A CLOUDY DAY, A SPOON, A NEEDLE & ME

...I should have known when my iPod's shuffle button pulled up the following to start off my day:

"Bela Lugosi's Dead" - Bauhaus
"Hunter" - Bjork
"Rippin Kittin" - Golden Boy with Miss Kittin
and
"Last Chance Texaco" - Rickie Lee Jones

As I was on my way to address some business with my way-cheap lawyer, I opted to turn off the iPod and focus on my ride to the Balboa BART Station. Now, my lawyer's office is not in a horrible part of town -- but it isn't all that great either. It is not too far from the city college. I have to walk several blocks to a bus stop where I catch the bus I need.

It is cloudy today and according to a bank sign I passed it was 47 degrees --- so it was a bit cold.

I walked up to the bus stop. Sad fact of life: low income areas have more people who need public transit, but they don't get the nicer equipment -- nor do they get as much of it as the "better" areas do. There were about 20 people and from what I gathered from a frustrated college student -- they had been waiting for quite a while. After about 15 minutes I decide to sit on the brick way behind the sidewalk. I jump up, sit myself down and a lady calls to me, "Be careful, boy! Look what's next to you!" ...she said this in the tone of a woman who thought me a total fool.

I look to my left and see nothing. I look to my right and see a bent spoon, a gross looking syringe and an empty paper sack. hmmm... It all felt so Sid & Nancy circa 1977! Annoyed that I didn't have my camera and the knowledge of how to post pictures to my blog, I jumped down and walked over to the lady and thanked her for the warning. She then told me I needed to watch where I sat my butt adding something like ---"your ass was just a few inches away from that needle, boy!" Her friend laughed and I smiled. She rolled her eyes.

10 minutes later the bus arrived. We all got on and I saw the lady get off two stops later where she walked past a package store toward street full of houses in dire need of some new paint. I felt sad because I knew that once my meeting was over, I would be back on the bus and headed back to a much better reality than my friend.

There just has to be a way to effect some positive change. I just don't know what it is, but I am thinking on it.