From the day
Perspective: The Anxious Local · Sight
The ticker tape is screaming, a dizzying tangle of white ribbons announcing two million shares traded, yet my stomach churns at the sight of five-cent bread in every shop window. I pull my wool coat tighter against the soot-heavy air, squinting at the flickering gas lamps that illuminate headlines of a market gone mad while my own pockets feel dangerously light. The brassy stomp of "Blaze Away" blares from a phonograph nearby, but even Abe Holzmann’s march can’t drown out my nerves over these rising prices. I steady my shaking hands with a steaming cup of coffee—thankfully, it is still good to the last drop—while watching a boy in a stiff collar stare longingly at a new Lionel Train he’ll likely never afford.