You know the one, it makes your heart beat faster

[sovay]

And this morning we discovered that when the weather turns cold enough for the upstairs neighbors to leave their cars idling in the driveway, because the driveway runs directly past our bedroom windows—it's the slant of the hill around the house—and at least one of the neighbors' cars needs a tune-up, this time-honored ritual turns our bedroom into a resonating chamber for an all-consuming bass vibration that jackhammered me up out of dreams so fast I thought the contractors were working on the porch again as they did all this month last year. As far as I can reconstruct, I was in the middle of a psychological thriller whose modern setting did not preclude it starring Robert Ryan, last seen letting himself into a hotel room in bruised dark glasses and a stranger's change of mismatched clothes, enduring what seems to the audience like an inexplicable degree of personal harassment, or perhaps it's penance, because he does keep answering the phone to the man who says each time, "Now tell me how bad it was." When I finally fell back asleep, I dreamed about reading at the gate of an airport, which would have been extremely banal except I haven't actually been on a plane in more than a decade, which I suppose accounted for the presence of payphones.

Comments

[lauradi7dw]

There were a few payphones at Logan as recently as 2019, I think. There may be one still, but I haven't checked lately. The car warm-up thing is terrible.

[gwynnega]

I am sorry about the car idling noise. Missing out on a dream Robert Ryan movie is really adding insult to injury.

[ethelmay]

Can't they get a block heater or whatever it's called?

[asakiyume]

last seen letting himself into a hotel room in bruised dark glasses
--this makes me think about how dark glasses are used (in films, at least) to hide bruised eyes.

I hope the neighbors don't plan on making that a daily ritual...