Thursday, March 03, 2011

The Long Way



I didn’t know your reason for wanting to take the long way but I’m glad you did. I knew you were cold and I worried about it, I didn’t know how cold, I didn’t know if we could risk getting you colder or not.

I wasn’t going to ask you to take the long way but I wanted you to walk further with me. You may remember that there was more than one long way to where we wanted to be; the route didn’t matter to me, it was walking with you I desired.

We’re not the same when we’re riding the T as we are walking about; and one of us being high on sugar and caffeine had little to do with needing to walk.

We ducked into the doorway of a vacant storefront. There was a family behind us and their conversation kept on intruding in my thoughts and outrunning them wasn’t a realist option so I made a reason for them to pass us.

The doorway to the vacant storefront used to be the doorway to a used and out-of-print bookstore. It was the same bookstore that we visited two days before, at their new location.

As I pulled her in, I said, “This is where Commonwealth Bookstore used to be. It looks to be about the same size as their new place.” She replied with, “What’s Commonwealth Bookstore.” I told her that the little bookstore hidden in that little alley that we went to was Commonwealth Bookstore and that the only reason I was showing her was to let that family that was behind us to pass.

While we were there, she looked around and read the graffiti; a young woman was walking by; she was walking by rather quickly, she seemed to be walking with purpose but when she saw us, she all of a sudden became intrigued. She made what seemed to be a ninety degree turn and marched right in. We left.

We continued down the street and a little while later, the young lady raced passed us and then stopped in a doorway to a college dormitory. I calculated that she was in that other doorway for a couple minutes. I wondered if she was fascinated by what she had seen or she was just simply trying to figure out why we were so fascinated by it.

I did call the young woman a sheep because sometimes I like to say mean things about people I don’t know, like stating that a delightful older woman wearing a delightful orange scarf, out to dinner with one of her girlfriends sitting at a table directly adjacent to us, just happens to look somewhat like the very aged Peter O’Toole.

1 comment:

Melissa said...

Yeah but Old Lady Peter followed you to MFA so that one gave you some karma.

Commonwealth was great, I'd like to go back there.

I'd walk with you anywhere, especially if you held my hand.