For more than a year now, I have taken a morning walk on
Wednesday mornings and an exercise class (pilates) on Thursday mornings. Then, due to an alteration in my pilates
teacher’s situation, I agreed to move my pilates class to Wednesdays,
rescheduling my Wednesday morning walk permanently to Thursday.
Oh, dear.
The preceding may be the most boring paragraph I have ever
written. Anywhere. Somebody recently
asked me what I write about in my blog, and I said I write whatever comes to my
mind, going on to explain, “But it isn’t not like, ‘I ate an egg.’”
That, however, is what I believe I just did.
Just for fun, I considered writing that opening paragraph
again, seeing if I could “top” it with an even more boring paragraph. But I
won’t, fearing I might easily succeed.
Instead, I shall judiciously move on.
No matter which day it is – be it a Wednesday or now a Thursday
– the route for my morning walk remains unalterably the same. I walk southward on Fourth Street, turn left
on Rose, proceed eastward to the Groundwork
coffee emporium, I purchase a small “Venice Blend” – fresh brewed or, if it is
not being brewed that day, a “Venice Blend” “pour-over”, and then I retrace my
steps, walking westward along Rose and northbound on Fourth Street.
Oh, no! That paragraph was ever worse! Dear Lord!
Have I contracted “Boring Disease”?
Oh, wow! Maybe I’m always
this boring and I am only noticing it today!
Jehosephat! “I made an egg” is a spellbinder compared to
that twaddle.
The thing is, – he explained in the way of an excuse, a
pathetically lame one but an excuse nonetheless – my now Thursday walks are less interesting than my former Wednesday adventures used to be.
Yeah, that’s it,
Earlo.
Blame the day!
Although that does, I swear to you, seem to legitimately be
the case. “Thursday” is just not happening. No woman walking four dogs at the same time,
leading me to wonder, “Is she a professional dog walker, or does she just
really like dogs”? No more monitoring my
natural charisma, glancing at walkers headed in my direction, seeing if can
induce a smiling “Good morning” from a stranger, scoring surprisingly
regularly, though considerably less so with Asian females and men from wherever.
(An adaptation of the line from Red River – “There are only two things
more beautiful than a good gun: a Swiss watch and a woman from anywhere.” Only that one is better.)
Thursday walkers seem inexplicably immune to my irresistible
twinkle. In fact, nothing is the same. Even
the birds chirp differently on
Thursdays. Less enthusiastically, it
seems to me.
A RANDOM BIRD: “We chirped great yesterday. But Thursdays? I don’t know, it’s getting close to the
weekend and we are pretty much ‘chirped out’.”
I fear I have lost something valuable in my moving my pilates
session to Wednesdays and my morning walks to Thursdays, not the least of it being
engrossing Wednesday morning material.
Thursday is demonstrably more… I don’t know, it’s like nobody’s trying.
Although I did notice one
thing.
I took my morning walk – I shall, mercifully, not reiterate
my route – I procured my small “Venice Blend”, and I proceeded back home. And when I got there – I was actually putting
my key in the lock when I noticed this – on the return fifteen to twenty-minute
trek to my house…
I had not touched a single drop of my coffee.
Making me wonder,
Did I actually want coffee at all?
Or did I want a walk, but I could not go out on one without a
specific destination?
(Which in this
case cost me three dollars plus a tip.)
It would appear that as a personal value, walking for the sake
of walking is unacceptable to me. My
walking requires an intention, even one, judging from the untouched cup of
coffee I returned home with that morning, that I do not actually care about.
My observation suggests, that, for me, walking without a
purpose is, like, “What’s the point?” similar in its meaninglessness to a
ballgame where nobody keeps score.
What exactly does that say about me?
That nothing is intrinsically valuable to me and I have to
set, if necessary, artificial objectives to participate?
Or that I needed something to write about and this is the
best I could come up with?
And if it’s the second one, I am telling you…
Blame Thursdays.
3 comments:
Perhaps the reason you did not drink your coffee was that you were so engrossed in noticing that nothing happens on Thursdays. Reminded me of that book "Nothing Ever Happens on my Block."
I'm still amazed that anyone charges $3. for a small coffee. Aside from the fancy hotels/restaurants in big cities. An aside: a waitress at a restaurant where I regularly waste too much time and money told me that she'd never pay what Starbucks is charging for coffee. I told her I go there daily, and for coffee, 16 oz. coffee and only coffee, I pay around 2 bucks. She thought that was way too much! So I picked up the check and pointed at the $2.49 charge for their severely bland coffee...and she hasn't mentioned it since.
I think lots of us get out of sorts when our routine gets changed. Or drink too much coffee!
The Univ. of North Dakota baseball team recently stormed my hometown and took 2 of three from the homies. For game 2, I sat among the UND fans where I was instantly reminded that this is the school w/out a mascot. And then I recalled that you wrote about it a year or 2 ago.
They were the Fighting Sioux but the aforementioned Fightings were neither none too pleased or ennobled to be the white man's mascot once again. Hence, the NCAA said you must change your mascot or we will not allow you to host any NCAA tournaments which is usually a big moneymaker. So for the last 2 school years, the school has been sans mascot. After this school year, they will select a new one.
Among their fans, many wore clothing that showed the school's old logo (very similar to the Chicago Blackhawks logo). And most were disappointed that their own state officials sided with the NCAA and ordered the school to get rid of the name. Even after almost 2 years, they're still pissed.
So if you're w/out a topic sometime, maybe you could re-visit this one.
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