Pilgrimming

I don't mean to say, "lost in thought;" that implies a weight and severity not common to my mental processes. "Daydreaming," too, is insufficient, in that it describes a fantastic element that I can't safely confirm my thoughts were then employing. "Dreamy" possesses the effeminate , aloof quality I seek to express, but to a greater extent than I quite intend, and the continuous "dreaming" is better retained for its literal definition, referring to an activity I find indispensable. The pejorative "absent-minded," as in preceding "professor," invokes too specific an image: a disheveled, middle-aged eccentric whose visage couldn't be more dissimilar from my own.

Best just to say my "thoughts [were] elsewhere." That's usually where they are. But occasionally there comes a piece of input from my immediate environment sharp enough to penetrate the dense, tumultuous troposphere of my consciousness and provoke my attention. Returning to my car, I passed the patio of a pizza parlour, upon which stood two figures smoking and conversing. Visibly, they impressed nothing upon me (as the term "figures" indicates), as the myriad candidates of foci in my immediate environment collectively fail my darting gaze, not necessarily because the quantity of sensory information overwhelms, but because most of it is unremarkable when interpreted correctly (additionally, eye contact--always a possibility, intentional or not--carries with it numerous and varied undesirable consequences). But audibly, and perhaps on some deeper intuitive level, their presence registered profoundly.

"Life's a journey, man," said one, and that's all. I walked on and savored the resonance of that powerfully banal sentiment, functioning as a kind of ironic commentary to my current situation, less like the voice of a narrator than an incidental verbal soundtrack. A full block-and-a-half later, standing in a parking lot, it dawned on me that I had forgotten where I'd parked. As if I were being filmed, I turned 360 degrees, straining to recall. At last, I decided I had been heading in entirely the wrong direction, and set off retracing my steps. Across a distant intersection, I saw my car. Of course, to reach it, I would have to pass by the pizza parlour again, and the existential discourse transpiring upon its patio. Shaken to an uncommon level of awareness by my slightly embarrassing predicament, I was this time capable of devoting greater attention to the exact dialogue.

Still on the subject, the same voice came again: "I'm just talkin' about livin' life, man."

And I thought, Is there really that much to say about life?