Author: Monica McHenney

Monica lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband and two foster dogs. She taught parents how to raise their toddlers for twenty-five years before retiring in 2015 to write. The secret to toddlers is to make sure you get enough sleep. Monica hasn't found the secret to writing, yet, but is diligently working at it. See links to her on-line stories on the publications page.

Minnesota Nice Meet Minnesota ICE.

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Good said, “I’m not mad at you.” 
ICE said, “Fucking bitch.” Then he shot her. 
What would Freud say? 
Opposing instincts, 
Eros, the life force versus Thanatos, the death force. 

Comity versus violence. 
Consensus versus fascism.
What would Jesus say?
Turn the other cheek.
Like Martin Luther King, like Mahatma Gandhi, like Jesus himself.

What would George Harris III say?
Flower Power. Carry a carnation. Insert it into the barrel of a soldier’s gun. 
Hope they’re so surprised they forget to shoot you. 
But I’m mad. I want to bloody curse.
Choose life, choose love.

Don’t be mad, be transformative.

Sitting For a Haircut When Labor Starts

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“Cut it short. This might be my last haircut for a while .”

Another contraction, then they stopped. Like the baby knew we needed to get this done.

Was this the best use of time? Could I have done without it? But it wasn’t the haircut I wanted. I wanted to tie up all the loose ends in my life in a neat bow.  I wanted to be ready to give my all to this baby.

At REI I bought a blouse. One that wasn’t meant for a pregnant person. And then I was ready. At least, I thought I was.

Oh Lord, Let Me Be the Person My Answering Machine Thinks I Am.

I’d like to change the message on my answering machine, but I want to do it myself. Why? Imagine if I asked for help. First, who even has an answering machine? And second, I would have to decide who to include in the message.

My kids have moved away, but the answering machine has no idea. Will it feel betrayed when it finds out? Will it wonder how long it’s been living a lie. Even I can’t remember.

Better outsource the problem. Maybe I’ll win a recording on Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. My answering machine won’t question Paula Poundstone.

It’s Better to Flip a Coin

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They were compatible except for different ideas about where to vacation. She wanted a cruise on the Rhine. He preferred the Nile. She wanted to visit a democracy. He said that Egypt is a democracy, but they both knew better. She wanted to leave her raincoat at home. He said, “Then Egypt is the place to go.”

The negotiations lasted for a week. Every evening, they huddled separately with their phones. Their conversations were revealing. They were determined to compromise; also to keep trying for their vacation choice and win the other’s heart. In the end, they flipped a coin.

The New Year Just Like the Old Year

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Twas the night before New Year and all through the land, 
No glasses were empty, no noshes unplanned.
The mistletoe hung under doorways in clusters
Completely ignored due to long  filibusters.
Folks whispered and tittered 
They blistered and dithered,
All trying to force their opponents to wither.
These twisters of words, these sisters of shadow, 
Their blustery blows have me thinking of Maddow.
The night almost over, the cat cleaned her whiskers
And finished the dregs from the host’s brandy snifter. 
She loudly exclaimed as she stalked out of sight,
“The year has begun with no break from the fight.”

Coal in Every Stocking

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From a young age, Johnny did his best to earn coal in his stocking when St. Nick came. He pulled his sister’s hair. He stole his brother’s allowance. He even kicked the dog. 

His reach is wider now. But he’s still the same trickster he was as a child. And he’s still enamored with coal. He’s earned enough coal this year to smog up the length and breadth of America. Johnny cut a deal with the mines. Santa will deliver. And with the economy, and the cost of toys, not to mention the cost of heat, America will thank him.

I’ll Take Them Anyway

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Elbow length opera gloves were Maisie’s aspirational accessory. They were hard to find, but on her way to work, she saw them in the window of a secondhand shop on the corner of Main and Chestnut. She knew she had to have them. She had twenty minutes.

A bell tinkled above the door as she entered the store. The dominant smell was pachouli with a dusting of pine and a soupçon of je n’ai sais quoi. Maisie picked the gloves from the window display and slipped one over her hand, up her arm, the satin soft and pleasant. Too big.

It’s a Small Neighborhood

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Some people said the limo was black, others said it was white. Marla didn’t believe that a limo picked up the janitor every evening at 5 PM. I mean a janitor for a rundown building like hers, no way.

But she saw him leave in a limo with her own eyes.  She followed in her beat-up Civic all the way to a well-known drug dealer’s house. She saw the janitor take a suitcase from a sketchy-looking  guy. Draw your own conclusions, but Marla thought drug money was the janitor’s side hustle.

Such juicy gossip, she hurried to tell her neighbor.

When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Share a Meal

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Justice O’Connor, who died two years ago on this day, was an advocate for informal lunches at the Supreme Court. Even Clarence Thomas, who’d stayed away from the events, succumbed to her invitations. 

O’Connor and her fellow female justice, RBG, advanced equal rights for all. There are four women on the bench now. It was probably easier for them to get there thanks to the two women who went before them. Here’s hoping they will ease the way to full equality for others. Here’s hoping they will make those SCOTUS lunches welcoming for all as O’Connor did in her day.

Sandra Day O’Connor died on December 1, 2023. Ruth Bader Ginsberg died on September 18, 2020.

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