Every once in awhile a loud, guttural exclamation emerges from the poker table. Everybody looks back at the older men playing cards, trying to see if anything dramatic has happened. A short, stocky man in a satin Twin Dragons Kick Boxing jacket just won a big hand on a bluff.
It’s probably his lucky jacket, the one he wears out for cards, the one that reminds him of his days ascending, a jacket that he imagines still commands respect from all the gathered on this winter night. He’s standing up in victory, like he just knocked somebody down, like he just knocked the entire goddamn table down.
The waitress wears a clinging, striped dress and has short, blonde hair but for a long thin strand at the back that she’s braided. She talks quickly, does everything quickly, in fact, and likes to express herself through the flamboyant use of her body. Her body is the central component of any conversation she’s having, and it is her that the young man has come to see.
They sit together and do a shot, firing the empty glasses across the bar like the cowboys they know themselves to be. Boxing is on the TV, and the fighter the two of them have agreed, “Looks too nice to fight,” gets punched in the head. This repeats in slow motion, his sweat exploding into the air around him like fireworks, beautiful stars now lifting free from gravity.
The young man has his hand on her back, moving it softly, slowly around, and he is so happy, so proud to be the guy going out with her, alive in these days he will one day look back on with a disbelieving, hazy longing, while the man to the other side of them, still in his FedEx uniform, dozes on his stool, his dreams unknown.
]]>
A father and his two young daughters walked by on the path beside me, and the dad commented to his girls that it was great that there was a baseball game on in the park for everybody. The youngest girl, the one who might have been four, looked at him like he was crazy, “Not really, you know you can only watch them play, right Daddy?”
A skinny woman somewhere in her 50’s jumped about behind home plate encouraging the Leafs. She had spiky, blonde hair and was wearing a two-piece Lycra workout suit that she’d pulled up over her paunchy stomach to the belly button. Her thing, it seemed, which may well have been her workout, was to trot off after the foul balls and return them to the coaches. It was clear that this wasn’t an official position, but rather a chosen one.
Not far from her was a guy in a lawn chair with opinions.
He thought that the strike zone was too big.
He couldn’t believe that a hotdog stand existed without Rob Ford at it.
The second baseman couldn’t catch the flu.
When the spiky-haired woman ran off after another foul ball, he piped up, “I can’t believe they’re so cheap that they make you give the balls back!”
The woman seemed almost insulted by this and turned toward him, her hands on her hips, and in a chippy, defiant voice said, “The game’s for free, they don’t make no money and they’d go broke if they were giving away the balls!”
Lawn chair: That’s crap, you gotta think big, you gotta think marketing! If they gave the balls away this place would be packed and they’d have sponsors all over the place!”
Spiky-haired woman: You just want something for nothing.
Lawn Chair: When I was a kid they gave ‘em out for free!
Spiky-haired woman: Well, this ain’t the 60’s!
Lawn Chair: Jesus, I’m not that old! (But he looked like he was) That just shows you don’t know shit!
Spiky-haired woman: Yeah, you are too that old, and you know what? The reason you’re griping about the balls is because you ain’t got none!
And then the second baseman booted the ball and the guy in the lawn chair used this distraction and started to shout at him, “Goddamn it, can’t you guys do anything right!” and as he yelled the spiky-haired woman kept looking right at him, satisfied that she’d protected her turf.
A handsome and confident young man, a few years older, approaches them. He’s wearing an expensive leather jacket that looks at home on him, almost accidental. He flips easily between French and English, bums a smoke from the girl and proceeds with an irresistible seduction. It’s a cruel display of power. The North African no longer shimmers or flashes his brilliant smile. His posture collapses and all vitality is drained from his face as the girl, now laughing and alert in a different way, lights her cigarette off of the newly dispensed one held so perfectly in the stranger’s hand.
]]>
Just as I was about to move forward and pay for my items an old woman stepped wordlessly in front of me in the line. I looked down and saw that she had left her basket on the floor there before me. She dropped a few items into it and made a point of avoiding eye contact with me before pointing her chin up and away in a haughty, indifferent way. It irritated me a little bit, the way that these types of things do, and I watched her. Her hair was touchingly dyed the way that all grandmothers seem to colour their hair and the paint on her fingernails was chipped and fading, her fingers bent and swollen. On the back of each hand was a small, gauze bandage that had been taped into place by a nurse, little, island bruises spreading out from beneath— the signs of chemotherapy. When she left the store she got into a red Sentra that was idling in front, and sat down and smiled as if relieved. Her daughter or granddaughter, the woman who was driving, also smiled and they drove off, the old woman now happy, her basket full of the vegetables she need to make that special dish for her family who still remained.
Heading home I passed a beautiful young woman. The sunlight caught her hair and her cheeks were pinched a healthy rose by the autumn. Her right leg was in a brace and she used a cane to help as she threw one side of her body in front of the other, heaving up the street toward the subway, beauty and sadness falling indiscriminately upon the world around us.
]]>I had no idea.
He’d told me that he was going on his Hajj and that as he wasn’t sure when he’d be back from Mecca, it would be in my best interest to find another teacher.
I turns out this was a lie. Alpas never went on a Hajj and all the while has been teaching other students. Let me quote from the letter I was forwarded after trying to find out if he was back and ready to continue with our lessons:
“Instead of concentrating on the road Mister Murray seemed to prefer willful nattering, thus presenting a constant threat of an accident, endangering both his instructor and his inspectors newly repaired vehicle.”
“On numerous occasions Mister Murray was watching female pedestrians instead of the road, presenting a serious risk for an accident.”
“Mister Murray frequently asked inappropriate questions about my religious practices that made me feel very uncomfortable.”
“Mister Murray has shown no willingness or ability to learn and in my opinion is unteachable.”
There’s an awful lot I could say in my defense. For instance, the reason my driving skills never progressed was because Alpas was a HORRIBLE instructor. Also, Alpas frequently took one of his “obligatory” five daily prayer sessions during our one-hour class, and it appeared to be nothing more than a cigarette break where he stood around and smoked with cab drivers in front of the mosque. However, I’m not a mud slinger so I’m not going to get into a fight here, and Alpas, if you happen to be reading this I want you to know that I wish you nothing but the best and maybe some veneers for your teeth.
And so I’ve been assigned a new driving instructor and his name is Tarik.
He’s a bit of a dude.
Even though he has an emerging bald spot on the crown of this head, he spikes his thin, black hair. When I met him he was wearing wraparound sunglasses and had the earpiece from his phone dangling off his ear like a status symbol. The ring tone to his phone, which had a screen saver of him doing a chin up in an undershirt, was Bad Boys, the theme from Cops.
He was the anti-Alpas.
One of the first things he told me was that I had a gift from God when it came to driving. This was something Alpas never thought to tell me. Tarik was impressed by my confidence and my ability to accelerate through yellow lights, traits that are very highly valued with dudes.
Tarik also told me about all the sexy students he dated, and how Asians, East Asians and Pakistani people were absolutely the worst drivers on the planet. But I think the best part of the experience was getting a nickname. Tarik dubbed me “Fire Chaser,” (this because we spent the hour long lesson in pursuit of the source of a fire that was burning in the city—it was on Wellesely Street!) which is a super cool nickname, way better than “Nibblet,” which was what my old floor hockey team, the Jesus Cobras, called me.
They can suck it.
]]>