Ten seconds in Purgatory.

I am recovering from a head cold and an upset stomach. The last goddamn thing I needed to see/hear was the outgoing president’s farewell speech. Even ten seconds of it, which I stumbled upon when tuning into “Countdown.” I don’t know if it’s because of the shuddery hiss that escaped my person at the first glimpse of THAT SMIRK on its face, but the image that keeps coming to mind is Francie Nolan’s description of the bottom of the airshaft in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. To wit:

The airshaft was a horrible invention. Even with the windows tightly sealed, it served as a sounding box and you could hear everybody’s business. Rats scurried around the bottom…Since this bottom couldn’t be reached by man (the windows being too small to admit the passage of a body), it served as a fearful repository for things that people wanted to put out of their lives. Rusted razor blades and bloody cloths were the most innocent items. Once Francie looked down into the airshaft. She thought of what the priest said about Purgatory and figured it must be like the airshaft bottom only on a larger scale. When Francie went into the parlor, she passed through the bedrooms shuddering and with her eyes shut.

Maybe it was the line about the rats. At any rate, eeeuuuggghhh.