Big Pancake

Now, I've been makin' my way through this life for some time now and I've come to a few conclusions. One of the most relevant bein' that we men aren't too good at thinkin'. Well, not plain old sittin' down and thinkin', anyways. A fella has to be doin' something else while he thinks, like working on car or making a sandwich. For me, it's writing, and running. But to confess, I've been doin' more running than writing lately.

But when a man gets an idea, it's got to turn over in his head a few times, like a pancake. Yep, ideas are a lot like pancakes. 'Cept the main difference (besides all that bio-chemical stuff) is that the big ideas don't always take longer to cook. Some little silver-dollar size ideas take more time than ones that are so big ya can't fit two of 'em on a griddle.

Some years ago I was making myself a big pancake like that. I had woken up that day at the crack of noon with a notion to make myself a really fine pancake breakfast. I fired up the stove and whipped up some batter. In my hunger caused-haste, when I was pouring out my batter I slopped it up a bit. The pancake was perfectly round, with the exception of two long drips of batter that looked almost like little legs.

Well, I left my pancake sizzling happily in its oil. While I waited, I read my paper and drank my coffee. (I don't drink coffee really, but when I read the paper I feel like I should be.) I was chuckling over the latest antics of those clowns in Congress when I heard a PLOP! and a sizzle. I looked over my paper at the stove, and danged if that pancake hadn't been flipped over somehow. There was no one else in the house at the time, so this puzzled me a bit. I wondered if maybe I had put too much sugar in the coffee I wasn't drinking and was starting to imagine things. I went back to reading my paper.

After a bit I decided that the pancake was just about done. I grabbed a spatula and a plate and headed over to the pan. Well, that pancake must have decided that it was just about done too, because it jumped out of the pan onto those two little batter-legs and started runnin'. My pancake ran through the kitchen, through the living room, and right out the front door. I'll confess that I stood there for a few moments trying to figure out what in the world was going on. I speculated on a couple a theories before I realized that this was one of those situations where you don't have time to understand so you just got to look at the bottom-line. And the bottom line was that I was about to lose my breakfast. I grabbed my bathrobe and my cow slippers and took off after that pancake.

I chased that pancake all the way down to the supermarket on the corner. It ducked inside, and I followed. I was right on its tail, chasin' it around a corner when I bumped right into the woman of my dreams.

I knew she was the woman of my dreams before I even hit the ground. For one, she was so beautiful that I knew I could try for the rest of my life and never be able to describe her to my satisfaction.

And for two, the only thing she had in her hand-basket was a bottle of Mama Lola's Maple Syrup. Real maple syrup, from a real maple tree, like a lot of folks I know have never even tasted.

I was about to introduce myself when that pancake peeked around the corner to see if I was still chasin' it. I leaped up off the ground, bowed slightly to the woman of my dreams, and ran after my breakfast. I heard her laughter behind me, like little bells. I swore to myself that after I caught and ate my pancake I was going to set up a tent in the middle of the syrup aisle and live there until I saw her again. But, first things first.

I finally caught that pancake in the check-out lane. Can you believe that it was trying to convince the cashier that it was 21? Twenty-one minutes, maybe. But while it was doing that, I snuck up behind it and grabbed it. I apologized to the cashier and hauled the pancake home. It was pretty tough, that pancake was struggling the whole way. The little bugger even kicked me in the nose. It didn't hurt me much, it mostly hurt my nose's pride.

Now, I used to have a little button of a nose, but when that pancake had kicked it, my nose had gotten so offended it had puffed up with anger. And my nose is the kind of nose that holds a grudge, so even to this day it hasn't forgotten. So if you see me and my nose is still big, well, you'll know that it's still pretty upset about the whole darn thing.

I was a bit upset myself. "You've giveb be a lot of trouble, little pabcake," I scolded when I finally got it home. "What bade you rub away like that?"

"I wanted to go to Hollywood and be a screenwriter!" the pancake said indignantly.

"A screebwriter?" I laughed, "How cab a pabcake be a screebwriter?"

"I know it sounds nuts," the pancake said, (deliberately using as many 'n's as possible to annoy me) "but for your information, stranger things have happened. Do you know who wrote The Last Samurai? It was an eggplant!"

I thought about that for a moment. An eggplant that writes screenplays? That did sound nuts, but it would sorta explain all them historical inaccuracies in the film, and the very last line of dialogue.

The more I thought about it, the worse I felt. This pancake had a dream of writing screenplays in Hollywood, and here I was dreaming only of filling my belly. I decided right then and there to let it go. After all, who am I to stand in the way of someone's dream?

The pancake thanked me, and said that if I ever needed a place to stay in Hollywood I should contact it. I laughed and told it that I would. But before I did anything else, I was going to find myself some breakfast. The pancake thanked me again and then ran off to the bus station before I could change my mind.

The next day, I went down to the supermarket and discovered to my horror that Mama Lola's had decided to stop making maple syrup. There was no sign of the woman of my dreams. I sadly purchased an eggplant for supper and made my way back home.

I guess what I'm saying is that you should follow your heart and not your stomach.

By the by, I highly recommend seeing Tim Burton's Big Fish. It's an icthyological-metaphor of a tale.