Set up and take down

In the morning when I run I like to see the cafe guys setting up the tables and chairs on the sidewalk.  It's still dark, usually cold and sometimes raining.  The tables and chairs are neatly placed in rows waiting for the neatly placed patrons in rows to sit for hours and watch the world go by.  In the beginning I used to ask myself how they could stand to do this morning after morning after morning.  And then I realized that the flower man does it, too.  And the shoe man.  And the fish man.  And......me! 

I'm on the opposite schedule though.  Before I run, I'm in take down mode.  As you may remember, I don't unfold my "click clack" (bed).  I sleep on it sofa style.  But, I still put on sheets and pillowcases and make it into a little bed every night.  And I've never been sad about climbing in.  So, every morning, I take it apart.  The comforter goes on the back of the sofa.  The sheets go in the bin under the sofa. And the extension pillow goes on the floor next to the sofa.  What's the extension pillow?  The sofa is a little short.  So, I pull one end away from the wall and stick a firm cushion between the wall and the sofa and voila.....my sofa is a tiny bit longer.

So far, I've taken things apart every morning and it hasn't bothered me at all.  Now when I run past the guys setting up I don't wonder how they can stand doing it.  It's Parisian.  You work with the space you've got, you develop a routine and it's just what you do.  It doesn't even enter my mind that one day I'll return to Chicago and I won't have to wear my down vest to the bathroom and remember to take my keys (so I don't lock myself out) and  a handful of toilet paper and my mini-flashlight.  Who knows?  Maybe I'll kind of miss it.