connecting*the*dots

not too strange, originally uploaded by * tathei *.

This is only the second time I’ve been back to the NJ/NYC area since I moved in September, and it’s the first time I’ve commuted in over three years. Stepping onto the NJTransit Bloomfield Station this morning immediately brought me back to the days of running to the Union Street Station with dripping wet hair and bagel in mouth trying to catch the N&R.

It’s strange how you notice the little things around you when you’re not a part of the scene, such as watching an entire car full of people reading their NYTimes (almost exclusively) by folding the paper into columns. Or how a triple seater gets claimed by two people, with one placing a large bag in the middle signifying “Go ask someone else to move. I need this space.”

No, I don’t miss spending an hour each morning struggling with the rest of humanity for a seat and a two-second head start out the door into Manhattan. But I have to admit, it is nice to be around people again.

UPDATE: Okay, I’m finishing this post at the office I’m working from this week. Let me take back everything I said about being around people. After I got off the train, I walked through at least five different scents of piss. My home office (sans piss smell) is looking good right about now.

I tag like a 15 year-old kid in the South Bronx with a box full of Krylons and a yard full of freshly sandblasted cars.

I tag like I just got jumped by a handful of punks who made the mistake of letting me follow them to their trailer park homes adorned with freshly cleaned aluminum siding.

I tag like I get told who I am, what I’m supposed to believe and how I’m supposed to act on a daily basis.

I go all city, hoping that one day, the vehicles I’ve touched get stitched together to form a complete sentence.

I tag because I saw you leave your mark and it was dope.

I tag because I know how to freeze, watch TV and (kinda) avoid the kissing bugs.

I tag because the words I drop in time will find a way to form a cohesive rhyme.

I tag because the world may be getting smaller, but it’s damn sure not coming together.

I tag your name, your spot, your position, your mood, your frame of mind when it’s too hard for you to see it for yourself.

I tag the expected terms of modern constructs.

I tag the post-modern undercurrents of miscellaneous descriptors.

I tag my tags so that when structure is forged out of chaos, you’ll know how to find me.

I tag so that it’s me you won’t be looking for.

When I tag, I’m regurgitating the meal I’ve caught for the chicks in my roost.

When I tag, I feel one with the universe of the collective unconscious.

When I tag, I can see the pillars of control quaking in their foundation.

When I tag, I experience therefore I understand.

When we tag, anything is possible.

————

Tag! We’re It! Part II
Tag! We’re It!

My day at work today centered around getting pissed off about the upcoming war; the commute home got even more interesting.

First, for the comedy relief of the day. I’m waiting for the N/R train on the Cortlandt Street platform, when I look across the track and notice this older gentleman, probably in his mid-sixties, dressed conservatively in a gray suit, casually drop his paper on the platform and stroll away. My first thought was, "Ok. He just littered. Maybe that’s how people acted before Woodsy the Owl. Give him the benefit of the doubt." So I did, and went back to scanning my own rag. That’s when I hear water splashing down on the track.

In the midst of the afternoon commute rush, the same guy is urinating onto the tracks. No one knows what to do. All of us were deer in the headlights, caught watching this unfold. The guy didn’t look drunk and was dressed in a nice suit. He eventually finished (old guy = bad prostate), but the kicker? He strolls back to his paper, picks it up and goes back to reading. Ha.

So I finally get on the train and manage to find a seat. At the next stop, the women next to me gets off and a guy squeezes between the doors and sits down in her place. Nothing out of the ordinary. So during my daily dose of conservative subway people watching (i.e. don’t look at anyone for more than two seconds and only in glances), I notice the new guy reading a miniature copy of something that looks like Arabic, bobbing his head up and down… pausing… and then mumbling to himself. He’d then reopen the finely bounded/crafted book for a half second, look up in the air, and then go back to mumbling.

Now, I’ve been traveling the NYC subway system for years, and to my best recollection, the only people I’ve ever noticed reading like that have been Orthodox Jews traveling with me from Brooklyn to downtown Manhattan. So here I find myself during the month of "Shock and Awe," sitting next to a guy with a mustache as thick as Saddam’s, dressed in a green army jacket, mumbling to himself while reading Arabic prose.

Welcome to New York City, the cultural Mecca of Western Civilization—the only place where one can feel enlightened daily by the vast diversity of people surrounding you, yet simultaneously fear for your life because of the actions of your government and media outlets.

I’m pretty sure (about 99 & 44/100%) that this guy was praying and looking inward during a rough time in his life or something, yet his actions, which at any other time wouldn’t catch my eye or stir my hand to write about, got me second guessing my safety. This type of irrational fear is what the majority of this country doesn’t understand when they blindly back a poorly sponsored and irrational war.

The “red states” of this nation don’t land anywhere near the top twenty terror spots to hit in America (I have the celebrity map, you know). So while Billy Bob and soccer mom 12,614 “support the government fully to protect us” in very vaguely defined ways, people over here in NYC start to look for exits whether we’re underground, on the streets, or inside our office buildings.

I hate the fact that these thoughts even crept into my skull. As hard as it has been to be a New Yorker over the last few years, being a Muslim New Yorker must take the cake for “king of all shitty positions.”

Well, I guess it’s better than being Muslim in Ohio.

I’ve only been a NYC resident for the past three years, but after going through last 9/11 and commuting past ground zero every day for the past six-months, I’ve come to realize that no matter where I live for the rest of my life, I’ll always consider myself a New Yorker.

The people here in this city are fighters. They get knocked down, but get right back up and offer the other cheek in defiance. I’ve dealt with a ton of adversity in my life and consider myself someone who doesn’t relent easily, but I’m more than humbled by the collective resolve of my neighbors here.

There’s no way to express the grief that’s shared on a day like today, but this morning I had the opportunity to overhear a conversation between a group of firefighters on the train that I wanted to share.

They seemed somewhat somber while beginning to talk about a fallen brother from a year ago, so I braced myself for the remainder of the conversation.

What do these guys end up doing?

For the entire 7 stop ride, they cracked on his horrible cooking around the ladder company back in the day.

New York.

Linda and I hopped on the Q Saturday afternoon and rolled down to Coney Island to catch the yearly spectacle "Mermaid Parade." When we got there, we realized that we came a bit too late as the streets were packed with spectators and mermaids were hustling to get into position. We did the best we could and shoved our way to the front of the rows of people stacked six deep and waited for the show to begin.

Now here’s something I didn’t know about mermaids; apparently they like to drive vintage hot rods and burn massive amounts of rubber. One mer-dude peeled out right in front of five cops and got them all choking on melted rubber fumes. I laughed really hard, which had people looking at me funny, because ever since 9/11, it seems that no one can make fun of cops in NYC. I still thought it was a Kodak moment. Sue me.

The next thing I learned was that drunken mermaids like to show off their boobs. Actually, all of the mermaids seemed to enjoy it. It made me smile. Linda didn’t say anything, but I think she thought I was a perv. I just found the whole spectacle amusing.

We ended up walking around for hours, stopping once to eat and once for me to lose five bucks on a basketball shooting game (it was rigged, I swear). At the end of the day, after spending an hour watching people on the boardwalk we dragged our tired, burnt asses to the train and went home.

Brooklyn rules!