Big black woman with enormous braless bust: “I woanna commit my daughter, she crazy. They tole me I could come up here an’ git the forms.”

[She lifts her udders and lays them on the counter. The two librarians are speechless.]

Busty: “Cuz she tryin’ t’ break me an’ my Messkin boyfriend UP.”

Librarian [to man nearby]: “May I help you?”

Hispanic man: “No, I with she.”

Busty: “Yeah, she tryin’ t’ break us up. But he would work five jobs if he gotta, an’ no black man doan woanna work one.”

[It should be noted that both librarians are black and male.]

Librarian: “You gotta go to the Mental Illness Court across the street in the Records Building.”

Busty:  “Come oan, Wahn, les go.”

Pretty much everything about this makes me happy.

I’m not a sweets person either. Mashed potatoes and gravy. Turkey at Thanksgiving. Rolls. That’ll work. The secret with the sledgehammer is to let it do the work for you. You hold yourself still and let the hammer go. You guide it, like what do they say about how to hold a bird? Then, once a crack begins to open up, you guide the chisel to the hairline and open it. It splits as effortlessly as butter. Move to a new location. Repeat.

Do y’all have The Hobbit?

Her name was Ida, she told me. She liked my smile, she told me. She said she could see that I was a good person. She wanted to tell me who she was. She wanted me to know that, when she was a very young woman, she was in love with Ignacio and he was in love with her. They wanted to be married. But Ida’s mother told her no, that marrying Ignacio was a bad choice. Ida’s mother told her that she needed to write Ignacio a letter and tell him that she didn’t love him. Ida told her mother no, that she didn’t want to do that, that she loved Ignacio with all that she was. But Ida’s mother said it was for the best, and Ida wrote the letter. I said, but that ruined your life. Ida said, yes. Ida said she decided to become a nun, and she entered a convent in California. But they kept telling her that she had no vocation, and they kicked her out. She entered another convent. They told her, after a year, that she had no vocation and should move on to a different life. She married and had children. But she never stopped loving Ignacio. After many years, she contacted Ignacio to apologize to him for lying to him and breaking his heart. She had carried the burden for as long as she could. Ignacio’s wife had just died. Ida’s husband was dead. Ignacio and Ida married last year, in their late 70s.

Ida and Ignacio are happy.

I thanked Ida for her story. I told her that it was my birthday, and that she had given me a gift. She thanked God for giving us that day. She kissed me and hugged me. She told me she loved me. She kissed me again and again.

Fuck’s your name, anyway?