It’s sunny here today. I went out in it at two o’clock in just my sweater, no jacket at all. But I saw some weird things while I was outdoors and they made me think about human life these days. Everyone is so disconnected from each other. The only thing that unites us is the exchange of money, but we ought to be loving each other like good Christians or like people who have read James Joyce.
On my way back from the store, I heard a woman screaming abuse at her husband. They were parked in a pickup truck in a lot next to Ninfa’s Elite janitorial service, but I don’t even know why they were there. That’s one thing. Also I stopped and talked with Karen’s friend Jean who was getting into her car. She told me she’d been living in Idaho with her daughters, but it didn’t work out. Now she’s staying with a friend while she waits to be approved for Section 8 housing. It could take up to six weeks for this to happen. And then I went inside the salon to say hi to Kim and Karen, but they were too busy with clients to talk to me. So I let myself out the door and went home. Finally, I observe Roger pottering doggedly, stubbornly with his project of reconstructing a Willis truck.
In all of this I see so much disharmony among people, like a noisy kind of music, atonal and arrhythmic, that hurts to hear. It all goes on under a cloudless blue sky, perfectly sunny and beautiful, as if no one had a problem in the world. Even this doesn’t make sense. Meanwhile, my neighbors in Betty’s old house ride flatulent motorcycles around the streets.
But, I got what I went for at the market: a wild cherry Pepsi and jerky for Aesop. At least the soda tastes sweet.
robgradens 