George Washington’s Bandaid
by Stefanie Freele
We had to dig a trench. For the tortoise’s fence as she needs winter quarters to semi-hibernate. It might have been Betsy Ross’s hair band we found in the dirt first, the very same band she used to hold back distracting tendrils as she sewed with concentration on the American Flag. Or the sharp piece of glass shattered from Ben Franklin’s light bulb. We located the sturdy feather used to write the Declaration of Independence, and a pen tip from 1907, proudly made by Joseph T. Pen, whose wife invented the Pencil. Her name was Maryanna. Every treasure must have a story. Two soil-encrusted beads: jewels lost for centuries from the queen’s crown when she came to visit the garden and tripped on a root. A sticker, most likely dropped by Abraham Lincoln on his way to return that penny. A small rock with white: a drop of paint from a hurried Picasso, or from that troubled bloody guy who cut off his ear? The Mariana Trench we called it, George Washington’s trench. Dig! Someone—a huge fan of David Attenborough—pointed out that the Mariana Trench isn’t necessarily the deepest on the planet because we haven’t discovered everything about earth yet. Go discover, we shouted, Go! as we dug farther, further, deeper, uncovering King George’s favorite green crayon, tile from a nearby undiscovered Egyptian tomb containing King Tut’s coffee cup collection, a reddish clay piece of the world’s original wheel. There was shouting and ah-has and look! The reptilian eyes of the tortoise watched as we unearthed history and when asked if she’s happy, none of us knew how to respond. How do you tell? She’s a tortoise, we shrugged. We don’t speak tortoise.
Stefanie Freele is a previous contributor to The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts. Her short fiction can be found in Flash Fiction Online, Glimmer Train, and Witness. Stefanie is the author of two short story collections: Feeding Strays (Lost Horse Press) and Surrounded By Water (Press 53).
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What surprising, fascinating stuff can you tell us about the origin, drafting, and/or final version of “George Washington’s Bandaid”? Sulcata tortoises show affection by bumping into you. Should you be bumped by a tortoise, I would think it ranks as a special moment. Staring into a tortoise’s eye is much the same as gazing into the night sky. How do you make sense of something so expansive?
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