Max Agigian ’19
Excursion Smiling faces, larger than life, greet me as I disembark with a blast of cold air at Boston University East. Neither friends nor strangers, these pastelcolored acquaintances might someday soon decorate my home, or I might leave them behind as I travel to far-removed lands, there to continue my education. But that will be then, and this is now, and I am crossing the street to stand nearer to them. The glowing red hand bids me stay, but the river of cars has parted, and I take advantage of Commonwealth Avenue’s momentary emptiness. As I arrive on the other side of the street, I walk not towards the almost-youths but away from them, in the eastward direction whence I came. Were there rain or snow falling, the awning might protect me; as it is, the bitter chill reaches under it with ease. I walk along, passing by posters advertising upcoming events, passing by a crosswalk and a green sign entitled BU East, passing by storefronts (much more distinct than those one sees when confirming that one is not a robot), and eventually I come to a Starbucks with a bus stop in front, meaning it is time to turn right. I could not tell you the street onto which I turn, for I know it is not Cummington Mall, but instead some obscure throughway that is the sidest of side streets, bordered on the far side by what is either a very small park or a very large lawn, and on the near by the less publicfacing face of Warren Towers. This is not marked by inviting shops and welcoming murals, but by dark entrances to parking garages with fluidmottled pavement, by sundry signs and traffic cones strewn as if in storage. It feels as though I am seeing something private, perhaps even painful, as if the building is exposing a grievous wound to air and has not noticed me staring. There are many places on and near Cummington Mall where one feels like an intruder. I have walked through long underground hallways in buildings with no classrooms; I have ascended stiflingly hot stairwells with discarded equipment languishing at the bottom; I have pushed through doors with printed-out warnings reading “CAUTION—FIRE HAZARD— DO NOT PROP OPEN.” There are places whose very atmospheres seem to say that one does not belong, but which have no people, signs, or locks that tell one to keep out. One must step a few paces into an empty garage to reach the desolate staircase that leads into the alleyway separating the backs of the buildings on Cummington Mall from the backs of the buildings on Commonwealth Avenue. As always, I look at the staircase that leads up, wondering what is at the top, but, as always, I take the staircase down instead. 1
