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“Hey, Doc, how’s it going with the writing?” asked Moosehead Frame. “Give me a gaslight special and a large coffee. No, better make that dirty eggs with a strawberry bagel. Yeah, that seems better. You might throw anchovies into that gaslight special. I’ll get a table so we can talk.”

“We don’t keep anchovies at Ms. Anne Thrope’s,” I said.  “I guess you want me to sit and talk with you.”

“That’s the point of showing up after your morning rush. Fred Foulzone and Anahid Bentley are supposed to meet me here to talk about the cuts to the library budget and organizing a protest, but I figured to be here before them because I want to know about your writing game.” I rang up the total, and he tapped his debit card and then added 25% tip.

Strawberry Mkrtchyan filled in at the counter when I took the order to Moosehead.

“Moosehead, it’s hard to write these days because of all the bad news I see online and on the television and what I hear from people. It’s disheartening. Some days I sit at my computer and simply sit and my fingers feel itchy to do something, but my head doesn’t communicate with my fingers. I put a drawing above my desk–Saint Augustine–and that’s changed things.”

“Which Augustine?” Moosehead said. “From Hippo or Canterbury?”

“Hippo in North Africa. I’m surprised you knew to ask that! Augustine inspires me because he wrote The City of God while the Roman Empire was collapsing. People thought God ordained the Roman Empire and yet, here it was falling because of inner corruption and the attacks of the Visigoths and Vandals and whoever else. And even while he heard and witnessed that bad news, Augustine kept writing about eternal citizenship while temporal citizenship was declining. I’m writing under Augustine’s scrutiny and not letting those outside things destroy my inner vision.”

“Good dirty eggs, by the way,” said Moosehead. “I’ve never read The City of God. I tried to read Augustine’s Confessions, but I didn’t understand it. It wasn’t exactly what I expected to read as a confession. Stealing pears doesn’t seem worth it. What are you writing?”

“Short stories of hope, Moosehead. Stories of hope. They won’t show up in The New Yorker or any of the little literary magazines, but I will keep writing. Maybe I’ll publish them on one of the web outlets or print them and sell them here. Could be a new business—Ms. Anne Thrope Press. I see Fred and Anahid over there. Time for me to get back to work.”

“Thanks, Doc. Keep up the good work.”