Braun
Riding on the public transport system has always brought with it amusing, frustrating but above all fond memories. Observing, judging, sniggering, admiring.. wondering about the person standing in front of you, where he or she is going, what they're thinking, when they're gonna die.. whether they OUGHT to die, how they're gonna die. Morbid, but fun.
This morning, a dragnet of three pairs of brown shoes pulled my attention away from a lady's blistered heels.
The first was skinned with suede, had a slight stump for a heel, and covered the i-would-presume smelly feet of a 40-something woman. Gaunt and frail, she shifted around, attempting to synchronise her centre of gravity with the sporadic oscillations of the car.
Little grunts of hot breath shot out from her nostrils, sifting the air for danger like a molerat. Looking at her reminded me of a picture I once saw. What magazine was it again? Ah yes. National Geographic. A hazy recollection perhaps, but she did resemble the likeness of a dying meerkat. Meerkats are cute.
I like meerkats, especially when they're young. Meerkats should only remain young. They should all die young, spare the world the misery of having to endure them in their old age. Very much like old scrunched up female librarians, except that old scrunched up female librarians should very much be allowed the liberty never to have been born. They ought to die as foetuses, lonely, severed, and helpless.
Brown suedes was probably a librarian, starting out young at the former National Library, working her way though the ranks, and now ending up at the helm of some department that little minority natives couldn't pronounce. Relishing in the power of authority, she would make her minions listen to her stories of the old building, and how if she had had a chance, she would go back to the old site just to exhume the little carcasses of all the little runts that she'd murdered throughout the years, stuffing their bodies in between archives of timbuktutian travel and cook books.
Alas, a hint of a copy of the previous night's copy of Lianhe Wanbao, flyers from Burger King, and a copy of Lau Fu Zi, volume 11,435. My fantasy was shattered. She's no longer a librarian. Boring.
I fixed my attention on Brown Birkies. The first thought that came to mind: bastard. I want that pair of Birkies. I pictured myself grabbing him from behind, ripping out his half-done dreadlocks (ok fine, I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. He got caught in the dryer.) and stealing the shoes off him. I've never stolen shoes off anyone. I think it would make an amusing hobby, stealing shoes off the feet of passers-by. Most people, I assume, would hardly know how to react.
Of course, finding the right fit would be somewhat of a problem, especially for a person with annoyingly wide feet. How wide? I could probably steamroll 5 egg McMuffins (TM) sideways, and conjure up Feetcakes (MY friggin TM) for some poor lonely kid bouncing up and down outside Maccer's wailing for his mum to get him a friggin ice-cream cone. It's an ice-cream cone. Get the kid the ice-cream cone. If he doesn't shut up after that, throw him in with the fries. He might take a while longer.
I digress.
Before I could think of how Brown Birkies was going to die, he got off the train, and rhythmically slipped himself in between a couple of school girls. They looked at him with the utmost annoyance you could almost hear them say "TSK TSK TSK TSK TSK TSK!!!!!" A woman did that to me once along the bridge. The rest is history.
I peered at Old Browns. Tattered along the seams, worn at the heels and holy beyond belief on the instep. Damn.. this guy was old. I could just imagine swirls of stinkiness hovering around his feet in concentric circles, creating a vortex of stench that would force my farts into retirement.
Old Brows could hardly stand properly. I could easily picture him in a boat at that very moment, attempting to gain his balance, missing the wake, falling overboard, lungs filling with water, sinking lower, lower, lower into the abyss. His shoes had stuck with him through it all. The riot of '64, the bombing of Mcdonald House, the reign of Singapore in the Malaysia Cup. They shunned the Tiger Cup, of course. That was just a disgrace. They were almost as old as Lau Lee's pubes.
I wondered if he ever bothered to take them off. It's like that sometimes isn't it. You get so attached to an item that you never want to part with it. I guess that's how a lot of junk is collected. Old bookmarks, pencils, clocks, random pieces of cloth that are given the excuse of being rags, the broken-down telly. I wonder if that's how old friendships are as well. Maybe people just don't want to be friends anymore, but they're just storing the friendship in the closet for future reference. It's interesting how we can literally throw tangible items like a bottle of expired fish sauce or spoilt milk away, but how we never really bother to just throw away a friendship, even though it may have just slipped into oblivion for a while. Expired. Old Browns definitely loved its owner.
I thought a smile to myself, and took a step toward the exit. As I lifted my head, Old Browns was staring at me. His expression was unmistakable.
"What the hell is wrong with these young people nowadays."
It wasn't even a question.
posted by Da Buffalo! @ 1:20 AM
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