Thursday, July 05, 2007
A beautiful moment on the subway today.
I'd just come from a bit of an expensive new-agey holistic bullshit session complete with untestable methodology and highly interpretative results, by which I mean I don't believe in it at all, rationally, yet I feel it all too keenly to dismiss it as pure nonsense. The difference between the me that walks into that room and the me that walks out of it 90 minutes later is undeniable, palpable and significantly lighter by 70 dollars. Something good is happening, we just have very different language and viewpoints to describe what.
So I walk into the train carriage that's arrived at my metro station, sit down and immediately begin to scan my environment for the usual array of physical threats, edible prey and fertile cavewomen but instead I somehow settle my eyes on a young, dark kid dressed in all his gangster finery. He's maybe 19, looks half-Indian and half-African, kind of big and threatening - and... looking... straight... back... at... me.
I wasn't prepared for this, I'm normally so good at peeping around that no-one sees me seeing them and besides, I don't stare idly into peoples' eyes without good reason (if then). But my brother taught me to stare down anyone and everyone, always, and it's a piece of advice I've recently re-applied for licensing rights of, having gained a brash slice of confidence in the last few years (relative to a fieldmouse with a birthmark, anyway). So I stare straight back, and of course he's NOT flinching. And I'm not flinching, because I'm a man and he's a boy. A couple of miliseconds go by and still he doesn't budge. I can read in his eyes the simple, completely justified thought "What is this odd-shaped white man doing staring me down? Does he really want me to kick his ass? I will kick his ass" and with that in mind, I opt very quickly to lose this battle of 'wits', darting my eyes any which way but that - and besides, it's really gay staring into a man's eyes on the train. What if... but no... it could never be. Or could it...?
I look back. I can't help it, I just have to. I'd only looked away half a second ago and already i'm back, staring at him. I can't even think why. I'd say it's because I have an appalling short-term memory, meaning my thought processes go something like "Where was I? You were sitting here staring at that guy in front of you. Oh yeah, thanks. No problem" But for some reason, and I think it's not unconnected with my previous chakratic fondlements, I SMILE at him. I think it comes from realising the absurdity and hilarity of the situation more than any desire to actually make peace. I'm really just smiling at myself, not at him at all. However, he catches my eye again, sees me smiling and I watch him struggle, really struggle with himself over the next split and a half seconds as he loses the fight, breaking into a massive, beaming grin too. And all the while we're still staring at eachother and for all the world to see it looks like two young men from different sides of the tracks, both dressed in their boldest heterosexual clothing, have finally found true gay love, through the barricades, by staring into eachothers' eyes and smiling. Oh god.
We both look away, but I can't stop laughing now and out of the corner of my eye I see he's also still very amused by this. And so we reach level three of major social awkwardness as I pray it's his stop next and get my wish granted.
Well I guess it was his stop. He got off. To be honest, if it hadn't been, then it would have been mine. Maybe I forced him off with my disarmingly friendly fauxmosexual advances? I have to watch myself now, though not too closely.
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I'd just come from a bit of an expensive new-agey holistic bullshit session complete with untestable methodology and highly interpretative results, by which I mean I don't believe in it at all, rationally, yet I feel it all too keenly to dismiss it as pure nonsense. The difference between the me that walks into that room and the me that walks out of it 90 minutes later is undeniable, palpable and significantly lighter by 70 dollars. Something good is happening, we just have very different language and viewpoints to describe what.
So I walk into the train carriage that's arrived at my metro station, sit down and immediately begin to scan my environment for the usual array of physical threats, edible prey and fertile cavewomen but instead I somehow settle my eyes on a young, dark kid dressed in all his gangster finery. He's maybe 19, looks half-Indian and half-African, kind of big and threatening - and... looking... straight... back... at... me.
I wasn't prepared for this, I'm normally so good at peeping around that no-one sees me seeing them and besides, I don't stare idly into peoples' eyes without good reason (if then). But my brother taught me to stare down anyone and everyone, always, and it's a piece of advice I've recently re-applied for licensing rights of, having gained a brash slice of confidence in the last few years (relative to a fieldmouse with a birthmark, anyway). So I stare straight back, and of course he's NOT flinching. And I'm not flinching, because I'm a man and he's a boy. A couple of miliseconds go by and still he doesn't budge. I can read in his eyes the simple, completely justified thought "What is this odd-shaped white man doing staring me down? Does he really want me to kick his ass? I will kick his ass" and with that in mind, I opt very quickly to lose this battle of 'wits', darting my eyes any which way but that - and besides, it's really gay staring into a man's eyes on the train. What if... but no... it could never be. Or could it...?
I look back. I can't help it, I just have to. I'd only looked away half a second ago and already i'm back, staring at him. I can't even think why. I'd say it's because I have an appalling short-term memory, meaning my thought processes go something like "Where was I? You were sitting here staring at that guy in front of you. Oh yeah, thanks. No problem" But for some reason, and I think it's not unconnected with my previous chakratic fondlements, I SMILE at him. I think it comes from realising the absurdity and hilarity of the situation more than any desire to actually make peace. I'm really just smiling at myself, not at him at all. However, he catches my eye again, sees me smiling and I watch him struggle, really struggle with himself over the next split and a half seconds as he loses the fight, breaking into a massive, beaming grin too. And all the while we're still staring at eachother and for all the world to see it looks like two young men from different sides of the tracks, both dressed in their boldest heterosexual clothing, have finally found true gay love, through the barricades, by staring into eachothers' eyes and smiling. Oh god.
We both look away, but I can't stop laughing now and out of the corner of my eye I see he's also still very amused by this. And so we reach level three of major social awkwardness as I pray it's his stop next and get my wish granted.
Well I guess it was his stop. He got off. To be honest, if it hadn't been, then it would have been mine. Maybe I forced him off with my disarmingly friendly fauxmosexual advances? I have to watch myself now, though not too closely.
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