A Quick War

May 1, 2003

Today is my 50th birthday.

My daughter’s gift to me was this tan leather journal. She told me she wanted me to start recording my life so when I’m gone my future grandchildren can get a glimpse of my life that they missed. I don’t know where these grandchildren are coming from. My daughter is thirty years old, her only date was to her high school prom twelve years ago and she has yet to move out of this house.

My son’s gift was a black sweatshirt with “I’m not 50! I’m 18 with 32 years experience” scrawled across the chest in white paint. He told me he wanted to get me this thing called the coffin box that contained fake Viagra pills, an Over the Hill mug and an inflatable walker but the gag gift store was sold out. There’s something not right with his sense of humor. He laughs at the stupidest things. Of course I cannot tell him that, he’s my son. So I gave my best “haha, this is great” smirk and head nod and quickly moved on to my wife’s gift.

A pressure washer. She told me I could get started on the deck tomorrow. I suppose this was her way of saying that she really was mad that I bought her a washer/dryer combo and not the topaz necklace she wanted for her 50th birthday.

I’ve made it fifty years and I get a blank book, a shirt I’ll never wear and more work to do. What life is there to record? I am a mechanic with calloused, blackened, arthritic hands. It hurts to hold this pen. I get up at 5 a.m., drive an hour to work, flip tires and replace disc brakes for nine hours, drive an hour home, eat dinner, go to bed. Repeat. There is no life, there’s only work.

I could record history. Today’s a historic day. President Bush announced the end of major combat operations in Iraq. Mission accomplished. That was a quick war.

May 3, 2003

I didn’t write yesterday. The wife made me pressure wash the deck, the siding on the house, the walkway and something else. I forget. I tried showing her how to use it but she said it was my gift to enjoy. I wanted to tell her what I would’ve enjoyed more than the pressure washer was getting laid but that seemed inappropriate.

When did appropriateness become an issue with us? If I would’ve said that twenty or even ten years ago she would’ve laughed and I would’ve got laid. We only have sex on holidays now. The major ones – Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter. There’s a big gap of time between Easter and Thanksgiving.

May 4, 2003

So I was inappropriate. I got to thinking that turning 50th constitutes as a major holiday and I asked my wife if she wanted to “fool around." I should’ve phrased it differently. Her reply, “Are you going through a midlife crisis now or something? Fool around? We’re not sixteen. We’re fifty. We don’t fool around anymore.” To which I replied, “Well then what is it that we do?” She hesitated with a sigh and said, “Nothing.” 

I wanted to say well, don’t you think that’s a problem but I didn’t because I knew that would lead to a fight and I didn’t have the energy for a fight and then I realized if I didn’thave the energy for a fight I probably didn’t have the energy for sex and so I just rolled over and went to sleep.

May 5, 2003

Contemplated an affair today. I was sick to my stomach after thirty seconds of thinking about it. I really do love my wife. I bought her roses on the way home from work. She didn’t say thank you but rather, “I’m too tired for sex tonight.” I told her I bought them ‘just because’ but she had already started to walk away and I don’t think she heard me.

May 6, 2003

I do not want to record my life any longer. In the past five days I have realized my daughter is somewhat delusional, my son’s humor annoys me and my wife is no longer in love with me. At least the war is over.

Episode 34: Aluminum Foil

TRANSCRIPT
Originally Aired 10.24.2015

Note: Things People Do was created for the airwaves and by no means do we encourage you to read this transcript if you lack imagination. Transcripts often include errors because our team loathes the laborious task and we make our children type the broadcasts.

Prologue.

Ellison Cole: Long before social entertainment sites were teaching us how to make our lives easier with seventeen ways to do this and that, my mother, Alice, was hacking life with that shiny, crackling, reflective material we call aluminum foil. She used it to sharpen the knives, polish the silver, remove sticky residue from the iron and could even transform AAA batteries into AA. My brothers and I were never without tinfoil hats, and our family cat, Squiggles, learned how to fetch better than any Retriever thanks to an unlimited supply of foil balls.

About two weeks ago I traveled back to my hometown in western Pennsylvania for a weeklong family reunion. During a day excursion, my cousins and I traveled to Saxonburg. A quaint borough about thirty miles north of Pittsburgh that is most notably known as the home of John Roebling, the engineer who designed the Brooklyn Bridge. In the twenty years since I last visited, the town has undergone a hipster facelift. A vegan cafe greets visitors and as you travel the red brick sidewalk you pass an artist's cooperative, a historic hotel serving the best lobster bisque ever made in a landlocked state, an indie coffee shop, a creative eatery using locally sourced food, along with many consignment stores promising antiques and wares. One particular store caught my eye. Aluminum Foil. A vintage clothing store with a twist. And that's where today's story, told in one act, takes place.

From WZEB Metropolis, it's Things People Do, distributed by Rural Community Radio. Stay with us.

ACT ONE. The Idea

Ellison Cole: It's sometimes difficult to decipher between a unique idea and a gimmick. There's a sandwich shop in New York City that sells only peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. This simple concept attracts thousands of locals and tourists daily and probably will continue to do so for decades to come. The shop doesn't just sell PB&Js, it sells nostalgia. A unique idea that fosters retention.

Aluminum Foil, a two month old consignment shop owned by Ana Lawrence, a Master's prepared millennial plagued by overwhelming debt and the insatiable desire to move out of her parents' basement, appears to walk the line between idea and gimmick. A note to listeners: Ana obsessively Instagrams our interview. Within an hour of leaving her store, I was trending #EllisonColeheartsAluminumFoil #saltnpepajournalist #listenrualshoplocal.

So Ana, tell our listeners about how Aluminum Foil came to be?

Ana Lawrence: I was studying Aristotle's Rhetoric on Wikipedia and was struck by the thought that one could persuade an audience with a logical idea. I always wanted to be a business owner and my parents said they'd cover start-up costs and rent for a year. All I had to do was brainstorm. What does foil do? It preserves. And what does vintage clothing need? Proper preservation. The light bulb just went off.

Ellison Cole: Ana gives me a tour of the shop. A single-storey bungalow nestled between Grinder Beans and Tree Leaf Antiques with decadent wooden floors and muted walls plastered with her favorite quotes hand scrawled in black Sharpie. And here's where the possible gimmick comes in. There are no shelves, no racks, no spinners of clothes. Instead, there are piles of clothes, wrapped in foil on the floor. Six piles to be exact, all labeled by a tented piece of cardboard (recycled from the coffee shop, she tells me.) Dresses, ladies' formal wear, ugly sweaters, men's pants, unisex tees and mystery. The customers are not allowed to peek inside the wrapping prior to purchase.

What is the mystery pile comprised of? Don't you think all of the piles would constitute as mystery?

Ana Lawrence: The pile is a smorgasbord. Maybe you'll find a hat in there, or overalls, or get lucky and find your daughter's future prom dress.

Ellison Cole: It seems to me that you're putting a lot of faith into your customers' willingness to accept blind faith.

Ana Lawrence: I haven't had any blind customers yet, but if I did, that's kind of
the point. My audience is everyone and my business is designed to spread diversity.

Ellison Cole: My phone dings. While I check my notification, I watch Ana walk over to the ugly sweaters and methodically re-arrange the pile. I've been tagged. #blindfaith #EllisonCole captions a sepia filtered image of me looking perplexed. Perhaps she's pulling my leg, she does hold a Master's after all. And then she speaks.

Ana Lawrence: I'm constantly shifting the piles. You always want your business to stay fresh. It keeps your customers interested. They don't want to see the same product in the same place each visit.

Ellison Cole: What do you love most about being a business owner?

Ana Lawrence: Definitely the look on the customers' faces when the exchange of money is over and they can finally open their purchase. In one regard, my business model is a "fuck you to capitalism."

Ellison Cole: We're interrupted by a customer. A woman, mid-seventies, clad in a pair of army green workingman's trousers and an embroidered peasant blouse, walks through the door and goes straight to the mystery pile.

Ana Lawrence: That's Lydia, my best customer.

Ellison Cole: Lydia has a distinct shopping style. She picks up two packages and weighs them with each hand, does this a few times and takes the three heaviest packages to the register. I ask why she shops at Aluminum Foil. She's deadpan.

Lydia: The box of chocolates metaphor.

Ellison Cole: And finally, I get it. The idea is not just logical, it's brilliant. One day Ana will get it too. I'm Ellison Cole, back next week with more stories of Things People Do. Announcer RCR, Rural Community Radio.