The 500 Blows

I have spent  a lot of time underground. In fact, I calculated today that in the year 2008 alone, I spent an estimated 500 hours on a New York City subway train, or waiting for one in a station. In 2009 I spent less time on the subway, as this was the year I moved to Paris. Yet, even so, there were many nights and days spent beneath the earth, both in America and in France. And I can't account for the hours. I sometimes feel as though they were stolen from me, or worse, deleted from existence.

My earliest train memory is of the Long Island Railroad. It  was here where I spent some time as a child traveling with family on day trips to Manhattan from my uncle's home in Queens, and years later, from Rockville Centre. I remember most clearly the transfer station, Jamaica, where we would wait, my mother and uncle and I, for a connecting train. It was also here, as an adult living in Brooklyn, where my husband and I often waited patiently to transfer to the train that would, from here, screech its way into the small town where family lived.  The total travel time of 90 minutes began at the Atlantic Avenue station in Brooklyn and ended in Rockville Centre, Long Island. At least it was above ground.  Besides, these were fond memories. Especially the journeys of childhood. Then, the trains seemed to travel faster, and you had the sense of actually going somewhere. Somewhere exciting. Maybe you were going to see the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center, or to take a carriage ride in Central Park. Maybe there was snow on the ground outside, and in that split second of descent, just as the train is plunged into the darkness of underground tunnels, your window fills with white light, and this stays with you forever.

But then, you grow older. And if you should happen to work for a living and live in the city, you will probably spend a greater portion of time than you desire on a train. I certainly have. I know that I was most often going from home to this or that terrible job. I was sometimes meeting friends, or going to the market. I know that the journeys were necessary ones;  I just wish they hadn't kept me in the dark for so long. But, if I try, maybe I can salvage some of the pictures from the black mass of time.

I have a still, deep, blue tinted recollection of a glimpse of the Brooklyn Bridge at dusk, a single moment I didn't realize at the time was imprinting itself upon me. I remember one summer evening sitting across from my husband, happily exhausted from a day at the beach. I wore my blue dress, which was damp at the hem, and the saltwater still burned on my calves. I also recall vividly that September afternoon when I was told my father died, and the excruciating 20 minute subway ride home. As an opposite train passed, I glanced out of the window and briefly met the forlorn gaze of a stranger, who is a stranger still. Then there are less significant memories. A forgotten bottle on the floor of the car, rolling involuntarily between the black boots of passengers. A tired advertisement for a credit card company. The red crease in the crook of my arm made by the bag I carried. A feeling of having left something behind. This must be what we call Time.

As time elapsed, those hours by train accumulated into a sense of heaviness and fatigue, much like a series of blows to the head. I grew weary. So heavy and weary, that when the last train left the station on the third of July, and I dropped my metro card into the trash as my husband pulled me along toward JFK airport, I felt the weight of 500 hours drop away. And then I slept. I slept going over the Atlantic Ocean without opening the window. I slept in an airport chair under the midnight sun of Iceland. The moment we arrived in our Paris quarters, I collapsed onto the bed and slept some more. For many months, I slept for a few hours in the middle of the day. People crept by, suspecting I was sick. No, I told them. I have just been on too many trains.

On this New Year's Eve, looking back in time is as important as going forward. I am happy where I am, and try not to worry too much about the future. I have learned, mostly the hard way, to value time. Perhaps this is just a part of ageing, or maybe it's the result of too much underground thought. I can't remember much about my subway travel or what I may have been contemplating during all those waiting hours. I imagine I  thought about someone I saw or something said, what I would eat for dinner, how I would make it and where I would buy the ingredients, where I had been and where I needed to go next. I'm sure I thought I had plenty of time to do it all.

Like I said, I can't account for the hours. I just know they are gone.