professor marion

Professor Robert

Marion McCullough

An Heroic Tale of Loneliness, Incarnate, eh?

By Professor Izzy Ess de la

Welland Wilderness du Canada

Professor Robert M. McCullough spent some thirty years collecting data on Lake Erie and was instrumental in the saving of the lake from frank pollution and the death of all aquatic plants and animals, including perch.  In 1998, when he retired, he was completely satisfied by what his efforts had accomplished.  He was accidentally assisted by the introduction of the Zebra Mussel to the denizens of Erie’s Lake, which filtered water better than an artificial Millipore device.  The water had become so clear that fish could see the shore and fishermen and started moving to the deeper parts to get away from them.  The other ecological events were in his favour and the water was so good, it was quite drinkable without additional plant processing.  Most water sold in Canada and northern areas of Cleveland came directly from the lake.

Professor Robert had his eye on several mansions on the cliffs in Cleveland.  He had purchased one a year before by using up the greater part of his retirement fund.  His hobby was gemology.  He felt that prehistoric cliffs of the Escarpments of the Lakes would yield some interest for the leisure time that he would have.  The Professor was a loner, basically, and loved to spend his time alone with rocks and gems.  He had a childless, loveless marriage to a female surgeon who found other men more interesting.  She had left him many years ago to shack up with a fellow surgeon and his mistresses.  Professor Robert was not devastated.  Frankly, he was satisfied his social needs had been accomplished sans a lot of diddling with the personalities of Academia.  Affairs with female graduates had satisfied whatever needs he had regarding sex and love.  At his advancing age of 62, he was quite happy to be left alone with his small shiny rocks and semi-precious gems.

The twelve room mansion on the cliff was once the residence of wealthy CEO’s who worked their money magic management in larger firms in Cleveland and surrounding areas.  Its architecture was quite interesting, something like an English Tudor structure seen in many British areas for royalty and wealthy businessmen.  It was well-built and could withstand the winters easily.  There was an acre of expensive land surrounding it.  The stables, barns and other utile structures were included, plus a tiny beautiful grand guesthouse on the very edge beside the Erie Lake, itself.  The gardens and the copses were outstanding.  Crews of gardeners and housekeepers had worked there.  Our Professor Robert much preferred to live alone and do the gardening, housekeeping and the cooking by himself.  His ample pension was sufficient to do everything, including buying modern tools and landscaping equipment.  Robert fashioned a neat Italian  gondola with some ropes and tackles, which enabled him descending and ascending the escarpment cliff, allowing him to use his little hammer/chisel to examine rocks and other stuff.  Disappointed in the yield, he next constructed an old-fashioned mining shaft beginning in the basement of his guest house.  He engineered the shaft to be enforced with beams of railroad ties.  With this in place, he made a lift for transportation up and down the shaft.  Disappointed once again by getting nothing much to study, save for tiny shells of ocean life embedded in the strata.  He did begin to perk up with the luminosity of lower layers.  In the lowest areas, above the water table levels of the Lake, there was an icy layer with concavities, quite tall enough to let him stand and look around.

One such cave was icy and it glowed a greenish light that fascinated him.  He liked to walk around this cave, imagining himself in prehistoric times, when native cavemen might have lived, therein.  The cavemen would have had an icy shelter not unlike a fancy igloo.  Iciness allowed him fun in sliding down some humps and bumps.  Retired Professor Robert M. would build a fire with splintered railroad ties and roast some steaks or chickens on a tiny spit that could be rotated for thorough cooking of the meat and vegetables he brought down from the surface.  Fire would also melt the ice, a bit, providing clear, cool water for his thirst.  At times, he lived way down below the level of his guesthouse for some days and even weeks.  A sleeping bag provided warmth and comfort for his naps and bedtimes.

Firelight was enough, along with greenish glowing walls and ceilings, to allow him reading opportunities, or re-examining of his rock samples and the tiny ocean shells he found.  He was excited by the nautili he found.  Discovering that there were forms of life that were declared extinct, was quite exciting to his curiosity and scientific mind.  He began a log to catalogue his findings with the vague idea that a publication would be possible.  Moreover, he discovered that the warming up of some small specimens had brought them back to life.  He had a pool of water that was suitable, environmentally for his new friends.  The melted ice provided swimming room for them and nutrients for their survival.

Disturbing to Professor Robert were the tiny tremours that he felt from shocks and aftershocks of small earthquakes that did recur.  The shaft that he had built became unsafe and he began, anew, to dig a wider, much more re-enforced conveyance from atop the cliff to get him to the lower layers and the glowing caves he found so wonderful.  He dug from his big mansion’s basement through the layers to his glowing-walled great chambers down below.  He wondered if the greenish glow had changed his mood, at times, from mild depressive feelings to some form of hypo-mania with some exciting feelings of superiority.  He had consulted with psychiatrists regarding his propensity to moodiness and overwhelming antisocial feelings.  He had learned to gauge his moods and live with them, accepting his evaluation of his schizoid personality, as something with which he was born.

Suddenly, one day, a large earthquake completely changed his world.  The initial shock, and all the aftershocks, collapsed his engineering marvels to a pile of rubble, which dropped down on him and knocked him out.  Only slowly did he try to stand, when he awoke, and found he had a dislocated shoulder and a fractured ankle.  He knew quite enough about first aid to realize he needed major help to get him through this calamity.  Some desperate strong feelings came in waves as he became aware of just how isolated that he was.  The shafts that that he had built were not escaping shafts.  The piles of rocks and railroad ties lay everywhere.  With one arm hanging uselessly, he dragged his fractured foot and managed to get extricated from the rubble and to move toward a corner of the glowing cave that was not so damaged by the earthquake.  Robert found a rounded hump to sit upon and think about what could be done to get him to the mansion, realizing that his injuries prevented him from trying to get out himself.  He thought a thought that maybe this time was the time he should have had a mate to help.  He didn’t think he’d ever feel this helplessness.

A deep depression overwhelmed Professor Robert and he cried.  He beseeched whatever God would listen to assist him.  Calming down a bit, he realized that walls behind him had some openings that could be passages to safety.  He began to draw a picture in his mind about his whereabouts and to where the passages might lead.  He brightened up when he discovered that the tunnels were quite long in places.  Having not a clue about directions, he proceeded to explore the tunnels, one-by-one.  His spirits flagged as he discovered glowing chambers everywhere, not one indicative of likely passage to his upper world or to Lake Erie.  His depression deepened as he looked around unable to see daylight or a way out of the cave.

Professor Robert fell, as quaking started up again.  The after-shocks kept Robert down for fear of further injuring himself, when suddenly a great resounding crack was heard.  Professor Robert M. Mccullough realized the ice was fracturing as he saw the crack extend before his eyes and right beside his supine body.  Moving carefully away from it, he saved his life.  Something else was happening.  Water filled the crack.  The level was increasing.  Water overflowed the floor of chamber after chamber as he tried to limp away to higher ground.  Luckily, he found a shelf of solid rock and pulled himself up more than four feet to a tiny ledge, allowing him to sit and hang his legs.  He noticed that the cracking floor was matched by cracking ceilings.  A shaft of light came from above!  It excited him by prospects of escape from his dilemma.  Looking up, he saw the sunshine and the blue sky that he craved.  He shouted up the shaft of light for someone on the surface, but to no avail.  Some shadows quickly flitted through the shaft of light.  He guessed that he was underneath a busy highway and the cars were zooming by.  The passengers could not detect the crack and could not ever hear his shouting.  Desisting, he again was feeling sad and hopeless and he had the sinking feeling, he could not ascend, without some outside help.

Professor Robert M. McCullough faced the facts that he was stuck and might well die.  Hunger overcame him and he shivered, uncontrollably.  He had some matches that were waterproof and found them functional.  He lit a fire on a lovely hump in a compartment that was higher than the flooded floor.  The fire melted off the ice revealing a quite regularly shaped huge egg.  He knocked on it and was shocked to have an echo of some sort as knocking came from deep within the egg.  The knocking got some louder.  Robert waited patiently and was rewarded when a tiny nose broke through a crack.  A tiny greenish blue small horse emerged.  It looked around and spotted him and ran on four strong legs to spear him with the horn that came out straight from his small forehead.  It was a unicorn, with bluish-green scales on his body, like a lizard, or chameleon.  In fact, the shimmering quite beautiful appearance of the tiny horse-like creature was astounding to our Robert.  Moreover, horsey became quite used to him and playfully did prod and butt him with his central horn.  Our Robert used to have small animals like dogs and cats for pets and this small animal was loving and adoring sans a limitation.  The tiny reptile unicorn repeatedly brushed up against him playfully expecting to be petted.  Unicorns were not a figment of a man’s imagination!  This was it, a winsome unicorn, that was a reptile, had come back to life to help him, thought our Robert as he watched the tiny creature eat the yolk and albumen from inside the eggshell out of which he’d come.  So hungry now, Professor Robert M. knelt down and licked the broken eggshell clean.  The unicorn, that he named Horny, tried to push him off the food that was his own.  Professor Robert kicked the unicorn to stop him from attacking him.  The tiny stabs with Horny’s horn were really painful and were drawing blood, which Horny licked and savoured.

Robert found a sharpened splinter from a railroad tie and stabbed poor Horny in the chest and killed him.  Then he wrenched the neck and pulled its head off to be able to get at the flesh for which he hungered.  It had such a strange taste but he wolfed it down, and lived.  By sucking on the tarty blood of Horny, he could quench his thirst, somewhat.  Afterward, he felt remorseful but not a great deal that it kept him from relaxing and deep-sleeping.

When he finally awoke, the room was darker and more ominous.  He felt along the floor and found another rounded hump and lit a fire upon it with his last remaining match.  The ice then melted and revealed another egg.  This time, he waited patiently.  Anon, another creature, like the first, broke through the thick and shaggy shell.  It was a reptile Pegasus, so beautiful and graceful as it flew around and up the shaft that had been lit up.  It fluttered noisily above his head but couldn’t quite ascend.  It floated down just like a hawk descending, using tiny circles to create a softer landing on the ice.  Our Peggy, named by Robert, quite appropriately, nuzzled up to him and started moaning, like a baby needing food.  Our Robert shrugged and strangled her and hungrily drank all its blood and chewed a lot to get the slimy flesh ingested.  He began to vomit and to have such diarrhea that he couldn’t find some comfort and he lay down in the ice to get some rest and comfort.  He dreamt of his amours and died.  His clothes, now soaked with water started freezing and he made a funny hump completely frozen to the floor of his new grave.

The rescue folks had been alerted to his probable demise by undelivered mail and newspapers accumulating at his mansion door.  They descended through his holes until they found the icy chambers down below.  With cranes and chains and chipping hammers, they enlarged the holes to get below and found him stiff and frozen.  They had no idea that there had been other life below.  They merely chipped his body free and brought him up to the nice mansion.

Some family had been alerted and they purchased A smart oaken coffin for him.  He was buried with some wide celebrity because his papers had been published and his fame had spread amongst intelligentsia from academia who came to watch his burial.  His headstone read:

HERE LIES ROBERT MARION McCULLOUGH, A PROFESSOR AND EXPLORER.  MAY HE REST IN PEACE, FOREVER.  WAS SURVIVED BY DAUGHTERS, ISOBEL, MELINDA AND ADELE, AND EX-WIFE SURGEON, A PROFESSOR DOCTOR JANE McCULLOUGH, WHO ADORED HIM FROM AFAR.  JULY THE TWENTIETH, TWO THOUSAND, FORTY-FOUR.

THE END

© izzy sommers, md

Welland, Ontario in Canada

August 2^nd of 2013, ACE