Day 787: 5 Minute Freewrite: Monday - Prompt: only what we could carry

While doing business with her friend Mrs. Mildred York, Mrs. Selene Slocum-Lofton encountered another of the high-net-worth Ridgeline Fire survivors – Mr. Joseph Chase, who seemed very down on the corner of Main and Market Streets in Big Loft, VA.

“Buck up, Joe – what is the matter?” Mrs. Slocum-Lofton said, and Mr. Chase sighed.

“I was just thinking about the wife and I; she can't stop crying and I can hardly stop. We thank you for for organizing the evacuation, but you know, we got out with only what we could carry, which really wasn't very much. A whole life, gone up in smoke.”

Mrs. Slocum-Lofton was weary of all such conversations, but recognized that most people simply were not as ruthless about living as she was at 83. So, she went into mother-tone before setting Mr. Chase straight.

“If your whole life has gone up in smoke, who is this handsome young fellow telling me about it?”

Mr. Chase cracked a smile.

“Well, I'm not young,” he said.

“If you smiled, you have an ego like most men, and compared to me, you're young – and don't you know not to contradict your elders? To be that much messed up, you've got to be alive, so stop this gloom and doom. Your important stuff wasn't at the Blue Ridge house anyway.”

The smile got wider.

“I'm so glad Mary insisted we keep the summer house lightly furnished,” he said.

“Exactly,” Mrs. Slocum-Lofton said. “I mean, you have lost one of six houses, and it was gorgeous, but … .”

Which is why Mrs. Slocum-Lofton was tired of these conversations.

“You would think the world has come to an end with these people,” she said to Mrs. Mildred York, “like they had lost all their income properties or something, or like someone important to them died. All depressed over a house they spend exactly one month a year in – one month! We are well out of our neighborhood, Mildred, believe me – too much time spent sitting around with people who don't know the value and measure of things is not good for old people like us!”

“So, what are we going to do, Selene?”

“I plan on buying an apartment building somewhere here downtown and moving in – where things are happening! We'll keep the house on Jonathan Lofton Avenue, of course – I enjoy your company, and of course we'll have to entertain over there when necessary. But the richest parts of Big Loft have to yet be rebuilt – clean-up, infrastructure, landscaping, construction – in addition to the city being desperate for revenue to deal with lawsuits coming from the stupid side of the Pendleton Prison scheme. Nine local banks may break. This is the place to be for the wealth creator!”

“And look, they even have a church down here,” Mrs. York said, noticing the Church in the Midst of Life sign on the corner of Main and Straight Street.

“Hmmmm... .” Mrs. Slocum-Lofton said as she noticed the people going to and fro. “They have a lot going on there, for a weekday … .”