Out Walking

Sorry it's been a little while since my last check-in. I was having a technical issue, which is now resolved. In the interim time, work continues to be crazy, but I have briefly escaped down to Houston to visit my family for the Eastertide. Now we're all caught up.

So tonight, while Mom was busy working on Heather's taxes and Heather was busy with a project for school, I snuck out for a walk, enticed by the rosy edge of the storm clouds that have been rolling in and out all day, but were now illuminated by the setting sun. I enjoyed the warm, sweet air so particular to this corner of Texas, softened by notes of jasmine, oleander, and rose. I saw scraps of torn paper strewn over the grass and imagined the epistle of a spurned lover, or perhaps the frustration of a man feeling cheated by the outcome of his tax return. Ever since I got to Houston, I feel like all I've wanted to do is go walking. I thought that was strange until I considered that, in Buffalo, it hasn't really been warm enough to go walking since January. But, even more than weather factors, I can't go walking in Buffalo. I live in a pretty rough neighborhood and wouldn't feel safe going walking by myself in the daytime, let alone at night. In an ironic twist, society has deemed it necessary that I find some male escort to at least give me the illusion of safety in warding off what would probably be male assailants. I have no male escort, but as I have made obvious, if there simply were no men, there would be no problem. Alas, this is not the case. So, no night-walking for me.

But tonight I started thinking back to the circumstances and atmosphere of those lonely night-walks. They were not for pleasure. I felt driven to move, driven to escape from a life that the most rosy description would term confining, and so I would run out as soon as everyone was in bed, starting out with rushed, angry, steps that made my ankles ache, reliving whatever ignominy or absurdity I had put up with that day, and walking until my temper cooled and I gradually went slower and slower until I sunk into a dejected plod. Little toads would peer out at me from the edges of the sidewalks, owls cry their shuddering condolences, bats swoop through their erratic night dances. I was blind to the small beauties around me because I felt so hopelessly trapped in a life I was growing to despise more every day.

So, I suppose I can't help but consider my circumstances improved, even though my new life comes with its own limitations and frustrations. Every life I live, every where I go will, I am growing more and more certain as I attain the wisdom of age. So I guess I'd have to say that I prefer having a reason to wake up in the morning and somewhere to go everyday to the small luxury of walking alone at night.