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Thursday, October 05, 2006
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Haiku "Is that all you're bringing?" Mr UD just asked the classic UD's-taking-a-trip question. I pack light. The morning is cool, windy, and overcast. I've stepped from the Metro platform into a Red Line train in the direction of Union Station. I'll go to a ticket machine there and hope a Boston train's leaving pretty soon. Then I'll go to another machine to withdraw some cash. Must remember to keep my receipts! The Metro car is full but silent. An extremely civil transportation system, this one, with well-dressed people tending to laptops and newspapers. ...Wow! That's something new. As we sped in the dark from Metro Center to Gallery Place, a film appeared out the righthand windows! How do they do that? Vast posters lining the tunnel walls? You fly by and it's like those picture books whose pages you flip to make their images move... The flashing figures were an advertisment for Target. A strange sort of ad. No content; only a series of variations on red circles, each variation cartwheeling along against the black rectangles of the windows. In A Station of the Metro The apparition of these faces in the crowd: Petals on a wet black Target ad. Boston bound. We've paused at Wilmington. The overcast's over; it's sunny as all get-out, with thin clouds, under which the city looks toylike. Christ, the Quiet Car is a tomb. A few rows behind me, the loud, wise-cracking ticket-taker sprawls unconscious. Everyone's half-asleep as we slide along... Is there a word for the annoyance you feel when none of the annoyances you anticipate arises? Plenty of Quiet Car seats; funereal hush; all stops on-time... We're in Philly. "Be careful getting the luggage down. Don't want to hit that lady in the head," says a woman to her husband as he stands athwart UD. She smiles at me as she says this. "If you hit me, I couldn't even cry out," says UD. "Quiet Car." Boston, Massachusetts. Early evening if you want to be pretty about it. Height of rush hour would be another description. Big Dig mess. Still, a lovely dusky night in the big city. |