Streets and Subways

I thought it was stroller when I got on the train but as I squeezed in the car I realized it was a folding chair with a hoodie over the back.  It wasn't until I saw the drum sitting in front of it that I realized we would be serenaded by something other than the crying cat in a carrier at the other end of the car.

It was a new route for me.  A ride down from Harlem on the 3 to 42nd Street, then a transfer to the R to get to 28th Street.  The lettered trains are still so exotic to me, especially ones at the end of the alphabet.  I'm a 1,2, and 3 person, generally, and enjoy the opportunity to collect more letters and numbers.

The occasion was a private party for the music program for which I teach.  It was an end-of-the-year celebration for staff and board members.  I had the street address for the place, but the same wasn't true of the building.  The first restaurant I entered had no private party, but upon asking they sent me next door to a small wine place.  I tentatively entered, wedging my way in with my cello and asked the same question.  "Looking for a private party," I said.  And the woman said, "Follow me."

She led me through a small hallway and towards a large, warm, back room which I scanned for familiar faces.  Nothing.  She turned to the left and gestured, "Just down there, first door on the left."  I followed the trajectory of her hand down chipped, narrow concrete steps to a cellar with a low ceiling and what appeared to be a service door.  Hmmm, was this the same private party?

There below the seen, was a hidden little cellar with bottles of wine on the walls and the people for whom I was looking.  I came in, stood awkwardly for awhile, my friend and I sort of played a piece that we had run through twice (late notice), I talked to some really interesting people and ate some really good hummus, and then squeezed my cello back up the stairs and through the red and white wined people of the counters and tables out to the street.

Sometimes the sirens of emergency vehicles grace the streets but this evening the soundscape was punctuated by a pick-up truck with a giant electric menorah on which was written, "Happy Chanukah!" playing loud music.  Shortly thereafter I walked past and then stepped into the 28th Nader Food Market which enticed me with its huge containers of nuts and dried fruits and at 9:06 pm it was still open, negligently or not.  It was a sale of $8 for the man who had been in the back and I was happy to have the almonds for a good price.

In the subway station on the way home a woman saw me with my cello and got extremely excited.  "Ooooh you gotta take my picture with that!"  People can be crazy sometimes, but I let her pose with my case until she picked it up a little too close to the tracks for comfort.  And that was enough.  I quickly got it back and handed her her phone, relieved but a little sad that I didn't have a copy of her interpretation of what it means, apparently, to have a cello in the subway:  super tough and cool.  She even got her outfit to show.

There are so many things to see and take in.  And it seems so natural to let one slide away into the next, to be phased by nothing, constantly underwhelmed even by the incredible.  It would be a shame to be so stressed as to not see it or remember it.  What a crazy place.