Many streets end gradually, tapering off from the four lane screeching stream of metal, gritty gutters and curbs, wide sidewalks, noise and billowing smoke of downtown traffic, to a lazier two lane affair making it's way thru some residential neighborhood, or perhaps a rusted industrial zone where sidewalks will be done away with altogether, eventually coming to rest in some sandy, overgrown cul-de-sac, or else ending abruptly with a right angle formed by a fence or wall.

Streets are bisected by highway overpasses, train tracks, parks, and bodies of water. Sometimes a street will be temporarily obstructed by construction or crime scene tape, other times they may metamorphasize into pedestrian malls, only to be blocked by locked gates when the shops close and the money goes home.

Ruthie B was a scientist of streets, a mathematician, a real PHD, over the past 50 years with her pushcart and her feet she had mapped out the streets of Big City, and her knowledge of their up hills, down hills and wound around hills was nearly encyclopedic.

She figured each street was a line, some straight and others wiggly, but all theoretically endless and free to encircle the world if they so desired. Most of these lines had been relatively forthcoming in her
exploration of them, beginnings and ends were easily ascertained, though in certain cases the trek might take days, however others would divide or merge in most perplexing ways, sometimes requiring her to retrace her steps for a week or more until at last she felt she had grasped their true nature.

As each city street was measured out by her footsteps new streets would sometimes appear. Most of these were residentially and relatively uninteresting in terms of trashcans to explore. They occurred most exclusively on the outskirts of town and were rapidly lined with beige vinyl siding monster homes like toxic mushrooms.

Recently, however, other, older streets had begun to silently emerge.
These streets were old, because the paving stones that lined them were all very old. But somehow these streets were also new. They were new because Ruthie B, scientist of streets, had never, ever seen them before.

Ruthie B had arms like pythons and hair like a hornets nest. This evening it was tucked up under a towering 18th century bonnet. She pushed her heavily laden cart towards the little fenced in park where
neon lights met china, the moon was full and she was headed for the midnight tea party with the queens under the trees.

They always appreciated her sense of style, in the dappled shade from the dancing leaves she would quickly erect a scrim, ingeniously fashioned from bamboo and plastic bags around her cart, emerging,
minutes later, her layers of cast off sweater dresses gone and instead replaced with some stunning, if soot smeared, ball gown, a transformation greeted with appreciative oohs and ahhs from the assembled handful of trannyho's, decked out in their own finest regalia: sequined tops, tiny spandex miniskirts, faux pearls, fishnet tights on long, lovely, muscular legs.

Each tea party occasioned a different dress, all fabulous, many clearly antiques, the tranny girls were always eager to see what Ruthie B would come up with next. Often whispering to one another their entertaining suspicion that somewhere along the way, that old bag lady had clearly burglarized a museum.

Tonight was a very special night indeed because Ruthie B. had a gift to give Carmel, her youngest granddaughter, whose 21st (or some would say16th) birthday had recently passed without much fanfare beside the prerequisite drinking binge. Ruthie B. thought to herself that these sweet, shy, young debutantes deserved something more than another night of anonymous blowjobs in a cheap motel room to celebrate such an important birthday with. What Ruthie B. had in mind was a big picnic, layed out in some imaginary bucolic landscape of rolling green hills, complete with streamers and cake and balloons.

Several days ago Carmel had staggered into Ruthie B. in a shadowy piss stained alleyway, grabbed her shoulder and cried out "It's my birthday!" with a hint of desperation in her alcohol flavored voice, then tottered away on her platform shoes screaming out again "It's my birthday!" to a group of horrified business men as she shoved her way past them, Bull dozing a path back through the crowded, sunlit street.

After nearly a week had passed and the imaginary birthday party had failed to materialize Ruthie B. took it upon herself to throw a surprise party for the disappointed young lass.

Making the journey step by step with her cart out past downtown, past the trendy shopping area, where she paused briefly to pull a sandwich from the trash, past the latino barrio, and the warehouse district, at last coming to the most perilous part of her quest, the vast clanking sea of the train yard.

The only way across was a narrow shuddering steel bridge, which held no sidewalk, so Ruthie B. sang an old big band song to herself about the girl with the strawberry blond hair at the top of her lungs to drown out the beeping of the car horns lined up behind her. The old woman with the cart held up traffic for nearly an hour as, step by step, she made her way across the bridge. Sometimes she stopped to rest, watching the movement of the colorful containers below, from this height she thought they looked like beaded necklaces.

When Ruthie B. reached the ground she stopped singing. She emerged into a wealthy suburb of immaculate white houses and lush green lawns, a bus hurtled past her. Ruthie B. never took the bus because they wouldn�t allow her cart. Instead she walked everywhere, all this exercise kept Ruthie B. in excellent shape for her age. Ruthie B. was 100 years old.

She made her way through the suburb to the fancy organic grocery store where she knew she would find her cake. Ruthie B. had never been much of a cook, to her first few husband's dismay, but boy oh boy, did Ruthie B. love to eat.

In the big blue dumpster behind the strip mall Ruthie B. discovered a
free range turkey with all the trimmings. Waiting in some bushes for her cake to be delivered to the dumpster she devoured the entire turkey, bones and all. She belched. In the tree above her birds were singing songs about the moon and the sun and the stars. Ruthie B. smiled and folded her hands in her lap.

The sky began to paint itself shades of orange and purple. Ruthie B.
looked up and as if on cue a young pimple faced boy in a towering white chefs hat strode out thru the back door of the grocery, carrying in his arms a large, multi-tiered birthday cake with "Carmel" written on top in chocolate ganache. He carefully laid it down inside the dumpster, balancing it atop bulging black trash bags and piles of multicolored decaying produce. He brushed off his hands and headed back inside.

Ruthie B. went and carefully retrieved her cake. It had been a long trip, but it was worth it. She carefully poked a single diagnostic finger into the cake, taking a biopsy of the frosting. As she licked
her finger clean it confirmed her sense of satisfaction. The frosting was made with real butter, subtly flavored with freshly grated lemon zest. It was magnificent. She quickly stowed it under her cart and left.

Headed back toward Big City Ruthie B. paused briefly in front of acluster of newly erected condominiums and snatched a bunch of colorful birthday balloons from the signpost. "You'd do more good if you came along with me" she muttered as she attached their long curling ribbons to the edge of her cart. The balloons trailed behind her like a flock of neon colored baby ducks as she made her way back across the sweeping arc of the bridge to Big City.

As she pushed her cart through the uneven terrain of the warehouse district one of the wheels became caught on a clump of fennel which sprung, enthusiastically, from a shattered slab of concrete sidewalk. Bending to tug her cart lose Ruthie B. felt a warm breeze enveloping her from the left side. She straightened and turned. Where only minutes before had stood a crumbling brick wall, matted with ferns, there now appeared a narrow cobblestone street that Ruthie B. had never seen before. Carried on the breeze was the tantalizing smell of freshly baking sourdough bread.

Ruthie B. glanced upward, there was no street sign. "Well, that's no way to introduce yourself." she muttered, and with no further ado Ruthie B. stepped out into the unknown of the old/new street. Determined to go just far enough to find a street sign and thus satisfy her curiosity, Ruthie B. thought to herself that maybe if she was lucky she could bring back a loaf of that wonderful smelling bread for the tea party.

To be continued... in the soon to be released epic zine "In The Mouth Of The Dove" which will be made available on my web page at www.pigeonpress.org.


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