John Harvard's Ghost

 first wrote this piece about a month ago

        Harvard Square is dead.

    I know; it's always been shitty, these score of years I've known her--it's always been shitty,  & great at the same time. But lately, even before COVID they've been taking away everything great to make room for the mediocre--and still leave the shitty. But now, in whatever wave of the pandemic you'd call this, it's a ghost town. Not that nobody's around--the students are back in class, the hobos and addicts as numerous as the geese by the river (and leaving as much feces in their wake.) But there isn't any place to go.

    Today I have the day off from work, but the exterminator is coming to fumigate our apartment; so with the kids at school, my wife working, and the cat visiting my mom, I thought I would spend the late morning/early afternoon enjoying Harvard Square in some way like I once did, from high school daze of stoned summers till the Vitamin Shoppe finally closed in 2014, after I'd been working there for seven years.

    After stopping at the library to pick up some books and finish writing the second chapter of a novella I've been working on, I was hoping to go to the Harvard Art Museums to see some Edward Hopper, who just the other day became my favorite artist. I remember them opening at 10:30 before the pandemic, and had been told a week or two ago by some security guards outside on a cigarette break that the museum would be re-opening that Saturday. But when I climbed the stairs to the front entrance, a sign informed me that reservations were needed to enter.

    So I went straight through Harvard Yard where vain co-eds sit on the long staircase hoping someone will look up their skirts, learning less than a highschool drop-out drinking on the sidewalk with winos. My first stop was Citizens Bank, to get some quarters for laundry (we'll have to wash the sheets again I pulled before the pest guy came to spray the bedbugs) and a little cash to hit a pub, hopefully; but the teller wouldn't even process my transaction personally but directed me to the ATM and traded me two rolls of quarters for a $20 after I withdrew. Well! You can forget about me looking for the customer satisfaction survey in my inbox this time (as every time)!

    Now at least with some money in my pocket I thought I'd treat myself to a CD at Newbury Comics, but the 2nd floor of the Garage is closed until further (if any) notice. Leaving by the back door I came upon where John Harvard's used to be, gone a while now but supposedly replaced by some new brewery/bar, but it seems to be closed. Getting desperately thirsty, and feeling justified as it was already 11 AM, I thought to try Charlie's Kitchen next but it was dark and closed, with no sign to indicate their operating hours or whether they'd closed due to pandemic or just gone out of business altogether. The Xfinity contractor clipping cables on the side of the building tried but wasn't very helpful.

                    "Oh, yeah they're open.

                        For sure. I think

                        maybe at 12. But

                        they're definitely open --

                            should be, anyway."

    Then I went to sit by the river and read poetry and start writing this articles in my spiral-bound notebook, now almost used up. That's one thing they can't change. They'll never stop the river flowing, the ever-winding Quinobequin; or as the White Man calls it, the Charles.

    Eureka! I thought, Shay's will be open. Yes, good old Shay's -- now, the only problem is, should I have a pint of Guinness or a glass of Malbec? But when I get there, it's dark, the door's locked, and no sign or hours posted. Rats! Despairing of ever getting drunk before noon, I stopped into Pinocchio's for two slices of Sicilian pizza with veggies. My only successful experience so far. Inside the pizzeria I recognise a middle-aged woman I remember from back in the day, when she was selling flowers on the sidewalk, part of the street community. I eat outside on LGBTQ rainbow wooden Adirondack chairs in front of the Lutheran Church and throw the plate away in a trash bin in somebody's driveway, passing by a man I know to be the boyfriend of the woman in Pinocchio's, though I've never spoken to either of them. A truck stops on JFK Street, burly men unload kegs -- of course! Tasty Burger serves beer. But I walk in only to learn the bar doesn't open until 5.

    I'm done now, say Hi to Jean riding by on his bicycle as I make my way out of the square, heading towards Porter (where, as it happens, all the bars are closed as well; so I settle for a pint-size can of hard kombucha which I sip walking around the block, admiring the garden of some highschool friends' parents') past lovers lying on the Common breathing in cuttings from the mounted lawnmower.

    I guess this all has little to do with John Harvard. But then neither do the University, or yonder olde pissed-on statue.