint played much. Last time before this I had a guitar was nineteen fifteen, I still remember we was walking down a road in Kansas and I was strumming and this friend turn to me and says Sam I give you a dollar if you bust that fucking guitar, and so I laughed and said okay and busted it on a telephone pole. And I aint had a