Meh

In school, I hated gym -- actually, I've pretty much always hated physical activity of any kind. That didn't stop me from trying, though, and I always passed -- if not from success, then at least I got by with Effort. No matter if it was basketball or tennis, though, the other athletes always made beating me look effortless.

One day, after a particularly embarrassing round of foot hockey (or whatever they called it), one of the guys, I'm pretty sure it was RA (the one who gave me such sage advice as, "Never get in a fight you can't win.") told me surreptitiously, "You know, Sam, you would have more fun if you didn't try so hard."

About a year earlier, I was stressing out over a paper for Western Civ. and Will M. told me, "Sam, you need to learn how to say, 'Meh.' Say it with me. I've got a paper due tomorrow! Meh."

My coworker and boss always tell me that they are amazed at how much extra work I make for myself. It always seems to me that if it's easy then it's wrong.

This is why I rarely miss a deadline, even with this blog. I don't particularly want to post. I rarely want to do anything, in fact. I just do it. It's always what Ought to be done and what Should come next.

I'm not entirely sure how to finish this one. You see, I don't like writing about myself in this blog. Ironic. Even when I'm writing personal essays I tend to think in terms of  Narrator and Story, not Me. That said, it's been a tough few weeks and I'm trying to resign myself to disappointment. In the past two weeks, my applications have been declined by Wash U., KU, and Minnesota. The deeper into February I get, the more remote the possibility that I'll receive good news. It reminds me of when I was 18 and applying for college, receiving one rejection after the next, opportunity narrowing to one possibility -- UI, which was legally required to accept me because I was Iowan and had the good grades and test scores. Not that I'm not grateful for my education there, but it would have been nice if I'd had a choice.

Last year, when the first round of rejections started coming in, I confessed to CD that I was afraid of getting rejected from everywhere because I didn't think I'd have the energy to move north and apply for jobs. She said, "Well, even if you are rejected from everywhere, it'll suck, but you'll have the energy, you'll apply for jobs and get one." I wasn't glad she was right. Seventy-odd applications, as many networking dates, and about ten second-interviews later I ended up with another last choice.

It all disturbs me because I don't understand what I'm doing wrong. I've heard too often that I'm good, but not good enough. I'm growing bitter. IB told me, in the middle of the Bad Season last year that she knew many people who were in the same situation, applying for dozens of grad school and hundreds of salaried jobs and finding themselves in AmeriCorps or coffee shops wondering how the hell That happened. I take no comfort from this, though. I feel bad for my peers who are suffering disappointments and hate that we have to share such awful camaraderie.

"I write to exorcise my demons," a friend of mine told me once. Xe was being melodramatic, but sometimes melodrama's the way to go. This is the most confessional post I've done in a long time and I needed to write it and I do feel that I've gotten something Bad out of me.

A and I had a good night last night. We saw several bands at the Turf Club and it was worth the entry fee. This evening, we shall get together with friends to play games and it will be Good. I have a long weekend and I'm going to make the most of it reading (The Bell Jar about three years too late), writing, playing video games, wasting time with friends, and visiting with my brother-in-law. It's a beautiful, sunny, cold day in Minneapolis, and A and I are hanging out at Spyhouse Cafe. The light roast is immaculate.

Short Short Stories

After work, the three of us stood around in the office while the sun went down, talking about politics, past jobs, and sickness. C noted that there were many more sick teachers and administrators this year. They're dropping like flies, he said. It's the long summer, he said, bacteria needs cold damp weather. But the cold brings other problems.

A kid died after playing in the leaves when when I was superintendent, D said. He was the son of one of our principals. They were out playing in the leaves and the next day he was in the hospital. They didn't know what it was for days. They even brought down the CDC from Atlanta. It turned out that it was some rare genetic trait that both he and his brother had inherited. They both died. It was so tragic. It destroyed their marriage and drove them both crazy. It was so tragic.

In five minutes, D told a story that claimed four lives. It's so easy to sum up days and years and lifetimes. Given a few minutes and enough creativity, we could probably cover just about everything in the time it takes to microwave dinner.

#

I'm fascinated by the way people tell stories. IB once said she saw this come up again and again in my writing, that I zone in on anecdotes. It's how we get by and through life, breaking the slow march of days and years into manageable, meaningful things. But, whenever you stop to think about it, write it down, stories somehow seem to callous and almost Kafkaesque. Pick up Etgar Keret or Alex Epstein sometime. Short short stories are spooky.

#

In other news, my good friend Colleen Morrissey's story, "Good Faith," was just published in The Cincinnati Review. Check it out.

Tribute to Chuck Palahniuk

To Chuck Palahniuk:

And IB muttered, "This city..."

"I came back for the soil," DB said. She returned shortly after the flood waters that followed Hurricane Katrina finally receded. Most of St. Bernard Parish has been a sugar plantations for centuries up until very recently. It's rich, sweet soil for gardening.

"It's home," said OH. "There's a lot of history in this area. New Orleans is the fulcrum of the country... The city has to be here."

"You'll meet the nicest people you'll ever know in this city," JH said. "Everywhere you go, there'll be someone with food."

"My cousin was by the levee in the woods when it happened," DB said. "He said he heard a sound like a bomb going off and then everything went quiet. And then he saw deer, squirrels, birds, all these animals, every animal in the forest started running past him. The entire forest was in a stampede to get out of there."

VG: "The first time the fire department realized something was wrong, a friend of mine was in the room with the New Orleans chief. He got a call from some guys who said, -- There are all these fires on the north shore. -- Well, why aren't you putting them out? -- We can't get to them. -- Why can't you get to them? -- Because of all the water in the streets. And then the chief yelled, 'Fuck! The levees broke! It's the only explanation...'"

"You know, I wouldn't be surprised if they blew up the levees for Betsy," said LD. "But for Katrina the whole city was destroyed. Nobody got anything out of that."

"I have a friend in the National Guard," said JWB, a St. Bernard Parish resident, "And he told me, swear to god, that the year before Katrina he was ordered to go out to the levees and bury dynamite. They didn't blow it up then. But they did for Katrina."

"No matter what you heard, saw, or read about Katrina, it was much worse than that," KM said.

DB has gardened is her life. From seeds, scraps, and branches DB has coaxed out an entire perennial paradise. All of the plants have a purpose, though -- "Butterflies like pizzas and hummingbirds like ice cream cones," DB says, explaining the shapes of the flowers in her garden.

Behind his gutted, rotting house, JY keeps chickens. He and his wife bring their kids out to see chickens several times a week, to feed and water them. It turns out, he discovered, that the city has a limit on how many animals a person can have on the property: four. He culled the flock down from a dozen to the city's prescribed limit.

VG: (paraphrased) Actually, CNN was one of the first news agencies to report the levees breaking. X was in a community center with her cameraman. Suddenly the councilwoman from the Ninth Ward rushed inside and yelled, 'Please, come quick! People are dying!' So X and her camera man followed the councilwoman up to the Claiborne bridge, I think. All the electricity in the city was out so it was pitch black and they couldn't get any visual footage, but they could hear it. Standing on the bridge, surrounded by a pitch black, muggy night the reporters and councilwoman could hear the sound of rushing water, a deluge, and the screams of thousands.

"I was at a bar the other night and this guy sitting next to me asked me where I was from," AO said, "And when I said I was here for a year with AmeriCorps he said, 'Get out now. Because if you don't, you'll never leave.'"

"This town doesn't like to drink," JC said, "it likes to be drunk." But, "All the things that are great about this city are starting to go away. I mean, some policemen are starting to bust you for drinking on the streets... They're getting after bars because their bands for being too loud."

"I don't like New Orleans, actually," admits JY. JY received a great deal of money from Road Home, but could only use it to elevate the house. There are specialized services in New Orleans for elevating houses. JY told the contractor to raise the house as far as he could with the  tens of thousands of dollars he received from Road Home. This turned out to be nine feet. None of the money could be used to build anything else, even a staircase. The only way to get into the gutted house, now, is with a ladder.

JY laughed and explained that he tells his friends they can store things in his house if they want to. No one can get in it, not without a ladder. It's the safest place to store things.

Author of Showdown in Desire, Orissa Arend, spoke at Fair Grinds Coffee. She described a shootout between the New Orleans Police department and the local chapter of the Black Panthers. It appears, from witness reports, that the police issued no warning and, without provocation, shot at the house for a half hour before the Black Panthers inside were allowed to surrender and leave the building. Miraculously, no one was hurt or killed. One Panther said he spoke to a black officer at the scene. They echoed one another's words, "Sorry, but I'm on this side." And then the started talking about the Saints.

"... I don't think I've ever been in a place full of happier people than when Drew Brees paraded as king of Bacchus one week after the Saints won the Super Bowl," said SD. "The happiness of the crowds that night was unbelievable, and I'm so glad I was able to be a part of such a great celebration--even if I didn't get one of the mini footballs Drew was throwing from the float."

"I get the impression that people came here to have a parade and a city got in their way," NF said.

"The great thing about this place is you can be anything. You can do anything," JC said. "I could decide to be an astronaut tomorrow and I could do it. I've never wanted to, but I could."

Trash

In this heat, the trash can't sit. At my office this basic fact has become a sacred duty.

My coworkers and I find Evidence of vermin every morning. Droppings. Dead cockroaches. Things. Combating the fruit flies is a full-time job. At one point, a former colleague threatened anyone who dared leave food in the office overnight with the punishment of being tied up Gulliver-style, covered with cheese, and left until morning. The trash must be taken out. And that full-time job goes to me.

When I worked at the Java House in Iowa City I never minded taking out the trash. It was a duty universally despised by my coworkers, but for some reason I found it zen. Remove the bag, march through the back past the studyers, the coffee junkies, the people Ignoring you walking by with a gigantic bag of coffee grinds and filters, depositing said bag in a dumpster and, magically, the place is cleaner. That's why, before I leave work every day at the office, I don't mind taking out the trash.

Actually, I do this Everywhere.

At my house, I am usually the one carrying the trash can to the curb every Tuesday and Friday morning. Whenever there's a construction project that I am compelled to attend because of work, I'm always glad to clean up the site, tie up the garbage bags, and throw things into the giant green bins for Disposal.

Often, at parties, I find myself Carrying out bags of red cups, beer boxes, half-eaten slices of pizza, dirty plastic plates and silverware, scribbled notes, cans, bottles, wrappers, moldy food, broken electronics, and the debris of late furniture. It's a compulsion.

And I'm not Opposed to sorting out the Refuse either. My Green and German friends have Educated me. Plastics, glass, paper, and bio-degradables all belong to separate containers to be taken Other Places, Somewhere Else.

It's easy. A zen gesture. Probably something that, under proper scrutiny, Reveals Something about my personality, upbringing, and identity. I am, however, too lazy to make metaphors or go too deeply into self-introspection today. So, take from this what you will. In fact, take it out. Forget about it.

#

My friend, Paul "Canada" Nemeth, the man who saved my life once in high school, is now a poet. And he knows it, apparently. Check out his Facebook page.

New Orleans Misc.

A friend, CO, was at a bar not far from my house. It was a Wednesday afternoon, hot, muggy, strange and there was nothing better to do. He sat down and an older man sitting next to him asked CO where he was from. New Jersey, said CO.

"What brings you down here, baby?" said the man.

"AmeriCorps," said CO. "I  rebuild houses."

"You like the city?"

"I love it here," CO said, holding up his High Life and taking a sip.

The man's tone went dark. "Get out now."

CO was taken aback. "What?"

"Get out now," the man said. "Because if you don't, you'll never leave. Trust me. You'll fall in love and never get out."

#

Last week a fifteen year old black girl was shot to death in the Desire neighborhood. A week earlier her boyfriend was shot and killed in more or less the same area. The Times Picayune says that the best the police can do is say it's about turf warfare or schoolyard brawling.

#

"There are so many ways to make a left turn in this town," AC says. We're trying to navigate through the streets of the Marigny and we are not being successful. AC instructs to make another right turn. No one has any idea where we are, but this does not seem to bother AC.

"You can make three right turns. You can overshoot and make a u-turn. You pull down a driveway, back up, and go straight down the way you wanted to..."

"Yeah," said AY, "you can basically do anything but make a left turn."

"But it forces you to be creative."

#

Six years after Katrina, there are still several thousand people who haven't been able to rebuild their houses.

The Greater New Orleans Community Data Center said the number was around 10,000 in 2010 and since then people have played with the statistics (five thousand, eight thousand, and so on) because no one really knows.

There are so many mysteries about this place. It might be useful for the ambiance, but it's hell for a grant writer.

#

L and my house sits near the end of a one-way street in the Fairgrounds. There is no direct way to get there by car except by way of an elaborate dance through the other one-way streets surrounding it like a labyrinth. There is, however, an intersection of two main streets which our road runs into, but you cannot enter the street from this point.

AC was driving with us home one day. L stared down the entrance to our street. "Why can't I just drive down that way? It would be so much faster. Why can't you enter there?"

AC shrugged and said, "Do whatever you want."

"Really?" L asked, looking over at him.

AC nodded. "Really."

So L drove down the street directly to our house. No one tried to stop us.

New Orleans made more sense to me suddenly.

Building Systems

A cold fall night. Maybe Rain. Thanksgiving draws closer and Why Not is good enough. Uptown just off of Magazine.

They stand outside smoking and listening to the wind through the dead leaves and thinking about the water that may fall on their heads.

S is baffled that trees lose their leaves Down Here. It's a twelve month growing season. He just assumed that, you know, nothing died below the Mason-Dixon Line. And yet, there it Is – piles of wet debris in the gutters, on the sidewalk, matting the grass, leaving bare, skeletal oak arms up above whose only garment now is Mardi Gras beads.

There are three of them – and an occasional loud party-goer wanders out to chat, smoke – but then returns to the party. E introduces S to the Other Guy: D. E says, "D and I are old friends. He's a civil engineer. He works on the levees."

"Oh," says S. He's holding a tumbler of whiskey. While everyone else went to the fridge for beer, he ferreted out the liquor cabinet and, since no one stopped him, took generously.

"That's the reaction I usually get," says D.

"Yeah," says E. He's nursing a beer. "D is our go-to guy when we want to know How Bad It's Going to Get. During Gustav we called D up and asked him if we should leave and he said 'Get the hell out of town.'"

"Yeah," says D. "We were lucky that time. But it could have been a lot worse."

"So you must know--" S begins.

"Yes," D says and lights a cigarette, seemingly in preparation for the following conversation. "You want to know What Went Wrong, right?"

"Yes," S says.

"New Orleans is a bowl," D begins. He cups his hands, smoke rising between his fingers creating a smoldering crater. "And the way you’re Supposed to build a levee system is with a lot of spill ways back-up levee barriers, and so on. It's so that when a storm hits and there's a surge there's somewhere for the water to go. If the pressure gets too great, you open up a spill way and relieve pressure on the system.

"What we have in New Orleans is just one Gigantic Wall. You know what happens when a hurricane hits? They have all these gates surrounding the city and when a storm comes they close them and seal off the city. Any pressure or surge affects the whole system. If the pressure gets too great then the whole system fails. Well, there's nowhere for the water to go and no way to relieve the system. What happens then? Catastrophic Failure. You lose a three hundred year old city."

"What about the system now? I thought the Army Corps was rebuilding it," says S.

D laughs and shakes his head. "It's no better. Their solution to the Failure was just build a Bigger Fucking Wall. Very American – just build it bigger. It's supposed to stop a Category 3, but..."

"Just a Category 3?" S asks. "What happens if a Category 5 hits?"

D shakes his head. "There's nothing you can build that could stop a Category 5."

D's cigarette falls to the cement and his shoe rubs it out.

Tornadoes. That's what S remembers. The raw force of wind that can twist and pull entire towns off the face of the earth. No such thing as Tornado-Proof.

And it starts to rain.

Fights You Can't Win, Part II

Spring a few years ago I went to Mayflower dorm that sits on the River in Iowa City. Two years later it flooded. But this story isn't about the deluge -- it's about fighting, sort of.

A friend lived in Mayflower. His name is Henry. There was no occasion, just an invitation on a Thursday night for a pre-game drink before going into town. Mayflower is an old apartment building renovated to be a dorm so every time I went there I felt slightly out of my element. It was crossing a threshold from carefully monitored and manicured campus existence into the weird liminal space of strictly regulated freedom. College dorms are weird. Sort of like college life in general.

Henry invited me in. Well, he opened the door and, in a characteristic gesture, grabbed me in a hug and flipped me over his shoulder, somehow maneuvering me so that I cleared the door frame, into his apartment. "Sam!" he shouted. Henry is a diabetic who has never followed his prescribed diet and has survived by balancing his eating habits with absurd physical activity. I still don't think the guy sleeps.

Steadying myself against the wall, I said, "Never do that again," knowing that he'd just forget in a few minutes.

"How the hell are you?" he asked, darting past me into the kitchen. "Did you bring it?"

I nodded and pulled a gallon of Arizona Green Tea out of my back pack. He clapped his hands and said, "Fantastic. Now I'll show you my discovery. Follow me and let's begin."

I followed him through the cramped entry way with miraculously in-tact drywall into the tiny kitchen. The roommate was there, sitting at the table. He was a beefy kid, a bro who wore a cap on backwards and sunglasses to bars. He was eating a candy bar and had a large kitchen knife sitting next to him on the table.

"Hello," I said.

"Hi," he said.

"Hello," Henry said.

The roommate and Henry stared at each other for a moment. After a very tense silence the roommate picked up the knife and walked out of the kitchen to his room.

"So," I said. "How is that working out? I thought you two got along."

Henry went to the fridge and pulled an unopened bottle of Smirnoff from the freezer. In a brutal gesture he twisted the lid off and tossed it down on the wooden table. A sound like pennies falling. In the next room Coldplay suddenly erupted at an absurd volume. Henry gave the wall the finger.

"We did. But over the past few weeks, as we've gotten to know each other, it's just like been every time we're in the same room together we're both thinking 'I hate you.' Do you hear that music?" Henry stabbed his hand in the general direction of the noise. I refrained from saying that I like Coldplay.

"Anyway, Henry said, yanked a stool out from under the table and jumped down on the seat across from me with three glasses and the bottle of vodka. "Let me show you something."

He poured out about a glass full of the tea and then set it aside. He then refilled the gallon jug of tea with vodka and shook it vigorously. Once the ad hoc bar-tending was done he poured it out into the two glasses and then poured vodka into the glass with just tea and stirred it up with a butter knife. Three glasses.

"Where is Kim?" I asked and took one glass.

There was a loud knock on the door. "Speak of the devil," said Henry quietly and stood rather than jumped up. A moment later he led Kim into the kitchen and both sat down wordlessly. I raised my glass.

"To whatever," I said, feeling clever. Kim didn't ask what it was and drank anyway.

Then we talked about the weather, how the heat was becoming unpleasant and there was no way not to sweat anymore. We talked about classes and allergies, the pollen that chocked and itched and brought tears. It was a cordial conversation. And we talked about Tae Kwon Do.

I had been an amateur and, after moving to Iowa City, I had given up. Not Henry or Kim, though. They were Serious. They competed in Nationals and I met them both through the Iowa State Karate Club (a drinking club with a martial arts problem). They were the reason I didn't spar. Both of them were stronger, faster, and gleefully meaner than anyone else. So it wasn't so much that they were both serious as that they took too much pleasure in fighting.

Anyway, at some point I mentioned that I hadn't seen Molly in a long time and the conversation came to a dead stop. Henry and Kim looked at each other and then at their glasses. They took turns refilling. In the other room, Coldplay's "Trouble" was still playing as loud as ever and it now seemed strangely appropriate.

"Uh," I said. "What's going on?"

"Nothing, actually," Kim said. He looked at Henry. "Life and everything are sort of on hold right now. There has been a misunderstanding. A failure to communicate. And, so, nothing is happening."

"That's one way of putting it," Henry said, still looking at his glass.

Molly was Kim's ex. There had been marriage plans announced and then swept away, forgotten, tensions rising and falling. Ultimately, it sounded like all the wounds had healed months ago. Things were supposed to be back to normal.

Kim said, "How would you put it, then?"

"Molly is trying to decide which one of us she wants to date," Henry said, staring at his drink. Kim stiffened, turned red, and then relaxed.

"Yeah, that would be the sum of the misunderstanding," Kim said.

"She said so yesterday and now things are..."

"May the best man win," Kim said, raising his glass in a toast that no one reciprocated. "We have a gentleman's agreement."

"We do," Henry said, grabbing on to the statement for dear life and drinking. "We're waiting for her word and then the guy not chosen will ow out graciously."

"Step to the side. Tap out," Kim said. "That was the deal."

"It's not going to work that way, though," Henry said. He looked up and the two stared at each other until both nodded. "It's not, is it?" Henry said.

There was a grim pause. Eventually, I said, "Holy shit. Are you two going to fight over her?" hoping that this would jar everyone back to reality. It was my best hope.

They both looked at me. There was shock and horror.

"Holy fuck," Henry said. "We can't let it come to that."

"It would be like The Matrix," Kim said and he did not sound like he liked the idea.

"Buildings would collapse."

"Bystanders would be killed."

"There would never be enough police."

"They'd have to call out the Army."

"Call a national emergency."

"And we wouldn't stop until Everything was Broken."

"It would be apocalyptic."

"Uh, guys...?" I said. They both looked at me and must have seen terror because they both burst out laughing. This continued for a long time, drowning out the Coldplay.

"Come on," Henry said. "Let's get drunk and then go out."

And so we did.

That was the last I heard of the love triangle for a long time until one day, many months later, I asked a mutual friend how everything worked out. She said that Molly chose God over the boys and that was the end of it. When she said this, I felt sorry for God. It was only a matter of time before Kim and Henry had their reckoning.

Make or Break

Imagine the Perfect Person for You. This Person is everything you have ever desired in a Partner. If life were a genre romance, this is the Person you would go on a Quest to save and your Story would be inflicted on generations of high schoolers. Probably you’d make yourself sick by loving this person. Yes, that One. Perfect in every way except for One Thing.

This is the game: Make or Break.

For instance: this Person is perfect for you in every way, except when you’re within ten feet of them you become functionally illiterate. Or they have face-blindness – just for you. Or they can only speak in rhyming couplets.

You get the idea.

It’s a great icebreaker, or a good way to pass the time when you only have one bottle of wine to share among four people, it’s a Tuesday night, there’s no reason to go out, something vegetarian lies mostly-eaten on the table and there’s no other alternative than to have a pleasant round of one-up-man-ship. Usually, this gets dirty fast. Most people can’t help it. After all, we’ve all played Apples to Apples. Or it just gets too personal (“They’re perfect for you in every way except they’ve slept with Elyot… I mean…”)

Or people take it too seriously.

K, M, and I were driving down Claiborne on the way back from Work when, in a few moments of silence, I suggested the game and explained the rules. M had the windows down and so we had to shout over the hot, late, Caribbean fall wind. It hadn’t been a Bad Day, and so we were talkative.

“They’re prefect for you except that they believe you’re an imaginary friend,” I said, “ala Fight Club.”

All Considered this one for a moment and concluded that this would be problematic, but Interesting. Ultimately, the relationship would Fall Apart. Preferably before they had you duct-taped to a chair on top of a skyscraper, pressing a gun into your mouth.

“What if they lived across the country?” M said, making a sharp turn for the realistic. “No matter what effort you made to get close to them, their work always took them somewhere else?”

“That sucks,” I said with conviction. “And that’s not in the spirit of the game.”

M was undaunted. “What if she had a much more adventurous sexual history than you and her name is Amy?”

“Isn’t there just supposed to be one flaw?” K asked, flicking a cigarette into the street. A line of ash erupted across the pavement and then Disappeared.

“I’m just speculating,” M said.

We turned down St. Bernard, past the Circle Food Store that has remained closed since Katrina – in fact, most of that corner looks like the Nuclear Holocaust passed through fifty years ago. It’s difficult to imagine a time when this was a shopping area where Families came to get groceries and chat and sit in the shade of trees on the concrete benches and envy the people who could live so close by in the now dissolving wood, decaying paint, angles of disrepair and stretches of house-shaped, once-life-shaped lots.

“Make or break,” K said slyly. We pass over a significant bump, but on one is fazed. “She’s an alcoholic.”

I considered protesting this one, but already my brain was at work. All the alcoholics I’ve ever known suddenly sprung to mind along with Empathy and a deep Reluctance to Dismiss them outright. They have all been good friends. I love my Alcoholic Friends.

“Well,” M said, “What kind of alcoholic?”

“Or is she a classy, 1950s drunk?” I asked. “Can she still hold a cigarette holder, quote Ginsberg, and walk in on high heels when she’s shattered?”

M made a dangerous pivot in his seat to look at me and show the measure of his false-disgust. “You would ask that, wouldn’t you?”

“Whatever kind of alcoholic would be most problematic for you,” K clarifies.

“Well, that’s tough,” M said, returning to the relevant topic. He was going now, in his Routine. “I mean, are we talking functional? Or does she vomit blood every night?”

M pulled down our street. “This is a terrible, terrible conversation. Thanks, Sam. You’ve made us all terrible people.”

“I do what I can,” I said.

“I know. And it’s about time you stopped.”