Waiting for the tow truck

Lovely cool Texas evening, waiting for AAA to come. Wyatt called on his way to IHOP, his weekly ritual to help his football friend load up on pancake carbs before the game. "The car won't start, and if you don't move it from the Reilly parking lot, it'll get towed." Right, need it towed but to our destination of choice, not the city pound. I head over at 7:10pm, the tow due by 7:30. At 7:30 they call, running late, it'll be another half hour. Then another 10, the driver's late. Then he arrives, with an old manual tow truck and he spends an hour trying to figure out how to line it up properly. Eventually, he gives up, and we wait another 20 for the flat bed. It's after 9:30 now and I won't get home before 10:15 pm. Luckily, I've brought a flashlight and George Saunders, "The Braindead Megaphone." I thought "Abstinence Teacher" was next in line, but that's a hardcover (signed!), and this is a paperback so it's easier to throw in my bag. So I'm not freaking out. I'm actually enjoying the immersion in the book. Reading by flashlight in the dark cool air. John and I earlier blew off our plans to catch the Seeger doc at the Dobie, when the distress call came in, so the evening's clear. I wait. I hang. Enjoying the night.

Not relishing the next steps. Is the 98 windstar dead? (The kids were so awesome helping me buy it that many years ago, over John's "not a mini-van!") We were hoping to nurse it through Wyatt's graduation. Ugh.

But reading. Yes, reading. One of the after mulls from the Texas Book Festival, the lingering effect of hanging out with so many writers. How articulate they all were, how well they told their stories, how attentive to detail and narrative. But too, how much they read. Like us with movies. We keep up, we see a ton. They read. John's been reading forever. I used to but then fell prey to computer addiction and let it go. This weekend feeling a bit of the pull to get it back.