After graduate school, it was time for my husband, W.S. to get a job, and he found one in “The Windy City”. So, we chugged toward Chicago in our beat-up Plymouth. It was a long drive and by the time we arrived, we were tired and bedraggled. W.S. hadn’t shaved in several days, and we both were looking forward to a shower, a meal and a bed.
Cruising down the Outer Drive, W.S. turned on the windshield wipers and said, “Too bad we had to get here on a rainy day.” By now, it was raining very hard, making it difficult to see out of the front window. Then, I looked to my right, and I looked to my left, and I said, “It’s not raining on those other cars.”
“What do you mean?” he said.
“I mean, the sun is shining and it’s only raining on us.” Sure enough, those Chicagoans driving by hadn’t been welcoming my bearded husband with shouts of “Razor! Razor!” They were yelling, “Radiator! Radiator!” It was time to pull off the road, and find some water before our little, old car died of dehydration.
We pulled into the side lot of a very large hospital. W.S. said, “I’m sure I can find a bucket of water in here,” as he left the car, headed toward the automatic entrance doors and disappeared---And then, I waited, and I waited, and I waited.
Finally, after 45 minutes, W.S. sprinted out of the hospital with a rusty bucket in hand, dribbling a trail of water behind him. “What took you so long?” I asked. He said, “Have you ever run through a mental ward yelling for a bucket of water, and then tried to convince people you don’t belong there? Well I have, and I don’t recommend it.” I guessed that he had put up quite a fight, because they told him to leave the bucket outside the door.
By now, it was getting dark; we had no place to stay and an unpredictable car to get us there. I suggested we pull off the road, find a service station and stay anywhere there was a vacancy. It took awhile, but we did find a service station whose manager promised that the mechanic would be there in the morning, and he recommended an inexpensive hotel nearby.
Inexpensive was the operative word. The small wooden structure didn’t look much like a hotel, but the desk clerk showed us a room that was clean and had a bed and a bathroom. As long as there were no bedbugs, we were satisfied. The strong smell of disinfectant was unpleasant but reassuring.
We had purchased some sodas and unhealthy snacks at the service station, which had to suffice for supper, and W.S. went down the hall to get some ice. By now, he was an expert with buckets. After 20 minutes he returned. “Did you have trouble finding the ice machine?” I asked.
“No, he said, “It was right at the end of the hall.” “So, what took you so long?”
“People kept stopping me,” he grumbled. “Three doors down, some woman opened her door and asked me if I had the time. Then another woman walking down the hall said, ‘Sugar, you got the time?’ Doesn’t anyone in Chicago wear a watch?”
For once, I kept my mouth shut.
Esther Blumenfeld (“Whether it’s the best of times or the worst of times, it’s the only time we’ve got.”) Art Buchwald
CROSSING WITH THE BLUE LIGHT, Blumenfeld c 2006