recurse42

So far from home, it doesn't matter how shameful something is, nobody who matters is going to to see you.  If any of your friends kew you'd have to hide inside a hovel, shivering like Raskalnikov if he had lived above a starbucks, or like a writer who has just committed a horribly overstretched metaphor to a publicly visible website.  No, the activity in question is not related to the "horny nasty nude lapdance massage parlor" in the Tenderloin. Not its not even the bestiality dildo shop.  It is of course, the tourist strip on Fisherman's warf. 
   Yes, if any of your friends could see you ducking fertively into the wax museum, or buying some breaded balls of wax touted as captain petey's shrimp, you'd have to move far away and get massive plastic surgery.  But here you are, with maybe a travelling companion, but your British or Australian or French accent gives you away just how secure you are that no-body you know will catch you buying a plastic pirate looking glass down on the pier, or an "alcatraz escapee" shirt in china town.
   As for me, I'm just looking for someplace to sit down, I tell myself.  I'm in town visiting relatives, and today I took the train into the city to explore a bit.  I've just hiked up past telegraph hill for the view, and my feet hurt enough that I don't care if I have to sit next to a giant mock up of a sailor swigging a brew, or a half fallen down earthquake replica, or a wax statue likeness of Deforest Kelley.  No position is too demeaning so long as it is bipedal.  At least I manage to convince myself for a few seconds.
   Then I have to admit that this, this sitting here, marks the abject failure of my secret plan, to walk through the city and find the secret ... internal organ of it.  No, not the secret heart of it, that would be too common. I want to find the secret kidney, the secret lymph gland, the secret uvula.  Did I stumble into an underground poetry salon while trying to buy something to drink?  No, all I had found was a young middle-eastern man trying to simultaneously watch a soccer match and make change.   Had I stumbled into the last hidden temple of a largely unheard of Siberian religion?  No, sadly I never even found the Castro.  (too many hills in the way).
   Something, something inevitable has pulled me down here, to this bastion of history and culture, the fisherman's warf.  I am tempted to walk into the fortune teller's storefront and ask her where I went wrong, but the ashtray memorabilia throws up a thorny force field that will not let me walk through the door. 
   I have felt this force field before. It is the same one that kept me from entering Christmas Mouse in Williamsburg the time I needed some Cookie Cutters.  Then, I had overcome it, only to discover that Christmas Cookie Cutters are not sold in Christmas Mouse.  Singing lawn statues from the "How Kiss Saved Christmas" series, yes.  Tree ornaments with your favorite Nascar car numbers on them yes.  -Trucker hats besloaganed with holly-like fonts, yes.  But Christmas Cookie Cutters, ofcourse not.   Yes, I had overcome it then, but now, in the cool sea air an entire continent between me and my home, I couldn't help but look at that tired looking person on a bench and think "Did I go to school with that person?"  
   So there I sit, paralyzed between hell, and ... hell, at a loss as to what to do.  Another case of reaction  paralysis which always seems to find me when I am trapped between what I want to find and what I do find.   All my energy disappears and I consider the meager possibility of funnel cake.
   There is a tap on my shouder.  I look over, and it is not a finger that has touched me in my despondent state, but something... something more like a small pierogi.  The texture is light, but heavily oiled, and the smell is a mixture of dough and bitter melon.  Is that... Dim Sum?
   Before I can get my bearings, I see a feleting figure move into the alleyway between Madame Tuso's and Bubba Gumps Shrimp Catchery (extablished 1897).  I glance into the ally. It is fairly well lit, and I don't see any bearded figured hunched up against the walls.  Nothing seems to stir near the dumpster.  There is only the memory of movement.
   Stretching a little under the renewed protest of my legs, I walk tentatively down the alley.  A little girl walking with her parents, all speaking what sounds to me to be Dutch, not that I would know Dutch from !Kang, but the accent reminds me of  the guy with the giant Cellphone from a british prank show, the character supposedly being dutch, so that is what I think it is.  The girl, unaware of my linguistic analysis, but aware of someone standing in the trashy alley, cranes her neck to see what sign for what marvel of the world I am standing under.  Not seeing one, she seems confused, but her parents drag her on.  
  I turn back to the alley and walk down to the dumpster.  Behind the dumpster, the alley turns between one of the buildings and the rising hill.  This part is not so brighly lit, but I spy something... It is metal, a .. handle. There is a small door , not in the building but in the hillside.  It is an old door, some sort of steel, with rivets around the edges, painted in a random pattern of golden browns and greens to match the dry grass.   Bitter mellon, the smell wafts from the hatch. I reach for the door...
  Unfortunately, dear reader, I must stop here.  As for what secret organ of the city I found behind that patch, you must speculate, for it is a violation of ancient covenants to reveal it to you.  I can neither confirm nor deny that it may or may not have involved a wayward tribe of roboticists, who escaped from the valley and moved north, to plan their eventual return to reclaim their homes from a conspiracy of chip manufacturers and orange growers.  I may or may not have become involved in their plans to leverage B to B e-commerce initiatives to facilitate a more streamlined version of inside sales through SOAP, providing a scalable framework that simultaneously reduces cost and improves ones sense of peace.  There may or may not have been gun battles, brain storming sessions, , covert rescue operations in silicon valley, and a giant pool table made of legos.  At some point, we may or may not have stumbled apon a way to use XML to mature the human spirit enough to handle the power of RNA interference with kindness and dignity.   Alas, you must stumble apon these things in your own tourist traps, or settle for an ice cream at the local Giardhelli choclate outlet as less destined person might have had to do.

   At 12:30 in the morning, having been up and working since 8 am, I'm not exactly the most assertive person.  Generally, at such times, I seem to have two modes: calm acquiescence and whining petulence.  For example, at 12:30 am after a long day you might here me say "Okay, so next I crawl into the pit full of spiders. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.  I think I can find my way there on my own from here. Thanks again!" followed by "Stupid pit full of spiders. I bet nobody else has to be in the pit full of spiders.  I might as well just lay down and die.  Yeah, I'll let the spiders crawl up my nose and eat my brain. I'll just die here and then see how they like it."  In other words, Hemmingway wouldn't have thought much of me in the wee hours.  
   So, there I find myself, deplaning in Philadelphia.  I dont' know if it is always sunny there, even in an ironicly cloudy way, because it is quite dark.  I assume always being sunny doesn't imply an alaskan style endless day, but is more indicative of the weather.  Even if I could do some fact checking on the titles of sit coms, I probably wouldn't, because I have other things on my mind.  "Where is our third person!" the airline attendant keeps saying into the microphone.  I'm in a bit of a conundrum.  It is around midnight, I'm tired, my feet hurt, and it is 20 minutes after my aircraft supposedly left.  Yet, the ever hopeful attendent thinks I should run to the other side of the airport.  "Hurry, they might be holding your flight.  Where is the third person with a connection!"  The whole plane is looking around now, trying to spot the person who is too lazy to be making a good faith effort at bolting off the airplane.  I take a deep breath, put my book in my backpack, and start moving past people to the front of the plane.  "There he is!" people begin to say, as if I have just emerged from a mountain wilderness or a mine collapse.  Their hearts are filled with hope again, because I, the third person, might make my connection.  Still, I'm not moving fast enough for them... "Hurry!" says the steward.
  Meanwhile, there I am, aching, walking as fast as I can without breaking into a jog.  Does he really think I can reach my connection?  This is Philadelphia airport. I hope he knows where he is.  I mean, I just fly occasionally, he works for the airline in Philadelphia airport.  Has he convinced himself he works in the Chicago ot Atlanta airport, a sort of bargain of his sanity to make it through the day.   He must know that my flight will have left 10 minutes ago.  As I get off the ramp he is standing there.  Wearily, I manage to make eye contact with him.  "There you are!" he says.  I want to ask him "Hasn't my flight already left?", but he gives me a nervous look that all but says "Do it for the other passengers. Don't crush their faith in our travel system." "I've called for a cart, you should run down to the end of "A" and meet it on the way up here so you have a better chance."  Personally, I just want to lie down and hope someone sticks a meal voucher in my mouth, but I somehow get the feeling I might as well say to the whole deplaning crowd "Livestrong... what is this stupid bracelet.  Give me a break I'm not going to put this thing on."
   So then I find myself breaking out into a trot, along with a young couple, down from the end of "F" terminal.  Jogging along on the people mover, I am passed by a mysterious 8 year old boy who seems to be running circles in the airport at 12AM.  He doesn't even stop to look at us as he whips past us.  Then, just for sport, he run's along side the people mover and outpaces us.  Suddenly I have a picture of dolphins swimming along side a lumbering boat, wondering who the bloated oversized dolphin is.  When he reaches the end of the people mover he whips around and achieves mach 2 on the people mover going in the other direction.  I wonder for a minute who he belongs to.  Is he one of the kids I used to see hanging out in philly as a teen?  Has he found a secret people-mover rush that makes his skate board obsolete?  Whatever the case he seems to be in a zen state.  I try to emulate him. Don't think about the lost connection, just think about the velocity.
  That works for about 30 seconds, when we finally get to the electric cart.   It is ofcourse, all downhill from there.  The electric cart beeps along, slower than we could have jogged, but I am happy for the ride.  I mean, one pace of futility is about about as good as any other.  Besides, I am a bit chagrinned at myself for sort of buying into the whole "make your flight" myth, and try to remind myself that even if the cart could go faster, it is a lost cause.  Still, the ritual must be carried out.
   The journey to the end of C terminal takes about 30 minutes.  It involves a tram that just stopped service for the evening.  We waste 15 minutes waiting for it before moving on.  While waiting we talk for a bit.  They are pleasant people people, a ceramic artist who went to William and Mary, and her software engineer boyfriend.  The ceramic artist is talkative, and charming in the way she seems to think that she has a chance of leaving Philadelphia.  The boyfriend is tall, lanky and reticent, with a ponytail and beard that scream opensource.  He stays quiet.  I cannot tell if he is tired, naturally shy, or just doesn't want to crush his girlfriend's enthusiasm by accidentally speaking.  As I leave them behind headed down the cooridoor to terminal "B" I picture her looking at him and saying "They don't really hold flights, do they?"
  By the time I reach terminal "A", I cannot help myself.  I have broken into an all out run, they type I usually reserve for the gym or chasing escaping pets.  I am torn, picturing myself from the outside.  I have become one of those people, the people you see running through the airport thinking that maybe, just maybe, their travel schedule means a hill of beans in this crazy mixed up world.  I want to kick myself for being guillible, but I realize too late that kicking myself in the ass with my heels is just making my legs move faster.  Before I know it I reach my gate.  A gate agent looks at me with a sudden look of confusion.  "Are you going to Baltimore?" No, no, the rules of the universe hold fast.  I have not arrived within seconds of my departure to Baltimore, as I am not going there.  The gate agent looks away, the faint glimmer of joy disappearing.
   Then I begin the fateful trek to special services.   I get my hotel voucher.  It is now even later and I now have to walk to ground transportation and wait for a van to take me to a hotel 30 minutes away.  Still, I have a voucher, so who am I to complain.  "Yes, ground transportation is that way?  Thank you so much for pointing me in the right direction. Have a good evening!"