The sky is low, woven with lint, and the air materialises into mist—not exactly conditions you want for a mid-morning walk, but workable nonetheless. Besides, a touch of moisture can cool you off when you’re on lap five of the suburb, and rainwater applied gently can work wonders for the age lines in your skin. Plugs of debris (palm fronds, fingered branches, fig leaves) mound at the mouths of storm water drains. You should be thankful for this drizzle after yesterday’s downpour, an event which broke your routine and bottled you (hence today’s extended hike).
It takes 1.5 seconds (and 2.5 strides) to traverse each concrete pavement section (1.5 s/ps). This despite the litter of garden bark, gravel and sticks you have to negotiate, place your squishy-soled Nike sneakers around. Actually, you’ve grown accustomed to this manoeuvring given the negligence of council and the scarcity of their sweeping (but that’s O.K., they’re probably not lazy, there’s probably just plenty of footpaths around). Ahead, a young gentleman has clearly had less stepping practice. His footwear choice is plain ignorant (sandals). His footfall adjustments are exaggerated, over-expending energy to avoid the debris. You could show him a thing or two about walking these suburban streets.
The pace you’ve adopted can only be described as good. It’s quicker than a stroll (you’re not lazy), but is less than brisk (you’re not actively trying to lose weight, lose that excess 3 kgs to get under 60; and you’re not actively monitoring your metabolism because your troubles with it are well in the past; and you’re not trying to impress anyone, these daily walks are just nice, just part of your routine). And the pace is good because it lets you absorb this beautiful suburb, lets your blonde hair bounce to a rhythm, lets you remove your pink Cotton On sweater and tie it fashionably about your waist. The good pace distracts from thought.
You travel slightly faster than the young gentleman (who strolls at 1.8 s/ps), and as you approach, you notice more detail in his motions and physique. The way the heel of his sandals scrape the rough concrete with every step, an obnoxious grating heard for a 20 m radius. And how the back of his too-long-for-a-gentleman hair is glued together in one bulky fist. And how he taps away at his own fingers in furious and infuriating repetition like he’s agitated and could lash out at any moment at anyone or -thing (but these are all indicators of some misfortune—mental, mobility, monetary—so you should empathise, feel a touch sorry for him, his foot scrapes are O.K., his matted hair is fine, his tapping is good and healthy, you guess it would calm him). You can see yourself chatting with him quite amicably because that’s what good, positive, optimistic people do, see every situation from its best angle, see the heart inside the grinch. Your relative speed means that in eighteen pavement sections, you’re going to overtake—and it’ll be a normal, regular event.
When you and The Friend used to pram-walk, you’d travel abreast and fill the full width of a footpath. And whenever a pedestrian approached, head-on or from behind, your inclination would be to pull back, merge into the same lane as The Friend and her pram, so the coming pedestrian could pass. But, the first time you went to do this, The Friend also pulled back, and when you sped, she matched your speed, and the pedestrian was forced off the footpath, into a shoe-dirtying section, onto the lawn to pass. That first time, and every time since, you braced yourself for an insult or a disapproving look—waited and winced to prepare for something that would never come. The Friend had confidence, she did, and showed you about authority.
A pavement section behind you slow to match the young gentleman’s dawdle. Moisture collects on the fuzz you should’ve plucked from your upper lip. This pace might see your metabolic syndrome return, see your body temperature plummet and will eventually force a reapplication/re-wearing of your sweater which, given the sheen of water on your forearms, will be an uncomfortable experience (but not traumatic, obviously! It won’t incite starving-children-in-Africa levels of discomfort; you should be thankful for even having access to a jumper—and you are, you are, life is good). So, the young gentleman is better off behind you. You must resume your good (but not brisk) walk. Ideally, he’d turn down the driveway of one of these old brick bungalows and disappear from the footpath completely. But the odds are low, just look at that hair; he’s not rich enough for a house.
Only two sets of shoulders can walk adjacent on this narrow, cracked, uneven path. And when you overtake, you’re going to invade his bubble of space, and he’s going to occupy a portion of yours, and the sparks of your auras will grate together and set your teeth to cheek-chewing, fingers to furling, and your breath to hummingbird quick. And the only way to earth this static will be to acknowledge his presence, give eye-contact, a “Hello,” a smile, a nod. But, because you’re overtaking, because your relative walking speed is 9 s/ps, it’ll take almost 30 s to enter, traverse and exit his personal space. And if you greet him, you’ll need to say more words to assuage the tension of the extended passing, but what words would you even say? You’ve nothing in common with this drongo. You can’t repeat your “Hello” several times over to fill the void, so is the best option here to skip the greeting altogether and blindly march on past? And what’s worse? Being greeted and then intensionally ignored, an act that says, you’re beneath me, or being disregarded from the get go, implying that he is a ghost?
When The Husband started to lose hearing in his left ear, you thought for months it was a psychological game. You’d ask him where he put the keys and he’d continue fiddling unfazed with his little watches and you’d have to find them yourself. You’d say, “Goodnight,” and he wouldn’t flinch. You’d threaten from the kitchen to eat the yoghurt he was saving, and he would go on reading the news. Being ignored disturbed you, and you felt isolated, and you retreated ever inward, disconnected from the word. It frightened you when your own body questioned its existence, and you swallowed the question back down.
Then, when The Husband had his poor hearing confirmed, you joked about the times you were ignored, laughed about how you felt, admitted to family that it was so funny how you used to record voice memos on your phone and play them back as evidence for your own actuality—what a wacky time. It wasn’t The Husband’s fault for ignoring you; you forgive him now, of course you forgive him, of course you do.
Your original pace is too slow for this purpose. It’s O.K. to crank up your speed momentarily, perhaps to the top end of brisk, right below power walk, so you can get around this objectively fine young gentleman with rapidity and reduce the duration of awkwardness, and maybe burn a few calories as a beneficial side effect. The waist of your sweater knocks at your calves. You cross a pavement section in 1.2 s and come shoulder to shoulder with the gentleman. Is it him that smells of packet chips? At this hour of the morning? The diet of youths these days kills you, and likely them (but each to their own, you guess). Eyes forward to avoid prompting a greeting, head tilted down to break through the mist, the moment you enter the gentleman’s periphery you realise it’s going to be impossible to return from this almost power walk to your targeted good pace because you’re in the gentleman’s viewing range now, and if you slow, it implies your pace is a facade, put on to get around him as quick as possible, and how is he going to interpret that? He’ll take offence, think he’s smelly, think people hate him, think he looks like a creep, when really, if you look past his tattered flannel, sandals and tangle, he’s an excellent human beneath (you guess).
There’s good inside everyone, you used to say to The Husband and to The Friend. And you believe that you believe in this statement, in the same way you think love trumps social etiquette, trumps binding marital contracts, trumps maintaining a cohesive family. Everyone is good people, of course.
When The Husband came to pick up a box of loose watch parts he left behind, he looked down at your girth, asked, “How’s your metabolism?” and you swallowed, said, “Good,” and handed him his box of things. You’re happy for them, happy they’re enjoying life. You’re so, so glad, so glad. Their happiness makes you happy too.
Over the next block, the pavement sections lengthen, but for consistency, you ensure they still take only 1.2 s to traverse. You’re well into power walk territory, and there’s no slowing because you can’t hurt the young gentleman’s feelings, can’t let any observer know the true motive behind your pace. And the truth is, you’re probably not like this at all, probably don’t over-analyse your walking speed and the implications of overtaking a stranger and how they might feel about your presence and how they might react to you overtaking then slowing. But you whip past me and trail off into the distance at Mach 5, blonde hair and pink sweater swaying in synchronicity, and I’m trying to understand why anyone would charge through suburbia at such an obscene speed, and in doing so am projecting my mentality onto you. You’re a version of me, a 55 y.o. white woman version who lost her husband to her friend. And from that perspective, I get it. If I were you, I too would be an obsessive power walker lapping Rosebery no matter what the weather (and that’s all O.K., I guess).
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