Thursday, October 14, 2004, 4:06pm
Thursday, October 14, 2004, 4:06pm
Leaving the office I committed one of those stupid laptop PC sins – forgetting to zip my daypack. The moment it went airborne I could feel the weight lessen from my shoulders and the pressure ease from my spine. But there wasn’t anything I could do to stop the inevitable as the machine crashed to a carpeted oak floor with a gut wrenching thump.
The case has a ding in the plastic where the right front corner took the majority of the blow and it seems to be running okay. At least it was powered off with the hard drive heads auto-parked away from the disk surface.
Diverting my attention to the outside world – at South Station blue sky from this morning has given way to gray clouds and a light rain as we ease alongside the Track 3 platform. Dropped PC and all, I’ve managed to get here soon enough for this early express train which greatly improves the odds for reaching Arthur’s group meeting on time.
In the ongoing process of the Big Dig, abandoned work boots rest atop a lonesome concrete support near rusting paint cans standing open to the weather. Well past this, just before Back Bay Station, we pass the Hancock Tower – the tallest building in Boston, looming 60 floors above modest brick and stone. Such an edifice in New York City would be lost in a sea of glass and steel. But here it stands alone like a gravestone.
Soon we can all stop thinking about New York City. The Yankees will very likely beat the Red Sox again this year, and not just because Curt Shilling has wrecked his ankle and can’t pitch anymore this season. Pedro took the lost last night – no run support – and now there they’re down two games to none. Unless the Sox rise from dead it’ll be over soon.
Today’s 4:10 Worcester Express is making good progress so maybe I’ll have a minute to check an eBay auction before heading out again. Of the three items I’ve bought for resale it’s looking like I’m not going to make any money. These are items I acquired mainly to check out the hardware first hand. But I need to stop doing this. The point is to divest my collection – not start a new a new one.
Only half a dozen miles downstream from where I’ll soon be driving to see Arthur, we cross the Charles River. Most of the trees still carry their leaves and perhaps 70 percent of those leaves are still green – though a sickly dying sort of green.
On approach to West Natick Station we roll in a drifting state between backed-off-throttle and freshly-applied-brakes while yet one more would-be pedestrian line queues for the exists. Here under overcast gloom and fading daylight, I notice how the outermost leaves – those more directly exposed to the sun – seem to be changing colors first. And with those leaves brightly yellowed I sense unmistakably direct sunlight where none directly shines.
“West Natick”
Disgorged from the early train with nary a suit or fancy dress among them, a decidedly non-professional crowd trudges past my window. It’s too early for the 9-5 business crowd I suppose.
Underway again the crowd trudges faster and faster beside our accelerating carriage until I notice only those yellow and orange ‘sunlit’ leaves and the sounds of the train creaking and rolling yet more miles west along reassembled rails.
It may be my imagination or lack of short-term memory, but tonight this car has not leaned to the north when crossing into Framingham, so perhaps the rail work has reach this far east.
