The platform is barren in the early morning, except for the four of us, travelers waiting on the railroad. The sun barely shines through this fog, a dull reminder of things to come.
There is the kid, can't be more than twenty-two, the baseball cap backwards, the T-shirt a maze of creases and folds with his black jeans and slump of apathetic confusion. You see this everywhere and I even catch myself at work, under the tick-tock man keeping the pay clock, slouching toward infinity. Guilty, guilty, guilty.
Then there's the woman in mom jeans smoking a cigarette, high waisted almost white jeans, striped t-shirt tucked in. Her husband is holding their little girl in his tanned, wiry arms, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Maybe they should give the little girl a kiddie smoke too, like I used to have in my childhood; the candy cigarettes made of that powdery hard barely sweet nearly flavorless gum. Smoke they all told us, even Joe Camel™ told us to with his sly smile and penis shaped mouth.
Those cigarette guys were awesome like the pirates of yore were, until they were sued and taxed and maligned in the press for the cancer they caused that we all pretended not to know about or care, until too many started dying.
There's a lesson to be learned here about hunter and prey. Hunters shouldn't consume so many prey that the prey actually care. And as for the prey, the herd doesn't care too much if they lose a few here and there. But if too many go the way of all things, then the prey get angry and afraid and scatter or worse, fight back.
I stand on the platform and wait, the morning air raising goosebumps and sending the random chill through me, even with the sports coat on. I like to travel in style, like a modern Cary Grant sneaking onto a train in North By Northwest, but not really that elegant or that good looking.
I hope the seats are comfortable. Eight hours of nothing to do but get somewhere I need to go. Surely I can find some rest for my weary head and heart on the last of the old ways of getting around.
Most everyone flies these days. I don't like flying. Tired of watching first class citizens escorted to their first class seats. Airlines make me confront too many uns when I fly; Un-successful, Un-important, Un-comfortable.
Coach is an invention of the Illuminati to make you feel more like cattle being herded from place to place.
Makes me wonder if all this time, maybe just like everyone else, I've been looking to be comfortable in this world. That's hard to come by because lately, maybe even forever, I've felt so uncomfortable in my own skin that I wish I could slip it off and leave it somewhere for cleaning or retire it to some bag or box in a garage of unwanted soul-stuff. But at least for eight hours on a train I don't have to worry about a thing. It is one of the joys of traveling; you don't have a to be a worker, dreamer, father, husband, democrat, catholic, or yourself.
You can just be.
There is the kid, can't be more than twenty-two, the baseball cap backwards, the T-shirt a maze of creases and folds with his black jeans and slump of apathetic confusion. You see this everywhere and I even catch myself at work, under the tick-tock man keeping the pay clock, slouching toward infinity. Guilty, guilty, guilty.
Then there's the woman in mom jeans smoking a cigarette, high waisted almost white jeans, striped t-shirt tucked in. Her husband is holding their little girl in his tanned, wiry arms, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. Maybe they should give the little girl a kiddie smoke too, like I used to have in my childhood; the candy cigarettes made of that powdery hard barely sweet nearly flavorless gum. Smoke they all told us, even Joe Camel™ told us to with his sly smile and penis shaped mouth.
Those cigarette guys were awesome like the pirates of yore were, until they were sued and taxed and maligned in the press for the cancer they caused that we all pretended not to know about or care, until too many started dying.
There's a lesson to be learned here about hunter and prey. Hunters shouldn't consume so many prey that the prey actually care. And as for the prey, the herd doesn't care too much if they lose a few here and there. But if too many go the way of all things, then the prey get angry and afraid and scatter or worse, fight back.
I stand on the platform and wait, the morning air raising goosebumps and sending the random chill through me, even with the sports coat on. I like to travel in style, like a modern Cary Grant sneaking onto a train in North By Northwest, but not really that elegant or that good looking.
I hope the seats are comfortable. Eight hours of nothing to do but get somewhere I need to go. Surely I can find some rest for my weary head and heart on the last of the old ways of getting around.
Most everyone flies these days. I don't like flying. Tired of watching first class citizens escorted to their first class seats. Airlines make me confront too many uns when I fly; Un-successful, Un-important, Un-comfortable.
Coach is an invention of the Illuminati to make you feel more like cattle being herded from place to place.
Makes me wonder if all this time, maybe just like everyone else, I've been looking to be comfortable in this world. That's hard to come by because lately, maybe even forever, I've felt so uncomfortable in my own skin that I wish I could slip it off and leave it somewhere for cleaning or retire it to some bag or box in a garage of unwanted soul-stuff. But at least for eight hours on a train I don't have to worry about a thing. It is one of the joys of traveling; you don't have a to be a worker, dreamer, father, husband, democrat, catholic, or yourself.
You can just be.
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