offline vibes influence volume 3

 

Need I say more?

from union square (5/2/21 5:21 PM)

if stone could remember

and well, perhaps speak,

what would it say, and what timbre

what voice, one proud or one meek?

it’s seen, i’m sure, time and again

the same old mistakes, beginning to end 

rainfall

"rainfall"

~~~~~~~~~~

it's raining in san francisco. it's january, and it's raining quite hard. i got back from the airport last night and the rain had already started a few days ago. i had been in los angeles, where it was foggy and grey. but not rainy, and certainly not like this.

it doesn't rain that much in san francisco. usually when it does, the city looks really pretty, especially at night. the way the rain water pooling on the streets and between the streetcars' tracks reflect the lights of buildings and cars and so on makes the city scene feel like one big glowing ball of energy. it's nice to see it all lit up, especially when usually winter nights like this feel so devoid of any energy at all. at least they seem to feel like that recently.

tonight i went out for a walk in the rain because i desperately needed to feel better: something about my mental state recently has just not been right. usually walking in the rain can be calming. the sound of the drops of water steadily beating down against an umbrella, the quiet of surroundings, and the warm glow of the city lights around you; it should be conducive to feeling peaceful, at ease, reflective. tonight, though, i had really underestimated how torrential the rain was supposed to be. i guess i had not paid close enough attention to weather reports online. when i stepped outside, things were clear enough, but ten minutes later, the pace of the sound of droplets increased and i felt my pants get noticeably wet from rain blowing underneath the umbrella. i really wanted to keep going, keep walking. i could not go back home in the state i was in: i really, really needed something to change. i guess that's all i really wanted.

i decided to take a bike. inspecting a row of rental bikes at a station, i tried to figure out which one had the seat least drenched by the storm. i brushed what remaining water off i could and then got on, starting down market street. no longer able to hold up an umbrella and with a harsh wind in my face, things suddenly felt a whole lot more vicious than they had before. as i made my way further and further upwind, i could feel my whole body getting colder and wetter and my hands, dry from the L.A. heat, cracking and burning in the wind and my hair, sopping wet at this point, starting to stick to my face and eyelids and my vision blur with hair and rain and who knows what else.

the more i pedaled, the faster the rain fell. i couldn't think of what else to do. there was not really anywhere i could go to escape it; i could sit underneath some covered awning or a tree or try to go in some building, but the rain was not going to stop for the next few days. there was no point in trying to hide from it. i guess the only thing i really felt i could do was outrun it, fight it. even though i knew i would not win, maybe at least i could show that at least i was doing something. i could and should be in my apartment, under my covers, wasting time, waiting for myself to feel satisfied enough with my day to fall asleep, or depressed enough to desperately try to. i couldn't bare to do that though. and maybe, subconsciously, it wasn't much more than the gut-bending frustration i felt at the thought of me sitting in that bed and wasting hours more of my life away that made me mindlessly pedal and pedal and ride the bike onward for no real reason at all.

* * *

eventually, though, i did end up under an awning, silent, waiting for the rain to slow down. i knew it wouldn't stop, and it didn't, but eventually the worst part of the storm that night relented. i took the bike back to another station and parked it. i turned back and walked down through the empty streets back home.

i did not think about too much as i was walking. i get these fits of whatever that bike ride was -- frantic desire to just _do something_ -- every once and a while. afterwards, i feel a sense of peacefulness. i can't tell, though, whether i am compelled to act like this because i craving the peaceful feeling at the end or if it's because i crave the franticness itself.