Working from home but missing Metro North.
T.G.I.F.: Riding Metro North
July 31, 2020 by 22 Comments
Riding Metro North. With El ConVirus.
March 6, 2020 by 32 Comments
El ConVirus.
Platforms sparse.
Wide berth between waiting commuters.
Subways with empty seats during Peak hours.
Hands tentatively reaching for hand rails, door handles.
Hand shakes replaced with knuckle bumps and elbow touches. Followed by Smirks. The new greeting code. Disquiet.
Travel curtailed, discontinued. Conferences cancelled. Large meetings shifted to conference calls.
Corporates scrambling to pull together Business Continuity Plans. First one, then two, then more work from home, with sniffles, with flu, with Something.
Fear spreading like Bay Area fog.
I twist in my earbuds, fire up Audible Books on Tape, and settle in for the commute home.
75% through Colum McCann’s Apeirogon. “Apeirogon, a polygon having an infinite number of sides...Combing the signals like moisture from the air.”
A cough. A sneeze. Duck for cover.
Combing the signals like moisture from the air.
Photo: Pierre Bacus via Aberrant Beauty
Riding Metro North. No Wings.
December 7, 2019 by 46 Comments
Tuesday.
Low 30’s F.
Walking to catch the 6:16 a.m. train to Manhattan, irritated that I have a late jump, and finding a seat is now a 50% probability. $15.25 for a ticket, and I have to worry about getting a seat.
I’m 1000 ft away from the stairs to the platform, and the cyclops eye beams through the morning fog illuminating the track. This is followed by a short horn blast signaling its arrival at the station.
It’s 3 minutes early.
I run.
I catch the train.
NO SEAT.
I stand for 55 minutes.
I’ve started a new book by Niall Williams titled “This is Happiness.” And this ain’t bloody Happiness. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. Seat Selection Psychology.
October 11, 2019 by 24 Comments
I’ve noticed.
It’s happened enough times, to notice. Is it only me that notices these things?
Typically off peak trains.
I’m early.
I take the window seat, in a three seater. Always a 3-seater. Always the window seat.
I don’t place my bag on the seat, a Welcome mat for other commuters.
Train car begins to fill.
Ladies. Men. All colors, sizes.
They take a quick glance.
And they pass.
They’ll crowd into a two seater across, in front, behind. Or a three seater in front, behind.
The car reaches capacity, and he (or she) will approach,
look up and down the car,
and take the seat.
But why?
All of the seats already had an occupant, which meant I was going to have to position myself next to a stranger. In a different mood, I enjoyed this game: one had ten seconds to scan the occupants and select the slimmest, sanest, cleanest-looking person to sit next to. Choose wrongly, and the fifteen-minute journey into town would be a much less pleasant experience—either squashed beside a sprawling fatty, or mouth-breathing to minimize the penetration of the reek emanating from an unwashed body. Such was the excitement of traveling on public transport…I stared at the floor, my mind racing. Did I … did I look like the kind of person who ought to be avoided in a game of bus seat selection? I could only conclude, in the face of the evidence, that I did. But why?
~ Gail Honeyman, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine.
Photo credit
Walking Cross-Town. Not Autopiloted. Not Missed. Not Today.
July 31, 2019 by 65 Comments
It’s Hump Day. Darlene shared a wonderful video on a camel farm. In watching it more closely a second time, I catch that the camels are raised for meat. And that, was the end of that. So Caleb is taking a break this week.
Tuesday. 5:48 A.M. Metro North train to Grand Central. Train on time. Plenty of seats. No tourists chatting in Quiet Car. Everyone bathed, B.O. full contained under sprays or sticks. Fully rested with 7.5 hours of sleep. What’s up with that?
End of July in NYC. That means one thing in the train tunnels. Suffocating heat. It starts around shirt collar, sliding to jacket collar, and then sweat drips from neck line down the center of your back. It really is something special to start your day.
Walking down the tunnels under the tracks to the exit. NYC, in the top 5 of the World’s Greatest Cities. Ceiling panels missing. Electric wires protruding down, a mere 6″ above your hairline. Large giant garbage pails capture water dripping from God knows where. Giant floor fans stirring air, cooling nothing, moving around heat. We’re so much better than this.
I approach the escalator. Turtles stand on the right. DK, passing on left. Winded at the top. Too old for this sh*t.
Dark Sky app says 77% F. Heat Advisory. Wind 2 m.p.h. – 2 mph? That seems high. Nothing moving in the atmosphere here. Humidity 1237%.
I cross street. Garbage fermenting somewhere. Demolition crews are hauling out refuse on carts into large dumpster. His mask hides his face. White dust coats his black tee-shirt. Asbestos. What a job. DK, what could you possibly ever bitch about?
Riding Metro North. Right Place. Right Time.
July 20, 2019 by 43 Comments
Tuesday morning. 5:33 a.m. Second morning train to Grand Central.
I pause in front of the empty aisle seat. The occupant, feigning sleep, awakens immediately after my “excuse me.” He looks up the train car wondering why I hadn’t found another seat. He slides over roughly signalling displeasure. Bullsh*t.
I set my bag down onto the floor, reach down to grab my iPad, and in doing so, I clip his arm which extends into my air space. Ladies, no worries. I size up opponents carefully before jostling them. He tucks his elbow in. I settle in, with territorial boundaries established, and all parties now in their rightful places.
I catch a whiff, it lingers for a minute, it’s foul, and then it disappears. I go back to reading.
The train makes its first stop at Stamford. Doors hiss, open, passengers pass by, and there it is again. B.O. Heavy, thick B.O. This time it hangs. It can’t be me. Has to be Him. It vaporizes. It can’t be Him, otherwise it would persist. I go back to reading.
Passenger passes by, and there it is again. I glance around to locate the source and then look up, and there resting (rotting?) on the overhead rack is a large, canvas backpack. Directly over top of Him. Cigarette smoke penetrates my suit jacket, does B.O.?
Train arrives at Grand Central. I get up quickly, woosy, with vertigo, looking up after 30 minutes with head in the morning papers. I exit into the underground tunnels. Head spinning, ears ringing from the roar of the train engines, the heat, the crowds spilling down the tunnels, all swallow me whole. I step to the side out of traffic, slow my pace, take a few deep breaths and inhale a trace of urine and rancid food from garbage cans marinating overnight.
I enter Grand Central terminal, look for the Lexington Avenue exit and punch my destination into the UBER app.
I step on Lexington and cross the street to catch my ride. We take FDR Drive South, and the morning sunrise pours through the window. 21 minutes to the office.
“Would you mind if I opened the window?”
“No Sir, not at all.”
I roll the window down. I can smell, and taste the East River. The water shimmers and sparkles. The Sun warms my face. The morning breeze is refreshing, and clears the head. The world is silent but for the wheels spinning on FDR Drive. Buechner’s passage from the day before comes to mind: “we hear a whisper from the wings…you’ve turned up in the right place at the right time.”
I will remember this.
Notes: Photo via poppins-me.
Which Platform to Grand Central?
November 6, 2018 by 20 Comments
Which Platform?
30th May 1936: A very young passenger asks a station attendant for directions, on the railway platform at Bristol. (Photo by George W. Hales/Fox Photos/Getty Images) (via Newthom)
Riding Metro North. With Four.
May 9, 2018 by 30 Comments
5:40 am train.
Full. How can this be possible?
I stand in the vestibule, irritated, and then remember that the 5:40 am train is a Peak train, and further remember that I’m paying a Peak Fare rate to Stand. Irritated.
I set my bag down on the muddy floor, irritated, and wait, hoping for someone to get off at the one and only stop on the express train to Grand Central.
I see a commuter to my right zipping up his backpack. I grab my briefcase, block the aisle (and the commuter who is waiting on the other side of the vestibule) and grab the open seat. Commuter code: You snooze, you lose. Smiling. I’ve become a New Yorker.
I pull down the bench, a handicapped seat which flips up. There’s an awkward shifting of knees and legs to avoid all contact. There will be no man-touching.
Two men across from me. Two men to my right. And me.
- Sleeping. Reading. Reading. Sleeping. Reading.
- iPhone. iPhone. iPhone. Not visible. iPhone.
- Earbuds. Earbuds. None. None. None.
- Sneakers. Loafers. Lace up. Sneakers. Lace up.
- Baseball cap. Balding. Full head of hair. Hoodie. Balding.
- Backpack. None. Backpack. Backpack. Briefcase.
- No watch. No watch. Wristwatch. Unknown. Smartwatch.
- T-shirt. Business casual. Suit. Jeans. Suit.
- Nails (grimy). Nail biter. Manicured. Unknown. Nail biter.
The train car is silent but for the rocking of the car on rails.
We pull into Grand Central and exit without an acknowledgement of the other.
4 head right. I head left.
I walk alone, down the tunnels, with the sound of my footfall on concrete and with Patricia Hampl (again).
“There may be no more solitary location in America than a New York subway—take a look at the faces of those commuters, their heads bent to their open books like monks at their breviaries, little glowing screens casting an otherworldly aura onto their intent faces. They are elsewhere. They are alone. Alone with words as much as any writer at a notebook or screen.”
Notes:
- Post inspiration: Patricia Hampl, The Art of the Wasted Day
- Photo: Downtown train, Luc Kordas (via thisisn’thappiness)
- Related Posts: Commuting Series
Riding Amtrak 2151-2172: Baltimore.
March 31, 2018 by 33 Comments
Five days gone. 4 memories remain. Freeman Dyson’s memory: Unreliable. Selecting. Rearranging. Forgetting. Embroidering. Inventing.
Scene 1:
My assistant. So grateful to have an assistant. So grateful for her. Two introverts in well plowed furrows. “Are you sure, you want to go there and back same day? 7 hours on train, in 10 hours?” I look up. She knows the answer. There. Back. Exhaustion traded for sleep, sleep in my own bed. Book it.
I’m waiting on the platform for Amtrak 2151 leaving at 7:54 am to Baltimore. It was for Dickens, and it was for me: “One of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade.”
Scene 2:
She boarded at Penn Station. Student. Maybe 20. She’s determined, bangin’ away on an old model MacBook Air. Wireless white earpods pumping in music, she’s bobbing her head. The cover of her notepad: Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. Biomed? Engineering? Medicine? She snaps the laptop lid shut, turns her head to the window, leans back, closes her eyes and lets the morning sun warm her face. Confident. Ivy leaguer. At peace.
It’s Thursday, three days later, and I’m deep into Irvin Yalom’s Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist’s Memoir. I wouldn’t be caught dead seeking therapy, but this, ‘this’ memoir is well within bounds. I’m back on the train, Ms. Johns Hopkins sitting across from me, and me, I’m so Irvin Yalom, so wanting to repeat that trip: [Read more…]
Riding Metro-North. With Holy Cow.
March 5, 2018 by 43 Comments
Morning. Today. 5:01 a.m. First train to Grand Central.
Dark Sky reports 33° F, feels like 25°. Feels like: Not Spring. March 5th. Spring backward. Falling and stumbling forward.
I wedge myself into a two seater, nudging the occupant awake. (Same occupant who was sprawled across two seats). He’s annoyed. I’m annoyed that he’s annoyed. I’m way more annoyed.
I glance up at the few unfortunates standing in the vestibule. Now they should be annoyed.
But for the low throb of the annoyances, and the giant overhead heaters blowing through the vents, the train car is silent. No talking. No whispering. No paper shuffling. Nada. Silence.
It’s as if Jack Kornfield blew the whistle and yelled Go: “It was the silence, stopping and taking a breath, opening the heart, seeing that the whole planet, and everything on it, is holy.”
And at that moment, the lead-weighted shoulders are freed.
The soles of the feet, through the leather soles of my lace-ups, feel the vibration of the steel of wheels on the steel of the tracks, bumping along with the rhythmic skip of steel on steel at the ties.
The seat under me is soft and shifts with each rail tie. The train car rocks, my body sways ever so slightly left and right and then back again. My knees gently knock on the seat in front, first right knee then left.
Feet, knees, palms, seat — sensations are elevated.
I close my eyes. Drift off, and float along on Kornfield’s holy train.
His holy car. Holy Cow.
I awaken to the conductor’s announcement: “This station is Grand Central. Please mind the gap between the train and the platform.”
Meditation? Nah.
Mediation is not for real men.
Notes:
- Photo: “Sleeping” by Michael Knudsen (via Your Eyes Blaze Out)
- Kornfield Quote: Thanks you Make Believe Boutique.
- Related Posts: Commuting Series
Riding Metro-North. Delayed, but it could (always) be worse.
February 22, 2018 by 26 Comments
Wednesday morning. 5:46 a.m. I step out, lock the door and step it to the station.
8 minutes to the 5:54 am train to Grand Central. A six minute walk. Tight.
I’m a few hundred feet away and the overhead speaker signals a five to ten minute delay. Naturally.
- 6:00 a.m. No sign of the train.
- 6:10 a.m. I set my bag down. No sign of train. Other commuters stir impatiently.
- 6:15 a.m. No sign of train. A second wave of commuters stack up on the platform waiting for the 6:16 am. train.
- 6:25 a.m. No train. Announcement over the speaker announces further delays due to “police activity.” I check Twitter for a Metro-North update. 10-15 minute delays, my a**. I keep on reading…and the edge comes off. Slip and fall? Jumper? Heart attack?
Riding Metro North. One Car Short.
December 8, 2017 by 51 Comments
Thursday morning.
33°F. Feels like 23°F.
Out the door at 4:50 am to catch the 5:01.
Dark.
Directly across the street: new Neighbors. Young and DINK. First things first. No curtains up, yet bright, white lights were carefully hand strung and evenly distributed across their bushes. The evergreens throw shadows on the front door. I pause. What was that? That softening, that load lightening ever so slightly. ‘Tis the season.
I board train. No open seats. At 5:01 a.m.? Conductor announces that the train is one car short and apologizes. $15.25 for a one-way Peak ticket to Grand Central (Yes, Peak at 5:01 am.) $15.25 and you get the privilege of standing. And standing for 55 minutes. Sigh.
I stand in the aisle, as the vestibule overflows with commuters. I set my bag down between my legs, grab the seat support, being careful not to brush against the passenger sitting in the seat. I hover over him. He feels it. Nobody likes this.
We’re five minutes into the commute. I’m restless. I’m tired. I’m anxious. I’m not going to make it. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. Est-ce-réel?
July 28, 2017 by 34 Comments
It came Monday afternoon, an Amazon order. Tall, soft and plastic, the kind that you would see end up with other marine debris choking the life out of Nemo in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
Calm is stenciled in 80 point font on the cylindrical container. “Natural Vitality Natural Calm Calmful Sleep Magnesium Anti Stress Extra Sleep Support, Organic, Wildberry, 16 oz.”
Bullsh*t. No chance this works but desperate people need to take desperate…
“Natural Vitality Natural Calm Calmful.”
Seriously? Really? Who writes their copy? What idiot would buy something with this lead?
I yank off the seal, tilt, then look down inside. The soft, white pillowy substance slides to one side and then the other. Contents may settle. Product sold by weight not volume“. It has settled below the half way mark. $28.49. Bullsh$t. Shysters. At least get it above halfway. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. With Sunbeam.
June 16, 2017 by 37 Comments
You think you might give me a run for it, but you can’t touch me. You can’t come close, not remotely close to my Superiority. Top 1% of the 1% in…
Mood Swings.
Close your eyes and think bungee jumper, in an infinite loop, who’s boinging up and down in a zone which pulls up short of Bliss and a whisker from Abyss. Not too hot, but hot enough to pinch, and not too cold, but cold enough to feel frost bite, and once in a while tasting Despair, but never lallygagging in Euphoria.
It’s the 5:40 am train. I have the entire seat to myself on Metro North to NYC.
We’re operating on 4.5 hours of sleep, and hauling the wet slushy snow of accumulated sleep deprivation from the prior three days. Eyes heavy. Shoulders heavy. Words from the morning papers slur together. I set down the smartphone.
Tired. Sick and tired of being tired, and bored writing about tired. Tired³. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. Don’t Sit Here.
May 23, 2017 by 46 Comments
You, yes You, are standing on the platform waiting for the next train. The train approaches. You flip open an app that displays which seats are open and…the app flashes a profile of your seat mate. Profiles are pulled together using a composite of the individuals’ blog posts, google searches and social media activity. So, what you have here is a form of seat match-making, with no names or addresses disclosed.
You, yes You, see that there are only two seats open. You scan the first profile, and you move to the second, mine, needing to quickly decide where to sit as the train pulls into the station. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. With Nana.
April 17, 2017 by 36 Comments
5:55 am train to Grand Central. It’s the 2nd stop. My head is down, I’m flipping through the morning papers.
The voice is soft, kind: “Excuse me.” She struggles to avoid contact as she slides to the middle seat; she’s directly across and to my left.
Someone’s Mother, Someone’s Grandmother, a Nana.
She settles in, straightening her neat, navy skirt. Her hands clutch a thin, pocket umbrella and rest on her lap, on top of a small black purse attached to a black shoulder strap.
Of Central American origin, Guatemalan, if I was guessing, of Mayan origin, guessing again.
I catch her in a quick glance at me, she was guessing: “Suit. Privileged. WASP. Ivy league educated. Money.” Wrong on most, but not all counts. OK, let’s call it wrong on some counts. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. With William Edward Hickson.
April 11, 2017 by 31 Comments
6:16 am to Grand Central.
Train car is packed but Silent.
I’m riding backward, feeling lighter, refreshed, alive. Looking East, now in Daylight Savings Time, it’s a ride in morning light, following months of lurking in darkness. A orange glow lights up the horizon and triggers Cummings: “the / mercy of perfect sunlight after days // of dark, will climb; will blossom: will sing (like / april’s own april and awake’s awake).”
I can feel all that.
Back to the morning reading.
New thing: Riding + reading = Nausea. Eyes, knees, shoulders, and now stomach. Middle age creep. Oh, how to be blessed for 50+ years with a cast iron stomach that can be filled with any grade of fuel, and bam, like a light switch, Gone. I’ve become a delicate flower, a petal to be handled with care. Stress? IBS? I softly lick my lower lip and find the sweet remnants of one of 2 glazed, cheese danishes from last night. Who the hell knows. It’s all exceedingly fragile, I’m teetering like a Jenga Tower.
I set the e-reader down, lift my head. Need to stabilize. [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. With Both Thumbs.
March 22, 2017 by 54 Comments
5:40 am to Grand Central. Standing room only, 4 men stand in the vestibule. How is this possible on the second train of the day?
One of the four left standing, leans against the railing. Italian shoes. Beats Wireless Ear buds. A snappy form fitted Canada Goose vest. Shirt cuffs unbuttoned. Stylin’. A Starbucks cup in one hand, a smartphone in the other, he flicks screens, grins, and sips his coffee.
Lady in the seat directly across reads the New York Times. Yes, like a real newspaper, a legitimate oddity on a commuter train. A glance up and down the rail car reveals no single other newspaper, just the hum of the air-conditioning and the silent flicking of hundreds of index fingers.
Lady next to her, a face white as snow, contrasting with her black coat, tall black knee high boots, and the white skin of the knee bunching out of a black knee brace. She grips a large, black, Samsonite wheeled carry on, with her black back pack resting on top. Her makeup groans to cover darkening bags under the eyes. The dike is leaking, age is ready to break, for her, for me. Cat Steven’s tune drifts in: Morning has broken….black bird has spoken… [Read more…]
Riding Metro North. With Black Crow.
March 15, 2016 by 31 Comments
End to end, it was seconds.
But this won’t be wiped with a flick of the wrist on an Etch-a-Sketch.
5:37 am. 45 F.
Rain, a light mist.
Minutes from the 5:40 to Grand Central.
She’s approaching.
Ten Yards.
Tall. Wafer thin.
Her eyes on me.
I avert, and then return to Her.
Black hair. Neatly primped above shoulders. Dark as night.
Black pumps.
Black coat.
Black shoulder bag.
Five yards away.
Thin nose.
Black eyes. No light.
I slide back six inches from the guardrail.
She maintains her course, straight ahead.
The Earth and the platform trembles.
It’s the Iron Horse, three spot lamps from the head illuminate the rails.
She stops, in my space, the rail cars rush by…followed by a blast of wind.
We stand face to face. Eye to eye.
She glances at my black rain slicker, and then down at my black shoes.
And snaps her head back up.
Empty.
She abruptly turns and continues down the ramp.
Her tail, or tail feathers swishing behind her.
WTH was that?
I step cautiously over the Black Cat’s path and wait for the doors to open.
Black?
Nah, let’s go with Black Magic.
Notes:
- Art: Edward Binkley (American, based Madison, WI, USA) – The Gift Drawings (via Your Eyes Blaze Out)
- Related Posts: Commuting Series
Riding Metro North. Man With a Plan.
February 3, 2016 by 23 Comments
High School graduation.
Scholarship.
Land of the Opportunity.
He leaves.
Undergraduate Degree.
Marriage.
Green Card.
Graduate Degree.
He learns. [Read more…]
Live & Learn 