The Muffin Man
A short-short story
I’m 35, a computer programmer, and forgettable. I mean, last week a coworker told me about a party he went to. When I said that I had been there, he said, “Oh, I didn’t notice you.” Yup.
I’m not too tall or too short, too fat or too thin, too handsome or too ugly, too quiet or too outspoken. I’m just there, buried somewhere in the vast middle.
When I was younger, I tried to stand out — tell lots of jokes, wear bright clothes, praise people — That’s what How to Win Friends and Influence People tells you to do. I even bought a red Toyota MR2, the little sports car.
But none of it really worked. Today, I mainly just work and play video games.
Recently, I tried a different tack — I started baking muffins. It’s easy and enabled me to fantasize. Like in The Glass Menagerie, maybe a caller will come and I’d make a new friend.
True to my thorough self, I made batch after batch: chocolate muffins, blueberry muffins, blueberry walnut muffins, lemon muffins, lemon walnut muffins. Soon, my freezer was filled with muffins.
What to do? Well, last Saturday, I defrosted them and took them and a card table to the train station. I set out the muffins and a sign that said, “Free. Enjoy!” I was hoping I might make a new friend or at least the muffins would find a home and my freezer would be free for God knows what.
Well, most people looked at me like it had to be a scam — Was I like a Jehovah’s Witness giving a free copy of the Watchtower but then you had to hear a pitch? Or was I crazy and the muffins were poisoned? A woman stared at me a while, saw a policeman nearby, and strode to him.
Next I knew, the cop was in my face. “Do you have a license to sell food ?” I said I wasn’t selling. I was giving the muffins away. He said, “You’re not allowed to do that either.” So I packed up my muffins, put them back in my freezer, and played a video game.
I read this aloud on YouTube.
Dr. Marty Nemko is a career and personal coach. He’s also the author of 18 books, including, Soloists: Short-short stories of introverts and outsiders facing a dilemma. You can reach Marty at mnemko@comcast.net
