cold and a walk

it was quite cold last night but i had a nice long walk to the california street building to see an art show and sale of a friend preparing to move and casting out his past work. on the long walk there i went completely inside. i was aware of car traffic and of the snowy mess on most of the sidewalks, i saw the texture change sometimes to ice and made adjustments to my walking but my concentration and energy was all on myself, on keeping my heat inside. i think it was a little bit below 0 degrees F but the walk was tolerable, brilliant and amazing.

it took me a while to adjust to the changes, the heat and light and crowd inside the gallery space. outside, it had been just me and the cars. here were the people, and the paintings and drawings and prints. i looked hard at the images. i saw my friend thru his paint and ink and the patterns of his thoughts and eyes on the walls around me. i picked out an image of the inside of a bus, seen from the back, and almost floating up, out of body. there was one silhouette on the bus with the seats and windows in japanese black ink over white. it was very like my walk to there, my walk back home.