Frustrating days happen.

On this particular evening, I made a positive decision to quit stalking angrily around the house and walk to the library. Walking has always calmed me, mellowing my mood with each footstep I seal against the pavement. No matter what, a solid walk always injects a certain feeling of openness into my chest, drawing my breath toward the sky.

I've always loved to lose myself in the library, hiding away in a corner and running my hand over the uneven rows and columns of spines, delighting in the unlikely juxtaposition of subject matter in the nonfiction section: knitting, wine, bathroom remodeling, crafty handbags. Somewhere in this odd commingling of volumes my fingertips come to rest upon a book titled It's Hard to Make a Difference When You Can't Find Your Keys.

This title describes me in such an essential way I have to pick it up. It is full of language-based exercises such as making lists, thinking of life in terms of straightforward descriptions. I figure it's worth a try since I'm certainly not going to complete the series of visualization exercises in 4 Weeks to an Organized Life.

While I'm in the library my husband calls to ask what sort of soda he should buy at the store: root beer, cream soda, or berry lemonade. I debate sending a text message from the lobby after I've checked out this new book along with a copy of Stitch and Bitch, but think better of it. He can figure it out. I still need to walk.

My brisk yet meandering journey leads me down Union Avenue, past Formstone and brick and cedar shingle houses. The city possesses a nourishing beauty I can see and hear and breathe as my feet put square after square of sidewalk behind me. When I walk alone I see through the lens of Writer and Photographer, my mind constantly cataloging snippets of images, words, phrases. Rough, weathered brick; crumbling stone surrounding an archway of rusted steel; a clamoring bell urging railroad gates to lower into place as the Light Rail slides into the station; Dick Cheney's face in blue stencil on the sidewalk under the JFX; the cool, dark underside of the expressway contrasting the cars speeding along hot asphalt overhead.

Suddenly there is a young hipster girl in front of me carrying a green bike with one tire removed. The bike is carelessly draped across her back and she is walking briskly, her t-shirt soaked through with sweat. I tuck this away in my memory, too: her damp, almost-black curls barely held in check by her headband; her determined stride, powered by lean muscles concealed beneath the soft, milky skin of her thighs; the careless ease with which she carries the bike frame on her petite body.

Hipster Girl is still walking, starting up the hill toward Druid Hill Park when I turn toward home. I wonder where she is going with that half-dismantled bike, whether she is a figment of my imagination. Eventually I come up out of the valley and resurface on our street, my shirt damp from sweat, my feet passing under familiar sycamores.