June 3, 2012 7:45 pm
Sitting in my bedroom window chair, looking out onto the greens and burgundies of early summer on Milton street. The breeze lifts the curtains and carries with it the scent of potted jasmine blossoms. I have tilted the chair so that I am floating above the street, as out of doors as one can be while sitting by the window in one’s bedroom. I peer between the windowsill irises to the outside, where the sky is moving through blue-grey and grey-blue and a sometimes-dash of purple. Below me, three old Polish ladies stand in a triangle on the sidewalk and compare their sandals. They lean against the garden fence and take off their footwear to view them more thoroughly. I float above them and see the pink plastic insoles versus the black rubber insoles, discussed with some attention in a language I don’t understand. The air is soft but the wind stirs things up. And I am overcome with sadness and nostalgia. Nostalgia for nothing. Or maybe nostalgia for this