(excerpt from a letter)
We’ve spent most of the day just wandering Asheville, and I should know better. Now I’m hot, kind of tired, and sort of in the mood to sit with a book and sleep, but it’s not really an option. For some reason most of the coffeeshops and whatnot in this part of Asheville are closed on Mondays. We’ve had a good time walking, lots of good art is scattered throughout the city, and I Love the way the buildings crowd in and then suddenly there’s this GAP and you can see mountains rolling off forever, hashing the horizon to bits. We’ve been hunting and exploring and looking at hats and skirts and discovering books and the basements of paper stores.. I’ve spent the last five minutes wondering if the skater careening down the street in front of the bar will make it out of eyeshot or if he’ll wipe out.
In any case, listening to all the accents, wondering where these people are from. the parks here are full of transients, as far as we can tell. One woman caught my eye, attractive but vacant-eyed, weathered in the way that usually denotes homelessness with hair that’s obviously sun-bleached white. I wonder how much harder it must be for an attractive homeless woman that it would be for an unattractive one, in some ways. Wondering about that and worrying. A shirtless man carrying nothing but a towel is industriously whipping dirt and litter out of the gutters and down the street, picking up scraps of paper and trash. He pockets the refuse as he walks over to the café where we’re sitting and very pointedly straightens all the chairs and tables, picking up the menus and arranging everything at right angles. Maybe THAT’S what people mean when they say we’d fit in here – that’d we’d get along well with the homeless insane.
