City Workers in Love

The Street Crew read the latest horoscope together as part of their morning routine with coffee and doughnuts, and then sing of their love for their vocation.

Al, the Street Crew Foreman lauds the Crew for their dedication to the City, but then expresses concern about young Romeo, the newest member of the Crew.

Romeo, a lovestruck junior member of the Street Repair Crew, sings of his longing and love for Mavis the Grasscutter, who he only sees from afar and has never met.

Mrs. Demers sings of her love affair with a hot young City clerk named Peter, and how their paths eventually separated after she lost touch with him.

After hearing Supervisor Demers’ tale of love and loss, Al shares a story of his own.

Mavis, the young psychology student who works as a city Grasscutter to put herself through school, sings of her unhappy and unhealthy relationship with Pete the Garbageman. After a fight develops between Romeo and Pete over Mavis, the Mayor appears (thanks to Al’s earlier phone call) and issues a Mayoral proclamation: Pete must cease and desist his opressive relationship with Mavis the Grasscutter.

Devasted after the Mayor’s proclamation, Pete the Garbageman tells his own tale of woe and lost love. Soon after, Mrs. Demers realizes that Pete is her long-lost love. They reconcile, as Mavis agrees to get to know Romeo better. A happy ending ensues with the Street Crew rejoicing after Mrs. Demers gives them another three months to replace the maintenance access cover (aka manhole cover) close to their favourite café.

Final Chorus Lyrics

Throw off the hard hats of heartache!
Kick up your boots, wave your gloves!
Reroute the traffic of sorrow,
Shout from the buildings above!
We will log the overtime of happiness together.
We've paved the avenue to love!

What a Fine High-spirited Bunch

What a fine high-spirited bunch! Only those who spend their working days in the service of society have such a love for what they do. I worry though, that somehow they may be misunderstood, that people may not see their selfless devotion to this neighbourhood.
They toil in glad obscurity on every path and thoroughfare, with pride of stewardship and painstaking care. They mend and tend and overbackwards bend and often it affects their own affairs.

That young man there, he seems too melancholy for his age. I’ll find out why, for my duty is to ensure the health and happiness of my earnest crew. Inner turmoil robs them of the energy they need to serve the City as best they can.

Every Day I See Her

Every day I seen her mowing down that gentle slope,

She moves with perfect grace like a steel-toed antelope.

The mower does her bidding like an eager child

As she glides over boulevard and lawn.

She was born to mow the grass, and I was born to love her.

She has limbs both bronze and lithe,

Their tan-lined beauty I extol
Her eyes, I cannot describe

For tinted are the windows to her soul

Her hair shines reflecting the sun

As brightly as a signal flare glinting off my safety vest.

When the blades of grass hear her engine accelerate

they rise and strain to greet her, trembling to meet their fate.

They smile as they surrender to the whirling scythe

And desperately yearn to grow again
So that soon she’ll reappear, and they’ll succumb anew

How I long to be that sod, each day as she floats by like a dream.
If you saw her you’d be awed by the beauty that’s captured my whole being.

Her hair shines reflecting the sun

As brightly as a signal flare glinting off my safety vest.

Every day I seen her mowing down that gentle slope,

She moves with perfect grace like a steel-toed antelope.

The mower does her bidding like an eager child

As she glides over boulevard and lawn.

She was born to mow the grass, and I was born to love her.

Every day I seen her mowing down that gentle slope,

She moves with perfect grace like a steel-toed antelope.

The mower does her bidding like an eager child

As she glides over boulevard and lawn.

She was born to mow the grass, and I was born to love her.

She was born to mow the grass, and I was born to love her.

I Know What Love Is

Yes! I know what love is, too well. I have known its awful power. Love has been filled out in triplicate on my heart, my mind, my soul. It was thrust into the inbox of my psyche when I needed it most. But now… the file is dead. It was terminated through gross romantic mismanagement.

I have filed it in the nethermost folder in the furthest reaches of the bottom box in the very deepest drawer of the dark and dusty archive of my bleak and empty life.

It stared several years ago, when a hot young clerk was hired to assist me. At first, it was his dark good looks that booted my lustful mainframe, but soon it became more than that.

He was an artist in the office. He filed with dash and moxy, cross-referencing with an abandon that made me blush. His grasp of knowledge process outsourcing was a gift from God. Ah! He drove me wild with interdepartmental desire. I couldn’t help myself, I called him into my office and… I mentored him.

Our office ran with passionate efficiency. Soon, of course, I was promoted. I wanted to tell him that he would be promoted too. But first I had to get away, for my annual ten days in Vegas.

When I got back, he was gone. He had transferred out of my life forever. I wandered the endless corridors of City Hall, calling his name, to no avail. I had won in my career, and at blackjack, but lost in life.

That Is Truly a Sad Story

That is truly a sad story, Mrs. Demers, but life must go on. I too can tell as sad a tale, as can everyone else here. Here’s mine:

We knew we were meant to be right from the start. Our souls connected on so many levels. We shared uncounted common interests: Hutterite music, Inuit cooking, those little porcelain figures you can buy in magazines. We shared our hopes, our dreams, our lives. But now it’s all over…. we finally met in person.

Reopen that file, Mrs. D. The road to love has many cracks that can be filled with the tar of understanding. Now you’ve heard my sad story, Mrs. D., and life must go on.

We Met Last Year

We met last year, our routes crossed paths all summer long. I saw in him more anger than I knew was healthy. His rage was a pathetic cry for help. If he would open up to me, I thought, the expression of his feelings would set him free. Ah! I would enable him to nurture his wounded inner child. I would enable him to meet his developmental needs. Instead, I became an enabler.

I can’t help him, I can’t help Peter. We have to help ourselves. His rage was a cry for help. I would enable him to nurture his wounded inner child. But we have to help ourselves. We are family!

I have to get back to work now. Nice to have met you, Romeo.

The Mayor Has Spoken

The Mayor has spoken, it’s over. My long nightmare has reached its nadir. No, don’t say anything, there is only one thing left to do. I must quit the City. No, no, this is the end. My demise was a foregone conclusion, ever since that darkest of days.

Life used to be so good, I lived in municipal paradise. I was good at my job, the future was bright and most of all, I found love. Not a love like our, Mavis, all twisted and impure, but bona fide binding guaranteed love. We were partners, in our office, in our lives. My partner did so well that she was promoted. I arrived at the office, my arms full of flowers.

But she was gone. “She went to the desert”, they said. There was no promotion for me, there was nothing, nothing. I had to get away. My white collars mocked me with the lipstick smears of my betrayed love. I fled to the bottom of the City’s barrel. My life was garbage, so trash became my life. I tried to love again, but the toxins had poisoned the watertable of my soul. Now the dump is closed, the gulls and rats can have what’s left. I must resign, I must resign!