Giant Newsboy Cap

Saturday, I stopped in the Timothy’s coffeeshop across from the Bloor-Yonge subway stop. There was a long line of people who all seemed to be the sort who sit on museum boards. At one table, a group of wealthy, middle aged museum board types talked cheerfully about one man’s $1,500 digital camera, while an obviously hauled - along - in - protest twenty two year old sat staring at the table in a trance of boredom that I bet required shaking when everyone else was ready to go.

Behind me, two French women chattered about…well, despite my best attempts, all I could discern were words like “”always”" and “”too much”" and “”not”". I know it’s a cliché, but to my ears, French is truly the most beautiful language, so I was thoroughly enjoying myself. The man who owns this particular Timothy’s makes every customer feel as if he has opened the store that day solely in the hopes that they might stop by. He speaks flawless English with an Arabic lilt, so I was as surprised as the French women when he greeted them with, “”Bonjour, mesdames. çava?”" in what sounded to me like a perfect accent. The two women gave twin cries of delight and proceeded to order in French.

And that is some fucking customer service, people.

One of my worst habits when I’m with Paul is wandering off in my own head. We’ll be standing there waiting for the subway train, and he’ll be telling me a story, and I’ll suddenly realize that I’ve missed half of it because I’ve spotted a man striding by in a sort of giant newsboy cap, in which I know his prodigious hair is piled in a luxurious mess and I’m wishing I had the guts to ask for a photo.

The subway stations attract the sorts of ads that you’d see in the back of a TV Guide. Advertisers reason that if the potential customer can’t afford a car, they can’t afford nice clothes, or a house, or fancy restaurants. TTC riders can, apparently, afford cellphones, condos, and we soak our financial woes in the soothing broth of Television. Would you like some lovely Spam with your Television, sir? I’ve warmed it up just for you. Throw away your glasses forever in just two weeks! Conquer your impotence problems, I have! Attend our Philosophy School and change your life!

It was the Philosophy School ad that I was looking at the other day (as Paul was telling me a story, again, as usual) that made something in my head go ZING. The ad ran something like this: “”Tired of worries and anxieties? Distracted? Connect to the present moment.”"

And although I never do this, I whipped out my notebook and wrote that down, in all capital letters. Connect to the present moment. It’s been a helpful mantra that has brought my attention back to what’s actually happening in my life, instead of what happened four years ago, or Kite’s visit next week. Kite once noted, amused, that Todd and I only ever disagree about what might happen in the future. Laughing, we had to agree.

This morning I began watching Wandafuru raifu, a Japanese movie about a group of people who have just died, and are allowed to choose one memory to take with them to the afterlife. Thus far, I’m enjoying it tremendously. It brings up, of course, what memory I would take with me. I’m sure there are a hundred others equally wonderful, but what came first to my head was this one, that Todd wrote about in January of 2001.

There was a point, perhaps the first day he could really go out as his cold had subsided. We dressed him warmly and went out into the crisp air (it was in the teens that day). The sunlight was dazzling - reflecting off the snow, which had turned into a hard crust that only Sage and I could break through. Sage played in the tipi and I gathered wood outside. Paul was running around yelling exuberantly and chasing Shelly the cat who seemed to be playing with him - trotting just ahead of him and looking back to see what he was doing. At one point, he yelled to me “”Look Daddy, I’m sparkling”" And I think he really was!

Don’t call your MOM.

Overheard:

Adult Man 1 …but was he alive during the civil war?

Adult Man 2 gets out his cellphone

Adult Man 1 Aw, man, don’t call your mom.

I woke up around three a.m., sweating and shaking from a nightmare about zombies. Todd and I were in the rowhouse we lived in before Paul was born, and the zombies were congregated across the street. They were very stupid zombies, who would bypass a house if the shades were drawn. Unfortunately, the window itself had to be closed for this to work, and after Todd and I ran around the house putting all the shades down, we found a window in the back that had fallen off its tracks.

I’d been confident up until then, but when I realized our lives depended on fixing the window? I knew it was all over.

Saturday I went out searching for a pair of boots. I have never liked shoe shopping. Given my long-standing tendancy towards butch clothes, you’d never have recognized my fourteen year old self drooling over the high, spike heeled, circa 1864 schoolmarm boots. Which, you know, had a width approximately half that of my foot.

I’ve been putting off this trip for about six months, which is when my feet started hurting again. Before Paul was born, I was diagnosed with a heel spur. The doctor told me I had very high arches, and needed to wear arch suppots in order to fix them. He told me horror stories of heel spur operations and scared me into wearing the supports faithfully until the spur went away on its own.

But then Paul was born, and summer came around, and the pair of boots with the supports in them got all wet in the rain and stank so badly they were never wearable again, and so I threw them away and later, I realized, the supports with them, and meanwhile I was able to wear pretty much any shoe I wanted (that fit my mutant hobbit feet, anyway) and I thought I was done with the old lady podiatry of it all.

About six months ago, both of my feet began hurting, to the degree that getting out of bed in the morning necessitated limping to the bathroom. I tried finding arch supports (could only find pale imitations), wearing tennis shoes instead of sandals, but nothing worked. And when I saw these clunky shoes that not only fit, but made my feet look twice as big as they really are, I bought them. Even though they were cheaply made and basically began to fall apart from the moment I paid for them.

So Saturday, even though I hate shopping so much I actually considered staying home and cleaning both bathrooms instead, I headed out to find a nicely made pair of boots that would make my feet stop hurting. I ended up at the Fluevog store, because I admit to believing that the more expensive the shoes are, the more likely they are to cradle your foot in happy comfort, which - given the number of women whose feet are actually painful to look at in their summer sandals because after years of wearing high heels their toes have curled in on each other like frightened mouse babies - I should know is utter bullshit.

The clerk took one look at my 3-for-$12 shirt and Zellers pants and decided that I wasn’t going to buy anything. I was determined to prove him wrong, but hated the Fluevog style so thoroughly that I couldn’t. He asked what my size was, and I said I didn’t know and asked for the foot measuring thingie. “We don’t have those in our stores anymore,” he said archly. Really? I mean…what, were they deemed too Payless or something?

I wanted clunky; he gave me a pair of shoes that looked clunky on the shelf, but made my feet look as tiny as they actually are, so much so that I couldn’t imagine doing anything but tip-toeing in them while wearing fairy wings.

I thanked him for his time, told him the style just wasn’t for me, and headed back into the snow. The next shop sold shoes I liked, but that only came in certain sizes, so there were tags like, “Doc Martens: UK sizes 4 and 13″. After some sushi, I went to the St. Clair subway stop (where the consession storekeeper asked me to watch her store while she ran to the bathroom, and, pleased, I wondered what it was that made her trust me) bought a pair of boots that I didn’t particularly like - but they fit, and I was tired, and it was snowing, and there were wolves - then went for chocolate cake and espresso at the Wellesley stop.

As I left, I spotted a tiny, badly lit boot store across the street. I ran in, found the perfect pair of boots, bought them, zipped back up to St. Clair, returned the pair I didn’t like, and was home in time to spend a lovely evening with Todd and Paul (who had, in the end, decided against going to see the World’s Biggest Poutine being made).

Sage and Paul are going up the subway escalator. Sage spots a man dressed up as Santa Claus going down the stairs, and pokes Paul and points. The man has bushy white hair, sticking out from under his hat.

Paul, excitedly Mama, look! It’s…it’s, it’s our LIBRARIAN!

Sage, taken by surprise, snorts Well, I can see that his hair is just like the librarian’s hair, but I think that’s -

Paul It’s our librarian, dressed up like Santa Claus!

Sage Um. It’s a man, actually.

Paul, pulling Sage down so he can whisper in her ear I think he wants to go trick little kids into thinking Santa Claus is real.

Sage, straightening up I think he’s probably got a job at a mall, so…

Paul I whispered that because, you know, some people just like to have fun this time of year.

There are so many rumours about it.

Overheard on the bus:

Jessica Well, where did he get it?

Michelle In the States, and there are so many rumours about it.

Jessica Like what?

Michelle Like, it’s infected.

Apparently I haven’t been getting enough sleep lately. The other day, in two unrelated incidents, two children whose names I don’t even know came up to ask if I was really, really tired.

I told both of them that I was sick, but they just looked doubtful and wandered off.

Todd is explaining why marrying his best friend from kindergarten to twelfth grade would not have been a good idea.

Todd Oh, you know, we had blow-ups. Sometimes she wouldn’t talk to me for days.

Sage Really? I can’t picture it.

Todd One night when we were nineteen, we went to this party. We were supposed to go home together, but I hooked up with -

Sage, putting hands over her ears and saying, La la la la la No. Noooo, no no no.

Todd What?

Sage That’s on the list of forbidden phrases.

Todd Hee.

Sage You “met up” with -

Todd - this high school senior -

Sage, putting hands over her ears and shouting, LA LA LA LA LA

Todd - and when my friend wanted to go home, I said actually, I’m going to this other party instead. She was really mad.

Sage You know, you are really lucky that I didn’t meet you until you were…older.

The first snow of the year.

Monday, Paul and I were walking down the street. The ground was covered in the first snow of the year and the wind was biting. I was tremendously crabby, prepatory, I found out the next morning, to gettting really sick. He’d lost one of his gloves on the streetcar, so he was wearing mine instead. He has this aversion to eating someone else’s food or wearing their clothes, though he’s more than generous with his own food and clothes. I don’t know where it comes from. As long as the mess on my computer desk is generated by me, I don’t care whose food or clothes I’m using.

Paul Whyyyy can’t we play in the snoooow?

Sage Because you’re wearing my gloves, and my hands are cold, and my gloves aren’t even waterproof, so your hands are going to be cold in a minute too and I just want to go home.

Paul, beginning to take off my gloves I don’t want to wear your gloves!

Sage Put those back on.

Paul But they’re yours!

Sage Put them back on, I said.

Paul Well, WHY?

Sage Because people think it’s their business whether or not you wear gloves. And they won’t hesitate to be hateful if you aren’t wearing them.

Paul puts the gloves back on and we walk in silence for awhile. Finally:

Paul But why do people think it’s their business?

I discard a lot of answers in my head, like, “Because people who wouldn’t breathe a word if a kid were being hit in public will swoop down upon a kid they think is cold,” and, “They have nothing better to occupy their minds with,” and settle on:

Sage Because…they get worried if they think kids are too cold, like…they might think you asked for gloves and I didn’t give you any.

Paul looks thoughtful Hmmm.

Tuesday morning I woke up with a sore throat, sneezing every five minutes. But Paul felt fine, so I gamely soldiered on, taking him to a pre-arranged meeting. We ended up running three very long blocks through the wind and icy rain, Paul dressed appropriately (except without gloves, as I appear to have lost mine as well) but me - predictably - in an outfit more suited to a breezy autumn day. As I ran through the rain without a hat, I could feel a band of headache run across the whole of my forehead. I was sniffling and coughing, fuzzy with my cold, and the traffic was very loud.

When Paul stopped to pick up some fascinating leaf or rock or something I turned to him and said, “YOU NEED. TO KEEP. WALKING,” and the way my voice broke in desperation put me right back to being fourteen, this day it was raining like crazy and I’d called and whined until my dad came to pick me up in the car because I didn’t want to walk, and I didn’t know it at the time, but he was sick, and then the car wouldn’t start, so he had to get behind it and push it and actually fell down into a rain puddle and stood up and said, “Did you really need a ride?” and in retrospect I think the poor man was on the verge of tears and man did I want to go back to my fourteen year old self and buy her a damn umbrella, the big baby.

Demain

Paul and I were at the science centre. He sat and listened for a good ten minutes to the information on birth control. Afterwards, I asked him what he’d found out.

He frowned deeply. “Mama, it said they kill sperm. Why would anyone do such a thing?

In Paper Doors: Japan From Scratch, Angus Waycott writes:

This morning Todd sent me a cellphone text message: Try coffee today. Coffee promotes inspiration and well being.

Last night I was sitting on the subway reading Almost French, by Sarah Turnbull, about an Aussie woman who moved to Paris after meeting her French husband. The man sitting next to me suddenly let out a long stream of French. He and his friend spoke to each other while I smiled into my book. As one man exited, the first called, “Á demain!” and the second answered in kind. “Until tomorrow,” I whispered happily to myself.

Man, you think if I read a book about a woman finding her long lost stepsister, mine would appear on the subway?

Weed

The photo that got away:

A woman in an electric wheelchair, carrying two small children on her lap while a third child walked beside her.

I was walking by a store selling nothing but purses and heard…

Clerk Come back soon!

Customer Oh, you know I’ll be back. I’m the Imelda Marcos of purses, thanks to you.

Sunday morning I headed out to hunt wild photos. I stopped at The Bay for some longjohns, gloves and a hat, and I don’t know why I seem unable to remember how much I hate that place from week to week, but by the time I’d bought a pair of longjohns, tried on twenty hats and hated myself in all of them, tried and failed to buy a pair of gloves without a price tag, gotten Jingle Bells in my head, and sweated like crazy in the overheated windowless depths, I was a big ball of grumpy frustration. The photos I’d managed to get so far were few and far between, and I knew the light was fading.

Even so, I consoled myself with the promise of a piece of chocolate cake at a cake and coffee shop I knew was just around the corner, but when I went around the corner and backtracked, and then went around two other corners, it wasn’t there. (Fourth corner would have been the charm.) No worries, I told myself, you can go have pizza in the basement of the Eglinton shopping centre. Which is when I started to get the low-blood-sugar stupids; even though I’ve been there time after time, I went to the right instead of the left, and wandered around for a good five minutes before realizing my mistake. They were closed Sundays, of course. So I heaved a big sigh and stomped upstairs for some sushi. (I know. My life is so hard. Don’t you feel sorry for me?)

I’d intended to go home, photos or no, after eating, but once my blood sugar had been shored up I felt cheerful and inspired. I headed to Chinatown and had some really good photo luck there, then promptly got lost. My notoriously bad sense of direction has been helped by picturing the Toronto subway map in my head whenever I’m not sure where I am. It works beautifully, unless I’m near University Street. Every subway stop, except those on the University line, are named for the road they sit on. So I spent a good twenty minutes looking for St. Patrick street before I remembered that it’s the name of the station, not the street. I did get a giggle when a guy sitting in a doorway called, “Spare some change for a bag of weed?” as I passed by.

The second you get home!

Two thirteen year old girls were talking in the park, and as they walked by one said, “But that’s, like, something you’d say when the guy had divorced you or something!”

Now I’m vastly curious as to what the first part of that sentence was.

Paul and I were eating sushi for lunch. He was reading a book, so I looked around at the other restaurant patrons as I ate to entertain myself. A young woman was holding up BITS Magazine, reading as she ate. The next time I looked over, her boyfriend was holding up the magazine. The third time, they were both holding up their own copies, which is when I realized she was the woman on the cover.

Then I had to giggle to myself, because if I ever had a book published, that is so exactly what I would do - sit around in public places with the book held up high so that everyone could see the author photo, and me, and then the photo and think, “Look! It’s the author! That woman must be a phenomenal writer, to have published a book that looks that good. I’m running right over to Chapters, to buy myself a copy! Or several. Maybe twenty, even.”

Paul doesn’t mind getting his hair cut; it’s the hair washing part he objects to. Because previous hairdressers had been willing to cut his hair without washing it first, I’d promised him we’d be able to do that again this week. But when we arrived at the hair salon, we found a big sign reading, “For sanitary reasons, we must require all patrons to have their hair washed.” Thinking this was a new Toronto law (after all, a city that would attempt to outlaw sushi could certainly be capable of a rule this dumb) I told Paul that we’d probably run into that everywhere, and we might as well get it over with now.

He whimpered, but reluctantly agreed in the end. The woman behind the counter said, “You’ll have to come back later.”

I looked around. One woman was sitting in a chair, inspecting her nails, and two men were enjoying a cup of coffee in the back room. “What?”

“You’ll have to come back later,” she repeated loudly, “We are very busy right now.”

I laughed disbelievingly. “Yes, I can see that. You look very busy. C’mon, sweetie,” and we headed off to find a different salon.

You know, I’m sure she was afraid to say, “I don’t want to cut your kid’s hair, he obviously is afraid of having his hair washed,” because she was afraid I’d scream, or sue her for ten thousand dollars, or both. It’s just, if you’re going to lie to me, try to put a little effort into it.

We found a different salon, where a nice older woman was happy to cut Paul’s hair without washing it first. She asked what I wanted to have done.

“Kind of like mine, but long in the front,” I said. “Right, Paul?”

Paul nodded.

The hairdresser pointed to the crown of his head. “You want it kept long here also, right?”

“Well, no. Short.”

“On your head it looks nice,” she said, “because you have a very nicely shaped head, but on…” she checked herself, “I mean, your son also has a very nicely shaped head, but in a different way. Longer here would be better.”

Hee!

I’m not myself today.

Yesterday, after cancelling Plan 1 because I’d forgotten about Plan 2, I found out that Plan 2 wasn’t until today. So Paul and I had a lovely stay at home day, filled with Legos and laundry and learning and I’m sure there were some other things that start with L, but I can’t think of them at the moment.

In March I’d grown disenchanted with the first grade curriculum and finally put the book back on the shelf, working with Paul on other ways to learn. About a week ago, he discovered the book himself and I found him an hour later, happily doing the worksheets on his own. So instead of grinding through the chaff, we’ve been concentrating on the, well, wheat. Yesterday found us making instruments from boxes so we could pretend to be the Bramin Musicians, a six year old’s version of a logic problem, and cutting out little houses with contractions like “is not” on the outside, and “isn’t” on the inside.

Of course, Paul is learning all the time, everywhere, no matter what he’s doing. We’ll work together on the bus or the subway, all of our walking games are educational in some way. But there is something to be said for a day like yesterday, filled with basic everyday activities.

As I told an acquaintance the other day, “Socialization is the least of our problems. It’s finding the time to stay home and learn that’s our biggest struggle right now.”

At about five thirty we set off to meet Todd for dinner at a restaurant. A few blocks after we’d gotten on, a woman boarded the bus and sat down. The bus driver accelerated and she said, “Can you let me off at the Downsview subway station?” which is kind of like getting on a bus headed for Montana and asking to be let off in Florida.

The bus driver hesitated, then said, “Uh, well, I’m headed for the subway. So you can get off there.”

She realized her mistake, and chuckled nervously. “Sorry, sorry. I’m not myself today!”

“I’ll bite,” said the bus driver. “Who are you?”

“Angry!” she said. “If anyone bothers me, I’ll punch ‘em in the face.”

The bus driver had nothing to say to that. Then she went into a long sad story about something that happened to her when she was twelve, which started out so sadly that even I made a concerted effort not to hear it.

When we got off the bus and headed into the subway station, we could hear two women yelling at each other. Both women were behaving oddly; it seemed a case of two vastly differing world views crashing into each other. By the time we passed the first woman, the second woman had given up and was scurrying towards the subway car. The first woman stayed where she was, to howl, “I want to go to weeeest!” leaving the very kind concessions seller to ask which west, as there are four stations which answer to that description.

Everyone else, including me, hurried by and hoped she wouldn’t notice us.

So I wondered why there’s that impulse, the head down “I did not see you, I am not here” hope to be invisible that happens when people behave outside of the norm.

While we were standing on the subway platform, Paul kept asking me to point out something weird so he could write it down in his notebook. I had to resist the urge to direct his attention to the crazy lady stomping up and down the platform, talking loudly to herself, instead going with the ten full grocery bags lying underneath the payphone.

I can’t really hide behind “well, I have a child with me,” because I do the same when I’m alone. I think it’s a dread that helping once won’t be enough. That the person in question will keep on asking, and asking, and asking, until I’m tapped out and have nothing more to give.

I mean, look at the woman on the bus. The bus driver gave no indication at all that he thought she was behaving strangely. She told the bus driver that terrible story, probably because she needed someone to talk to and didn’t have anyone, and he was treating her with respect and kindness. For her, there was no sense of boundary, of being formal simply because she didn’t know him.

I know people who wouldn’t even consider walking by someone in trouble. I’m just…not one of them.

Mr. Wolf

Sometimes I wonder if my Canadian friends are just fucking with my head. One will be like, “Let’s play, ‘What time is it, Mr. Wolf?’ everybody!” and proceed to lead the kids in a surreal version of Mother, May I which ends in the wolf saying, “LUNCHTIME!” and running after the screeching little kids.

And I’ll have a moment of, “C’mon…really?“

But yes, apparently this is a British game that has been around for a hundred years and probably everybody but me played it during recess. Still. I wonder.

I carry a notebook around with me everywhere I go. One side is for addresses and shopping lists, the other is for things I see, overhear or think about. Paul started getting curious about why I was writing things down last January, when we were eating breakfast out and this woman was telling a fascinating story about why she’d broken up with her girlfriend. I said I was, “writing down something I wanted to remember,” and he seemed satisfied with that.

For example, here are my Mosquito Coast notes for yesterday’s entry:

Now - completely on his own - Paul has begun to carry his own notebook around, in which he writes down the things he wants to remember. Like:

“Bare man! Leaning out window.”

Apparently the man was there all day. The prevailing theory is “photo shoot”.

See, this is why the librarians love me.

The other morning, long before the sun was even thinking about rising, we were all woken up by the fire alarm, which is broadcast over the PA system. We stumbled out into the hall, putting on shoes and coats, and started down 92 flights of stairs. I was confident that it was yet another false alarm, and when I smelled something unpleasant in the stairwell I crabbed in my head about creeps who won’t go outside to smoke, and Kitey would never do that, and look, there’s a cigarette lying right there on the stairs, my god, you’d think people would show a little more consideration. That’s when the unpleasant smell started smelling a lot more like plastic and a lot less like cigarettes.

The whiney voice shut up and I continued following Todd and Paul down the stairs, wishing that we’d brought the cats with us. Though we couldn’t see it in the air, by the time we’d descended ten flights the smell was terrible. Two men in their early twenties were standing in their boxers and tank tops, hugging themselves and rubbing their arms. Their apartment door was wide open.

I couldn’t hear what they said because the fire alarm was echoing up and down the stairwell, but Todd reports that the gist of it was, “Oh, man, we are seriously embarrassed. [Incomprehensible] just went up in smoke! You already walked down ten flights? No, no, it’s okay. Go back upstairs. Please. Please?”

Not willing to bank on the word of two people who weren’t even alive when I was in third grade, no matter how pretty they were in their tank tops, we continued walking down. We were very surprised by the number of people in the lobby - usually we’re the only ones uncool enough to be overcautious. Paul mooned over the firetrucks and, knowing that it was going to be fine, Todd and I amused ourselves by snickering over what people had thought to bring down with them: one woman clutched her hamster in a blue cage close to her chest to keep it warm, a man held a Logitech keyboard box in a way that suggested he thought it was a silly as the rest of us that he’d grabbed it before running downstairs. A man and woman drove by, their dog in the back, calling, “Is it safe to go back in?” out their window. The same woman who brought a full breakfast onto the elevator last week stood there with blankets and pillows. I turned to her and said, “I’m looking at what everyone else brought down, I mean, blankets and pillows? Very smart, and what do I have?” I held up my hand. “Two library books.”

She laughed kindly. “But what if you had to wait a long time? It was a good idea.”

We all got onto the elevator together and I told her about the two young men. She said, “I’d have pretended it wasn’t my apartment. I’d have been like, ” ‘Oh, I wonder WHO could have caused all this SMOKE? I’ll just follow you guys down the stairs, okay?’”

I saw The Mosquito Coast in the theatre when I was fourteen. I found it brilliantly written, acted, and produced. I also decided to never watch it again. As someone who finds disappointment unbearable, watching those people go through such a heart-wrenching disappointment left me in tears.

When we were living in Pennsylvania and Todd read the book by Paul Theroux, we decided to watch the movie again. I had exactly the same reaction.

Saturday morning, Todd asked me to watch the movie again. He eventually won me over, but I was definitely -

You know, my 7th grade teacher, Mrs. Skjerven, had a giant poster on the wall of the classroom that had “ALOT” crossed out, and “A LOT” written right next to it. I have not made the mistake of spelling it as one word since. But the word “definitely”? It’s not only that I’ve been misspelling it my entire life, it’s that I keep thinking I’ve figured it out. It’s definatly! It’s defininately! I’ve got it THIS time!

- but I was definitely a reluctant viewer. What I didn’t expect was the degree to which we can now relate to the Ally Fox character, who takes his homeschooled kids to Central America to build a utopia. We bemoaned his absence at the yurt, where he would surely have figured out an environmentally friendly way to haul water from the spring to our faucets, and a way to recycle the trash that converted it into energy that would make the laptop work out there in the woods.

Then, his character said:

We eat when we’re not hungry, drink when we’re not thirsty. We buy what we don’t need and throw away everything that’s useful. Why sell a man what he wants? Sell him what he doesn’t need. Pretend he’s got eight legs and two stomachs and money to burn. It’s wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. There are people in New York that live on pet food, and would kill you for a quarter. You don’t dare take a walk, for fear somebody will stick a knife in your ribs! Think about it! You stay home, and they come in through the windows! Ten-year-old homicidal maniacs on every street corner!

And I paused the movie and said, “Wasn’t I JUST saying that, in part eleven of my Why America is Scary lecture series? Oh my god. I’m Ally Fox.”