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Downtown Diary
The Ramp responds
Readers of NUVO! Citizens of Indianapolis! It is I, the ramp on East Market Street. A few weeks ago, I read J. Williams" calumny-filled piece "Notes Indicting a Ramp" and feel compelled to respond to the charges that he, who seems to confuse a butter-knife with a rapier when it comes to the estimation of his own wit, made against me. 1. Yes, I said, "Hey! Punk!" to that drunk friend of his, who then got arrested for public intoxication for running around downtown blubbering about a talking ramp. So what? That same guy, as I recall, once peeled out on me. Tit for tat. 2. Yes, his buddy had sex and caught syphilis while under me, so to speak. And? Is that my fault? Who the hell has sex under a ramp, anyway? Do you think I enjoyed seeing the guy"s tubby ass bouncing around and hearing his choked gasping? Ugly. Very ugly. 3. Yes, his friend decided to devote her life to the poor while walking beneath me. Is that a crime? I should get a medal for that, and instead I get threats of my destruction, my annihilation. A sad, sad state of affairs, citizens. 4. Yes, I am, like Orson Welles, a dominant presence here in this miasma of mediocrity I call home. The Orson Welles of Citizen Kane! The Orson Welles of Touch of Evil! The Orson Welles of Francoise Sagan"s memoirs! Like Welles I should be celebrated, not denigrated, for my greatness. I had a chat with my ladyfriend, a curvy cloverleaf ramp on the Southside. "Rampy, why are you so full of rage?" she asked me. I told her how abandoned I feel. After so many years of service, abandoned. From my interstate aerie I watched my old friend Market Square Arena get demolished for no good reason. Now I"m next. And I am angry. "Rampy," my ladyfriend whispered to me, "just turn the other cheek." "Darling," I said to her, "I don"t have cheeks. I"m a ramp, remember?" "Rampy, I"ll miss you so when you"re gone," she whispered, and began sobbing. "Darling," I said, "I"ll miss you, too. And I"ll miss this world of ours, so strange and beautiful."
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