I’ve been out wandering the colorful nighttide. (Still one of my favorite words.) The colors and sky have been worth seeing. I enjoyed seeing the little house cat in the industrial building, its paws raised up behind the dirty glass of the front window. The fox that darted across the street in front of me, headed to the creek. A couple of rabbits, one dog wandering and wanting to be petted, goats in their enclosure, a few bats, and a variety of birds that I collected on my Merlin app. The wind has been blowing the entire time, rustling the trees and foliage. I saw a couple of people who were ill-advisedly still up from last night. One of them was sitting by the creek on the large rocks along its banks, enjoying a beer. I don’t normally walk in the creek barefoot so early in the morning, but I couldn’t resist. There are a few places near my apartment where the sky opens up and are relatively uncluttered. I sometimes forget how much a juxtaposition the area is. The world is unfortunately waking up now. But I owned it for long enough this morning.
Güino is 16 now. He may look scruffy, but I brushed him 5 minutes and then petted him until I got carpal tunnel syndrome. I think he’s planning on having a rough day. He’s learning Excel. X .
Erika gave me two window bird feeders. I have a few birds who are loyal. Most of them congregate at her apartment. I looked over a few minutes ago and realized that a bird had been sitting in there gorging itself. Both feeders are in complete view of the cat tower. My cat Güino was too busy at the back window listening to a hundred birds sing and fly past. X .
I normally don’t splurge for things like this beautiful hummingbird feeder. It doesn’t look as dazzling right now because the storm apocalypse is rolling over toward me. This time, I bought the special nectar that apparently hummingbirds devour like the last french fry in the bag. My first year here was a delight with a hummingbirds. I need more beauty like this. Practical beauty is a thing onto itself. Assuming my building will remain standing once the storms roll past, I’ll look out the door or window frequently in an attempt to catch my first hummingbird visitor.
What goes up must come down. I laughed when I thought of that. Because the way down lacked any attractiveness compared to the sense of adventure when I started up the tree and pile of brush. I dare not say how high I went. My age allegedly begs for restraint. There is a shimmering word in our language that attempts to describe the realization that you might not know it could be your last time. I reached the pile of brush and the trees jamming up from it because I had seen a hawk flying low upon the creek bed. At the end of its run, it elegantly rose up through the canopy and disappeared. It was my guess that it had a perch somewhere nearby and above. I followed the narrowing and disappearing dirt path until it was no longer. I pushed through the brambles and vines to reach the most likely tree that would serve as a candidate for ascension. Though I sometimes regret being barefoot, I also miss the connection with the dirt, rocks and water when I choose to protect my faith. I was barefoot today. I leaned against the tree trunk and waited. Watching the birds and squirrels. A shadow went above me and I could hear the woosh of wings. And the bird of prey sat across from me, adjusting its wings and feathers while keeping an eye on me. I slowly reached for my phone in my front left pocket. Just as much to avoid dropping my phone or hurling myself from the exposed safety of the tree trunk. The moment was enough but I felt compelled to take a picture. For just a moment, the bird and I were at the same level. I was a little bit jealous that it would be able to jump, spread his wings, and skim along the cold water of the creek below. It would be two seconds of glorious freefall. As we all know, it’s not the fall that hurts. It’s the ending. Some people question others for their elaborate planning and effort for short bursts of pleasure. To that I would say, the best one-off moment so far this week was making an effort to see SpaceX blaze across the sky above me early one morning. Or to point out that you spend hours to shop and cook for the tastes sensation of eating that sometimes only lasts a few minutes. Or you rush for the singular goal of pleasure, when it is the journey and process that makes the sensation what it is. I managed to get out of the tree and brush. The hawk probably laughed at me, wondering why I took the long way to get out of the tree. I left him there, scanning the creek. When I looked back along the creek and realized how far I had climbed, I reminded myself that I have a picture. And that one day the digital picture would still be here, long after the memory attached to me would be gone.
Yesterday morning, I watched an older lady painfully collect her bags from the EZ Mart counter. When I left, I rolled down my window and offered her a ride. I could see the look of distrust in her eyes. She said thank you and immediately turned away. She struggled with the bags as she walked.
Today as I left the worst convenience store in the history of mankind, another older lady seemed to be talking to me from a distance as I drove away. Because my car has ancient roller windows (even though it’s a 21 model), I leaned toward the passenger side and rolled down my window. She asked me if I could give her a ride. Honestly, assuming she wanted a ride to a nearby location, I had time. It’s rare for me to hesitate. But something about her seemed off. I told her I could not. She smiled and said thank you. And then she added that she loved my purple glasses. Something about her saying something nice and adding a smile after she realized I wasn’t going to give her a ride banged a gong in my head. I’ve given plenty of rides to questionable people if I’m alone because the risk is only to me. Or them, if you know me well enough.
Love, X
PS The picture is unrelated to my story. I took it Saturday. My cat was rolling around under the tree debris as if it were catnip. He’s on lockdown again after yesterday’s shenanigans. .
I took a great picture of… Nothing. I was wandering around, thankfully with shoes firmly on, oblivious. Something behind me crashed through the brush. It wasn’t instinct. I decided not to turn around because whatever it was would have already been on me by the time I turned. The unseen thing went up over the rise before I let myself pivot. It’s more fun imagining what it might have been. Perhaps a creature from Where The Wild Things Are. Even dangerous magic is sometimes worth it. X .
It’s lovely that the goats recognize me now. I brought them both healthy and trashy treats. And this time I remembered that there would be a tumult of birds. All of us were happy. When I left, I heard the distant roar of the tourist train approaching, so I stopped at the corner and got out and leaned on the hood of my car. A small silver car passed driving erratically. The driver was angry and screaming at the passenger. The kind of anger that easily results in danger. That guy needs more goats in his life.
On the heel of using some of my lottery winnings to replace the windshield of my car, today I went in for an oil change. For my car, I mean. My oil seems to be fresh. A young tech entered the waiting area where I was busy doing shenanigans. He told me he thought I had a chipmunk problem. When he came in, I expected odd news about my car. To hear the word “chipmunk” was near the bottom of the list for expectations. He went on to say that when he pulled my air filter assembly apart, he ran into a problem. I figured I was going to have to replace the air filter. Or worse. He told me that there were 50 plus acorns in there and that he used a special vacuum nozzle to get them all out. It was at that point I realized he was referring to squirrels! The lady in the waiting room with me looked up in surprise. Because the conversation was probably one of the weirdest and most rapid-fire ones she’s heard in a long time. I thanked him, after noting that whichever squirrel that was using my air assembly as a nut hoarding place was going to be plenty pissed when he returns to find his stash missing.
I’ll keep an eye out for an angry squirrel for the next few days.
This isn’t a vaguepost. It’s an observation about how I interact with the world, which evidently runs afoul of many people’s attitudes. We need a ‘pass’ sometimes, wherein we can just stand and shout, “WTF, dude? Explain this to me.” Sometimes, the person in question might apologize and say, “I needed to get my entire foot in my mouth. I am so sorry. That was stupid and petty of me.” People are going to misbehave, have a bad day, or just suffer the same affliction of quickness and not thinking twice that I do. If we did have a ‘pass’ option, at least we’d know if they react angrily that we aren’t dealing with someone interested in communicating authentically. Ain’t nobody got time for that, much less the sanity of long-term exposure.
We can’t know someone’s intentions most of the time. That’s why it’s more important to observe behavior rather than words. But there are times when “nothing” actually happens, but someone has consciously or unintentionally demonstrated a horrific outlook. In those cases, words have significant power. Last week, I heard a story about an example of this. Anger flared inside me righteously and briefly. The person being treated poorly and demeaned will never know about it. But I do. And I’m stuck with the knowledge, knowing that the person and people involved revealed a sliver of the “real’ them in their behavior. It wasn’t mere pettiness. It was hostility on a basic level. They pulled back the veneer and let their mask slip. Witnessing or knowing such an attitude is inside a person fundamentally shifts my ability to trust such people. This is so much of the reason that I have lingering problems with people I know to be racists. If they gossip to you, they’ll gossip about you. If they treat others with subversive hostility, they’ll do the same to you. It’s just a question of when. Most prejudice stems from the false idea of superiority. Superior arrogance lends itself to a lot of rationalization regarding behavior. In most cases, we never hear about it because they recognize that such behavior or words are reprehensible. They conceal and camouflage the “real’ them. I’d rather deal with outright hostility in most cases. You can avoid a snake in the open field or when it announces its presence; the ones hiding in the grass at your feet mostly can’t be avoided.
Love, X . PS That’s my cat judging me for not kicking the heat up to maximum. He ain’t 7 feet off the ground for the view.
P.S. Parenthetically Speaking 