You Belong to the City

Tonight I had cocktails. High above the city, into the late evening. It's the best way to look at a city. Alcohol, distance, darkness, and guitar solos coming from hidden speakers at a light volume. The city becomes invisible in the emptiness of a black night, leaving the lights to form constellations made up of man made comforts. Roads, buildings, bus shelters, newspaper boxes, and all night convenience stores. Along with the lights these are the things that make us forget we are still living in the wild. There is dirt, refrigerators, and soiled underwear in the city, but atop my perch earlier this evening, it seemed empty, the way I like it. Just the lights, marking the uniform grid of the streets below.

Then there is the cab. When you are riding in a cab, and you are drunk, like I was tonight, you are seeing the city at a pace for which it was intended. Unable to look at anything too long, the city streaks, slips, and slides along the waxed finish of the yellow cab. There is movement, there are sounds, and there is advertising in well planned locations.

Then I was walking.

A vulnerable pace. I walked in front of cars lined up at red lights. Twelve beams of light projecting onto my body as I tried to look confident walking across the street. It is pointless to look towards the light, you will see nothing but blackness.

You will be approached at this level. The man with the beard and backpack that feigns weakness for a dollar here or there. I give him nothing.

But it is here on the street that I can see her, in the little shop, with light beaming from the large floor to ceiling window. She is wearing classic heels with a thick band around her delicate ankle. Her retro influenced mid length pin-stripe skirt, paired with an olive sweater, offsets her shaved head and dyed blonde mohawk. The whole scene makes me think of this.

I love this.

Then I left for home, with a fantasy tucked under my arm. And that, gentle reader, is where we begin.