Out near the desert, in the California live oak and scrubby hills, far from anything, even a motel, astride a curve in the highway, near a battered barn and trailer ~ across the road from this "developed" and maybe abandoned parcel, is a carefully hand-lettered sign nailed to a tree:
Future Home Of Tom's Towing
Not a board or flat spot in sight, on that side of the road.
But there's Notification; and the hope of an individual for his endeavor; and grasp of its interest to others; and requisite chance for the news of the future to sink in. Avoiding an interruptive, sudden appearance. A neighborly warning, a courtesy, for some thing this important. Modernizing. The changes a-comin.
And a tankard of atmospheric ether; to get those people who might one day need these here-to-be services fired up and fantasizing about the appearance on Ditter's Road of Tom's tow truck and twinkling, hill-jiggling light bar.
These are declared intentions, which are bigger than any other human thing around there. |
