I have long coveted a headlamp. A colleague who worked in a more developed location lent me a headlamp in Sudan, and it was very likely the only thing that gave me the courage to go out to the pit latrine at any time after dark, let alone in the middle of the night (although, as we all know from reading this post, going to the pit latrine in the middle of the night was a mistake). It was so bright, and so stable, and it stayed right there on my head while I used the squatty-potty. I looked at them online while I was there, but they were around 90 euros for the kind my colleague had lent me, so I gave up on them completely.
This evening, I was in r.e.i. with a friend who was on a mission, and, having nothing I particularly need and two trips planned to non-U.S.-type places, I meandered over to the headlamps. I do this often. I look at them, and admire them, and then fail to buy them, even though they are much cheaper and more varied here than on the 90 euro website. Today, though, a salesperson came over and pointed out that last year's model was on sale. And then I found out that I had store points, making said headlamp very affordable. I bought it.
I had ridden my bike over to my friend's house, so on the way home I looped my new headlamp around my helmet and took off. I have a light that blinks on the front of my bike, but it doesn't really illuminate the road. It is more intended to alert cars to the fact that I am there, so that they do not kill me. Thus, it is pointed in a more, I guess, forward direction rather than down at the road. The headlamp, however, lit the street in front of me quite perfectly.
When I got back to an area with streetlights, I turned off the headlamp, and then, adjusting it while stopped at a stoplight, I flipped it right off my head and onto the road, breaking off the clear plastic piece that covers the lights.
This is the story of my life. I break things. I break things that I just bought. I break everything, it seems sometimes. Clumsy.
So I parked my bike on the sidewalk and scoured the road with the headlamp, over and over. Nothing. A bus stopped for me, although I was not at a bus stop, but I waved the driver on and kept looking. Nothing. (At least I did not hear crunching as the bus passed.) I wanted to cry, the way one does when a shiny new thing breaks, a shiny new thing that you value far more than you ought, just because it is new and shiny and you have wanted it for almost two years.
At long last, a possibly-drunk older man came by. I could tell from his demeanor a block away that he was going to offer to help, the way you sometimes can. Anyway, he did not smell of alcohol even if he was drunk, and he was not scary, and so I accepted his help, and it took him all of 30 seconds to find the little plastic bit. It was in the second place he looked.
I snapped it back on and the headlamp was good as new, save for the little nick in the top that I choose to regard merely as proof that it is used and useful.
Seriously, though. They should not allow me to have nice things. It should be forbidden.
This evening, I was in r.e.i. with a friend who was on a mission, and, having nothing I particularly need and two trips planned to non-U.S.-type places, I meandered over to the headlamps. I do this often. I look at them, and admire them, and then fail to buy them, even though they are much cheaper and more varied here than on the 90 euro website. Today, though, a salesperson came over and pointed out that last year's model was on sale. And then I found out that I had store points, making said headlamp very affordable. I bought it.
I had ridden my bike over to my friend's house, so on the way home I looped my new headlamp around my helmet and took off. I have a light that blinks on the front of my bike, but it doesn't really illuminate the road. It is more intended to alert cars to the fact that I am there, so that they do not kill me. Thus, it is pointed in a more, I guess, forward direction rather than down at the road. The headlamp, however, lit the street in front of me quite perfectly.
When I got back to an area with streetlights, I turned off the headlamp, and then, adjusting it while stopped at a stoplight, I flipped it right off my head and onto the road, breaking off the clear plastic piece that covers the lights.
This is the story of my life. I break things. I break things that I just bought. I break everything, it seems sometimes. Clumsy.
So I parked my bike on the sidewalk and scoured the road with the headlamp, over and over. Nothing. A bus stopped for me, although I was not at a bus stop, but I waved the driver on and kept looking. Nothing. (At least I did not hear crunching as the bus passed.) I wanted to cry, the way one does when a shiny new thing breaks, a shiny new thing that you value far more than you ought, just because it is new and shiny and you have wanted it for almost two years.
At long last, a possibly-drunk older man came by. I could tell from his demeanor a block away that he was going to offer to help, the way you sometimes can. Anyway, he did not smell of alcohol even if he was drunk, and he was not scary, and so I accepted his help, and it took him all of 30 seconds to find the little plastic bit. It was in the second place he looked.
I snapped it back on and the headlamp was good as new, save for the little nick in the top that I choose to regard merely as proof that it is used and useful.
Seriously, though. They should not allow me to have nice things. It should be forbidden.
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