Today it is 60 degrees out. Unseasonably warm. It feels completely STRANGE. Nobody can believe it. People are wearing shorts. It is January.
So I woke up today. At 7:45 a.m., which, to me, is like sleeping until 1 in the afternoon. I felt like a decadent lazy sultan or something.
I’m still sick, so I got up to just take a nice mild walk through the morning.
Put the hair in the ponytail, put on the sneaks, the jeans, the sunglasses, put the kleenex in the pocket, and emerged into the misty glimmering morning. New York City looked like a mirage across the water.
I meandered along. Nobody was up except for me, of course. I walked by the reservoir. I listened to birds chirping. Occasionally, I blew my nose. I enjoyed myself.
2 women approached me on the sidewalk. They were probably in their late 20s. The morning was so quiet, and still, that their conversation, while occurring at a normal decibel, seemed rather loud.
And as they passed me by, I heard one girl say this to the other girl, obviously in the middle of telling a story:
“So I said to her, ‘Thanks very much, I’m really flattered, but I like cock.’ ”
8 a.m. January 1. 2005. Happy new year.
You know, Red, that one might not get topped in 2005.
Happy New Year-Have you read”The Floating Opera “by John Barth”-in which plays are performed on a moving barge while the audience is stationary on the shore. They can only hear periodic portions of the performance as the barge passes up and down the stream and must infer the rest or get it in snatches from up and downstream listeners. The book was quite popular in the sixties. Haven’t read it since then.
The overheard remark reminded me of the book.
mike –
I have not read that book. Sounds very interesting, though. The “sirens” section in Joyce’s Ulysses is like that, too. It’s all about the random sounds.
I just got the WHOLE PICTURE of the encounter in her one comment. It was hysterical. You can’t really argue with her point. “Thanks but no thanks. I like cock.” “Well, all righty then. Can’t blame me for tryin’! Have a nice life.”
Rob,
You very well may be right. :)