The Sanderman

It was the Sanderman who pushed the machine up and down the old wood floors. It was the Sanderman who decided when enough of the floor had come through from the grinding roller. Some times he had to remove tar, or paint, or oil; and sometimes he just had to remove one layer of dirt. If there were no floors, then he would be out of work.

The Sanderman was always happy to find a floor - anyone's floor - because each floor was different. The wood was never the same. Only when there were no floors, were they the same - void spaces. The Sanderman could remember once working on a construction site where all the floors had been removed. At the top of the stairs, on the third level, the Sanderman had looked down into the emptiness and thanked the Gods that there was a staircase to stand on until the planks were laid across the empty space.

The Sanderman remembered laying those planks, one at a time; and slowly, very slowly, the emptiness disappeared. The air was pushed aside and squeezed above and below the floor; the emptiness disappeared into oblivion. The Sanderman could not see the air being re-aligned thus, but he could fear it as it disappeared. He no longer feared it.

When the floor was finished, he walked across it and examined the planks with their hair line fractures joining them - separating them. He wondered if they mined being so close. He wondered if they mind being pulled from the ground, sliced up, reshaped and sewn back together. He had not been a Sanderman then.

As time wore on, the floors became less interesting. They could not speak back and perhaps that was why the Sanderman had never asked them how they felt about becoming what they were. But one day that all changed. The Sanderman had suddenly realized that as the new floors became older they had lots to say and they did not have to speak, that is, speak the way he did. On that day, the Sanderman had come to the work site and the floors were already in place, but they were covered with years and years of use. His boss looked at him and then at the floors and said, "Well, now, my friend, I think we will use the sander this time."

The Sanderman looked at him, blankly. The he was sure that he could feel it, although at first he though he must be imagining it, but he was sure that the floors moved. It was like he might have moved had he been letting out a sigh of relief - a slight heave of the chest, a small burst of air escaping from his lungs up through his mouth. Yes, they did move. He was certain of it now. The air came up from the floor and squeezed through the cuff of his pants and up the length of his legs. His eyes opened wide until the white pushed forward through the blue. Then uncontrollably, his eyes roamed the room. His mouth was open and his feet, gently moving from side to side, caressed the floor. On that day, that day in particular, he became the Sanderman.

The Sanderman - go to page 2

© 2005 The Sanderman is copyrighted and cannot be copied in whole or in part without permission from the author.