Walking By Myself, Down Avenues That Reek of Time to Kill

 Okay. So, I was late for work a few weeks ago. The thing is, I originally had plenty of time, so in my addled brain I thought I could just water a few plants in our front yard. You know...Because the drought and all. After I did that, I still had a couple of minutes, so I figured I'd just run across the street to my plot at the Community Gardens and only water the tomatoes and my pepper plants. It was almost the end of the season, and those were really the only things producing much.

Anyway, I got over there and saw that there were some ripe tomatoes. I knew I should wait to pick those until after work, but I have this impulse control thing wrong with me, so I decided it would only be a minute more to pick those. On my way to the spigot for the water, I was amazed to see that there were quite a few green beans that could stand to be picked. Huh? I thought they were done. I was running out of time, so those could REALLY wait to be picked until after I got home from work. I want us all to stop here and admire my restraint. At least for a minute.

I watered the tomatoes, and while I was watering the peppers, this very sweet young man (he could probably be anywhere from 15 to 40 years old, but everyone looks young to me) came over with a root vegetable in his hand. "Hi," he said. "Hey, do you know what this is? I thought I just planted mustard greens, but then this came up and I'm not sure what it is." 

"Hmmmm. It looks like it could either be a malformed turnip or one of those weird white radishes. What are they called?... Oh yeah, Daikons! I wonder if there's some kind of vegetable identifying app you can get on your phone, like the plant ones?" 

He said he figured there was one. Then he told me this was his last day in the gardens. He had to nanny for some kids and wouldn't be back before we all had to be out for Winter. He also told me to help myself to any of the mustard greens he had left in his plot. Which was very kind.

Shit! Now I was actually late. I stared hard at the green beans, couldn't stand it, and said, fuck it. I was  going to take the time to pick them anyway.

I gathered up the tomatoes, green beans, and my watering can and juggled them all the way home. Of course, once I put everything down on the counter, I realized that I got weird dirt/vegetable puke stains on my shirt and had to change it. So, I grabbed a light gray shirt out of my clean clothes hamper (I hear some people actually fold their clothes and put them in their dressers. It sounds quaint). I looked down and realized I was wearing a brighter pink bra that showed through my shirt. If I had been in my twenties, I may have just gone with it, but being 58, it felt a little unseemly for the office. So, I dug through said hamper again until I found a darker shirt and put that on. Amazingly, it wasn't backwards or inside out. I searched around for a bit before I found my gloves, grabbed my messenger bag, hopped on my bike and headed to work. I was about halfway there before I realized I had forgotten to wear my helmet. I thought about turning around, but reasoned that I rode my bike without a helmet for close to 40 years before I started wearing one, so this one day probably wasn't going to kill me. I know, I know. I fully expected to slip on a banana peel left in the street, crash my bike, and bleed out through my temple  five seconds after that.

Amazingly, I made it to work only five minutes late. It wasn't even worth trying to explain to my boss why I was late. He's a busy man, and I'm sure he didn't even notice. Also, he's met me before and would probably be MORE surprised if I started getting to work early every day.