UNO: I am walking up 6th Avenue and approaching a Menswearhouse store. I notice three young men standing at the entrance to the store carrying black plastic suit bags marked “tuxedo rental”. They are obviously planning to attend a formal event in town. As I walk past them I overhear one of them say to the other two:
“You know, I never stole any money from my Mum.”
His friends give him a look and one of them replies:
“I stole $20 from my Mum once, but I think she knew I did.”
As I walk away, I smile as I review my private assessment of that stolen moment: “The first guy may become a successful public prosecutor; the other guy, on the other hand, is destined for big things on Wall Street”.
DOS: Later, after this weird encounter, I find myself in one of those long lines that snake through the aisles in a Trader Joe’s supermarket. My slow stop-and-go journey to the checkout counters is interrupted by a female member of Trader Joe’s “crew” (staff members are referred to in this fashion in keeping with the original South Seas motif of the chain) who asks to cut across in front of me. As I emerge from the semi-hypnotic self-induced trance of a slow-moving check-out line, I realize that the “crew” member is helping a tall elderly gentleman, who is shuffling unsteadily on his feet, to navigate across two unbroken lines of shoppers.
I smile inwardly and think to myself: “This is something I can look forward to in Trader Joe’s when I get too old to battle the shopping lines on my own.”
But then things get better – he gets the full service. The “crew” member doesn’t just help him cut across the lines, she is actually helping him shop in the store, with his arm in hers! Miracles never cease.
TRES: Finally, I am on the 1 train heading uptown towards home. When the train stops at 34th Street Station, the crowd divides to allow a young man in a wheelchair to enter the carriage. As soon as he gets in, he parks his wheelchair next to the carriage door. The other passengers float in and settle down as the door closes with its usual hiss.
I can’t help admiring his hi-tech EZ Lite Cruiser which is lightweight, collapsible and powered. (I later discover they cost about $3,000 each). When the train starts moving, he deftly touches the joy-stick on his arm rest and moves himself to the centre of the empty space in the subway car between the doors.
I ready myself for an announcement or speech of some sort because many New Yorkers sincerely believe the subway car provides the ideal captive audience in the city to spout your political views, panhandle, dance the hip-hop, drum up a storm, swing from the hand rails or simply ride the trains in your underwear. (Tragically, the riding-public-transport-in-your-underwea
But, to my surprise, he doesn’t say a word. He slowly looks around the car and starts sizing up the passengers. He then spins his wheelchair 180 degrees until he is facing in the opposite direction to when he first entered the subway car.
“Oh, I get it. He doesn’t want to travel backwards when he exits the subway car at his stop,” I tell myself with satisfaction. The young man backs up his wheel chair until he is next to the passenger occupying the seat next to the door. My self-congratulation quickly turns to amazement when the young man parks his wheelchair, leans over and starts reading the seated passenger’s newspaper over his shoulder!