Coffee will start it all up
Today began like most lazy Sundays, the gray clouds above lingering with promise of rain and distraction from motivation. I was having none of it, however, and off I went to one of my favorite downtown cafes which had entertainingly schizophrenic music and satisfyingly strong coffee.
In the Malcolm Gladwell book I was perusing, I saw him use the word
provocateur. I had forgotten this word.. this lovely, lovely word. How can you not like it? Look at all those vowels! A nearly complete urge to get my own personal metallic calling cards swam into my mind with a vengeance. Imagine, at an evening soiree, as I held a unreal colored cocktail in one hand, and with the other handing over a sharp(ha!) card, stating plainly:
Namey Nameington
-Provocateur
-Part time Necromancer
-Lazy Incubus
(my actual name is perhaps more lyrically pleasing)
It could work.
What would John Constantine do?
Though I lived in Seattle nearly two years, to get in the proper frame of mind for walking a few hours in the rain near downtown, I instead like to cast my mind into the frame of mind of a Londoner. Specifically JC, who seems unperturbed and utterly in his own element, even while soggy in a cityscape. I skip wearing the tie, but I have the long coat. Today I have the sense that the Urban Shaman part of my psyche has completely stolen the day planner from the Doomed Romantic who; let's face it, hasn't even been producing enough embarrassing poetry these last few years to justify his existence.
The river walk I started down was lush in the way a park trail so near downtown can only be in the wet winter months. Local trail markings abounded:
Oh, youth of San Jose... you were so close! Water is H20, not 420... oh well, keep studying, you'll get it.
Urban wildlife isn't completely lost to me. I love the blackbirds that perch all around where I work, and the strange barking squirrels that yodel and plop onto my cottage roof at all hours of the night. This was the most I've seen ducks, geese, and other amusing waterfowl in a long time. A whole thriving ecosystem a mere mile or so from me. Not to mention these two:
I tried not to disturb their cluckings and rainy day too much, but I think they started to feel concerned as I attempted the perfect shot, clicking my handy cameraphone and taking a single step closer, over and over again. Stop! Stop, my pretties! I'll make you famous!
On I went, past strangely stork-like posing geese (I *think* that's what they were. Who knows what kinds of mutant life I was walking by?), cavernous workshop warehouses with faint music inside, and the occasional street dweller's encampment (complete with peeled off Mickey's labels adorning public utility boxes). I enjoyed the kind of slow knowledge park signs afforded me as I walked by them, as opposed to the instant download of online life. I strayed by the "sister city" bench for Dublin, enjoying a quote on a rock:
We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams,
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World-losers and world-forsakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
Of the world for ever, it seems.
- from "Ode", Arthur O'Shaughnessy
I got a powerful urge to return to Dublin. My putting it off, like most things in the last 6 years, I could feel coming to an end. The inertia I began feeling about a month ago now I have been feeding in inches, every day. It is starting to feel more and more real.
Go far enough South, and you're in Robot territory.
I began to reach the end of my southward stroll for the day and came across two very tired looking ducks snoozing on a cement ramp down into the water. From above, strange alien noises filtered down from overpasses above. Some kind of art piece was installed there; tiny multicolored tents and the sounds of birds from some far away land, in harmony but relentlessly chirping and echoing down past the asphalt and plastic bags from the streets above.
What were the ducks dreaming of, presented with this consistent, yet alien set of sounds? I imagined their duck minds, gently drifting through a reality that was some dream layered on top of the downtown overpass and river below. They had bird neighbors, some good conversations, and perhaps even the hints of where the water went and other concerns that I could only guess at, listening to the robotic birds warble and gossip. I moved along, leaving them to their duck-sized dreams.
I ascended to ask a shop worker at the Children's Museum about the friendly restroom icon I had seen on the park maps. Taking one look at my trenchcoated self, he pointed me to the next one along, across the river. I wandered over to a puzzling and anonymous back side of some huge down town building, with restrooms obviously for the river path, but locked. There was a kind of intercom button and what seemed to be a camera, so I pressed the button a few times, asking the door to let me in. After a few false starts, I heard the clicking of an automated lock releasing and re-latching, and I gained entry. I departed, thanking the door twice for letting me in. I have never been so happy that my karma with robotic life seems to be in good shape. (edit:
this robot can explain on my behalf - )
I turned and headed back along the path. The sky seemed dark and mysterious, and downtown futuristic and serene:
Every time I walk into a secret world, I leave feeling more myself.
Home Again
The guardian at home assured me all was well, that the forces of entropy and order were in check, and that the path to adventure would be open again next time I wanted it.
She's small and orange, but very reassuring.
