weather turns cold

P1010009.JPG

A mid-day walk through the neighborhood. While we’ve had an unseasonably warm fall, it has finally turned cold. Overcast, and there’s a bit of precipitation, too. I used to hate weather like this, but now I long for days like today.

Upside: There’s a coffee processing plant in my neighborhood. The air smells good.
Downside: It’s Folger’s coffee.
Upside, part ii: There’s a good coffee shop in “Scamp’s Alley” (check out the last pair of photos in this entry from Heidi) where I can get a decent cafe americano.

pieces of a life

October 2003: Kansas City, Missouri. More adults dressed up this year for Halloween than I’ve seen in a long time. Pikachu is a server at the sushi restaurant on Friday night. The woman in the car in front of me has cat ears. A discarded Lil’ Bo Peep cap lies on the sidewalk outside my apartment Saturday morning.

September 1985: Naples, Italy. Members of my graduating high school class are held captive at gunpoint on the beach for … how long? … twenty minutes? an hour? It seems like I should remember.

December 1989: Berlin, Germany. I walk up to the Berlin wall with a hammer and pound on it until pieces fall into my hand. Guards come sauntering by to shoo me away halfheartedly.

Stitching the pieces together makes a life. Some fabrics are more interesting than others. Sometimes it feels like you have a choice, and sometimes it does not.