Walking in the Neighborhood

You know how, after occasions both happy and sad, the initial frenzy of activity tends to slow down?

That has sort of happened with me, these nearly five months since my separation from my prosecutor's career. For the first few months, there were few days of simply being home. Not only did I have the new voice over classes, but I was meeting up with people for breakfast, lunch and dinner or combinations thereof all the time. Right now, my voice over classes are in hiatus (for me). Although I continue to meet for breakfast with one of my co-severed from the job colleauges during the week, have begun volunteering at places like Learning Ally (formerly Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic)and have had various social occasions at old haunts like Papa Christos in mid-LA with former colleagues/friends as I did yesterday, with the days shorter and the novelty of my situation wearing off, I have also found I am not filling every moment.
This is difficult for someone who had a work day structured for 30 years, even if it is otherwise a most desired liberation.

Today was the first day I felt that I had nothing whatsoever to do, and it alarmed me. Really, if I were a truly meditative sort, I would have found the time and quiet energizing. Instead, I worried that I would cease having goals. I suspect I have a little seasonal affective disorder along with my other neuroses, and the clouds of the day might have contributed to the anxiety.
I got up later than is even usual for me. I knew I could easily have stayed in bed all day with the gloom outside, but I forced msyelf up and after a cup of coffee, out. I decided on a short walk.

Walking is something I love to do, but for some inexplicable reason have not been doing for quite some time. The gloom provided a cool, so it actually was a perfect day for a stroll. I stayed initially off the main drag and wandered past various houses on the way toward Santa Monica Boulevard. The houses may be close together, but they are all different and charming in their differences. I ended up near the intersection of Fairfax and Santa Monica and decided to go back south to get a closer look at some of the newer establishments at the bottom of the various condos built in the last few years. Yet another high scale pet store. Yet another coffee shop, but this one not a Starbucks. As I got back toward Melrose, Fairfax High School was letting out. There was a sea of noisy students at the bus stop, none of them making way for the pedestrians like myself trying to circumvent them. I passed a young girl three some, one of whom was saying something like, "She never f-----ing called me." All of 15 and she litters her conversation with the gems of the English language.

As I was moving toward Canter's, the home of the Kibbutz Room, and many an old time rock star n his or her hey day, I saw a man walking haltingly in front of me. Homeless soul, and since he seemed to be touching the ground at intervals, an obsessive compulsive one. As I crossed Fairfax toward Rosewood, another homeless man said, "I love The Love Boat. Do you have any change". I felt a little guilty saying what was true, that I had no change, when I knew I had two twenties. But that seemed to be asking to much of my guilt to give up one of them. That is an interesting consideration for this blog, or for any idle conversation. Should I have given him my twenty? I cannot say I have never given a larger bill, a ten or a five in the past. But today, a twenty seemed a little excessive, based on the non-sequitur nature of the request. Even if I did like the Love Boat (should I admit that) in my younger days. (Love, exciting and new. Come aboard, we're expecting you!).

I decided to press on. Go east, Djinn, toward Gardner Street.  I have been looking for decorative rocks to stick in a non-growing area of my comfortably seedy back yard, so I thought I should toddle to Rolling Greens, a combination plant and unique gift shop. It used to be where my mechanic was, Town Tire Company, until the owner, a gruff but accommidating guy, retired. The new owner kept the basic facade and made it into this rather upscale but approachable store of things you don't need but must have.

It smelled of Christmas, pine, and cinnamon. I got the pebbles and like four other things I did not intend to buy. I browsed and browsed. On one of the cashier stands, one of the owners had placed her scottish terrier in a lovely basket for sale, who was amenable to much petting. The dog, not the basket.


I am always amazed at how I intend not to spend money and then inevitably do. But I had my lovely bags with my lovely little things, including an ornament that looked suspiciously like my friend Carol's Springer Spaniel Rosebud, which I had to get for her. And I walked contentedly down Beverly Boulevard now, toward my block, past the vintage store. I tried to take a picture of the old time cash register for all of you, but it did not come otu well (through a plate glass window). And then I had a cup of coffee at Buzz and watched the people go by at the corner of Grove Drive and Stanley Avenue. 

                                                                                        

Just a short three blocks from my apartment, I found that my mood had lifted. I got home and took my


It was a nice day, it turns out, just walking in the neighborhood.  In the moment. Without expectations. That's the ticket.