something about leaving

She started feeling a little sentimental as she prepared to check out of the hotel. "I'll never be in here again." A melancholy trickled always, but, in the moments that she inventoried her stuff and looked the room over, the valve opened a tiny bit more. She thought of the city she was in and of how she was unlikely to return because life is too short and there may be other places to go. She would feel this way the times she traveled even while not ever really wanting to come back.

about how I should drive more (update of a previous post)

The 7:45 morning bus always arrives early, the 8:05 late. Someone plays her phone audio out loud on the ride. I get off at King Street metro station and wait for the yellow line to Greenbelt. After Pentagon station, the train surges out of Virginia across the Potomac—my favorite part of the commute. Looking out to see dulled light glancing off hard bridges, rough, sectarian waters, and wildly uneven expectations. I see the mild winter morning sinking the bots in their cars moving from A to B. I think of how every day I take the subway to and from work, but each time I ride, I feel like it takes me farther and farther from home.

At Len'fant Plaza station I crowd off the yellow line to catch the next train west to Capitol South. And, there, young blood marches to Congress for another day of legislating and messaging. They moved from somewhere in the top of their class down into the tunnels beneath this pyramid where they scratch walls and people, where they keep tradition alive, where everyone else can lick heels.