In Motion

Chicago --

Getting out of River City is always fraught. Or, at least, it seems that way lately. I tell myself it's important to remind myself: it's the time of year. Summer travel is a always a little .... more. More crowded. More expensive. More prone to run late. 

I decided to cheat on the old grey dog and use Megabus for my run up to Chicago. Yes, I could have taken a bus up to Indy and rode train... except that regional train travel is complicated thanks to the monumental lack of foresight that led to the decommissioning of the Indiana State Hoosier. It would have extended this leg of my trip a bit too long, and I would have had to spend at least one night in the Indiana Depot... an accommodation I've experienced many, many times too many.  In order to be an even more particular traveler, I opted for the option. -- at the cost of an additional $2 -- to reserve a specific seat. I chose one on the left side of the bus, next to the window, near the front, on the top level. 

That proved to be a complete waste of time. Not only was the bus an hour late, but my seat and the one next to it were taken up by a future seminary student and his prodigious amount of luggage. I wasn't the only one to fall prey the hopeful, false advertising.  Two women across the aisle and one row up from me were actually sitting in seats that had been reserved by a young woman and her friend. When the young woman attempted -- politely -- to explain they were sitting in her seats, they were incredibly rude. Sure, they were probably still sore at being bamboozled. But that's no reason to call a fellow sufferer a bitch.

Bus travel isn't my preferred mode, but it gets the job done. Mostly. At least regionally.

So I remind myself the delays are seasonal. Interstates are construction- choked arteries. There are more people on the road, and because we're heading out during rush hour, delay is almost guaranteed.   But there's been a steady increase in people moving around the country by bus. Flying can be prohibitively expensive, and trains don't go everywhere people really need them to go.

More people are in motion, for reasons and excuses to numerous to list. No, they're not traveling; at least, not traveling in the sense that I travel. And they're not vacationing in that Sunday Morning retirement IRA commercial sense, either. But people are in motion. Not in control, but still in a damned hurry. And because of this, and because public transit goers tend to see themselves as consumers rather than the consumed, the gentility and etiquette I saw a few years back is wearing off like tired, neglected paint. 

But the sunset in Indiana, just north of Indianapolis, is lovely. The colors are autumnal: purples and blues highlighted with splashes of tangerine, splashed across the sky above an endless ocean of green fields waiting for the harvest. And that, more than anything, is why I don't drive.

   

Williston Update: Eyes And Ears

I got to a state where phrases like "the Good, the True, the Beautiful" filled me with a kind of suppressed indignation.." - Thomas Merton

The biggest change since the last time I traveled by train is the heightened sense of paranoia... I mean security. There's a huge television in the Concourse B Lounge that plays a video on a permanent loop. The smiling, friendly woman in an Amtrak engineer's uniform assures us that we were all in this together. TSA, along with city,county, and state police are all working together to ensure that our rail experience is safe and enjoyable. They have specially trained explosive sniffing dogs. While the friendly engineer lady reads the cue cards, a montage of competent officers and well-trained dogs plays. Everyone is calm and courteous and official. 

But, that's not enough, according to the kind engineer lady and one of the calm and courteous and official TSA agents. 

"After all," he proclaims to the camera, "we're all in this together!"

They say they need my help. MY HELP. Why, I can be a hero,too! I can be the eyes and ears of the police and turn in people who look suspicious.

Whatever that means. The video makes sure to not advocate racial profiling. I am told several times to focus on behavior, not looks. The nice engineer lady is Black. The TSA is Latino. All of the people committing "suspicious acts" are white... and a few of them are even dressed like urban professionals.

After all, it could be anybody.

The thing about traveling, whether you're on your own or whether you are traveling with someone or with a group, is that at some point you have to be able to reach out to fellow travellers. Even if it's just to ask directions or about some procedural. In order to travel, you need to know when to reach out and ask for basic assistance. 

Yes, there are going to be less than trustworthy people; but generally, if you keep your wits about you, and you pay attention to your surroundings, you begin to learn who you can reach out to.

But does that mean that I need to be not  racially profiling and report some abstract "suspicious" behavior to a cop?

I don't know. I tend not to trust cops. I know there are good ones and there are bad ones... but in the end, they're the arm of an institution I have long lost faith in. And for all the talk in that Orwellian video about NOT racially profiling, the fact is that cops do generally profile people. The fact is WE ALL generally profile people. For example, when I say "I don't trust the police" I realize I'm lumping a whole bunch of people  together. The best I can do is try and remember that when they're people,too. 

I sometimes hear the phrase "post 9/11America." The heightened sense of paranoia... I mean security... and increased hassle of traveling. Random searches and added delays are a part of the deal. Your property is not private if some representative of one of the cooperating agencies decides you are behaving in a suspicious way. 

A Baboon in New York, Part 1.2: The Chaotic Columna Ceruluia (Cont.)

New York has a trip-hammer vitality which drives you insane with restlessness if you have no inner stabilizer.
-- Henry Miller 

The simple, compact, well-join’d scheme—myself disintegrated, every one disintegrated, yet part of the scheme:  -- Walt Whitman


When I found Steve, he was standing right in front of the gate, facing it with his back toward me, waiting. It had been a few years since I'd seen him,  but I recognized him instantly. In his winter coat and pointy winter beanie, at a distance he looks something like an elf;  his small bearded features lend dimension to the description, but so too does his general demeanor. He is neither nervous, nor impatient. He is just standing there, waiting, watching, expecting. Standing, like I said in my previous post, "as if he has always been standing there primordial, separate from the passage of time, as if the Earth and the whole of  The Port Authority had risen up around and engulfed him without his even noticing" .  


I called his name three times, but he didn't turn until I was nearly up on him. If it were anyone else, I would say he was simply conditioned against the noise of city life (Which is Considerable); but I really think that, owing to the way he simply lives in his own space, regardless of where his, and quietly mediates his way through the world like a permanent visitor, trying to harm no one, hoping that no one harms him. 


He was glad to see me, and Susan was glad we found one another. He asked whether I wanted to see some of the city or go home; but I was tired from traveling and a little hungry. So I said I'd rather go back to his and Susan's place, if that was okay.  So we headed for the subway.

Now: to understand New York, you must understand the subway. And to understand the subway, you must appreciate that it is a system based almost entirely on chaos and absolute democracy.

I took my lead from Steve, being as I was in his city; I assumed he knew his way around -- or at least, how to get home from The Port Authority. Of course, I wasn't taking certain things into consideration:

1. No one who lives in New York goes to The Port Authority unless they're taking a bus out of town, buying drugs, or trolling the restrooms for anonymous sex on the down low; and
2. The only possible reason Steve would have to be there is waiting for a country bumpkin techno-hobo, who, like him, has a sometimes questionable sense of direction and is easily lost in his own thoughts.

First things, first, though. Before I could slink around under the city streets first I had to buy a Metro Pass. Travel and the cheap ass motel in Norfolk and spending a bit too much at an Irish Pub in D.C. with my friend Eric had diminished my funds substantially.

My travel plans through back through the Midwest have been plotted and paid for, however, and I have already announced the date of my imminent return to see friends, tie up loose ends and plan for more travel. My plans are to go south and west eventually going to the West Coast to check out life on the Left Coast a bit more closely.

I knew I had about $17 left, so when I approached the Metro Card Vending Machine I looked for the lowest amount I could put on the card that would still be useful, at least for a day. [Note about New York City Subway Metro Card Vending Machines: I'm sure they all start out any given 24 hour period in perfect working and vending condition. BUT THEY DON'T STAY THAT WAY.]  The machine I approached would no longer sell single ride passes. Each time you walk through the gate to enter the subway platform, it costs you $2.25. Now it's possible to catch multiple lines once you've entered, so it's not necessarily $2.25 every time you ride. And according to Steve's wife, Susan, the New York City Subway is so well organized that it puts most other public transit systems in the country to shame... particularly Chicago, a place for which she has little affection.

Probably has something to do with the fact that she grew up around there.

NYC Subway System Map

I put 10 bucks on a metro card. I figured that while some walking would be involved, that Steve and Susan probably lived near a subway entrance. I knew they didn't have a car anymore, having fully embraced the New York urban lifestyle. 

Steve checked his Metro Card twice because he didn't have enough on there to ride. Then he approached the same machine I purchased my card from. Standing back and watching Steve interact with the world is, in many ways, a cultural anthropologist's dream.  And for some reason, it reminded me of the movie Brazil.

After a few minutes of standing in front of the machine, trying to feed it actual money, he walked over and told me it wasn't taking his money. He wanted to find an attendant -- which, he said, were there the last time he was at the Port Authority. So we went back into the station to the information booth. The woman in the booth was busy trying to communicate in English with a tiny Far Eastern girl who's English was probably as bad as the woman's was, only for different reasons. One of them was from another country. The other was probably a survivor of the New York City Public School System. After a couple of minutes of waiting, Steve asked the policeman wearing a riot vest where the nearest metro card attendant was, since the machine would not take his money.

The guard looked perplexed. I could only assume that underground air was affecting him, or maybe he was dreaming of pepper spraying attractive Wall Street Occupiers as a way to heat up his sex life. Then he said there weren't any attendants and told Steve he had to purchase his Metro Card through one of the machines.

So we went back and I suggested that he try another machine. That one seemed to work. Then we entered the turnstiles that led to the subway platform, and he stopped dead in his tracks.

"Let me think," he said. "I know how to get home, but I'm not quite sure."

While we wait, a few notes about New York City Subway platforms.

The first thing I noticed is that the general ambiance of the MTA subway platform is actually... surprisingly... much grimier than on television. It wasn't horrible. No disgusting smells, no bums urinating on the third track, no pickpockets. No one was especially rude, either. As a matter of fact, it was almost the opposite. No one was friendly. But no one was an asshole. Now, it could be because it was a weekend. 

Susan later explained to me that post 9/11 New York was a different place in many ways; Steve agreed, saying it was very different than when he lived here in the 1970's.  People, they told me, were just a little bit more aware, a bit more polite. People didn't generally rush the subway train doors when they opened anymore; Susan said people had offered her their seats more than once and that she had seen numerous examples of basic kindness while riding the subway. Steve agreed, half-joking that the whiteness of his hair helped as well.

Steve said he THOUGHT we were on the correct platform, and that the subway was going the right direction. We stood there for a few minutes, waiting for the E Train to Queens. When it stopped, the conductor stuck his head out the narrow window to look behind and make sure they're not going to be in the way of the next train and to make sure no one was blocking the doors. Steve spoke to him briefly, probably asking if we were boarding the right train. The conductor nodded noncommittally; so we boarded and found a place to stand and hold on.

It's important to either hold on to something, lean against the side, or sit. The ride is smooth, for rail, but it's bumpy because of the rail and because of the slight turns it has to make, and the stops and starts do require some balance ... which I was having trouble with because of my satchel. [NOTE TO SELF: GET A BACKPACK.] 

So we rode along for a bit. Before the first stop, though, he started looking around; I could tell he wan't sure we were going the correct direction. Right before the first stop, he asked another passenger if the train was going to Queens. The passenger, who was not at all sure he wanted to talk to anyone... but who was unwilling to be rude... told Steve the train we were on was headed towards The World Trade Center.

(That he called it The World Trade Center struck me as odd. Was it habit? Some grief/denial strategy?)

We got off at the next stop. We stood there for a few minutes, Steve trying to decide whether the train was indeed going the wrong direction, or whether we needed to make our way to the platform going the opposite direction. On the other side of the turnstiles, there was a booth with a MTA Attendant inside. Steve was going to go ask her about which train we needed to be on. He asked if I wanted to wait in case we really were heading the right direction; but I still had faith in Steve's sense of the place he lived and exited the turnstiles with him.

Turns out we were going the wrong direction, which meant going up a few flights of stairs to the next platform.

More on subway platforms: the subway feels like a world unto itself. Music... sometimes piped in, sometimes by live musicians trying to earn a few bucks... could be heard in between the rhythm of the rattling trains. Kiosks selling newspapers, magazines, and cold drinks were open. People milling around, nearly all of them on the way to somewhere. There are scads of beautiful women here, by the way. Lots of walking, and a smoke-free city (which I object to on principle)... not to mention where I was, I'm sure, was an entry exit location for people who work/live/play in Manhattan.

After making our way upstairs and waiting for the E train -- this one REALLY going the right direction -- we  got on the train and rode to the correct station in Queens, where we exited and walked to his and Susan's apartment.

As someone who rides a lot of public transportation, and has ridden it in enough places to be able to compare, I have to admit, the New York City subway isn't that bad... at least... in my limited experience. One of the things you notice very quickly is that the subway absolutely egalitarian. I'm sure the very wealthy folks and those who are claustrophobic or who are formerly obsessed fans of that miserable show, Sex in the City (link omitted deliberately) and believe you have take a taxi everywhere in order to be cool don't ride the subway often; but the mixture of people, ranging from tailored and fashion forward to dirt poor, from post-millennial mod to goth to hipster to hippie-go-lucky to conservative casual makes for a good cross section view of one part of the city... the area between downtown and Queens. It's all public space and everyone has to mediate it, one way or the other.

Or get ripped off by cab. Or be dumb enough to drive a car.

As someone who, as I mentioned, has no real context for understanding New York, the subway was a better introduction than most. 

And my pass assures me I will ride it again... at least two more times.

At this point, I need to thank Noah S. Kaplowitz and Rebecca Fitkin Jones doe their generous donation. Although Kap wanted me to make sure and paint him as an asshole, I cannot, in good conscience. The good news is, I don't have to, since he does quite a fine job on his own, without my assistance.

[If you like what you read here, you can help by:

1. Passing the link around.
2. Graciously donating to the cause using the button on the right hand side of the screen, or by going to paypal.com and donating to mickp@gmx.com. THANKS FOR YOUR SUPPORT. If you DO decide to donate, I will mention you in the blog. Promise. 
3. Contact Catherine Sellers at Greyhound, 415-331-6049. Tell them you are asking about a sponsorship when the operator picks up. When I go to Boston, I'm riding a Bolt Bus... which owned, or is in partnership with Greyhound. Any single guy will tell you... if you can't get the girl you want, go for the friend. You just never know.

THANKS FOR READING AND FOR YOUR SUPPORT!!]