At 9am, You'll Hear The Bells From St. Patrick's

Most days in Marin, people are zooming by. Hard at work on workouts. Knee-deep networking, making the next deal and making a show. Traveling in Teslas until the rival Rivian is "it". 

On my way to work, thinking about meetings or what to make for dinner or that nagging Amazon return package I have to take to UPS, I rarely take time to hear the bells. They did, however, call out to me this morning.

Today is my birthday. A perfect excuse to switch up my pattern and look at lives and things so close and never noticed. It's an exit ramp and I took it this morning landing on a walking path, past the perfect donut shop (Donut Alley, Larkspur) and a bench under a small grove of evergreens.

Looking for quiet, birthdays are a time for contemplation, a gray-haired lady in a wildly colorful old red white and blue ball cap with a puffy jacket and a lanyard swinging from her neck startled me as she called out to a small crowd I'd failed to notice gathering 15 feet away. She looked like a Marge or Betty. "Alright everyone, any newcomers?!"Marge belted it out barely taking pause before launching into, "Ok, the joke of the day...how many sides does a circle have?". Again, Marge wasn't really doing call and response, just call. Nobody had time to consider the answer before, "2: inside and outside. Welcome back Phyllis. We all missed you very much. Let's get started with arm circles!" Marge deftly maneuvered the elderly bunch in a series of soft exercises while I enjoyed my sweet, fatty, delicious birthday treat.

Birthday trio: bench, coffee, donut.