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This weekend I started my Bible study project at Amy's brother and sister-in-law's house. C and T invited friends from church and we cracked open the Book of Ruth. I hope it wasn't boring, or confusing or just annoying. I'm keenly aware that things I enjoy are often far from interesting for other people...I often leave a class all hyped up only to hear a classmate grumble, "That was a waste!" Afterward C drove me to Hamilton, where I caught the GO bus into Toronto. Once in TO I caught the subway and a streetcar home. It was when I got to the streetcar that the fun started. I boarded the King streetcar at Simcoe, going west. On a Saturday night. As I waited for the streetcar a taxi pulled up in front of me and out stepped a blonde woman in a pink coat. This detail will be important later. She crossed Simcoe, heading west. Soon enough I boarded the streetcar and we were off. But King St. West is a land of bars. Gimmicky bars with plastic cows sticking out of the facades and names like "El Drinkos" and "Boozy McBoozerton's." (I made these up, but that's the general tone.) In the summer they cater to tourists, perhaps emphasizing their grills over their bars in an effort to snare families. In the winter they serve as the U of T social club and on Saturday nights King St. is clogged with cars and pedestrians. Into this mess plunged the streetcar, and we inched our way west. About three blocks along I spotted the woman in the pink coat. She was walking west and looking about, as if searching for friends. We glided past and left her behind. Another couple blocks of inching and I looked out the window again...just in time to see the woman in the pink coat, waiting to cross the street. She still hadn't found her friends. On we went. A few more minutes, a couple more blocks, and there she was again. This time on the phone, looking annoyed. By now we were almost out of the steady line of bars and she was clearly not pleased that her friends had been so hard to find and that she'd walked the length of the bar district. Perhaps she'd be cheered by the knowledge that she was making better time than traffic. |
