Last Wednesday you travelled alone. You where in new place. But what else was new? You had made the journey before, many times actually, except mostly on different continents and under much more pressing circumstances. This time you were lost to all sensibility but somehow, still, had a semi-conspired plan in mind. However, you had not planned very well. Or maybe the not planning was part of the plan. You forgot to figure out in what direction to go or how long you would need to get there, wherever there was.
The place was cooler than you imagined it to be, especially in a district called Sunset. Though you never really imagined to be there at all. It was a place which felt more like Portland than any neighborhood in California. That day the sun was missing - instead, replaced by a dreary fog and a coldish breeze. You weren't quite sure in which direction you were headed. The most you gathered was that you would hit the beach by sun down. You had the idea to someday visit the Golden Gate and once on the tram, above ground, you spotted it, but in the distance - too far of a walk to make with your already blistered feet.
The shore was ahead of you, beyond the East horizon. Each bus stop which passed you thought, "I'll get off at the next one", but instead you chose to keep riding. You had a quiet thought, hope, or wish, perhaps, that he was there with you. But that wish quickly subsided. For in the company of anyone else you wouldn't be this still, this quite. Your thoughts would have gone to him instead of to those frigid, serene moments.
The bus topped the final hill to the coast as you spotted mounds of sand in the distance. To your right was a laundromat that reminded you of him, but just barely. To your left you saw two grungy, half-baked guys sitting outside of a coffee shop. Outside the door were two chic girls atop an over-sized piece of driftwood - the first sort of style you've seen in blocks. You shrug the thought that they did not belong there - that they simply sat in places like these in hopes of making a statement - away.
It was 1pm. You had yet to have had your morning coffee, and as it was on your list of things to do, you started toward the door. From the looks of it outside, you half suspected Nirvana to be on rotation, the flannel-clad barista even hinted to the scenario. Though "Silver" or even "Lithium" did not resonate in your ears that day, you were delighted, none-the-less, by the owner's southern drawl. He had relocated from North Carolina to California to take up surfing.
The blithe owner of that shammy, grungy coffee shop assured you that you were in the right place and on that day you decided that's where you wanted to be - that somehow your unplanned plan came to fruition.
Water from the Pacific.
