Fire drill. Fire drill at the rehab, evacuate the school. “Everyone out to the smoking area,” I repeat a couple of times. Mario who is on crutches moves very slowly, all the time saying he won’t let me burn up. The fire alarm sounds relentlessly, like a child having a tantrum. Everyone exits out the gate and stands in the street, in the cul-de-sac. The area where residents smoke, a dirt lot with chairs and a white tented canopy is just across the way. A staff member announces that the building where the residents live was constructed in the 1920s and no one is to smoke in their room. “The building would go up like a tinderbox,” he says. I wonder if we have any guys/gals with arson on their record? It’s time to go back to work. As I walk the winding paths back to my class I notice a handmade flier taped to the wall. It announces they are having a ping-pong tournament coming up and first prize is several bags of Bugler Rolling Tobacco. I miss playing ping-pong and the occasional smoke. Smoking is just so 20th Century.
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