Last Friday: set off for the Boston area, in part to take a workshop, in part to rendezvous briefly with friends. I've driven long distances far too many times in this lifetime of mine, so many that -- between extended periods of driving long hauls and extended periods of living in places like New York, Seattle, L.A., Cambridge/Boston -- I burned out on the automotive bit. Which is why friends scattered around the northeast who didn't make the drive north haven't seen my adorable butt this summer. Which is why driving in this area feels so therapeutic to my sadly jaded self -- roads threading their way through green mountains, comparatively few drivers, most of whom don't seem like they need to get wherever they're going ahead of everyone else at any cost, and will even wave hello with little provocation. (I once had a brief romance with a woman from North Dakota whose father taught her to drive with one hand positioned at the top of the steering wheel so she could wave whenever she encountered another car. It's a state-with-hardly-any-residents thing.)
The ride between here and my destination: highways flanked by spectacular displays of autumn color. And a gradual change from nearly no traffic to major highway congestion. Pretty weird going from out in the middle of nowhere to 8-lane roads packed with Boston-area maniacs.
The hotel was in Burlington, part of the 'burbs to Boston's northwest, known for big industrial office parks and big shopping malls. Me being in desperate need of black jeans, having had no luck lining any up in this part of the world, I'd decided to do the mall thing. Checked into hotel, dumped baggage in room, headed back out to a mall conveniently situated down the road -- an oversized complex bookended by Sears and Macy's, packed during evening hours and on weekends. Nearly deserted on this Friday afternoon, when most of the world was at work or school, and the few souls wandering around didn't appear overjoyed to be wandering around where they were wandering around (in a deserted mall, with a beautiful autumn afternoon happening outside).
Scored jeans. Returned to hotel. Waited for friend to come pick me up for a Friday night of, er, well, carousing is too strong a word. Cavorting. (Sedately.) With someone else doing the driving, something that gets me feeling real happy.
I spent nearly 20 years living in Cambridge. A long enough span that it encompassed several different lifetimes, several different mes (or me's, for those with an apostrophe fixation). Long enough that it feels a little freakish to say the number out loud, a little unreal. Long enough that when I'm back there these days, I often experience the actual present moment overlain with a layer or two of memories specific to wherever I am. [See entries of August 30 through September 4, 2002.] Kinda weird, that, but also kinda fun. Probably a big, boring pain in the butt for anyone accompanying me. Luckily, Cambridge supplies diversions, generally keeping accompanying friends distracted.
Drove local roads from Burlington to Cambridge, through Woburn, Winchester, Arlington. Found our way to Inman Square. Tossed down some decent Chinese at a small neighborhood joint (scallion pancakes! yee-ha!) (yes, maybe I'm easily pleased -- what about it?). Went to a show at ImprovBoston (had its moments). Stopped in at Christina's, I inhaled a pretty good bowl of ice cream while my friend tried a sorbet listed as Kaifer [sic] Key Lime. Tasted exactly the way a certain substance smells: the liquid handsoap (pink, usually) found in many gas station men's rooms. Man, talk about funky.
The ride back to the hotel proceeded along more local roads, winding through various Boston bedrooom communities -- as in Cambridge, some of the route originally cowpaths that villages grew up around, ultimately swelling to the current nonstop sprawl of people. There's a lot about the Cambridge/Boston area to like: abundant culture, loads of sports (spectator and participant), plenty of music, film, theater. Restaurants everywhere, including ethnic food from all over the map. The ocean close by. Other states an hour's drive to the north or south, more countrified in-state settings accessible to the west and north. My life seems to have moved on from all that, though, and I find myself at home here way up north, away from big population (away from just about any population at all, actually), surrounded by green mountains.
On the other hand, in a month I'll be back in Madrid. Huge city, major population -- my flat in the heart of a crowded, busy, centrally-located barrio. It'll be interesting to see how that feels after these months here, months of being very comfortable out in the middle of nowhere.
Stopped in to see old friends in New Hampshire on Saturday's ride home. Crossed the Vermont state line shortly before ten p.m., a moment that always comes as a relief to some part of me. Pulled into the driveway sometimes before eleven, mist and fog drifting everywhere.
The days slip past, places, people, events become memories, everything giving way to the ongoing unreeling spectacle of the present moment.
The present moment as I write this: three days after this entry was begun -- a cold morning, the sun lifting slowly above the hills across the valley, fog slowly burning off. Crows and blue jays occasionally call out in the distance, now and then a hairy woodpecker stops at one of the bird feeders outside the dining room window, spends a few minutes chowing down, then disappears. The last few nights the mercury has dropped well below freezing -- when I got up yesterday, the temperature stood at 19 degrees, the frost on everything outside so dense it looked as if snow had fallen overnight. The season's first killing frost, taking out tomato plants and the last of the in-ground flowering plants.
It's cold inside the house, I sit here wearing fleece. The local representatives of the weather biz claim we have a warm day on deck, warm enough that cranking up the coal stove would leave the house stifling later on. The solution: get up and move around, maybe crank up some caffeinated liquids.
Time to get this day underway.
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Morning, the colors passing peak:
Madrid, te echo de menos.
rws 4:55 PM [+]
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