This remodel on Shirley, for Alan, is a long, twisted, dirty novel that is taking some work to get read.
There are convoluted chapters, hairpin curves, a cast of characters that belong in a Louisiana swamp.
This job is not one you want to bring a friend to, but a friend is the only one who will show up day after day and help you put a nice shade of ruby lipstick on an old tired pig. As little money as possible has been spent on this house over the decades and the guiding principle has always been too use a band aid when a tourniquet was needed.
This project is almost done. You keep showing up day after day until there is, finally, a quitting point.
For me, this might be my last rehab. Stan, one of my best friends, says he has ” another nineteen years, two hundred and five days, three hours and two seconds to go till he retires. ”
With this property turned princess finished, dressed for the King’s ball, I am going gator hunting in the bayou and eat fried fish in a tin shack restaurant with sawdust floors and a cooler full of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer by the old fashioned manual cash register.
Next week, Stan, Stan’s brother Sid , Floyd and I are playing golf.
Golf beats working no matter how we score.
ABQ Marketplace on Louisiana has eclipsed Winrock Center, the original Albuquerque Mall.
While Winrock is now huge piles of dirt, exposed steel, jack hammered asphalt, chain link fences and construction signs, ABQ Marketplace is stocked with big name stores, food and restaurants, and stylish clothes that are already moving out of style. This evening shoppers jockey for parking spots and neon lights compete for human attention.
I sit outside the Apple Store and wait for Ruby to finish browsing Bebe’s. Watching her decide between dresses is a lot like watching paint dry and it goes easier if I sit out front and surf the net to see what Russia, China and the United States are up too in their latest wrestling match.
The Apple Logo is prominently mounted, above the Apple store’s front doors, highlighted by a spotlight. In diminishing light, clouds look as if they are plotting rain.
As powerful a mind as Steve Jobs had, he has moved on and other’s have picked up reins of his wagon and are driving it hellbent down winding mountain roads as outlaws try to steal his intellectual property.
Taking a bite out of an Apple has historic repercussions.
We still pay for Adam and Eve’s first unauthorized bite.
Golden Pride in Albuquerque sells fried chicken, Bar- B- Que, burritos, red and green enchiladas, and, of course, a world famous cinnamon roll drowning on a plate in butter and icing.
This black vehicle is parked in front of the East Central Route 66 location and comes equipped with literature, philosophy, and Biblical principles.
On the hood, the trunk, door panels, and bumpers is wisdom from the past. Good ideas are good regardless of the century and continent they were penned.
Mark Twain has his own special way with words and ideas. The Bible is clear on its central points – Men are Sinners, Mankind has fallen, Temptation is Satan’s favorite game, Redemption is possible, Death can be conquered, Jesus is the Savior.
Inside Golden Pride, I try to pinpoint the owner of this moving book but it could be most anyone in the restaurant.
New Mexico is odd that way. You can have a millionaire and a bum sitting at the same table and you can’t tell, from outward appearances, which one has the money.
Diving into my cinnamon roll, it is certain that Mark Twain, as much as the Holy Bible, comes up with ideas I wish I had thought of.
Thinking about the kind of person who would write on a car makes my lunch go better than normal.
This cinnamon roll has just the right amount of butter and icing, ordering two would just not be right, so I concentrate on the poetry of ideas..
One thing I wouldn’t write on my car, for sure, is my phone number.
Anonymity has great advantages.
Casa Esperanza is a non profit that provides temporary housing to families whose members are undergoing medical treatment in Albuquerque.
As a part of fundraising they run a car auction of donated vehicles. On Friday, the first of each month, you look at rolling stock, start engines, check doors and windows, look for oil leaks and body damage, check fluids. On Saturday you register, get a bidders number, and follow the auctioneer down a slippery slippery slope.
This Saturday there are fifty bidders and sightseers who move from one car to another as the auction unfolds. Some cars go too cheap, some too expensive. Some of these clunkers have been parked in garages as elderly drivers used them only to go to church. Some are to the point that fixing costs more than keeping. Some have been in wrecks. Some have salvage titles. There are stories behind these vehicles as flamboyant as the stories behind their owners.
The auction is over by noon and successful buyers take their papers to the office, pay fees, and make a white knuckle drive home.
Crazy Ron buys a Cadillac Deville that drives like a charm till it gets a mile from his house. The engine light comes on and the car shuts down from overheating.
” It drives great, ” he tells me at the curb in front of his house the next day.
Auctions are a place where buyers bid against buyers.
It is a spectacle, but buyer beware. Casa Esperanza doesn’t guarantee vehicles.
They move them out.
The fourth of July is the official birthday of the United States.
The American fight for Independence was hatched in Boston pubs and undertaken by a cadre of locals. Over taxed and under represented was the big beef and secretive plotting led to a Declaration of Independence from merry old England who was licking wounds from European wars and needed raw materials and taxes from America to pay for debts incurred.
There was fighting, men died, a Constitution was written, leaders got elected.
These days the metaphor for America is an aging Uncle Sam who sports a long white beard, wears clothes made out of a flag , has a top hat of red, white, and blue, a firm grip on your American credit card, and a hand in the affairs of other countries all over the world.
This is an older group present tonight, a group with a collective history.
This wild bunch has seen the Civil Rights movement, Kennedy assassination, Moon Walk, World War 2, Vietnam, Watts, Desert Storm, 2008 Financial Collapse, Government Shutdowns, the fall of Russia, Castro, Cell phones , Computers, Multiple Recessions, Gay Marriage, Food Stamps, Medicaid, TARP, TSA , Sex changes, Drones, Watergate, LSD, Disneyland.
Birthdays are good, once a year. They give a chance to pause, look back, look ahead.
What America says it is, and what it is, is a growing enigma.
It makes moments of peace, like this, more poignant.
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