03/26/2003 Entry: "Extra Realness."

Walking to the subway this morning feels like I am walking uphill at 65° angle, tilted to the left. It is only nine, but I am already tired and have not had enough coffee yet. I climb past the center where the developmentally disabled man found the bag of molotov cocktails, past the crowd of people waiting to get into the Goodwill As-Is store at opening, past a heap of soggy clothes on top of a garbage can, past the crazy old man in a dirty sportcoat shouting at the trees and sky behind me.

I get up to the corner to get cash out of the row of ATMs, but a couple of them have been smashed and there's "Police Area" tape around them. Later I learn that this is where a out-of-control taxi has smashed into two people. (Link via Jessie.)

I get out of the crowded subway several stops later, taking the escalator up and meeting a crush of paramedics on the stairs coming down, bringing a stretcher to a man sitting, supported by EMTs, at the bottom of the stairs. A woman in front of me on my walk to work has such a potent smell—a regular body odor, instead of the typical chemical fragrance that I'm assaulted by—that I pinch my nose. I think briefly of Agent Smith in my long black coat, and wonder how badly I smell to others. I get in and wash my hands and listen to the chorus of coughs and sneezes from whoever it is with the cold this week, the one that's floating around the office for the past few months.

And I wonder why I'm so enrapt in this glossy, clean, online world?

Replies: 2 comments

There's no telling who really stashed the bag of molotov cocktails in that planter, but that's just the skeptic in me talking.

Posted by Katrina @ 03/26/2003 03:49 PM PST

And of course all those near misses mean something darling.. I mean... Is the world trying to tell you something?

Posted by vince @ 03/27/2003 11:54 AM PST