This particular glorious October morning, I kicked my Ford to life and cruised slowly towards Market Street Station, looking for a client. A man in a business suit flagged me down, and soon I had several dollars stuck in the pocket of my purse. Two hours later, rush hour turned the city streets into something remarkably similar to an elementary school's hallways: the same chaotic traffic, the same noise, and the same intense knowledge of the priority of one's needs. It was time to get off the road and have the second daily cup of coffee. I pulled into a secret parking space between two rundown buildings off Spruce and 13th Street and went into a tiny Uncle Tad's coffee shop. They brewed very strong coffee and carried good ole American Tastykakes at a thousand calories apiece, but that was all I needed to wake up and start a bright new day.
The place was packed and, stepping inside, I held the door for yet another hungry fellow. Moving in lockstep between narrow shelves, I felt the guy's hot breath on my neck. He got so close that he poked me in my head with the tip of his baseball cap. After three divorces, a man's body in proximity could cause skin irritation, nausea and seizures. Inhaling and exhaling rhythmically, I filled my cup with coffee, got a heavy chocolate Tastykake, paid at the door, and got outside as fast as humanly possible.
I finished my snack and coffee, sitting on the cab hood. Food stinks up the car too much, and I like to keep it clean. I threw the paper bag into a trashcan and opened the car door, when suddenly I was pushed inside the cab with such force that my face met the steering wheel and salty blood filled my mouth. Somebody clenched my neck from behind and ripped my earrings off. They were 3.5-carat diamond earrings that my third hubby had given me as a wedding present and forgot to include in the list of marital property items. The earrings were worth more than the cab I drove, but for me they also had a sentimental value, like tiny particles of dust from my past comfortable, suburban life. I never expected that the process of separation from my earrings would cause me so much pain. Instinctively, I turned around and smashed my purse into the predator's face.
He grunted, pulled his knee off my back, and ran. I reached him ten feet away and hit him with my purse again. He fell to the ground. I stepped on his wrist, bent over and, with a victorious cry, pulled my earrings from his clenched fingers.