Wednesday, June 30, 2021

Dancing in the Street

Jim Somes

They were paving Maplewood Avenue in front of my house this week and traffic has been a nightmare. This afternoon while returning from a meeting I found myself the last car in a fifty-car que line waiting to proceed along the one way obstacle course. After a two- or three-minute wait I was the last car to be waved through. The neon clad flagger was a 60 or 70 year old man who had been there all day and who had been dancing with his head phone’s on every time I’d been in or out of my driveway. He was incredibly animated and making the best of a miserable and unpopular job. As I turned left into my driveway (while he continued to dance to Jimmy Cliff or someone) a young woman with a stroller and two young kids crossed the sidewalk in front of me and all three started to dance with the flagger. Then the woman in the car behind me (who was now first in the next que) opened her door and got out and started dancing. Then the guy in the pickup truck behind her (a sixtyish construction worker) got out and joined in. It was fantastic! For about 30 seconds it was the perfect example of turning chicken $@#% into chicken salad. Keep on Dancing!