Visiting Sylvia

I went to see Sylvia yesterday. We made a plan for me to stop by at 4. On my walk over I dipped into Rite Aid and bought Swiss Miss and some Maria cookies. The cashier accidentally dropped the package of cookies on the floor. "They're not broken," she said. I knew otherwise and ran and got another package. I said "It's a housewarming gift, I can't risk it."

I took the elevator up to the tenth floor. It was great to see Sylvia. She was wearing light blue Crocks with yellow ankle socks and her silver hair framed her face. The light was wonderful even on a gray day. Her view was magnificent. She's overlooking the whole city. We stood at the window and pointed out all of the things we knew. "There's the Stadium Theater, the train station, the Salvation Army, the Irish church, Beacon School, the Post Office, the credit union, the butcher shop, Harris School, the fire station. Her apartment was perfect, a kitchen, living room, bedroom and bathroom and lots of closets. The whole place was lit up by the southern sky. Her dog was happy too sitting on her purple blanket covering Sylvia's new remote-control easy-chair. Sylvia even has a deck and her own parking place below.

"I'm making a pot of coffee," she said. I suggested we add the cocoa to the mugs to make mocha. We tried the Maria cookies and they were perfect, just like English tea biscuits.

The furniture man called to say he would show up in a few minutes to fix the easy-chair. She had just bought it on Elm Street and said it needs more stuffing where her lower back meets the chair. The elderly man arrived with a bag of fluff that looked like pale green cotton candy. He took off the top section of the chair and flipped it over and and refilled it. Lucy the dog was thrilled and chased a few stray bits of fluff around on the shiny white linoleum floor.

Sylvia and the furniture man spoke Canadian-French and laughed. Sylvia switched back to English: "I've been married three times, I'm not cut out to make someone supper every night!"
"You make Lucy supper," I said.
"That's different, she's a dog." Sylvia quipped.

The furniture man said goodbye and by this time it was dark. We looked out of the windows again. "The city looks like a miniature Christmas train-set with little lights pouring out of the windows," I said.
"Look at the little curtains below on the orange house," said Sylvia.
"I could stand here forever and just watch."
"Me too, its better than TV."
"You'll have to get your police radio fixed. Then you can watch everything as you hear what's going on."
"I'd love that," she said.