hope

I’m out of sorts, out of breath almost, as if I had run a long race but I haven’t. A young man with golden piercings on his beautiful face hugged me when I declined to sign his petition, and the Apple store employee asked me why I looked down. He said he empathized. Later in the street, a couple ran past me and the woman slowed her pace to nod and smile and say “hi!”. A few minutes later, a young girl, walking with a large backpack nodded and smiled directly at me. Then I saw a tall young man walking with a very short and plump older lady across the street, and at the same time a culinary student crossed the street in his chef’s uniform. A man who looked like an agent drove past in his convertible Mercedes, top down and sunglasses on, and all those things, life moving around me, purposefully, trees firmly planted along Green Street and the kindness of strangers, all moved together like a symphony of hope to me, on this summer morning, and I took a full breath of air, and lifted my head and looked ahead.