san narciso

Two dachshunds, a stray cat, and a kind Korean Uber driver all make for a pleasant Monday morning. This is my first day testing a regimented calendar which accounts for SAT prep, volunteer work, homework, and, in more grown-up fashion, a career plus family, friend, and J obligations. Heart pains and palpitations coming and going at increasingly rapid intervals are easily ignored when I consider what’s at stake if I slow down. There is swallowed pride and self-reflection and a film crew scuttling around the Village like sand crabs under a rock that’s been lifted and goddammit they’re even in the library. Where am I going to get any work done? Whatever. I still have my turkey and cheese croissant so I’ll sit on this bench and read a book even though it’s against my new rules and doing so will throw off every other time slot in today’s schedule––another dachshund passes: an omen. In fact, this was supposed to be written by 9am and it’s already almost noon. I’m self-aware regarding the image of me reading Flaubert with the croissant and reassure myself I do these things because I like them and not because of the way they make me look. That gives me hope for today regardless of the strong possibility that it’s false hope.

My fingers are slick with croissant grease by the time I decide to get back to work. I avoid working in coffee shops because I get the sense I look like the type of person who gets off on being seen reading French literature while eating a pastry; or, for that matter, writing in trendy little spots like the one I’m sitting in now, typing with still greasy fingers after having spent $13 on a glorified sausage McMuffin because I needed somewhere to sit. It’s actually chorizo, not sausage, and truthfully, I’m enjoying it enough that I’m willing to pressure wash my keyboard later and make myself sick by eating the whole thing in addition to the croissant I just finished. Throwing away roughly the last two bites at least spares me some of the shame I would have felt eating the whole thing––a clue toward a mild eating disorder, but that won’t stop me from self-imposing grueling circuits of cardio until 730 calories have been burned, so I add an hour of exercise to the calendar. Where was I?

Now we’re really behind, but the same self-control that enabled me to throw away $4 worth of salty instant dopamine will help me make up for lost time. I leave the coffee shop partly because the music is too loud but more because a kid in a FedEx uniform has been tapping his foot against the bar’s footrail sending vibrations my way for the past 30 minutes. I consider saying something, but he's watching TikToks with mouthfuls of mini donut that make him look like a pelican gagging down sardines when he tilts his head back to laugh. There are visible remnants of spewed donut on the counter in front of him. It’s all too much and I realize there are only so many things you can politely ask of someone before you’re the problem. I’ve learned the number is one at maximum but more often zero.

I collect my things to leave. A girl comes in and goes to kiss him. He sets a donut down, and he kisses her, still chewing, wiping powdered sugar on his shorts with the grace of someone very comfortable in their skin. Someone totally unparanoid about bothering or offending the people around them. I leave intending to be more like him. I cut through the Village’s pristine brick-walled alleys to the next street and realize I’ve been seeing the same rotation of faces walking the same sidewalks at the same times while I hold the same bag; realize that knowing which alleys to cut through to get to which streets has inadvertently become instinct. It’s not like this is a big city, but this is to emphasize the point that I’ve always hated sameness and routine, or I thought I did.

The film crew look purposeful carrying set pieces and sound gear. A PA tweaks a sidewalk sign just right. The sign reads “Austin’s Best Bar” with the words “karaoke,” “beer,” “wine,” and “cocktails” underneath. The offensively nondescript sign makes it obvious we aren’t in Austin and that the dry-cleaning shop it’s designated a bar is not actually a bar. This little downtown’s already utopian soundstage appearance further amplifies the Truman Show effect; the hamster wheel squeak of routine life’s melodramatically high stakes held up against the town square that’s quiet and never changes; where someone tapping their foot is the most aggrieving part of your day, and it’s easy to let this go and even improve your human perspective because the environment acts as a natural sedative. I’m sitting on a bench now in the shade of one of the many tall, full elms uncommon to the Southern California I’m used to. Here, passing cars sound like an ocean’s tide compared to the death rattle of the 60 Freeway. I find that I love routine if the routine is anything like this. When Groundhog Day presents as endlessly hard work against the backdrop of a beautiful place (or as work so beautiful it doesn’t feel like work despite a hideous place), Nirvana is achieved. Even if the work you’re doing and the place you’re in are hideous, but you know Nirvana is around the corner judging by the passing of yet another grinning weenie dog who this time wears shoes and a bandana, you might as well be there already. This is a good day, but I know the feeling won’t last. I’ll now be getting back to work I’m not good at and routines I’m not fond of. Nirvana isn’t far though and that’ll get me by.