Riding the Train

This is a true story that happened to me back when I was still in NY.

I was standing on a platform, waiting for a train so I could go home. Headphones in, tracks playing, everything was right with the world. I had a list of stuff to do when I got home and I was feeling good about it all.

This old woman starts to tap on my arm.  She had to be at least 80, big tan down jacket that went to her ankles just about, scarf on her head, the works.  So I take out my headphones. I figure I can be helpful, right? She had to need directions or something. Probably she didn’t want to tell me about saviors like the last old lady who tapped me. It was the last nice thought I had.

“Aren’t you that man from the TV?” she asked.  Well that’s new. I don’t think I’ve ever been mistaken for an actor before. That’s pretty cool!

“Uh, no, sorry,” I said.

“Are you sure?” she asks, seeming to be positive that I am who she thinks I am. “That man from the TV, you know, the one who plays the retard?”

I stop. I blink. I play that back a few times at speed. “Excuse me?”

“That nice man from the TV, on that show?”

“What show?”

“You know, the one with the police?  Yes, you look just like him!”

“Like the… like the mentally challenged man on the police show?”

“Yes,” she insists, smiling now, “but well he’s… well.”

“Taller?” I thought maybe he was taller, you know. He could’ve been taller. Taller would’ve been fine. But no.

“No, he doesn’t look as strange.”

“Strange?”

“Well, you know, not ugly but… Are you sure you aren’t him?”

“The challenged, ugly actor from your TV?” I ask, trying to keep my voice perfectly fine while I simultaneously try to not push her onto the tracks.  “No. I don’t act.” Because what else can you say?

And I turn toward her, trying, seriously here, to be nice and calm.  And then… well…

“Oh,” she says, frowning, now that she can see the left side of my head, “no, he didn’t have a gay earring.”

Which is when I snapped.

“Hey,” I said, “you do not insult my Hello Kitty earring. You respect it! Got that?”

“What?”

“The ugly TV man said watch it.  Keeee-rist!”

At which point I walked away, further up the platform to get away from her.  Because with my luck she’d want to throw down, whip out a taser, shock me until I fell onto the tracks, and then the train would come.  That’s how this shit goes, it seems.  I still have no idea what show she even meant!

Anyway that was one of the stories from an old collection of true NYC stories a publisher asked me for that ended up being called NYCWTF. My life is strange.