it may have occurred to me in many different ways before, but the first time the thought clearly hit was a couple days ago when hubby and I were watching Life Story narrated by David Attenborough, on netflix - we humans think we are the smartest, but is there a very deep illusion there? are we actually dumb? and worse, making ourselves dumber using little skills to replace what intelligence and natural sense we did have?

I had resolved some days ago, that I would get out more often, out of the apartment, out of the suburb. spend more time in the city, awake, unlazy, out in the world, and more importantly, doing more work than I was getting done at home. today I set out around noon in search of a public library, found it, sat around for a bit, even figured something out in the literature I was unsuccessfully reading so far, and felt good. I noticed there seemed to be a lot of homeless-looking men watching stuff on youtube on the public computers. it set me thinking to what extent the whole internet revolution had touched the poor in this rich country. a couple other lone students were studying around, definitely younger than me, one moving rhythmically almost like Indian kids did when they memorized stuff. an Asian student with an exam coming up. another asked me to 'watch his bags' while he looked for some documents (I wondered if he was hitting on me).

there were announcements about free lunch somewhere in the building either for those aged less than or more than 18 (I didn't quite catch that). I got up to get some food for my grumbling belly too. found the neighborhood around a lil seedy and yet colorful. also emptyish. again, that luxury of being free to roam on a weekday afternoon. the Thai restaurant wasn't bad. big windows, lots of light, small tables, three couples lunching and some loners on the bar and me with my hardbound reading and watching Obama in Dallas on the big TV. the duckrolls were not the Vietnamese rolls that I would have liked and had expected (god knows why) but lil paratha rolled around strings of veggies and minced duckmeat. I ate, carefully pulling out the noodles of ginger from my rolls. that had a strangely meditative effect on me.

walking around after, updated my information as the neighborhood being more Latino than it looked before. lots of hole-in-the-wall places to eat, can try in the future. a cafe sign caught my eye at a crossroads and the walk sign to it was on. why not? not a soul inside, although empty chairs spilled out into the lil courtyard outside. Brazilian owners - a young girl and her mom/aunt - and their tiny lil dog (I'm not good with breed info). I got a tea and settled right under the TV talking about giant catfish eating or penetrating humans (?) in the Amazon. I must have sat around for at least a lil under a couple hours. aunty gave me a brochure for the lil cinema next door. the girl made some chore phone calls, they talked about some financial processes. a couple other relative/friends of theirs dropped by, more to chat, than to buy. one with two kids. the lil boy as boys are let be probably teased or kicked the dog (I didn't see anything cos I wasn't paying attention, nor did I hear any whines of any sort). boy was also excited by the giant fish on TV. after a lil while, the dog, snoopy, just jumps up to where I'm sitting and lies right next to me, his body kinda snuggling against mine. I was touched. all the dog-phobia that I've been infected with being with hubby so many yrs went poof and I stroked it very gently. the boy tried to reach out to snoopy, snoopy makes it harder to be touched, and I figure maybe this is harassment of some sort. I ask the boy if the dog is scared of him, he says something about maybe cos he kicked him or maybe cos he is standing, taller than the dog and if he crouched to the dog's height it wouldn't be scared). thankfully, boy's mom takes him and his sis away soon and I become snoopy's savior, by coincidence.

I'd hardly coochie-cooed to snoopy for more than an instant before this, but he knew. I wondered while I stroked him, how he knew that I would stroke and not strangle. people take so long to trust people, and maybe that's smart cos people do strangle. are dogs simply more naive and therefore trusting, and pay the price when it comes to it, or do they know better than us, in an instant? the question isn't do they know better? I'm sure I can find some answer to that with some research into the repository of human knowledge, the question is how do they, what is intelligence, and should there be a common definition across different species? I'm sure even that question will have some answers, somewhere.



I also ambled around, picked up some produce from a tiny organic market run by two young women, walked more, saw some plants outside another market shouting to me across the street. crossed, stood by them, wondering which one was willing to risk death while it added some life/color to our lil apartment. finally got a tiny pot of African violets, believing they are easy to raise. kept also wondering whether it would last enough to be reason to buy a pretty pot to put it into, reached home while thinking "there must be something at home practically unused that can serve exactly that purpose", after being dropped off by the bus at a strange corner I didn't want to be dropped at, retracing my map and figuring out the right bus by the same number that got me home. and ya, attracted attention from a couple more black (always) guys - one waved to me from behind his wheel, another after receiving a hi and a small polite smile from me in response to his mini-stare started to ask me my name. I laughed and said I didn't want to buy anything, somewhat disappointing him. some days.

I remembered why I liked Teju Cole's Open City. It was like Youth by J. M. Coetzee, which I'd liked a lot too.

and yes, I found something at home in the recycle bin that at least now is serving as a perfectly sized tray under the violet pot. this wouldn't have happened in my own apartment; no material lies around unused for future creativity. I throw, very often.