Look Both Ways: 8. Ookabooka Land Summary & Analysis

Cynthia “Say-So” Sower invites her classmates to gather round and let her make them laugh. She invites her teacher, Mrs. Stevens, to listen too. Mrs. Stevens is at her desk. Giving Cynthia the last five minutes of class to put on her show is the only way to keep Cynthia from derailing the entire class. If she doesn’t get this time, Cynthia inevitably starts in on a humorous monologue that’s tangentially related to math class. One was about how negative numbers deserve empathy, since “no one should ever feel lower than zero.” Every monologue ended with Cynthia racing out of the classroom dramatically to return a moment later as if nothing happened. Mrs. Stevens chased her and threatened to write her up at first, but she likes Cynthia’s jokes. So she and Cynthia struck this deal.

Back in the present, Cynthia asks her classmates to agree with her that “shirt” is a strange word. She heard that long ago, a clothes maker invented the garment and he initially called it an arm-belly-chest cloth. But that was too long, so he shortened it to ABC—but then the ABC song came out and it was too confusing. One night, at a dinner party, the clothes maker’s friends all tried the garment on and loved it, but they all hated the name. The clothes maker was an anxious eater; he started shoving bread in his mouth as his friends asked him what he wanted to call the garment. Finally—Cynthia pauses for dramatic effect—the clothes maker said, through a mouthful of bread, “Shirt, I don’t know!” Mrs. Stevens tries not to laugh as she says that Cynthia’s time is up.

Cynthia’s mom works during the day and attends night school. She used to read to baby Cynthia from her night school textbooks. She’s Cynthia’s hero, though Cynthia’s mom is too busy to save Cynthia, or even laugh at Cynthia’s jokes. Cynthia’s grandfather, on the other hand, is her superhero. Cynthia believes he’s incredible. Most people think of him as just an ex-soldier who used to own the liquor store. He used to flip over crates and put on comedy shows in his store.

Cynthia is named for her grandfather, whose name is Cinder. He’d always say he’s Cinder as in “cinder block,” not like Cinderella. But really, he has elements of both Cinderella and cinder blocks in him. He’s tough, but also soft. He adored baby Cynthia, made the babbling little girl his sidekick, and gave her her nickname, Say-So.

Cinder’s girlfriend, Miss Fran, was a mail lady. She’d always stop by his store in the middle of one of his routines, and her laugh—and the obvious love between her and Cinder—made men in the store jealous. On her Saturday visits, she’d always catch Cynthia marching around. Miss Fran would stick stamps on Cynthia’s cheeks and threaten to mail her to Ookabooka Land, which made Cynthia scream. Miss Fran died when Cynthia was seven, and after her death, Cinder’s mind started to float away. Maybe his spirit went underground with her body; he could see her grave from his apartment window. He lived five doors down from Cynthia and Cynthia’s mom.

Not long after Miss Fran’s death, Cinder closed his liquor store. Soon after, the city knocked the store down and the apartment complex built a playground on the site. They included a small concrete platform, about the size of a crate, and stuck a plaque on it reading “Cinder’s Block.” Cynthia always hoped Cinder would stand on it and joke, but he never did. Soon after the playground went up, Cinder started forgetting things, like how to use the microwave. He’d always call Cynthia to his apartment to help him remember things, like how to turn on the TV.

Not long after that, Cynthia and Cynthia’s mom moved in with Cinder. Cynthia and her mom technically share a bedroom, but Cynthia sleeps on the couch because her mom thrashes in her sleep. She spends her nights dreaming about making her mom laugh and let go of some stress. The stress on her mom’s face looks like she’s wearing the wrong color of makeup. Cynthia wants nothing more than for her mom to be around and to love and joke with her, the way that Cinder and Miss Fran loved and joked with each other. But Cynthia’s mom is too busy, so Cynthia jokes with everyone. A laugh is a laugh and Cynthia takes them where she can get them, like at the end of Mrs. Stevens’s class.

Back in the present, Cynthia stands in Mrs. Stevens’s doorway handing out flyers handwritten on notebook paper. They state that Cynthia is giving a live show on Cinder’s Block at 3:33 p.m. Finally, Cynthia heads down the hall herself, stops at her locker, and pauses at the door to tease Gregory Pitts for smelling like an armpit, which she does every day. He knows it’s a joke, so he flaps his arms to waft the smell toward her. Instead of going the usual route (up to Ms. Post and walking around the long way), Cynthia cuts across the grass behind the school to the shortcut. She didn’t take the shortest shortcut—leaving out the back door—because then she couldn’t tease Greg, and Cinder taught her how important traditions are.

Cynthia walks along the brick school building to the line of trees at the back. She tiptoes through the trees, since this area is always muddy, and then looks both ways before crossing Carigan Street. Cynthia enters the Southview Cemetery—the shortest way home is to go through it. She’s also on the lookout for “giggles” for Cinder. Giggles are cigarette butts, and Cinder collects them. People always smoke as they walk through the cemetery. Cynthia named them giggles soon after Miss Fran died, when she was helping Cinder clean the apartment. He’d told her to get rid of stamps and envelopes (Cynthia pocketed the stamps instead) and then Cynthia had asked about an ashtray full of cigarette butts, all of them smeared with Miss Fran’s red lipstick. Cinder picked up one of the cigarette butts, studied it like it was a bullet—and giggled.

Cynthia finds no giggles in the cemetery. There are people visiting graves or walking their dogs, and there are two girls sitting on a skateboard by a tombstone. They look familiar, but Cynthia doesn’t want to stare and make it weird. Cynthia only has seven minutes to make it to Cinder’s Block, hopefully with a giggle for Cinder—and she finally fines one smeared with lipstick on Miss Fran’s gravestone. It seems like a sign.

At the other side of the cemetery, Cynthia crosses Southview Avenue to the playground. There’s a small girl playing happily on the swings, but nobody else. It’s 3:31. Cynthia sits on Cinder’s Block and pops her back. Sleeping on the couch is making her feel old. Giggling, Cynthia says to herself that couches are called couches “because of the ouch part.” A minute later, a pigeon—gray but beautiful—lands next to Cynthia. Cynthia tells the pigeon that she always wings it anyway. Then, she says she wonders what it’s like to be a pigeon, with wings to fly anywhere it wants. But it’s such a letdown that when a pigeon gets to where it wants to be, it doesn’t have the hands to grab things. Cynthia giggles again as 3:33 arrives.

Nobody ever comes to Cynthia’s shows. Occasionally other Southview residents, like Gregory Pitts, Remy Vaughn, Joey Santiago, and Candace Green come. People probably don’t come because they have other places to be, or things to do. Or maybe people don’t think Cynthia is serious about her shows being at 3:33. Really, though, the shows are at 3:33 for Cynthia’s mother. Cynthia’s mom finishes work as a barista at three and starts graduate school at 4:15. She always goes straight from work to class—but if for some reason she decides to take a day off, Cynthia will be on Cinder’s Block, waiting to make her hero smile just like Cinder taught her to. But Cynthia’s mom never takes days off.

Cynthia pulls a notebook out of her backpack, rips out a page, and scribbles her joke about birds not having hands on it. She continues that it’d be great if birds had hands—but then they’d be angels, and angels with beaks would be scary. Laughing to herself, Cynthia pulls out an envelope and a stamp from a special pocket in her backpack, seals her joke in the envelope, and writes her own address on it. She stamps the envelope and then approaches the swinging girl and offers her a sticker. When the girl holds out her hand, Cynthia slaps a Charlie Chaplin stamp onto it.

Once Cynthia gets into her apartment, she knocks on Cinder’s door and says she got mail. He doesn’t answer, so concerned, Cynthia opens the door. Cinder is sitting on his bed and writing in a notebook. Balls of paper cover the floor, which is normal for him—he writes random sentences written on them as he tries to put his thoughts on paper. Some of the paper balls, though, are in Cynthia’s handwriting. For a moment, Cinder doesn’t seem to recognize Cynthia, but then he comes to and says he’s trying to write a good joke for her to tell at school tomorrow. Cynthia joins him on the bed, kisses his cheek, and sees “eardrums” written on the paper. He says the joke isn’t working, wads up the paper, and throws it on the floor. He’s working on something better.

Cinder asks if Cynthia told the shirt joke today. Cynthia says it was great; her teacher didn’t get mad about the implied profanity at all. Then, Cynthia says she found a giggle and drops the cigarette butt into Cinder’s palm. Cinder smiles and puts it into a bottle containing 100 more giggles. Cynthia adds that mail came for him, and she offers him the envelope she stuffed, stamped, and addressed at the park. Cinder puts it on the table, but Cynthia knows what will happen: he’ll read it later, forget he read it, and then believe he wrote it. He’ll suggest she try the joke in Mrs. Stevens’s class, and she’ll be able to tell him after school that his jokes are still working.

As Cynthia heads back for the door, she asks what other joke Cinder was mentioning working on. Cinder asks what would happen if a school bus fell from the sky. Cynthia asks if it’s coming from Ookabooka Land. In the silence that follows, Cynthia stares at the man who taught her that life is funny pretty much all the time—and that even when it isn’t funny, it’s still possible to find humor. Cinder stares back, and then they both start laughing hard enough to shake the bottle of giggles.