hit me

Rather than the deep wheaty aroma that drifted over downtown from the Taystee bread factory, where Dad and I would pick up a dozen loaves of day old white from the outlet store to be put in the basement freezer until T and I would load chocolate chips between two slices and stick them in the microwave for a midnight snack, perhaps the scent of lilacs from the unpruned bushes that hung above the tall wood panel fence bordering Mom's backyard garden rushed through me with the head pain and lost wind when the car struck on Grand between Larry's Grocery, where Ramsey kids would buy candy from the extra wide bellied man who'd flash his baseball bat if he saw trouble, and Ace Hardware, where Dad had been buying supplies for his never-ending interior constructions. So full hands could not grab the five year old who didn't look both ways.

It would not be the last time I was hit while crossing the street but likely the most memorable. Second most was the time, some 14 years later and less than four blocks to the east at Snelling and Grand, when a sedan took a right turn smack into my left leg. I rolled myself up the curb and onto the sidewalk, grabbing my cramp and shouting "what the hell!" as I tried to walk it off. The sedan stopped and backed up. The driver, who I noticed through tears of agony wore the collar of a cleric, glanced over his shoulder at me. Then, apparently satisfied it wasn't serious, he peeled off.

The piercing stink of rotting carcass grows in the nose as I walk down Burbank Boulevard toward the Sepulveda Dam Recreation Area. A lump of dusty fur, sunken eye sockets that form crosses, sags into the dry grass.

Blessings cat...Blessings...