October 1996
I rode my bicycle to the Log Cabin Grill for breakfast yesterday. When I walked in wearing cycling shorts, a colorful cycling jacket, carrying my helmet and handlebar bag, you would have thought I had walked out of an episode of the X-Files.
The waitress came over, poured coffee and asked, "Where you coming from?"
"I live across from the nursing home," I said. (People place things in LeRoy by landmarks.)
"I've never seen you before," she said.
"I've never seen you either," I said. We smiled and the place went back to humming about corn prices and that damn-Clinton-draft dodger.
If you have ever lived in a small town, you know the local eatery has a "community table," where anyone -- male and known to everyone else may sit for coffee or breakfast.
A man at the community table related how he and his wife had gone up to Bloomington-Normal recently for dinner. Understand that people live in small towns like LeRoy and seldom leave their borders.
"I don't know what the world is coming to, " he said. They wanted two dollars for a goddamn beer. A goddamn beer! Something is mighty wrong when they want two goddamn dollars for a beer."
A collective nod from the community table acknowledging the sorry state of the world.
Copyright 1996, Bud Polk
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