Jana is a capoiera kick to the senses. Always up for upright zeal and running around downtown. I caught her for an all too brief few hours on her five-day layover from Brazil back home to Australian waters. Hailing from Sao Paolo and containing compactly all the concomitant cool that comes with it, she was a-heading home to Sydney where responsibilities lay in wait lurking. But for the time being, fun and sunshine were the only action items on the docket.
We floated around Clifton’s Cafeteria and were mightily taken aback by all the taxidermy spectacles. She’s usually a vegetarian but on holiday that all gets shelved. On her plate lay a fat tri-tip in which she gobbled up garrulously. She also learned what stuffing was. Which was the height of my cultural contributions for the day. I also discover she’s allergic to dairy and gluten yet she accepts them with a smile. You only live once, she chastises to her stomach. Aches and gastro-gurgles be damned.
Next we find ourselves roaming around the Ross just down the street downtown along Broadway. She was going dancing that night and didn’t have a decent pair of heels for clicking. She flittered back and forth and up and down the aisles shoeless. It was a vision, alright. Toes tickling the fluorescent-lit linoleum floors.
Aside from shoes, she was always chasing that sunset. With much chagrin and woe did she mourn a day without taking in the dusk. But when she did find herself loitering around the purple hour of sundown, she would snap a thousand or so pictures. And she always had these pictures at the ready to share. Half of the time I spent with her were seemingly cheek-to-cheek gazing into her phone while she thumbed through it with deft finger dexterity.
When we first met she had a standard-issued, tourist-mandated selfie-stick. But at some point during our gallivanting she had misplaced it. Which was perfectly fine. As no stick was long enough to fully capture the fully-flared aura of amity that she emitted at all hours.
Other assorted facts pertaining to jubilant Jana: She can balance three plates with ease. She’s a banana bread connoisseur and is probably a better skateboarder than you. Also, any avocadoes in her vicinity will be confiscated and consumed summarily.
We’re lounging around the Biltmore Hotel. It’s perfectly past midnight and I have a train to catch. But her night is just beginning. She has a Red Bull in one hand and a plane ticket home stuffed in her pants pocket somewhere. She’s the Thoreauvian hero we’ve been reading and pursuing our whole lives.
I get one last glance of this breathtaking sight of beauty and desolation before I head into the soupy abyss of twilight downtown.
She’s got appointments to keep. And scores of sunsets to meet and greet before she sleeps.