Momentary Life

Prancing to stretch my legs
Outside of a Burger King
I too quickly remove myself
And enter the warm bright

And even in the reflective
Afterglow of my joyous
Exploration of my muscles
In the parking lot waystation

I forget to return to the bus
In similar exultation

Ti'ta'nu (We have led astray)

I apologize,
girl
on the platform
who looked at
me
in terror
through the closing
subway doors
you
on the side
I
had indicated
me
on the side
I realized
we
both
needed
when it was
already
too late
to save
you
from my advice

Sticky

I'm sorry, subway traveler
trying hard not to fall over.
It was I who made the pole sticky.
The pomelo was so good, though--
Surely you understand.

- on a train to Washington Heights
with a nod to W.C.Williams

Beat

Pale, pale hair, spiked hair, paler skin. A short black jacket bearing the word Corrupted.
Passed him as I walked to the spot that I had chosen.
He waited for the train a yard or two away. Waited behind me. Waited next to me again.
We walked toward the train when it came. I looked at his profile. His nose had a bump. Not as big of a bump as I remembered, but it was enough. We ended up next to each other, in the center, on either side of a pole, facing the same direction.

You remind me of someone I used to know, I say.
A couple seconds pass.
Where are you from? I ask.
Sweden, he says.
The train moves with us, and I look toward the window.
Was he a good person or a bad person? he asks.
Beat.
A good person.
Slight pause. He inclines his head toward me, leans closer. What?
A good person, I say louder, more distinctly.
Silence. I hook my arm around the pole, rest, one leg braced, the other bent, content, rocking forward and back. He holds on with one hand, above my elbow, below my head.

I think I'm glad

I was riding the express train back up north. The 1 train started off going slightly faster than us, and I watched the people in the other car as they passed us by. Then their train slowed down to make a station stop, and we seemed to go faster and faster, and the people passed by me in the opposite direction, and I could see the outlines of the train cars, could see how strange it was that we were in these massive mechanical train cars, and I could also see bits of the station through three sets of windows, and then the people were gone and we were hurtling through the near darkness alone again.

We were already past 72nd Street. At one point I stumbled, caught myself, looked up at the man standing closest to me, hoped I hadn't run into him. Our coats were poofy enough that I might not have noticed. But he was not paying any mind.

He started singing ever so quietly. Humming, perhaps. Wordless, but I knew it.

Some...times in our lives...we all have pain...we all have sorrow....

Ever so quietly. I felt the need to connect, to acknowledge, to put myself into his awareness, his singing. If he had been playing the song on a saxophone in the middle of a train station, I would have stood there a bit and sung along, harmonized. It would have been fine. It would have been fun. As it was, I wasn't sure what to do. Things were too quiet, too personal.

But...if we are wise...we know that there's...always tomorrow....

I went ahead and harmonized. So, so softly. I wasn't sure whether or not I wanted him to notice. He did not, and I think I'm glad. But what would have been the issue?

We got to our stop. He hesitated in front of me, and I asked him if he was getting off there. He smiled faintly and said he was, and then he left the train, and I followed. I became happier with the smile, calmer, more comfortable.

I had been thinking about saying, "Good song." Just some sort of recognition. Some sort of bond. But for whose sake? I didn't say anything. We went up the stairs. One person was between us by the time we got to the turnstiles.

I had started singing again, melody this time, louder than before. With words. Why not, I figured. What was I afraid of? But he never heard, and I think I'm glad.

The song stayed in my head for a while. Maybe I'll pass it off to someone tomorrow.

Comrades of a sort

First it was just us two, me and the boy with unkempt dark hair, a backpack, and a slightly feminine face, at the first stop on the 1 train. We were uncertain that the train was running - only saw one person on it - and from that moment of shared uncertainty onwards we were comrades of a sort. An official-looking man assuaged our fears, and we started to settle a train car. He sat down, I sat down on the other side of the car doors, and he moved to sit across from me. We had a bit of a wait.

The boy asked me what I was reading. I said it was a prayer book. Praying is good in subways, I said. There's the time for it. He asked what it was - a "Tanaka"? A Torah? A siddur, I said. Are you Jewish? I asked. Yes, he said.

Before the train left the resting station, a man joined us a few seats down with a mustache and a book. I wanted to ask him what book it was, but I didn't. He was most of the way through it.

The boy had been visiting a friend and watching Nicholas Cage movies. I had been visiting a friend who was about to leave the country. He was going to take a train home from Penn Station.

Fifteen teenagers joined us. They described themselves as drunk. They sang Happy Birthday to two members of their group, adding a remix each time that changed up the rhythm. One girl spat on the floor a bit. A couple of them were quite acrobatic and made good use of the vertical and horizontal poles. The boy and I shared looks - some amiable, some shocked - and smiles. I laughed out loud once. I wondered what the others who joined us on the train thought of the teenagers. I wondered what the boy thought about teenage drinking.

We arrived at Penn Station. I was standing, leaning my back against a pole, facing down the length of the car. Have a good evening, I said. You're leaving? he asked. No, you are, I said.

He stood and said, I'm Matt. I'm Molly, I said, and he shook my hand. It was nice to meet me.

That's my brother's name, I said to Matt as he left the train.

Awww sounds

A fellow woman and I made awww sounds while watching a baby rat try to scramble up a vertical concrete part of the subway tracks below us in order to follow its parent. It succeeded, eventually, to our delight and relief.
- Times Square stop, Q track

To talk

To talk
Press, release
And wait for
Steady light

- Instructions, emergency intercom, 2 train, Manhattan

Make sure you got your phones

Make sure you got your phones!
Make sure you got your wires to your phones.

For any positive comments, my first name is ____ and my last name is ____....For any negative comments, my first name is Jack and my last name is Frost.

- Bus driver, upon arrival in New York

A Man with a Name (though I don't know it)

A Man with a Name
(though I don't know it)

Sat next to him
on the Greyhound bus
from New York to Maryland.

He was concerned about the seat lights.
They weren't working at first,
but they lit up when we moved.

He had a textbook on his lap.
Read two or three pages.
We both slept for a couple of hours.

He got his Master's at Hopkins.
He didn't understand
why we had made a rest stop
when we were already running late.
The driver was fixing the sockets.

I stood up to make sure that everyone was there.
(A full bus makes it easy to check.)
He admired my caring.

The tiara on my lap - for a New Year's costume?
No, I'm bringing it home
for my 20-year-old brother.

Residency in D.C. following time at UCLA.
We talked about snow and snow days
and snowball fights.
I don't like snowball fights.
I pass it off on my pacifist streak,
but really, I just get scared.
I'm more okay with them now.

He mused upon a life
without constant studying.
I appreciate structure
and work-not-work
separation.

He grew up speaking English in Nigeria.
His accent is British-sounding.
We both sometimes say "gonna". I say "hon".

The moon was newly new
and we discussed a bit of religion.
He brightened up
when I mentioned singing in New York.
He was in a church choir once.
His family is very religious;
he is "not particularly".

The sun was at 10 o'clock, on our left.
We both got sunspots. I closed my eyes,
following the circles as they descended.

He likes shrimp and crabs
and doesn't like chocolate
or Ethiopian restaurants-
the bread is not his favorite.
White chocolate is good, though.

He approves of his sister's boyfriend,
not that either of them asked him.

I did not strike him as a New Yorker.
I extolled the subway for a while
and hoped that I would not turn
taciturn.
Apparently it takes about a year.

He grew to like the Ravens
but still finds the Orioles
not to his taste.

He likes performing facial reconstructions
because he is making a difference
one person at a time.

As a Senior Resident, he has both Christmas and New Year's off.

He is going to see two friends tonight,
home friends,
and family as well. We're both hungry.

I had already deemed him
"A man with a name
(though I don't know it)"-
but he told me his name before the bus stopped,
first name only,
and I told him mine,
and we shook hands.

We parted with well wishes,
and he's going to look up my choir,
although I don't know if he'll remember
how to spell it.

Haiku: New Jersey to Port Authority

We speak haiku
and let the world keep turning.
Someone must witness.

Cultures are poems.
Some sing within the stanzas.
Others burst through the syllable count.

Counting syllables.
Possibilities expand
within a framework.

Religious frameworks
put the yoke of Heaven on
your back. Heavy wings.

Culture poetry.
I stay within the structure
afraid to lose rhyme.

Afraid to lose time
On the New Jersey transit,
I think, write, and sleep.

Earlier haiku

My adventure in saying something to a stranger where I would normally not

So I walked into the subway.
There was this guy past the turnstiles with red hair and a beard.
A short beard, very short.
Reddish orange, the beard.
His red hair was down to his chin or so. Kind of curly, I think.

Well, it was just really cool. He rocked his red hair.

He stood

(leaned?)

against one of the columns

in the middle of the Grand Central subway stop.

I took note-

-he had a bag that could have been luggage-

-maybe not, but what was he waiting there for?-

and passed by

almost got to the place where I would go down the stairs

thought for a bit

looked back at him

thought for a bit

then turned around, went up to him

said "Excuse me,

I just wanted to say that I  

appreciate your hair.

Have a good evening."

And he said

"Thank you"

in an pleasant smiled manner

(and an akin-to-British accent).

(Then I noticed that he was well-dressed and the accent made sense.)

And I skedaddled off and

went down the stairs.

I might have looked back once, I forget.

That was my adventure in saying something to a stranger where I would normally not.

Santas, and Other Causes for a Good Mood

I am in such a good mood.

1) babysitting
2) subway interactions
3) Santas Claus
4) buying Chunky Monkey ice cream
5) bananas on my door

Babysitting
     This was my second time babysitting two wonderful kids. There is a cat named Little Man. They (not including Little Man) ate tortellini, which happens to be one of my favorite foods. I played duck duck goose with the younger girl and some of her dolls and stuffed/beaned animals, and then we read The Berenstain Bears before she got in bed. The 10-year-old-boy and I discussed books - including our own aspirations (both of us are writing stories currently) - and played Scrabble. As I was washing dishes, I thought about how calm I felt, how calming this all was. I love being with kids. I love petting cats. I love bonding. Babysitting is being.
     The boy took out the second book in the Eragon series for me to read while he read before sleep, and the father had recommended a New Yorker fiction article by Nathan Englander. I read the article first and had just finished when the parents came home. Eldest will wait for next time.

Subway interactions
     I have written about the subway before. There are many manners of riding on the subway. The headphone manner: you are not closed off from others through body language, but you make yourself separate, involved in a different world from the one around you, one that should only be intruded upon when necessary. The already involved manner: you are traveling with someone or someones - perhaps your child, your boyfriend, your posse - and are engaging in conversation or cuddling. The "I am trying to nap" manner - self-explanatory. The "When will this train get here?" manner. The vacant manner, common in the mornings and late at night. The similar-in-phenotype yet different-in-genotype preoccupied manner. The prayer manner, which, to an observer, seems similar to vacant and preoccupied and, probably, to "I am trying to nap (standing up)" if your eyes are closed.
     I frequent the roaming eyes manner: you are interested in other people in general, smile upon making eye contact if you overcome your shyness, ask questions, make comments, and engage in conversation on occasion, especially if you find yourself talking to someone who is not from New York. Yet I find that the "absorbed in your reading but can be interrupted" manner is often the most lucrative in terms of social interaction. My most involved and interesting conversations occur when I am studying Jewish liturgical sheet music. Tonight, I had a brief chat about my future after a young man noticed that I had a GRE book on my lap. I myself met a pianist on the way down from Washington Heights after I discovered that her book was Russian. (If you want my attention in a public setting, speak or read in Russian. I have been known to follow around Harvard tour groups in order to drink of it.)
     Subway interactions - so fun! Unless you step on someone's foot. Then you feel bad for a while.

Santas Claus
     On my way to babysitting, I noticed this man:

     Yes. Yes, that is Santa Claus.
     He was not the only one. And many of them were drunk, as another subway-goer commented. (Regardless, I saw one mother-and-child pair ask for a photo op. All the ones that I encountered were in good spirits!) I asked another Claus for some explanation, and it turns out that there was a SantaCon tonight. You show up with two cans of food while wearing a Santa Claus outfit at one of two starting places, and from there you head to bars around town who are also participating in a charitable project. I think that being a Santa Claus gives you leave to converse with other Santa Clauses. (Or should it be "Santas Claus", like "knights-errant" and "Brothers Grimm"?) Another tip for city interactions: anything that brings you closer together in dress, attitude, or other discernible quality also entails a sense of affinity that often can lead to conversation or at least a knowing smile.
     I found myself thinking about causes, and what you do while you are supporting a cause. I might flesh out these thoughts, but not right now.
     Here are some more Santas for you. I asked in advance before taking their picture. (The answer of the two who heard me was in the affirmative, in case you were wondering.)

   Thanks, Santas Claus.

Buying Chunky Monkey ice cream
     I had just babysat. I had money in my purse. I would have gotten a cone, but that place on Lexington was closed. Instead I went to the neighborhood convenience store and bought Chunky Monkey ice cream and two oranges. Need I say more?
     I think the two men who run the store recognize me each time now. I have demonstrated a seaweed habit and like to think that they have noticed.

Bananas on my door
     Last night was a long night for one that had a bedtime of eleven o'clock. I had reserved a place at a Chabad meal twenty blocks south of me. Services were to start at 6:30. I arrived perhaps ten minutes late - not sure, wasn't wearing a watch - and found a locked building and no doorman. I couldn't ring the bell. I waited for a good twenty minutes, sang to myself a bit, and watched a man try to cajole people into entering the fur-selling store next door. (Furs were on sale!) Perhaps I had accidentally headed to their office address instead of their religious-services-plus-dinner address. Regardless, I was short davening and a meal.
     Headed back north, stopping at two places of Jewish prayer on the way. Prayed at one - gorgeous, gorgeous sanctuary - but was kicked out very kindly when the building was to close. The second one I arrived at after services had finished. There were young adults milling and chatting in the entrance-way, but a couple of men that I asked could not point me to the sanctuary. They were there for a Manhattan Jewish Experience dinner. Had they prayed elsewhere beforehand? I do not know. I did not ask. A non-Jewish man who worked there was the one who told me services had finished, and who told me no, the room was closed, I could not go in and pray. I almost cried once I had left the building. Sometimes things hit me hard.
     I made my weary way back north. The doorman brightened my night, as he often does. I stayed downstairs for probably a good hour, our chatting punctuated by his occasional elevator calls. I lamented my unpreparedness for eating dinner in the apartment, and we discussed food, nutrition, and weight for a bit among other topics. Thank goodness, I had the basic Shabbat dinner elements of wine and two unbroken bread items, and later in the night I let him know that I had also discovered an apple and some yogurt and had enough for a veritable feast. (It turns out that pasta sauce and mozzarella cheese can be good even cold on bread.) So while I did not have food with company, I still ended my night with a more-than-sufficient amount of both.
     I saw him today on my way out to babysitting. We were both to be working until eleven o'clock.
     I came home to bananas on my door.

Filled with appreciation and awe that such people as he exist in the world, I ate one banana straightaway and have yet to touch the Chunky Monkey ice cream.

Yedid Nefesh

First time putting a song online. Yedid Nefesh is traditionally sung on Friday nights, right as Shabbat is starting, and then sometimes again on Saturday nights, right before the end of Shabbat, with a different tune. I was going to use pictures from a walk I took once, but uploading takes a while, so instead you have the Hebrew text to look at if you'd like. (Slightly different Hebrew text from what I'm singing.)

(To listen, please go to the Songs page.)

It was especially good for me to have this prayer when I was on a train crossing Russia. The 1 (2) 3 1 (2) 3 1 rhythm matched the rhythm of the turning wheels perfectly.

One of those nights

1. One of those nights Tonight was one of those nights where I walked right past my train stop without noticing. Then again, I am not too familiar with Houston Street, so I might have missed the stop even if I had not been wrapped up in conversation with two fellow choristers.The girl who became my friend was the one to notice, a girl of eighteen with curly black hair and a lot to say. We continued on to another convenient stop, bearing to our left while the third of us crossed the street to reach her apartment.One of the first in my newly adopted singing group (well, I guess they adopted me) to reach out, my friend had proposed that we walk together and then delved into bits of my life story - which, of course, inspired her to share bits of hers.

By the time we parted ways with our acquaintance, I had talked about Seeds of Peace, and my friend had explained aspects of her background and upbringing....

This is how she had started talking about the community - because what I said about Seeds of Peace bringing people together who might be unaware of each other (at least in some senses) resonated, and she felt that the community could use something like that, that there was such a large amount of ignorance, that it was just not representative of the larger world, that they weren't really living in the world.We talked a little bit about religion - we passed a food cart, I asked if she kept Halal, she said she's not really anything at the moment. She went some into being baptized Catholic and being raised in the Church but then snapping a couple weeks before Communion - or confirmation? Whichever it was, she was around thirteen, which she used as part of the explanation of why snapping made sense.

  I mentioned going to a Quaker school at some point.

Our third had brought up the Episcopal church that she attends.She said there, they're Christian, but sort of anything goes.

  Are there drums sometimes? I inquired.

  Yes, drums.

  It was around then that she parted ways with us.

  And then my friend really started talking.

  She had been talking all along, but this was a little more rapid-fire.I forget a little bit of the ordering.

  There was one question I asked that set her off talking, but there were also things she just said on her own.

  She said there was no use playing the field if she found the person she lovedand I said "If you know, you know." And she seemed to agree with that....

She asked me at one point

  if I was very religious.

  I said, "Pretty religious."

  She shared some of her views. Not views as in, "I believe in God," etc.

Although at one point she said something about spirituality but that that word sounds "kumbaya." I totally understood her there.

  The views that she shared were about what she loved about various religions.

  Muslims, she said -

in Islam, there is a new love of God every day.

  My first thought was that this meant there was a different way to love God you were supposed to take on each day.

  Then she said

  In Judaism, you have an old love of God every day.

  Then I started thinking about the new and the ancient.

That our love of God is an old love, in an old way.

  She said

  that Jews are keeping an ancient promise, are still keeping that promise.

"If that's what you do."

  I thought that was beautiful and it totally changed the way I see my role. I might have thought of it before. But it came out of her mouth then, and it was a breath of clarity.

  She talked about Christianity

said that she had issues with modern Christianity

  has seen a lot of hypocrisy

  but what she believes Christianity should be

  is love over morality

  She is frustrated by seeing people hate others for their sins.

After what I would call the commandment of "v'ahavta l'reacha camocha"(love your neighbor as yourself).

  She apologized several times for speaking so much.

  I said I enjoyed it and was looking forward to many more opportunities.

 I said she was a pretty wise person.

And she started remarking about how she wasn't, or she doubted that, something to that effect

  and then we got into a conversation about

  how if you acknowledge that you're wise, that's how you're supposed to know you're not

  that the wise people are ones who don't know it really

  and the kind people too, the good people.

I mentioned this, and she started talking about a story about a guru

  who would do something called tapas

  and get to some sort of state

  but then upon realizing it or thinking of himself a certain way

  he went back to the beginningagain

that that's how people get drawn back into the cycles of reincarnation - you think you do a good deed, and once you think about it in that way karma draws you back.

So it was right as we were talking about such matters that we arrived at the second train stop.

  We bid each other good night, take care, see you next week, I'll add you on Facebook.

   2. Train Man, or the moment I might regret as long as I remember it

I got on the train. It's a longer trip than I usually take, at least not involving a transfer - meaning more time I can do something instead of walking.

  There was a man next to me in awesome pants. He had hair in a bun on the top of his head. He was Asian of some sort. He was part of a group of people. One of them commented on his pants. I said I loved them too.

A woman a bit down the train car had sold them to him on her online store. They were part of the same group.

  I pulled out my chazzanut pages to study and sing quietly on the way back north. Review time.

At some point, the large group left. They were really cool. I contemplated what it would be like to say, Hey, you guys seem real neat, or something like that at least, My name's Molly, can I hang with you?

  I don't know what that would have even looked like. They might have been looking for a bar at the moment. I have work tomorrow.

  So they left.

  I sat down.

  A couple people sat down next to me, presently.

A man on each side. I gave each a brief glance and continued studying.

  But a woman was looking to sit down. She chose on the other side of one of the men, but I wasn't sure there was enough space, so I stood up. As I am wont to do.

But then it turned out there was enough space, and the man scooted a bit and beckoned me to sit back down. Which I did, feeling slightly foolish but only very, very slightly. I would have stood and been happy, but perhaps it would have made it seem like I didn't want to sit there. In any case, he made sure there was room.

  So I studied.

  At some point, the man said, Are you studying to become a cantor?

I paused - the answer has taken different forms over the days and years - and answered that I was not currently studying to become a cantor, but I was taking a class on chazzanut.

  I forget whether we used the word cantor or chazzan. Perhaps cantor.

He said, so you are learning for fun?

  I said, well, not really, I want to lead services, I like leading services.

  It was obvious at some point that he was a Hebrew-speaker from the way he pronounced a few of the following words.

  He said all he had learned was singing his parashah, for his bar mitzvah.

  I asked which parashah? (Parashah was the word that gave him away as non-American.)

  He said Bereishit.

I said, a good place to start.

  He had dark curly hair, somewhere between wavy and curly. Within ten years of my age. Within five, probably.

  He said I was probably planning on leading Reform services?

I said no, actually. Conservative. Then I hesitated and almost corrected that, almost explained more, almost said something about not Reform being about liking Hebrew, but then all I said was, whomever would let me, but not Reform.

He said, there are troubles in Israel about women singing, have you heard?

  I said, yes, I've heard, and added a couple more words that related to how I had been following such matters to some extent.

  I said, are you from Israel?

  He said yes, where are you from? I said I'm from Baltimore.

Or maybe we asked each other in the opposite order.

  Either here or slightly earlier in the conversation he said,

  I'm sorry, I am distracting you from studying.

  Or you were studying.

  Or something like that.

  But I said, not at all. Or that's okay. Or something like that.

  And closed my book on my lap.

  We were in silence for some moments.

I forget whether we talked about something else, or whether this happened slightly earlier in the conversation and then the rest of the conversation happened right then.

  But we were saying something, but not mid-sentence.

  Then it got to my stop.

  I said, this is my stop. and got up.

  Have a good night, I said.

  Good night, he said.

And I left the train, not knowing his name, not knowing where he was going, no way to contact him ever ever.

  I contemplated looking at Craigslist to see if he had put anything there.

  Not for romantic reasons.

  But just a conversation, he was interested in me, I was curious about him to some extent, at least enjoying talking with him.

I could have stayed on one more stop. Very easily. I often do get off at the next stop, if I take the express train.

  But instead, I just left the train with a good night.

  And that's something that I might always regret if I remember it.

  At least that's what I was thinking as I left the station.

  Although now I realize

  that this story wouldn't have a part three in the same way if I hadn't gotten off the train there.

3. Because I was feeling slightly hungry  Because I was feeling slightly hungry

  and walked into a Starbucks

  because the door was open.

  I almost never go into Starbucks. Nothing against it, just almost never a reason to.

  But I walked in

  and was waiting to get a piece of multiple berry coffee cake.

  There were two doctors there

  stethoscopes around their necks.

  I asked the woman if she was on call

she said no, she was working, just taking a coffee break.

  I was going to pay the guy for my slice of coffee cake.

  He said not to pay, they were about to throw it all out anyway.

Oh, that's what he had said earlier, that they were about to throw everything out, did I want anything?

  The female doctor (the one closer to the man behind the counter) and I were shocked.

  They were just going to throw it out? They always threw it out?

  There was a lot of food left - and fresh, too.

  I was thinking of finding a homeless shelter in the area to take it.

That'll actually be a project of mine this week, trying to figure out whether that Starbucks location can partner with a shelter to donate what's left at the end of the day.

  But my phone wasn't really able to search for a shelter at that moment.

  or at least not that quickly.

  The woman suggested to him that if they were going to throw it out but were asking us to take what we wanted, she could take some back to the hospital.

Maybe the ER is where she was. I don't remember. But she was going to put the food in the conference room.

  The doctors would be very happy for that late at night.

 I volunteered to help her carry it back. It was that much food.

  But it ended up fitting on one or both of her arms,

  in paper bags with handles, five or six strung on her right arm.

Smallish paper bags, but still.

  And that wasn't even all of the muffins and cakes and candies.

But that happened, and I walked out of the store with her (after asking for a piece of lemon pound cake for breakfast - he gave me two, I found out when I got home)

  and we swapped first names and parted with a Good night.

I acknowledged earlier on how it was probably strange of me to just walk in with her, so it's good that it turned out that way, I think.

but yes, we parted

  I came back here

  she had asked for the guy's name

  Noel, or Noelle, however it's spelled, but pronounced No-el.

  I looked up a homeless shelter and called and got an answering machine.

And I looked forward to putting this into writing...about my extraordinary evening. And I thought, I had a distinct sense of God tonight.  4. Seaweed  And then I bought two packs of seaweed.

The New York City Subway

(Don't want to read? Look at some pictures instead.)

I love the metro.
I love the bustle, the direction, the sheer mass of humanity. I love being squished into a standing position so I do not have to hold on. I love testing out my balance, standing as though on a skateboard in my super-cool converse-type sneakers and dress pants. I love the permission to be quiet. I love the acts of kindness, the proffering of seats for old and pregnant and tired, the moments of eye contact sometimes followed by smiles - shy, hesitant, sympathetic, bold, joyful.

"Plan extra time for travel," NYC-savvy people tell me. It turns out that a number of mundane metropolitan maladies have the potential to defy the powers that be at Google Maps. Trains break down; streets come under repair; transfers do not always line up. Today, however, I came across another reason to give myself a buffer of twenty minutes:

Good music.

Heading from the S train to the 6 train at the East 42nd Street/Grand Central stop, I ran into the fine musicians of The Yaz Band, headed up by Yasuyuki "Yaz" Tagaki. To gain a taste of the experience, look here (not my own video; this one features a slightly different musician lineup but is in the same location).

A locked rhythm, contagious energy, crisp drums, tight control that made your body want to dance. The least you could do was bob your head in time - not down, down, down on each beat, but up, up, up, in the blues dance tradition.

How lovely to have the time to stand there for twenty minutes, bobbing slightly to the music, wishing to do more, watching Yaz step in place, one foot after the other, as he keeps time for the band and enjoys himself a bit.

I exchanged grins with another young woman in work attire who was standing slightly behind me. She seemed so excited and happy to be part of a communal jazz experience. She was striking, slim and pretty, with good jewelry and a short fitted dress. Unlike me, she had kept on her heels for the subway. She stayed for at least three songs before tipping and heading down the stairs toward the platform for the downtown 6 train.

One guy with dark hair and a bulky top also stayed for multiple songs and went over to the information table at one point. He kept his headphones on the entire time. I assume his music was off.

I focused attention on the people going by without stopping. Some turned their heads. One put his hands over his ears. Most did not smile. I bet they were on tight schedules.

Another girl started dancing over near the keyboardist. Subtle steps and hip and shoulder and head movements, certainly more into the groove than into performing for an audience. A guy came out from the throng and displayed his own interpretations in front of her. There might have been some applause. I would have danced with someone. Heck, this is the most anonymous that I'll ever be in this city. I should capitalize on the opportunity.

An old black gentleman with graying hair in a dark striped business suit took out his camera and recorded a few songs. His stance was calm and his hands were steady, and every so often he switched the angle from which he filmed. I admired his dedication to his task and his love for the music, and I imagined that he must have a back story. Some jazz past. Maybe he once fronted a band, listening to the keyboardist take a solo, feeling the pulse, moving his feet to the beat, one foot after the other, back and forth, body turning slightly right, left, right, left.

Give yourself some extra time when traveling by metro. And carry some bucks for tips.

**

They first hooked me with this song, which I have transcribed below according to the solo saxophone line. Can anyone tell me what it is? I'm guessing Hancock or Coltrane.

|:e---gaa----gabde----------------e---gaa----gabde------------bdbde--e--------bdbde--e------------:|