An elderly man in dress shirt and pants, brown dress shoes with Velcro closures. His hands shake as he holds a short story collection, turns each page. Between his knees, a black cane and tote bag filled with books.
Two women from Eastern Europe—Romania maybe?—dark hair and eyes, slender bodies. Both wear fur vests, carry beautifully tailored leather bags. Their language lilts in the space between them, unfamiliar (to my ear) consonants.
A man wearing a gray flat cap and black-framed glasses works on his laptop. Leans around the white stone wall separating his table from the table next to him, asks the woman sitting there to explain how to use the words ‘to’ and ‘too.’ ‘English is my second language,’ he says. The woman leans around to read his laptop screen.
A tourist couple wearing heavy winter coats share a pot of tea, the turquoise china set between their hands, their unfolded maps. New mothers push plastic covered strollers in from the rain. Three women with white hair tie bright scarves around their necks, fasten them with gold broaches.
And suddenly, my father. Through plate glass windows, my father in a boxy suit, black briefcase in each hand. He walks quickly, slightly limping from his bad knee, and is out of my sightline before I can wave my hand. But a wave would have been ridiculous: my father is dead. And the man didn’t look my way, that ghost of my father didn’t see me. Another woman’s father, maybe.
London. Bath. Café after café: I watch a woman eat chocolate cake for breakfast, a business-looking man reading a folded paper, a man who worked the night shift—red plaid shirt, dirty knit cap—sleeping on a corner sofa. Listen to a couple discuss William and Kate’s expected baby—a girl, the woman claims.
Café as meeting place, resting place. Pause in the middle of the day. Time to be anonymous, alone in thought. Time to eavesdrop on others’ lives, imagine their lives as my own for a moment: if I wore that fur vest, who would I be? If I met that girlfriend with two-year old twins? If I came here to write, ask help of those around me? I sit and watch and listen. I ask myself again and again: who of these myriad variations do I want to be?
Planet of the Blind 