Unpacking My Day

You just never know who or what will be in your day.
It was so hot last night that didn't sleep for more than a half hour at a time, then I dragged myself up at 4:45am in order to make the 5:18 train and be in Salem before 7 to help my mother move. Yes, I'd heard it was a national holiday, but all the electronic schedules said the trains were running normally. Sure enough, when I got to the station at 10 past, the gates were open. So I waited.
And waited. And waited. I grew increasingly more awake and therefore more aware of how exhausted I was. Turns out the train was running on an unadvertised Sunday schedule. Surprise! The first train didn't arrive until 10 past 6. I got to North Station to take the choo-choo (as my grandmother would say: the subway is the "train" the commuter train is the "choo-choo") and discovered that I couldn't get a to Salem until 10:30. Tired and ticked off, I seemed to remember a long distance bus leaving out of Revere, so I took the subway to Revere Beach to find it. I found myself staring out over the ocean at quarter to 7 and, for the first time ever, was bored by its pale blue immensity. Gulls took a Sunday-type break from the work of elegant flight to idly skwack and waddle. The seaside was sedately devoid of romance.
I wandered from bus stop to bus stop, trying to figure out where the 450W would stop, since I heard it takes an "irregular" route on Sundays. I was going to wait on the northbound side, but that would be far too logical. Instead I chose a bus stop on a westbound side street labeled for every local but the 450W and, sure enough, the one and only 450W of the day pulled up right against my toes. (hells yeah, I still got it!)
I rode on towards Salem, hoping that this stressful adventure was just a once-a-year renewal of my certification as Maven of Public Transportation. I arrived in downtown Salem at 8:30 and made a beeline for the corner full of coffee shops. Walking in the opposite direction was a best friend from high school, dressed in barista green. She smiled as though she had expected me, then brightened even more when she actually realized who I was. We doubled back to her Corporate Coffeeshop, where she slipped me some much-needed caffeine. She made me promise to call her once I was done moving things to come and see her new place that she's renting along with another great high school friend.
After the unfortunate novelty of the Sunday schedule my day took an "irregular" route down memory lane as I moved my mother's things. Most of what matters to me fits in my apartment, but among Mom's many things there are still a few that are transportive to nice moments in time. I was pleased to find an antique sewing machine that I had bought a few years ago, loaned to my grandmother (who was going to get it fixed,) and given up for lost after she died.
After my first McDonald's lunch in years and a day of moving well done I went to see my friends' new place. We laughed at the glass ghosts of their fourth of July festivities and at the images of ourselves in old photographs (and tapes!) they had at hand.
By now I was starting to fade, but I bused myself to Boston for one more event- An excellent staged reading of a British play. I was invited to stay for champagne, but I was afraid of where the bubbles might take me and opted for the train instead. As though to make up for the morning's events, an 11:03 rumbled right up to meet me.
This sketch is too literal; this post is too much a chronology. Sometimes, though, it's good to be reminded of how much you were able to pack into a day: what joy you were able to fit in around your irregularly-shaped frustrations.