Moments in Boston
I know, I hardly ever post. So quick update -- I've moved to Boston, which was what I really wanted when I moved to New York and began using it as a springboard to get up here, because I couldn't figure out how to go straight from Ann Arbor to Boston, financially. I moved out of my room in New York on Veterans' Day (November 11th).
There are lots of these little moments in Boston -- just little things that happen that I want to remember. Today I was on the Orange Line (one of the subways) coming back from the Eritrean Community Center where I run a small English program. Some idiot had left half a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee, along with an empty cup and the lids, just sitting there on the floor of the car. It tipped over and a stream of coffee began flowing towards this couple sitting across from me. I pointed it out to them, but they didn't seem to understand me until the coffee was almost on their shoes; they lifted their feet just in time. I realized they didn't speak English. I put the cup upright again, though most of it had already spilled. I wished I had paper towels to clean up the mess, and wondered if it would be too weird to just start carrying a little clean-up kit -- a wad of paper towels and a small bag to put them in -- in my briefcase for these situations. Boston is so beautiful, it pains me when people make a mess of a public space, and I'd like to do my little bit to counteract it.
At the next stop, an older woman who was obviously a native of Massachusetts (from her accent) got on. She looked at the coffee mess and shook her head, and I said, "Yeah, some idiot left it there." She said, "They do that all the time" and moved the cup over so she could sit down without stepping on it. She pulled out a kleenex to clean off her hand, and I said, "If you give that to me, I'll clean some of this up." She said, "I normally carry paper towels for this kind of thing, but I used up the last one going the other way." I knelt down and started wiping up what I could of the river of coffee. She found more kleenex and handed it to me. Now the couple who didn't speak English saw what I was doing, and the woman looked in her purse, and the man found some kleenex in his pockets and knelt down next to me to begin wiping up the coffee. The Massachusetts native held out the cup for both of us to put the dirty kleenexes into; I said I could put them in the trash at the next stop, but she said she was getting out there too. She gathered up the other trash that had been left. When we got off the train, she was still commenting on the idiots who leave things like that -- "and the barrel is right outside on the platform, too!" -- but I think all four of us were in a better mood than we had been a few minutes earlier. After all, there had been two cups left, so two slobs, but there were four of us.
*****
A few days ago I got to do a small cat rescue operation. Very simply, I was walking back to the home of the friend I'm staying with (I haven't found my own place yet, but I'm helping my friend with utility bills in exchange for a spot on the couch) when I heard the most ungodly yowling. I thought it was a cat that had been hit by a car, but when I followed the sound, it became clear it was just a cat that was trying to get in the back door of a house. I called to the cat and she came running to me, then around to the front door, where the same frantic yowling started. It was really cold out -- the temperature had fallen a lot after the sun went down -- and I could tell the cat was just freezing. I gathered her into my lap and held her paws to warm them up, and she calmed down. Now I didn't know what to do -- I couldn't sit on the porch all night, but I couldn't abandon the cat to freeze, either. After a while the neighbors came home; it wasn't their cat, but they said the cat's people ran a bicycle store a couple of blocks away, on Broadway. I ran back to my friend's house and googled it, and called the first number I found. I was lucky -- the guy who answered the phone was the cat's owner, who thanked me profusely when I told him his cat was freezing, and said he'd come straight home. I went back to sit with the cat, who was screaming her head off again; I put her back in my lap until he got there a few minutes later.
It turns out that this guy and his wife run a store that imports special bicycles from Europe -- bikes with heavy cargo-carrying capacity that you can go shopping with, and more; bikes that can literally carry 300 lbs of cargo. I found all ths out when I stopped by the bike shop today to check it out (he'd given me his card) and he gave me the grand tour of the workshop where they customize bikes. They have these amazing bikes called "conference bikes" with seats and pedals for 6 people -- one person steers, but everyone contributes to the pedaling. He said schools for the blind buy them, because this way they can take 6 kids out for a bike ride at a time. They have all kinds of bikes for carrying cargo of various sizes. The bikes are expensive, but he explained how they're engineered -- I could never repeat it all, but there were a zillion details of how they're designed and the high quality materials they're made of, and I came away convinced that these are amazingly well-built machines. Their website is at http://www.dutchbikes.us/ -- they have pictures of the conference bike there, and video of people riding them at http://www.dutchbikes.us/cobi/cobi_videos.asp . It was fascinating to see the ways that bicycles can be so much more than I thought they could. I'll probably buy some sort of cargo bike someday when I'm in a better position financially -- they have various ways for people to order and buy them, including a layaway plan that lets people make payments through the winter months for a bike to be picked up in the spring.
So those are two of my little experiences in the Boston area -- two of many. :)
There are lots of these little moments in Boston -- just little things that happen that I want to remember. Today I was on the Orange Line (one of the subways) coming back from the Eritrean Community Center where I run a small English program. Some idiot had left half a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee, along with an empty cup and the lids, just sitting there on the floor of the car. It tipped over and a stream of coffee began flowing towards this couple sitting across from me. I pointed it out to them, but they didn't seem to understand me until the coffee was almost on their shoes; they lifted their feet just in time. I realized they didn't speak English. I put the cup upright again, though most of it had already spilled. I wished I had paper towels to clean up the mess, and wondered if it would be too weird to just start carrying a little clean-up kit -- a wad of paper towels and a small bag to put them in -- in my briefcase for these situations. Boston is so beautiful, it pains me when people make a mess of a public space, and I'd like to do my little bit to counteract it.
At the next stop, an older woman who was obviously a native of Massachusetts (from her accent) got on. She looked at the coffee mess and shook her head, and I said, "Yeah, some idiot left it there." She said, "They do that all the time" and moved the cup over so she could sit down without stepping on it. She pulled out a kleenex to clean off her hand, and I said, "If you give that to me, I'll clean some of this up." She said, "I normally carry paper towels for this kind of thing, but I used up the last one going the other way." I knelt down and started wiping up what I could of the river of coffee. She found more kleenex and handed it to me. Now the couple who didn't speak English saw what I was doing, and the woman looked in her purse, and the man found some kleenex in his pockets and knelt down next to me to begin wiping up the coffee. The Massachusetts native held out the cup for both of us to put the dirty kleenexes into; I said I could put them in the trash at the next stop, but she said she was getting out there too. She gathered up the other trash that had been left. When we got off the train, she was still commenting on the idiots who leave things like that -- "and the barrel is right outside on the platform, too!" -- but I think all four of us were in a better mood than we had been a few minutes earlier. After all, there had been two cups left, so two slobs, but there were four of us.
*****
A few days ago I got to do a small cat rescue operation. Very simply, I was walking back to the home of the friend I'm staying with (I haven't found my own place yet, but I'm helping my friend with utility bills in exchange for a spot on the couch) when I heard the most ungodly yowling. I thought it was a cat that had been hit by a car, but when I followed the sound, it became clear it was just a cat that was trying to get in the back door of a house. I called to the cat and she came running to me, then around to the front door, where the same frantic yowling started. It was really cold out -- the temperature had fallen a lot after the sun went down -- and I could tell the cat was just freezing. I gathered her into my lap and held her paws to warm them up, and she calmed down. Now I didn't know what to do -- I couldn't sit on the porch all night, but I couldn't abandon the cat to freeze, either. After a while the neighbors came home; it wasn't their cat, but they said the cat's people ran a bicycle store a couple of blocks away, on Broadway. I ran back to my friend's house and googled it, and called the first number I found. I was lucky -- the guy who answered the phone was the cat's owner, who thanked me profusely when I told him his cat was freezing, and said he'd come straight home. I went back to sit with the cat, who was screaming her head off again; I put her back in my lap until he got there a few minutes later.
It turns out that this guy and his wife run a store that imports special bicycles from Europe -- bikes with heavy cargo-carrying capacity that you can go shopping with, and more; bikes that can literally carry 300 lbs of cargo. I found all ths out when I stopped by the bike shop today to check it out (he'd given me his card) and he gave me the grand tour of the workshop where they customize bikes. They have these amazing bikes called "conference bikes" with seats and pedals for 6 people -- one person steers, but everyone contributes to the pedaling. He said schools for the blind buy them, because this way they can take 6 kids out for a bike ride at a time. They have all kinds of bikes for carrying cargo of various sizes. The bikes are expensive, but he explained how they're engineered -- I could never repeat it all, but there were a zillion details of how they're designed and the high quality materials they're made of, and I came away convinced that these are amazingly well-built machines. Their website is at http://www.dutchbikes.us/ -- they have pictures of the conference bike there, and video of people riding them at http://www.dutchbikes.us/cobi/cobi_videos.asp . It was fascinating to see the ways that bicycles can be so much more than I thought they could. I'll probably buy some sort of cargo bike someday when I'm in a better position financially -- they have various ways for people to order and buy them, including a layaway plan that lets people make payments through the winter months for a bike to be picked up in the spring.
So those are two of my little experiences in the Boston area -- two of many. :)