The time was eleven-thirty five. It was time to ride out into the openness of the ghost town. I needed to clear my head and search for a specific something. I escape the confines of my small cardboard apartment and into the cool night air. The temperature cooled me. In a good way. I recently changed steeds; from a 1950's beach cruiser to a late-nineties mountain bike. The cruiser was (and is) beautiful. The mountain bike is extremely ugly. Of course, the cruiser rides like shit and the mountain bike is smooth and effortless. It is extremely quiet outside. Quiet like Kansas. This may be hard to believe, but where I live absolutely shuts down at night. It's beautiful. People and noise are nowhere to be found.
Tonight the sky is cloudless. Many nights are like this. The aggregation of population means that there is a ring around the edge of the sky like an orange rind. Only in the middle can you see stars. I pump the pedals of my bike smoothly. I escape. My mission tonight is simple: find a large piece of plywood or the equivalent to use as a canvas. I'm way too broke to buy one.
Unfortunately, because I have so specific of a request, I will probably fail. I don't care. I live right by the railroad tracks, so there are tons of warehouses that loom large at night around me. They are like aircraft carriers; cold and metal and built for function.
The cold mixed with the lack of people is almost eerie. It's as if people don't exist; all of their specialized accoutrements and dwellings remain but there is no sign of anyone, anywhere. I think about how this is what the Earth would look like if we all died from some sort of disease or something, suddenly.
My mind wanders and the rhythms of riding begin to soothe my brain, which has been racked from law school pressure. The cement is smooth as it makes contact with the tires.
I stare at some of the houses; most of them look very small and sad. I think about the people who live in these little boxes, across from the warehouse and the train tracks; do they do anything important? Do they like what they do? Are they happy? I hope so, but I think not.
During the day my area is a madhouse; an ant hill stirred up by a five-year-old with a stick. Kids scream outside and run around aimlessly. They smile. Adults drive around aimlessly. They scream only occasionally, but they do not smile. The feeling during the day is one of motion; the feeling at night is one of rest.
This is why it feels good to move in the stillness.
I do not find any plywood.
As I re-enter my apartment complex and stride towards my door, I notice the only sound I have heard in the last hour that did not come from my bike tires or the occasional car---
It is the muffled windy chatter of the Five and Twenty-Two freeways.
It sounds almost like the ocean.
Tonight the sky is cloudless. Many nights are like this. The aggregation of population means that there is a ring around the edge of the sky like an orange rind. Only in the middle can you see stars. I pump the pedals of my bike smoothly. I escape. My mission tonight is simple: find a large piece of plywood or the equivalent to use as a canvas. I'm way too broke to buy one.
Unfortunately, because I have so specific of a request, I will probably fail. I don't care. I live right by the railroad tracks, so there are tons of warehouses that loom large at night around me. They are like aircraft carriers; cold and metal and built for function.
The cold mixed with the lack of people is almost eerie. It's as if people don't exist; all of their specialized accoutrements and dwellings remain but there is no sign of anyone, anywhere. I think about how this is what the Earth would look like if we all died from some sort of disease or something, suddenly.
My mind wanders and the rhythms of riding begin to soothe my brain, which has been racked from law school pressure. The cement is smooth as it makes contact with the tires.
I stare at some of the houses; most of them look very small and sad. I think about the people who live in these little boxes, across from the warehouse and the train tracks; do they do anything important? Do they like what they do? Are they happy? I hope so, but I think not.
During the day my area is a madhouse; an ant hill stirred up by a five-year-old with a stick. Kids scream outside and run around aimlessly. They smile. Adults drive around aimlessly. They scream only occasionally, but they do not smile. The feeling during the day is one of motion; the feeling at night is one of rest.
This is why it feels good to move in the stillness.
I do not find any plywood.
As I re-enter my apartment complex and stride towards my door, I notice the only sound I have heard in the last hour that did not come from my bike tires or the occasional car---
It is the muffled windy chatter of the Five and Twenty-Two freeways.
It sounds almost like the ocean.
posted by struggleville staff at 12:45 AM
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