Childhood in plague times.

(from One Story, #57)

A really cool story. Had a lot of the things I like: Interesting setting. Ambiguous era. Mostly meaningless tangents. Enormous distastrophe/loss of life (so sue me, I like disastrophe movies too). Hints of everyday menace. Touch of sci-fi (or sci-freaky).
Yeah, I liked this one. Had no idea where it was going, and didn’t agreee with a lot of the choices the author or the narrator made along the way, but whatever. I bought it.

I’d been meaning to read this for a while, rode around with it in my backpack for at least a week. (One Storys are so lightweight and compact!) On Friday I biked up to the Art Museum to check out the Live8 soundchecks (heard “Pour Some Sugar On Me” and wandered around backstage where I saw Def Leppard’s drums). On the way back it poured, like a flashflood disastrophe. The story was warped and soaked (as was I), but was dry enough today for me to read it. Later on, Lori and I hauled ass to Camden to see Def Lep on some sort of lost childhood pilgrimage, and damn if the flashflood I biked in, the one which could not destroy this story, didn’t cancel the show. Heck of a thing to find out once you’re already in Camden. Rain or shine, my ass. Armageddon it, my ass also. Did see Def Lep the next day at Live8. I don’t think I’d thought about Def Leppard in about 15 years, so whatever. Kanye West and Will Smith kicked ass. So did the weather.

Jennifer O’Connor, “Hopeful”