Mac was sitting in the cool shade of his old filling station. On hot dusty day's like

this, it was his favorite spot. The car's that used to stop by for gas were now just

speeding on past, raising cloud's of dust that would swirl in the wind and then

eventually settle on everything, including Mac. The hot sun had now climbed it's

way high into the sky, and the breeze had chased the morning cloud's away and

left only the clear blue sky above. Must be around noon, he thought.

  As the car's sped by, sometime's the occupant's would wave or honk when they

recognized Mac sitting in the shade. As the sun moved higher, Mac adjusted his

hat to keep the sun out of his eye's. He began to think about all those new gas

station's down the hill in town. They all looked like they were brand spanking new.

Just like they were built yesterday. They were clean, bright and surrounded by neon

light's that would light up the night and make the gas station's look almost like some

kind of oasis. They were alway's white and  you had to have key's just to get into the

bathroom's. They sold stuff like beer, candy, chip's and every kind of soda pop that

a person could imagine.

  Mac's old filling station was dirty, grimy, dusty and surrounded by empty oil drum's

and worn out tire's. The old Texaco sign on the front of the building did not even light

up anymore. Mac only sold one brand of soda pop, but it came in three different

flavor's. Root beer, Orange, and some new kind of strawberry flavor. In the summer

time, Mac would move his old soda pop cooler inside the station so that it would be

out of the hot sun. He looked over at the old Mail Pouch thermometer. He now had to

squint a little and saw that it was already 92 degree's.

  Those new gas station's don't even smell like gas station's, he thought. Mac's gas

station smelled like oil and gas and exhaust and worn out old tire's. It was musty and

would get so hot on the inside during the summer, that the oil that had built up over

the year's on the floor would get slick and begin to stick to the bottom's of all of the

customer's shoe's. Layer's of dust were piled on the windowsill's and in every corner

of the building. Big dusty cobweb's were clinging to the rafter's and had long since

been abandoned by the spider's who had carefully spun them.

  Every month, the tall skinny candy salesman, whose hair was somehow magnetic and

stood straight up and alway's leaned a little to the north, would come pulling into the

station, making sure to run over the long black hose that stretched between the pump's.

The bell would ring, making Mac think he had a customer. But it was just the candy guy

stopping by to extol the virtue's of selling candy, gum and now even baseball card's. He

had even offered to put in a vending machine and split the profit's with Mac. But, Mac

did not want to sell candy. If he did, he would have to install an air conditioner just to try

and keep the candy from melting. Mac could not afford something like that.

  Mac sold gas. He repaired car's. He fixed tire's. He changed oil. He even had his own

sticker's to put in the corner of people's windshield's to remind them of their next oil

change. He paid good money for those sticker's, and now they were covered with dust,

just like everything else.

  Mac was a big guy. Six-two or six-three. Dark skinned and alway's with a couple day's

of grey stubble on his face. He'd worn the same Texaco hat for several year's. Everytime

the Texaco salesman came by, he would offer Mac a brand new hat, but Mac liked the hat

he had just fine. He alway's wore grey striped overall's and steel toed boot's that he would

use to kick the tire's on the customer's car's. He was still checking people's oil, washing

their window's, checking their water and also their transmission fluid.

  But nowaday's, most people did not want Mac checking their fluid's or washing their

window's. They were alway's in a great big hurry. They did not seem to care if they were a

quart low on oil. Or a little low on water. Or if their tire's needed a little bit of air. They would

speed in and speed out. No time for small talk. No time to sit in the shade and pass the time

of day with Mac. Ask him how he was doing. Or how the wife was. Or what the kid's were

doing now. No time to enjoy a cold bottle of pop and a little small talk. No time to insult the

Arab's or the Governor.  No time to bad mouth the Federal government, he thought. As Mac

sat there in the shade of his filling station, he began to think the world was somehow passing

him by.

  He thought about that one gas station in town that would sometime's have a big dancing

Bear standing out beside the road, holding up a sign. Mac had never bothered to read the

sign. He was too busy wondering what the hell a dancing Bear had to do with selling gas.

Or changing oil. Or fixing tire's. He thought about the picture hanging in the hallway of him

and the kid's standing with Smokey the Bear at the County fair. That was a Bear with a little

bit of pride, he thought to himself. The kind of Bear that would never be caught dancing

around out on the sidewalk in front of a gas station.

  The afternoon sun had moved now and Mac was only partially in the shade. He got up and

moved his chair to a spot where he knew that he would be shaded for at least a couple of

more hour's. He leaned forward and pulled a greasy rag out of the back pocket of his

overall's and wiped the sweat off of his forehead, leaving a small streak of grease just over

the top of his eye's.

  At one time Mac repaired more car's than almost anyone in the whole county. Real car's

with real name's. Comet's, Zephyr's,Galaxie's,Roadmaster's, Belvedere's and Falcon's.

Car's that were built good and built to last. Built in Detroit with American steel. Built like

army tank's. Family heirloom's that would be handed down from one generation to the next.

Car's that most people would include in their will's, along with their house's or their farm's.

Car's big enough to conceive a child in. Car's with trunk's big enough to hold at least two or

three people comfortably, if you were going to the Drive-Inn movie theatre. Car's with no

plastic. No fiberglass. No computer's. No idiot light's and no air bag's.

  Mac looked up at the old Texaco sign hanging above the bay door's. A bird had built a pretty

good sized nest on top of the sign, and one side of the sign was covered with quite a bit of

bird shit. Several time's he had thought about grabbing the water hose and trying to wash the

bird shit off of the sign. But that would only cause friction between him and the mother bird.

The bird's were the only steady customer's he had anymore, he thought. The nest was now

in the shade and the baby bird's were peering over the side's of the nest, chirping and trying

to flap their wing's. Soon they would be flying away, he thought.

  He looked out at the road and began to think about his own kid's. All eleven of them. Three

of the boy's in the Navy. His beautiful daughter's all married and gone now. He thought about

how quiet the filling station had become without all those kid's of his to liven up the place.

  The school bus used to stop right there in front of the filling station. Half of the kid's on the

bus were his. The kid's would run off of the bus and then the driver would smile and wave at

Mac, and then the big yellow bus would head on up the hill. The kid's would talk to their dad

for a few minute's and then run up the hill to the house. After changing their clothes, they

would run just as fast as they could back down the hill and spend a couple of hour's playing

around the station and helping their dad with whatever he was doing. They would sweep the

floor's and wash window's for the customer's. They would fetch a quart of oil when someone

needed a quart of oil. Those daughter's of his would bring flower's down from the house and

put them in empty pop bottle's and sit them on the counter to try and brighten up the place for

their dad.

  In the summertime they would wash people's car's to make a little bit of spending money.

They would spend hour's and hour's working on their bicycle's. Sometime's there would be

so many bicycle's sitting around that a person could hardly walk around the place.

  He looked over at his old tow truck, which was parked on the side of the station, covered

with dust and with one low tire. The kid's used to spend hour's in that old truck pretending

that they were driving and towing car's into the station for their dad to fix. The old tow truck

did nothing now except to provide shade for Mac's dog, Chico. The dog used to spend all

day down at the station with Mac. But nowaday's, the dog seemed to prefer the shade of the

house instead of the shade of the filling station. But he would still manage to saunter down

everyday and spend a little time with Mac. Mac would alway's prop the bathroom door open

so that Chico could get himself a drink whenever he wanted one.

  Just then Mac heard a familiar sound. A sound he had heard almost everyday for thirty

year's. The sound of his wife's car coming down the gravel road from their house on the hill,

and pulling around back of the station. He heard those familiar footstep's.

"Hey, whatcha doin?" she said.

"Sulking. I guess that's what you would call it" Mac said, standing up and stretching.

  Mac's wife, Helen, was still a very good looking woman. Most people could not believe that

she had given birth to all those kid's. She was kind of short, thin and had beautiful long black

hair, without a hint of grey. She alway's wore her blue jean's during the day and her bright red

Texaco shirt's.

"Cheer up" she said. "I got some Salami when I went into town the other day. I even remem-

bered to put some horseradish on it".

"Great. You did'nt put any pickles in there did ya?" said Mac, his thin bony finger's opening

up the brown paper bag and peering inside.

"Nope. Sure did'nt" she said, smiling. "I saw that small pile of dried up pickle's over by the

tow truck".

"Well" he said, "Chico used to eat pickle's".

  Mac reached into the brown paper bag and pulled out his sandwich. The noise aroused

the dog from his nap, and the dog wandered over and began staring at every move that

sandwich made. Helen had only put horseradish on half of the sandwich, knowing that Mac

would only eat half of the sandwich and then share the other half with Chico.

"I put some cookie's in there" said Helen, leaning against the tire machine.

"Good. We like cookie's don't we boy" said Mac looking over at the dog and nodding.

"You really should'nt feed cookie's to the dog, ya know" said Helen.

Mac winked at Chico and Chico smiled back. "We'll take that under advisement" he said,

returning the smile to the dog.

  Just then a car pulled in to the gas pump's, running over the long black hose and causing

the bell to ring inside the office. The sound of the bell reminded Helen of back when the kid's

would ride their bike's back and forth over the hose and causing the bell to ring endlessly

until Mac would yell at the kid's and tell them to knock it off. Helen had alway's hoped that

one of the boy's would take over the station. But, like Mac, she was beginning to realize that

old filling station's like their's were quickly becoming a thing of the past. Nowaday's when

someone needed a tire fixed, they went to a tire store. If they needed their oil changed, they

went to one of those quicky lube place's.

"I'm going over to Becky's house for a little bit. I'll be back in a while" Helen said, walking off

toward's her car.

"Okay" said Mac, hurrying over to help the customer. The customer was a young lady that

Mac had never seen before. After pumping the gas and washing the young lady's window's,

Mac asked her if she would like him to check her water and oil.

"Sure" said the young lady, somewhat surprised.

  She reached down and found the hood latch and gave it a pull. Mac opened the hood and

peered down at the motor, which looked to Mac like it had come out of a spaceship. It was

nothing but a jumble of hose's and wire's, plus they had accidently put the motor in sideway's,

or at least it seemed that way to Mac. He lifted his hat and scratched his head. He checked

the water and then began looking for the dipstick, which he could not see anywhere. Mac

finally asked the young lady if she might happen to know where the dipstick was.

"No, I'm sorry I don't" she said. "To tell you the truth I've never even looked under the hood

before".

  Before long Mac finally found the dipstick and checked the oil, which was fine. He asked the

young lady if there was anything else he could do for her.

"No" she said. "But thank's for the good service. Thank's alot". Then the young lady drove off

down the hill toward's town.

  Mac walked over and grabbed a cold soda out of the big red cooler, and then he went back

and sat down in the shade again. The sun had climbed a little bit higher into the sky, and the

mercury in the old thermometer had creeped up close to 100 degree's.

  A pretty good sized tumbleweed had blown across the road and lodged itself between two

of the bright red gas pump's. Mac began to think back to the day's when he was nothing

more than a bouncing, drifting tumbleweed.

Bouncing around and going anywhere the wind would happen to blow him. He thought back

to that one summer after he got out of the Navy. He had hitch hiked clear across the country.

Across the Mississippi river. Across the Great plain's. Through the Rocky mountain's. And

all the way across the desert and back home. He looked jealously over at that tumbleweed

that was trying to squeeze it's way through the two gas pump's, and began to wonder how

far that tumbleweed had traveled. Mac thought about how much he used to have in common

with that tumbleweed.

  On one side of the station, there was a big pile of old tumbleweed's that had blown into the

station from time to time. Some would blow in right through the front door. Some had blown

into one of the open bay door's. Some, like the tumbleweed Mac was looking at, would blow

in and get lodged up against the pump's. And then some of them would hit the front of the

building so hard that they would literally explode into a thousand piece's.

  Mac would pick up the one's that survived the trip intact, and take them out back and throw

them onto the pile. Sometime's, when a big wind would come up, the wind would scoop up

the tumbleweed's and carry them off down the hill toward's town and they would slowly

disappear over the horizon.  Sitting there in the shade of his old filling station, drinking his

cold soda pop, Mac began to hope that maybe, just maybe, when his time came, he would

go out the same way as those old tumbleweed's. Just disappear over the horizon.