saturday

Me at the Loft. March 7, 2006. Photo by Alex Storer (probablevacancy).

Sleeping at the loft is pretty much the best thing ever. I like saying things are "the best thing ever," just as I've been known to describe myself as being "in love with" various people after only a brief encounter. The trains outside the loft are very loud. There is the constant shuffling back and forth as the CSX railway people assemble trains, or whatever it is they do as they run the engines back and forth pulling cars this way and that. And then there are the trains that just come roaring through without stopping, "the sound of a freight train in the distance," but the distance is spitting distance. When the steam comes through the pipes, the pipes clank and bang as if hit with a hammer. But with some practice you can easily sleep through the banter of trains and the restless pipes and the place just exudes an enveloping, peaceful calm, and the way the light comes in is good too. It is not a studio apartment. It is just a studio. It seems like the right amount of space for a couple. We slept until noon, went across the street to the public market and bought three mini cheesecakes for two dollars, and then ate breakfast at a diner.

I've been enjoying operating a free hostel lately. I forgot we had a guest coming today until I ran into Far and he said she had called from the bus station. So Bree and I stopped by the greyhound station to pick up our most recent guest, a girl named Alexis who lives in Ithaca but is from Los Angeles. We are the only hostel listing for Rochester, NY, so we've been getting a trickle of visitors. Alexis arrived and I asked, "We were just about to go for a drive in the countryside, do you want to come along?" And she did, so the three of us spent the afternoon on a spontaneous sojourn through the countryside and villages south of here, which is really incredibly pretty. We drove to Caledonia and looked at the fish hatchery. We climbed through the woods and walked along the railroad tracks. We drove on dirt roads and saw horses and pigs and chickens on farms. We happened across a family farm getting ready to host an event they call Old Fashioned Day where they plough the field with oxen. We ate ice cream at Scottsville.

Last weekend we had two hostel guests, a couple who drove in for a weekend in Rochester, all the way from Illinois, to check out RIT. About halfway through the tour of our place the guy said, "So, you just invite people to stay in your house? That's .... revolutionary." Inviting random travelers to stay at our house has been, at least for me, extremely gratifying. It does feel strangely revolutionary, and gratifying that maybe we are doing the smallest part to work against the alienation of the world, maybe what we are doing here will inspire others to open whatever they have to strangers on the road. After being with us for maybe an hour, driving down some country lane on our spontaneous meandering countryside daytrip, Alexis remarked, "I think it would be awesome to cross the country with you guys."