I felt like Randall Flagg

Well, that subject line should grab people's attention (one would hope).

I just wanted to mention that I went for a walk last night, and felt a little like Randall Flagg. I was just out getting some fresh air so I could think more clearly about stealing a nuclear device to destroy a community of good people in Boulder, Colorado.... hey, maybe THAT'S why I felt like Randall Flagg! I didn't even think of that. Wow!

No, I was reminded of that character because of the stuff about him being The Walking Dude, and how it felt just walking down a long empty street alone at night, "clocking along," as Stephen King said. I kind of felt like that. It isn't necessarily a GOOD feeling, exactly, in the sense of being part of a community. It could be seen as a little scary, just that you're out walking with no social context, and there is a feeling of freedom and anonymity that could easily go down some dark path, if you were crazy in that particular way.

Anyway, just something about being out walking at night, with the wind in the leafy branches of the trees overhead... we have only had leaves on the trees for a little while where I live, this spring, and it still feels new. It just made me feel like a character in a book, in general, and also more specifically like Randall Flagg. Soooooo that was scary.

One thing that was actually good about me going for that walk was that I went out there at all, at that hour (which wasn't THAT late... maybe 10:30 to 11:30). You guys might remember that three years ago, in the spring and early summer of 2021, I got accosted TWICE in the space of just three or four months. Once it was just a bunch of local teenagers who were probably going out of their minds from all the Covid lockdowns... they stopped me when I was out for a jog, and really got in my face, for no reason at all. That sucked, but it wasn't too hard to deal with. I just find other roads to jog on. (I STILL don't jog or walk through the area where they live, there are a whole bunch of them and several of them are bigger than me). The other time I got "accosted" that spring was when I actually got mugged, right on a major traffic artery in the Boston metro area. It was very late at night that time, like 2:00 AM, and I was just finishing up a jog that I went on at that hour just because it was too hot to exercise during the day. I got "accosted" (mugged) by a bunch of guys with some kind of Middle Eastern accents who had stolen a bunch of mopeds, and were just riding down my street mugging people. I felt lucky they didn't knife me.... anyway, I have not gone out at night too much since that spring, so it was probably a good sign that I am feeling somewhat recovered from 2021 that I even went for a moderately long (maybe three miles) walk at that hour.

Sorry, none of this has anything to do with anything, I just thought it was interesting that I felt like I got a glimmering of that kind of mindset that Stephen Kiing might have been trying to capture when he made up the Randall Flagg character. Had to share.