booktastic

As some of you may know, I spent three hours last New Year’s Eve reading Visions of Sugar Plums while locked in a women’s toilet and waiting for my husband to get off work. Well, I can’t top that for a New Year’s Eve reading adventure this year, but I did have one, if minor and disguised as a misadventure…

Yesterday, New Year’s Eve, I got off work early. I wasn’t even scheduled to work yesterday, but they said we could come in to pick up extra hours (and that we didn’t have to worry about the dress code, and I was that eager to pick up the “Nostalgia City” t-shirt I bought over break) so I went in and worked until three-thirty. Then I ran by Trader Joe’s and picked up a couple groceries (including a bottle of Moscato for the evening’s celebrations) and called my husband to see if he needed me to drop anything by the Zoo where he currently works. He would be working until nine, you see, but he didn’t need anything, so he told me to just head on home. We would be spending New Year’s Eve quietly, together, with that bottle of Moscato and a lovely ball of fresh mozzarella cheese from Trader Joe’s.

It takes me about an hour to get home from my temp job. I ride one bus for twenty minutes, then wait ten minutes for my transfer bus, and ride that for another thirty minutes. I did so, and got home at about five-thirty; cold, and ready to put down my heavy grocery bag and put up my feet. I regretted not wearing my gloves on the walk from the bus to my door as it was colder outside than I thought, and my hands had gotten quite chilled. At the door, I paused, put down the grocery bag, and opened up my purse. I reached into the small, inner pocket where I usually clip my house key.

It wasn’t there.

Sometimes it falls out into the bottom of the purse, so I reached in and hunted around for a while. It still wasn’t there.

So I took everything out of my purse and looked through every nook and cranny, looked inside my wallet and inside gnarled twists of old receipts, and still nothing. That was when it finally struck me that the last time I’d actually used my key was when I let my in-laws into the house two days before, when I was wearing my old winter coat.

I was wearing my NEW winter coat.

I sighed. My feet had gotten very cold: I was only wearing canvas shoes and one pair of socks, as I hadn’t expected it to be very cold out that day - and my hands were getting colder every minute. For just a second I contemplated waiting on the porch until my husband got home - but five hours in fifteen degree weather? Without proper winter boots? Not even to mention the bananas I had bought would go black. I dismissed that thought pretty quick.

I walked around the house shaking the windows to see if any of them were loose - a futile gesture, as I know I keep the windows locked tight. I checked the back door to see if the neighbors had left it open - no such luck. For just a few moments I contemplated phoning our landlord, Mr. Komarek, and asking him to let me in… but I couldn’t see doing that to him on a cold winter night, especially as he’d recently been kind enough to pick up our mail for us while we were away for Christmas. And the thing that I used to do when I was locked out of the house - go and hang out at my almost-next-door friend Georgia’s until Mr. Hall got off work - wasn’t going to happen. My friend Georgia moved to England earlier this year, and I don’t have any other friends in the neighborhood.

I was left with only one option.

I sighed, picked up my grocery bag and trudged back out into the night and down to the bus stop. I had no other alternative but to ride the bus to Mr. Hall’s workplace, get his keys, and ride back again. I would ride the bus there (forty minutes), chat with Mr. Hall for a moment or two explaining where my keys had gone (ten minutes at least), wait for the returning bus (ten to fifteen minutes) and then ride it home again (thirty to forty minutes). At least an hour and forty minutes of wasted time before I could relax for the evening, all because I’d forgotten to put my keys back in my purse.

There was naught to be done about it, so I decided not to fret about it. I experienced a few moments of anxiety that Mr. Hall might get sent home early from his job and I would have spent the bus-ride in vain, but I didn’t worry about that too much since I had no other options and riding the bus was better than being out in the cold anyway. And I could read!

As soon as my bus came (which was a relief, as my feet were getting really cold by that time) I whipped out the book I happened to have with me, A Monstrous Regiment of Women. I had just gotten to a rather interesting spot when the bus dropped me off near Mr. Hall’s workplace, so I really didn’t notice that half of the bus ride at all. I had no problem with motion-sickness as (oddly!) since I started wearing my New Winter Coat it simply hasn’t been an issue.  I suspect it is because my new winter coat is more breathable and I don’t get as stiflingly hot.

I chatted with Mr. Hall for a few minutes at the Zoo as expected - it was a slow night at the Zoo, and I was actually able to do him a favor; he had gotten a Christmas present from the Zoo (a Zoo mug and a book about the Zoo) and I agreed to tote them home for him. I pocketed his keys as well, shook his hand (no overt displays of affection at work) and trudged back to the bus stop to wait.

This was probably the worst part of this excursion, as it is always extremely cold at that particular bus stop, and my feet hadn’t quite recovered from their previous chill - and it was too dark to read. I kicked my feet on the ground, trying to get the blood flowing to them, and trying not to be annoyed with the odd hoard of children who kept frolicking around me (who seemed unaffected by the cold). It was forever before my bus finally came. Actually about fifteen minutes, but it seemed like forever.

But it did, and I whipped my book out again. It got more interesting and I barely even noticed the time passing. I was a little worried that I’d get so “into” the book that I would miss my stop and ride all the way out to Cicero… but I didn’t. (Thank goodness). My feet warmed up again, and at long last I got off my bus at the corner and made the short, chilly walk up to the block to our apartment, and let myself in again. It was seven-thirty when I got home, so it had been exactly two hours since I first realized my keys were missing.

However, I’d read a hundred pages of my book, I can’t say the time was wasted! And once again, I had an odd New Year’s Eve reading adventure. — Mrs. Hall

P.S. Happy New Year! Mr. Hall and I had a quiet, pleasant, and even romantic New Year’s Eve and beginning to 2009. We turned the lights down low, drank our wine, listened to George Harrison and gazed at the lights on our Christmas tree. All and all, a lovely evening.

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