John Updike, Ernest Hemingway and Tobias Wolff walk into a bar...

I apologize for no clever joke, but after picking these three authors at random they told stories that with enough imagination could easily intertwine. I read the Tobias Wolff story "Powder," which was only five pages. It's a five page story and the reason I chose it is because I wanted to read stories that could force imagination the way "The Killers" had. The story seems straightforward, father and son go skiing and dad seems determined to get his son home for Christmas in the midst of a snow storm. So determined they sneak through a highway roadblock. Small details come to light throughout the story. You realize they get stuck in this snow storm because the father was getting in a good day of skiing. You realize the father needs to get his son home because he is struggling to keep his marriage together. The story ends without saying if they make it home or not, which I suppose is irrelevant. The boy in the story is still young enough to be amazed by his father's skill at handling the car in this storm, and how amazing the sight and feeling was when it happened. When I was ten I went to Colorado to visit parents friends. When I was there I got to go for a ride in this tiny little classic red MG. The weather wasn't dangerous but to come along those mountain sides and to imagine this father doing the same sort of thing with near reckless abandon is well, impressive on a level. The John Updike story I chose turned out to be a story about a slightly older boy making his own decisions.
In all honesty I chose John Updike because I recognized his name as a guest on The Simpson's. When I researched his name I was very sad to see he had just passed and we did not get the chance to be formally introduced. With John Updike's passing I wanted to read one of his earlier stories so I chose "A&P," published about 1961. The story is an account of a teenage boy trying to make a stand in the name of or either to impress three bikini clad teenage girls in a A&P he works at. The boy describes the physical features of the girls in detail. He is overcome with want for them but totally intimidated by their presence. When his boss and a family friend embarrasses the prettiest of the three, the boy quits. He makes a public show, unties his apron, tells his boss a thing or two and becomes a champion for the downtrodden everywhere. And everyone knows your reward when you make this decision is three bikini clad teenage girls. However the young man realizes shortly after going outside his display was for nothing; they were long gone. as he stands there seeing his boss doing his job he realizes he made his heroic stand not for himself but to impress girls, a valuable lesson. He's left with a short of empty feeling and realizing his life won't get any easier after that moment. This simple moment is not unlike the last story I read by Ernest Hemingway.
"Old Man at the Bridge" has a strange calm to it when I read it. The narrator is a soldier sent out to explore the enemy advance when he is confronted by this old man at a pontoon bridge. The old man goes on to say he's seventy six, without politics, and was the last to leave his town because he was taking care of animals. The man goes on to talk about his animals, probably more than the soldier was paying attention too. His home was being destroyed with artillery and the concern he repeats is for his animals that he had to abandon. It ends without a climax, only the image of a lonely old man sitting in the road thinking of the things he took care of being lost to him now.
The three stories, separate could be spun into the same life with enough creativity from Hollywood. Maybe wrap his life up with a Faulkner story so this man seems truly tragic.