The Inner Elbow Market

Ten years later, the same people were still sitting where they were, not really talking to each other so much as reconvening the neighborhood at the Market, just to remind each other that they are a community.

At our side, one of those helicopter mothers had gathered other like-minded people to explain to them what was wrong with Pima Community College. The other four nodded agreement. "God help Pima College!" I thought. "The Taliban are coming!" No. She was just trying to ease her son, at her side, into and through an education. It probably was a process that needed lubrication.

The University volleyball team had made a deal, so they were siphoning omelets down into their long, lean bodies, and at the outside tables, lone wolves were drinking coffee and reading the newspaper at their iron grate tables: weather-proof, wear-proof, and theft-proof.

The Rincon Market is a combination of grocery, delicatessan, fruit market, coffee shop, and weekend waffle and omelet shop. It is too far away for our regular attendance, but it is a gem. Once we lived nearby, and a second time, we drove to the University for work, and now we live in a farther corner of the city, but the Market remains: memory and touchstone.

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