A woman with purple hair, a purple shirt, and a purple comforter in a clear plastic bag, running down the 96th St. platform to catch a train; a man speaking Spanish behind me, whom I was surprised that I could understand until he walked past me and I realized he was probably not a native speaker; a group of day campers in matching T-shirts in a hot, underground subway corridor; policemen and policewomen on the subway platform at Times Square; a homeless man on the local train, explaining his bipolar and schizophrenic status at bureaucratic length before he asked for money for clothes; a 40-something Asian woman sitting across from me, wearing a loose khaki pantsuit, reading a Ravi Zacharias magazine. I see her reach down into her pocket and finger some change, considering whether to give.
Lots of people with rolling suitcases. A family of blonde, well-groomed suburbanites, obviously just emerged from Billy Eliot. The youngest daughter starts to cross 8th Ave. in the middle, and when her mom tells her she can't jaywalk, she replies, "I know. Shut up!" A boy negotiating spending money with his dad outside a cheap souvenir store. Crowds, crowds so thick for blocks that I can't dodge them to the left or right. Two women in the middle of the crowds, with a map, gesturing; outside every office building, people smoking near the entrance; a blind woman at a crosswalk, with a cane; a man with his suit-jacket flung over his shoulder, talking on his cellphone, starting to cross the street in traffic and suddenly stopping; a pregnant woman on an elevator with a box of takeout macaroni and cheese. A man in biking shorts changing a tire quickly without looking, and talking to a bicycle rickshaw driver. Everywhere, those big T-shirts with the ruching.
An image from earlier this week: A man playing Chopin on the subway platform at Union Square. Yes, that's a piano on a subway platform.
A woman on the train, thin, late 50s, grayish blond hair and unusually large veins in her arms. I'm trying to decide whether she's unusually strong or unusually weak, and I never figure it out, even when she stands up and bows under the weight of a portfolio, which looks heavy; a pony-tailed real estate agent in a suit with a collarless black shirt, complaining loudly about people pulling out of rental deals; a family from South America trying to entertain a fretting toddler so he won't cry. His five-year-old sister is wearing an elasticized necklace and bracelet with large, plastic beads, and she's letting him play with them. C.Z. and I transfer to the express. They follow. A very tall, large-boned blonde woman with a ponytail, whom I saw on the same train yesterday wearing a different black dress. Three Puerto Rican women, two middle-aged and one younger, with a little girl and an Anglo boy who is about ten. One of them greets the boy and touches him tenderly on the head. He's showing off for the younger girl, making silly noises.
Above ground again, a South Asian mother and her eleven-year-old daughter. The daughter is in that tall, thin stage and is wearing a bright blue embroidered shirt, cropped pants, and flip flops. A tall, broad-shouldered man with dreadlocks to his waist; a large man in baggy shorts and a T-shirt, leaning on the scaffolding outside the hardware store as though he's taking a smoking break, but every time someone passes he says, "Excuse me, excuse me." He's asking for money. Two people behind me talking very intently about how a certain piece of music should be performed. The super and doorman of the building next door talking very intently about garbage. Seiko, my former frilly-punk hairstylist, who, no matter what kind of picture I brought in or drew, always gave me the same too short haircut; a skinny youth in a tank top, baseball cap and baggy pants, with his hand inside the pants as though it's part of the pose; the usual checkout girls at the gourmet market--"Naxt! Naxt on line!"
My neighbor Alexis knocking on the elevator door and complaining because someone is holding it open downstairs; our temporary super Jose, on the elevator with a broom and dustpan, looking sheepish (later I give him some vegetables, because I have extra and I know he lives alone); a man sitting inside the church door checking off names for the vegetable pickup. "Tomatoes!" he says conspiratorially. (We've all been waiting for the tomatoes.) An Amish man (very friendly) at the farmer's market. He sold me a dozen small eggs for $2, which is a good price. He said they were from hens that had just started laying, and they had rich yolks. Pam, the Ronnybrook "milkmaid," tanned in a tank top and apron, looking in her van for a glass bottle of half and half. Columbia students, lots of them, everywhere. Two women in matching hot pink dresses and black aprons, coming back to a nail salon from their break. A very small thin man in khaki shorts that turn up on the end. His legs are white and his shirt looks too big. A group of Mormon missionaries, outside the subway station, playing paper/scissors/rock, to determine who goes where, I guess. A group of older men on a side street, speaking rapid Spanish in what might be an argument, but could be just an involved conversation. "Biblia!" I hear one yell.
I could do this, and get a different cross-section of my fellow city-dwellers, almost any day I go out. I wonder if I would recognize myself in someone else's description.
