It was cloudy out, and chilly enough that I was glad I had brought a light jacket. The trees were full of bright green leaves, but cast no shadows. The wind picked up and the cast-iron gates and brick facades of the old houses took on a slight menace, guarding the comfort of their interiors against me, mocking me. It would rain soon. This had been stupid. I made my best guess as to the direction of the river and started hiking that way. By the time the first drops began to fall I had spotted the freeway.
(In the seventies, the federal government insisted on building an interstate highway through town. Initially, they were going to plow down all the buildings in their way, but the protests of various neighborhood associations and historic preservation societies scuttled that plan. In order to issue forth a big "fuck you" to those who had stood in their way without having to go through all the red tape that bulldozing would have required, the government decided to simply build an elevated freeway right over the neighborhood. This little piece of history affected me only insofar as it afforded me a dry spot to wait out the rain.)
So I ran underneath the overpass, settled down on a nice concrete barricade and huddled next to a supporting pillar against the cold. As you may have anticipated, of course, I was not alone. Across the street was an old man standing behind a desk, displaying some paintings. A street vendor. God only knows why he would choose to set up his kiosk here. He couldn't possibly get many tourists. But I supposed that he had probably moved down here in order to evade the rain, like myself, and would return to the surface once it had passed, in order to be ignored rather than invisible.
Well, I ordinarily would not have gone over to speak with him at all. I'm rather shy, you see. But having spent all this time looking for adventure, I figured I owed it to myself to meander on over and see if there was anything interesting to experience. So I plucked up my courage, put on my most cheery face, strolled up to the ancient figure, and gave him a friendly, "Afternoon." He repeated back to me, and with a gesture invited me to take a gander at his paintings.
Now this was interesting indeed. These could not have been the product of an entire life's worth of study and dedication. They were children's paintings. They had to be. And not very old children either. Old enough for crude stick figures and sloppy, disproportionate attempts at shapes and patterns. Seven, eight years old? I did my best to conceal my grimace, realizing at the same time that I must be in the presence of a complete psychopath. I glanced at him again and noticed his demented expression and his leering eyes. Now I had to think on my feet. The guy probably had a collection of shrunken heads hidden in his decrepit tenement. I could be beaten, raped, tortured and mutilated if I didn't get the hell out of there. So, thinking myself mighty clever, I pointed at one of the more horrendous doodles and asked him to wrap it up for me. As soon as he bent over for a piece of twine to tie it with I took off like lightning. I knew that I could follow the freeway to the main drag, and there I would be safe. Jesus. You think you're in a nice neighborhood and then shit like this goes down. I guess that's why I don't like cities. Anyway, after running a couple of blocks I dared look back and didn't see anyone following me, so I decided to drop my pace down to power-walk. I was still a bit shaken up when I got on the bus to go home, and I accidentally spilled my change in the aisle. Fuck. Well, at least I had an adventure.
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