Commuting

For the first time in my college life, I commute.

I spent my first three years in university housing -- which, in a non-campus urban school means that I was within walking distance.

This year, I live 30 minutes door-to-door from class. And I must say: I love it.

It's the perfect wind-down time (except when the train is so packed that I cannot breath...) to separate the 'work' from the 'play'. (Or the work from the homework with a nice buffer to let my mind clear.) It's an enjoyable subway ride, too, with a nice walk on both ends which is quite enjoyable when the wind isn't too bad.

Sometimes -- rarely -- I read on the train. And thus, a story of a commute from a month ago...

I was going home from school and got onto the local train at Union Square in order to have a place to sit. I sat, opened my bag, and pulled out my book of short stories.

The Girl in the Flammable Skirt. A book whose stories I have loved, especially on the train since I can just read one in the time I'm actually on the train in my commute. This book is not an effeminate book, but the cover, well, it is. It's a baby-blue with a picture of a pair of female legs coming down from off the page in a skirt that is the orange color of fire.

But why should I care? It's only a book and I'm not going to talk to these people around me, so what's the big deal?

That is, of course, until the doors opened at 23rd street and a beautiful girl walked on -- about my age -- and sat directly across from me.

I looked up, saw her, and before she could look at me, I put away my book in order to pull out another book of short writings, this time short non-fiction essays. Twentysomething essays by Twentysomething writers. This cover is red with only the title on it.

I truthfully didn't do much reading during this subway ride as I kept glancing up in hopes that this girl's eyes would meet mine and maybe she'd start a conversation. (Of course, from my previous post about the bar scene, we know that I would never start this conversation.)

She got off the train at Hunter College and I breathed a small sigh of relief, put my book away, and replaced the original book in my hands to finish the story I had started to read earlier.

So this poses an interesting question: What will you do to appear a certain way to a complete stranger, even one whom you will likely never interact with? Evidently, I'll pretend to read a book with a more gender neutral cover...

I knew I was right all those years just to avoid reading all together!