Straphanger Joe’s Subway Car is Packed to the Gills

Stepping Out

It’s a giant fish flying over Manhattan with doors and windows that make it look like a flying fish subway car. Inside are benches and poles to hold on to and passengers including a couple of aliens, a painter, a ballet dancer, a knight in full armor, a saxophone player, a woman listening to a radio, and a commuter stepping out the door – falling.

It’s subway art commissioned by the MTA, painted by Chris Gall. I know the artist because of the children’s books he’s illustrated and written – some of my son’s favorites (There’s Nothing to Do on Mars and Dear Fish – http://www.chrisgall.com/).  

The poster is in the middle of the car and I’m at the far end. It’s crowded and I’m annoying a few people by craning my neck to see it better. I peek to the left then the right of a big man who’s reading the paper. I crane my neck to try and see over them. The other people between me and the poster who make eye contract with me think I’m staring at them and give me a dirty look.

I walk past them, including the big guy, excusing myself as I edge closer. I stare at the poster from a few feet away, just above a woman’s head. She’s asleep so she’s neither annoyed nor self conscious about me staring at the space above her head. She doesn’t turn around to see what I’m looking at – to make sure it’s not a giant roach, or something important that she missed. She just sleeps – inhale, exhale… inhale, exhale… 

My gaze keeps going back to the commuter falling off the car. I know it’s a picture of a flying fish subway car and that’s not a real thing. But I keep wondering why he’s falling off? Like a true New Yorker the first thing I wonder is, “Did he get pushed?” I don’t see anyone behind him. There’s no hand to act as evidence.

He’s not smiling but he’s not scared – or at least doesn’t seem to be. Maybe he’s not falling? Maybe he’s just stepping off? Does he know that the fish is flying? Can he fly also, or does he think he can? Is he mistaken? Is someone or something going to catch him — perhaps the Goodyear blimp? Or maybe he’s close to the Empire State Building and is just stepping down to the observation deck?

I don’t know. The train stops at 23rd Street – my stop. I take a last look, searching for some clue, some answer to the question: Why?  Nothing.  

I make it out the door just as the bell rings for them to close.  I step out, onto thin air – or at least thin concrete. Okay, it’s heavy concrete, worn down and trampled upon by the feet of hundreds of thousands of subway travelers, (and scampered over by untold numbers of roaches and rats – the other populous denizens of this underworld).

But still, for a moment I think I may understand why the guy is leaving the flying fish subway car – why he’s falling/exiting/jumping/stepping off.  “Hey, buddy, you wanna move it through the turnstile?” a voice says from behind me. 

I shake my head and the answer disappears. I head up to the surface where fish don’t fly but daydreams do.

–Joe Lunievicz