i love electric light

I WAS PUMPING gas early one morning three Februarys ago when he stepped out from under the streetlight. “Hey man,” he said. “Can you help me out with something to eat?” Good sense would have dictated I do the exact opposite of what I did, but it was cold and I felt bad for him, so I pulled out my wallet and opened it.
     I would have sworn it was full of singles, but there was only a twenty inside, and all four of our eyes were all over it. Two people have never been so sure of the exact contents of a wallet. There was no point in pretending otherwise. What else could I do? I handed him the twenty. “No man,” he said, pointing to the cashier. “I can go and make change if you want.” “That’s OK,” I said, “Here, I want you to have it.” He doubled over in disbelief and let out a sharp cry. “Thank you,” he said, sobbing.

     I’m not telling you this story to let you know that I’m the kind of person who gives twenties to homeless people. Like I said, I don’t recommend it, especially at 5:30 in the morning in downtown Houston. It’s completely inappropriate. Indeed, the situation at the gas station escalated pretty quickly. We were standing at the pump, talking about Electric Light Orchestra — I was wearing an ELO t-shirt — and we were singing the chorus to Don’t Bring Me Down when this other guy steps out from under the streetlight and approaches me with a small glass pipe. “I think there’s something still in there if you want to hit it,” he said. Then a third guy emerged. That’s when I high-tailed it out of there.

WINTER MAKES me moody — irritable and obsessive — so I prescribe myself a bicycling regimen to get me out of my head and out of my bed. Three or four times a week, no matter how cold it is, I get up early, before sunrise, bike to the coffee shop and write for several hours. I find the combination of exercise and fresh air has a way of turning a glum gray day on its ear. There’s something inherently mood-elevating about being conveyed on rolling wheels. And out of the house I’m less distractible. I have a space of four or five hours I can really pour my obsessiveness productively into. The regimen has worked so well that now I look forward to winter.

     It’s a short bike ride to the coffee shop, ten or twelve minutes, hardly an aerobic workout, but the benefit of the bike ride transcends the cardiovascular and musculoskeletal systems anyway. It’s true, bicycling keeps me limber, and learning to turn corners and navigate curb cuts without holding the handlebars builds strength and dexterity in my legs in ways walking or even working out at the gym never could, but it’s more than mere physical exercise. It’s spiritual exercise. It’s learning to dance with the cold. When it’s cold I want to linger in bed and vegetate. The bicycling regimen short-circuits that pattern. I embrace what I’d rather avoid.

AND HONESTLY, it’s Houston, so it’s never very cold for very long. It dips into the twenties maybe seven days each winter, so it’s possible, with proper clothing, to stay warm even on a bicycle moving through a light drizzle. The bike ride is a kind of morning meditation. At 5:30 it’s still dark, and even though the streets are well-illuminated, I’m always on the lookout for obstacles. I have to be mindful of the surfaces I’m biking over. I also have to be aware of my larger environment, one ear tuned to ambient traffic noises, the other tuned to the urban dawn chorus. I have a heightened awareness of my posture, leaning forward and backward in my seat, recalibrating equilibrium as needed, leaning into a turn. My eyes are on the road in front of me, where the rubber meets the road, all senses on high alert, open. I can’t afford to be in my head. My safe conveyance depends upon it. So bicycling can be an opportunity for the direct engagement of reality, which makes it a kind of meditation.

     It took me a while to figure out exactly what to wear, how to be warm enough but also not too warm. I’d underdress one morning — wrists too cold, for example — and I’d reconsider my clothing choices the night before the next ride. I got good at gauging the outside temperature by feeling how cold the glass in the bedroom window was from the inside. Some mornings I didn’t really want to bundle up in all those layers and go out into the cold dark morning, but I’d decide to anyway. I’d close the front gate and pedal past the flowerless oleanders, and it would never be very long before my decision to go on that bike ride would be validated in some poignant or profound way. I’d see or hear something, aloft only my gear-operated cloud, whizzing through the neighborhood, my senses fully engaged, my whole being in tune with my environment, and that something would shake me awake — bamboo alive with the chirping of a hundred sparrows, a man asleep on the sidewalk, a thin blanket barely covering his feet, a parked ambulance flashing its lights nearby. Bike ride after bike ride, I kept returning to two realizations. One, how distant we are from each other and from nature. Two, I’m not as cold as I thought I was.

A PAIR OF BLACK GLOVES, a pair of gray half-gloves, a gray thermal shirt, sleeves long enough to tuck my half-gloves under, an Electric Light Orchestra t-shirt, rainbow logo on black background, black silk leggings, black briefs, black tactical boots, a pair of short gray socks, a pair of long black socks, a long gray-and-black scarf, a shorter gray-and-white striped scarf, black jeans, a black coat, a navy blue bandanna, a black knit cap, a bicycle helmet — that’s what I was wearing when I saw him again the following February. I was chaining my bike to the street sign. He was holding the door open for coffee shop customers. This time I had a dollar ready. I slipped it to him as I walked through the door he was holding open for me. “Man, I love Electric Light,” he said with a big grin. I know he meant it was the band that he loved, but I couldn’t help but think he was also referring to me, that Electric Light was his nickname for me, that it was me who he was loving.

     The scenario still swirls in my memory. I was seated at a high table near the coffee condiment station with my headphones on. His hand was lingering in the air over the stir-stick container. I remember so clearly how he singled out a specific stir-stick for selection, how he tore the paper packet of sugar open so gingerly, how the coarse raw crystals tumbled out into the dark circle of his coffee, how his coffee steamed as he stirred it. He felt like he was a part of something. I could see it on his face and in the way his whole being softened into a prayer of utter gratitude. He was inside where it was warm, where the pastries smelled fresh and the honey flowed freely, and he was going to savor every blessed second of it. He was milking his coffee, literally, for all it was worth.

     I’d left the house in a sour mood that morning, and even the bike ride hadn’t shaken it entirely. I was wondering if all the mornings I’d spent scribbling away in my notebooks would ever amount to anything, or if I’d end up exactly where I’d started years ago, frustrated and misunderstood. And then I looked over at him standing there, stirring, and he was just so happy to have a fucking cup of coffee. And a packet of nice sugar. And I realized how warm my life was, even at its coldest. I removed my backpack from the stool next to me and motioned toward the seat. “I like your bracelet,” I said.
      He sat down and took it off — a black plastic wristband with NO WHITE FLAGS stamped across it in tall white capital letters. “I haven’t taken it off in a year,” he said, “but I don’t need it anymore.” He said, “Here, I want you to have it.”