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Just because I haven’t been on The Tramp Trail for some time around these parts doesn’t mean that I don’t recognize new faces (plus enough old faces to keep me grateful). This morning as I walk into the store, I notice a newbie that goes by the name of an area sports team and, frankly, he looks as if he would be a fan of that sports team. He looks...a little rough; anyone would look a little rough if they’ve been on the Tramp Trail for a little while. (Being on the Tramp Trail is a little different from being homeless.)
I do notice that he’s not bad looking at all.
I go into the store and buy a Financial Times. The FT “Life & Arts” section is one of my favorite sections of any newspaper. The first time I had ever seen the section was when I worked on Capitol Hill (in another lifetime) and there was one congressional staffer in the office that my cousin worked in that would sit at her desk on lunch (or maybe break) and work the crossword out of the FT. I’ve attempted to work the crossword on a few occasions. I’ve only gotten as far as completing about half of it. Nowadays, I do get around to looking at the bridge “diversion,” usually.
The need to have a newspaper, for some reason, reminds me of the morning many years ago, when I decided to buy a Chicago Tribune prior to going to the drug spot to cop a coupla bags. The dealer thought that I was a cop and flat-out refused to sell me anything. It was still rather early that morning so I was content to return home empty handed of drugs, for once.
(And since I remember how heavy that Chicago Tribune was, I am 100% sure that it was a Sunday morning.)
I head to the el and off to my destination: a favorite diner of mine located right under one of the el stops. Even if we weren’t in these days of being almost out of the pandemic (almost...maybe!), it’s a take-out joint that caters to CTA employees...and pretty much everyone else. I’m really not in the mood to pay a full tip at a sit-in diner and the food at the take-out diner is just fine. I am a regular enough customer where they know what one of my 3-4 orders will be, how I like my eggs, how I like my grits, etc.
I brought my Kindle with me so that I could continue my obsession with reading Joan Didion essays. Now, I have seen some of her very iconic and rather...forbidding pictures and I try to reconcile this high-society looking woman with what she writes at the beginning of The White Album. Her overall psychological profile is not what I would expect, she’s sitting up talking about “hustlers” and getting in on drug deals and palling around with Black Panthers (even Eldridge Cleaver!).
That Ms. Didion contains these opposites is probably the main reason that I like her work. It’s one of the reasons I think that I would probably love to sit at an outdoor cafe table with her while passers-by look horrified (as long as they pass by) the oddest of couples, have good coffee and good times in the morning.
Enough of Joan Didion, my order’s been called.
Denver omelet, extra buttery grits, whole wheat toast. Toast is lightly buttered and that’s the way I will eat it. Without jelly.
I crack the FT and scan the first few pages and realize that I have a quick choice before I settle in and eat: There’s the FT lunch with former Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini or the front page article with the loud headline: Can you change yourself?
The Salvini lunch is tempting but after five plus years of a fascist who still won’t go away, I decide that yet another proto-fascist won’t go down well with my Denver omelet so I decide to see if I can change myself.
And then I am hit with a word in the third paragraph: “clever-dick.”
Really?
And then I remember that I am reading the Financial Times and, yes, it is a word.
I read on a bit and note that the writer thinks that she can “make a strong case for having acquired some humility...” and I lose interest: I mean, if you’re actually writing about making a case for yourself “having acquired some humility,” you haven’t acquired much humility, I figure.
I close up the paper and continue eating and watching humanity flow in and out in and out in and out of the diner. At one point, the cashier asks one of his customers if he’s sober now and...that cashier knows his customers.
I finish my meal and trek across the street to the mall to go to the bathroom. Take an after breakfast smoke.
And then back to the el and home.
This is Howard, as far as this train goes. Transfer to Yellow and Purple Line trains at Howard. All passengers must leave the train. Thank you for riding the CTA Red Line.
The conductor chimes in, “This is Howard, the end of the line. Everyone off.”
Comments below the fold.
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From Another Progressive:
This comment by stolenvirtue in OK Dodo’s recommended post on a shooting at the Houston aquarium.
Highlighted by zenvegan:
This comment by Elwood Dowd in lafosner’s troll post.
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