Likely the two weirdest characters you’ll ever read about: Luke from “My Friend Luke” and the recipient of blows in “There’s a Man Hitting me on the Head with an Umbrella”, by Fernando Sorrentino

Zou in normal font, Reyes in bold, italics when one answers the other

I’ve read a collection of different authors now, (thanks to Mr. Watt), but Fernando Sorrentino (born in 1942) is just so different. He creates peculiar characters, living peculiar lives, entertaining the reader. Luke, from “My Friend Luke” somehow is a character who has two polar personalities. In one way, he is the “sweetest, shyest person in the world” and never wants to inconvenience or interrupt anyone. He has the ability to make himself disappear into the background; when he speaks he uses a “very thin, subtle voice, so inaudible that it is hard to tell if he is speaking at all”, offering no thoughts, opinions, protests, or even a simple “Excuse me”. He’s so unimportant to the world that he “is not allowed a key, so he has to ring the bell” and is even viewed as having “little to offer the world” by his own wife and son. How did he even form a relationship with his wife? Was he always this way, or did aging turn him into a shell of a person? But perhaps, Luke never needed to form a relationship. His wife seems perfectly happy to lead the relationship and is glad that no one is stopping her cranky angry personality. As a result of his actions, you could say he’s very thoughtful and considerate towards others, never wanting to disrupt their lives in any way. If we were to compare him to someone we know, I am reminded of a girl that we normally see in the hallways. Her shyness is very evident because of her posture and the way she crosses her arms, in a way that looks like a hug, as she walks.  I’m definitely seeing that comparison (though we’re referring to different people). 

Unfortunately, right as one forms that opinion, Luke’s bus antics are introduced and you realize that he isn’t always that sweet, blend-into-the-background type of guy; in fact he’s quite infuriating. Once on the bus, he does everything possible to aggravate, annoy, and anger everyone on board, including the driver. Thinking back to the girl I previously mentioned, do you think her personality changes as soon as she steps out of school, similar to when Luke hops on the bus? Maybe her personality will change when she gets into a more comfortable place. But I doubt she would change. I’ve seen her act around her brother, and she’s quite odd then too. As Sorrentino said, “Luke’s resources are plentiful and diverse.” To put it in simple words, Luke acts like a jerk on the bus. He “look[s] for his money, slowly” and “pays with the largest possible number of small coins, which he delivers a few at a time”; he “light[s] up a cheap, heavy cigar” that clogs the air in the bus; and he never gives up the front seat but “makes some recriminatory remark against those that kept their seats.” All the antics that he uses to bother people seem to be carefully crafted, as if he dedicates part of his time thinking solely on how to annoy others. Along with that, when he manages to get a seat he tries to take up as much space on the seats as his little body will allow him. And probably one of his worst tactics, he eats “a salami sandwich and [drinks] a glass of red wine” specifically on fully packed buses, right before he boards. Why? Because it’s a very effective way to annoy everyone. The strong smell of salami, with it “still between his teeth” is enough to make everyone else gag. It’s as if the bus ride is the time of the day he most looks forward to – the time that gives him sadistic joy. As Sorrentino said, “I would say that the driver’s impatience gives him a certain amount of pleasure.” This makes me think about the way that he finds joy makes him a twisted person. For instance, serial killers–completely off topic, I know–have things called trophies that they’ve gathered from the people they’ve killed. Each time they see these objects, it pleases them. Maybe this relates to the pleasure Luke receives from annoying others.Yes, it’s like that German word schadenfreude that means getting joy out of other people’s pain. 

As for seeing Luke in real life, I can’t say I have. But wait, Chloe, what about popular girls? They act so friendly when talking to teachers, but when they talk with girls outside of their friend group, they look them up and down as if they had done something to harm them. These Darien girls might not be exactly like Luke, but in a way, they are, because both they and Luke are two-faced. True, in the essence of two-faced they definitely are. I would even go as far as to say our 18-hour a week gymnastics friend is a bit fake and two-faced, always buttering up teachers; it’s as if her voice and her personality becomes so sweet when she talks to teachers, even our healthy living teacher, because she loves to be everyone’s favorite student. But as we were talking about Luke, I can’t imagine how someone like him would even function in society. How would he survive with his “ludicrously low” wage? How many hours would he wait for an inanimate object to be moved out of the way in the path in front of him? Who even smokes big cigars on buses anymore? And even my imagination hasn’t ventured far enough to produce a character like him.

Now perhaps part of the reason Luke acts out on the bus is because he needs to take out his anger somewhere. I will admit that when anger piles up inside of me, I feel like lashing out at everyone around me. Saying this makes me picture a viper, which my mom commonly compares me to when I’m in a bad mood. All of Luke’s rage might be caused by his job because he is treated extremely unfairly by his boss at the dismal company of don Aqueróntido. One can tell that don Aqueróntido would take advantage of his workers because Sorrentino describes him as “violent and greedy”. Luke is given a ludicrous amount of work that’s impossible to finish during the 9-5 hours, paid essentially minimum wage, and is always judged by co-workers and his boss. The “disapproving looks of don Aqueróntido” are so strong that Luke has no choice but to work with his jacket on so his only shirt and one tie that’s “so frayed and greasy that it looks more like a shoelace” are hidden, and then to preserve this jacket, he “wears a pair of gray sleeve-protectors”. What is going on in his head when he is dressing for work? This reminds me of Mrs. Penny’s shiny, velvet dresses. They weren’t in the condition of Luke’s clothes, but something about them ticked us off. We probably gave her disapproving looks just like Luke’s coworkers gave him. Can’t say she didn’t deserve them. And didn’t we also wonder what was going on through her head when she dressed for work? Very true, and Ms. Penny’s Poshmark clothes were interesting to say the least.

Even with his “ludicrously low” salary, that’s always being cut, his wife wants to send their son to an expensive private school. Of course with this job, Luke can’t afford it, so his only choice is to stop “buying his newspaper and (an even greater sacrifice) The Reader’s Digest.” All of this judging and unfair working conditions must madden Luke, though he doesn’t show it generally, as he must always not inconvenience others. However, no one can act the way Luke does 24/7, so it could be why the second he boards the bus he transforms into a new type of person – it’s his happy time when he takes out all the anger of a day’s work.

Despite Luke’s horrible work conditions, I don’t know how someone could become such a shadow of a man. Usually, one’s first reaction to judgmental treatment isn’t to turn into the sweetest, least inconveniencing person. However, this also becomes a question of did the egg come first or the chicken? Because couldn’t one argue that he’s treated this way at work because of his odd, frugal personality? It’s why he only has one shirt that’s always being made fun of, or why he can’t stand up for himself to ask for more wages or a fair amount of work. Before all this, did Luke ever act like a normal person? If we were to look into his childhood, would we see what caused him to be this way? Or, was it because Luke was always like this that he gets treated badly at work, which in turn makes him act out on the bus? But whatever came first, he is now stuck in a bad cycle of blending into the background, being judged, and being a jerk on the bus. Luke clearly wants to make others’ lives miserable, but he does that in a masochistic way, as evidenced by blasting a program he is uninterested in, and sitting next to the open window in winter, suffering doubly so others can suffer too.

After reading a story like “My Friend Luke”, one can’t help but wonder why Sorrentino chose to write this. Was it just to be funny and humorous? To be slightly reminded of people in the reader’s own lives, through exaggeration? Watching Luke go to the extremes? Is it like a short story that could also be an animated short? I can definitely see this being turned into one; Luke skinny and dressed in gray, waddling sideways to get past someone on the road and perhaps standing stock still as the frames speed up, and we see the sun pass by before continuing to work, but then turning into an entirely different person on the bus. By exaggerating his actions, his emotions can be clearly conveyed to the audience. It would be very effective at bringing a lot of laughs from the audience as they see how absurd and obnoxious (even though he strives not to be) Luke is.

Now it’s time to move on to “There’s a Man in the Habit of Hitting Me on the Head with an Umbrella,” and before I say anything else, can I just mention how long that title is? But, I suppose that extra-long title fits in with the extra weird plot. One day, as the narrator was sitting at a park, reading the paper, he was disrupted when he felt the whack of an umbrella on his head. Umbrella Man’s only point in life was to continuously hit him on the head, no matter what. Every moment of every day, Umbrella Man hit him, even while he was sleeping or doing his “most intimate activities”. And so this odd situation continues: for the past five years and now, into the character’s future. Does this story reflects on our way doing the same repetitive routines each day of our lives, whether that is school or work? Or is it about something much more sinister? 

Luke is anything but normal, but Umbrella Man also a “common face” with a lack of emotion and “is graying at the temples.” He “wears a gray suit” and is “average in appearance.” Umbrella Man is basically the background: he’s the background noise that never goes away, equivalent to the buzz and slight vibration on a plane ride that you can only get rid of with noise-canceling headphones or the music you put on when you study. But after a while, if you never end up putting in the headphones, you don’t even realize the noise is there! Just like we get used to the noise, he got used to the tapping.

This constant tapping on his head also just goes to show how human nature is so capable of adapting. He starts off the story unable to bear the mechanically and impassive whacking of the umbrella. That first time he “turned around filled with indignation” and even “stood up and punched him in the nose.” He tried everything possible to get rid of Umbrella Man; tried to run away; tried to slam the door in his face; even thought about going to the police; eventually he learns that he will have to deal with it for, most likely, the rest of his life. But now five years later, the thought of these blows of the umbrella disappearing causes him more anxiety than the actual tap tap tapping of the umbrella on his head. “A new anxiety is eating at my soul, the anxiety stemming from the thought that this man, perhaps when I need him most, will depart and I will no longer feel those umbrella taps that helped me sleep so soundly.” How much this man has changed, from not being able to bear the tapping, to not being able to live without it. In a way, I can relate this to school and summer break. During school, I long to have a time when there is no homework, but once I am on break, I realize how that homework keeps me busy and occupied. Then this causes me to feel like I’m not doing anything, which makes me want to go back to school. Once part of my daily routine is taken away, it makes a big difference in how I feel and act. If Umbrella Man were to suddenly disappear, I’m sure the narrator would have the same reaction. So true. That’s a great example, though I’m sure some of our friends wouldn’t agree – they’d rather always have summer.

Now perhaps not all of us would be able to adapt to someone hitting our head with an umbrella every second of the day, but we do adapt to other things in life. Just one example that popped into mind for me was, when I first started gymnastics, getting blisters on my hands seemed like a symbol of me really doing the sport, but now (and I know I share this sentiment with my teammates), we forget that normal people don’t have blisters and rips on their hands. Just like he can’t imagine not having the tapping of the umbrella, I can’t imagine having smooth hands. And Montse, I know you know that feeling too, from rowing blisters. Yes, I do. And like the Umbrella Man, I forget about them until I put on hand sanitizer and feel the sharp sting in my hands, which forces me to remember their presence.

Even if this Umbrella story was a way to demonstrate human adaptation, it is a pretty extreme way to show it. But then perhaps that is Sorrentino’s style – absurd seems to be something Sorrentino specializes in, whether it’s a man always getting hit by an umbrella to the point where he can’t sleep without it or a character like Luke with his dirty string tie and spineless yet obdurate manner. Of course, Sorrentino’s writing might reflect his own life, so he could have gotten the inspiration for these stories by examining himself, but perhaps not, as making any assumption about a writer’s connection from their work to their life is entering dangerous waters, for quite often, when asked to explain these connections, authors will snap at the interviewer, like How dare you draw those conclusions!? Could this come from the fact that writers feel it as an invasion of their personal life to assume every piece of writing came from their experiences? Would that be disregarding their ability to write out of pure imagination? Though whatever the influence, Sorrentino writes in the extremes, providing slightly strange, but funny stories for all of us to enjoy.