7/20/19: subway stories


I wouldn’t go so far as to say I like the subway, but I do enjoy people-watching and shameless eavesdropping and the subway can usually be counted on to serve up something to pique my interest. There was a video that made the news recently, showing a lady dressed up in some kooky costume, looking like an alien spider and acting like a weirdo, you know, the way an alien spider might, but the point of the video, the part that made it so popular, was how the cameraperson focused on the rest of the people in the subway car, most of whom were completely ignoring the wacky alien spider lady and staying resolutely focused on whatever they were doing before she showed up.

The headlines were all “New Yorkers Unfazed!” and that is basically the one rule of the subway: when something weird/unusual happens the only expression you should have on your face is boredom. You can be surprised or dismayed or disgusted or amazed on the inside but you can’t show it: whatever it is, you’ve either seen it before or you’d better act like you have.

***

I am fortunate enough never to have seen anything too un-see-able on the subway—sure, I’ve fallen victim to the suspiciously empty car a time or two, and I’ve run across more than a few people who seemed to be struggling with some mental health issues, and one time, on the way up to Yankee Stadium, a young fellow rather over-filled with beer wet his pants, but otherwise it’s just been the garden-variety subway stuff: the show-time guys, the hard-luck cases, the various musical acts.

My favorite musical acts are the guys in sombreros or cowboys hats and boots, who play guitar and sing tightly emotional close harmonies. I also love the quartet of older gentlemen who file through the car singing shockingly smooth Motown hits—“My Girl” is a perennial favorite—the surprise of their rich acapella harmonies made all the more unexpected because they usually look a little rough around the edges. There was also an older fellow I used to encounter on the shuttle from Times Square to Grand Central, just going back and forth from one transit hub to the other, playing light classical while smiling gently and looking down at his keyboard, one one-and-a-half-minute concert at a time. I am generally unhappy to see a really earnest-looking young man with a guitar, as that rarely bodes well, and of course if you are bringing any kind of amplification on board with you, I am going to try to duck back to the car you just left because NO.

The hard luck cases can be…hard. There’s a man I often see on a platform at Times Square, who is badly disfigured, with stumps for arms and awful burn scars all over his face and other visible skin. He holds a sign up, a piece of string draped over each stump, with a can around his neck for change. Sometimes he just walks slowly through each car, not speaking at all, his mute appeal doing exactly what a picture can do better than words.

Then there are the guys with an on-the-edge vibe, the ones who come through shouting their stories, the ways in which they have failed or been betrayed, then apologizing in an even angrier voice, somehow both telling us they are sorry for taking our time, for bothering us, but also making it very, very clear that they know that we know we are ignoring them, and the tremor of rage in their voices runs through the car like a current, everybody a bit extra alert until they pass out of our little bubble and into the next.

In contrast to those guys, there are the regulars, the ones you run into over and over until you have their stories practically memorized—“My name is Carlene, and I have two children”—I saw her almost daily for years. People like Carlene, the regulars, are almost universally treated as fellow commuters, all of us shifting out of the way to allow them through the rush-hour crowd without looking up from our phones because the sing-song quality of their refrains signals they’re just here, doing their jobs, on the way to work like the rest of us.

***

The other day I was on an A train, coming down from Washington Heights, and a guy came through the car. He was giving the usual spiel about how he’s homeless and he needs X amount of money for Y thing, me only half-listening just to ensure he’s not saying anything alarming. Nobody else seemed to be paying him any attention, including the kid next to me, who looked to be about nine years old and was completely absorbed in working his way through a fresh bag of McDonald’s French fries. As the man got closer he got louder and then he was telling us that he’s staying in a shelter and last night, someone stole his shoes, can you believe that, what kind of person does that, but it’s true, it happened, and that’s why, he says, he’s walking here, through the subway, without any shoes. “No shoes,” he shouted, “No SHOES!”

The kid next to me immediately perked up and craned his neck, leaning forward and across my lap to check. I looked too, of course: if a guy tells you he’s so down and out that he’s barefoot, it’s a normal human reaction to seek confirmation. But this guy was wearing socks and shower shoes. The kid’s mouth twitched in a little frown, mirroring exactly my feelings: shower shoes are shoes: it’s right there in the name. The kid sat back and returned to his fries. The man in the shower shoes went by, continuing his lament. Another passenger—and this is how I know we were all disappointed/unimpressed by the shower shoes—was inspired to turn to the woman next to him, maybe the kid’s mom, and tell her about a time he saw a lady panhandling in the subway with a fake baby. I looked up at this and he noticed, widened his can you believe that gesture to include me in his audience. A fake baby, he kept saying, positioning his arms to show how the woman held the baby, in a blanket, he said. Man, he said, shaking his head, everybody’s got a scam. The woman mmm hmmed in response and we all nodded and the kid kept on eating his fries, not about to be surprised by whatever else might be going on around him. 

***

One day, on the Q at 34th Street. A lady trying to make the train got caught in the doors and her immediate reaction was to look down the length of the cars and shoot the conductor a glare of such malevolence I actually laughed out loud. He released the doors for just a second and instead of stepping back to the safety of the platform the way most people do after they’ve been caught squeezed tight between the doors of a subway car, which, if they had not opened, could have resulted in certain death, she bulled her way into the car, her face easing back to a standard subway frown, and then the train was moving again and it was all over in less than three seconds. But I was tickled for the rest of the ride: you know what you did, her look had seemed to say, and now you know I know. And now you know that I’m not standing for it. I watched her covertly for the rest of my ride and she looked every inch someone satisfied they’d gotten the better end of a negotiation, never mind the black streak of subway door grease down the side of her pants. Every battle has a price to be paid. It’s those who will pay it that win the wars.

***

I had to get from the Bronx to Brooklyn, which meant the 6 to the 4 to the Q. Approaching the turnstile at 138 and 3rd I could hear a man screaming from the platform, cursing up a storm. A youngish man was sitting on a post, laughing, and I caught his eye: “Somebody having a bad day?”

The young guy just shook his head, smiling: “His Metrocard didn’t work.”

Sure enough I got down to the platform and there was the screaming guy, doing that thing where you yell curses until you run out of ideas and stop, then think of more and yell those. He was filled with rage, this man, his Metrocard failing to swipe probably not the main issue in his life but certainly getting the full force of his attention. It wasn’t clear who he was yelling at, exactly—the turnstile?—and as I walked gingerly past him I was relieved to see three cops on the opposite platform, hanging out and ignoring this guy, understanding that between the heat and the general shittiness of the MTA and the crushing pain of life in general, sometimes a guy just needs a little space to scream curse words into the void.

Google maps had warned me the train will be crowded—awesome, I definitely wanted to start dreading the ride before the train even arrived—but the 6 that pulled in wasn’t terribly so. I took a seat next to a dude who was just TIRED. He was a big guy, too, and dressed like maybe he’d been working outside. He was leaned back, eyes closed, until at 86th street a man got on wearing a backpack. Successfully navigating the subway with a backpack requires expert-level subway skills and this dude did not have them. It’s generally best to hold your bag by your side, or wear it on your front, but this guy hadn’t gotten the memo and when he turned to look at the map his bag and the flying cords on the back of it swung around into our faces. The big guy next to me didn’t even appear to open his eyes, he just reached out, put his hand gently but firmly on the man’s backpack, and pushed him forward.

“Come on, boss,” he said, and in just those three words channeled that subway feeling: I’m not mad at you, but this whole experience is bad enough, dude—please don’t make it worse. Clearly this emotion is universal, as backpack man took it in the spirit intended: he repositioned himself, held up a hand of apology, and murmured something that sounded conciliatory but was also in another language so who knows, maybe it was a very polite fuck you. He didn’t take the pack off, but he did find a space where he wasn’t infringing on anyone else’s, and while this is not a city k own for its manners, we’ve still got SOME rules for right behavior and if you don’t know them, don’t worry: someone will surely teach you. Come on, boss: you don’t have to take your backpack off but you sure can’t wear it here.

A week or so after that, I was on the B train at 7:30 on a Monday morning and the car was surprisingly full, certainly more crowded than when I’m usually on it, which is generally more like 9:30 am. Most of the people I could see were asleep, or at least trying to be. Where had they come from? Where were they going? The only people who looked wide awake seemed to be me and some dude who was deeply engrossed in a surprisingly thick spiral-bound book titled The Basic Poll Worker’s Manual. At Atlantic Avenue we were joined by a smiling guy who sat down across from me, nodded hello, and then held up his phone to point out we had not just the same phone but also the same phone case. We had a brief discussion about how sturdy that case is (very), and I was pleased to notice he kept his backpack cradled between his feet so it didn’t touch the subway car floor because FILTHY. Since we were now best friends, we made a point to tell each other to have a good day when I stood up to get off the train at Church Avenue.


In the spirit of the mitzvah project, when I see a person—man or woman, but usually a woman—who has clearly taken the time to put together a killer outfit, if circumstances allow I will pause by her as the doors open at my stop and say something like, “That is an awesome outfit,” or “You look amazing today,” and then skip out of the car before she has to come up with any kind of response. There are all manner of mitzvahs going on in the subway and if you look you will surely see one: there are the guys who casually hold the doors (no easy feat) so somebody running can make the train; the people who help with directions, which almost inevitably becomes a crowd-sourced endeavor, side discussions starting about whether it’s better to change at Queens Plaza, where the E is across the platform, or go all the way to West 4th Street, which will be faster on the F but you have to go upstairs to get the E there so you may as well switch trains in Queens if the E is there, right? If you look for these mitzvahs, you’ll see plenty of people helping others up and down the many, many (many, many) stairs, or pitching in to help with heavy loads.

I have before approached a woman with a stroller and said simply, “Want help?” As soon as she begins to nod or say thank you, that’s my cue to bend down and grab the bar under the kid’s feet and then we muscle the bulky, awkward weight up or down the stairs together, most likely people jostling by, me praying silently that today not be the day I lose my grip or stumble because THAT would be horrible and then hiding a sigh of relief where we’re safely four wheels on the ground, the mom just getting started on thanks as I smile and wave. “No problem,” I say, and then I turn and head off, because all it takes is a minute or two at the most. Just do the one tiny thing that might brighten someone else’s day, whether you’re helping or whether you’re sharing the experience of feeling guiled, because if there’s anything we can all relate to, it’s either the desire to wear the kooky alien spider costume or to be the person who is completely unmoved by the antics of the kooky alien spider person, or, maybe, both. It’s kind of a fun town in that any given day you can really take your pick of roles. There’s always another car, another line, another group of people who haven’t met you, haven’t heard your story, another place where you can start afresh without hardly having to leave your home.

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