novembre

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local motion

and when i got home today the sidewalk was clean except for a note from the donations truck: the items you specified for donation were not at the drop-off location. please call and reschedule.

connotation doesn't follow belongings, especially after they cease to belong. but for a few days after i leave things out on the sidewalk i scrutinize passers-by, looking for that shirt i wore loyally for five years, the bright pink ski hat, a boxy old pleather airline bag.

i shrugged and went inside. my neighbor and i clinked glasses, listening to people in the next building over fight. i hung the rugs on clotheslines hanging two stories over L's garden, beat them half-heartedly.

in one of the piles i went through, i found this list in my loopy scrawl:

things i saw during my train trip to sacramento

1. retired naval ships shoved side by side in groups of 16 (3 groups)
2. a sign nailed to a garage reading "TRESSPASSERS WILL BE SHOT & KILLED"
3. a mary shelley quote carved in the marble front wall of the lobby to the department of education
4. a tree jutting out at an odd angle over the river, and a young man/teenaged boy standing on its trunk, staring directly at my part of the passing train
5. a freight cab to a truck with the top ripped off, looked like a hastily opened can of sardines
6. a wilting rose bed dedicated to cesar chavez
7. a huge, beautiful train station, built around 1910?, rosewood, high relief arcing ceiling 3 stories/open space giant lengths of sturdy oak benches that are only comfortable when you fall asleep on them, chandeliers with exposed light bulbs blinking on and off, depression-era mural of groundbreaking the site, 1819?

i remember that trip. my first ever business trip, and i spent most of it walking through the suburbs, following train tracks through the flat city's little heart.

10:42 pm - 03.08.04

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