At Least They're Committed

Walking along Cherry Creek on my lunch break, later than usual, it’s Friday, bitch of a week, it’s after 1:30 p.m. . . .

Lost Man’s on his bench. This time he just nods and smiles a broken grin when I go by the first time; on the way back, though, he says his signature line, “I like that, I like that!” I can see his lips move and feel the hum of his voice over the music as he points to my iPod or to my boobs. I can never tell which. I smile and say “Thank you!” and he smiles a bit wider.

New Man on the wall, long brown hair tied back, legs draped over, 10 feet above me on the grassy knoll that leads to Speer Boulevard. Can’t tell if he’s homeless and dirty, or olive skinned and enjoying the warm, sunless day. I don’t look that closely at anyone really. He’s staring at a jogging man on my way past the first time; but smiles on my way back, I smile back, he yells “HAVE A GOOD DAY” above the din of my and his ear phones and I say “Thank you!” and smile again.

One day, one of these beautiful, special souls shall shove a dagger deep into my neck or chest. There won’t be blinding light or an atomic flash jettisoning out from the open wound, rather I’ll just bleed and cry out in pain and maybe, just maybe, be a little grateful.

The dead fox is even more undescernable; a more escalated stage of decay on a different sand bank, washed closer to the shore. The stench is horrid;  not unbearable. I feel like jumping in the rancid water, scooping the red, wet dirt with my hands, and covering it so she can rot in peace.

The Woman, wrapped in filthy scarves, under the 13th street bridge looks different today; taller, her nose spread wider. I wonder if it’s not her. But it is, I see on my way back, she’s the same gal, avoiding my eyes, asking for nothing; needing so much.

White truck is driving slowly toward me. Not sure why it’s down on the walking path, the red letters on its side say it’s from Thornton . . . I’m in Denver. It’s making no motion to get out of my way, and I’m calculating my escape — cement walls on one side, shallow creek on the other. I’ll take the creek if his intent is to run me over. Jump in, if the white man in the truck follows, I’ll circle like a rabbit, he won’t be able to turn sharply enough to catch me. At the last second, he pulls off into the embankment at waterside. Not sure what he was doing. Guess he must notta been out to kill me, tho.

I glance into the water grates and gates as I go past, checking for dead bodies. I haven’t found any yet.

Corpse or no, truck or no, I feel like jumping into the water, where it’s fresher and spills and dances over the man-made breakers. I feel like “falling” into it “accidentally” and coming back to the office filthy and wet and, maybe, smiling.

There are pigeon feathers, too many for it to have survived, freshly twisted among the grass alongside the creek and I then feel myself over, my hair and shoulders, after another three pigeons swoop past me, one winging so close it flips my hair. Nope. Not shit upon. Not by the pigeons.

An obese lady walks past me, damp, pink and huffing, and I’m happy that she’s out here and hopeful for her. Hopeful. What a word.

There are all these commercials with elite athletes running, dribbling, slamming and you know, really, that’s cuz that’s all they have to do. It’s what they’re paid to do. What about the rest of us? The ones with too much, the ones who can’t take it, the ones who are obese and broken and ugly inside and out and who keep forging onward? Those of us put upon this Earth to serve, to make other peoples’ lives a little better, maybe even happy but never, never to be happy ourselves. Why do we keep coming out here? Why, do I do this?

We’re silently, quietly and futilely running our own ad campaign:

Just do it anyway.