Q train to 57th Street. This is Canal Street. Next stop, 14th Street Union Square. Stand clear of the closing doors, please.
Attention ladies and gentlemen, this train will go out of service at 57th Street. For continuing service to Queens, transfer at 42nd Street. I repeat, this train will go out of service after 57th Street. Sure, when we get to 57th Street, I could come out of this box and walk through the train. Make some kind of a plea for your attention. I could look for the stragglers and the tourists, for the people who don’t speak English and the hearing impaired. I could look them in the eye. But I prefer to shout the same thing over and over. Or at least that what my ex-husband tells me. He tells me I shout and he tells me I repeat. Shout, repeat, shout, repeat, you know.
I’ll tell you where I’m from: Brooklyn, born and raised. Williamsburg. The old Williamsburg. Not like it is now, full of toothpicky rich kids. The newspaper’s always calling them “hipsters.” The don’t look hip to me, just delicate. I don’t mean delicate like a flower but delicate like a bed-wetter, but that’s just my opinion. Nothing more.
“This is how we talk in Brooklyn!” I used to tell my ex. “I am not shouting, I’m talking! You call it ‘shouting’ and that’s your opinion, nothing more!”
He’s from Staten Island. Let me tell you something, there is no elevated train in Staten Island like the J train. Williamsburg, Bushwick, and Cypress Hills, the J does nothing but screech and scrape over your head day in and day out, competing with every word and every tooth in your mouth.
Before he walked. I said, “Joey, stop it already! You made your point! You made your point, Joey. Just stop. You’re point has been made. You think I shout. You may stop now,” and he said, “You’re doing it again. I heard you the first time. I’m right here!” Meaning he was standing right in front of me as he said this. Then he walked out dragging a piece of ugly luggage behind him. I stood clear of the closing door. 14th Street Union Square. Transfer here for the 4,5,6, N, R, W, and L train. 34th Street Herald Square next.
Like I said before, this train will go out of service at 57th Street. I am repeating this information if you didn’t hear it the first time or if you’re just joining us. Common sense says when we get to 57th street, you will see everyone get off and you’ll get off, too. But you cannot rely on everyone having common sense. Not now, not ever.
My ex, he had this coffee mug that said, I wish I were dead. What kind father drinks from a coffee mug like that in front of his kid? My daughter, let me tell you, she is beautiful. Soft brown curls, big hazel eyes, skin the color of Bambi. Nine years old and has more sense than her father. It’s hard to believe she’s half him. Does she drink from a cup that says, I wish I were dead? No and not because she doesn’t have one. My ex gave her one for Christmas last year. How do you like that? Tried to tell me it had something to do with God and going to heaven and all that. I said, “Joey, you can leave now! You can leave!” He said, “I just got here.” I told him, “That’s because you were late. You were late getting here and now you can leave early.” This is what I mean by lacking common sense. Maybe you’ve met my ex. He drives the F which is also always late. 34th Street Herald Square – transfer for the B, D, F (which is probably late), V (which no one takes), N, R, W, and the PATH upstairs. 42nd Street Times Square next.
After 57th Street, this train is going out of service and returning to a storage yard. I’m going to repeat this a few more times in the next few minutes so if you are trying to enjoy your book, your magazine, or flirt with some guy or girl you are too shy to talk to, well, I guess you can forget about it. As we get closer to the end, my voice gets louder. For those of you who ride my train daily can attest, you can’t ignore me forever! But if you should ignore me and ride this train to the storage yard with that guy or that girl that you have been looking at for months, be warned: this is how I met my ex.
He looked so perfect with his navy blue uniform. The MTA doesn’t make them like that anymore. Fitted. I got nervous seeing him in those fitted pants and the crisp jacket that I threw up a little bit in the back of my throat. The doc calls it acid reflux. I call it deja food. That’s not real French but, you know, my opinion.
I was on the Q train, just like you. He walked on the train and our eyes locked. I must have had temporary hearing loss because I did not, I repeat, I did not hear the warnings. I didn’t hear that it was the last stop or anything about a storage yard. I didn’t hear the words “paternity suit” or “probation” come out of my ex’s mouth. I certainly didn’t hear “the terrorists are out to get me.” None of it. I just looked at him and melted like the inside of a grilled cheese sandwich. Now some of you may like that feeling. That’s why you drink too much. Don’t lie to me. I see some of you people everyday, puffy and about to loose your balance every time I veer to the left at 23rd. I guess maybe you need that to cope with sitting at a desk. I wouldn’t know. Me, I didn’t trust that melted cheese feeling. But I went with it because that was all I could do, you know? We rode the Q train to the last stop and then he kissed me, the doors closed and we sped toward some patch of land in the Bronx overgrown with weeds, iron tracks, and broken glass.
He told me about the wind in Staten Island, I how it swipes at your face like an angry cat, how you can hear the cries of widows waiting for their husbands to return from the sea. All my sisters had boyfriends in jail and I thought tragedy was romantic, thought waiting was some kind of reward given to those who knew what real love was all about. I told him about the screeching of the J train because I don’t claim to be some sort of a poet. I told him how it drowned out even your most intimate thoughts. How you could never be the good kind of alone with electric iron blocking your view of heaven. I cried. He wiped the tear. The lights flickered. I turned my head.
42nd Street! 42nd Street Times Square. Here you will find connection to the past, the ACE, and some break dancers. Stand clear of the closing doors.
Sometimes this train stops at 49th Street. There is no rhyme or reason to this. So let me tell you, today it will not. 57th Street is the next and last.
Stop.
I tell my daughter, “live your life above ground.” Working underground is hard. I start to feel like a mole person down here. Tunneling, tunneling, squinting when all the facts come into the light. I got the job down here to be closer to my ex but our train lines just go side by side most of the time. Me ending in Little Odessa, him at Avenue X. Close but ugh, what do I care? A mole person. Or a pod person. Oh, yeah, those are the other people who don’t hear my warnings. The ones with the iPods. How much those things cost, like $300? This is only my opinion but you don’t need that many songs. Ever.
You just need a song that takes you to where you want to go. Mine is “Heaven.” I bet there’s a hundred songs called “Heaven” and they’re all mine. 57th Street. Everybody please exit the train.
