A short walk through Rosedale in 104° heat

An appalling lack of sidewalks in this little city. Nowhere to walk but front yards or the middle of the street. The BBQ joint has a line out the door but isn’t open on Sunday. From the forested corners of the park, a chorus of cheers from the late evening pack of disc golfers. Someone has drilled a hole in one. I’m too faded to drive, which is why I’m on foot. The plywood firecracker shacks have been taken down and put into storage. Elsewhere kids lounge in the heavily vignetted decadence of fake Polaroid sunsets. Here, the workweek is just one long, boring flash mob. The construction crew lowers the cornerstone to the brand new CVS, a nice enough location they probably won’t have to lock the condoms up. A beautiful mural is painted on the wall of a parking lot that no one ever parks in. The word “ROSEDALE” and some animals and plants and people and the Memorial Arch opening up to a rainbow utopia. Beauty, as envisioned and painted by children. Next door the neighbors fight the nightly battle of the basses: rap vs. Latin. When one guy refuses to turn down his subs, the other one turns on his own car alarm and blocks his neighbor’s car in — handling the situation like an adult. On Tuesday night the lightning storm blew out the transformer. It sizzled for a minute until it exploded blue and prettier than anything I saw on Fourth of July. On Fisher there’s a little place for sale on a big lot, but it’s more like you’d be buying a really nice big tree that comes with a crappy house. Mid July and the Mimosa trees are in full bloom, pink silk feathers carpeting the little sloped lawns on Minnie. Vacation Bible School is over and the empty church bus is parked across from McDonalds. The man in a tank top and matted hair staggers by the Jiffy Lube shaking his head vigorously and talking to himself. He doesn’t look crazy as much as preoccupied. The lack of sidewalks doesn’t seem to bother him.