My heart is breaking!
I just came off the Southbound train from St George station heartbroken:
Here I am, sitting on the back of the train minding my own business when I notice a younger, middle-aged black man wearing a pair of black jogging pants, a slightly over-sized white t-shirt, and a navy wind-breaker, striding into the train at Spadina station, a trail of what feels like failure, hopelessness, and melancholy follow closely behind him. I glance quickly in his direction but revert my eyes back to the glowing screen on my blackberry.
As I was perusing through a list of songs on my playlist, I notice a funky odor in the air; maybe perspiration, a chunk of hot shit, a table spoon of urine, and... a dash of rotten eggs. I quickly identified the smell as "that homeless man" smell - boy, does it smell bad. Luckily, for me, my station was next.
My nose only had to endure this very distinctive smell for a couple second, but it felt like a century. Mint green walls begin to speed past the dirty TTC windows, and finally, I hear the automated voice conductor lady robotically announce, "arriving at St George station, arriving at St George." To my guilty relief, in mere seconds my body was swiftly heading toward the exit doors, but as I approached the walkway, I stopped for about 2/100th of a second to take one last look at my train, and him.
My eyes dart from seat to seat until they stop on the homeless man; there he was, lying down on a three-seater, with all his loneliness, his trials, his failures, his shame, and essentially, his death - he was heartless, in that he had no spark left in him. He was lying with all of them, and it broke my heart. All I wanted to do was help him.
I got off the train feeling like I had done something wrong, as though I was responsible for his well-being. As though I had been the cause of his situation. I felt it all, and I don't know why.
