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Yet, it seems unclear whether Father Grindgrad was indeed censoring my columns when he refused to bless them. Does anyone know that Grindgrad performs this function? Does his blessing count for nothing because he isn't paid for doing it? Is the Sardine the only one to listen to the Father's objections? How important could Grindgrad's post be? More mysteriously, in an apparently censorship-free zone, what can the Father have found objectionable?
The censor cannot afford to make a mistake. More to the point, a dictator better not err in judgment, as Nikita K. found out the hard way when he allowed A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch to be published. Grindgrad might actually advance the Sardine's cause by removing lesser, more frivolous, or simply less Sardine-like material. Calling him a censor, perhaps, doesn't seem fair. He approves of most of what he sees, worried less about the factual nature of columns than the complete decorum. That is, does the Sardine make sense? Will the columns please or displease?
You might think he has little influence on what you read? What is not known or seen are the columns I could not publish. In fact, Grindgrad started to read the columns after the Sardine had published the first one.
"You're new here," Grindgrad said to me. "You're this Sardine wise guy?"
I nodded. Did he want to come inside my apartment? Melinda brought him a Dewers and soda.
"Thank you. Now, I must ask you something. What the hell were you thinking when you wrote it?"
I said that I thought it was self-explanatory.
"Someone came to me and asked how I let that column through. No, not one of my bosses, thank God, or I might have been canned on the spot. To put the criticism bluntly, there was nothing in the article except for some stupid teddy bear."
A stuffed dog, I corrected him. Did he read the entire column?
"Hell no. I don't think the editor did either, assuming I had. Nothing like making my job a little tougher."
*
More than twenty columns never received the Father's blessing. They're around somewhere — in a file — waiting for a time when I have run out of things to say.
On the other hand, the unblessed columns have become a parallel universe for those which were blessed and you have read. For example, Grindgrad suppressed a column dealing with Joe T.'s and Antigone's wedding day. He called it "tasteless." The curious result of this omitted column is that it caused Joe and Antigone to miss their own wedding! Finding themselves together, they don't know what the status of their relationship is and have decided not to have children until they found out what had happened.
They were in the Attic the other night. Oedipus kept asking when the big day was and all they could say was that they were already married.
"I may be blind," said Oed, "but I'm not deaf and dumb. I would have known." He turned to his left. "Othello, were you invited?"
"Not even an invitation."
"Othello's such a bore," said Antigone, "always on a crying jag about his own marriage."
"That Iago-guy must have been a prick," said Joe T.
"You got that right," said Othello.
"Nothing compared to my marriage," Oed said.
"Don't you be a bore, Dad," said Antigone.
"My mother arrived a half-hour late for hers," said Joe T. "Her shoes were the wrong size."
After a pause, Oedipus slapped the bar.
"Are you two getting hitched or not?"
"Dad, be quiet."
"What's your betrothed have to say? Is he still intimidated by Creon? Tell that old fuddy duddy uncle of yours to stick it where the sun don't shine."
"Hades?" said Joe T. hesitantly.
"Great Zeus," Oedipus sighed, "maybe it's better that you two didn't go through with it."
Grindgrad had more sense than the Sardine was giving him credit for. Who else could "mute" (since it couldn't be "stopped") Joe T.'s marriage and save the spectacle of little Joe T.'s running around?
Joe had asked me whether he and Antigone were really married. I shrugged my fins. How would I know?
See why one must thank a censor.
Bob Castle is the author of A Sardine on Vacation. He has had two other books published this year: The End of Travel, a comic memoir and send up of traveling abroad (Triple Press) and Odd Pursuits, a collection of stories (Wild Child Publishing). He is regular writer for Bright Lights Film Journal and has over one hundred fifty stories, essays, and articles published. The first fifteen installments of his saga can be viewed at the old Unlikely Stories. A Sardine on Vacation is also available in book form.