!LIFE!

 

 

It never happens as expected

 

 

 My name is Irv Thomas, and

I was given the best years of the 20th century

-- its middle decades, when things were booming and competition was slim --

like a big juicy apple on which to chew

the life of my choosing
 
 

 

But something went askew at almost every bite of it:

  • an aborted schooling
  • a wandering, feckless search for career
  • a marriage of misfits -- too late, and too poorly grounded in reality
  • a crunching automobile accident
  • a desperate illness
 

 

...and almost before I knew it, the good years had been eaten

and the only thing at the core of the apple were . . . the seeds