Thing about natural beauty, is it's always trying to grab you or give you Lyme's disease.

I left the house yesterday, because as always our kitchen is a barren, god-forsaken place, and I needed food. Of course, since everything in Owings Mills is within a few miles, and it had cooled off considerably as evening was falling, I decided I’d hoof it, and enjoy a nice walk. Having neither a car nor a license had nothing to do with this decision.

I didn’t find food, but I did swing into the Best Buy to buy a new pair of headphones and this, which is much better than food anyway:








> Eating.














Out in the parking lot, I rolled myself a cigg – a new habit I’ve picked up that I’m particularly fond of. I popped in my new headphones – cheap ear-clips, nothing fancy with noise cancellation or bass boost (not that I wasn’t sorely tempted to opt for the latter) – and then, in a sudden burst of inspiration, I took them out again. Deep down, you see, I’m secretly a Romantic, and occasionally I just can’t help these urges to appreciate my environment – to “stop and smell the roses,” and all that nonsense. It’s what separates me from efficient, practical people who get things done and advance society.

I took the long way back, walking alongside Owings Mills Boulevard. Perhaps you’ve never walked along side a four-lane road, as cars sped by? The wheels, spinning along the pavement, intermittently accentuated by flashes of music or bits of conversations floating out of open windows – it’s not very unlike the lapping of waves against a seashore. And though there is human life carried in that river of movement, hearing the waves of sound and seeing, maybe, the white and red currents of light, you feel lonely and awed. On this particular stretch of road, that loneliness is accentuated, because the place really is barren; business complexes with sprawling, empty parking lots, shopping centers that have so few customers that after years of operation they look brand new, and massive, empty buildings with more being built… It was surreal, standing under that geometric skyline, while the setting sun reflected off shattered beer bottles and empty potato chip bags.

When the future comes, we’ll only miss trees because environmentalist pussies say we should.