Do we really live in a dystopian hellscape?
Don’t want to: 1) talk about the election 2) have my landing page open on the New York Times 3) blame Uncle Joe . . . etc.
Want to: 1) cut off people in traffic 2) take a handle of vodka into a closet and drink it all 3) buy a heavy bag and get to work on it . . . etc.
Likely won’t keep any of those promises. More likely go to Fayette Mall and wander around with others – join people with overflowing shopping bags, My Mission is Goin’ Fishin’ T‑shirts, and those who take too many napkins from the dispenser because they don’t care about trees.
I will race to the food court to look for comfort. I will order a steak and cheese without cheese. Why, you ask? Because I grew up in Baltimore and we don’t have Philly Cheese Steaks in Charm City (for the record, I don’t care a whit about Geno’s or Pat’s, I prefer the orecchiette at the Victor Café with checkered tablecloths just down the street).
When provoked by absurdity to become my feral self, I go on expeditions in search of my childhood comfort food – a steak sub with lettuce, tomatoes, mayonnaise and fried onions on a crusty Italian sub roll. The culinary construction is called a submarine for a reason – it is a long sandwich, its dimensions mimicking Das Boot. A steak sub cannot be wide or short. It must be long and packed tight, rolled up in butcher paper and bite-worthy, so you get the steamy taste of flat-top macerated steak and onions in each chomp.
Sadly, the B’more steak sub experience no longer exists. The Jersey Mike’s #17 without cheese is close. Because you are so distraught about our Shiny City on the Hill’s recent political shenanigans, you may be tempted to order a Giant version and gobble it so fast you require the Heimlich. In the spirit of such matters, I insist that Mama Cass did not choke on a ham sandwich. She succumbed to a heart attack.
I am choking back tears and girding my loins against potential heartless attacks. No doubt you have had the same conversation with your tree-hugging, woke-loving, oat-milk-latte-frothing comrades – you are looking at friends and neighbors thinking “was it you who did that nasty thing in the seclusion of a voting booth?”
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Well, I’ve got news for you. It wasn’t “them,” it was “us.” The proletariat paying ten bucks for a dozen eggs and $17.26 for a cheese steak without cheese rose up and said stop the madness.
Full disclosure: I did brave the turn lanes on Nicholasville Road and went to the mall to seek solace. I made a faint-hearted joke to the young cashier at Charlie’s Cheesesteaks about my $17.26 ticket. I said, “that was a good year,” hoping to draw her into a conversation about the Continental Congress, democracy, et al. She smiled and said, “I have no idea if that was a good year, would you like a straw?” In the glow of bright florescence, and the push of customers behind me, it wasn’t time to carry on about misogyny and abject racism.
I found it weirdly comforting to see folks wandering the concrete confines of Mall Land displaying the crazy quilt of Americana – white, brown, yellow, young, old, some wee-wees pushed around in race car shopping carts or riding on the eerie mall choo-choo. Everyone was cheerfully embracing their favorite brands, including the Hooters Apparel Collection.
I told a friend about my steak escape. She said she didn’t like to go to the mall anymore. It wasn’t safe.
Funny, it felt safer than the wanton endangerment I saw on the last night’s evening news.
