Dear Diary:
I joined the morning throng on the escalator descending into the 83rd Street entrance to the Q train, which must be among the steepest in Manhattan.
On this morning, the up escalator was not working. Dozens of people were on the way down, but only one person, a man, was coming up on the opposite side, step by methodical step (I’ve counted 130 while making the climb during other outages).
This man was handling the ascent with ease and grace. He was dressed in a crisp suit and tie, notable compared with the clothes being worn by those in the crowd headed down. He had a cellphone pressed against his head as he climbed and was waving his free arm wildly.
Looking down at him from above, it was hard to tell if he was gesturing in happiness or anger.
At one point, he stopped abruptly on the motionless stairs, stood stock-still and leaned into his phone. As the escalator continued down, I got close enough to hear what he was saying.
Suddenly, he shouted into the phone, his voice booming loud.
“No, you listen!” he yelled at whomever was on the other end of the call. He was holding the phone directly in front of his mouth. “The only thing I need from you — right now — is for you to pretend that you understand what I’m telling you!”
And then I had passed him. I looked back over my shoulder and saw that he had renewed his uphill hike. But his words hung in the air. And by the time I got to the platform, they made perfect sense in my mind.
— HP Newquist (x)
