Mandy's Ruby Slippers

[Ellipsis]

A friend of mine sent me an e-mail a couple days ago about a mutual friend who died... It’s cool, She went peacefully. It wasn’t unexpected.

As an aspiring actress she moved to New York. One night she found herself alone... making her way back to her apartment... in the middle of Manhattan ...at 3:00 am... on a dimly lit street. (How is an even longer story.)

She saw in the distance on her side of the street, three very large gents coming her way. As they came closer she recognized the body language...her Adrenalin kicked in ... she looked around for an escape of any sort ... underneath the oncoming street light there was a garbage can... Mandy did the only thing an actress could do to keep her out of harms way. She walked over to that garbage can ...took the lid off... and stuck her body in as far as it would go and started mumbling.

Everything to her at that moment became slow motion. She found an odd separation from her plight. As she’s doin her “mumbling thing” she sees in the garbage can a perfectly good teddy bear with a rainbow pin on it, a box of number 8 shot gun shells and a pair of red sequined designer pumps.

Her father taught her to hunt when she was young and she thinks to herself ...how odd... why would anybody buy a box of number eights in New York...couldn't lay waste to a rat at 20 feet ... She thinks for a moment grabs the Teddy bear and shoes. She starts waving the Teddy bear around like it was some sort of Voodoo doll and launches into an improvised monologue loosely based on the “Wizard of OZ” complete with “Lions and tigers and bears oh my” finishing off with “Monkeys ...Monkeys flying out of my ass” repeated about 40 times....

Needless to say half way through the monologue the gentleman crossed to the other side of the street.

Mandy took the her treasures home. The shoes, unused fit perfectly.

My friend said she had received a package and a note from her shortly before her death . Inside was “Mandys Ruby Slippers” as she often referred to them and the Teddy bear. The shoes are on her mantle.

I just put the teddy bear is on my dresser.

She was special.

Gonna call it an early night.

Peace
(Paying homage to Understanding Life)