Maybe (Maybe Not) by Robert Fulghum Read Free Book Online Page B

wonderful animal?”
    “A hundred dollars over here; two hundred dollars on the right; two hundred and fifty dollars in the middle.”
    There is a sniffle from the mother.
    Tears are running down her face.
    “DOG” is licking the tears off her cheeks.
    In a whisper not really meant for public notice, the mother calls to her husband:
“Jack, Jack, I can’t sell this dog—I want this dog—this is my dog—she loves me—I love her—oh, Jack.”
    Every eye in the room is on this soapy drama.
    The father feels ill, realizing that the great bowling ball of fate is headed down his alley.
    “Please, Jack, please, please,”
she whispers.
    At that moment, everybody in the room knows who is going to buy the pooch. “DOG” is going home with Jack.
    Having no fear now of being stuck themselves, several relieved men set the bidding on fire. “DOG” is going to set an auction record. The repeated hundreddollar rise in price is matched by the soft
“Please, Jack”
from the stage and Jack’s almost inaudible raise in the bidding, five dollars at a time.
    There is a long pause at “Fifteen hundred dollars—going once, going twice …”
    A sob from the stage.
    And for $1,505 Jack has bought himself a dog. Add in the up-front costs, and he’s $1,765 into “DOG.”
    The noble father is applauded as his wife rushes from the stage to throw her arms around his neck, while “DOG” wraps the leash around both their legs and down they go into the first row of chairs. A memorable night for the PTA.
    I see Jack out being walked by the dog late at night. He’s the only one strong enough to control it, and he hates to have the neighbors see him being dragged along by this, the most expensive damned dog for a hundred miles.
    “DOG” has become “Marilyn.” She is big enough to plow with now. “Marilyn” may be the world’s dumbest dog, having been to obedience school twice with no apparent effect.
    Jack is still stunned. He can’t believe this has happened to him.
    He had it down on paper. No. 7. Kids or pets, not both.
    But the complicating clauses in the fine print of the marriage contract are always unreadable. And always open to revision by forces stronger than a man’s ego. The loveboat always leaks. And marriage is never a done deal.
    I say he got off light. It could have been ponies or llamas or potbellied pigs. It would have been something. It always is.

E nvy is part of the secret life.
    In the
public
and
private
realms, envy has long been considered a sin infused with jealousy and a tendency to covet, which thou shalt not, especially in the case of thy neighbor’s wife and whatever. Still, in the sanctuary of our solitude, we envy.
    There are degrees of envy. The “Lord-I-wish-I-could-do-that” envy that is carried on with a light heart and good humor is harmless enough. Most envy that doesn’t lead to theft and manslaughter is OK. Affirmative envy that reflects delight in the fringes of human achievement is a pleasure like bittersweet chocolate. You have to develop a taste for it.
    In my case, I envy a guy who used to come into the old Buffalo Tavern in Seattle. He’d hang around thepool tables and offer to play you left-handed. Using a No. 5 trenching shovel for a cue. If you’d give him three balls ahead, he’d even play you with the digging end of the shovel, which had some duct tape on it to keep from nicking the cue ball. If you were smart and you weren’t one hell of a pool player, you’d leave well enough alone. And just offer to watch him destroy some other fool’s ego. But if you wanted to get a little education of the kind they don’t teach in high school, and you didn’t mind losing twenty dollars in a hurry, then you could take him on, shovel and all. I know about all this—firsthand.
    Oh, he was good, all right, but he was nothing compared to his wife.
    She played with a broom or a mop—your choice—no handicap.
    She’d whipped every hotshot cue-pusher in town before she stopped