A few human moments that brightened the market and opened the day.
In this issue:
The gift of a second glance
In the busy winter market, a brief moment of recognition reminded me how easily a small, honest hello can brighten an ordinary morning.
Winter light filtered down from the high windows. Children hurried toward Santa. The booth felt alive with the shuffle of baskets and the soft scraping of crates moving across the table.
A woman stepped forward and paused, studying my face.
“You look familiar,” she said, almost to herself.
Something tightened in me.
A small breath caught in the space between us. Then her face warmed.
“Oh! You’re that skater! You were really good.”
The change inside me was immediate.
A lightness rose in my chest. The moment relaxed its shoulders.
Then when she reminded me of her name, memory settled gently into place. A different season returned: a summer afternoon, the plastic scrape of wheels on pavement, a mutual friend laughing, the three of us circling the park with the easy confidence of people who move for the joy of it.
Skating still feels close.
I do it less often, but the rhythm remains in my body. Most of that practice happens alone, away from any audience. She had seen it once, during a rare public event, and carried it with her all this time. Hearing her speak it aloud in front of familiar faces felt like a small lantern lifted toward another version of myself.
Before she left, she handed me a copy of a recent article she had written for the Public i. Her world and mine meeting for a brief, unrelated moment.
How easy it is to hesitate when a face seems familiar, but you just can’t place it.
How often we look away rather than risk the small uncertainty of being wrong.
There is something gentle in trying anyway.
A simple hello. A question about a name. A moment of curiosity. Sometimes that is all it takes for a forgotten part of ourselves to rise toward the light again.
And every so often, someone else feels it too.
So, Dream
A few months ago, in the heat of August, the outdoor market eased into the morning with its usual slow unfolding. The metal frames of the tents gave their familiar strained squeak as we opened them. Early light gathered across the pavement. Wrens called from the trees at the edge of the lot, their voices thin and bright against the still air.
As market setup neared its end, I arranged bunches of basil at the front corner of the table near the register. The scent of it rose sharp and green. That last task always gave me a moment to settle into the day.
While I worked, my thoughts drifted to someone who had shared several markets with me earlier in the season. We had moved behind the tables with a rhythm that felt natural, almost instinctive. It had the ease of a practiced duet. We made room for each other without speaking. We anticipated each other’s movements. The work felt lighter in her presence.
She had stepped away mid-summer for her own City markets and projects. We stayed in touch here and there, texting about projects and whatnot.
That morning, in the warm quiet before customers arrived, I imagined what it would feel like if she were there. The thought opened into a small daydream. I pictured her walking up with a nitro cold brew in hand, the way we used to take turns stepping away to grab morning drinks once the tents were up and the tables were set.
It was a brief imagining, shaped by memory and the heaviness of the heat. Then I thought it was plain silly.
An hour into the market, I glanced toward the parking lot and saw someone approaching. The sun was behind them. Everything appeared as a bright-edged silhouette. For a moment I could not tell who I was looking at.
Then the outline sharpened.
Then her face came into view.
Then I noticed the nitro cold brew in her hand and her market shoulder bag resting across the other side.
She stepped into the shade of the booth and slapped the cold drink on the table with a grin. She stayed for a while, visiting with Denny next door when our booth was busy. When the booth quieted, she showed me photos from her City markets. We caught up about our kids again and the projects that were slowly shaping our days. The familiar ease of our former teamwork settled briefly around the booth.
After she eventually headed out, I found myself standing still, trying to understand how my daydream had materialized. Then I realized that, really, nothing improbable had taken place.
- She sometimes visited our market as a patron.
- It was a hot morning, the kind that makes a nitro cold brew feel like a necessity rather than an indulgence.
- We had spoken recently.
- Earlier in the season I had brought her a gooey vegan brownie from the Everyday Feast vendor, so the gesture she made fit comfortably inside our ongoing pattern of shared small kindnesses.
When I looked at it with clarity, the probabilities did not point toward surprise. Everything was already set in motion. The morning simply moved along lines that were already present, and happened to converge to match my daydream. That quiet thought of a friend, a connection, a coffee.
Sometimes the world meets us at the point of our dreaming.
So, dream.
As the last of her footsteps faded across the lot, the heat rose around me again. The shade seemed thinner. The air regained its weight. The morning returned to its ordinary brightness, and I felt the day warming on my skin more clearly now that she was gone.
Making space
Some mornings teach you that things don’t depend on your eyes alone. When people have room to move, the whole day keeps its shape.
By five-thirty the mall was still echoing, overhead speakers warming up with a strange mix of classic rock and nineties guitar. Fluorescent light pooled over the tiled floor, the rattly-rolling carts, the crates still holding the cold of the truck.
A few of the other longtime vendors were there before me. We traded our usual hellos, the camaraderie of people who wake before the sun, then fell into our separate rhythms.
When the next market staffer arrived at 6a, she stepped easily into the work. I gave her a table layout sketch and she moved through it with that steady competence I trust. With our staff, you only need to give enough instruction so they know the general goal. Then, if you leave enough room for a person to find their own way through it, you get to learn from their ideas. Soon we had the market stand ready, with time to spare.
The mall grew brighter. Coffee appeared. A small joke about a “Vanazelnut Latte” hung in the air between us. It was a simple, good beginning.
At eight, our third staff arrived, and the line began. This is the part of market where my sight narrows: hands on the produce, prices tallied, bags filled, questions answered. It is a warm, focused tunnel, and I step into it willingly.
So I didn’t see her sit down.
I didn’t see the color leave her face.
I only heard the staffer say, “Keep an eye on her,” and felt a small drop in my chest. An abrupt shift from the smooth motion of sales to the sharp worry that I had missed something important. That I should have been the one to notice.
But the situation was already in hand. Water was fetched. The moment had been held before I even knew it was happening.
Later, after our ailing friend headed home and the rhythm returned, I understood something I thought I already knew: a market doesn’t work because one person is watching every corner. A market works because the people inside it feel free to step in, speak up, and care for each other. It works because there is room to notice, room to act, room to take initiative without waiting for permission.
Leadership, I’m learning, is not about being the point of every answer.
It is about a morning that keeps its shape even when one pair of hands steps back.
It is about fostering a team that trusts their own eyes, their own hands, their own sense of what is needed.
Perhaps the real job is simply this:
to leave enough room.
Enough room for others to move with clarity and confidence.
And on this winter Saturday, when the fluorescents hummed and the mall speakers cycled into another guitar solo, my team quietly reminded me: I don’t have to see everything.
I only have to make sure everyone feels able to see and act together.
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