Early Mornings in Late Summer (Week Twenty-Five)

To get to the park from my house means running almost two miles up a long hill, which in addition to being a two-mile hill requires navigating the usual perils of city streets, even at five in the morning: cars and buses and garbage trucks and pedestrians and heaps of trash on the sidewalk. But the hassle feels worth it when, after stepping around the swinging gate -- this road is now (mostly) closed to traffic -- I see nothing but smooth, empty pavement, a gently sloping downhill, and the brightening horizon. This is nice, I think: if only real life worked like this. 

On the other side of the park, the path is still dark: the sun hasn't reached the western edge. Even though the light and shadows are beautiful and mysterious, I'm always a little worried about who (or what!) lurks around the bend. It's exciting for a moment to think that I'm in a horror movie, until I remember that, well, actually, I *am* living in a horror movie that has nothing to do with a dark path in the park. In this movie, the true monsters don't live in the bushes but can be found running the government and the monopolies. And running fast is no guarantee of escape. 

In the heather gardens, the lamplight makes the landscape glow in muted but surreal colors. It looks artificial, like a stage or movie set, like the grotto that King Ludwig builds in his castle in Visconti's version of the monarch's life. 

The nature here is just an illusion. I'm not actually in the middle of nowhere, even though it feels that way. 

Meanwhile, above the artifice, the sky is getting bluer. 

I like this time of year. The city feels a little quieter. Even when it's impossibly hot and humid -- as bad as July -- there's something about the light, or maybe the air, that tells me in a whisper that the misery isn't going to last. 

Or at least this very specific form of misery, the one I associate with hot, summer days in the city, which -- unlike so many other forms of misery -- is relatively benign. It would be nice if all we had to complain about this summer were a few heat waves. 

Having completed my first loop, I'm back at the top. It's time, I tell myself, to forget about real misery and real monsters. The sun is coming up and I'm about to take off down a long hill. 

As long I'm flying down this road, I can convince myself that it's never going to end. 

Comments

[Edith Zimmerman]

This is so nice.