Forty Four Dollars and Found.

 

 

 

 

Forty-four dollars and found.

August 26. 2023.

I arrived at the kolache place at 7:05 a.m. The weather was cool and clear. The wasps have a nest in the Hruska’s sign above the door, and the sullen creatures were already busy hovering in front of and menacing passersby.

My garment bottoms extend past the end of all my summer shorts, so Amy is only happy when I wear long pants in public. Which is okay except when it gets above 90 degrees – which happened today. That makes me a little impatient for fall weather. Still, with global warming, greenhouse gas, and Trump running off his mouth ad nauseum, I believe the Wasatch Valley will likely not see comfortable fall temperatures until Halloween.

Trick or Treat!

Today’s haul is $44.00 in my #10 can and nine kolaches.

My haiku today:

Glance at a cloud once,

Then turn away for a bit –

Look back, and it’s gone.

Seven people stopped to tell me they liked my haiku. That pleased me enormously. I enjoy analog praise more than likes and emojis on digital social media.

Several people bought me bottles of Glaceau SmartWater. I never drink ‘em. They go to Amy. Since she says I already got a smart mouth . . .  (Henny Youngman, get outta town!)

No street construction work today. I guess those guys have a five-day workweek. So, I was spared an incipient migraine.

On one of my bathroom breaks, I left my can in front of the wheelchair and propped my haiku up against the backrest. Someone put a five-dollar bill in my can while I was gone. That was a happy surprise, and it triggered a flashback to my childhood – when Dad would drive the whole family down Larpenteur Avenue in Saint Paul in late October to search for suitable jack-o-lantern pumpkins. Back then, Larpenteur was studded with corn fields and truck farms. We always went on a Sunday, so no one manned the vegetable stands. They were all at church (or, more likely, inside, glued to their TVs watching football.) Each stand had a coffee can on a table, with a scrawled sign giving the prices of corn, squash, tomatoes, and pumpkins. The farmers trusted Sunday shoppers to drop in the right amount. That’s a warm memory I like to mull over when today’s world gets too chilly and distant.

There were no crazy people today during my shift in front of the Kolache place. No extended conversations with anyone, as a matter of fact. People came and went, dropping money in my can and bringing me kolaches with little to say.

Except for that age-old question that is beginning to bug the Skittles out of me – “Are you homeless?”

I must have gotten that question a half dozen times today. The next time somebody asks me that, I’m going to answer “Yes” and see what happens . . .