His seat-mate, a middle-aged brunette whose words rushed out of her mouth before her thoughts could catch up, was only too happy to talk about movie stars and directors and their latest flashy projects. She helped him build upon the stereotype that all Angelenos read Variety.
He really likes Stanley Kubrick. And the weather here is fantastic. She agrees, excitedly, because, well, no one ever talks about the weather.
The automated voice told us unhurriedly that the next stop was 'Comp-ton Sta-tion', prompting the British man to ask his new friend about Compton's exports to the world at large.
"I listen to the rap songs," he clipped, "and they mention Compton quite a bit. Also Long Beach, South Central...I can't remember the others..."
She wants to talk about movies. And the weather.
"So what studios have you been to? How did the meetings -oh, call it a pitch" (giggle) "go? Who'd you talk to? So you live in London?" Her sentences pile on top of each other.
London is the only city in England, so you just might as well say you live there, I want to tell the British man. I want to tell the British man that Compton isn't scary. It has little houses with nice people, who put bars on their windows some time ago. It has new multicolored (unsold) condominiums, that look like crap, like they'll fall over if you hammer a nail into the wall to hang a picture. It has a few dirty streets, while some aren't so bad. An abandoned armchair, where someone is lucky enough to sleep, sometimes. It has a city hall, chamber of commerce, old folks' home, gardens. It is home to whole families and fractured families, trash-strewn yards with chain-link fences and small patches of well-kept green lawn. Pigeons, cats, dogs, goldfish, books, guns, grammas, pregnancies, language, assumptions. What it lacks in confidence it makes up in reputation.
