Sight For Sore Eyes

So I decided to pay attention to my surrounding a bit more closely than I usually did on my walks back home in New Brunswick. I had been passing the same string of stores from Rockoff to Scott Hall for the past three years now (considering I am an English major, Scott Hall had been pretty much the only area I had classes in). It is interesting how, over the span of three years, a lot has changed (for the most part) on that particular strip of George Street, while at the same time, a lot hasn’t. The stores remain the same, the restaurants remain the same, and the buildings themselves for sure remain unchanged. Even the same homeless people sit on the same bench across the 7-Eleven that is by the Paterson bus stop. I can picture all the usuals: the tall lady who has short pale blond bangs and ties her hair into a messy half bun (she also has an extremely husky voice and loves my upside-down black t-shirt), the guy who wears a red Rutgers cap, sweatpants and a sweatshirt and always has his cigarettes and bag with 7-Eleven snacks (he is always around the tall lady I mentioned earlier), and the guy with the long hair who always fills George street with bewitching Jazz through the night and into the early hours of dawn. All of these people and stores have stayed here my entire 3 years journey to and from class. And yet, seasons catch up to stores and age catches up to people.