Monday, June 20, 2011

LXXI - the wind up bird makes its sound

today i saw a girl who was so cute that i had to write about her.

and i'm not going to defend myself, generally or particularly. but to tell the truth, i don't usually like to look at girls - because if i see them on the street then they'll never be there again, because if they're someone i just see around from time to time i don't want to think about them too often, and if they're someone i know i'm usually wary of appearing to be interested. i'm single, but also single-minded to a t (the literal meaning applies). so the fact is that i almost always look away. i'm almost always better off disinterested, or so i believe.

and to me it's certainly very amateurish to have a crush on someone you don't know. but i think i'll give the circumstances a quick once over. why, why, might you ask. and i almost actually don't know. if the closest path between two objects is a straight line, then in a similarly direct fashion, perhaps a brief supposition that i'd been noticed by a cute girl is idiosyncratically gratifying. hiding behind big words, oh, for shame! but there's another wrinkle, i think. and that is that there is always life, beautiful and random, after every thing has been said and done; after every heart has done it's searching, after every sigh has been exhaled, and after every wistful feeling has been safely kept away. and when i say random i don't actually mean random, only metaphorically random. but today i had the feeling that life would not pass me by.

and it went something like this. right, so i spotted her a short distance away. and then i turn my head in another direction, eyebrows raised, clearly thinking, my gosh she's cute. and of course i notice, not looking directly at her, that she smoothed her hair across her brow and behind her ear, with a slight smile coming around on her lips and her eyes. i sometimes wonder whether girls do that subconsciously. anyway i hesitate to walk past her, look around, and then decide to do so, because it was the way i wanted to go. i looked her right in the eyes. and there was a look in there. and that was it. eight points, nine seconds. and i thought, golly, she's so cute, she should be in a picture. as in, colloquial for "movie". i don't remember much else about her, partly because i didn't look at her that hard. partly also because who can remember after awhile, right.

i'd gone swimming earlier today in the afternoon. i actually did quite well. after that i'd hung on the side of the pool to gently and carefully think about things, allowing my thoughts to swell and subside, much like the physically wallowey feeling of water in a pool. and i wasn't emo, of course. mild physical exertion (and a corresponding slight accomplishment) often puts me in a zennish mood. and i thought about how this window was closing, and the way in which it was closing (or so i surmised) seemed unhesitant. was i ready to accept that? i knew that i was close to the brink, but i didn't know where (or whether) i'd shifted across that tangent. i wondered if i had. and i saw that it was indeed like the last one, although maybe with less finality. but i knew better than to guess at the future; i'd done enough guessing for two, as it were.

and after that i cautiously felt as if i'd stepped out of a cold place into a place with soft, warm sunlight. i felt like rubbing my hands and looking carefully at them, and more than carefully.

and later, for that brief, strangely captivating moment, i caught a fleeting impression that life would not pass me by.