//Glue

//Glue Part I – Glue

One of the greatest fears of your young life was of running out of glue. You had full faith in the healing properties of the substance. You’d been assured. You’d been convinced, proselytized to by the zealots of adhesion. You were sure that losing a limb could be solved were there enough glue to connect the arm to its socket.

When Paul Campanelli came back from hitting his head on the swing set that looked like a horse, he told you his mom said they’d glued it at the hospital. When the decorative plate that grandma gave your mom broke while you were doing dishes, the wood glue was the first thing you looked for. When the window was broken, with a NERF football, it was glue you looked for to try to put the window back together. When you were somehow, despite their advertising campaign, unable to solve the problem with the Elmer's glue at your disposal, you became convinced that it was only because you didn't have Super Glue that you were unable to reconstitute the pane of glass.

“Isn't there any glue in the junk drawer?” you asked your brother.

“There is paste,” Jackie said.

“No. I don’t need paste. I need glue. Crazy glue, or gorilla glue, or super glue. For real.”

“Paste is the same as glue,” he said.

“No. Only glue is glue,” you told him.  “Tape is ok too, but not as good as glue.”

You never did find the glue. Your mother was livid when she discovered the broken glass. You know she was livid because she told you she was livid. You were grounded for a while for that one. And you think you lost your allowance for a while. Not that they were paying you much to begin with.

~

//Glue Part II – Screwy Louis

Screwy Louis used to sniff airplane glue. Some people thought the glue was what made him screwy. You weren't sure exactly what that meant until you saw him in the grocery store one day. His blond hair was long and caked with something thick and dark. His head tipped forward and he placed a single, tall can of beer on the rubber conveyor belt at the grocery store.

He turned the insides of his jacket pockets out, his scum caked jeans firing the coins onto the conveyor belt.

The cashier could barely bring herself to pick the coins up, but eventually she was compelled by the ritual of currency.

Louis didn't notice her disgust, but you did. You imagined the cashier going home to tell her husband and kids about the fact that Screwy Louis came into the store again and made her count out all this crazy change so he could buy his malt liquor. You imagined the delight with which she would describe how badly he smelled and how he would probably soon die.

When you glued together your airplanes and model cars you made sure not to breathe whenever you used the glue. You held your little breath until black bubbles appeared in front of your eyes while you glued the chassis together, B167 fitting into 15-482. The glue was warm and stung on your fingers and it made your nostril hair and the inside of your eyelids hum. It was only proof that it was powerful. The good stuff.

The existence of glue made you believe in second chances and in the triumph of life over death. It was paramount in your understanding of Christ's ascension. It made you believe that anything that happened between your parents could be fixed. And anything that you did to piss them off could be corrected with some version of glue. And in later years that anything you did to one of your partners could be forgiven. Solved. Fixed. Glued. Super glued. Gorilla glued. Taped could work too but not as good.