The Pure Life of Dreams

March 16, 2022March 20, 2024

A Trip to the Game Provides a Detour

The four of us are off to see England play at Wembley. And this time I have also brought Mama with me. I park the car in the daily parking lot and we walk some distance to the looming grey stadium before ascending to find our seats.

We climb high up into the rafters but the view is constrained by thick mud brown walls and brick sized holes through which you must look. Otherwise, to see the game, you can leave your seat and go to the balcony to peer over.

“Neither view is good, it never is.” I explain. “You are there for the atmosphere more than anything else.”

We walk around but there is not much to see regardless of which brick hole you look through. It is difficult to view more than a small rectangular patch of green at a time. And the players don’t come into the field of vision. It was the same view the last time I came, and I wonder if I could have paid for better seats.

When the game is over we get into the elevator to return to the car, however somehow we are now separated. It is only Mama, Lizzie and I left. Siobhan and Liam are gone.

I press the button to go to the ground floor. Supporters are getting off at different floors, but we have pressed a different button, a button wider than the others; and instead of depositing us at the bottom, the elevator slides onto a rail road track, and rolls out into the open.

I recognize that we are in Boston, and still stuck in the elavator car, which is clearly taking us to its home for its regular cleaning and service. Above us, either side of the tracks, are silver grey skyscrapers and in front, the leafy green elm trees of Boston Common. When the elevator arrives at its destination, it is at a place called Waystar. I need to get back to Siobhan and Liam. Siobhan will worry about us.

The manager, a portly man with ruddy cheeks, comes out of his office to greet us. “Sorry about that. You didn’t press the wrong button did you?” The office is a wooden shed inset by the front gates to the service station.

“No we didn’t press the gold one, just the white, ground floor button,” I replied.

“Well here is a card for a free dry cleaning service,” he says, as he pulls out a large blue tag from his thick woolen jacket and hands it over.

“No, we are only in Boston for a visit, we don’t need that. We just need to get back home.”

“Ok,” he says, and he hands me a brown skinned wallet. I open it. ”Don’t worry, there is enough in there.” I see a fair number of bills in the pocket fold.

“Thanks,” I reply.

We leave through the gates and head for the metro.

“Lizzie, take care of Mama,” I tell her, as Mama wanders off like a bird, taking little bird steps, one foot in front of the other, like a metronome, without pause. Lizzie steers her down the dark grey steps of the metro, taking care that she doesn’t fall. She nudges her gently to adjust her direction on each turn down to the platform.

Finally I can call Siobhan to say we are on our way.

Picture by Alexius Horatius, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

January 20, 2022April 25, 2025

Anxiety and Finding the Bathroom in a Hotel

I step out of the hotel and ask to hitch a ride in the back of a white van with a group of doctors. They also have to go to a conference, all of them dressed in white coats and talking amongst themselves about the day’s events. I check my papers, they’re in the case with me and we are headed downtown, the day bright with the early morning sun like you only find in Washington.

Then the van pitches suddenly to the right, down a steep spiral cobblestone street. We flit past old buildings covered with posters and tall enough to block out the sky.

“Woah!” the doctors cry out as they grip the door handles of the van.

I need to leave, it is the wrong way for me.

“Can I get out?’’ I plea with the driver, but only at the bottom, the van comes to a halt and the driver lets me go.

I am in a park, green manicured lawn, the walls on one side remind me of the Tower of London. Then I notice the doctors get out too and it becomes clear that they are actually sightseeing.

To get some directions I step into another hotel but realize I’ve forgotten something on the van. What was it? I have my wallet and my jacket jangles with keys. Whatever it was, it cannot have been important and first I need to pee.

“Can you tell me where the bathroom is?” I ask a woman in uniform.

She points up towards to the bar area. “Then go through to the steps on the other side”, she says.

I follow the sign through the bar, spot the entrance then slowly I descend slick orange and white marble steps glistening with moisture from below. The steps spiral down, each becoming more slippery, but instead of a bathroom I come to what looks like the steam room of a gym. There is a man behind the steamed up glass, whistling and the steps are fully wet now. I shouldn’t go in I think to myself, he is probably undressed and uncertainly, I turn back.

(Then I remember what it was, that I left my camera in the van, brand new, a pocket camera that I had rested between my thighs when in the van. It’s annoying, but it’s not my immediate concern.)

I am in a restaurant area when I ask the woman, I think she is the same person, “Where again is the bathroom?” But her answer is not clear.

“Look, I’m going to piss in that thing right there in the middle of the restaurant”, I retort, pointing at an oval shaped vase with toothed rim made of some sort of alabaster. It is pretty, but only a foot or so high, a strange place for it, in the middle of the restaurant. You could trip over the vase if you were not looking.

“You can’t do that!” she replies.

I take off my cardigan, and throw it on the ground in front of her for it is getting hot. Then I throw down my jacket, right there. A man comes into the restaurant, he doesn’t see it on the floor and steps right on the splayed out jacket.

“Hey!” I shout at him. “You’re standing on my jacket!”

He looks up at me threateningly, curls up his left sleeve and makes a fist to swipe me with. He is young, well built in a smart gray jacket; has a handsome face and short curly black hair.

I don’t want to fight. I feel an affinity with him… Instead it would be better for us to get a drink at the bar.

Photo by Stephen Bowler from PxHere

November 5, 2021October 27, 2022

Two Nurses Help Me from Being Lost

A boy had a COVID test in hospital chair, had a hard time of it, so I think I’ll try the same. To see if it was that bad.

I sit down in the blue hospital armchair. The nurse puts the tube in my arm, but I can’t get comfortable. There’s no pain, but there’s a strange feel of the rubber hose rolling under the skin of my bicep as I move from side to side.

I hold up my hands, trying to adjust my position. My hands are frozen in the shape of duck feet, pale webbing and pink fingers. They might look strange but they don’t hurt, they’re just amusing to looking at.

October 16, 2021October 22, 2022

Mud, Tunnels and a Citroën 2CV

I am going to a restaurant in Hanwell, stopping first in one of the side streets to drop off both Siobhan and Liam. It is badly lit. And there is thick brown mud everywhere.

“I will park and meet you there.” They go on ahead. But I don’t need to move the car, I am already in a good spot, though my Citroën 2CV is pressed perhaps too close to the curb, hub caps and tires covered in mud. It is between a motorbike and some tree branches that have been thrown into the road. A tow truck hauls a dirty red skip past me, it blocks the view between the 2CV and me.

The car will be fine, I think and head off.