The rotary dial was a building block of civilization, the key that unlocked the phone system for millions of people. It was an integral part of your parents’ lives. Imagine your father stuffing his dirty fingers into the waiting greasy dialpits, over and over and over again, over and over and over and over again, ringing your mother’s bell until finally she shudders and reaches—for the phone and says: “Hello? This is [YOUR MOTHER’S NAME].” “Hey,” says your father, “this is [YOUR FATHER’S NAME].” “Well, how do you like that?” asks your mother even though she likes it very much. He asks her out to dinner. “Let me check my busy calendar,” she says. She goes so far as to coyly ruffle pages of the nearby phone book. “As it turns out,” she says, “I’ve had a cancellation.” Not much later your father drives by and picks her up and off they go. And usually they would have just had dinner, but this night—this night initiated by dialing on a rotary phone—they have a couple of nice chops and too much red wine, and, maybe it was the pretty moon, they find themselves engaging in penetrative sexual intercourse, your mother and father. Both of them. You can hear the smushing-together of bodies, soft and moist like warm gingerbread, their skin traversed with thick bristles of interlocking hair, hair like the hair of wild boar. Never forget the both of them, eyes half-lidded, hairy-gingerbread bodies glistening on a bed with maroon sheets. The smell of stacks of damp pennies. Your mother and father. Pennies.

1. snightingale posted this