Earth Day 1997

Spring had truly begun and instead of enjoying the rebirth of beautiful weather, for nearly twelve hours we were left with the maddening loop of light music and the pathetic gloom of fluorescent lighting. We were trapped in the high, thick cement walls broken only by the almost forgettable, dwarfed skylight of the Staten Island Mall. As the customers milled in with newborn relief from another winter's assault, they smelled of the grass they had just cut, the soil they spread and the flowers they fertilized. Behind our respective counters of service, we continued to be mired in the same aromas of every season. Bobby, stuck behind the deli counter, wore the comforting cologne of freshly baked breads and bagels; I, on the other hand, could to do nothing to shake free from the coffee grinds that covered me whole (others often talk of their love of these smells when passing them briefly, not knowing the hell of their ever-presence).

It seemed we were doomed, again, to have a season pass outside the walls of our employment prison without our presence. On that day, I felt a fury inside me upon this realization. It was Earth Day, after all, and I deeply believed that On Earth Day one should appreciate nature! The forest green hat embroidered with my store's name on it squeezed a little tighter. The air in the store felt thinner. The hexagonal tile patterns beneath my feet and the endless inventory of chutneys and preserves were dizzying. All the things that I once thought made our store stand out above the rest, crashed down around me in a flood of familiar. It was all a trap. None of it got me outside.

So, when Bobby asked me to go to the diner with him that night after work, I embraced the opportunity to drive across the island with my windows down allowing the wind to blow all the aromatic evidence of our confinement away. And when, after the enchanting date at the diner from another time, he suggested we go to the park even though it was nearing midnight, that's when I knew it was love.

That was the night of our first date. The night of our first kiss. The night neither one of us wanted to trade one indoors for another. It was Earth Day 1997, the night we didn't want to go home.