The sudden cancelation of one of my dance classes found me in downtown Davis past eight o’clock on Monday night. Davis is surprisingly jumping for the beginning of the week in what should be the dead zone past graduation and before the start of the fall term in a university town. I pass gaggles of girls in high heels crossing downtown streets and have to shake my head and wonder what planet I’m from that this seems strange, when me and my sneaker clad feet are so clearly in the minority.
To me, high heels are for nothing short of a wedding or a night at the ballet, and I can picture neither of these things on Monday night in Davis.
Twilight is a strange time of day. I recently discovered that the term twilight can refer to either dawn or dusk. My whole life I didn’t know that. Likely because I’ve seen so many of the latter as to call them common place and so few of the former as to consider them more or less myth. Hardly matters if the sun is coming or going as far as the atmosphere is concerned, I guess. To me, the difference is the edge to the chill in the air and whether I’m tired, or entirely bleary-eyed and sub-conscious.
In warm, Sacramento Valley summers though, dusk is a nice time to be out and about. I still can’t figure out where these young, flirty dresses and high heels plan to be going on this still night in a quiet town. My sneakers and I are headed to the bookstore. It’s well-lit and high heel free, as is the coffee shop down the way.
The light gives over to dark so easily in the summer that I didn’t realize I was standing in it until I got to my car and absently switched on the headlights.
On my way out of town, I had to wonder if my choice of shoe and evening activity was some herald of the aging process. I flashed to several scenes in which my mother, my sister, and several well-meaning roommates held forth fancy shoes with a pleading look in their eyes.
No. I suppose it just means I’m me.