yellowandblackmail

I had something profound to write about earlier but when I got home from work I lost it.

Here’s something less profound, though:

There’s a woman who is a regular rider with my company and she’s got this harsh disability where all her joints froze up. She walks stiff-legged, her hands are stuck in a duckbill like position if you were making shadow puppets, and her hips must be killing her. She’ll chat up a storm, though.

4 or 5 years ago her son got a full scholarship and randomly decided to go to the college that my mother was a librarian for. We both got a kick out of the coincidence and we talked about it for a few different rides. I gave her son my mom’s email address and I’m unsure if they actually talked or not, but it doesn’t really matter.

When my mom passed away, this lady was very sympathetic. She suggested I pick up a couple different books, one being “Journey of Souls” or something. I put them on my amazon wishlist, but never got around to buying them.

Today I had her in my cab again, and after not seeing her for over a year, she looks much older, thinner, and run down. Like life isn’t treating her well. She never looked like that before, she was always upbeat. She looks like the grandma that she is, I guess (her first son had a daughter that was with her today). She pressed on about the books, and eventually I’ll get to them.

She did say that she knew my mom was looking down on me and proud that I got married to a tall, handsome Englishman and that I was happy. I got a little misty, and am glad that I have this random connection to my mom even in Madison. It’s just how this town works.

It kinda sucks that after being gone over a year I see the definite and depressing signs of aging in some of our regulars. One woman earlier today was now completely gray and pulling an oxygen tank… she only retired about 5 years ago half-gray and no need of extra oxygen.  I think she might just be waiting to die.  She talked as if she hadn’t left the house in a month.  A second woman was leaning more heavily on her walker and speaking much slower with her slurred enunciation.  She had a severe brain injury 15 years ago has gotten to the point that there will be no more recovery or even a plateau of functionality, it’s now turned into a slow decline.  She’s not even really old, more middle-aged.

First full working day back in Madison after my California vacation… until a citywide weather emergency is declared and our company CLOSES (we’re 24/7 everyday of the year). It’s funny to hear the dispatcher call over the air: “All drivers pull over safely and wait for further instructions.” So what do I do? I head straight for my friend and co-worker’s house to pick her up and get some beer.  I wasn’t far away.

There is no stopping. Only sliding! At one point I was passing some pedestrians that wanted to walk in front of me… and even though I was going 3 miles an hour they were risking their lives. I rolled down the window and stuck my head out yelling “GET OUT OF THE WAY I CAN’T STOP!!!”

No pedestrians were harmed on this beer run.

Work was total shit. It snowed today, the roads were icy at best, and passengers were cheap and intolerant. I actually had a woman in my cab start blabbing about how awful prop 8 was and how she doesn’t want her child in any school that teaches about “Mom and Mom” and “Dad and Dad” so she moved to Las Vegas instead of Fresno. THEN she turns to ME (the female cab driver with short hair and tomboy clothes) and asks “You aren’t gay are you?” I gave her the non-answer of a foul grimace and she quickly changed the subject. I hope I made her feel uncomfortable and guilty, even if i’m not gay. She should know better than to run her mouth like that, and I hope her daughter becomes a better woman than her mother.

I shouldn’t take tomorrow off, but I’m tempted. I could use a nice long bath and time with my cats. … Even though last week I barely worked at all.

Tonight was pretty darn beautiful in Madison. I was REALLY scared before the results started coming in, as I think a lot of us were. Here are some highlights:

My coworkers who didn’t have to work (like I had to) went to Genna’s to see the election pan out. They were giving free blue jello shots to everyone in the bar for each state Obama won. They ran out before he was declared the winner (not from u underestimating him, but under estimating how many people would show up to the bar). The bar exploded with cheers when Iowa was declared blue.

I had 3 sorority girls in my cab going to a restaurant for one of their birthdays. They were very excited to see that Obama was ahead, but you could tell one of them didn’t want to admit she voted republican because the two other girls that were more popular than her voted Obama and were very vocal about it.

Probably more than half the bars in Madison were hosting campaign parties. None of them were offering specials to McCain supporters. Several were offering 30% off if you had an Obama Something on. All of them were pretty full for a tuesday.

WORT, the local public radio station run by volunteers, were excited to announce that CNN, NBC, CBS and other major stations had declared Obama as the winner. Then they went on to say “This is early in the process, though, so it MIGHT change, but probably not…” Then 2 minutes later, “FOX just declared Obama the winner, and if FOX admits it, that’s huge!”

From there the celebrations started small. College kids ran around campus in twos and threes with arms up and yelling cheers to each other. Then parades started breaking out. PARADES. AT TEN O’CLOCK AT NIGHT WITHOUT PRIOR ORGANIZING. State street was impassable for a while. I hear the parade ended on the top of Bascom Mall with the national anthem.

About 30 people the ages of about 25-50 partied in the middle of East Johnson just 1 block east of Baldwin in the median… for an hour. A whole flipping hour, from 10 to 11 pm. They were drinking beer and dancing and waving at the heavy traffic and a lot of cars honked and cheered back at them.  This is a residential area without any bars nearby.  Neighbors just decided they wanted to all celebrate together in the middle of the road.

I’m sure there’s a lot more stories, but my job is unique enough that I got to see more than 1 thing happen in the city tonight, and it was pretty magical. I love Madison even more than I did before, and I can’t WAIT until the current Bozo is out of office.