J. B. Thompson

“How’s that leg?” queried the Authorial Rabbit of his friend Titmarsh.

“Oh, it goes, it goes.”

“Goes and goes, slows and slows,” intoned the AR, providing the echo of sympathetic companionship among the aging.

The two friends strolled near the beach, where today in white sunshine, young does lay on towels displaying more haunch than in previous years, the naked mounds, and children screamed their unself-conscious existence in the cool water and groups of families and friends engaged community by way of portable chairs, baskets of fried chicken and chips and umbrellas.

The AR and Titmarsh selected a log some distance away from the heaviest action, swept sand from it and lowered themselves upon it to observe the sky, the sea, its birds and the other creatures of other kinds and their own.

“Sad about Hackenbush.”

“Apparently when Feeble visited him in hospital and the Hack had tubes in his nose, he pretended to play them.”

“Right to the end.”

“Mmmm.”

Children laughing and screaming and crying.

“I went to the gas station yesterday.”

Titmarsh threw a handful of sand in the direction of the children.

“An old woman was standing by a step in front of the door where you go in to pay. I asked her if she was in line. You know, these days, you have to pay first before you pump.”

“Pump your own gas. Full service gone the way of the dodo.”

“Exactly. Anyway, she said she wanted petrol.”

“Petrol.”

“Still some folks from the old world diaspora. I said to her, ‘You’re here first, you go in.'”

“She repeated she wanted petrol in her English accent. Another couple of people have come up to stand in line after me. We’re lined up to go in, someone is inside paying and we’re waiting. That person inside comes out. I beckon the old woman to go in. She says she can’t step up on the step.”

Titmarsh nods. “Leg issue.”

“Right. I see that the step kind of levels out in a few feet and suggest she walk over there and come up on the gentle slope.”

“That sun is hot,” says Titmarsh.

“Instead, she repeats she wants petrol.”

“Head issue?” wonders Titmarsh.

“I go in, and it’s full COVID: plexiscreen, young woman masked, she’s there alone, clutching the desk. She says, gas? I say, there’s a woman outside who can’t come in, trouble with walking, could you please go out and serve her.”

“‘I can’t leave the station!'” she almost shouts, partly because of the plexiglass, partly because she’s nervous. ‘I’m here alone, I have to stay behind the screen.’ So I open the door, point towards the woman, hoping the clerk will reconsider.”

“And does she?”

“By now, she’s nearly hysterical. She cries that she can’t go out, what does that woman want? The old woman sees her and yells, ‘Petrol! I want petrol!’ and she brandishes some money, a couple of twenties.

“I say, I’ll hold the door, guard the entrance, you go out and serve the woman. Indeed, she now brushes past me, stands in front of the woman and asks, ‘What do you want?’ The woman says, of course, ‘Petrol!’ and flutters her money. ‘What is petrol?’ asks the clerk. All of us shout, ‘Gas! She wants gas!'”

A camped family near us look our way.

“The clerk grabs the woman’s money, rushes over to pump gas into her vehicle. Eventually it is done, and the old woman climbs into the passenger side of the vehicle. I hadn’t noticed she wasn’t the driver. An old guy masked is sitting at the wheel. They drive off.”

“Those two shouldn’t be on the road. They need looking after by relatives.”

The AR and Titmarsh meditate.

“I remember,” says Titmarsh.

“That’s good,” says the AR.

“I remember when you’d go to a gas station and two or three young guys in uniform and caps would rush out to your car, you’d not even have to get out, they’d ask what you wanted, you’d say gas ‘er up, and they do it, and they’d clean the front and back windshields, check the oil and air in your tires, all the while calling you sir and waving you with a smile on when they were done.”

“Just how old are you?”

“Ha, ha. Not so long ago.”

“Living memory. Yes, and people in stores knew their products and waiters seemed to like you and your doctor would make house calls and you could get referred to a specialist and been seen by that person the same day, if you had a leg issue.”

“At least in our part of the world.”

Titmarsh and the AR meditate once more, thinking of the short duration in one part of the world after WW II when life was getting better for most of the people and when that changed.