This is the room that the local Obama staffers found for me in Hazelton. A mattress on the floor. I had to rifle through the closet to find my own sheets. Luckily there was a down comforter in a dry cleaning bag among the piles of boxes and books and VHS cassettes that filled this some sort of study room.
The host wasn't there to greet me. He was working at the campaign headquarters. I don't know who he was or if he was his son but the guy who answered the door had black framed glasses with impossibly thick lenses. He never looked at me but only into the phone he was simultaneously talking into as he led me around the house. He was a nice guy. Friendly. But something had happened in his life and I don't know if he always did but now he stuttered and repeated himself and went off on tangents that, not knowing the terrain of the world he inhabited, that I couldn't follow.
I counted three cats in the house so far as he showed me my choice of rooms. By the smell of the wall to wall carpet they seemed to be engaged in a long drawn out pissing war. Dave.. Day... Davy.. was on the phone with a neighbor who had spotted another combatant that had escaped and had called in to report it's location.
The house had a big Obama sign that filled the screen door. There was another patriotic blue sign on the lawn. Beyond that the neighbors had surrounded it with McCain/Palin signs. These were good people, but I couldn't stay there.
I made my bed. I went to the office. I had a tuna sandwich. Then I went back to the house, took my things and checked into a Motel.
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