Two Postcards.
Washington
We thought that the zoo might be romantic. A sunny, autumn day, we would stroll hand in hand and make clever remarks to one another about the zebras. Everyone could see that we were in love, everyone would want to be us, maybe ask us directions to the panda pen just get some of that glow. But it was cold and all the animals looked bored and lonely, like they’d run out of ideas, and after a little I began to feel depressed, like I was wandering through an institute for animals with mental disorders. And so we saw all we cared to see and left, strolling through Adam Morgans, the schoolgirls ahead of us on the sidewalk exuberant near twilight, shouting to one another as they sang the songs of Mariah Carey and Gwen Stefani.
Montreal
Sometimes I get lonely cab drivers.
This one wanted to talk about how his mother immigrated to Canada from Europe. “In Europe, where she came from, ” he said, “it was very densely populated. There were towns and villages everywhere. When she came to Canada she arrived in Halifax and took the train out to Montreal. She was alarmed because she traveled for days without seeing a single other human being out the window. She did not know where she was going or what could possibly be out there in the middle of all this nothingness, but my mother, like a lot of immigrants was an optimist, and she was glad to see that all the cows she saw were well fed, not like the starving beasts back home.”
He wanted me to know that he wasn’t just a cab driver, that he had a life outside of his car. He told me about his travels, about being at the heart of the socialist movement in Ireland and that he regretted that he didn’t travel more when he was younger, because now, living alone, it was difficult to find the motivation. And so we sat there, outside of the church, talking and talking, the meter off.