NYC 3 // The Subway

No contest: My favorite thing about NYC was the subway system. Once you get a sense of how to get around, it is incredible to be able to hop on the subway and make your way around town. No warming up a cold car, or cooling down a hot car, or anxiety about parking, or always thinking your car is making funny noise, or making right turns over and over and over just to avoid making a left hand turn (is this just me?). I hate driving.

But it's not just the convenience of the subways that I love. This Time article on Christopher Morris' photos of graffiti-covered New York subways in 1981 was really fascinating. The photo collection shows ordinary New Yorkers on the subway trains; reading, sleeping, pushing their way through crowds or waiting for a train. There are so many unique faces, but shortly after each photo was taken, everyone went their separate ways, back to their lives, and we'll never know who any of them were or what became of them. Aren't we so little and insignificant in the world?

It's the anonymity of life in New York that I love. There are many, many people in the city, and everyone is so busy that no one really notices you. Being from southwest Missouri, where every stranger in the checkout line wants to strike up a conversation, I was really grateful to just feel invisible. I wore all the clothes I don't have the courage to wear back home, and I was able to recover from public displays of clumsiness and cluelessness instantly (like getting my arm caught in the train doors... eye dart). Existing was easier.

As a result, you see some strange people on the subways. Never a dull moment.