Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, June 14, 1994 TAG: 9407070062
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: BRIAN KELLEY
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
I happened upon it while running late, as usual, on my way to breakfast with some old friends in downtown a few Sundays ago.
The sun shone, the passing students gave College Avenue a glow of healthy, youthful freshness.
But just beneath the benign exterior lurked an agent of decay. Or at least one of poor sanitation.
As I pulled the car up beside a local beans-and-sprouts eatery, my wife, Leigh Anne, noticed something on the nearby curb.
It wasn't one of the underemployed Slacker Youth who are prone to hang out on this particular corner at all hours.
It was lower to the ground, had gray fur and a long, ugly tail.
"Wow, it's a rat," I said, with that acute descriptiveness that comes from spending years as a Professional Journalist.
Leigh Anne declined my offer to let her out of the car with a dry, "I'll wait, thank you."
The large rodent seemed out of place on that sunny street corner, particularly in downtown Blacksburg, which goes to so much trouble to keep up that tidy college-town image.
I spent a few years as a night police reporter in Richmond, and as such became familiar with its seedy districts and their rodent habitues.
One of my favorite pastimes - when not chasing ambulances, standing near the bloodied corpse of Richmond's latest homicide victim or chatting with fellow cynics on the police force - was driving around the dark city streets, police scanners blaring.
After a while, I knew to expect to see a rat now and then, especially in the warmer months. It was akin to knowing you'll see white-tailed deer on the rural roadsides of the New River Valley, except it does a lot less damage to flatten Templeton the rat than it does to collide with a full-grown Bambi.
But that was Richmond, which remains a grimy, industrial city, despite efforts to gussy up Shockoe Bottom for the nightclub crowd.
Perhaps I'm naive, but a rat in downtown Blacksburg, in broad daylight, surprised me.
The rat seemed surprised, too, along with confused and panic-stricken as it scurried to and fro by the curb. Finally, the rat dashed across College Avenue and stopped beneath a garbage can.
That's where it got interesting. I looked up and noticed Jeff London, the former chairman of the Montgomery County Planning Commission, sitting on a bench immediately behind the trash can, talking with a friend.
They saw us staring and pointing and they also saw the rat hiding.
And then, the panicked rat dashed from beneath the trash can, straight toward the two men on the bench, which backs up against a brick wall on the edge of Virginia Tech.
Now, Jeff is a trim and fit 40-something. But until that moment, I had no idea that this mild-mannered, nonprofit housing agency executive could sky. We're talking a 40-inch vertical leap, way up into Michael Jordan territory.
Or, as Leigh Anne puts it, "They levitated."
And the rat finally found safe passage through a nearby opening in the brick wall. I last saw it running on the Tech campus.
Jeff and his friend landed back down on the sidewalk. The friend pointed across the street at Leigh Anne and said, "You made it do that, didn't you!"
I parked the car, wandered over and made a bad joke about the possible breakfast specials across the street. Jeff wasn't amused.
But what the heck, he's leaving town this month for a new job in New York.
I suppose he'll miss quaint Blacksburg, dirty little secrets and all.
Brian Kelley is a reporter in the New River Valley bureau of the Roanoke Times & World-News.
by CNB