donuts : the great equalizer

Someday’s I’m a pancake, but as long as I flip before I burn, it’s all good.

I was driving in to the city this morning, on my way to do all kinds of good & spiritual things and getting all kinds of cranky because of road construction on the BQE, also known as New York’s perpetual construction zone. Sooner or later the construction has to wind up at your exit, today was my day, and at certain points, all three lanes merged into one.

And then that one single lane, stopped.

A wiry little construction worker, in the requisite neon orange vest and dark roadwork tan waved a SLOW sign, then flipped it to STOP. Traffic stopped, backed up, and we waited — until the man carrying two dozen Dunkin’ Donuts crossed the road –then we were waved on and all was right with the world.

I had to let it go. How can I be angry when my day is held up for the delivery of my favorite donuts to my favorite group of guys?

Mama loves a working man. I especially love road construction crews. It’s hard, hot work and as much as I’m jonesing for the chance to operate heavy machinery, I’d hate to have to do it daily. The sun beating down, rain pelting your face, soaking your clothes, hot tar fumes, breathing exhaust all day, all day, all day. Gentlemen of the road, you of Caterpillars, Pavers & Road Rollers, I salute you. If your day can be made a little lighter, a little brighter by the delivery of 24 Dunkin’ Donuts, who am I to bitch about my time? Seriously.

Dunkin Donuts can unite the world.

When I was nine years old I ran away from home. I packed my blue plastic suitcase, stuffed all my money in a red knee-sock that had long since lost its ability to stay up without use of a rubber band and walked away. After about a mile, I stopped at the Dunkin’ Donuts.

I pulled forty-five cents out of the sock — enough for a Boston Creme, a cup of milked-down coffee and a dime to call my mother who promptly came and got me.

I’d gone far enough. I don’t remember what was bothering my nine year old self, what it was that prompted me to “leave home” that day, but whatever it was, Dunkin’ Donuts made it okay, at least for that day.

A properly timed Dunkin’ Donut can change your whole day.

If I hadn’t been held up in traffic, hadn’t had to wait for the well-muscled, bare-armed, gleaming with sweat heavy road construction guy carrying two dozen donuts, I would’ve been out of the car by the time this came on to WBGO’s Saturday morning Function in the Junction. Not to be missed, Willis “Gator-Tail” Jackson’s Good to the Bone. [audio:https://onlythejodi.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/15-good-to-the-bone3.mp3]

A properly timed blues saxophone can also change my whole day….