The Merits of a Good Education (or) The School of Hard Knockers
As the digital watch crept toward 10pm I knew that, this not being my own work, I must depart. I made my way through a nighttown of south central Atlanta to the Peachtree Center MARTA station with ‘Topology of a Phantom City’ tucked beneath my arm, excitedly descending the cavernous escalator in order to read. I understand the dimness of what lay ahead: the train ride, the bus ride, the greasy seats. But what most clearly lay in store was a grey night. One night that I had trained several years to suffer through. So here I am living through it. After being deposited at the MARTA stop in front of CVS on Peachtree Road, I wondered to myself how many nights in the past I had lived out of a bag, or a store and dined in the parking lot. Tonight I looked forward to a fresh can of beans from CVS to no avail. I was forced to purchase a box of Mueller’s (the name still gives me nightmares) elbows and a can of tomato sauce. This was made all the more acceptable for I knew that a fraction of a can of corn was waiting to be added to the mix in the kitchen. So I sit now on the brink of dining, before the computer, chatting facelessly, and am grateful and indebted to my education for giving me the skills necessary to forge through nights such as these.