A hearty voice booms out a cheery greeting to someone I can’t see…a conversation continues down the hallway and fades. I can’t know the outcome because I am in the other room. Who spoke? Are there plans for lunch?
January meals; we charge against the wall of grey cold armed with only a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich on rye, crisped in curried butter; a bowl of cold, snappy sharp vinegary coleslaw and a mug of black coffee with fresh cream, boiled strong. This is a gut cleansing lunch meted out in bits and bursts and bayonets; heated with friendship and talk of the storm, politics and the playoffs.
From the other empty room where I remain alone, I imagine the battlefield…caffeinated steam rising up beyond the window and over the dirty edge of the Genesee river…as we ready ourselves for the final week of January.
690 Saint Paul 