When the weather is nice, I like to get out at lunch and walk around the neighborhood where the bookstore I work as a bookkeeper is located. It is mostly made up of Victorian homes, has been quite gentrified, and literally taken over by ex-Californians. Sometimes when I don't have much time, I just walk around the block for a brief bit of fresh air, which is what I was doing when I took the alley photograph seen above (I work in a windowless basement, for God's sake). In the background you can see the Sie Film Center, which is located just across the patio from our store and is where the Denver International Film Festival is held.
Right next to this alley, along a busy one way street, is a sign in memory of a man named Kent Roper, who I imagine was killed at that spot while trying to cross the street. When I see that sign, I think of my Uncle Jack's story of the girl who lived next door when he was growing up around 88th and Racine, in the South Side Brainerd neighborhood of Chicago. Her name was Rita Roper, and his and her parents were encouraging the two of them to become a couple. Rita was quite attractive and had big ambitions, and neither she nor my Uncle were crazy about the idea. Rita, as it turned out, became an actress and a dancer, and toured with Bob Hope overseas when he entertained the troupes. After Hollywood, Rita came back to the South Side of Chicago and opened a dance studio in Oak Lawn, a suburb just a few miles to the west of Brainerd. Every time I walk past that sign I wonder if that poor guy was any relation. Probably not, but I can't help wondering. The scary mind of an old guy at work.
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