Heisenberg, Goedel, and Chomsky walk into a bar. Heisenberg says, “From the fact that we are all here I can infer that this is a joke, but cannot determine whether or not the joke is funny.” Goedel says, “No, we can’t tell if the joke is funny because we’re inside it, if we could observe ourselves from outside, we would know.” and Chomsky just shakes his head sadly. “No, no,” he says, “The joke is funny. You’re just telling it wrong.”
Crossing the park outside the train station to buy our tickets back east tonight, the night smells like dark, warm grass and marijuana under the broken lights. A man on a park bench to my right sings a snatch of song as I pass, though with a falsetto woman’s voice, sweet, light, as if they were secretly a ten year old girl in a ratty disguise of fourty years of hard drinking. Inside the train station, I don’t see David, who’s to meet me here. The building is mostly empty, the sort of vast space which hushes conversation, forces everyone to talk a little quieter as if our voices might be swallowed by the square footage if we were to speak too loud.
I walk past the bench with a young dreadlock-attractive couple, the sort that are nationally recognized as being from British Columbia. They both look like they should live starring on Folk Festival posters, but a little more tired, a little more worn around the cuffs of their sweaters and indian cotton shirts. The next bench only has a studious young man all in black, with a pair of new wing tip shoes in a box resting next to him. I sit on that bench, after pinning him on my mental map as the least likely to talk to me, and take out my book instead of strike up conversation. David has thirty-five minutes to arrive with our cash, and then the discount on our tickets will vanish.
The clock ticks..
After every page, I look at the clock, trying not to fret, but thankfully, it all works out. David arrives with our money, the man behind the counter apologizes for the flawed website and the terrible help-desk women who hung up on simple questions, explaining that the help desk offices are located in Dallas, Texas, Nova Scotia, and Bangladesh. He is generous, kind, and completely helpful. (Thank you man-behind-the-counter, you’re excellent.) We buy our tickets, I shake his hand, and we walk off into the night, three minutes to spare.
Wagons ho, we’re going on the 18th.