Big place

GRAND CENTRAL ?

 

Over there, near the clock, I look at the curly-haired kid tugging at her mother's scraggly coat. She's tired, she wants some popcorn: she has to make pee-pee, she doesn't want to go on the train, she whines. She's a pain in the neck. Shut her up, Lady...but mama smiles and off she goes looking for the ladies room. Ugh!

 

Toilet paper is all over the floor. The johns are overflowing. The sinks are dirty and clogged with paper towels. Women are not exempt from writing graffiti on the walls. Mama lifts Honey Bun over the mess, holds her high enough so her tiny tush won't touch the foulness. Her eyes     dart all over the sloppy room as she hastens to get out. Mouth barely moving, I make out her words, "Pigs, pigs, such pigs!"

 

On a wooden bench a bag lady cradles her  possessions, putters amongst her treasures and pulls out a spangled, lop-sided star. Her gloved hand holds it up to a neon sign and she turns it round and round, watching the colors change and bounce from point to point. It is a magic star, lighting up her world. There is a little twinkle in her otherwise drab eyes that wasn't there before. She's a very lucky lady. Does anybody else in this whole stinkin' station have such a thing? Yes, this is a very good day, better than yesterday, a day of small pleasures.

 

Here comes the Florida crowd, coming home for the holidays. Are they all crazy? What's up here? Cold, slush, muggers, pimps. Who needs another cousin, a niece, an old friend? I guess these sun-tanned folk do. If they had any sense, they'd invite all of New York south. Wouldn't that be something? A peaceful, quiet New York. Wow! The thought is
exhilarating. Go, go, on your merry way. Take your wrinkling faces to the top floors of the glass condos, to the farms out of the city's reach, to the re-modeled brownstones. Watch all the families smile. Eat yourselves into a frenzy. Take snapshots, lots of snapshots as you madly open fancily wrapped packages. Enjoy, enjoy. As long as your are here, enjoy!

 

The crowded escalator carries travelers up, down. They are coming. They are going. Nothing and no one stands still very long. The world is rushing to be somewhere else. Greasy smells of chicken, pizza and hot dogs send me quickly past their open doors. Visions of better things dance before my eyes. Roasting turkey, succulent ham, a table set with silver and crystal, laid out for kings, pull me toward my exit.

 

Then I stop. Think, re-trace my hasty steps and return for a slice of pizza, hot, oozing with cheese. My purchase, trivial, cheap, brings joy to  the  bag lady, still doodling with her star. The feelings are special.      Christmas does things to people, things that they'd not consider the rest of the year.

 

Ah, yes. It's Christmas in New York alright