A Funny Thing Happened on the 4 Train

(or, Bitch I Didn't Push Your Fucking Kid)

A crowded subway car is a great way to watch New Yorkers. In a city of over 9 million people, in which we are quite literally stacked on top of one another, we still avoid human interaction with such a fervent intensity as to avoid making eye contact with the person whose face is stuck in our armpit (I am tall). I used to think it was a privacy thing-- we want our commutes, our walk down the block, to be exclusively our time. But when New Yorkers do get involved in confrontation, they often approach it with such zeal, with such unbridled passion...it's a pastime. It's enough to reduce your average Connecticut suburbanite to tears.

I got on a really crowded train the other day. I'm tempted to say it was the most crowded train I'd ever been on, but ever since I started taking the L train into Manhattan every morning, and watched the massive influx of A-line haircuts and skinny jeans at the Bedford Ave stop fit themselves like Tetris pieces against one another's frail beer-nourished bodies and reusable Whole Foods tote bags, my definition of crowded has changed.

But this was a very full 4 train, no doubt about it, headed downtown from 42nd St. After I got on, I noticed a family of three trying to wedge themselves in behind me -- a very young couple, the woman dressed in what I would call "post graduate Hot Topic chic," which is sort of trashy. Their son was probably around 7 and had a long rat tail (why? why? why do parents do this to their children?)

I always try to be really considerate on the train. I operate under the assumption that there is always someone more deserving than I of that freshly vacated seat. (This is less selflessness as it is a combination of me being a good person and me having my fair share of white guilt.) And so, this family is pushing me onto the train, holding one anothers' wrists, and I step aside to let them squeeze into an air pocket around the center pole.

I was wedged between the pole at the end of the seat and the women, who was wearing long lacy black gloves and a pleated skirt with a lot of chains and straps and other bondage accoutrement (wait, is this still a style people seriously wear?) The train lurched, bodies shifted, it was the kind of thing that happens a hundred times a day, I'm telling you.

It didn't take long, in this tightly packed brick of bodies, for me to notice the woman glaring up at me. I met her eyes and she kept them there, for a second, cold and loathing and heavily lined with black gunk. Then she turned to her son, who was entirely committed to his PSP, and started stroking his hair in a vaguely maternal way.

"Bitch thinks she gonna push you one more time she's gonna get pushed the fuck off this train."

It's funny how even the most crowded subway car maintains this eerie silence. There is very little chatter. One loud voice can carry, even over the roaring static of the subway. This was one such voice.

It took me a second to realize this woman was talking about me. I kept looking in the other direction, away from the woman and her son, thinking, "wait? me? I'm the bitch?"

"I swear to fucking God, you do whatever you want to ME. you can push me or hit me, but you do one single thing to my kid, well," and she made a noise of exasperation that suggested even she couldn't fathom the pure hell that awaited someone who fucked with her son.

It's always awkward when someone does not speak directly to you, but rather speaks in a way that's obviously intended for you to hear. This woman was talking to her kid,
running his rattail through her fingers and telling him she'd fuck up the bitch who did him wrong again. But the occasional sideways glance she shot me made it clear that I was said bitch, and I better watch out where I'm pushing.

I rolled my eyes, thinking, God, a little human contact is par for the course on MTA. I am not a particularly large person and doubt the force of my girth could have done much serious damage. Besides why would I deliberately push a child?

But my native, willingly unobtrusive suburbanite betrayed me, and I thought, "why doesn't this person like me? Why have I been falsely accused of wishing ill will upon her son? How can I straighten this up? Why would she think I want to hurt her child? What did I do?"

It is this type of thinking that truly separates people who live in cities from people who don't. For the Yankee, everything must be personal. For the New Yorker, sensitivity is switch-operated: if your son is jostled on the subway, it's an outrage, but if a woman threatens to push you off the train for said outrage, it's best not to read too far into it.

In conclusion, bitch, I didn't push your kid. Also, if I ever have a child, you better believe that the jackass who thinks they're gonna push that kid around is gonna get pushed the fuck off this train.