I went to Grit City early yesterday to hit the cool little home goods stores and shops selling interesting knick-knacks. I'm skipping the gym this week which means I have a whole lot more day to spend in the wild. I needed to get motivated, so I did a bunch of necessary home chores, changing a.c. filters, pouring clearing fluids down pvc drains, both the house and the apartment, taking out the garbage, too, and setting the cans on the street, etc.
I don't have "cans." Throwback lingo.
It was cool out, so after I showered, I put on shoes and jeans and a warm layer over my t-shirt.
Just before I hit the interstate, I had a text from the cleaning service. They had a cancellation and wanted to come at 11:30. I wrote back that I wasn't in town and the house wasn't ready, so . . .
They said they would come at the scheduled time.
When I got to Grit City, the streets were empty.
Not a soul around. It didn't look as if the town was open. I checked my phone for the time. Had I jumped the gun? Nope. Where in the hell was everyone?
Turns out, most of Grit City is closed on Mondays. For real? The Monday before Christmas, and the shops are closed?
It is a town of bums and drunks, and about that, I am not exaggerating. There are more bars, breweries and distilleries in a few block area than anyplace I've ever been. . . and I've been around. I'd estimate that in a five by five block area, there are fifty. Not making that up.
I decided to walk the town, block by block. I went past all the places where the cool little shops once were. Nope. They were gone. Even my buddy's import furniture shop had closed down. Nothing but bars ever make it in Grit City, which is a shame as it has one of the prettiest little downtowns you will ever see. And it is lakefront. Big river boats ply the river. This was once the main artery for getting products out of the center of the state. It was rich with opera houses and the original Country Club College. I think that part is correct. There is a plaque somewhere in town that says that. Or something like that. If memory serves.
The streets surrounding downtown and the waterfront are filled with big old wooden mansions, and they are aplenty. The town, however, fell into hard times mid-last century, and the old mansions were falling apart. Now, though, there have been restorations galore and things have gotten expensive. Oh, those little streets run for beautiful miles now.
So you would think that those pretty shops would be just the thing for serving the downtown population. But you'd be wrong. Even the historic old train station and the fire department have been turned into bars. True dat!
I walked for a very long time. Ili once lived here early in our relationship, and I spent some happy hours there. We ate and drank, of course, and walked the city far and wide, so I had a little nostalgia thinking about those old days, but nothing maudlin or morose. No, indeed, they were happy memories.
I was carrying my big medium format Fuji GFX camera and a camera bag with two Leicas that never came out. I had a strange lens mounted on the Fuji, a Lens Baby swirly bokeh thing that I had never used much before though I have had it for around a decade, I would guess. And I learned something. If you shoot the lens wide open, the swirly bokeh is very pronounced, but if you stop it down. . . not so much. I like the lens and now that I have learned its characteristics, I am sure to use it more. It can be a real pip.
After walking awhile, I was getting hot. A few people had come out into the streets, and they were all wearing shorts. I should have worn shorts, I thought as I peeled off my warmer layer. It was hot. I checked my phone for the temperature.
70 degrees! If I were in my house and it was 70 degrees. . . but here I was sweating. Strange.
I decided to eat, so I went to the old train station turned food court and bar. I got a spicy miso ramen bowl and a light beer. The barmaid was pretty-ish, short and stocky but well built, too, with a full sleeve on one arm and a small bullring in her nose. She, however, looked like two completely different people depending on which side you saw her. Her left side was eight years older than her right, it seemed. But that was Grit City.
"Do you want to keep your tab open?" she smiled.
"No. I'm not from here. I can't drink like the fine citizens of Grit City do."
She laughed. "Yea, it gets pretty wild."
I looked around the station. I was familiar with the crowd. It was not like the crowd in my own hometown where all the women begin getting botox and dermaplaning just before puberty. Alabaster faces, subtle makeup, and perfectly coifed hair even when it is pulled up slutty secretary style. It is still Vogue. It is Hollywood.
But there was no Lulu Lemon in the train station. Off-brand leggings, jeans, and sweat pants with big pockets, not rolled down at the waist to show those beautiful, bony hips and flat stomachs like those Country Club College girls do. Tennis shoes or plastic clogs, no makeup or too much and hair of straw.
Am I being sexist? Am I unkind?
O.K. then. The men were balding with big arms and slight bellies. There was a plethora of baseball caps. The worst of them wore sleeveless t-shirts. The best of them walked with their lats slightly flexed, chins up, chest out, their movements and expressions declaring them little league football coaches mimicking their sports heroes on ESPN.
Yea. . . I'm an asshole. It was like going back home.
After lunch, I walked back to my car empty handed having gotten my mother not a single gift. I was defeated. I decided to drive around the larger town before leaving, past the million churches (at least as many as there were bars, especially in the old African American section of town where my good friend grew up) and neighborhood parks. I spied something and wheeled my car into a parking lot. I had to get a photo.
I laughed to myself--a perv bus, ho!
I wanted to see if I could remember how to get to Ili's old apartment. You have to know which streets to turn on as there are many dead ends and backtracking streets before you get there. I drove past slowly. It didn't look quite as I remembered it. There at the end of the block was the community garden where I had helped clear, dig, plant, and fertilize her plot. From there, I turned out onto the onetime highway now clogged with cheap, meretricious buildings that served the community and made the long drive home.
I went to the cafe for a latte, then to my mother's for a visit. She was confused and thought I was spending the night.
"Nope. Not until tomorrow."
She thought it was Christmas Eve. She was dumbfounded. She checked her phone.
"I thought you were staying, so I told Marlene I couldn't go with her and Jamie to see the Christmas lights. I'd better call her."
Just then I got a text saying the cleaning crew was on their way. What?!?!? I thought they were coming tomorrow! Holy shit. . . it must be genetic! I was as confused as my mother.
I jumped in the car and hurried home. I needed to put things away and get them their money. I dashed into the house and put things away as quickly as I could. I hadn't washed the second set of sheets, so there would be no changing the bed. Shit.
Just as I finished, the big van pulled up. I poured a Campari and lit a cheroot. I would sit on the deck as they cleaned.
"Don't worry about the bed," I said.
Last night, I slept in the same sheets. I'm a bum. I'm thinking of sleeping in them until next time the maids come. I won't. I promise. But the thought is there. Whatever.
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