This Town Already Has Secrets. Here Are the Ones I Can Print.

WELL, HERE WE ARE. A brand-new town. A brand-new internet. And not twenty minutes after the ribbon hit the ground, this reporter — who had positioned herself near the factory’s east parking lot with a cup of coffee and the specific alertness of a woman who has been doing this job for nine years — witnessed something that she is legally prevented from describing in full but spiritually unable to keep entirely to herself.

I want to begin, however, before the parking lot incident, because context matters, and because this is the first edition of this column and I want to establish, from the outset, the operating principles of the enterprise.

Principle One: Miss Bitty is not a rumor mill. Miss Bitty is a rumor refinery. Rumors come in rough and unprocessed. Miss Bitty examines them against available evidence, checks their structural integrity, and publishes only what she can back up with at least two sources, one of whom can be herself if she witnessed it personally.

Principle Two: This column is a public service. People in a new town need to know who is who and what is what, and the news section, much as I respect it, does not cover cologne. Miss Bitty covers cologne.

Principle Three: Names are used at Miss Bitty’s discretion. When a name is used, it is because the person has, through their public conduct, made themselves a public figure. Being an alderman makes you a public figure. Being a hockey coach makes you a public figure. Being the person who drove a car with out-of-state plates to a parking lot whisper meeting on the first morning of the town’s existence makes you — arguably — a person who has invited curiosity, if not yet scrutiny.

With that established: the parking lot.

A certain fourth-ward alderman whose name this newspaper has seen fit to print extensively in the last twelve hours — and who is, I am told, very sensitive about the coverage, which this column notes while having no plan to adjust its approach — was observed in the factory’s east parking lot approximately fifteen minutes after the opening ceremony concluded. He was engaged in an intense and whispered conversation with a woman who was not his wife, who was, by this reporter’s direct observation, “extremely well-dressed for ten-thirty on a Thursday in September,” and who departed in a vehicle with out-of-state plates before anyone could approach within earshot.

I am not saying anything. This is a family newspaper. I am merely noting, as any responsible society columnist would note, that an intense whispered conversation in a parking lot at 10:45 a.m. on the first day of a town’s existence constitutes, in the Miss Bitty taxonomy, a Category Two Item. Category One is a confirmed fact. Category Two is an observed event whose significance is not yet established. Category Three is a rumor requiring verification. Category Four is something someone told me that I believe but cannot print yet.

The alderman is currently the subject of Categories Two, Three, and Four. We will leave it there.

On to the cologne matter. A certain hockey coach — who is, by all accounts, a perfectly professional and eminently serious person and who, for the record, makes excellent points about fundamentals and physicality — arrived at this morning’s ribbon-cutting wearing what multiple sources describe, without coordination, as “a meaningful amount of cologne for a pre-noon outdoor event in September.” The cologne was, according to at least two people who found themselves downwind of him at various points during the ceremony, “the kind that has a name” and “the kind that you would know if you were familiar with the category.” No specific names were volunteered to this reporter, which is itself a data point.

Frank Drewicz, if you are reading this: I am not accusing you of anything. I am simply noting a fact of the public record, which is that you attended a public ceremony in a notable quantity of scented product. This is information the public may or may not find interesting. I find it interesting. The public will determine for themselves.

Now: the blind item.

BLIND ITEM: Which well-respected member of the founding team — a person whose name appears prominently in the business pages of this very newspaper and whose professional reputation is, by all accounts, entirely solid — was observed at Tuesday evening’s pre-opening dinner at the Civic Center, reaching into their inside jacket pocket and retrieving what appeared to be a small silver flask, approximately wallet-sized, with visible monogramming? The item was used once, briefly, between the second and third course. It was returned to the jacket pocket. No one at the table appeared to notice. This reporter, who was attending the event in a social capacity and who was not technically working, noticed.

I am not saying this is a problem. Some people carry flasks to formal dinners. This is a long-standing practice with roots in reasonable social custom. I merely wonder, as I do about many things in this town: whose initials are on the flask?

I will find out. It may take a few weeks. When I do, this column will be the place to read about it.

SOCIAL NOTES:

Welcome to Marge Kuczynski, who has already organized the first St. Casimir’s potluck (this Saturday, 5 p.m., parish hall, bring a dish, leave internet devices in the car). Marge has also, I am informed, begun a neighborhood check-in system for residents of the northeast quadrant in which she visits new arrivals, brings a dish, and learns their names by the end of the visit. She has completed fourteen visits in three weeks. She has everyone’s names. This is the kind of person who makes a town work.

Welcome also to Zofia Deschamps, our new head librarian, who has excellent taste in cats (the library’s resident Maine Coon, Dewey, arrived with her and has already, I am told, organized the periodicals section into a sleeping pattern that the staff has decided not to disturb). Miss Deschamps attended the ribbon-cutting with a personal copy of a book by a mid-century urban planning theorist, which she was reading between remarks. This column approves of this.

A warm Miss Bitty hello to Head Coach Tom Marthaler, who confirmed for this column, when asked, that he has “no interest in being in the gossip column.” He therefore appears here, because a man who tells a gossip columnist he has no interest in being in the gossip column has, by the logic of the gossip column, done something more interesting than the people who do want to be in it. He also smells normal, which this column wishes to note is appreciated.

Final social note: this town needs a society. Not in the formal sense — not a gala committee or a philanthropic guild or any of the apparatus by which organized money organizes itself in larger cities. But in the older sense: people who know each other, who understand each other’s business, who check in, who gossip in the constructive mode — the mode where knowing that someone is struggling means someone else shows up with a casserole. Miss Bitty’s job, in this column, is to be that system’s nerve. Not the brain. Not the heart. The nerve — the part that carries the signal.

Fourteen people have already slipped notes under this newspaper’s door. Three of them are about the alderman. Four of them are about the parking lot. Two are about the flask. One is about the cologne. The remaining four are about other matters entirely, which will be addressed in future issues, once verified.

This town is, already, full of things. Miss Bitty is full of coffee and determination. The combination will produce this column, every Thursday, for as long as Rod Black allows it.

Rod Black says he will allow it indefinitely, on the condition that this column not use unnamed sources without significant corroboration and that it “never, under any circumstances, speculate about matters that should remain private.”

Miss Bitty, for the record, agrees with both conditions. Her definition of “private” is narrower than the editor’s. This is likely to produce exactly one conversation per week for the foreseeable future. This column has already budgeted time for it.

The Internet’s Miss Bitty (Bitty Trzeciak) appears every Thursday. Tips: 1-900-TRIB-TIP ($2.99/min., 18+) or a plain envelope under the Tribune door at 14 Main St. All sources protected. All facts verified. All cologne documented.