Last night, I had the pleasure of joining my good friend Mr. Piatt for a viewing of The Drowsy Chaperone (a charming show, and recommended to one and all). As the show was playing at the glamorous Cadillac Palace Theatre in the world-famous Chicago loop, this outing required a trip on the El.
The El, my friends, is friend and foe. It's convenient, reasonably cheap, and has that big city charm a bus just can't capture. It's also slow, kind of stinky, and occasionally, the scene of remarkable personal adventures.
As may be recalled, I was once reminded how very hot I am for an old chick while riding the El.
Well, last night, I was privvy to attentions of a very different sort. I boarded the train at Thorndale, and noted a man in the car with me. I did not note at that time that we were the only ones in the car. I felt he was eyeing me oddly, but put it down to paranoia on my part.
I put on my headphones, still strangely aware of the fellow seated half an El car away from me. I realized I had been humming along to my tunes, and thought perhaps I was annoying him, so I glanced at him to see if he actually was looking--with perhaps annoyance in his eyes--at me.
He was looking at me, with a sort of furtive look on his face, and I looked away. It only half registered with me that he was doing something with his hand. An odd, fast gesture. Close to his lap. "Does he realize," I pondered, "that his nervous tic makes it look like he's pleasuring himself?"
Only then did it begin to dawn on me that it was not a nervous tic. I glanced back at him. Now, I didn't get a good look, but I'm fairly certain that it was, indeed, not a tic. I looked away. I pondered. I felt the need to tell my story, so removed my phone from my purse to send Eamon a text.
No sooner did the phone come out but the man abruptly stood up and fled to the adjacent El car. Eamon responded to my text, fairly shouting, "Hit the button," meaning the call button in the car that allows one to alert the driver to malfeasance. I replied that the man had fled after I whipped out my phone. Eamon was glad.
We trundled along, and I pondered precisely why one chooses such an act in such a place. Had he expected to find the El car empty? Was he dismayed to have to attend to his "business" with someone close by? Or did he like company?
As I pondered these things, the train stopped on the tracks, overlooking what appeared to be one of the many ubiquitous movie shoots that seem to be cropping up all over the city. A side street was blocked off, and people in jeans and black jackets were preparing to set up what appeared to me to be a ridiculous number of director's chairs. And there was an antique car parked by the curb. And lots of lighting instruments. I watched, hoping for some "sighting," but nothing was forthcoming.
There is nothing witty or pithy that I can say to connect these two El adventures. Except that they both happened, within 2 minutes of each other. And it was very weird.
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