Subway couching

 The 103rd st subway on the 1 is a musical place. There is the old man whom I assume is called Frankie who plays jazzy tunes on his portable keyboard on late Sunday mornings, and sings it in a gruffy voice reminiscent of Sinatra. A black girl with a guitar whom I assume is called Rene or something classy that fills the lazy Saturday afternoons with her soulful voice.


Today, on a Saturday morning, I walked down the steps into the familiar strains of Paramore's 'The Only Exception'. A white dude with windswept hair and a cardigan with cargo pants was strumming his guitar and singing in a low voice. His guitar case was full of ones and he seemed to be on the end of his shift. People were milling around in lazy groups, and their energy seemed to fit the dude.

Let's call him Levon.

I drifted near him, threw my now-empty smoothie cup into the trash and headed to the bench. Here's the thing about NYC subway benches. They have 6 seats that are uncomfortably close to each other, with small little partitions coming up from the seat that make no sense. It basically looks like this: ,_,_,_,_,_,_,

With Levon on the left side, and a couple taking up the two on the right, I settled for the third partition. That is, until a family of three meandered over. Ohh, the kids were excited. Let's call them Megan and Paul. Megan did the cute thing where she kept glancing over at Levon, and at his guitar, and then back at her mom. Paul sat down right next to me and stood up and shuffled to the music and then sat back down. When the kids settled in, on the leftenmost two partitions, I shifted over one to accommodate the mom, who gave me the sweetest smile.

Now, if you're as good at math as I am, you will count that there are presently 6 people on the bench. And if you know NYC as I do, you will know that these 6 people are oddly comfortable with the proximity. But we were.

Levon, encouraged by this family of 6 on the couch responding to his music, lifted his voice an octave and regaled us.

When the train came, the kids and I placed some coins in his guitar case. He gave us a wink and a wave. Levon lifted his voice once again when we moved towards the subway cars. Sending us on our journey.

Published on
2/19/19 8:32 AM

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