A Burrito Along for the Search of a Metaphysical Wall Calendar Sunday. Whew. What a day. The sister picks me up, with my rebuilt bike, and we're off to a town a half an hour's drive away. A place nostalgic for the old west. It's where we do our weekend breakfast thing. Only today, it's brunch. I need just a couple of grocery items which I'm convinced I will find in some small grocery there. And I'm still on the lookout for a 2025 calendar. Metaphysical, perhaps. Or it may have fantasy-inspired art. It may even be full of obscure images from our solar system or beyond. We arrive a half hour before our reservation. We look in a couple of rustic shops. One place has a calendar of watercolors by a local artist. Its minimal imagery appeals to be. But I decide to roll the dice and continue my search back in the big city. I don't find any grocery here either. This town is rustic uber alles. The absence of neither of these apparent specialty items shall turn out not to be a problem. After she has a glass of wine with brunch, the sister no longer has a problem taking me to work. I ride across the street and grab a burrito, which I put in my bag and don't take the time to eat. I also ride to a grocery in the same shopping center, to pick up the few items I haven't had a chance to collect this holiday weekend. I'm there for an hour and a half cleaning up the work I left yesterday. I'm done just in time to catch a bus. I eat half the burrito at the bench. ...and the bus right outside work...will take me in a straight line to a corner with a particular bookstore. The Tattered Cover is something of a legend here in our 'world class' city. It used to be distinguished by its independence from chain bookstores. Until books themselves became distinguished from the digital age. It was recently purchased by Barnes and Noble. When I walk through the door, it does not appear to have been changed. This store surely has the most diverse collection of calendars in the city. (As one may say back where I had brunch, "Sure as shootin'!") I'm in here for the first time since I can't remember when. On my back is a bag with half a burrito, three tomatoes, and a dozen eggs. I search an entire floor of calendars. In the art section, I find one featuring masterpieces of Futurism. Yeah. Not only is the movement obscure, but it's a perfect expression of my life. Funny that at the end of last month, I went into a Barnes and Noble on my calendar search. They don't have a shortage of calendars. But in spite of the absence of metaphysical calendars in this city, where else can a calendar of Futurist masterpieces be found? So, now that my bike is fixed and my photo Christmas cards are in the pipe, let me digress into art history. And let me do my best to escape butchering of the subject. Space is to Cubism what time is to Futurism. The Cubists pondered the dimension of space and how to show it in two dimensions. The Futurists pondered how to show the movement of time, considered by some to be the fourth dimension, in the same two dimensions. The result both literally and visually can be the suggestion of chaos, and roughly a century ago was considered a representation of the anxiety of a relatively new industrial civilization. How's that, art critics? I mention my recognition of this calendar as an example of my nonstop life to the middle-aged cashier. She responds with the opinion that this is of significance. She pats my hand. I find my way through and out of downtown, and back home again. I've been gone for eight hours. I finish my burrito.
[The Tattered] Cover has long epitomized the independent bookstore, a model and inspiration for booksellers across the country... ...the warm, homey Tattered Cover vibe. "Booksellers have a lot more control now. That's the methodology. It's now a bookseller-led store. The initiative here is to give more power to the booksellers." ...people are... ...working [under the original Tattered Cover "methodology"] because they love the books and they love their community. [My younger brother, a kind of Jack of all trades, briefly worked there. Even some three decades ago, the pay was comparatively dismal. But the place was looking for a particular kind of employee. Prospective workers were required to write an essay with their applications. My brother makes friends quickly, and in spite of his brief employment, a collection of employees were invited to his wedding to his second wife.] "...the challenge is that the Tattered Cover...is a place where people feel ownership. ...if you wanted to re-interview everyone immediately, you shouldn't have bought the organization..." - Westword,12/5-11/2024 [I didn't realize how long it had been since I set foot in the place. This article mentions a brief period during the pandemic, before the Barnes and Noble purchase, when shelves were empty. I never saw that.]
...gloriously living in a loft apartment above tattered Cover [downtown] 2004-ish...the TC loaded magazine and newspaper section along with the modest cafe was effectively my living room... - Westword letters, 12/12-18/2024
...curbless streetscape... ..."bring the spaces together and really prioritized pedestrians." ...robust tree canopy and bump-outs... ...protected bike lanes...a "shared street"... ...informal gathering areas along the trail.
...a plan for ...pedestrian bridge...positioned to provide a quicker, safer route to those walking or biking to the [train station where I disembark for my old rec center on the way to work. The bridge would cross a highway.] ...the Rail Trail, a...corridor...along the [west train line. There's already a bike trail which follows the river and follows this train line at some distance.]
Denver's homeless population hit an all-time high in 2024... ...much of the housing built over the past two decades... ...remain vacant, are being used by hedge funds and the wealthy...to park large sums of untaxed wealth. ...investors from across the globe have amassed large tracts of single and multifamily residential units since the housing market crash in 2008. [I remember when so many people defaulted on their mortgages. I saw a documentary which explained that these abandoned loans where bundled, and the debt was eventually purchased.] The scale of the purchases has put upward pressure on prices, causing rents to skyrocket... There are...vacant...28 homes for every American experiencing homelessness. ...profit margins for luxury units are simply too large for all but nonprofit builders to resist. - Littleton Independent, 11/28/2004
...all the swag - clothes, jewelry, watches, accessories... ...a new-ish pair of Air Force Ones. ...the bad, bad men...each of them inked brand new contracts... ...their new deals added up to nearly a quarter of a billion bucks. ...that's just the market these days... I guess money talks after all. - Mile High Sports, Winter 2024
...my research...you term "chronic paradoxical rage with pseudovisionary delusions.' The eyes that once mirrored the natural world have rotated inward 180 degrees...evolved into an organ of pure self-rumination. ...it may be the form or metamorphosis. I am not like the patients you keep in your catacombs, stranded between being and nonbeing... I could cite...the effects of electromagnetic frequency on the soul; the agony of light and the agony of darkness..."...schizomedieval pathology..." ...the whole dead weight of a world that no one remembers or foresees. - Omni Magazine, 10/1983
Wednesday morning. I have a unique experience with one of my city services. I realize that today is when my neighborhood recycle truck comes along. I have my coat on to leave the house for work. I know my can is full. I unlock my back gate and put the can out at the curb. No sooner do I do so that I hear the recycle truck. I watch it pull up and empty my can in a line of those of the other townhome residents. I'm able to put my can back without ever closing my back gate. I don't believe this will ever happen again. In the middle of the week, the daytime highs are around 60 degrees F. The mornings are cold but it warms up fast. I love this new bag with shoulder straps. I can quickly access lighter gear for warmer temps, or throw it across my back for shorts trips from the bus to either home or work. This morning I don't get a late start and I do the ride all the way to work I'm coming along the connecting trail, toward an underpass. I'm along one of many apartment and townhome complexes. I slow way down for a guy walking his dog. They are stopped while the dog smells a corner of the trail. He's having a smoke, has no coat on, and appears to have brought his dog down from one of the condos above. He doesn't hear or see me coming. When is pass, he says, "Whoops," followed a sentence most of which sounds garbled to me. I make out, "...announce your presence..." Two things about dog walkers. About fifty percent of dogs appear to want to kill me, to the shock of their owners. And, when I'm dismounted on any bike trail, I keep my eyes peeled for any cyclists. Because as sure as the sun will rise, I know they're just around the corner. Friday morning. Yesterday I called the photo shop to find out if my Christmas photo cards are ready. They are. When I get there, I'm asked if I got a call. I didn't. I explain that my land line does not receive texts. Along the way there, I'm approaching the crosswalk of a highway. Oncoming traffic is about to give the traffic turning left a break, before they get a left turn arrow. To make myself visible, I must enter the crosswalk. The left-turning traffic and I do a dance, with each of us beginning and stopping, before I take the initiative and proceed through the crosswalk. It's perhaps the most dangerous part of my ride, unless I simply want to abandon my right of way until the next green light I have. Along the way to work, I discover that my lower gear shift is sluggish. I plan to take it into the bike shop after work, until I end up staying an hour late. I can't take it in tomorrow, as I am hitting another library used book sale after work. This means I will have to take it in Sunday. I catch the bus after work, and I ride toward home from the train station. I'm riding past the next train station when I get turned around in the damned dark, for the first time. I spot the lights of downtown down a residential street and get back on course. I'm back at the same highway intersection. This time, I begin crossing with traffic at the start of a green light. The car in front of the same left turning traffic for some reason begins turning into oncoming traffic, and we stop to let it complete it's turn. It's the left turning traffic which now takes its life in its hands. Then again, there's nothing stopping me from crossing to the opposite side of the avenue to cross the highway away from traffic turning left. Each side of the highway is divided by a river, and each side is one way.
Paved Trails
As previously mentioned, [the municipality where I work] takes care to keep all City paved trails clear during snow events. ...it typically takes about eight hours to clear all trails...starting as early as 5 a.m. ...crews...periodically check trails for problem areas if the temperature remains below freezing for extended periods. - Greenwood Village Newsletter, 12/2024, official publication of the city of Greenwood Village
Saturday. It's now an hour after we closed. I rode to a used book sale, made a purchase, and rode back to the bakery across the street from work. Instead of hauling my butt further across town to a train station at the opposite end of town. And sitting onboard as it crawls along the miles slowly over stretches of reduced speed zones. No, instead I have time for a sandwich for an early dinner before I catch a bus for a short ride to a train station, much further toward home than the crosstown station. It was a tiny sale, but indeed I found something, as I always do. They gave me their schedule for next year. It includes only two sales. The one way out across town, in January, they decided was too cold to have a sale. And they say, "It always snows." I remember a subzero bus ride there. The sidewalk was clear enough for the short ride to the library. This afternoon, I'm at the register, behind a tall white-haired guy slowly attempting to communicate to the high school employee. He wants to know when more printed sandwich menus will be available. Laying across the counter is his carved hickory wood cane. She assures him that the manager will jump on it Monday. He says he has 'a lot of people coming in" to town, and he "would like to know" his "sandwich options". He picks up his cane and slowly makes his way to a table to wait for his coffee. I'm eating my sandwich before the bus comes. The employee is running past the tables to the back for something. She's too fast for him, but when she comes out, he's standing up on his cane. "So the manager will take care of it?" he asks again.
Sunday is another madcap day. I get an early start and ride to the sporting goods supercenter, with the bike I ride to work, and get there right when the open at 9 AM. I'm in line behind young folk waiting to get skis and snowboards waxed. Regular wax, hot wax, permanent wax. A tech calls me up. I tell him that my low gears won't come out of gear. He doesn't look at it for very long before he tells me my derailer cable is "shredded". $39 in parts and labor when it's done this Wednesday. But I don't believe he knows I'm a co-op member. I may get the labor for free. I walk to the train, which whips me to my boulevard, where a bus comes along in jig time. I'm back home before 11 AM and, still in my cycling gear, I head down my boulevard to catch a bus for the gym. This bus goes to the train station near my new gym. Before I catch the bus, I run into a deathburger for lunch. A homeless guy comes out the door and holds him palms facing skyward, as if he's looking for precipitation. At first, he appears to have white chalk all over his hands. I soon realize he's wearing transparent nylon gloves. He struggles to make it back inside, having to use his shoulder to push both doors open. After lunch, I just make a bus across the avenue which is leaving. This driver acts as if she knows all the wacky passengers on this route. One woman sounds as if she's a drunk. She's a neighbor of the driver. We pick up someone else who also appears familiar with the driver. This passenger immediately begins reciting her problems to the driver with a loud slow voice. It's all about her husband who went to a hospital for his leg. This woman claims to be thoroughly unhappy with every detail of his hospital visit. She says the "goddamned doctors" did nothing for him, says one nurse got smart and said, "If you want to sue us, go ahead," says she replied that she would contact a local TV station about her experience, and says that she contacted the police who told her that they "don't get involved in hospital problems." I listen to this all the way to the train station. The driver gives me a day pass, just because she's that nice. I ride from there to grab some chocolate therapy before hitting this gym for the first time in 3 weeks. I do another hot tub soak. From here, I ride to a nearby supermarket to buy a few things for home, including the largest package of paper towels they carry. I think there may be 24 rolls. I bungee the paper towels to my back rack, sling my gym bag over the diet sodas in a bag on my back, and I'm off. The bungees barely stretch long enough over the towels. It's a short ride to work, where I drop the sodas and another grocery item. I just miss the bus up the street and I ride to the nearest train station, where a train comes soon after. The slow stretches of track are not so bad. It gives me time to attempt to bungee the paper towels to my front handlebars. Where I disembark, it's clear this won't work. I pull out a couple more bungees for my gym bag, put the towels on top, and the whole thig finds a comfortable place on my back rack. I make the short ride home and put everything away. I run across the street for a burger for dinner. When I leave, I pass a neveria, a Mexican ice cream shop, in the same little strip mall. I notice a long shelf running the length of the wall. It's stocked with different flavored chips. I don't know why, but I spot some salsa flavored Tostitos. I go inside to grab a bag. The two young women both look at me as if neither one speak English. I greet them in Spanish. I notice photos of mixtures of chopped fruit and chips. This is a new one on me. One of the girls asks me in Spanish if all I want are the chips. "No fruita?" I mention in Spanish that I was the only white person in this neighborhood f15 years ago. I ask how many customers are white and how many speak Spanish. A lot of white customers. A very few speak Spanish she replies. But she says, that's just fine.
Monday. Sometime toward closing, it small flakes begin coming down. I'm so goddamned busy with customers and work that I hardly notice. We close an hour later today than the rest of the week, and still I stay a half hour later. I make it across the street to the bus stop. It arrives and the driver doesn't even ask for fare. He just has he take a seat. There's not much at all on the ground, but the going is slow. We make it to the train station where I'm securing by bag on the back rack of my bike just as a train pulls in. I run as fast as I dare in the snow and hop aboard. I have no proof of fare, but no one appears to be asking for any this snowy evening. It drops me a couple of stops along, at my station. I disembark and mount the bike to just catch a bus which is leaving. Again, the driver asks for no fare. He just has me take a seat. "Please, man," he asks. We make our way toward my boulevard. There are spots where he gets no traction. When I get out on my street, I have no trouble riding the couple of blocks home through the little snow on the ground. The following morning, what little remains appears frozen and slippery. I leave the bike at home. The sun ends up coming out and melting almost everything. I'll be back out on the bike tomorrow. Thursday. I get a statement in the mail of what I owe for dental cleaning. On the way to work, I swing by the clinic down the street and ask the folks behind the desk at the dental office. Is it what I owe, or does it still need to go to the insurance company for them to decide what they will pay? It's the total of what I owe. Also, on my account is an amount for my dermatology exam. My medical and dental are in the same network, the same building. ...the good news, my boss gives me my Christmas bonus. It will cover, both bills, my bike repair, and leave me with some change. Since last week, I've been taking my photo Christmas cards to the bakery across the street from work. I write them out a few at a time. By Thursday, I'm almost finished.
Friday. Yesterday I called to see if my bike is ready. Yes, and they claim they sent an email to my new email account. I found no email. ...which is why I called. I catch a bus across the street at 7 AM. This part of the morning, the buses and trains are most frequent. In the aisle up front is a wheelchair, which belongs to a sleeping old woman in a seat next to the chair. I'm on the way to pick up the bike. The bus drops me at the train, which whips me downtown. I have a cold. I have cold medicine with me. I don't take it yet, though I have time before the sporting goods supercenter opens. I go into a Whole Foods for breakfast. They have a little stuff in their buffet. Scrambled eggs, gravy, and from the salad bar, red onion and mushrooms. I put it together, check out, and eat it at a table with hexagonal seats. The onions are sweet. Man, can I make an omelet or what? In a booth is an old homeless guy. A customer walks past him and asks him if he's okay. I eat and then haul my butt up the steps, across the train tracks, down again, and over to the supercenter. I get there a half hour before they open at 9 AM and I take a seat at an outdoor table at a coffee shop next door. It's chilly but the sun is out. Ten minutes before the doors to the supercenter are unlocked, I go into the coffee shop for a hot chocolate. Still I don't take my medicine. The supercenter opens. Inside, a grey-haired woman in a pale green utility vest asks a patron, "Know where you're going?" I use the men's room before I make my way to the bike shop. A tall overweight tech with horn rimed classes and stubble tells me the new shifter cable is installed. ...but he recommends a tune up and new rear brake pads. I decide to bring it back tomorrow after work. He asks a short girl with biceps to take a long pole and lower it down. I pay for the new shifter cable and put some small bags back on the frame. I'm now pedaling through downtown for the first time in which I can remember. I'm headed for the nearest branch of my bank to deposit my Christmas bonus. I'm in and out. And at this point, I have an hour and 45 minutes before I'm due at work. Do I backtrack and ride to a train station downtown? I doubt any train will take me to make my next bus to work. I may as well ride toward work to the next train station along the way. I get there and catch a train on the line to one station, from where it's a 40-minute ride to work. I suddenly remember that I can get out at a station before that and make it to my bus to work with time to spare. And make it with time to spare I do. I run into the cafe across from the bus stop. I grab a burger to go. I finally take my medicine. The bus comes and drops me at work. I first rush across the street to drop a card at the office of my investment broker. Then I'm back across the boulevard at work. Five hours later, I leave my bike here and catch a bus home. I feel miserable in a managed way. The following morning, the sister comes to pick me up for breakfast before work. By noon, it's 24 hours after my 24-hour medicine wears off. I feel as if I've snapped out of something. I work late enough that I will take the bus, to the train, back to the supercenter. I ride across the street from work to the bakery for some tea. Between there and the bus stop, I notice that the ring upon which my shifter with the new cable is mounted, is loose. The train I catch will take me to a trail to the supercenter. I won't have to drag my bike up the steps over train tracks. When I get there, I'm told shortly that the tune up and brake pads will be another $200.
"I want to make sure that the leaders...in this project are aware...they are preparing to bring appropriate resources for these children. ...I am waiting to hear those reassurances. Representation matters. It matters. ...the programming that they felt these children needed. ...honoring the history of the Chicano community that came from the west side...what this transition will look like for those students. It's going to deeply affect my...community in [my own part of town.] "
After nearly a century...Washington Park United Church of Christ has moved... "...the Washington Park community was pretty working class, and that has changed. Rents have gone up very high. The property values have increased... ...a developer...will build...for people making 30% to 60 % or the city's area median income. ...mainstream Christian churches, such as ours, were shrinking. - Washington Park Profile, 12/4/2024
...a community hub designed for sparking connections. ...a calm and safe environment... ...open to all good-hearted community members... ...large windows...natural light...classic coffee favorites as well as a seasonal menu... ...the Treatment Room...with dim lights, a sound machine, and cozy furniture. ...CPR classes, baby bodywork classes...and seasonal celebrations. ..."people feel safe [while] they're existing..." - colorado parent, 12/2024
...finding a coffee date that will work for six of Denver's busiest women? ...connect the wives of every general manager...to help her new community... ...researched the community initiatives... "We just couldn't believe how much people love their sports here." - Mile High Sports, Winter 2024
"...everyone was still paid in cash and no one clocked in or out... " ...must have pulled twenty-hour days doing the hiring, firing, payments, booking and everything else herself... ...taking credit cards for the first time in forty years. ...offered some menu items that were accessible pricewise to the starving-artist types... "...where people ...actually unable to fit into the culture went. Homeless, trans people..." ...a free meal every shift and...a community table reserved for staff...
...a city grappling with the rapid gentrification of its neighborhoods. "...to bring art into the neighborhoods that had lost it...Denver was kicking too much art out. ...the real march for accessible contemporary art..." ...small arts organizations face...systematic challenges...in a city. "...we weren't getting big money from individual foundational doors. ...rents and mortgages skyrocketed. ...the declining prioritization of...culture...puts developers ahead of local businesses. "Everyone in the art world is doing a hundred things just to get by. ...developers...turn small little bundles into $1.3 million spaces in my neighborhood that does not help anyone survive." ...launching...in a location...they would later find out as "integral to the original contemporary art scene of the late '80s and early '90s..." [Where in 1995 I had my first show in Denver.] ...north Denver. Once a thriving center for avant-garde art... ...relocated to more affordable suburbs. "Twenty years ago [here] you'd see all these old establishments...but there are very few left now. ...they've accidently or legislatively kicked the arts out because no one can afford it." - Westword, 12/19-25/2024
To attain true stature as a writer, one must look beyond...fandom - however cozy it may seem by the campfire... How far that campfire was from the civilized arts, back in the late twenties and thirties. Those gaudy [science fiction] covers...were totally divorced from all the exciting new movements of the early twentieth century. Cubism, futurism, surrealism, exerted no influence. - Aldiss
Sunday is day 3 fighting this cold. It's turned into one of those uncontrollable coughs, the kind where your stomach hurts. I decide to forego the gym until I am feeling better. Instead I stay home. Though I can't help but clean my bathtub, which perpetually appears as something out of the Amityville Horror. And I do dishes. Because this is a Sunday when I'm not gone all day on my bike, it feels as if it's the first day off I've had since I can't remember. And still I make the trip down the street to the supermarket, for more Kleenex and a huge package of toilet paper. I grab lunch at the Mexican place where my lady likes to go. But simply walking from the supermarket to the bus stop just at the end of the parking lot, I have just enough energy to accomplish the task. After some recuperation, some hours later I go across the street for dinner. I try to read but it's an effort to concentrate. When I walk back through my door, the phone is ringing. It's my coworker. She's the only one who calls me. Can I work for her tomorrow? I don't want to open tomorrow of all days, but I say yes. I get a kick out of the fact that, if the regular morning person can't make it, they get the guy fighting a cold. And it gets better. Overnight, I only get four hours of sleep. I will mention this to the owner when I see her, at the bakery across the street from work. I don't want to get back out on my bike until I feel better. But along with crawling down the tracks at a reduced speed, the trains run least frequently in the early morning hours. I have no choice but to take my bike to reach my bus to work on time. Over the weekend, it was almost too warm to wear my double lined riding pants. This morning, it's almost not warm enough. Though I awoke around midnight and couldn't get back to sleep, because I couldn't breathe through a stuffy nose or calm the machine-gun cough, it still takes me forever to leave the house at 5 AM. I get to the train station, purchase fare from a kiosk, and am just beginning to sit down when the bus pulls up. It drops me at work where I run into the owner picking up yesterday's bags. I throw my bike inside and decide to get breakfast at a restaurant also across the street. At 6 AM, they've just opened. The waitress sits and talks to me about riding out on the bike trail with her son. For Christmas she ordered for him a bicycle from Amazon. She tells me that her friends have been warning her about the homeless out on the trail, and she asks me about them. I tell her they're harmless. After my stop at the bakery, I spend the next 12 hours inside my store, staying an hour past close to finish everything. The last bus s home is gone, and if I ride to the train, it's reduced speed won't guarantee I get home at my bedtime. I don't want to, but I ride all the way home. Closing in on 9 PM, I'm approaching the last bridge across the river on the way there. A homeless guy is on an electric scooter. The scooter has hitched to the back two trailers. He's trying to help the motor get uphill by pushing with his foot. He stops across the trail with just enough room for me to pass in front of him. "Oh shit, sorry," he says.
The following morning, I awake with plenty of sleep. I again ride to the bus. I'm not sure about jumping right back into the full ride to work. By the end of my day, I feel as if I'm moving in the direction of being on the mend. I consider riding all the way home. But I want to grab dinner at the bakery across the street. One of my last customers is distracted by something out our windows. It's an accident at the intersection. It's close enough to close, I wonder. Traffic has slowed to a crawl. Will an earlier bus home be delayed by as much as fifteen minutes? This would allow me to close up and cross the street and catch it. Oh, oh how foolish. What a foolish thought I dare to have. I do get across the street. And I get on my phone. 'Hey, is the bus delayed, and is it almost here?' "You know what," a transit system operator tells me, "...that bus was detoured off route." You what? What? Suddenly I'm Joe Flynn. Whaaat whatwhat whatwhat? Yes I know what a detour is. Oh, but the operator is far from finished. Far from finished my fine passenger. "And this detour is only affecting your particular stop. If you hold, I can see where the bus is detoured to." This intersection will be cleared up soon. The next bus will be back here in an hour on time, or it will be at a detoured stop I will have to find. I hang up while still on hold. I do indeed do the ride all the way home. And I don't run into any homeless scooters pulling a couple of trailers. I hang up while on hold. Oh shit, sorry. Wednesday. I really think I could be on the mend. My late starts in the morning keep me headed for the train station, and again, late customers at work send me across the street to the bus stop. The bus drops me at the same train station as this morning. But I arrive just as a train is pulling into the station. It takes me to the station closest to home. I don't see a bus back to my street, so I begin securing my bag to my bike. A homeless guy comes along and wants money for a coffee shop gift card. he dials a website for the store to prove there's money on it. I hand him my transfer which I won't need. I'm doing the 20-minute ride home from here. I'll be halfway there before a bus ever arrives here. He's trying to give me a gift for the transfer. Eighty-five cents, a jack knife, a bike light. I turn them down.
Friday. In the morning, I'm on the phone with my health and dental insurance companies. I'm reenrolled, but my monthly premiums for next year have gone up. And I've just mailed out January's checks. I pay the difference to one company over the phone. Payment to the dental, I will discover, can't be sent the same way. The difference is 25 cents. I will have to send a check. I also forgot to withdraw more singles at the bank yesterday for transit system fare. Out of time...again...I head for the bus to work. I end up at the bakery where I've been hanging out before work. There are a full range of ages among the customers. This week before Christmas, it's busy during lunch. I'm sitting next to a middle-aged woman who is yakking on her phone. She mentions something about the bloodwork of a guy who is 30 years of age. "And mom got out of the house again. The police were called..." I'm in line with a bag of chips. At the front is one grey-haired guy, in Nike sweatpants and a huge gold watch on his left wrist. He's telling the clerk that he tried to call in an order, "But no one answered the phone." Between he and myself is a couple. The guy has his curly grey hair in a ponytail. They are telling the same clerk that they'll be back for a different flavored loaf of bread. A third grey-haired guy behind me is examining bread knives for sale. Sunday. I check my email. No message from the bike shop. I call. Is my bike ready. They ask me if I have an email from them saying it's ready. Nope. Well, it's ready. I pack 3 separate bags. Gym bag, bag with pouches to Velcro onto the bike frame, and bag with my phone and cameras. I'm out the door and across the street. It's midmorning at the stop for a bus to the train station up the street. I've been catching this bus on and off over the past seventeen years. This morning, a guy sits on a bench in the shelter. He's bent over and talking to himself. Across the street is the dollar per scoop Chinese place. Next to the door is a pair of trash cans. On top of one sits a guy asleep. He's missing his right shoe. It's only after divining these talismans when I realize I've forgotten the bag with the pouches. It also has my bike lock. I run back home as I spy the bus cresting the horizon on my boulevard. When I return here, there's no guy in the shelter. There's no bus. There is only a man asleep on top of a trash can across the street. Just another lazy Sunday on my corner. It's not long at all before another bus whips me to a train, which whips me downtown. I run into a Whole Foods for an early lunch, before I haul my butt over the steps across the train tracks. At the sporting goods supercenter, I lay my money down. I leave with my bike. I return to the steps, which have a ramp for luggage with wheels. It also works for bicycles. Only I must wait for someone with a suitcase to make his way down the ramp. When I crest the steps, someone coming down tells me, "I wondered what that (ramp) was for." I jump one train one, which takes me to a station where I transfer from the line back to my boulevard to train two, which follows a pair of lines south. I get out a few stations later. Train two is on the way toward the southeast. Train three takes me straight south, to the station not far from the gym. I blast through my workout to have time to hit the hot tub. I assume this means that I'm feeling better. I just want to get a workout done, in case I come down with yet another cold. From the gym I do another ride to the supermarket, and again I drop off diet sodas at work before I grab dinner at the bakery across the street. A bus takes me to the train, which drops me back at my own train station. In the evening I'm back home. I run across the street for a bag of my favorite chips from the gas station. The station is next to a Chinese dollar per scoop place. As I'm walking up, I see someone holding open the door to the Chinese place. He's looking inside at something. He lets the door go and I recognize Not Guitar Bear. I'm in and out of the gas station when he's approaching a couple going to get Chinese food. He asks the for a dollar.
Monday is the last day we are open at work before Christmas. On my ride home, I stop into a hardware department store for a Christmas deal, on a big package of batteries I need for the lights on my bike. Tuesday morning is Christmas Eve. I get a call from...my doctor's office. It isn't to wish me season's greetings. They want money. "They make you work Christmas Eve?" I ask. I decide to pay it out of cash I have around. I ride to my bank for a couple of money orders. One for my doctor bill. The other is for January's dental insurance premium. Last week, letters arrived from both my health and dental insurance. Each has been automatically renewed. ...and the new monthly premiums have been calculated. The letters show up a couple days after I've mailed both premiums...with the amounts for this year. I was able to pay the difference over the phone with my health insurance company. My dental insurance company wants payment through the mail. So, I also need a money order for 25 cents. I ride home along the sidewalk of my boulevard. I' still need a Christmas gift for my lady. I'm looking for any store with gifts here among the nail salons, liquor stores, restaurants, and tax offices. I spot a clothing outlet called Gen X. Inside, I find her a groovy coat. I arrive home and she picks me up at 1 PM. We attend a Mexican restaurant we haven't been to before, not far down the boulevard I just rode up. We have a late lunch, after which we exchange gifts. She loves her coat. She tells me her twentysomething daughter has one just like it. She mentions always wanting to, and finally taking hip-hop dance classes. Except she's not much of a fan of the music. And classes are expensive. And they're downtown, where parking is hard to find. She mentions her son going to "Noble and Barnes" to find a book he wants. She drops me back home, and in the early evening, my next-door neighbor brings me homemade holiday cookies. Christmas, I spend a couple hours with the sister and her husband. I come home with some candy. ...a piece of which pulls off one of my crowns. The following morning, I walk the few blocks to my dentist as soon as they open. I walk past a bus shelter popular with the homeless So I'm not surprised to see someone bundled up inside, next to a collapsible shopping cart full of stuff and a bicycle balanced on one wheel. But this is the day after Christmas. And this is where they spent Christmas night. I'm working with the hope that a patient at the dentist this early may have cancelled. ...and that's exactly what's happened. But I put the crown back on as soon as it came off. I wasn't sure exactly which molar it was. My dentist is so good, she found it immediately. She had it secured in no time.
Shortly after this, I was on my way to work. My pre-work hangout is closed today. I pull off the trail to a deathburger. Inside, a middle-aged woman is eating alone. She's not one of the young hipsters in Whole Foods downtown. We're miles from there, on a boulevard of car dealerships and small businesses. She strikes me as a local resident, in her stretch jeans and flannel shirt, her wild perm and bright lipstick. She returns to the counter to order something else, before she sits back down to watch something online. The other patron in the dining room is a grey-haired guy in a hoodie. With his hood on. He's at the counter, asking, "You got any mayonnaise packets?" He ate his food and left a tray full of trash on the counter with the condiments. Someone brings a cash drawer out from the back. She may be the owner. Her own grey hair is colored a light auburn. Another employee comes in. He has a tattoo which covers his right forearm, and his work cap in his pocket. Sunday. Breakfast with the sister. She drops me at the gym. I take the bus back to my boulevard. I step out at a bus bench. A homeless guy is sitting with his chin on his fist. He says out loud, "No thank you." I ride to a deathburger for lunch. Waiting for my order, I watch out the window as a guy in a motorized wheelchair navigates the parking lot. An employee takes an order out to an SUV with antlers on the roof. She comes back inside to tell the manager that they forgot part of her order. From the SUV comes a single mom with 3 or 4 kids. At least 2 of them are wearing Spiderman pajamas. From the speaker inside, connected to the drive through, I hear a siren out on the boulevard. When the rest of the family's order is finally ready, they depart in the antler vehicle. I'm home for some hours. I get dishes done. I walk behind my place, back to the Chinese restaurant for dinner. I pay with a fifty. I hand it to an employee who showed up this year. My bill is sixteen dollars and some change. She hands me back three ones. I mention to her that I gave her a fifty. She immediately turns to the owner and speaks Chinese. The owner asks me what's up. You got my fifty. All I got is three ones. The owner admonishes the employee in Chinese. I am convinced of two things. One is that this employee is hardly dishonest. The other, she's simply not proficient reading English. It's the kind of detail which causes conservative types to lose a precious sense of order.
Monday. I get the call to come into wok an hour early. It's off to the train station, and my bus to work. The sun is out but it's windy. I'm coming down the long street a block from my own. I should be on my own street if I'm going to the train station, but coming this way is an old habit, and not an issue. It feels as if I have a tailwind pushing me along. I reach the next boulevard, and riding through the intersection, the wind is trying to push my front rim out from under me. If it isn't ice or frozen slush, it's the rare gust of wind. In spite of which, in no time I'm at the station. A familiar crazy is there, yelling his head off: "...motherfucker!" He also has a bicycle. I imagine him slowly pedaling along and shouting obscenities. His rants from the platform are an odd combination with the measured automated female voice announcing train schedules through a speaker. It almost sounds as if he's yelling at her. Jesus, he's boarding a train which has just pulled up. It's headed downtown. Downtown's gain is our loss. The bus deposit me in front of work. I head for the bakery across the street. Instead of having a favorite bar, I hang out there instead. I'm not much of a drinker. I don't want to end up riding my bike and shouting "motherfucker!" at no one in particular. Usually, it's only my own bike which is parked out front of the place. This late morning, a father is locking up three more bicycles; his own, his wife's, and his young adult son's. He and the wife appear to be on electric bikes. After some decision making, he's only locked the three front rims together, not the frames. And this shopping center has few places to lock a bicycle to. By releasing the front rims, someone can have three stolen bikes and three rims locked together. The pair of electrics even have matching water bottles in their bottle cages. Not to mention that all three have matching skinny black Lycra pants on. It's a cold wind and I hope those pants are warm. Now, I have no serious problem with any of this, and I applaud anyone who gets out and rides, especially in less temperate months. But I go out to my own bike to put something in a pouch on the frame. I glance at the handlebars of the three other bikes. I come back inside and glance at the table and single empty chair where the trio sit. And I can see their heads. What I don't see are any helmets. If you don't want the opinion that this is fucking stupid, you're reading the wrong person. In eight years, I've had two spills where my head slammed against the ground hard. The first time was the last time I've ever mounted a bicycle without a helmet. This summer was the other, and my helmet cracked straight through the inside insulation. The only reason I'm still here, much less having stood up and dusted myself off, was my helmet. I remember a year or so ago. One day, I had stopped at a deathburger for breakfast. A couple of homeless inside were fascinated by the light on the back of my helmet. They thought it was amazing. On my way home that afternoon, I was climbing a quiet residential street back on my side of town. As quiet as my side of town can be. On a small porch was a child eating chips from a bag. He sat next to an overweight guy in sunglasses. The guy spots me and yells, "Look at this guy! You don't fuckin' need a helmet!" It's rare I hear something comprehendible and actually debatable, from anyone these days, much less on my side of town. Even if it's from a pair of characters who appear as if they belong on a TV show. Allow me to step down from my soapbox, for those of you who remember what that is.
Tuesday is New Year's Eve. I arrive back across the boulevard from my corner. To get here, I turned into the lot of a strip mall to avoid a guy standing in the middle of the sidewalk. I came out on the sidewalk along the boulevard and rode to the corner. The guy is on my left. He's young, drunk, and has two black eyes which appear to be healing. He tries to speak to me in Spanish. I get the signal to cross. He stays where he is. If I may raise his message up to the level of cryptic, I wonder if it contains a telling of my fortune for the coming year? Overnight I hear a smattering or fireworks across the street. I don't look at the clock.
