Walk #21

22 December 2004
3:46 pm to 4:46 pm
Heads: 57
Tails: 45
Intersections: 63
Ending point: corner of Peck Slip and Water Street
Latitude/longitude: 40:42:29.416N/74:00:7.160W
Distance from home: 0.3256 miles
Literature received: none
Coin: 1984 P quarter

On a day where New York City had thawed, at least temporarily, there were lots of kids running around, lots of last-minute Christmas shoppers, and a small army of Salvation Army bellringers, competing with emergency vehicles to see who could make the next noise.

I passed by two businessmen on Wall Street. One was earnestly saying to the other, “You know everything. I guess what it comes down to, you’re about eight years ahead of me on everything.”

Two Korean girls, both fashionably dressed, were taking turns punching each other in the arm.

When my cell phone rang, indicating that my hour of random walking was over, I was standing on the corner of Peck Slip and Water Street, one block away from the post office: the exact intersection where my first flip walk had ended. The odds against repeating any final destination were small, yet here I was. It seemed like a fine way to end the year, returning to where I had been in July. If you got someplace by accident, then maybe the best way to revisit it was also by accident.