Some People Walk In LA

I've started taking walks when I get home from work. A couple miles on well-trafficked streets around my neighborhood before the sun has set with my white earphones tucked in my ears, but not turned loud enough that I couldn't hear someone approaching behind me (can't be too cautious).

When I got home from work tonight, I threw on my exercise clothes; black track pants, my light blue Dengue Fever t-shirt with a ratty black zip-up sweater over it, and old Adidas sneakers that do more harm than good to my arches and knees. I uploaded the newest This American Life onto my iPod, dodged icy looks from my cat, who was upset that I was leaving again after a day of being away, and walked out into the dusky evening that was buzzing with the sound of the adjacent Hollywood freeway.

When Ira Glass started to explain the premise of this week's This American Life, my mouth dropped open and I literally felt giddy with excitement. I felt like I had won the lottery. Basically the entire hour, which normally features three or four segments on a theme, was to be devoted entirely to the story of a boy who was kidnapped in 1912, and the story surrounding his disappearance and the subsequent solving of the case some 90 years later.

I said "no fucking way!" aloud - I'll admit to you. I've always had an almost obsessive fascination with vintage crimes, especially cold cases. Up until about two years ago, when I ceased having a television in my life, I had seen every single episode of Cold Case Files on A&E. I bookmarked websites that had stories of vintage murders and kidnappings, read every James Ellroy novel, and poured over books with black and white crime scene photographs at my favorite used book store.

When I got close to the corner of my block, where I turn up the street and make the mile-long trek to Vermont Ave., I realized I was going to hit the corner at the exact moment that another walker would. We glanced up at each other and both did a double take. He was wearing black track pants, and the wires from his headphones were bright white against his ratty zip-up sweater. He didn't look like the type to get much exercise - not that he was out of shape - but he was kind of a rocker, really, and I wondered if perhaps he just needed to have that feeling of being free after a long day in a air conditioned, pristine office, like I did. We awkwardly smiled at each other, both realizing that we looked like a matching pair of salt shakers, his and hers, and I slowed down a little so he would be ahead of me. I wasn't interested in him, mind you, I just love little coincidences like these.

I crossed the street so we wouldn't have that awkward experience of me catching up to him and attempting to pass, only to find that he walked just as fast as I did, and we walked like that the entire mile; me on one side of the street, him keeping pace on the other. If anyone driving by noticed us, they probably assumed we were a couple that had gotten in an argument and didn't want to walk together anymore. I wondered if he was listening to last Sunday's episode of TAL as well, and thought about shouting that question to him across the busy street, but I didn't. When we hit Vermont, we went in opposite directions.