Raining in Paradise

Yesterday I had the pleasure of spending another day alone downtown, but this time I was determined to not spend so much money. I am rapidly going broke.

So first I made the trek, on foot, to East Bay Meeting House to buy a raspberry Italian soda and read At the End of the Alphabet. On the way there an old black woman with a limp approached me with a pile of pamplets and shoved two at me and shouted, "Come to Paradise!" I thought Paradise was a resturante until the woman was gone and the pamplets professed Jehovah Witness beliefs. I felt tricked.

Upon arrival I gave my order to a chubby college girl with multi-colored curls, to which she replied, "Si, amigo." I found her obnoxious. Soon after I sat down a kid started throwing a fit, so I left.

And what better place to go when your broke than the library?

Nowhere, that's where.

I didn't feel like going Nowhere, so I went to the library. I got some books and left. Outside the door I felt what I had been dreading. A rain drop. So I sprint down Calhoun, bent for the Francis Marion Starbucks. Its a funny thing how people in your same possision like to smile and nod at you.

In the Starbucks I dropped my book bag by a chair that was trying to be way too artsy and attempted to dry off with paper towels in the bathroom.

Back at artsy chair I began reading At the End of the Alphabet again when I noticed a woman in a red dress trying to dry her legs with a paper towel. She seemed to be in her early forties with long black hair pulled up in a loose bun.

Feeling social, I offered, "You get caught by the rain, too?"

"Well, kind of," she said in a northern accent with a light smoker's rasp. "I had an umbrella but my shoes the water all over my legs. Looks like its letting up now, though." She continued to wipe the legs and shoes. "Jesus," she laughed, drying herself. "Take it easy," she said, standing to leave.

"You, too."