There is a tiny building on a corner a block away from our office in downtown Columbus. Years ago, I think, it was a cell phone store, and before that it might have been a rental car office. Nothing about it commands your attention. It’s just a small, anonymous building that you ignore as you pass by every day.
For many months it was vacant. Periodically you would notice a new sign go up, for a wine shop or a bakery. The businesses never seemed to last, or maybe even open at all. I never patronized them.
A few months ago, a new business opened. I noticed it because the name — Flaxella Cafe & Deli — was a bit weird and sounded like the name of one of Cinderella’s ugly sisters. The business was so unestablished that the name of one of the prior ventures, L’Appat, was still above the front door. Still, the proprietor seemed to be making a go of it.
This past Wednesday, a taxi carrying two passengers plowed through the front window of the building. No one was seriously hurt. No one knows why the cab driver veered off the road, over a curb, and through the plate glass. It’s an intersection that thousands of vehicles pass every day without incident . . . until Wednesday. Who knows if Flaxella will reopen — but I wonder if the proprietor of the business is contemplating why this odd accident had to happen now, when the building is finally being used, and couldn’t have happened on a day during one of the many months where this anonymous little building stood dark?
Webner House 