One-Shots: 7

He was strange in every conventional sense of the world.  He was… otherwordly.    Words didn’t work on him like they worked on other people.  He was the kind of guy to wear the wrong thing to a wedding, or a funeral.  I’m talking about yellow and green polka-dot suspenders with a clashing red and green zig-zag jumper.  And he would wear different sized shoes, but they would be the same brand and make.  His socks would extend far pass his knees over his black slacks, and they would feature winking cats at the top of them.  One glove would be white and paint free, and the other would be slobbered with any and every color in a painter’s mind.  His hat extended high enough to reach the ceiling, or the top of any roof.  Literally, he had a lever system on the side of his hat so he could extend and retract his hat to suit whichever room or doorway he encountered.  His sunglasses wrapped round and round his head and ears in a looping pattern.  One eye was red tinted, one was purple tinted.  And he had a flipped eyepatch over one eye, with tattoo of an owl over his other eye.  In his hands he would twirl a cane with a dragon depicted on its handle.  Out of his breast pocket was a silver pocket watch on a gold chain, which was connected to a twine belt around his slacks.

And that was his Monday outfit.

While he might have been the most otherwordly and strange and different person this side of the Atlantic, he was also the smartest.  He had won each and every Bar Trivia Contest this side of the Mediterranean.  He had tried out Jeopardy and quit because it was too boring.  He had foiled Museum Tour Guides and Professors at local colleges with his vastly superior intellect.  He gave out passing lessons to kids in cram school, or sage advice to men on the train.  He knew where the best deals on produce and meat was in a hundred mile radius.  He knew the best moves to play in chess or checkers so that he would never lose.  He could recite Longfellow, Wordsworth, Emerson, and dozens of other poets and their poems at a drop of a hat.  He could recite soliloquies and speeches from any number of plays, movies, or persons.

He was also a painter and a writer and a craftsman.  He was a carver and engraver and a dancer and a musician.  He could play any number of instruments.  He could tell which grouping of flowers would look best on the windowsill, or which colors would best bring out the color of your eyes.  He could redesign any building if asked.  He could throw clay with the best of them.  He could weave any cloth, or plant any plant.  He was a chef without peer, and could make whatever dish asked for; that was even without having any of the ingredients.

He was incredible.  And otherwordly.  It was impossible to pin him down to one thing or another.  And he was a wanderer.  He wouldn’t stay in any place for too long before moving on.  And that makes him a treat.  I met him once, on a Monday long, long ago.  If you ever have a chance to meet him for yourself, look at his eyes.

Those ashy brown eyes are like windows to the soul.