Sometime last week, I think, I'm turning the corner onto the street with the campers. A ragged middle aged guy steps out the door of one of them. He's wearing bedroom slippers, with only one sock. Out on the bike trail, on the way home, a young guy is standing in the middle of the trail, putting on one shoe. as cyclists go past. He says to me, "How's it goin'?" Sunday is a pre-birthday lunch at the sister's. I don't choose a birthday cake. I'd like to hit the yogurt place downtown as an alternative. But I'm stuffed from fried fish. And I'm short on time these recent Sundays. Workout at the rec center. Swim at the waterpark. Dinner at Chilis off the bike trail. As soon as I walk in, I'm transported back in time. A woman is on her phone. "Can you hear me now?" she says to someone at the other end. She appears to be old enough to remember that TV commercial, and sounds as if she says this with no irony at all. It's a busy late Sunday afternoon, and I take a seat at the bar. The flat screens have the Olympics on. The sound is off, I watch a commercial with a member of the women's US Olympic vollyball team. She stands and watches several gigantic TV screens which she stands right next to. Across the TV screen is mentioned something about athlete survivors of breast cancer. The giant screens show family photos of the Olympic athlete, of her mom and herself when she was young. Did her mom pass from cancer? The young bartender behind the bar is working with a guy a decade or two older than he, learning to make mixed drinks. A manager is helping serve orders. She asks the young guy if this is his first night behind a bar. He replies that it is.
...a hub for shopping, dining and street art. The best way to see it all is via scooter (hey, if you can't fight 'em, join 'em). Just be careful in traffic. Not all drivers brake for beer. - Westword, 7/29-8/4/2021
They decide we are a corrupting influence. Zonk! Fists, red paint, kicks, beer cans...the whole American Welcome Wagon treatment. They grab our American flags and rip them up. Daisy petals flying all over like chicken feathers. A mother drops her baby in order to get a few well-placed kick punches. The baby's getting crushed along with the flower people. - The Best of Abbie Hoffman, ed. by Daniel Simon, 1989
Monday is my birthday. I'm spending it as I do, lately, working open to close. I think it was yesterday, I was coming home from the waterpark, riding past a dog park. In the parking lot is a white school bus. On the back in a motorcycle on a kind of rack. In the back window is a sign which reads, "Not a slow bus, but a fast home." On my way to work this morning, it's still there when I decide to take a photo. It's around six in the morning. A middle aged guy on a bicycle rolls down into the lot from the street above. He pulls up and points to the bus, and he asks me, "Is this yours?" Someone may want to know who this belongs to, perhaps someone from a code enforcement office. But this guy is in a plaid shirt and has no helmet, and appears as if he could be a homeless guy out on a chilly early morning. So I wonder what his interest is. I ask, "What?" As in, 'what are you pointing to?' Now he sounds impatient. "Is...this...your...bus?" I'm fucking being scolded by a homeless guy on my birthday. Perfect. When at last I reply that it isn't, it's as if a spell has been broken and he's free. He heads off down the trail from the direction I came. He has the luxury of inquiring about school bus ownership. I have a store waiting for me to open. The following turning, I've had plenty of sleep. I'm turning onto the street where all the action is., the one with the campers. A beat up black pickup truck pulls into a space between a couple of mobile homeless dwellings. The door opens and the driver is speaking to what I believe are dogs inside. "Sit still, sit still," he says. I don't look in my mirror, but I believe he lets his dogs out. I watch as another pickup pulls up to a corner on this street. This one is from the city. The driver gets out with a pail and a stick with pincers on the end. He crosses the street to pick up trash from the sidewalk. I notice he's watching the guy with the dogs. I can hear the guy behind me. "C'mon boys, let's go. We're leavin'." Then I'm out on the trail, rolling along a second golf course on the trail. Someone is searching the weeds along the fence next t the trail for his golf ball. "I don't see it anywhere," he tells another. Just around the bend is a spot along what's left of the river. There are a couple of points where boogie boarders walk down to one of two tiny man made waterfalls. A group of perhaps 15, all in black wetsuits (including a cute lady) and carrying boards, are making their way there. One guy rides one of those skateboard things with a single big wheel in the middle, carrying his board. Over their wetsuits, they appear to be wearing some kind of life vests. There are spots in the river where it's so shallow, even ducks have to stand instead of float.
...from zip-lining, Frisbee and spike ball to city fishing, boating and dog training. - Westword, 7/29-8/4/2021
Wednesday. I'm out on the trail to work, headed through the first underpass. A homeless guy appears to be in the other lane, throwing a trash bag up onto a ledge inside. A guy appears to be taking footage of him on his phone. Someone who perhaps is an assistant to the cameraman is also inside the underpass. Or perhaps she's also homeless. Just around the corner from the first golf course is a playground next to the riverbank, off to one side of the trail. Off to the other side, under some trees, is a concrete picnic table and benches. It's a popular spot for homeless. One of them, a young guy, is here this morning. He has long hair and a beard. He's sitting low, almost hidden behind the debris on the table, as well as two cloth bags. Each bag has "YUM" printed on it. At the end of a second golf course is a traffic circle on the bike trail. It's a way of managing the bike and golf cart traffic passing each other. A family of four, including a granddad, mom, and pair of kids, are all on bikes. They stop and park, and sit on the edge of the traffic circle under some shade. Just yards away is a big covered shelter with picnic tables. Just past them, a middle-aged wetsuit-clad couple emerges onto the trail. They put down skateboards, and each has a boogie board under an arm. I wait for them to realize I am inches behind them. The guy tells the lady, "Lotta bikes comin'." I follow them to where they enter the river. Soon I'm at the dog park. The white school bus is gone from the lot. Around the corner from here, on my way home after work, I pass the first person I've seen on the trail on rollerblades. I'm rolling past the waterpark as a woman approaches. She's on her phone. "'What drew you into journalism?,'" she says. "The optimism?"
...lurching around in a black knit shirt with nothing up his shirt sleeves. ...a wiry little bantam of a man who looks as if he belongs in a gangster film playing the mob runt. Born...of a WASP mother and a Greek diner-operator father who used to wrestle professionally. [He's] one of life's natural losers. He is surrounded by four TV newsmen, three cameramen... He grunts and belches, exhorting fate like a crapshooter... - Freedland
This week, I'm having wistful experiences coming to and fro work, through the neighborhoods across the street. Last summer, I met a 4-year-old in the old money neighborhood on the way to and from the trailhead on this end. She's adorable. I see her one day in a swing on a tree limb. She's wearing a helmet, and says to me, "Hi, I'm Maggie." A sign in her yard announces her successful kindergarten career. In the neighborhood between this one and work, i see a cute mom out in the residential street with her kid. Coming home on Thursday, I'm just across the street from work. I ride past a couple in the yard of a home for sale. The husband is gesturing to a gorgeous real estate agent. Onto the trail and the the connecting trail home. Closer to home, I pass the second only rollerblader I remember out here. Not far along is the small parking lot next to a bridge over the river, hosting a handful of homeless cars. Under a beach umbrella, on a camping cot, is a homeless guy. Soon I'm off the trail. There be another big show outside this evening at the Levitt Center. On the corner of a street with endless traffic, across from the park, is a Caucasian couple on bikes. The lady is cute in her denim shorts and halter top. The guy has a beard and ponytail, and a long sleeved shirt on a hot summer day. The cars are parked bumper to bumper along the street, again between the homeless campers. I watch a middle aged guy in khaki shorts and a buttoned down shirt, with a backpack, get out of a car between two campers. Another couple has a wagon with a couple of kids inside. The front of Dad's T-shirt reads "Happy hour."
...Shine Music...is reimagining...festivals [which are]more inclusive... The...first attempt, the Shine Music Festival, takes place at Levitt Pavilion [this Sunday] and will...remove barriers for concert-goers. [Including techniques] such as full-body sound and a bone-conduction dance floor [which] allows concert-goers to feel the pulse of the music from the ground up. Full body sound is a [small] device...that...carries the vibration of the music into [your] body via patches. ..."the music on the stage connects with the audience. If you're off to the side, you're on the outskirts of the bubble and you don't share the same experience." [There] will also be...pathways [through] Denver's Ruby Hill Park [which are]color-coded according to difficulty [of accessibility]. ...people with sensory disorders [shall have access to] noise-canceling headphones. A sensory bus will serve as a peaceful oasis for those with autism or [who] needs a break... - Westword, 8/5-21/2021
Nobody participates in ideology. ...people become involved in...myths...adding, subtracting, multiplying. Get them involved. Let them participate. ...leave a few clues and vanish. Change your costume, use the props around you. - Hoffman
Join your neighbors for an evening in our community parks! ...from 4-8 p.m. on select Thursday and Friday nights through August and September. Bring your lawn chairs and picnic blankets... Residents are encouraged to apply for $100, $300 or $500 grants to purchase supplies [for] ice cream socials, neighborhood parades...and more! - Englewood Citizen, Fall 2021
Jesus, I need a sensory break. On Friday, I'm down my street. I turn a corner to work at a big park. Just this past week, the Caucasian tennis players I saw out on the courts, which were unused until they moved into the old neighborhood. This morning, there's a sign on the grass here, and tents with some people. The sign reads, "Denver Public Schools Facility Maintenance Appreciation Day." It's the first of these such events I've ever seen. A good hour later, I'm onto the connecting trail. For the past couple of weeks or so, Public Service has been out on this trail. They are taking down all the old electric line towers and putting up new ones. Crews have been directing, and sometimes halting, bicycle and pedestrian traffic along the trail. This morning, one crew member is sitting in a chair by the trail...asleep. A bit further along is another crew member sitting on an overturned shopping cart, reading his phone. The last crew member i pass, I can hear his radio. "Y'all stay hydrated 'cause ain't no water comin' my way." Over and out. Saturday. The sun never makes it out through the clouds and smoke. I'm down the trail to work and climbing a hill out of an underpass. I'm behind a couple of grey-haired guys. They both have boogie boards under an arm, and with the other are both using a skateboard as a walking stick to climb the incline. At the top they drop their skateboards and begin rolling. I pass them, as well as another skateboarder with a boogie board. When I come out of work at 3 PM, the sky is completely grey. The pall appears to stretch from the sky all the way to the ground. At Chilis on the way home, I watch on TV that "the largest wildfire in California history has grown larger." Before that, I decide to stop by the waterpark today, instead of tomorrow. I'm in line for the drop slide into the deep end. behind me, I hear a female voice say that she's hiding. I turn to see a girl who can't be more than eighteen. She's in a red one-piece suit with "lifeguard" on the front. Her body, it just so happens, is perfect. I ask, "You're hiding?" She's hiding from the lifeguard watching the deep end. She's going to test this guard by going down the slide and pretending to drown. I go first and she follows. She's flailing in the water for no more than a couple seconds when the other guard in the pool. When they get out, I ask her, "How did she do?" She replies she did great.
Monday. This is supposed to be my last Monday working all day. It's somewhere around 5:30 or 6 AM. Along the trail to work, there is a guy curled up on the concrete, asleep. Further along, I'm passed by a cyclist with a backpack. His yellow safety vest won't fit over the pack and the rest of him, and wearing the pack over the vest defeats the purpose of the vest. So his vest is wrapped around his pack. Out on the connecting trail, a deer stands eating weeds. Was it this morning? I've seen both cyclists carrying their children in child trailers, behind their bikes, the riders with helmets on. On the same stretch of trail, I've seen the same homeless cyclist pulling his own child trailer, full of junk, no helmet but arms full of tattoos. On the way home today, I see a homeless guy walking toward me on the trail, in my lane. he takes short steps and holds his arms down straight, swinging them back and forth as he walks. I see him again in the same place out on the trail. This morning, he's walking on the edge of a low cement wall.
Wednesday. I'm turning onto the street a block from my own, with a smattering of homeless campers, along my way to work. A familiar homeless camper turns a corner ahead of me and enters the street. I look to see who's in the front seats. It's a couple, both in tank tops, both missing teeth. I can see this because they both have big smiles on their faces. They look as if they may be corpses come back to life and on a vacation.
A Real "Fuck" of a Thursday for Hipster Moms
"Fuckin' shit fuckin' shit fuckin' shit! I tell him what to do, and he doesn't do it right!" Thursday morning. I'm slowly climbing a hill toward a street which is about to take me on a long and quick downhill ride to the bike trail. In the tiny front yard of a bungalow along the uphill climb are a couple of folks, and a bicycle. The rider is complaining to the other as she repacks a bag on the back rack of her bike. When she's done, she rides off. The other one gets into a car and drives away. Down the long and swift incline and around the corner, and I'm on the street with the campers. Across from the curb with the campers is a lone young woman on a bicycle, who does not strike me at all as homeless. On her back is a book bag loaded with books. On the frame, between the seat and handlebars, she balances another book bag somehow even more full. Around the corner and I'm out on the trail. Soon, I'm behind the third rollerblader I've ever seen out on a trail, and all in the same two weeks. He's a grey-haired guy in a T-shirt with "CHECK ME OUT" on the back. When I'm past a second golf course on the way to work, I'm hungry. I turn off into the parking lot toward a deathburger. A dolly with four or five rafts and a pile of kayak paddles sits between the trail and the lot, and people in life vests are getting out of cars. I exit the lot onto a sidewalk along a busy avenue. Before I enter the sidewalk, again I hear "Fuck!" I look in the direction of the 'fuck' to see a little guy with a hiking pack on his back. The waistband is unbuckled. Oh oh, 'insane in the membrane.' As I pass him on the sidewalk, he looks at me and says, "You want to go to prison?" before tossing a chain into the busy avenue. "I'd rather you kill yourself," he then says. Well...fuck. Right? I grab my snack and return to the trail, where a line of kids in life vests and helmets are making their way to the river. On the bank is a tent with "Adaptive Adventures" printed along the top. I wonder if they have yet or will meet the Manson family member hiking their direction. Around another corner, and a fourth ever rollerblader and the second in one day is coming my way. This on is making his way uphill. I turn onto the connecting trail to work and soon pass first one young hipster mom with her child. She's on a bench taking footage of her and her kid. Just off the trail, I'm climbing yet another hill in a sleepy residential neighborhood. A second young hipster mom his out with one child in tow and a second in a stroller. This one has flaming colored hair, a print dress loaded with pigment, and a prominent tattoo on her calf.
Friday. I'm on the street a block from my own, smattering of campers. A handful of adults are walking the street with leaflets in their hands. One woman has her phone in her hand. I turn a corner. I hear the rumble of an engine from a vehicle coming up behind me. A truck? An SUV? It's...a brand new hearse. Once I'm out on the trail, I decide to pay a visit to the homeless camp circling an undeveloped cul de sac. I last saw it weeks ago, a ring of tents and even a camper. I can tell even from blocks away. It's been swept clean. Not so much as a piece of trash. The following day, I have an ambitious schedule after work. Pick up photos and a swim on the last day of the season at the outdoor public pool. It's an easy ride to the photo place on this hot afternoon. Then it's straight south to the pool. I get there in jig time. I'm locking up my bike as I watch a grey-haired lady approach the rec center entrance. A lifeguard comes to the door and informs the lady that the pool is closed, due to a "fecal emergency." The lady replies, "Oh, crap." She appears to be unaware of her own joke. I ask if I can grab a local neighborhood newspaper from inside. I'm in and out, and the lady is peppering the lifeguard with questions. Is a half hour enough to disinfect the pool? No. The parent is responsible for this? If the child is sick, no. I verify with the lifeguard that this is the last day to swim at city public pools for the season. She confirms this. "OH, CRAP!" yells the lady. Not far away, I hit up Chick Fil A. I order nuggets and am given a choice of sauce. I choose the "Chick Fil A" sauce. I waited upon by the manager in the same white blazer as the last time I saw her here. I ask her if this sauce was developed by the company with a flavor which represents the essence of Chick Fil A. She replies that it has been. A kid behind the register laughs. I sample the sauce and tell her, the flavor is dominated by mustard, but mellower. No protests of Oh Crap here. I take a route back across town which takes me over the same interstate three times. I'm coming down an avenue only a couple blocks from my own street. But I must cross over a highway with two lanes going one way in opposite directions, each on opposite sides of the river. I cross through the first intersection behind another cyclist, a guy with no helmet and long grey hair. It will be a miracle, as slow as he is, if we make it through the green light of the second intersection across the river. On the narrow pedestrian part of the bridge, some guy has his guitar case open on the ground. We both snake past it, and the guitarist, and into the intersection. The other cyclist slowly turns on the intersecting sidewalk, and I make it past him just in time to make it past an oncoming motorized scooter. Also on the sidewalk. Which isn't supposed to be there.
Sunday. I've been doing lunch with the sister, swinging past the yogurt place downtown, working out, and hitting the waterpark this month. This afternoon, at the yogurt place, I'm told that a customer broke the cold water machine. Delicious cold water, free to customers, on these hot days. A new one is on the way. At the waterpark, this has been an interesting season. I've noticed a larger Hispanic family presence here, as well as guys who could be gun rights folk. I can't recall, but I think it may have been the summer of 2017. I saw all kinds of kids being bused here as if it's a summer camp. My shift then began at 1 PM, and I was able to swim before work. I recall one young man with mental issues. Once he was in the water, this guy could swim circles around anyone. This afternoon, I watch a guy who may have something such as Down Syndrome. He has one swim shoe on, and the other under his arm. Sunglasses are in his hand. Fire smoke and clouds render them unnecessary anyway. He carefully steps into the pool, slowly makes his way to one corner, and stays there. He appears not sure what to make of all the kids, or even the drops of water which come his way. As I'm leaving, I peek back at the corner of the pool. He's still there. On the way back home, I grab dinner at an old diner I like to frequent. It's next to a condo complex with the obligatory young urban hipsters. Years ago, I listened to a couple of them having sex with their window open, while I waited for a bus before sunrise. At first, I thought it was a goose. It's slow at dinner time. The owner is there playing hostess. I ask her how they're doing. She says they're not open 24 hours now, as they were for decades, but they're keeping busy. She says Sundays start early and go until 4 PM. They close at 10 PM now. I ask her if they get many residents from the condo complex. She says not really.
Competition is grafted on[to the human spirit] by institutions, by a capitalist economy, by religion, by schools. Every institution I can think of in this country promotes competition. - Hoffman
Friday of the following week. Another effing crazy summer morning. I'm working all day today. Other parts of the nation have had heat waves. This morning, I'm out the door at 5 AM. I need a hoodie, I should have taken long pants, and my toes are cold in sandals. In the middle of August. WTF? It appears to have rained overnight. Standing pools of water and mud washed across the trail. I find out later that it freaking snowed up in the mountains. With a full day ahead, it's nice to have had some sleep last night. Didn't hear any rain. I'm out on the trail, past the first golf course where the trees line the river bank. I spot a shopping cart on the grass. It's piled with junk, topped off with a stroller. I stop to take a couple of photos before I notice the cart driver. He's asleep on the grass, under a plastic bag. Late in the afternoon, I'm home from work. I run over to the Vietnamese restaurant behind my place for dinner. I'm seated at a table next to some college types. They sound as if they are tech or science guys. I listen to them discussing a seminar or an extracurricular gathering. A friend of theirs arrives. He greets them with an announcement that he successfully made it into a particular class. One of them tells a waiter they want to begin with a couple of appetizers, the very two which make up my meal. At my table, I'm reading a published compilation of Abbie Hoffman's books I read a line about his respect for Marshal Mcluhan, in spite of his "university" roots.
On Sunday, I'm back at the sister's porch, where she and I have a quick lunch. I've been going there on Sundays since her preparation for upcoming knee replacement surgery. 'Tis a fine day. The fire smoke is waning and there's no weird chill in the air. After lunch, it's crosstown to the yogurt place downtown, where I listen to a couple of young employees converse. One tells the other that she's starting college. One of her four classes includes "Speaking With A Purpose." The other employee mentions something about getting her ring appraised. The first one suggests to her that she enroll herself, and take advantage of her status as "a woman of color." The store is still waiting for the new watercolor. I ask her if her phone has internet access. It does. She accesses the transit system website, but needs my help to decipher it. I may in fact make it across town to the next main artery, to catch a bus to work. I took a pair of shoes with me yesterday, with the intention of working out. I discovered when I got to the gym, after work, that I had left them at the store. Out the door, a weather-beaten homeless woman, using an umbrella as a sun shade, asks me in a barely audible voice for spare change. I make it to the bus stop just in time, and get out across the street from work. I realize then that I dropped my sunglasses on the bus. Ironically, that pair i found on the street some years ago. I'm next to a gas station, and I soon have another pair. Inside the store, I apply more sunscreen, and with shoes in hand I'm off to the waterpark. This afternoon, I see more familiar visitors than I have this season. There are the guys who adjust the diving board and make a big deal about preparing to dive...only to decide they don't know how to dive. I'm in line at the drop slide when a guy behind me asks if it's okay to go down face first. As I'm leaving, I watch a mom holding her son. She's dancing with him to the park's music. In the big park along the length of the waterpark, across a creek, I spot a dad relaxing on his back along the bank. One of his two kids appear to be poking him with a stick. He looks as if he's dead. Further down, a young girl runs through the grass, holding a helium-filled balloon like a kite. It sparkles in the sunshine. I stop at Chili's for dinner. At one table are four hipsters. One is in a T-shirt with "Emo is not dead" on the back. Three others occupy the booth in front of me. A guy with grey hair is in a buttoned down US flag shirt, and a cowboy hat with a Marine Corps pin on the front.
Monday. I'm on the connecting trail to work. I'm approaching a bend in the trail which was previously blocked off for a detour, due to electrical tower construction. A pedestrian comes around the bend and alerts us to a current detour. Around the corner is a signalman directing us off the trail. A cyclist comes from the opposite direction, and comes around the barrier. I suspect he came through the barrier back at his end, without realizing it was a barrier. I'm curious what it looks like. He points me out to the signalman and is confused why I'm approaching this barrier. He obviously thinks this is the first barrier he's encountered, and wonders why I'm on the other side of it. He's asking the signalman which way to go as I exit the trail. I head toward one street which I don't realize is blocked off. A construction crew member, he strikes me as a crew chief, approaches me. He accuses me of disregarding the signalman and tells me to get back on the trail and begin listening to them. I tell him to quit giving me that bullshit. I believe that the signalman directed me this way. I find another street around to rejoin the trail. I turn back toward the way the other cyclist came. I come upon a couple of orange cones on a bridge. There's no detour sign. No wonder he's confused. I go a little farther until I see where I turned off the trail. A couple of runners stop where I exited the trail, next to the signalman. They are similarly confused. I expect this has gone on all morning, and will continue to go on all day. I head back down the trail toward work. i come upon another crew member on the trail. I mention the crew chief who accused me of dismissing his signalman. The crew member says he thinks he knows the crew chief. He asks me, "Did he look like a Mexican Teletubby?" I reply, "Sure." He tells me that his supervisor is not there at the moment, and he took all their radios. he does not say why, but tells me he will mention the Hispanic Teletubby to him. Along the way home, the entire crew at that site are gone. I stay a half hour later to finish all the work, and decide to take the train home. Another cyclist is on the platform. He's perhaps in his thirties, in cargo shorts, a tie dyed shirt, horn rimmed glasses, and has a bandana around his head. He spots the mirror on my wrist. "Hey man," he exhorts, "that mirror's a cool idea." An even better idea...would be a helmet.
Sunday, I was on the train home when I spotted a couple homeless campers and a tent. They were along the highway which this train line follows. On Tuesday, I'm on the way home when I decide to track down the campers and tent. I turn onto the sidewalk along the highway. I never found the campers, but I made my way through a fascinating narrow space, between the wall next to the highway and the fence of a trailer park. It came out right next to the tent, on the sidewalk next t the highway. I moved inside a space in the wall. It took me to the cul de sac with the former circle of tents. A couple of new tents are there. Beginning this week, I also notice that the surfers along their favorite part of the river have vanished, as if they never existed. Nothing left but a solar panel pole with stickers. Thursday. In the morning, I notice that my internet is working just fine. I'm on the way to work, approaching the street with the campers. Before the corner, there are a couple of campers on the intersecting street. A pickup truck is stopped in my lane. The driver is speaking through the open window to someone in one of these two campers. I'm around this corner and the next, and then along the sidewalk on the bridge over the river. A pair of older teenaged couples are sauntering across the bridge. This week is in the 90s F, and one guy is dressed in a black T-shirt and black jeans. They carry a sound system upon which The Cure is playing. This year, I'm now the age my dad then turned, when I turned eighteen. Speaking of The Cure... On the way home after work, I'm coming down a long section of the trail, with trees along this side of the river bank. At one point, across the thoroughfare on the other side of the trail, is a guardrail. Someone ran into one end, and several feet have been left bent back for some weeks. A homeless tent now occupies this damaged end of the guardrail, hardly unusual for this stretch of the road. I watch as a thin guy comes toward the guardrail from the tent. He appears to be wearing a sheet tied at one shoulder, like a Halston dress, over a yellow vest. He grabs the bent end of the guardrail and begins yanking on it. When I get home, I notice that my internet is not working. Even after I turn it off and on again.
Friday morning. I'm off to meet my new doctor. She's at the main branch of my hospital network, downtown. To get there, I follow my old route when I worked at our downtown location, just last year. As the sun rises, I make my way to an entrance onto the trail along the way, just off a busy street. I can't access my new doctor's name, or which building she's in, because my internet is down. If I leave now, I may have time to make an appointment to get it fixed, eat breakfast which I have with me, and even put on sunscreen for when the sun is up. The trailhead is blocked by a homeless trailer. I cross the street and carry my bike over the curb and through some weeds. On the side facing the trail, the trailer door is open. I never speak to homeless, But i consider telling whoever is inside that their trailer is blocking cyclists, pedestrians, and electric scooters from entering the trail. As I roll past, I spot a ray of light illuminating a guy with a long grey beard. He's sitting on a seat inside, and appears as if in a Renaissance painting. I decide against any attempt at discussion. For I have appointments to keep. And others to make instead of sleep. I arrive at my appointment early and am told I'm in the right place. indeed, I do have time to complete all three aforementioned tasks beforehand. My appointment goes well. She will order her own blood work, but so far I appear to be fine. She wants me to begin monitoring my own blood pressure, because mine looks high at the hospital. She thinks it's a false reading. And she's the first of my six doctors in six years to tell me so. She's another resident. I think I like residents.
So, I opt for the train to get me to work on time. As I ride the train lately, I watch down all the side streets which go past the window. I try and spot homeless campers as I'm travelling 55 mph. There are some to be seen. The train passes one of them, parked next to the train train tracks. A police cruiser is parked next to it with its lights on. An officer is outside speaking and gesturing to a couple of the homeless occupants. I get out at my stop, and as soon as I'm on my bike, I hear a sound as it something is brushing against the frame. I stop and still hear a noise. Uh-oh. I check my tire. Flat as a...flat. I jump back on a train the opposite way. I only haver a half hour if I want to ride back to where I may change lines, and then attempt to make a bus which will take me to work. I decide instead to get out on the street where are plant is. I call my boss, and he comes to pick me up and drop me at work. A flat on a work day means onw thing: waiting 44 minutes after we close to catch the bus, to the train, which takes me to the north corner of downtown. (Downtown Denver is a square, tilted at 45 degrees to the surrounding grid of streets.) Then it means taking steps over the train tracks and a short hike to the downtown sporting goods supercenter. They're open seven days a week, until 9 PM. You can't ask for much more than that. They fix my flat in jig time, and there's a trail which will get me back to my side of the river. It's a long day, but much is accomplished. The following day, there are no detours out on the trail. The construction crews must have the weekend off. On the way home after work, though, I see something else. On the other side of the underpass just before the waterpark, a park ranger is putting up a pair of radar units which show cyclists their speed. The following day, they will be gone. (They were just being tested?)
...at Englewood River Run Park on the South Platte. water...at 350 cubic feet per second has helped to create perfect surfing conditions. ...some in full wetsuits and helmets and personal floatation devices... ...expert surfers and first-timers... The vibe gets...looser as...the sky turns dark. ...River Run Park opened in 2016...a partnership between the Army Corps of Engineers, The Urban Drainage & Flood Control District and Denver-based McLaughlin Whitewater Design Group to rehabilitate a half-mile stretch of blighted riverway. "When the water levels are right, it's just like a powder day: It's on. ...the most welcoming community I've ever been a part of..." ..."Blair Bear" [is] widely known...in the river-running community...that she does not use her last name. "...we're still seeing the sport in its infancy." For much of July and the first few weeks of August, the water was 250 and 350 CFS, and the surfers were out in force. "When...the Army Corps of Engineers...get water calls from farmers... We just wait for the alerts... ...new life along a stretch of the South Platte..." "...if you build a wave, surf communities will establish themselves." - Westword, 8/26 - 9/1/2021
Really? The apparent emergence of a summer trend, and more, explained in a single weekly newspaper article. Thank you Westword. My appointment to get my internet working again is for Sunday, between 7 and 8 AM. The guy on the phone, Friday morning, tells me not to cancel the appointment in the event the problem corrects itself. hey, i don't know what happens to the internet in other countries, but if this problem corrects itself I'm going to be more suspicious of hacking than I will impressed with modern technology. And I'm worried that no one will show up until far past 8 AM. You know, the usual worries. It's never the one who make appointments who get their sleep. Yet, I awake Sunday morning, just forty minutes before the appointed time. I have just enough time to move everything away from the computer when I hear the van pull up. This guy is early. And he doesn't stop checking cable junctions on the outside of the condo complex until he finds the right one. Just "a couple of connectors," he tells me, and my internet is up and running. All in just a little over an hour. He's so satisfied he pumps his fists in the air. I head out for my new Sunday routine. Lunch at the sister's, downtown for yogurt, and then head south to the waterpark. Between yogurt and the waterpark, I'm rolling through the residential streets south of downtown. I come upon a street festival running some three blocks. It's the first I recall this summer (at summer's end.) Entry is $5. I don't have cash, and they won't take a card. I can scan a hashtag, but my phone isn't hooked up to the internet. I'm out of luck, but I don't really have the time anyway. The following day, on the way home after work, I stop at a deathburger for a snack. After I eat, I'm on the way out the door when a homeless guy comes out of nowhere, with his meal on a tray. He spots my shoulder bag. With a barely audible voice, he asks me if it's my "go bag?" I pause to let my brain shift into homeless, before I reply, "No." He asks me something about it being an airline bag. It ain't that either.
In another two days, it will be a new month, during which I have a pair of overdue doctor appointments. In another week, Labor Day. The last day for the waterpark, the weekend for a rescheduled popular art festival, and usually the last festival of the summer in the park downtown will see the return of gatherings there. Another three weeks, and the summer will officially come to an end. The weekend after that will be a rescheduled biannual metaphysical fair in a new location. Everything about next month appears to be rescheduled. My life has been rescheduled. The summer comes to a close with my budgetary worries becoming assuaged one by one. Now that's scary...
