TATER

I am compartmentalized and uncomfortable in a zooming tin can hurtling  at speeds which provide a slightly unsettled flutter.  Just a nagging under the the old dome, that I am on the upper deck in this car, and if we should jump the tracks, the cantilevering force will undoubtedly crush and mangle me.  Jim will be reduced to feeding me through a straw, helping me out of my chair for bath time and diaper changing.  I will do my best to match the grace of Christopher Reeves with my new, and tragic condition.

I would definitely try to comport myself with dignity, as I toggle the joystick with my mouth and let out breathy labored pearls of wisdom to those that know that tragedy often brings wisdom, (and makes really, really, good television).  I sit and ponder what words of wisdom I might choose to dispense to the camera crews and to Diane Sawyer as she asks about the tragic accident which killed so many but spared me to this new and horrendously difficult life.  She will ask me why I think I was spared when so many perished.  I will reply something to the effect that it wasn’t my time yet, and I have things left to do here on earth.  Then I would launch into arguments for stem cell research, the need to end the war in Iraq, the need for national health care, the ---

TAP TAP

“Sir?  Ticket please!”

I reach around fumbling for my monthly pass as the conductor sighs and steps from foot to foot like a three year old waiting for someone to take him “potty”.

“Sorry bout that, here ya go”

Sigh.  Eye roll, as he spins on his heal to the next victim of his aggrandized impatience.

prick.

I glance over to my left and see El Grosso.  I instantly feel a surge of white hot hatred.  I take in his gaudy Hawaiian rayon shirt, mopish hair, and droopy mustache.  He is currently engrossed with sucking on the droopy ends of that stache, and picking at the detritus deep inside his ear canal with the forefinger of his right hand.  Mission accomplished, I watch in horror as he sniffs his finger and rolls the wax between his finger and thumb, and unceremoniously wipes the mess on his shorts.  My eyes follow his stork legs and rest on the fiasco of his corny and calloused bare feet, which have taken residence on the cushion of the fold down seat in front of him.  Yes.  His disgusting bare feet on a cushion that some other pour soul will have the great misfortune of sitting on, later in the day.  This is El Grosso’s claim to infamy.  Every day other passengers pass his seat and look down in disgust and disbelief at the great encrusted, yellow toe-nailed germ factories, choosing to bypass the empty seat next to it, and crowding into less spacious  areas beyond.  My favorite mental picture of El Grosso, is the look of abject searing hot pain, as I “trip” a little, and “accidently” spill my scalding coffee on his offending appendages.

“How clumsy of me!  Are you okay?”  I would say with a smirk. 

“I am soooo sorry!  Perhaps you should consider some sensible closed toed shoes?”

My gaze wonders as I gleefully imagine other tortuous punishments for El Grosso, and comes to rest on Straw Lady.  Ugghh.  I hate this bitch too.  Fifty something, she strives to keep the bouncy blonde hair of her fading youth by chemical abuse.  She has perma-grey roots, which never seem to accept their dyed fate, and each and every hair on her tortured scalp stands up like errant hay shoots in a bundled bail.  They are screaming their surrender, and begging for mercy.  Straw lady is very, very, self important.  One can often register a look of disapproval seeping over her outdated cat eye frames.  Not many meet with her approval, and none rate consideration.  I try and choose the opposite side of the train car from where she is sitting, if given the chance.

I often like to vacate my seat, and wait in the exit vestibule before the train gets into the station, in order to disembark with out wading through multitudes of people.  I am usually suffering from the dire need to urinate, brought on by my insistence to drink a grande coffee on the train. Being among the first to exit, guarantees my ability to make it to the urinal without embarrassment.  If I am down her row and she sees me stand up, gather my shit, and start making my way to the exit, Straw Lady immediately stands up in order to block my way.  She luxuriates in taking her time to gather up her belongings.  She has even been known to take off her glasses and polish them (with a cloth that she spends an hour digging around her purse to find).  She usually perches herself in the first seat at the top of the stairs leading own to the main level of the railcar.  She just can’t abide letting someone pass in front of her to get off the train, so she impedes the rest of us with her tackily dressed body.  In the winter, she ensconces herself in a hooded puffy down parka that makes her look like a christmas tree with feet.  When she chooses to punish me for sitting in her row, I often discard my stale gum in the hood of her coat.  I wonder if she ever thinks of me as she combs the sticky mess out of her beautiful flaxen locks?

In the seat behind Straw Lady, I see Red.  Red cracks my shit up!  She is a large gal, and everything about her person is too.  Today she has chosen a black, scoop necked, chemically made shirt, with an egyptian motif stalking the border of her neckline.  Filene’s? Marshall’s?   It is skin tight and can barely contain the surging rebellion of her pendulous breasts.   She usually parks herself in front of the doors to the exit vestibule, and is lost to the bopping of her head in time to the KICKASS tunes she is listening to on her Ipod mini.  The ipod is usually clutched in one hand, while the other hand is busy snapping her fingers to the rhythm that her flouncy red head is keeping.  These hands are laden with cheap gold rings, none can escape, not even her thumbs.  Her French manicured nails are so long they resemble cigarettes, and curve inwards like cat claws.  Her wrists jingle as well with the golden motif but I’m not convinced of the carat authenticity, as her wrists are often green hued.  On her back is a HOT.PINK.BACKPACK.  My ears are deafened from the screams of her aura pleading for attention.  I often imagine having to try to please a woman of this nature in the sack, and I am left shaken and shivery inside. 

I am now picturing Strawlady looking on in rigid disapproval as El Grosso and Red make the beast with two backs, and I giggle at my own perverse immaturity.  I try and shift my focus back into the here and now and plan the day ahead.  I will have to cater to the cacophony of middle managers arguing about how best to capture the essence of K_AFT Foods products, while attempting to pay rapt attention.  I will be thinking how badly I would rather be outside smoking than listening to these petty power plays guised as marketing strategies.

I thumb through a book not paying attention to what I am trying to read, and finally abandon it all together out of preference for my own crazy thoughts.

“Where were we Ms. Sawyer?”