imagine if you will...............

note: i am going to post a couple of pictures of my handbag (yeah, i'm that brave) but blogger for some reason won't upload them. i'll try later

i am so angry with myself i could spit! at approximately 11:45 am in broad daylight on a VERY major street in hartford, i missed a photographic opportunity of a lifetime (this was yesterday, wednesday may 31st). i would have won awards, EVERY photography award there is out there. oh, i had my digital camera with me. i take it every place i go. it was stuffed somewhere down in the bowels of my handbag. well, handbag is a misnomer. it's more of a canvas type CASE. it's heavy too. i have a LOT o' stuff in it. consequently i walk rather lopsided at all times (but i'm STILL as graceful as a gazelle). there are several sections of hartford. downtown where all of the insurance companies are. years ago, downtown had giant wonderful department stores. g. fox and company was the biggest and best. it had 10 or 11 floors, i've forgotten the exact number. all of the state of connecticut came out to see their christmas display in december. i loved that store! the north end where i grew up. now it is the 'ghetto' section of the city. it still has some lovely old houses but it has a lot of homes and apartments in ruins too. within the span of the last week, there were SIXTEEN shootings in and around that neighborhood. my friend brian lives on the street i grew up on. he is one of those 'catholic workers' our govmint (rory's word which i just appropriated) is spying on. he was recently arrested at a protest in dc. i believe he is the ONLY white (i mean REALLY white, irish white) person living in that area. anyway, it's a SMALL world. another section is the north meadows. that's where a lot of trucking companies and porno shops are. then there is the south end. the south end was strictly italian back in the day. now it is some italian and very much hispanic. the italian grocery stores and INCREDIBLE bakeries are still there though as well as a ton of the best italian mom and pop restaurants. DAMN they make some FINE FINE FINE food. the section of hartford i was in is called the west end. it has a GREAT mix of people. young ones, old ones, all ethnicities, some VERY nice homes, some not so nice ones. tons of doggies (one of my favorite hounds, nero the pit bull lives in this hood), lots of restaurants of ALL types (authentic mexican, a 1/2 japanese 1/2 korean one, pizza joints by the dozens, and probably more little tiny chinese restaurants than any other place in the world, including china. my favorite pub the half door is in this hood too.

well to get back to what i was really saying......i was stopped at a light on this major hartford artery and i glanced over at the sidewalk to my left. the only thing i could focus on (at first at least) were legs. BARE, CHUNKY legs starting at some cut off daisy dukes (when i say cut off i mean you could practically see heaven) and ending with some open-toed, open-heeled, strappy, platform skanky-ho shoes. oh i did notice her hair too. it was either wet or VERY greasy. she had a comb in her hand and was using it constantly. i instinctively had a feeling deep down in my gut something amazing and wondrous was going to happen. i unzipped my bag and started to fumble around for my camera (see recreation) while never removing my eyes from the vision on the sidewalk. all of a sudden, she bent over from the waist (still combing her hair mind you) and what was left of her daisy dukes disappeared up in her crack. i was frantic at this point. in tears, i couldn't find the damn camera! damn damn damn damn. too late - she stood up (wobbly on those skanky-ho shoes) and the light changed and i had to go. i thought about circling back but i had a very important errand to run. i really wanted not only the picture that would have brought me fortune and fame BUT i really really really needed to know if that poor lonely woman ever found the date she so desperately needed.