This afternoon: standing in a bank in Montpelier, Vermont, writing out a deposit slip in the amount of one dollar in pennies. Realizing at some point that they had a radio station piped in, my hand stopped writing as the music registered, Brian Wilson's voice soft and clear, singing 'Good Vibrations.' Which for some reason triggered a memory from this last Tuesday morning, me sweeping the floor in the living room of the flat in Madrid, the room austere, empty of most everything belonging to me apart from a battered boombox (hardy, dependable despite ten years of hard use, including a trip from one side of the Atlantic to the other) set to Radio 3, Iggy Pop's version of 'China Girl' reverberating off the space's white walls.
Out in the hallway, workers continue ripping down the plaster ceiling. The noise filters through two doors -- to the flat, then to the living room -- pounding and voices reduced to a level that made it all somehow coexist harmoniously with Iggy.
Not sure exactly how long I stood like that in the bank, immersed in my recent past. Ten, fifteen seconds. Came to, blinked, finished writing deposit slip, brought it to a window where the fact of depositing one dollar in pennies provoked laughter from the teller, pretty eyes closing to become pretty slanted lines for an instant as she laughed, face radiating a degree of enjoyment not often seen in that sober institution.
So. Back in northern Vermont, my bod still on European time, waking me up at ungodly hours. Temperature outside the dining room window this morning, 7 a.m.: 24° F. Skies gray, trees showing the first meager traces of green, grass beginning to show some life. As I walked in the kitchen door a couple of hours ago, movement outside caught my eye, I turned to see the curve of a hawk's shadow glide quickly across the grass. One in a constant stream of reminders that I'm not in Madrid any more.
Not in Madrid. (For now.)
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Yesterday, Logan Airport, Boston::
España, te echo de menos
rws 5:40 PM [+]
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