On the platform for the J last night at Brooklyn Bridge, one of those nice late night detours. Down the platform I notice a guy doing the junkie dance. Now the junkie dance, I'm sure you've seen if you've been in NYC long enough. I call it the junkie dance because in my mind it looks like the person has gotten "the good shot" and is nodding out on his feet. They stand teetering near collapse bent over nearly touching their toes, just when you think they're going over head first, they pull up, and start to crumble again. Like some drunken yoga movement. Perhaps I should call it Junkie Yoga.
Anyway dude is on the platform doing the Junkie Dance, and I swear he's going in the tracks, but then again I've never seen someone go over. Time goes by, no train, he's still teetering, I'm starting to not like the odds. If this turns out badly, I've got front row seats for a scene I really don't need to see, and honestly I don't want to get hit by the spray.
I move down the platform, back into iPod trance. A few minutes go by, I take a look back up the platform. The guy is on the tracks! He manages to pull himself up and out of the tracks. On first glance, it looked like he had actually jumped in the tracks for something. But he was wincing in pain, and his clothes were dirty and torn now. He wobbled around a bit, people looked on, shaking their head, that someone could get that messed up. He came my way, of course. In my general direction "This train Brooklyn?" (sic) It seems more of a question, as a comment to suggest he's somehow coherent. I nod, yes. He hobbles away, he finds a spot away from the edge of the tracks.
Four or five minutes pass, the train comes. I find a seat. Junkie Dancer takes a seat at the other end car. Four or five minutes..
1 comment:
Jeezis. That was quite nearly ugly as hell.
When I was living in NYC, the idea of somebody falling onto the tracks at the wrong moment was always somewhere in my brain. I think I even managed to develop a low-grade phobia.
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