Monday, June 29, 2020

It’s dark when I head out of the office. It’s been a while since that happened, this close to the summer solstice. I’m tired. I’m hungry. I trudge up the street. It’s a slight incline for the four blocks to the pizza place, then a steeper block and a half to the traffic circle at the top of the hill. It’s easier most of the rest of the way. Just past the circle, intriguing music approaches me from behind. A deep melodic bass line booms out under clattering percussion and a keening vocal. The voice and percussion reach me first. A man blasting an unaccompanied song from the phone strapped to his arm darts around me on his skateboard, along the sidewalk’s uneven bricks. I turn off the road before the car with the bass line can catch up with me. I stop at the burger joint for dinner. The same cashier is working as before. She asks my name. I tell her, in Hebrew. Her memory clicks in. “You prefer English, right? And you liked the mushroom burger?” I did. I order it again, along with the sweet potato fries. I think of getting a milkshake. I had gotten one there when they first opened. It was good, but I get a Coke Zero instead. After I eat, I dump my trash in the bin, set my tray on the stack on top of it, and put my mask back on. Most of the rest of the walk back home is easy. The last three blocks, along the pedestrian street, go uphill again. I pause halfway and sit down on a stone pillar where I had once seen a cat balance on a pile of dinner plates. I tie my left shoe. It won’t stay tied for long. It needs new laces. I haven’t seen them in drugstores or supermarkets, and haven’t gotten the courage to go into a shoe store and ask for them. I know the Hebrew word. I’ll just have to do it sometime.