Leonard's commute
Dunnock Bay's garbage man heads into the depot
“Cinque…” sang Leonard under his breath.
He picked up his wallet from the counter and put it in the left front pocket of his jeans.
“Dieci…” he sang, a little louder.
He walked into the front hall and grabbed his keys from the hook by the door. He placed the keys in his front left pocket, too. It was a little bulky in there with his wallet, but he liked to save his front right pocket for his phone alone. Anything else in there with it could scratch the screen.
“Venti..” he sang, full voiced now.
“Are you leaving?” called the muffled voice of his wife Cassie from upstairs.
“Si!” he called up the stairs. “Come down here and smooch me before I walk out the door.”
Cassie dashed down the stairs.
“You look so nice!” he said, as she hit the bottom step.
“Why, thank you,” she said, giving a slight curtsy before kissing him. “I have a meeting with the town this morning. I need it to go really well.”
“Tell ‘em if it doesn’t, I’ll refuse to pick up their compost bins for a month.”
Cassie gave a wan smile.
“With that kind of support, I can accomplish anything,” she said. “Hey, what was that you’re singing this morning? Suddenly you’re Italian.”
“Trenta… trentasei…” he sang, opening the door.
“Which is…” she said.
“Quaranta!” he sang. He gave a little twirl on his way through the door and said “Marriage of Figaro. I listened to it most of yesterday in the truck.”
“Lovely,” she said. “Tell me more tonight. You’ll miss the bus.”
“Good luck today!” he shouted as she shut the door behind him.
Leonard spun on his heel and strolled up his front walk toward the sidewalk. This is when he used to put on his headphones to lose himself in a podcast for the duration of his commute to work. These days, he left them at home and let the melodies in his head keep him company.
He hung a left at the sidewalk and walked up Peter Ave towards George Street. He had a bounce in his step as he continued to hum the opening duet from Figaro.
Celeste had really unlocked opera for him in the last few months. What began as a real struggle had blossomed into genuine enjoyment. He looked forward to their time together so she could explain some of the stories of the operas and about their composition and historical contexts.
“Morning, Lenny,” shouted Dr. Hadley from his front door, as he picked up his newspaper from his step. “Not a bad day.”
“I’m not even wearing a jacket!” called Leonard. “Don’t tell my doctor. He’ll be worried I’ll catch cold.”
“I won’t tell him if you don’t,” said Dr. Hadley.
Leonard smirked as he kept on his path. He smiled and nodded to a young woman walking a little dog on the opposite side of the street, who returned the greeting in kind.
It really was a gorgeous, sunny day. The winter had been cold with lots of snow, but the last week had been unseasonably warm. Two days of rain made short work of most of the standing snow. Since then, his social media feed has been filled with Dunnock Bay residents sharing photos of snowdrops and crocuses blooming in sunny garden spots across town. Just this morning, he marvelled over Damandeep’s photos of her garlic crop pushing through the soil. If you’d told him ten days ago spring was on its way, he’d have laughed at you.
Leonard smiled. That’s how spring worked. It was a miracle every time.
If he’d given himself a bit more time this morning, he might have even walked to work at the depot. If tomorrow was as nice as today, he’d get moving a bit earlier.
Leonard hiked the four blocks up Peter and hung a left on George. He had just enough time to pop into Bobby’s to pick up a coffee before the Number One drove past. He took a moment to pause at the window of the old record shop. He wondered if they had carried opera.
The bell on the door jingled at Bobby’s as he walked in.
“Morning, Bobby,” he said, walking straight up to the counter.
Bobby nodded. “Lenny,” he said. He turned to his shiny espresso machine and started brewing an Americano without even taking Leonard’s order.
Leonard leaned against the counter, making idle chit-chat with Bobby as he ground the coffee and tamped it carefully in the basket.
“The Mets look good,” said Leonard, knowing exactly who he was talking to.
“They look GREAT,” said Bobby. “Did you see Benge in that opener?”
“Nah, but I caught the highlights.”
“First hit in the majors, a home run,” said Bobby, fitting the coffee basket into the machine. “Who needs Alonso?”
“Had to strike out twice first,” said a voice from down the counter.
“Get outta my coffee shop with that Yankee crap, Tim,” shouted Bobby, his hands expertly making Leonard’s coffee the whole time. “You let me know if your precious Aaron Judge is going to wake up tomorrow and decide to play like it’s 2024, and we’ll talk.”
“Just sayin’,” said Tim.
“Just say it somewhere else,” said Bobby.
He put a lid on the plain white paper cup in his hand and passed it to Leonard.
“Better run,” he said. “Gloria ain’t gonna hold that bus forever.”
Leonard spun around and saw the Number One idling just outside the coffee shop.
“God bless that woman,” he said.
“Wait. Give her this,” said Bobby, pouring a cup of drip coffee. He added a shocking amount of cream and a tiny amount of sugar.
“You got it,” said Leonard, grabbing the cup. He walked towards the door. “I’ll pay up tomorrow, Bobby.”
“Yeah yeah,” came the response.
Leonard jogged to the open front door of the bus and stepped on.
“Gloria!” he said, handing her a cup of coffee. “Complements of Bobby.”
“That’s my boy,” she said, gladly accepting the cup.
She took a sip and sighed.
“He knows just how I like it,” she said as Leonard took a seat just behind her. “You think he’s sweet on me?”
“How could he not be, Gloria?” said Leonard.
“Oh no, now you’re sweet on me, too,” said the driver. “I’m gonna have to tell Cassie.”
“Gloria, I think it’s likely Cassie is also sweet on you,” he said with a grin. “Your problem is, absolutely every soul in Dunnock Bay is sweet on you. How on earth are you supposed to choose?”
Gloria whistled.
“Guess I’ll have to ask Gerry,” she said. “If I can’t trust my husband’s advice, who can I?”
Leonard laughed. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone and swiped it on.
He really was trying to spend less time on his phone. What a trap, this little device. He had deleted all his social media accounts from his phone, but he still had one vice he couldn’t quit.
He tapped the icon for The New York Times Games App and selected Wordle.
Gosh, he loved the Wordle. The whole world could be on fire, and he’d still probably get an itch once a day to guess that five-letter word.
He tapped the screen to move past an ad for a GMC pickup and saw the puzzle laid out in front of him.
It looked the same as it always does. Six lines of five boxes, waiting for him to input his first guess.
He always started with the same word. NORTH. He knew it wasn’t on anyone’s recommended list of optimized first guesses, but he liked it just the same. He’d been using NORTH as his first guess since before the Times bought Wordle.
He knew there were more efficient guesses. AUDIO took care of most of the vowels in one go. His wife favoured PLATE and had good results. But he liked NORTH. He knew what to guess on his second guess every time, based on the results of the first. It was too late to switch now, and he didn’t want to anyway.
He typed the letters into the keyboard and hit enter.
This was the moment he liked most of all. Each box flipped over to reveal if it was a correct letter (green), correct letter in the wrong spot (yellow), or wrong (grey).
Sometimes, the reveal animation seemed like it was going in slow motion, which is exactly what happened this morning. It was as if time itself slowed to delay the reveal of his results.
N. Green. (“Yes!”)
O. Green. (“Haha!”)
R. Green. (“Whoa!”)
T. Green. (“WHAT.”)
H. Green.
Leonard blinked. He looked up and saw the familiar George Street landscape whoosh past the bus windows before looking back to his screen.
He had done it. He guessed the Wordle in one try.
“Well, I’ll be,” he said to no one.
He knew guessing the Wordle in one was just luck. There was no calculation. There was no puzzling. It was just a guess, and today it just happened to be the right one.
Still, this felt special. It felt like he’d accomplished something.
It suddenly struck him, if he keeps guessing NORTH, he’ll never get the Wordle in one ever again.
Should he change his first guess?
He’d have to think about it.
“Lenny,” said Gloria. “We’re here. I ain’t picking you up and carrying you off this bus. Not after last time.”
“Oh,” said Leonard, suddenly coming back into the world.
The bus had stopped. They were idling in front of the town garbage depot. His big truck was parked in the wash bay, just where he’d left it last evening.
“Sorry,” he said, hopping up.
He thrust his phone in his pocket and walked to the front of the bus.
“It’s alright,” said Gloria. “It’s a heady thing, getting the Wordle in one.”
He looked at her. She was smirking.
“NORTH, right?” she said.
He stared dumbfounded.
“Did I tell you my guess?”
“Years ago,” she said. “As soon as I did the puzzle this morning, I thought: Lenny’s going to have a great day.”
Leonard smiled.
“I think you’re right,” he said.
She winked.
“Have a great day now,” she said.
“You too.”
He climbed down the steps to the sidewalk where he noticed the tiniest amount of snow swirling along the ground. He looked up and saw a few flakes in the sky, blowing in on a chill wind from the harbour.
He frowned, ever so slightly.
“Should have worn my coat.”
Thanks for hanging out in Dunnock Bay this morning. I hope you’re enjoying stories from my little town. The response to last week’s episode where Mindy washed the dishes struck a chord, so I thought I’d keep going on the more mundane themes.
Be sure to also check out my weekly newsletter The Quack where I have a lot of fun writing about not much at all.
Have a great week. <3 Davy