She barely had time to ask. In fact I'm not even sure if i gave her time to ask. I was wearing my headphones listening to a piano version of some radiohead song that made my walk from the supermarket through the park to my flat seem that much more cinematic.
I did manage to hear her say "disculpe la molestia" (Excuse the bother)
instinctively before my mind had finished processing who she was or what she might want i threw up a polite but firm, very well worn, no sorry don't have any. She might have been asking for directions, clever quips, hell, maybe even mac advice, all of which i would have had to confess i had plenty of.
She may have also wanted money, of which i had some.
Beggars, Pan Handlers, Bums, Street Urchins all of these are common fair in most large cities, and more so in the more affluent neighborhoods,
Sadly as i walked away i realized she was none of the above. My mind finished processing the visual clues as i reached the edge of the park.
She was dressed normally, wore some makeup, had her hair gelled back, and seemed in genuine distress. I'd seen her moments before she asked me, ask the man walking towards me and watched his reaction, his well rehearsed shrug off, and as i walked, as i in fact started thing about writing about this experiencing, slightly appalled that the writer in me would somehow profit from the moment, i realized maybe she was just like me, or you, or anyone i know who through fate and circumstanced needed to ask for 10 pesos to grab a metrobus, maybe there was genuine need of a helping hand and not merely the every day begging for a handout.
But my callousness is a coat i throw on even on the most unbearably hot days, without much thought, as i grab keys, wallet, music, callousness and head out the door.
Somewhere along the line, with the everday litany of people asking for money i became a man who wouldn't even stop to hear what that woman had to say, and for that i'm sorry because at the very least i could have let her get far enough past "excuse the bother" for it to actually be a bother.
i think it becomes a process of embracing and letting go simultenously. we all have concepts of home, built on childhood, great loves, perhaps even a dog and we look for those patterns in new places, we make those choices, to live with white walls, and not invest emotionally, it seems easier perhaps, to be a vagabond, to act like some wandering nomad with innner roots. For me ultimately i have to try, i have to find it in my selection of teas that i brew in one of my favorite cups, i find it in the familiar things i have brought with me, but some days its harder than others, some days i crave something so intangiable, so unspecific, that it feels like the noise of the mosquito buzzing past your ear at night even though you've already killed that mosquito.
"would you mind taking our dogs for a walk?"
asked delightful british neighbor
that's a deceptively simple request. After all her dogs are very nice dogs, and i do like walking, but really what she was asking was,
"i'm on set all day tomorrow and my dogs need to be walked twice, cause otherwise they might go stir crazy and possibly shit in my flat, I've got the first shift covered but not the second, so would mind taking them out at around 8pm and following them around until they both shit, then picking up the shit and hunting for one of those elusive Condesa public trash cans to dispose of it properly?"
It changes the nature of the favor doesn't it, and least for me. The truth is i love...well maybe just like, dogs. I'm certain i like them, but having lived in NYC and seen the delightful ritual that is the plastic bag crap scoop up i am convinced that to clean up dog shit, to not mind doing so must be very much like changing diapers. No parent i know of likes doing it, most of them find it a bit gross, but they all do it because they love their child, and i think those people walking around carrying their dogs shit in plastic baggies love their dogs, and their dogs love them, and its a beautiful symbiotic relationship.
But i do not love the neighbors two dogs. I have in fact only met them on two occasions. The truth is i'd be much more inclined to pick up my neighbors shit than their dogs, them at least i know.
somewhere just south of nowhere
near the park and a fountain and a pile of garbage waiting for its ride to the city dumps.
In there, some where, The hard floor was a shiny white something which made him think of a hospital waiting room.
It was the floor he'd wake up to in his shinny new but old apt.
The ceiling looked like the pockmarked face of a teenage Bukowski, "popcorned" was the term they so charmingly referred to it as.
It was a home, but not quite home. It lacked the little bits of memories that had filled his small avocado green living room on east 35th st or his unearned highrise apartment overlooking central park.
There'd been no great loves in this room.
No breathless "oh god's" to mask an "i love you" that's bashing to get out.
No snowy days spent in doors watching movies.
Just sex, good sex, fun sex, but..
...There'd been no arguments filled with bile and love
no promises,
no broken promises
no betrayals or reconciliations.
no hard hitting, core diving, conversations on a living room couch, no truths, no beautiful girls that would break his heart, on a beige living room couch, in fact
there was no couch here, just an old futon on the floor that didn't belong to him and didn't belong to the person that'd lent it to him.
Just an old futon that smelled of sex, and uneasy sleep, and strangers dreams.
His books and movies stood like soldiers against the wall, a cardboard box and a plastic shelf from his fridge were the extent of his coffee table,
He doesn't spend much time in this makeshift living room.
He wakes in the mornings and imagines a large wooden table that would welcome coffee stains and tea rings and nights of writing on its dark wood surface,
He wakes in the mornings and takes to the familiar confines of his music library and the people on his buddy list. To the list of movies or albums torrents he's left downloading overnight,
to the comfortable surroundings of the websites he reads, the blank "page" of a word document, the porn he knows is tucked away on his computer, that he'll rarely ever bother looking at.
To the half watched documentary on Bukowski that sits patiently paused for the last few days.
And his feet feel the cold shiny surface of that white floor in his bedroom,
and his feet walk to the living room, the slumped futon looking very much like an overnight guest asleep after a very heavy night of drinking, he opens the doors to the balcony, the tiny balcony that smells of dog piss when it rains heavily,
that overlooks the treetops and fountain and pile of trash,
He does this and thinks...this is home.
he does this and thinks...this is home?
in sleep duality disappears.
the most complex women look kind.
but i'm going a tad bit...
"Show me all the blueprints. Show me all the blueprints. Show me all the blueprints... show me all the blueprints... show me all the blueprints... show me all the blueprints..."