Good Mourning

It’s good, it’s whole and it fills me with warmth. I set down my morning coffee, with a shot of espresso, from the Forever Coffee Bar onto the window ledge beside me and try my best to recollect it all.

We were at a wedding. A friend’s wedding, though not a friend I know well enough to attend her wedding. Her first dance was a full-blown Broadway musical number. Though the guests weren’t sure what they were doing. This is something that needs time to prepare and of course her wedding guests had no such time. I turned my head to an ex-girlfriend of mine and whispered a snide remark in her ear. I remember a smile and then I was in my room. A gentle rain was falling from outer space.

I wanted a coffee and I wanted to walk. I put on yesterday’s socks and yesterday’s jeans, laced up my sneakers, grabbed a hat, a mask and my keys and headed for the door. On the way out I picked up some trash.

My apartment building has two elevators, one on the north side and one on the south. The southern elevator shaft takes you to the garbage room. I walked down the hallway toward the South, but the elevator was being maintained. I walked north and had to wait for the elevator. Once the doors opened I found that someone had pressed all of the buttons before I had gotten on. My first instinct was annoyance, a slight exhalation. But then I remembered being young. I remember the boy who rebelled against all of it. We all pay penance in different ways and at different times. Punishments and crimes and equality, if this was karma then so be it.

I found my way to the garbage room. A man was working. I don’t know why, but being watched changed my demeanor. Instead of chucking the trash into the bin as I usually would, I took care, gingerly placing it where it belonged. As I passed him, he took no mind.

My hand grabbed the front door to my building and my body stood still as an older man came through the portal. We nodded and I left. Rain from a window and rain on your skin are two different phenomena altogether. They both can ease you if you let them, but one requires complete surrender. I was without a raincoat or an umbrella, but the walk was not too far to Forever. I could deal with a little rain. I needed a little rain.

The walk was nice, puddles abundant. A woman was coming toward me; our paths would soon meet. My left hand’s fingers found my zipper to check all was in order. I saw her smile, but did not return the favor.

My arms were becoming slick. I shook them both at once and felt the sky’s water fall to the pavement. In front of me was scaffolding and I planned a short refuge from the elements, a moment to collect my thoughts and myself. I stood under the metal awning and a horn blasted from my left. Two pedestrians forced back onto the sidewalk by a large, white van. I watched the van as it drove by. A man alone in the moving room, facing forward. I watched as it drove down the hill and noticed with me under the scaffolding a woman lying down on the ground sleeping.

She was sleeping, still, though I wasn’t sure how much rest she must have been getting. Her clothes were piled atop her, purples and browns, blues and blacks. A spectrum of colors surrounded her. Colors and dry concrete. She had found a good spot. She was dry. My own moment of solace was decidedly over. I left the harbor of scaffolding and ventured again into the rain.

It was at this point I gave over to it all. I did not believe I would ever become drenched. I looked to the sky and saw some openings of light. I saw through the grey clouds heavy with their collections and, knowing soon it would all end, felt absolutely calm about the water on my skin. I was almost there. I was almost to Forever.

More I walked and more people I passed, shopkeeps standing at the edge, men waiting to enter the bank, a woman pushing a stroller. It occurred to me that the café could be closed. Maybe Forever isn’t open on Mondays. I had come too far. I crossed the street twice and almost passed it, but finally made it.

Inside it was different. Hardware and materials littered the floor. A woman wearing a mask had a small dog on a leash. The dog acknowledged my entrance, but she took no notice. I approached the man behind the bar.

“Doing some interior decorating?” He didn’t hear me.

“What?” His head found its way closer to the plastic sheet dividing us.

“You guys seem like you’re doing some work.”

“Renovations, yeah. What can I get you?”

I come from a place where small talk, little moments where strangers recognize existence, is not only abundant, but polite. It is different here. Panhandling or unwarranted hocking usually follows small talk. People are not unhelpful, just more aware of the time, their time. They feel it’s dwindling and they don’t want to waste it.

“Large red eye, thanks.”

He tapped the screen a few times, then turned the computer, which swiveled to face me. I ran through the motions of settling my debts and then found my way to another side of the café. With my hands in my pockets I looked at the dog that looked back at me. I think dogs would like small talk. Cats, not so much. Maybe everyone in this world could be divided into dog people and cat people. Maybe that’s the major difference; everyone is either a cat or a dog. At the heart of it all, maybe that was it. Every disagreement, divorce, war was just a difference in –

“Large red eye.”

I picked it up off the counter with its big pink lid.

“Thanks.”

I left Forever and went to return home.

I was right, the skies were opening and hardly any rain fell. On the way back I heard some whistling and chirping. I looked up to an open window with a cage protruding. Two colorful birds sat imprisoned and singing while two men had a conversation in Spanish underneath. Ascending the stairs to my apartment I donned my mask for a moment as an elderly woman passed, then went upstairs to relieve myself and enjoy my coffee.

Yesterday marked ten years since she left us. It’s funny, almost hilarious, how life flies by and we never care to notice.