Like a Child

Hello readers,

Life isn’t fair. It is so incredibly un-unfair I feel like a child, but better, because I can appreciate the days spent in the sun, playing in the water, walking under a full moon. And my work days aren’t work, just days with a different focus, less aimless in their wanderings, frustrating but carefree. Ambition taking a backseat is far more rewarding than expected.

Yesterday, Alice and I woke at 9:20 am for our weekly Saturday trip to Haymarket. Emily clattered down the stairs to join us, and Erin crossed the street to meet us when we arrived. The sun was shining, vendors shouting, people crowding, vendors flirting, spinach wilting, plastic rustling, sellers flirting, food exchanging, community again. We wait for each other when we buy food sometimes, and other times we continue walking along the four narrow rows; the others catch up when it’s our turn to count out quarters. The satisfaction of good deals keeps everyone alert and engaged, and we have no trouble holding a conversation, despite the honking of traffic, as we head out purposefully to our next destination, Chinatown.

I drag everyone to the streets along the ocean, because I’m a terrible person and wish to extend the length of time Alice carries her 12-pound watermelon. Alice wryly explains the real reason to Emily when I crow upon spotting some open-air stalls. “Monica loves stalls,” Alice says, and I do. They are so much more welcoming than stores, with their loud music and smells, expectations and tiled floors. If Alice let me, open air stalls and wind over the water would detour me every time.

We pass C-Mart, the Chinese supermarket, so I rush in and pick up some bak-choi. I used to call them “dead trees” at home, and thus drove my mother crazy, but you hold onto home things tighter when you’re at college. Most people haven’t even heard of the vegetable, so I explain it to them as we walk the remaining distance to Chinatown.

Chinatown has a beautiful arch marking the entrance, in contrast to the dirt in the streets and the ever-present jackhammering of construction. However, people flow through the sidewalks, restaurants pour into every street, and cars give up their arrogance to the pedestrians. We wait under the Emperor Garden sign, our third dimsum restaurant this summer, as Alice calls Angela, Angela walks some “10 minutes away, really” with Shirley, Alice texts Penny, Penny texts Erin, Liz, and Helena, Emily called Alison, and somehow we all make it inside the domed room decorated with painted peacocks. The food is great, the conversation lively, with often three conversations held at once. It reminds me of home, with people talking across the table at each other, oblivious to the conversations carried out in perpendicular.

Next to boba (bubble tea), where we fail once again to make people like tapioca pearls on the first try. That’s fine; I didn’t have bubble tea at home either, and it grows on you with time. So many things here are liked only when you were raised with them. Happily, most newcomers like dimsum, though my favorite egg custard dish can be a sell. Alice cooked pig liver today, and I frowned when she sliced through it, when it succumbed to its intrinsic properties of sliminess and collapsed limply onto itself and the white cutting board. I knew that if my mother had cooked pig liver, as she did many other Chinese dishes, then I would be encouraging others to try it as well.

There’s a smiling picture of the eleven of us together, each Saturday photo a different group of people, a different restaurant, a different photographer, a different together. Us old members searching for a single dish of something new, and the old favorites; the newcomers valiantly trying everything we place in front of them, even when we refuse descriptions until it’s entered their stomachs. Wellesley students, usually. You meet friends over the summer that you had never talked to the school year; hang out with people living in different cities in the hot months and one floor away when you study.

It was a beautiful morning, so we wandered. Alice walked to Angela’s frat with her and Shirley—I walked with the rest of the group to the clothes complex. I never shop on my own, for good reason—if I wait until I go home every summer, my mother will pay for whatever clothes I buy. But here I was, and I did need new shorts, so off we went, me carting my huge backpack into the dressing rooms.

Clothes shopping always takes a while, but we were out within two hours, I think. Not enough time to be annoyed at any rate, which is how I like my rare shopping excursions. During the year, I’m too lazy to shop at all, so I order everything through Amazon. People laugh at me, but I don’t have a car, and there’s always so much to do when school is in session.

My back was complaining by this point with all the fruit, even though I had my chest strap on, the one you’re instructed never to use at any social cost. I did anyway, as I had finally given up on Thursday and worn a dress with sneakers. If anyone has a way out of the aggravating dress with running shoes conundrum, I’d love to hear about it; my current solution is to look at everyone’s feet when I’m walking, in the vain hope of spotting sneakers I could sprint away on that still look like they’re formal enough to pass judging gazes undetected.

But I digress. In any case, we had decided we needed to head back to the frat, though we once again detoured along the way. Alison had heard of the Health and Fitness Expo at the Prudential Center, and it promised free food and pamphlets. We toured the inside of an ambulance, high-fived the oddest mascot outfit I’ve seen (it seemed a potato, but I was later told it was a famous Bostonian rock?), received a bag that folded into a strawberry, drank sugared milk, and retrieved a Frisbee each. All told, an enjoyable and unusual stop, adding more to the stash we were carrying. I love Boston, and the constant events within its folds.

We then decided that we needed to see a movie, so off we went to the Boston Commons theatre. For the first time in a while, the movie previews were PG, and we giggled over the stickers we were handed upon walking in. “Grandma, wake up!” one little girl whispered loudly, tapping her snoring family member. “Grandma, you’re missing the movie!” For we were there to see Monster’s University, and the room was filled with families.

We walked then to North End to supply Erin with cannolis. I watched a man twist balloons outside the pastry shop, and sell them to little girls’ mothers, one dollar apiece. The line went out the door, and the inside of Mike’s Pastries was bright and crowded. Alison and I waited at the edge of the sidewalk, the slow river of people moving past, the sun set and the air cool. We walked to the park and Erin and Emily feasted, all watching the full moon’s small jumps back up into the sky. Erin headed home then, and Alison too; Emily and I got lost and made it back by 10:30 pm.

I thought about doing work; went on Amazon and watched Monster’s Inc. instead. Alice came back; we talked about our days. Read into the morning, climbed into bed, making vague clicking noises to scare the mice away. Asleep so easily, like every night, fan pointed towards me, covers against the wall.

Thursday, with my lab, was beautiful too. Presentations and picnics and Frisbee and swimming and talking and dinner and movies and friends. I’m out of time; your eyes are tired, but Thursday was pure kindness. Welcoming, vibrant, and so beautiful.

Life is not fair; it’s too fair to me. All I can say is thank you.

Monica

Ps. Questions and comments welcome as always :).