slow paced and balmy
Tonight I worked at the library until it closed, and then I moved on to the laundromat. The Superwash curves around a corner, anchoring a three story walk up. Floor to ceiling windows showcase cream and grey stacks of machines. A folding table. Eames shell chairs, placed for utility, not trend. I’ve never actually come here for laundry. Usually I sit outside and write, comforted by the hum and wholesome plainness.
The Chef once asked me what my dream date would be. “Something sorta kitschy and unpretentious,” I explain. “Like backgammon at the laundromat.” He understands. Says he used to walk three extra blocks to the Superwash because the ambiance was better, and then drives past them both so I can see for myself. He asks when I’d last been to Hilo. Says I’d like the laundromat, there. “Still feels like Hawai’i is supposed to.”
This place still makes me think of him, but not with longing. Sort of like visiting a cemetery. Fond remembrance, no grief. We’d met here before a date. I’d told I wanted to meet somewhere far away from his bedroom. Somewhere “sexually neutral,” but I’m not so sure this place is. He gets us two packs of fruit gummies from the vending machine, sees me eyeing out the video cameras. “You little freak, I know you would.”
I like to walk neighborhoods like this around dinner time. I like when I can smell what’s cooking.
Both a bit voyeuristic from the sidewalk, he likes to see what people have displayed along their walls, or what program illuminates the living room. He tells me of an older couple. They eat from matching recliners positioned beneath the window. "You know, the type that only shops at Times."
I knew exactly what he meant. It might have been the most romantic Hawai’i-specific reference I’d ever heard, until a fisherman told me about “termite alerts.”
https://www.timessupermarkets.com/about-us
