A stone in one's shoe
Oct. 8th, 2004 11:55 amInevitably, Cosmic Forces get involved.
You know how it goes.
-Top 10, issue #2
Alas, Time stays, we go.
-Henry Austin Dobson
You know how it goes.
-Top 10, issue #2
- Personal, positive, present tense.
Visual, auditory, emotional.
While walking to the Metro this morning,
I get a small stone stuck inside my shoe,
small enough to rattle around while walking.
With all the construction going on, both housing
and commercial, there's lots of rubble around.
This isn't as much a problem during the summer,
as it's easy enough to knock a stone out of sandals.
But now it's fall, and I'm wearing my sneakers,
and it's the 2nd block of a 7-block walk,
and I'm already running late.
Don't have time to stop. Fix it when I get to Metro.
At block 4, there's a traffic light at two major streets.
Pedestrian crossing is complicated by both having medians,
the street junction not even being close to perpendicular,
normal traffic flow dictating left- *and* right-turn arrows,
and unending construction on the Edmund Fitzgerald building
( image behind cut )
(aka Clarendon 1021) continually blocking the cattycorner sidewalk.
Crossing, not quite fast enough, get stranded on the median.
Well, if I have to stand still for a few seconds anyway...
Take right shoe off - shake - shake - shake -
the left turn arrow shuts off -
quick, have to finish crossing -
with one stocking foot, shoe in hand.
And when I put my shoe back on,
there's a small stone inside it.
Grr.
I *think* it was a different stone - felt smaller, lighter,
less pointy. But still annoying. Still a stone in the shoe.
Finally shake it out on the upper escalator at the Metro.
(so if on the way home I find that escalator broken...)
A lot of one's life is like that. Of course one still has to try
to overcome the obstacles, and reduce or remove annoyances.
Struggling at work. Living at home. Or longing for the taste
of grape juice in a world dominated by apple - orange - lemon.
But sometimes, one just has to wait, until the right time
to shake the stone completely, entirely, out of one's shoe.
Alas, Time stays, we go.
-Henry Austin Dobson