too old to rock and roll, too young for diapers
March 13, 2010
It has warmed up considerably, and the path that leads up the hill to the Monastery is almost clear of snow.
Coming home today I had my first strange encounter on the path. I guess the weirdos have other places they prefer to go when it’s minus 20° outside. This afternoon it was more like 12°; I’m walking down the goat trail (steep side path, not pictured above) and I’m trying to stay on the rocky parts near the bottom because the path is muddy and I’m wearing my favourite red shoes. Down at the bottom where the goat trail meets up with the paved path there’s a large outcropping of rocks that the path diverges around, and the whole thing gets pretty steep right at that spot. Today there’s a man, about 55, with shoulder length white hair, a biker jacket and well-worn cowboy boots, and he’s lying down on the big rock and smoking a cigarette. So I grudgingly walk around, gingerly stepping on the small rocks and piles of last year’s newly revealed fallen leaves in order not to muddy my shoes. I’m also carrying an orange plastic bag full of solvent-soaked garbage (to throw away at home so that it didn’t stink up the studio at school, where my students are used to dealing with less toxic methods of printing than the ones I use). The bag of garbage may or may not have inspired the weirdness that followed.
So I’ve passed the guy, and I’m about to step down the last two steep rocks to the ground and he says, “It’s slippery”. “Yup”, I say, and keep walking. Then he says (from behind me, now) “If you slipped you’d get your ass all muddy”. “I won’t slip” I say, speeding up a little.
Then he says, “You should have brought your bag of diapers, you might need them”.
Seriously. BAG OF DIAPERS?
Not all that keen on having a confrontation with a stranger out in the woods, I just said “I’m sure I’ll be fine” and hightailed it outta there. What I wanted to say? Dude, there are thousands of pictures on the internet of women falling in mud and getting their bums all dirty. Surely there are quicker ways to satisfy your muddy diaper fetish than lying in wait in the woods hoping for someone to take a tumble. And on a Saturday, too, when the traffic out there slows to a trickle. Sheesh.
Here are some pictures of graffiti on the path that’s slowly being revealed by the retreating snow. I’m really hoping that the last one will turn out to say “Pocky”.
Posted by jodi on March 13, 2010 at 10.06pm
