For some reason, I awoke around 5am and was up for the day. I hate getting up that early but, as I lay there allowing my eyes to slowly adjust to the dim morning light drifting in through the window, I begin to think of all the things I can accomplish today: laundry, cleaning, planting some more flowers, going to the gym. Then, as I pull myself out of bed and painfully slip into my bathrobe, I realize that my first day back to the gym two days ago is still reminding me that I can't overdo it after a year and a half's absence. I sigh, knowing that the gym (and probably cleaning and planting) are not going to happen. But I am committing myself to getting back into shape. (sigh).... It's just gonna take longer than I thought.
Anyway, I start my day as I always do. Coffee brewing, news on the tv and my hairy butt draped in a bathrobe and plopped down on the sofa and telling myself that I'm gonna do this or I'm gonna do that during the course of the day. But alas, the morning chugged forward and, aside from getting up to pee or refill my coffee cup, my ass didn't leave the sofa.
As the hours drift by, I get more and more pissed off at myself for just spending my free time sitting on the couch. I could've at least showered by this time, but I instead wallowed in my own laziness, hating every moment of it, but too tormented to do anything about it, except sit there and watch reruns of The Golden Girls and The Nanny over and over and over again.
So there I am, unshaven, unshowered, undressed (basically), when all of a sudden there comes a loud knock at the door. I get up to peer out the window, when I hear keys being inserted into the lock.
FUCK!
It's my ex-roommate, boyfriend, friend...whatever the hell you wanna call him. I've mentioned him before. I forgot that he still had a set of my keys. He still has some things in my house that he's waiting to move down to his new place, but I haven't spoken to or seen him in a couple of months. Now, all of a sudden, he's coming into my house unannounced to pick up a clock stored in a closet to be fixed. I was already pissed at myself for lying around wasting the entire morning and now I'm even more pissed because I have an unexpected house guest who is too fucking rude to even call before showing up. I mean, it's a long shot, but who knows...I could be having sex right there in my livingroom for all anybody knew!
Well, I didn't feel like talking to him, so I kept any answers to questions or comments limited to one or two words, until he left a few minutes later. And when he did leave, I was so pissed off at everything that I couldn't just lay around anymore. It was a beautiful spring day and I needed to get out into it....
...and have a drink...
So I jumped in the shower, got dressed and was suprised to see that it was after 2 o'clock by the time I walked out the door into the bright afternoon sunlight.
Had I known the strange series of events that were to welcome me that afternoon, I would've stayed home.
My first stop was the Wawa on Rittenhouse Square for cigarettes. As I walked up 20th Street, I came upon Chaucer's, a corner restaurant bar that had an outdoor cafe. The bar was closed at this hour and the plastic patio table and chairs were stacked neatly against the side of the building, chained to a rainspout. When I first glanced the dark figure in the shadows of the canopies hanging above the windows of the bar, I just suspected it was someone waiting for the bus, but as I got closer, I noticed something more.
The man was homeless. There was no doubt about that. Dressed in dirty black pants and dingy boots and a grimy beige-colored raincoat, he seemed to be looking off in the opposite direction from where I was walking. As I neared him, I started to notice a strange, yet familiar movement, and I thought to myself: Oh no he isn't.
Oh yes he is...
His eyes were half closed and he was oblivious to me, the traffic and the other pedestrians strolling the afternoon streets as he looked off towards some unknown object while he sat at one of the tables and beat off. Yes, in the middle the afternoon, in broad daylight, out in open for all the world to see, this homeless man has this big ol' black shlonger out and was whackin' away like a teenager locked in the bathroom.
I didn't know whether to laugh, scream or just watch in horrid fascination. Beating off is natural. Hell, I had just done it not thirty minutes before (did I just say that?), but at least it was in the privacy of my own bedroom. But this guy...out in the open...ignorant to the world...
...And then I spotted the old lady heading in this direction...
Actually, all that I had just witnessed happened in the matter of a few brief seconds. I quickly walked past the guy (stealing one final glance to make sure I wasn't dreaming the whole thing---nope...it's really happening) and headed towards the old lady to warn her to cross the street or turn the corner or something. Luckily, she did turn the corner without seeing a thing. I looked back over my shoulder to see if the guy was still there and, seeing that shadowed movement of his right hand, I decided that the next thing to do was to look for a cop. This was just too disgusting to have happen.
I've just noticed that I have written quite a bit and I've only just begun to talk about the day, so I'm going to break it up into a couple of parts. Besides, I'm hungry now and need to eat...
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