the badge for forgotten popsicles

Good deeds. Good deeds. Sometimes I was told good deeds go unnoticed. Unnoticed unlike the terrible gut wrenching shit someone can do to you. Good deeds it pays off to pay attention to them. Like the view up the hill through Buena Vista. I stop the car every time to look at the hills, downhill, houses scattered closely together, seamless together of the roller coaster of urbanity. Flowing into the ocean the bridges into the east bay. I stop every time. As not to forget. Forget the view. The luckiness of the view. Good deeds are the same. Not the girl scout brownie boy scout eagle make but the subtle things we do. We do that are just good. That are just deeds.

As, I picked K up from his camp of Tree Frogs of hiking and running and superheroes and space camp. He had an excited grin painted on his face. I have something for you Kate it’s a surprise. He begins to slowly check out every compartment in his childhood backpack slowly at first then becoming more rapid, more quickly. He smile has now drifted away. He looks a little anxious. He looks like the anticipation of the camp has faded away. It’s okay K, I say you can look for it later. The virtual hug of nanny love. No Kate. Darn it- with his child like boston accent that speech therapy will one day fix. Eye contact direct and subverted. Darn it. I forgot. I forgot I ate it. It was a popsicle. A popsicle. Laughter erupts. It’s okay K. It probably would have melted anyway. There might not be anything sweeter than a child who saves their popsicle in their backpack for you. Except the good deed of forgetting he ate it. The puddle of the sweet was to be only left. His star wars modern lunch pail would have only held onto the freeze so long. So long.

Good deeds of subtly. Good deeds that are just really good. Yesterday as me and one of my closet friends walked smelling of the park and sun and champagne and beer and super tacos from a taqueria. We stopped. Stopped with the crowd of the bi rite ice cream enthusiasts to let a woman back her car up out of driveway onto the busy corridor of 18th street. We all stopped facing each other one group of strangers and citizens staring at each other waiting for her white lights to dim. Battleship opponents. But alas she began to get dangerously close to. Close to another car. And we told her the right directions and airport directed and baseball signed her out. But we only did everyone else kept walking. They had waited for her. Waited for her. That was enough. But we didn’t think about it. We just did it.

The good deed of strangers. It doesn’t mean more. It just something different than the good deed of intimacy. But the intimacy of two friends moving in unison in a good deed without discussing or vacillating or googling it- is a good deed within itself. That friendship isn’t an accident-it’s the good deed of a connection. We don’t get badges for these relationships or choices. We don’t need them like we once did.