I was on the train yesterday. I was in one of my Caligula moods. So frustrated by having to constantly sit next to loving freakin' couples that the fist I was making turned my knuckles white and left nail marks embedded in my palm. It is rare that I look for a fight, even on my worst days. I tend to have that New Englander "pardon me while I avoid this confrontation." As you might be able to tell from the blog, I am passive agressive, not agressive agressive.


Well, most of the time.


This woman, probably about 22 or younger, was on the train with her two children. If she was a little rough with her children, OK who am I to judge? I don't have kids. Did I approve of them eating cheetos when their mother was clearly on her way to morbidly obese? No, but again when you consider that I spent two weeks on an all alcohol and tylenol pm diet-again who am I to judge?


A fifty year old Asian woman got on the train. She had a cane and asked for the mother to move down a bit so she could sit. The mother said hold on a minute, but then proceeded to seemingly ignore the woman's request. The woman said, "I would like to sit down now please." Well, this mother made a big show of moving herself and her kids down and then proceeded to talk very loudly to herself about "This bitch who can't wait to sit. I told you to wait, and you can't wait. You don't know me. I'll cut you. I'm from the fucking Bronx." Now she is sitting right next to the Asian woman who looks at this ranting mother. "What? What? What the fuck is wrong with you now? You want to fuck with me?" At the next stop the woman next to me got up, and the Asian woman took her seat. The mother got up, "That's right you better move because I would kill you, bitch. That's why I hate white women, man, they mad stupid. I'll take you're fuckin' purse, bitch. You lucky I got my kids, cause I'd fuckin' kill you. You don't know me. That's why I shouldn't go out below 125th st. Can't stand these stupid fucking white people."


Now perhaps normally I wouldn't have done anything, but thism onologue KEPT ON GOING. I mean there was no end in sight even after the Asian woman moved, and I was just sick to death of this woman's ranting. This? This was the worst fucking thing to happen to her today? I mean christ on my worst fucking day, on the days when I started the morning by drinking gatorade and vodka, I wasn't this ridiculous. Then this mother started walking towards the Asian woman. The woman on the other side of me to my seat mate "Maybe you should change cars." At which point I stood up.


"You want to take somebody out, take me." She looked at me and started to launch into her "you don't know me" routine. I stopped her. "No, YOU don't know ME. I've been battling terminal cancer for the last five years. I've seen about every kind of physical pain there is, and I still have hell to look forward to. So you feel the need to take your anger out on somebody go for it. You want to kill me. Go ahead. Have fun." She gave me this stare down, and I just smiled at her. Not the "I'm a crazy fucker" smile, but the "I have no fear" at all smile.


There is a look of terror that passes over a crazy person's face when he/she realizes he/she is looking at someone way crazier than they can ever hope to be. That look flitted across her face. "You're lucky..." "Lucky what? That you aren't crazy enough to beat someone half your size in front of a subway car of onlookers. Yeah, I'm overfreakin' joyed. Look as I said, you want to beat somebody go ahead, but if not then shut the fuck up."


She stood there for a moment. There was complete silence in the car-these two crazies about to go head to head-these poor people worried that they were going to have to take blood soaked suits to the dry cleaners. But then she turned and sat down. Lucky for me that the next stop was mine. As I walked to the exit door I said "And incidentally you should be more polite to strangers. Because THIS stupid white bitch is a public school teacher and imagine the embarassment if I get your kids in the Fall."


Now of course almost ALL of what I said was a complete lie, but really what I said didn't matter. She was banking on fear, and she didn't expect someone to stand up to her. Once the Asian woman moved, the mother knew she had a victim she could harass. But as I say I can out crazy anyone any day of the week. Unfortunately not even that made me feel better.