Molt Be Blog

A Ride on the Metro (Now with Pod People)
R and I spent the afternoon at her parents' house in Bethesda. They have a really comfortable couch. We spend many a Sunday afternoon there and always take the metro back into DC at around 6pm or so. The platform is usually empty except for the two of us and someone crazy who feels like talking (see the Ode to Guy at Grovesnor from 9/23). This week was very different. Before we even got to the platform we watched as a large group of 40 and 50 somethings got onto the train (that we would miss while getting tickets). We're talking twenty or thirty people, which is a lot compared to the usual three. By the time our train showed up, there was another crowd of forty to fifty 40 and 50 somethings waiting to get on. As soon as we entered the car, fear gripped my like a nymphomaniacal Greg-fetished gorilla. Any new passengers would be met by standing room only in a car of older suburbanites wearing scarves and a cloud of the same perfume frangrance exuding from every female on board. What the hell was going on? I had to know. Why was a car, normally empty, now full of bald men and their caked makeup wives? Where did these women buy all their big, gold clip-on earrings? Why did everyone seem to know eachother? The next stop yielded the same results. More of them piled on, greeted eachother, introduced their wives and started small talk about slush and wind chill.
I honestly began to wonder if I had entered another dimension. My mind started to race through different possibilities. A GOP fundraiser downtown? No way, republicans wouldn't take the metro. An AARP gathering? They were old... but not that old. Were they leaving something in Bethesda and all just returning to their homes? Impossible. These people definitely didn't live in the city... they leaked suburbia from their pores. Was there a terrorist threat in Bethesda and some kind of new Patriot Act amendment that let all the wealthy men and their clingy wives evacuate first? No wonder they looked so pleased with themselves.
Why did they all look so content? What wonderful slaughter were we all being transported to?
And then I heard it. Three words. "Simon" "and" "Garfunkle". Suddenly, like an easy SAT question, all the pieces fit together. Crumbs are to Bread as Dust is to Wood and these people are all on their way to the same lame concert.
"I thought they broke up?" whispers R in my ear.
"They must need money."
All at once, a few of the elders seem to realize that there are young people in their midst.
"They probably don't even know who Simon and Garfunkle are."
"They're like Simon and who?"
"I don't even know the names of the bands my daughter listens to."
"Do you think they'll do Mrs. Robinson?"
Whispers fly around the car and, with the first explanation of buying concert tickets online as a pioneering concept, my head starts to spin. I'm overwhelmed with the idea that this is probably the first time in a year these wives have been into DC and it's all to go to a concert from the nice guy and his jerk friend who can't even sing.
"Get me out of here!" I want to scream, lunging at the nearest velvet bollero-wearing Garfunkle fan. Luckily, my actions never had to go this far. I kept silent; except for some random giggling and made it out the door with only a few disgusted glances around the car.
Now I'm home; safe. What disturbs me the most, is what I might have thought if I hadn't overheard the venue. I wouldn't sleep, that's for sure.