The Weirdest Day

Today was a pretty strange day.

I walked by the Turtle Pond while going back home after a late-night movie, and I saw that the water in the lower half was about half as high as it usually is. The upper half was as high as usual, and flowing into the lower half as usual, while the lower half was not getting higher.

On the sidewalk across from the Pond, there was a whole bird wing lying on the ground, with the feathers unruffled and perfectly aligned. It was gray. Only the bird was missing. I could swear it looked still warm and alive and it might have jumped up and flown away if I hadn't been looking at it. But it was all by itself.

The Asian couple walking in front of me stopped by one of the buildings and took a picture of the nameplate.

I was putting my fish back into his clean fishbowl and I dropped him. My first reaction was to say "Oh, baby! No! I'm so sorry! Are you all right, baby?" I've never called anyone "baby" in my entire life. I've had this fish for a whole three weeks. But he is beautiful and apparently I am very attached to him. More interestingly, we discussed animal personalities in Psychology today, and fish apparently have personalities (as do fruitflies, especially those named Trevor and Giles [who were pictured in the slideshow]). (For those who were worried, yes, my fish survived the fall. And is not traumatized to the point that he cannot eat; I gave him a couple bloodworms and he feasted upon them as per usual. But I will keep him under close watch for a week or so.)

I found a perfectly symmetrical arrangement of leaves on a live oak branch.

The email I was waiting for was sitting in my inbox, with the words I was not expecting.

My mother was in town, and was so happy to see me she took me to the museum and to dinner. She wanted to buy a piano.

At dinner, the waiter heard us speaking, recognized the language, and asked to trade currencies. A currency which does not exist anymore and which I have not carried on my person since that last day in the airport when my ten-year-old self treated my family to viennoiseries before embarking upon the longest journey of my life, the one that would change me forever. When we told him we didn't have any, he turned away and did not refill our glasses with water until the moment we were leaving. The other waiter took a personal interest in our menus, and tried to make me order some sort of fish on a bed of coconut rice. I hate fish and I hate coconuts. The place had a definite "Ranch" theme to it, but there wasn't a single steak or burger on the menu. I had quesadillas instead and did not have a cocktail, alas. I'm sure he wouldn't have IDed me. But Mother felt the need to say I was underage, so it was not thus. Maybe that is for the better.

At the museum, I saw a 150-year-old painting from a person I'd never even heard of before, and I recognized the scene instantly. It was a painting of a part of the city I used to live in when I was a child, one hundred and fifty years ago. None of the modern-day buildings, apartments, parks, towers were there. The riverbanks were mud, and horses pulled carts. But in the background, in front of the oh-so-familiar shape of a bridge, there was a house, a house which remains standing to this day, a relic lost in the middle of one of the world's most fabled cities. I've spent countless hours in that house. And now, seven years into the future and a century and a half into the past, on the other side of the world and an entire ocean away, I find it again.

The more I think about it, the more today appears to be a series of coincidences.

Or maybe it's just another normal day.

Maybe it's the spirit of All Hallow's Eve which permeates everything. Pretty much every person I saw in the street on the way home was dressed up and going to some sort of party. Which leads me to think, I may need to rethink my costume for tomorrow night. Clearly there is not enough fishnet and too much fabric to fit the norms.

Verdict: All in all, it was a pretty good day.