Errand Day

I love running errands. They're so therapeutic. Walking to the bank and then across the street to the library. I took the long way home, walking to the water tower, gawking at the gorgeous old mansions. I remembered a place that I saw as a kid, a window with an art display in it. My dad would always scoff when we past it, because he knew the guy and thought he was a prick. I found the building, but the display was gone. The man probably was priced out of the nieghborhood. We're all in danger of getting priced out, or our apartments being razed to make room for condos.

There's something so sad and intimate about laundramats. This is where you bring each piece of soiled clothing, bearing a story of what you did when you wore it: the chocolate stain from when you shared a candybar with your little sister, the shirt you wore when you first made out with your boyfriend, the unmentionables that were softly caressed then ripped aside. The memories go through your mind as you toss them into the machine, knowing that everyone else is washing away their garments' stories too. This laudramat has wood panelling, a fortress wall of not quite salmon, not quite orange dryers. The clothes hypnotically spin about, the colors getting brighter as they dry.

The snow is blowing, making it difficult to schlepp the laundry back and forth from my apartment. It is as light out at night as it was during the day.