1.05 Public Transport and Calamity

I shouldn't be posting this from work, perhaps doubly so, but I need an outlet or I will start re-living the events over and over again in my head. I've stuffed up....

I never stuff things up. I take my red pen of righteousness to them, and I draw a soft and noble line through the things that other people stuff up.

I was catching the bus to Lyneham to visit Booklore. I'd heard from a friend that they occasionally carried the Loeb series, and I was thinking of reading another Greek text. This man, and here I must commend Canberra for its' population of long-haired men as I think I have seen two blondes and three brunettes just in the last few days, sat down beside me and began to strike up a conversation.

I wish I could remember it, because he seemed reasonably lucid and coherent, but I was occupied with much more important plans. I am not sure if any of you in Melbourne or my new online contacts have encountered the amusing text of A.E. Waite, but I had a copy of his book that I should not have removed from my workplace, and I was holding this in both hands to both remind me of what fun I would have with a red marker in Photoshop that night, and to ward off the effervescently giggling teens. The pink ones, as these were, tend to flee at the sight of anything beyond the mundane.

I think that I am digressing in my panic right now. It's only a stupid, nearly worthless book, but if it is discovered missing I could lose this job.

I talked to the man about something, in the way that I do when I am not paying attention. A spiel on grammar, or Akhilleus versus Achilles, or perhaps the taste of coffee in this city. He seemed to be incredibly bored or incredibly interested. I kept thinking of my scanning and dastardly corrections as an aside to the cataloguing of the images I was set to do, and watching the trees of the huge and grid-like parks of Canberra amble past the bus.

When I saw the street I had to disembark on, I must have begun to gather up my work bag and drink bottle and other sundries while still talking, because I don't think I ever did say goodbye to him. I just had this moment of fear when he didn't seem to realise that I was trying to get to the door, and I could see the shops slowly trickling towards us.

And then (try to contest my use of "and", and I shall wave my kai and de, and explain how Greek grammar works. As it is a part of our language, I am allowed to use their rules.) I hurried down the aisle, dismebarked, and spent more money than I should have on books.

I have a copy of a series of papers on the Athenian theatre, called "Nothing to do with Dionysos." It looks very interesting. But when I had sat reading the first article in it at home for an hour I realised that I wasn't reading the Waite book. I must have left it with the man. I can't think of anywhere else I could have.

I didn't fancy riding the buses until he appeared again, so I searched. After all, if I have a blog, and others have blogs, perhaps someone had posted. I didn't even begin to look at those, though, because Google books has a copy. I feel like I did when I first translated "moira" as "deadly fate", and felt the weight of Hektor's future heavy upon my heart. I am a fool, I am absolutely dim! I didn't need to take the book at all.

And now it is gone, and I have no idea where. If anyone knows a generic guy, or perhaps more specifically one who has a copy of "The Book of Black Magic" by Arthur Edward Waite that is not his own (who lives within Canberra, preferably), please push him in my direction.