My Name is Slow Commotion

I was the last one to exit the train this morning. It wasn’t the first time. When the train pulled into Grand Central Terminal I was wiping the sleep from my eyes and getting that ‘morning after a one-night-stand’ look from the conductor. C‘mon, let’s move it. We’re all done here. Make sure you’ve gathered all your belongings, and have a nice day.

My belongings were on the upper rack. It’s a messenger’s bag that holds my iPad, water bottle, inhaler, pen, notepad, and whatever book I happen to be reading at the moment. My Name is Lucy Barton by Elizabeth Strout is my current choice. (Not long after I started reading the book I saw an advertisement on television: My Name is Lucy Barton comes to Broadway! Starring Laura Linney! I’m liking Lucy Barton, and I love Laura Linney. Ozark, anyone? But I’m such a slow reader that I’m afraid the show will close before I’ve finished the book, and Laura Linney will have retired and moved into the Motion Picture and Television Country House and Hospital. The longest it’s taken me to read one of my bag-books was three months. I’m easily distracted. I like people-watching and pretending I’m doing authorial research on my phone. According to my search history it looks like I’m about to write an expose on cats who supposedly play jazz piano. Long overdue if you ask me. And, boy, have I got the goods on those brazen little feline frauds. Do these parenthetical thoughts make me look fat? I thought so. Okay, outta my way, smiley. I’m coming through >>>>>)

Ahhh. I feel better already.

I eyeballed the messenger bag and told my legs to get a move on, but they paid me no mind. So I sat there as the train emptied.

It made me feel old. I don’t like feeling that way. Sixty-six is supposed to be the new Fifty-six. Or so I’m told by certain young acquaintances who want to make me feel better. Read that: young shits tired of hearing me whine. I’m getting downright cantankerous in my getting-older years.

Finally out of my seat, I throw my bag over my shoulder and wander off the train like a tired old hobo wanting nothing more than to curl up in front of a blazing fire with the lovely taste of Irish whiskey on my breath.

By the time I reach the street my circulation is back in order and I’m moving along like a steam engine; until I notice ancients older than myself whizzing by and offering me sympathetic glances.

“I am not an animal!” I scream. Wait. Wrong movie quote.

“Say hello to my little friend?” 

“There’s no place like home?”

“Top of the world, Ma?”

Oh, hell. On my return trip I’ll have to research appropriate movie quotes for all occasions on my phone. Then get busy shedding light on some fraudulent kitty cats.

I told you I was getting cantankerous.

“Here’s mud in your eye!”

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