Night Train Tanquility

A great weekend (more on that next time) ended with the single best moment of solitude I ve had in Japan. My mind has been in a constant state of motion with perpetual thought eating away my nights. I seem to always ponder my past , present , and future. But tonight the train ride home from a weekend away allowed met to rest, think nothing, and feel calmness. There is something soothing about the train at night. The eerily silent passenger cars, the rumble of the tracks under you, the slightest sounds from sleeping passengers, all make for a tranquil ride. My mood was a concoction of extreme sleepiness, pleasant happiness, and a unperturbed feeling of realizing this place is becoming home. I put on my ipod filled it with MGMT, The National, and Coldplay and rested my weary mind.

They are not particularly exciting stories or very creative but I find them to be interesting...

The night train is filled with empty seats and few passengers. There are just enough passengers to observe and wonder to yourself "where are they coming from?" "where are they going?" and "what is their life story?" ...One of my favorite things to do is people watch, at airports, bus stations, the mall. I like to make stories up in my mind, on who these people are, their background, their thoughts etc.

The Man with the shopping bag: There is a man sitting a few seats down across from me who looks lonely. His face is tired, the wrinkles around his eyes hang like spider webs. His hair is erased from the top of his head and all that is left is the gray hair which clings from the side of his head. His eyes are distant and ordinary, actually everything about him is ordinary. His face, his clothes, except for this shopping bag that he holds mightily. Everything about this man is grey, but the shopping bag is a bright white, illuminating against his grey slacks. He is restless, clutching to this shopping bag, gripping it as if he is afraid to live without it. The shopping bag is filled with something valuable, valuable is not something he is used to. He shops frugally and lives thrifty.

He takes the night train home as to not be bothered , to sit alone and think. He is not distracted by anything, no ipod, no book, just his thoughts. He is coming back home after visiting an old friend or family member. Someone he hasn't seen since his wife passed a few years ago. His wife, although a strained marriage, was someone he cared for deeply. They would share long silences at night, eating quietly, watching tv in seperate rooms, and even having different beds for the last few years of their marriage. But they shared in each others company, he knew he would come home to someone and that made him gently smile. He lives alone now, has since her death. He has an unremarkable job, the same job he has had for twenty years. He will retire soon, to do what he thinks to himself.

He goes to work in the same suit and tie everyday, its not the exact same, but to him it feels like it. He eats the same breakfast, catches the same train at the same time. He walks to work from the station slowly and calculates his path with caution. He stops for coffee each morning, coffee black, and is afforded his only meaningful conversation of the day. The girl who serves him coffee has been doing so for the last two years, she is actually a young woman, but he thinks of her as a girl. Maybe a girl that could be his daughter. She greets him warmly with a smile, gets his coffee , asks him about his morning. He has the same response, but the conversation means everything to him. His weekends are filled with meals for one, tv, and late nights. Without air conditioning the hot and humid air give him many sleepless nights, wrestling with his thoughts between short bouts of sleep. He often wonders what the purpose of his life is, what is he supposed to do with the next 40 years if he is so lucky. He has little to show for his life so far, a meager job, a small apt, no kids, a few plants that are scattered loosely in his home. He can barely care for the plants , never mind another person. But he wants someone in his life. Relationships were never his thing but he does not want to grow old alone. He often thinks what can he offer another, love although a rigid love is something wants to give again, security, his job could support two people, safety in routine, sometimes people just want ordinary routine. There must be someone out there for him, someone who could overlook his physical shortcomings and his unintentional lack of emotion? When his stop comes, the man looks startled, he has been thinking for too long. He gets up still clutching the shopping bag, a desolate look comes over him. He realize that he is going home alone and it will be like this for some time.