10.46 Riverdale Park

A few weeks ago, I was riding the streetcar along Broadview Avenue. During rush hour I like to stand. This isn’t because I am noble and chivalrous, I just want to no be judged for taking the seat from someone more deserving. Standing is definitely more uncomfortable, especially if you are in the small aisle between seats. You’re always in the way. People need to get past you and around you, and there’s nowhere for you to go. You’re just in the way.

Anyways.

I’m standing on the streetcar, and we were riding steadily uphill past Riverdale Park, which I would argue is one of the best views of the city. It’s not a great place to walk along at sunset though, especially if you’re a single person. Wow, do couples love this park at sunset. As someone who is, as Emma Watson put it, self-partnered, it really makes you think that all you need in life is another person and a sunset.

ANYWAYS.

I’m looking out the window of the streetcar, and at the stop right across from Riverdale Park, a man in his 50s gets on. Starting in the palm of his left hand was a row of cellphones that all the way up his forearm. Five in total. They seemed attached to him, but on closer inspection, they were attached magnetically to some type of metal bar wrapped around his arm. With his right hand, he moved from phone to phone, swiping and minimizing and sliding along the screens. His eyes scanned from screen to screen, then up the back of the streetcar and down the front. Then back to the screens.

“Hey, mister,” a kid said. “Are you playing Pokemon Go?”

“Yes,” the man said, without looking. “Pokemon Go.”

“Why do you have five phones?”

“Old phones. Five accounts. Five times the Pokemon.”

The man’s eyes darted past the kid’s head and out the window, down the hill that bordered Riverdale Park. He slammed his right hand on the STOP button and barely could wait for the doors to open. I watched the man dangerously run across the street, swiping his eyes from his phone to the other side of the street. Pretty much ignoring the honking cars.

The chime sounded for the streetcar doors to close. At the last minute, I slipped through the closing doors, my backpack getting caught between them. I could feel everyone on the streetcar glaring at me. I was that guy. The guy who puts his own convenience above everyone else. With one last pull, my backpack came free and I ran across the street, a car slamming on its breaks, barely avoiding me.

I caught up with the man. I didn’t have to worry about being discrete as he was focused on his five phones. He walked fast and had to pick up my pace to catch up. I kept the quick stride with him, stopped when he stopped, mirrored his every move. Out of the corner of my eyes, I thought I saw something unusual in the sky. I know this sounds strange, but the only thing that came to mind at the time was: there’s a dragon in the sky.

I shrugged it off and kept following the man. We hit a forested area and he dove right in, which meant, so did I. It was getting dark, the sky was clear. The full moon was the only thing illuminating us. The moon, and the man’s five cell phones. The woods just kept getting deeper, and darker.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a figure, but something that did not look human. It was yellow and looked like a cross between a bunny rabbit and a cartoon version of a bunny rabbit. It had red cheeks. I wasn’t afraid of it, but I also knew it might not be friendly.

I kept following the man and his five bright beacons. I wondered how I got here, how no one knew where I was, even the man. I’ve thought a lot about loneliness, about being alone, and what that means. I walked deeper into the woods and as everything got darker, I started seeing more and more of these animal-like creatures flying and running around me. As we kept walking through the woods, I went further inside myself. The world as I knew it ceased to exist in the same capacity. These figures swirled around me, they were colourful and bounced from the ground to the sky. Jumping and flying.

All of a sudden, the old man stopped so abruptly that I almost bumped into him. He turned slowly around, and for the first time since following him, he seemed focused on one thing: me. He lifted his right hand and pointed his index finger at me.

“You can see them,” he said. “Without one of these.” And he lifted up his left cellphone-laden arm. It was at that moment when something hit me on the head, and the world went dark. When I woke, my life would never be the same.