"Tea Hatting With Dada" -- The Surreal Circus Flash Fiction Contest

Dada asked for the strawberry jam; and I handed him what was closest.

He hawked and squawked and drew a condescending eye.

"Good, God, boy! Not that bourgeois rendering from some retailer's market.

"Pass me that nouveau stuff; the one in the fancy jar; the one I brought back special from university."

I reached and passed the jar.

It was an awkward rhombus shape with a lidded, circular, spoon-sized opening on the top.

It had a square label with a triangle for a logo; and calligraphy so stylized, that I could only and just barely make out the word "jam" among the maniacally erratic scrawlings.

I made the mistake of snorting at the pretentiousness; which made the condescending eye emit a rebuking voice.

"Better minds than thine distilled that heady mix of pleasure, my boy.

"Your young palate, so grossly and easily pleased, could never detect, let alone savor, the intricate and complex mixtures of nuance and subtlety in a jam so finely crafted as this."

"Oh come on, Dada." my argumentative side interjected. "Jam is jam. If it's sweet, soothing and satisfying, then it's jam. If it's sugar, water, and berries boiled to a relishing mash; then it's jam. Jam is jam."

Dada laughed.

He laughed hard.

He laughed long.

Then he stopped and wiped a humored tear from his eye.

"My dear, dear boy, your deconstruction is so obviously crude, elementary and superficial. Your tone reflects the crassly inexperienced perception that sugar is simply sugar, water is only water and that all berries are essentially just berries."

Dada leaned towards me.

"Let me tell you true, boy: there are as many different sugars in the world as there are grains of sand on Coney Island's beach; that waters in the world range in sources from high mountains peaks, to the lowest swamps and brackest sewers; and let me tell you truly, that a wild berry picked from the side of a cliff at the height of it's perfection, differs dramatically from those that are jerked off factory vines on some harvester's schedule."

Dada took the jar from my hand and gazed lovingly, respectfully, and admirably at it.

"An intricate mixture of the very best ingredients went into this jam; and it was prepared according to a recipe found by inspiration, intellect and intuition playing relentlessly with gastro-experimental forms."

Dada's eyes turned back and leveled with mine.

"This jam was prepared along an arc which plumbed the aesthetic moral of every passing muse that blessed alchemy could call. It is an absolute paragon of complex delight."

His eyes went back to the jar; and he smiled from his very heart.

"A palatable parable of paradigmatic perfection."

He set the jar down and reverently removed the lid; dipped a butter-knife's blade firmly in, and came up with a quivering slightly dripping mound.

Dada's eyes had a gleam that left me wondering if Moma had forgotten one of his medications that morning.

With studious artist's eye he spread the gelatinous blood, pulp and seed mixture across the pale yellow plain of his thickly buttered bread.

"Life is a nebular web of existential freedom." he recited without looking away.

"Boy.., once you've been around a while, you'll learn just how important good quality jam really is." Then he took a bite.

I looked at him for a moment; watching him chew. I wanted to say something smart, something to let him know that I got all about his fancy-panty jamsy-wamsy, but nothing was really coming. I was stuck on medication.

"Dada; did Moma give you all of your medicine this morning?"

He smiled and said carefully through bliss laden jowls:

"Havin' the last of it now, kid. The last of it now."



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620 words

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