Sometimes You Simply Cry

Mornings are emotionally a hard time of day for me. In times of pain, my heart is at it's most raw, my mind most vulnerable to demons that don't flee with the rising of the sun. Even after a night of mirthful levity such as last night, morning redelivers the hurt I'd pushed out of my view temporarily. It takes so, so much to make me cry. I cry rarely but deeply. It takes a lot, but some mornings there is enough. The hurt bubbles over the edges of composure and the tears come.

It is awkward when it happens on the T.

I ride quietly, not able to read as the demons dance in a furious tempest that no one around me can see, yet. Feeling still the searing hot slap of being discarded without a care, like useless litter. Being frightened by the enormity of one of my long-term goals, and by the growing urgency of the other one. It's too much in one moment; it swells past my threshold and without a sound, I break.

There's nothing to do but relinquish my seat and move to the end of the car where the fewest people are. I stand in the back, one hand on the pole and the other masking half my face, making no sounds or sobs, only tears and their acidic sting. I face the window and the black of the tunnel; people politely point their gaze elsewhere. I see my reflection in the dark rush of the window, altered in coloration, like a photo negative, my own image anachronistically flickering in an antique moving picture. The tears streak white down the contours of my face as I try to wipe them away, only smearing them.

I'm then on Berkeley Street. I have to go to work, must straighten up now. I stop in the bathroom two floors down from mine, where nobody knows me. I dry my eyes. Put on a little makeup. A little perfume. And I go to work.

New York tomorrow.