If you’re ever driving through Middle Of Nowhere Midwest and see a pizza joint named Jimbob’s, there’s nothing for it, you have to stop and eat there. I mean, really, it’ll either be great pizza that Jimbob’s family has been perfecting for generations, or it’ll be greasy, tasteless, and possibly deep-fried, which would be an equally good story to tell. As we drove up, I had an image of it’s interior in woody shades of brown, tan, and yellow. It also seemed like it should be dark inside, and possibly dirty.

We were rather disappointed that is was attached to a gas station. Something about looking through a glass door and seeing the inside of the station detracted from it’s potential charm. But the decor was both better and worse than we had imagined it. It was shabbily clean and very bright inside, with sunlight catapulting off the warring stripes of fuschia, teal, and daffodil yellow painted in varying lengths along the mottled white tables, walls, and chairs. Think a small herd of My Little Ponies melted down and then extruded over marbled linoleum.

My sister was fighting back disappointment at the cleanliness and lightness of the place until I sat down and my chair wobbled and creaked crazily. Looking down, we realized that a piece of particle board had been wedged under the chair’s seat to keep the whole contraption functional. Unfortunately, neither the chair nor it’s makeshift support were happy with this arrangement, and both complained loudly whenever I shifted.

Then we noticed that all the pictures on the wall were made by printing out 8.5×11 segments of the picture on a color printer, and then cobbling the segments together and taping them to the wall.

Jimbob’s was beginning to live up to our expectations after all.

A sign stood in the middle of the open space near the ticket counter. On its left lay a red carpet, neatly lined on its two long sides by dividing ropes. On its right lurked a blank expanse of standard grey airport carpeting. The sign, standing there to warn the masses not to sully the red carpet without authorization, carried two messages. “Elite Customer Boarding” leaned out toward the red carpet, and announced itself in cheery red lettering. On the right side of its divided face, “General Boarding” sat as a grim, grey reproach to those clearly didn’t care about their travel experience and who probably preferred balancing check books or shushing babies in supermarket checkout lines to frolicking on beaches or petting puppies.

“This way lies freedom from bureaucratic lines, suspicious scrutiny of identity, and hoi polloi, particularly those polloi over there with the 5 children, all of whom are hungry and two of whom have colds,” the cheery red letters seemed to say. “We know you’re elite at heart,” the sign crooned, “You care for the finer things, and for puppies, and if you saw a friend in need we know you’d take the time to help them out. You are not chattel. We know this. But until you ask for an upgrade, we can’t release you to the service level you deserve, nay, are entitled to. We’re sure you understand.”

As the moment of boarding approached, waiting passengers got up from their seats, checked for their boarding passes, calculated whether the letter following their row numbers would land them in the dreaded middle seat, and began to hover a respectful distance from the sign. Most hovered just to the right of the sign, not to encroach on the space reserved for the elite among them. No red carpet would ease their transition onto the gangway. No dividing ropes would usher them toward the plane in three feet of segregated splendor.

“We will now begin boarding our elite members,” the gate agent intoned. Everyone looked up expectantly, waiting to see who would be so privileged. Most shuffled even a few feet farther back from the bifurcated sign.

And then it happened. The privileged few stepped out from the crowds and walked carefully past their soon-to-be fellow passengers, past the gate counter, past the grey space that would soon herd the General boarders onto the gangway, and past the sign. Turning 120 degrees to the right, they stepped carefully onto the red carpet, between the dividing ropes, and walked along it diagonally back toward the gate counter to present their elite tickets to the gate agent before boarding the plane.

It was well worth the extra 10 feet of walking.

A halogen light burned out over my sink. This means that I’ll soon have to endure the socially awkward ordeal of going to our local hardware store to buy a new one.

I don’t know our hardware store well. It’s not that I don’t like being handy and all. I do. I just can never figure out the organizational scheme at the hardware store. I’m pretty sure it would make sense to truly handy people, particularly those with a little less estrogen and a little more facial hair, but it doesn’t make sense to me. So I usually have to ask the denizen of this little kingdom to help me find what I need.

Luckily for me, he’s the chatty, helpful type. He always walks me directly to the appropriate shelf and helps me choose between the various varieties of whatever-it-is-I-need. Then he walks me back to the cash register to complete the sale. Unluckily for him, he’s incredibly allergic to cats.

I learned this when I went there for wasp spray once, soon after moving here. After just a couple of minutes spent talking me through the various brands, he started coughing and sneezing. As I left, I wished him a speedy recovery from his cold only to be told, “Oh, I don’t have a cold. But I bet you have a cat.”

Ever since then, I work to keep more distance between us as he walks me toward the spackle or the calk. I have to judge just how far I can stay behind him without making him feel the need to slow down and help me close the distance. I try to time my arrival at the desired product for the moment when he’s made a decision so that we can immediately start our delicately spaced return to the cash register. On our way, I usually kick myself for not knowing how much money I’ll need to hand over the second we actually make it to the counter. Calculating the cost is difficult because a) I don’t do math in my head very well, especially percentages for tax, and b) I rarely get enough time near the product’s shelf to see the original price. But I want to be able to pay in cash because that takes less time.

Unfortunately, I don’t think he remembers that encounter 3 years ago, or why I might be minimizing contact and time. He probably sees me coming and thinks, “There’s that girl from out of town who’s always in such a hurry that she won’t stop to pass the time of day.”

Small town living is a tricky thing.

After two months of bands that played too slow or too fast or too little swing-able music, the band last night was more than a relief. It was a heady ebb and swell that transported us all beyond our every-day thoughts and habits. Under its spell, good dancers became inspired dancers, mediocre dancers executed moves with confidence and general success, mistakes brought on laughter and good natured teasing rather than frustration, and few of us sat out more than a handful of dances.

I had the worst dance of my life (which was unremarkable simply because the guy had no sense of rhythm, no movies, and no compunction about running me into other dancers), and the weirdest (which will probably have to be a blog post in itself, but which included extended and condescending verbal instructions about what I should do and where I should look). But these were only two in a string of dances that spanned more than three hours, a span which also included the best dances I’ve ever had. These two shrank into insignificance as new partners spun and dipped me, friends laughed and lip-synched “Hey, Mister Shane,” and the band played on and on. And my pride, stung at the being tutored in moves I should have performed if only I had understood (nonexistent) leads, was soothed as the next three partners whirled me intricately, flawlessly, and directly in front of the offending party as he watched in rapt attention. Revenge was sweet.

p.s. A couple of pictures are up on Flickr, now.