Loping along the strand this morning ("jogging" might be optimistic given what the oxygen-rich ocean air does to my lungs after my high-altitude acclimation to mountain living), the opening strains of California Dreamin' send me back to my many workouts in the Moscow gym. I can suddenly smell the vinegar water used to disinfect the equipment, hear the discofied thrum of Russky rock in the background, see the half-light of a northern afternoon waning through the full-length windows lined up before the bank of kilometer-measuring treadmills.
I remember countless runs on those treadmills, looking through those windows. Some days I would see Sergei the driver enter the compound to pick me up for work (I would be late!), kids walking from the British School to the Sports Center for their Phys Ed classes, Scandinavian moms with their gear-swaddled 3-year-olds riding independently on their bicycles--mostly, however, the Turkmenian workers, slogging through the repetition of their mundane gardening tasks, snow removal, or street and gutter sweeping. Desperate for whatever pitiful wage might accompany the derision of their Russian foremen and co-laborers, they never looked up. They were remarkable for their complete lack of eye contact, interaction, or anything that might mark them as individuals. The residents jokingly called them the "green men" because their uniforms were green, but the anonymity of that label would suit them fine, if they ever knew about it.
Today's playing of California Dreamin' (now that I actually AM in California) seemed to slap me with the comparison--what I saw then, and what I see today. Paunchy, carefully-tanned, middle-aged men balancing laptops on their laps while sipping coffee, --50-somethings walking up and down the beach searching for useless "shells," and the remains of hard weekend partying strewn across the strand are today's landscape. The memories of Moscow's jogging views, idyllic only because they are past, make me ashamed of the abundance California Dreamin'.
New playlist tomorrow.
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1 comment:
what i would give to be making my runs on that boardwalk instead of the russian gym you remember, although instead of the view you had out a window, i get to look at tv's playing russian court tv or another afternoon soap that inevitably involves a shooting. heaven help me. . .
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