empty town

pumpkin soup, grilled cheese sammies with fake chicken, beer, 2 shots of vodka

Josh and I are on a trip to this little town. Josh is there to work, apparently, but I'm along for the ride & hope to just hang around. I'm meandering down this little main-drag street, old brick buildings, a place you'd expect a "general store" to be the main grocery. But not suprisingly, it's another little old town with an ailing Main Street. It's nearly deserted, and many shops are boarded up. But those not boarded up are closed, pretty early it seems, and there's...nobody...around. What the...?

I make my way down one side of the street, and at the end see the storefront where I know Josh is working. The windows are decorated with modern, slick vinyls, the word STUDIO in green block letters and a red 80 in a red circle beneath it. I go a little further down & cross, come back to Studio 80, go in. But Josh is at work somewhere in the back and can't be summoned, I'm politely ushered out with a Thank You and Do Come Again attitude.

I walk down this other side of the main drag now. At the far end there is a tall, modern building, looks like a hospital. When I'm near the door, two guys in business suits come out, briefcases & all. One has oxygen tubes hooked over his ears & into his nose, but no tank on the end. The tube hangs down to his waist & is just open. His friend is telling him that he really doesn't need this thing to breathe, and he shouldn't wear it, slips in some slight jab of guilt about people who REALLY need such things, seeming to be referencing something personal.

I become the man with the oxygen tube. I pick up the end, put it in my mouth, and blow into it. I feel my lungs expand. I'm somewhat amazed, probably intuitively aware that such a thing should be impossible. I get into my businessman car, I drive away.