this is my second attempt at my first opportunity to use the computer anywhere outside a stationary building. It is not going as well as I might like, as I have already lost the first paragraph twice. But it is possible to sit here and type while looking out the window at the trees ribboning by. I am plugged in because there is no space to experiment with unloading the zip and loading the battery, and I even attached the mouse, which I cannot use because there is no space. The tray table is too small and too high so I keep swiping my hand across the control and deleting what I've written. This is complicated by the man in front, who has leaned his seat back as far as possible and drapes his clean thick hands across the back of the seat. He finally dangled his fingers over the edge of the computer and I asked him to change position.
He is a thick small faced man with a friendly uncle mustache and gray hair short on the sides, white delicate wires curling from the bald front of his head. The man in front of him
whose head, visible above his seat is similar, has, I think, been making phone calls to important people with important directions, sounding civil but powerful, like someone whose influence you would want on your side. This was a little confusing, because I couldn't tell if the man directly in front of me was the caller, and his body habits -- the continuous repositioning, the body drape, seemed inconsistent with an important personage. It appears that the two men are traveling together, indeed there is a whole related group -men in late middle age that know where they came from and have with some satisfaction arrived somewhere. From some neighborhood together. They are going to Baltimore.
There is some mention of medical center -- it sounds as if the the man two seats up owns one -- works at one -- knows one. Does it connect to the young man sleeping now on the aisle in the same forward seat who is thinner than anyone I have ever seen, neatly tattooed up both rawhide thin arms, with a lip ring, two nose rings, an eyebrow piercing and the requisite ear studs. I tried not to look but even at the periphery of my vision, his elbows were piercing -- so thin and angular - like v-shaped knives cutting into the view at the corner of my sight, like his companion's blunt fingernails in front of my computer screen. But he is not all right. Even as he has compensated for whatever the condition - with the tattoos and the metal work that say "I scare you with my look; see, it is on purpose. I am not my condition: I choose to look frightening," - it is apparent that this must be a major natural error carrying consequences. His shoulder blade protrudes, making him a hunchback of sorts. He is so thin, - is he wasting or genetically wasted? Perhaps Baltimore is a medical destination. All the uncles gathering to hear some considered (reconsidered) medical opinion; to explore some state of the art palliative regimen that will improve the condition. Maybe these are Shriners who are in an act of charity, accompanying this unfortunate and terrifying young man to a meeting with the best authority on this condition.
I didn't eat this morning, and with a window seat and this computer arrangement, I hesitate to try for the cafe car. With my own present disability, I ought to eat anything available -- but will probably try to get away with maalox.
At Kingston, RI, the platform parallels a lumber company and the ends of the long sheds are painted with huge men putting up house timbers. The perspective appears to be from below as if the artist were very small compared to the subjects and below them on the platform -- there is something monumental about it. At the loading dock half a man (the upper half) waits with his arms extended ready to respond to a customer, as if the window were perpetually open and he, perpetually ready.
This is like talking to myself: I can look and think and misspell, and more or less record whatever.
Life is made up of peripheral views: the glimpse of something exquisite or the glimpse of something not right, something disturbing, - both disturbing really. I wonder about the insulation of my children, or at least this particular set with whom I visited - the integrated, completely engaged threesome (son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter) who have absolutely no interest in anyone outside their constructed circle (perhaps it is like the membrane of an egg - they have their own membranous shell ) In contrast, all that is outside fascinates me: the old lady with the dyed red hair and the cane making her unsteady way to the club car - will I someday be her without the artifice; the queer children of the Arab family in the Stone Zoo in their strollers with odd shaped limbs and ears - something about the eyes, and wondering if both children were genetically eccentric - and feeling the horror, the unfairness of two children, similarly afflicted; or the wealth of pregnancy under the Indian woman's sari and the equal breadth of her mother/mother in law and the finely wrought nose jewelry and the way the older women tried to fill the bottle with water at the water fountain, which shoots up in a high energetic arc (I wanted to suggest she interrupt the flow at the base instead of trying to catch the water on the way down -- but didn't -- it's not my life, even if I insist on absorbing it at the edges). She was laughing and laughing. Though my granddaughter has been instructed to give way at the water fountain to someone else waiting, neither she nor her parents are interested, or don't appear to be interested in anyone else. It makes me lonely and leaves me talking to myself.
But that's what I do anyway -- talk to myself. Do I want to have this conversation with someone else? Observing, narrating the journey, noting each spray of briar; that roses appear regularly along the track; that the track always runs along the river; that the water at this time of year is a mysterious algae shade of green in which tires are buried.
I think the man in front just gave his son a big and noisy kiss - or else he farted. The young man, son or no, switched seats some time ago and now is at the window, in front of me. Sometimes his reflection in the window, curled over, scapula protruding , baseball cap on backwards, sleeping makes him solid, then he disappears. Once he stretched. His terrifyingly thin spider arms reached toward the bulkhead - only one arm is tattooed. His father talks to him - his hat is off now and his hair is short and even - but I can't hear him answer. Apparently he was convinced to go to get something to eat and he has gotten up and walked out of the car. (You know I am making him up - not the physical account but who he is, where they are taking him ,what his relationship is - all made up) Why does the uncle remind me of my cousin, heavy set, bald jowly and confident - and like Uncle Irving ugly and confident? It is a burden to want to remember all this.
After the fact: It appears that they were coming to a baseball game. The boss bringing the crew from wherever they came down to Baltimore for a treat. That's all I know. I asked one of two burley black guys that were in the group if they had come to see the Red Sox play the Orioles and he said he guessed but he really didn't know who was playing. Maybe a weekend in Baltimore and a trip around the Inner Harbor is enough to make you leave home. It seems much too like what already is in Boston (wasn't it modeled after Boston?) A little friendlier, I guess. I did hear enough to know that they all went by train because the man in front of me was afraid to fly because of 911 and his wife's nagging, but the train ride is too long and hereafter he will fly.
I found this today while trying to delete some ancient files. Apologies for any old and ill considered judgements. Everyone has grown up since then.
finding my voice 