Linkage

Ran into this yesterday. The text is telling. The photographs bolster.

Jumping to conclusions... this morning

Most mornings, I stop off at a makeshift diner in lower Manhattan and douse the fires of a twelve hour fast from the night before with a sandwich and a tall coffee. Today was no exception. After ordering, I look around and notice a lanky youth with afro hairdo and a backpack to boot intently staring at the menu choices written down on a blackboard strategically placed on the sidewalk such that the diner could waylay people like us with its choices. Mornings tend to be busy and as is typical, I noticed the sandwich vendor try and get the afro youth’s attention as to what might be his choice for breakfast. Those of us standing around waiting for the morning cuppa soon come to the conclusion that the vendor’s actions seem like an exercise in futility. The afro youth was in a world of his own, intently staring with singular focus at the two feet high blackboard menu, eyes unmoved. Just from facial expressions and body language conveyed by the motley group waiting for their orders, it was clear that most of us thought that we have a crank in our midst. Hey, it New York City – cranks ooze out of stone walls. A little later, the youth takes out a piece of paper clipped on a hard pad and starts to copy parts of the menu using a half chewed out pencil. Looking at the paper and little clip pad in his hands, I remember thinking to myself that this guy must have come prepared and planned – for what I was not too clear and did not care too much – just as long as I got my breakfast on time. At this point of time, I hear a couple behind me whisper that either the afro is copying out the menu to start a rival diner on his own or that he must be comparing prices for menu items between makeshift diners like this. By now, the diner owner is at his wits end and starts to slowly raise his tone and tells the afro that one simply cannot copy the menu off his establishment and the youth better make an order for breakfast or clear the premises. I also heard a ‘cop’ invocation somewhere in between the veiled threat. What was fascinating was that the youth still seemed to be stuck in a world of his own, writing laboriously on his little piece of paper. After what seems like an eternity, I am handed my sandwich and coffee and as I am about to pick up my bag, I notice the youth look up slowly and catch the eyes of the diner owner. The youth then proceeds to pass him the piece of paper. Maybe it is a stick up note – I thought to myself hurrying to clear the area. I heard him say something to the diner owner – nothing intelligible – it seemed like a guttural cry from deep within the back of his mouth. Just as I was turning to go, it slowly dawns on us that the afro youth with the weather-beaten backpack was a deaf-mute and he simply was copying out a part of the menu that he planned for breakfast today.

Photograph of a painting by Zhao Nengzhi at the ChinaSquare gallery in Chelsea (displayed in June 08).

A picture from last year and a poem from this.

Valentine's evening - a poem.

Yesterday, I had left early
from work. The usual routine, the usual commute.
the ferry to Staten Island, train after and then drive home.
I read the Times,
hoping to hone
a newly found liberal jingosim.
Maybe it was the elections.

Two women sat adjacent to me,
one of them familiar,
a commute friend, as some would characterize,
good for the commute,
strangers at the car park.
She was thirtysh and full of make up.
The other, a dark haired older woman
sat eating her gram crackers.
The plastic pouch dangling
from one hand and
a tiny vial of nail protector in the other.

We got talking, I rarely do
but this was an unexpected early trip home.
I was feeling good.

My commute friend told me how she was going home
to her husband
then planning on validating Valentines at Red Lobsters.
She said ‘celebrate’ Valentine’s, but it seemed more like validation.
She had two children, one one and the other three years old.
They were planning on taking them along to dinner.
She said it would be a riot,
trying to get them to sit still
while they fight with the lobster,
bib, nutcracker, white meat and all.
She showed us pictures of her children,
beautiful, Anglo Saxon to the hilt.

The dark haired lady launched into her own story,
said she also has two children.
12 and 22.
Said she had the first when she was 13.
I said going out for Valentine’s should be easy for you,
the children will mind themselves.
She did not say anything to that.
I make for poor small talk...

She said that last Valentine’s,
her husband had pink rose petals
all over the floor
when she got home.
It made her cry.
She showed us pictures of her husband,
and a couple of grown up children.
The stereotypical middle class suburban black family.
I thought.
I did not really carry pictures in my wallet.
I made a mental note to do so,
not too sure why I did that.

Somehow I felt, all of this
was a bit too melodramatic.
I did not believe in a Valentine’s day
and was not really expecting to deliver Valentine plans
with a couple of women on the way home.
I sat on though, listening politely.

The ferry was nearing Staten Island and
with a final bit of polite banter
I asked
the lady with the dark hair,
her plans for this day.
She said that her husband died six months back,
he was a veteran of the Vietnam wars,
20 years her senior.
Leukemia it was.
It was lonely,
she said.
Especially on days like these.
She was planning on going
to the Calverton National Cemetery on Long Island
the next day.
She had taken the day off.
She said, she did get roses from Costco.
Red ones.