my subway chanteuse, i saw her again today. this time, she was soliciting inside the train cars. she must have performed quite well in the car before mine because she had this air of entitlement, a well deserved one, as she shoved her grubby bonnet right to the commuters' faces.
i groped in the front pockets of my denim and only felt two very insubstantial quarters. i flip opened my billfold surreptitiously only to realize i have but a crinkly twenty dollar bill in it.
paralyzed with the quandary of giving her the quarters (nah, too insignificant.) or the twenty (jesus, no, that's my lunch money!), i just sat there transfixed at the ingrained soot and dirt in the begging bonnet of the cabaret singer of the d train. in the end, the busker moseyed on without extracting even a dime from me, her putative grateful fan.
just before i was about to get off at the 59th hub, i overheard two snazzily dressed ladies, both of them clutching fendi knockoff baguettes made from faux reptilian hide, across me talking about the kind of animals they would prefer to be reborn as.
i thought of them immediately as foxes. but the other girl, the one wearing an olive spring jacket three sizes smaller for her, quickly told the other she would love to be reborn as a jungle feline. a lordly sumatran tiger, perhaps, i quickly shifted mental gears as i continued to eavesdrop on their chaffing.
surfacing up to a gorgeous spring day, i immediately peeled off my jacket to soak in the sun. and as i walked towards this restaurant where i was supposed to meet someone, i have this genuine feeling of being pleased with how this world works for me. i truly felt i deserve the sun, the uncloying beauty of this city, the soon to be beautiful meal i will share with this person i deserve to be friends with.
after lunch, i ambled towards the nearby train station still giddy from this hazy feeling of worth. upon entering the station, i nearly froze upon hearing another busker, this time a gruff baritone, scatting what to me was an ella fitzgerald song. and his substitution for the song's lyrics with alliterative non-syllables, it was just very apt, very accomplished, in fact. he sounded like a well burnished baritone sax.
instinctively, i reached for my billfold. but then my train quickly approached the station and my mind, without compunction, dismissed easily any thought about the scat man.
on the ride home, a strapping young man offered a straphanging lady his seat. the woman, without thanking the boy, languidly claimed her seat like it was hers all along. dreamily, she filled the seat with her pleased self. like a pampered feline.
and it just hit me, i'm a cat. i haven't the scintilla of gratitude. i don't really give a damn if the world loves me, at all. i just take what this world tosses my way and then i go slink away.