Sunglasses in the rain

It's amazing what you notice when you take out the earbuds and looks around.

And read that sentence as 'I' and not 'you', per se, because I cannot say what you, in fact, notice.

Much like driving around in my own car, wearing earbuds creates a faux bubble, a personal world inside the greater world. (Side-note: I highly recommend this episode of This American Life, related to this topic.) Yet as soon as I take out my earbuds, i don't just hear new things, I see them.

I was on the subway yesterday just dancing along to my music. The 'ding' came on telling me the transit employee was going to make an announcement aside from the usual automated announcements, so I pulled out my earbuds. I couldn't hear the announcement, but I kept my earbuds dangling over my collar and just looked around. I noticed a woman, crying, on the other side of the uptown 5 train.

We were at a stand-still in between stations, so I know that she had been on the train for a few minutes, but I had not seen this woman before removing myself from my personal bubble. I surveyed the gazes of those surrounding me, and I'm convinced that I'm the only one who saw this woman's tears.

The funny thing; this is the third person I've seen crying on the subway this week.

There's nothing sadder than an individual with the inability to hold back his or her tears while in public. There's nothing you can say to a person to not creep them out, and there's nothing you can do to not merit a restraining order.

And from personal experience, I can say there's nothing harder than being alone surrounded by thousand. I have struggled to hold back my own tears, before. That's why I wore sunglasses in the rain.