Honestly, they’re just people, no different from you and I.

If all goes right, they wake up in the morning blessed with a new day.  Some get the kids ready before hustling them off to wherever it is the kids go for the day.  Some take out the trash before heading to work, because it’s, well, Tuesday.  Some get up earlier because that new hair straightener from Amazon was on the step yesterday when they got home.  A few wake up crusty, regretting those last few drinks that had them crawling into bed mere hours before and now crawling out of bed looking for the Tylenol.

It’s all pretty normal stuff, the kind of life tapestry that’s unfolding all around as others do the same things more or less, except for the night shift folks, who I won’t talk about because they wreck my narrative.

People, getting a start to their day, one foot after the next, inexorably leading to wherever it is they themselves go for the day.  Almost an old-school Norman Rockwell feel to it.

Some work for others, some work for themselves.  Some are part of the workforce, some provide jobs for that workforce.  Some have their own businesses, some own their own businesses with storefronts along the downtown corridor.  Some work for the public sector, most for the private.  And every single one of them, a lot of them anyway, are salt of the earth types, the people you see at Walmart or No Frills or Timmies, or the rink on a Saturday morning.  Their kids mix with yours, they mix with you, and it’s all a beautiful tableau of everyday life here in The Valley.

What could possibly upset all this, and transform these very same people into something less than a beautiful slice of everyday life?

Giving them a faint sniff of something they mistake for power.  That’ll do it almost every time.

Continue reading “SMALL TOWN ELITES” →