In her pushy, eccentric way, this woman -- hair bobbed, pudgy bod stuffed into tight-fitting clothes, round face, big, owlish round-framed glasses -- was kind of sweet. Or at least well-intentioned. And why do I use the word 'pushy'? Because she took to doing things for me without asking if I wanted them done. Helpful things, she thought. Moving things she figured were in my way -- armrest, tray holder. Things I was using, didn't want moved, hadn't asked to have moved.
Now that I think about it, this is something that's happened quite a bit in recent weeks -- people offering advice or doing things for me without first asking if they're wanted. With the best of intentions, for the most part, at times not happy if I don't especially want to hear advice, follow advice or have something done for me I don't need/want to have done. I've become less politic in recent years as I've become clearer about who I am. I tend not to listen much to things I don't want to hear, and make no apology for it. I trust my feelings, my instincts, what I call the guidance that rises from within, and during the last decade, that has transformed my little life in spectacular ways. Not that I have all the answers -- I'm a work in progress, like everyone else, learning as I go. But I get to choose, I get to make my decisions, and those who think they know better than me may not find me terribly compliant.
When I had to, I gently fended off the German woman's attempts to do things I didn't want done. At other moments, I'd listen to her free-form commentary, smile, maybe reply with something appropriate. Other times I continued reading, snoozing, listening to music. The long hours passed.
And suddenly we were on the ground in Boston, the local world white with snow. A crabby, tightly-wound cabby drove me to the bus station, his attitude easing up when I handed over some cash.
A handful of passengers boarded the bus with me, mostly young. Including one 20-something with five or six huge bags, a pile of luggage that looked far beyond what one person could manage. Until he stood up in the waiting area when boarding time arrived, picking up each bag, arranging its strap around some part of this body, everything fitting together in a way that defied logic in M.C. Escher fashion, confounding the intellect, though undeniably happening. Like a freakish kind of luggage contortionist.
Eight or nine people got on board. Some went to sleep. Some stared at the passing scenery. One sat leaning against the window, an arm angled up toward the ceiling, swinging slowly downward then upward, downward then upward, over and over like that for a long, long time. No talk, the only sounds those of wheels on highway, the sounds of objects rattling now and then in response to the vibration of the vehicle's motion. As we moved away from Boston into southern Hampshire and then the interstate that extends northwest from Concord toward Vermont and Canada, trees and mountains replaced sprawling 'burbs, the light of the lowering sun turned golden.
The temperature had risen enough that moisture hung in the air from all the melting snow, a haze that combined with late afternoon sunlight to produce shafts of dense light. Two or three times, I saw thick clouds of it hanging out over the road, radiant sunrays projecting out from between trees into open air, appearing strangely independent, almost alive.
A 35-minute rest stop in White River Junction, New Hampshire for food, stretching, attention to bodily functions, then out on the road again, just as the sun neared the horizon. As the bus followed the highway north, we had a spectacular view of the day's wind-up, the sun edging gradually out of view between green mountains, the afterglow lingering a surprisingly long time before dimming, the cloudless sky slowly turning dark. A lengthy, strangely meditative process, more than one person on the bus watching, everyone quiet, the space dark until the driver finally switched on a couple of internal lights.
Montpelier: cold for someone just getting in from Madrid, mild for here. Meaning temperature in the 20s, snow everywhere. A friend working at the local public library was to drive me out to the house when she got off work -- I dragged my bags across town from the station to the library, said hello, stashed my stuff, went out for a walk. Bought groceries, stopped in at a talk being given at Bear Pond Books, found myself in a book-lined room packed with Vermonters ready to hear a local author talk about Reef Madness. My seat: a butt-numbing instrument of torture posing as a folding chair (my adorable butt already partially senseless after far too many hours spent in far too many seats in far too many vehicles). I spent 45 minutes shifting about in futile attempts to get comfortable. Finally gave up, grabbed my groceries, crept out into the crisp night air.
Reached home shortly after. Back out in the Vermont country, hundreds of stars shining above, the Milky Way stretched across the middle of the sky, glowing faintly.
Further details will follow. At some point.
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This morning (far too early) in chilly northern Vermont:
Madrid, te echo de menos.
rws 8:14 AM [+]
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