"The Viper Is Coming!"

My dad liked to tell funny stories--nothing ever dirty or even much off-color (at least not in the presence of his three pure and innocent sons).  I have no idea where he got them--certainly not on the Internet, which Al Gore had not yet invented.  Dad, in fact, never did go online.  Although he lived until 1999 and could have surfed and emailed, he expressed no interest in it whatsoever whenever my brothers and I would suggest he might like it.  In fact, he was pretty much a non-technological guy. A bit of a genial Luddite.  Never used a computer.  Was bewildered by his own stereo system.  The microwave baffled him.  Never used an ATM.  He did use the TV remote, a device he considered among the greatest inventions of the human imagination.

I remember one of Dad's stories--which has some relevance today.  Here goes ...

Into a remote town in the mountains ran a frightened man, crying aloud, "The viper is coming!  The viper is coming!"  People were worried.  A bit later, a woman came running into town, crying, "The viper is coming!  The viper is coming!"  People were frightened.

A third person ran into town, screaming, "The viper is coming!  The viper is coming!"  People were panicking, scattering, terrified.

A weary old man with a bucket walked into town.  People slowly gathered around.  "I'm the viper," he said. "I've come to vipe the vindows."

Well, the viper is at our house today.  We've not cleaned the windows (do not be horrified; do not think less of us; do not gag) since we moved here in 1997.  But we noticed the other day that they were no longer transparent; they looked, in fact, a bit like the colored gels I used to slide into the fresnels above the Harmon School stage.

And so ... the viper is here today viping the vindows, and we can see the falling leaves with much greater clarity.  And only one question remains: Who will rake them?