I cannot believe my life has come to this: The thing I enjoy more than anything else in the world right now is my afternoon break. I did not dream of this while I was growing up, yet I get excited come time to get my $1.34 medium cup of coffee with two sugars and half-and-half. On Fridays, I splurge and let myself live large and have three sugars! I find a secluded table all by myself, take out my steno pad, and sit quietly and wait for words to come like the lame man in the Bible who went to the pool of Bethesda each day and waited for the healing waters to stir.
Finally, thoughts of something I had seen a few days earlier appear: a Rastafarian driving a silver Chrysler PT Cruiser on Route 4 going toward New York City. This was the only thing I got: the image of a wild eyed, dreadlock drenched Jamaican driving a Chrysler PT Cruiser. This unlikely image—a ganja guy in a retro remake vehicle—languishes in my head, a heavy, illogical thought. I look out on the manicured lawn of the corporate campus and it is perfect and unblemished. I take another sip of coffee and think about the Rasta man again.
I am sure the car was not his. I'm guessing he borrowed it from an acquaintance. Have you ever heard of a Rastafarian who owned a car? Rastafarians do not seem to be people who own a ting.
Ding-ding.
The second thought comes. I worked last year with a Rastafarian UPS driver who had a special brown cap made with a pouch that he could push his dreadlocks into. I noticed he did not reek of the aroma of marijuana, which I thought was unusual for a Rasta man. When I inquired a little about the Rasta faith, he told me he wasn't really practicing right now, except apparently the hair part that allowed the wardrobe modification instead of the UPS-issue brown cap. He was a good worker too, another sign that he wasn't practicing as a Rasta man, typically people who don't worry and don't hurry.
We got back from our vacation in Jamaica just last week. I suppose seeing a Rasta man in a PT Cruiser a few weeks before the trip somehow prepared me to go to lie around next to the Caribbean Sea listening to “Buffalo Soldier.” I was disappointed, however, that none of the hair-braiding women asked me about getting mine done. Even though I still have good coverage on top, they must have figured my hair is too brittle and would have just fallen out when they yanked on it. Maybe that's why no Rasta men have ever tried to convert me to their faith. I just don't have the right hair for it.