Sidewalk Oblivion

I wonder how many times I’ve been that butthole.

That’s the funny thing: I’ll never know. I can’t. That’s the nature of it. That’s what makes me the butthole. The oblivion is a prerequisite, a duringrequisite, and a post requisite for being that butthole.

I was walking down Newbury St. when I bumped into a butthole. It didn’t hurt or anything, but I was very upset by the incident. It bothered me all morning, to the point where I felt compelled to sit down and type this out; trying to make sure all the preoccupation wasn't wasted.

“Newbury St.”, in Boston, denotes a one mile stretch of swanky mcswankster restaurants and boutique clothing stores and ice cream shops that charge half a Chipotle burrito’s worth for a measly scoop of vanilla bean. Newbury is thus a place which tends to be seething with self-absorbed buttholes. (Note: giant, unfair, sweeping generalization. But also way too close to the truth.)

I was maundering down Newbury, headed toward the direction of the sunrise (read: east), being coated by a wispy stench of Italian leather the whole way. A woman was concurrently walking in a perpendicular direction (read: north, or south. But in this case north). She was emerging from the bosom of some indie coffee shop to the white light of her overindulgent paradise. The coffee shop was called Pavement, which makes any liquid flowing from their spouts sound repulsive, but that’s probably the point. It’s a hip, ironic type of thing. The name seems to imply something about being connected to the Earth, albeit artificially. I guess that’s the point, too.

Our lines of travel intersected at 10:22 this morning. But when they did, her behavior suggested she hadn’t a clue I existed. I had to step hard on the neuromuscular breaks, rotate my hips 45 degrees counterclockwise, so the momentum of my aging North Face backpack would not carry me through the butthole and the steaming cup of pavement she wielded, but instead the momentum of the North Face backpack would be redirected south and carry me down the two steps she had just ascended—demanding me to employ all the trace athleticism I have in order to save myself the $150 ER copay. And in the midst of this, I was the one to mutter a conventional “excuse me” to the butthole of her ears. Like it was my fault. I can be a real saint like that sometimes...

Still, in her world, I was immaterial. I was nothing. She continued down the sidewalk, readjusting the position of her ugly purse on her perfectly sculpted shoulder and staring down at the lid of the molten pavement. She never broke stride. She never looked back to check if I had stuck the landing. She never glanced over to make sure my head wasn’t split open and pouring its contents onto the swanky cement. She was too busy being a butthole to be any sort of concerned with, or aware of, my presence on her planet.

Again, I need to reiterate. It’s not that she didn’t care about me; it’s just that she didn’t know I existed. She was utterly oblivious to my living a life that was, at the foundation, very similar to hers, and in even closer physical proximity.

This happens often—this sidewalk oblivion—and every time, it really bothers me. Sure, the Newbury St. incident was an extreme version of what are typically more physically innocuous run-ins with sidewalk buttholes. But it happens all the time.

Three people walking shoulder to shoulder, saturating the width of the sidewalk, strolling at a European pace, leaving me to do stutter steps behind them, trying to find an opening to make my move, rotating my shoulders in preparation for a quick burst and shimmy alongside the wall of the building, and the entire time thinking what buttoles they are for occupying the sidewalk and being unaware of my presence and needs. Of course I could say “excuse me,” but I would hate to give them that sort of respect. So I never do.

I judge these people. Thus all the sphincter talk. I judge them as human beings with no regard for how they are affecting other humans. I judge them as buttholes. It is such an easy thing to do.

But sometimes I wonder how many times I’ve been that butthole, you know? How many times I’ve been engrossed in my own concerns, leaving me completely unaware of the concerns with which I share a sidewalk. I wonder how many times I’ve been walking the streets with friends on my elbows, while some poor chump behind me is trying to pass by, the entire time thinking what buttholes we are for having no idea he’s right there behind us. How many times I took a phone call in a doorway, without noticing the woman growing in frustration as she looked for a way to pass through. I’m sure this stuff happens. It must. I’m stuck in my mind—in my world—way too often for it not to have happened. I’ve probably been that butthole many, many times before.

I think we’re all buttholes sometimes. And I think that’s important to remember. We’ll just never know it when we are. It’s impossible to know. So I think when I go to assume someone’s a butthole, that’s fine. I guess I have the right to do that. But I should do so knowing I’ve been one too. So maybe 'butthole' is not a such definite thing.

(Sorry for overagressive use of a tasteless term. It just seemed most efficient.)