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LATIMER: An hour until the next train

This happened just over a year ago. I have written it in the present tense so you may experience it along with me. 

I’m grabbing onto my sheets like they’re the straps to my parachute. I’m sitting upright, trying to catch my breath. It must be 50 degrees in my room. Or is it 100? All I can actually discern is that I cannot catch my breath and droplets of sweat are rolling off my nose.

This does not happen often, so that is why I must have been shaken. I have never dreamed of losing a loved one, and after speaking to my grandparents that day, I dreamt I lost them simultaneously. The details are irrelevant.

The next morning I decided that I needed to get back home. I booked my bus tickets, packed a bag, and as soon as class was over, headed over to South Station. I didn’t tell anyone I was going. I don’t feel like explaining why I had to go home to my suburban sanctuary in New Jersey.

So I mount the 5 p.m. Fung Wah bus to New York. I have heard rumors of the dangers, and by rumors, I have seen the photos of charred buses after they smashed into medians on the way to the City. When the bus hurdled itself out of South Station, I gripped my armrests and accepted that the Fung Wah was actually Kingda Ka.

After a just under a four-hour trip to New York City in a monsoon — which is pretty much as fast as my parents drive in our modest sedan on a really good day — I made it. Because I sit in the back of the bus, constantly worrying about having a head-on collision, I didn’t make it out for what seemed like 90 minutes. I frantically grabbed my suitcase then realized my train left in twenty minutes. Two women offered to share a cab because apparently I looked “too cute and stressed to take the subway.” Why not milk that, smile a lot in a cab and make a friend or two?

They dropped me off at Penn Station and refused my meager $5. I blew a kiss, shouted my gratitude and made like Usain Bolt. With my backpack embarrassingly jostling my center of gravity — you know, in that way you tried to run for the school bus — I made it to my train. Wait, no, it left a minute ago and the next one is in an hour.

Utterly defeated and exhausted, I plopped down on the chairs, accepted that my phone was dead and stared at the tiles. At least I have a moment to breathe. This hour could —

Then I hear a man spit the largest, grossest loogie you could imagine next to me. I look over to the man sporting a faded black sweat suit, a ragged knit cap and a box of 20 McNuggets. He proceeds to regurgitate slam poetry about how, “everyone wants to see him dead in the gutter, but he will keep fighting.” All I could do was say, “Yeah, man! Fight the system!” I sprinkled a few inspirational words that I prayed would get him to walk away. Thankfully they worked.

Once he left, a woman sitting in the seat next to the one the man occupied, leaned over to me. She wore a wide, sun-bleached sunhat that may have been a deep pink or purple at one point. Her matted hair curled around the brim, adding to the sun protection. She wore two long jean jackets, a blue flannel and old hiking boots. She looked at me with soft, brown eyes and asked me if I was doing okay.

I couldn’t help but smile. Yes, people were kind to help me get to the train station quickly, but her immediate, curious sympathy was striking. I told her about my dream, my catatonic bus ride and the sprint to the train. I told her I wanted to see my grandparents this weekend. We had the most captivating discussion.

Then she told me this story:

“My nephews never quite got to appreciate how important they were to each other,” she said. “My younger nephew, Jason, who must’ve been 14, always wanted to follow his 17 year-old cousin, Jackson, when he would go hang out with his friends. Jackson always made a fuss and made Jason stay home to watch TV. I hated watching him sit there, crushed Jackson never wanted to spend time with him. Then one day, Jason went to follow Jackson. They left him running after the car in the street.  Then another came by and killed Jason.”

She sighed. She let me put my hand on her arm.

“Always go out of your way to make your family feel loved and welcomed,” she said.

We did not speak for a couple of minutes. I sat absorbing her story. She smiled, at ease with her past. Isn’t that what we all want?

Then the loudspeaker announced the departure of my train. I wanted to stay, but all she said was, “Be someone who makes everyone feel loved.”

If only I had more time to talk to her.

Brian Latimer is a sophomore in the College of Communication, and the new Opinions Editor at the Daily Free Press. He can be reached at letters@dailyfreepress.com.

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One Comment

  1. Dr.Luis F. Garcia

    Brian,
    Very well written. You certainly have a lot of imagination. I enjoyed it very much.Is this a real story? Did you get to see your grandparents that day?