Iron Saxophone

I saw a man today in Grand Central Station take the Main Lobby and shape it to his whim. Commuters, police, homeless, the lost, the confused, the harried, the others, all came to him. He was playing a saxophone, sending whorls of warm unseen colors drifting snakily out in to the voidlike echoes that are Grand Central.

Warm from exercise, I had spent the previous hour in having a pleasant drink with a friend whom I did not know that well, who had told me upon my meeting her in the exercise room that she had been dumped by her boyfriend, "the first time that's happened." Trying not to stare at her figure, made plain for all (some?) to see in shimmering Spandex, I feigned indignant confusion and asked if the boy was mad. Laughing, she proclaimed that her verdict as well.

We went our separate ways around the Universal gym, and she left early to work on the bicycles, leaving me to ponder breathlessly, as I shifted uncaring iron, the possible scenarios. Perhaps, to take advantage of her obviously cheerful (or at least forcedly cheerful rebound) to try to get her into bed, a goal which my endocrine system heartily approved of. Could I? Nobly, I'd like to think not. Realistically, I don't think I'd have a notion as to how to go about it. Or, to make knowingly subtle reference to the possibility and leave us both hanging, with the possibility of making a more pointed attempt later on after an appropriate amount of time. No hiding here; I simply didn't know how. I could wonder, though. Thirdly, to simply ask her out for an evening; perhaps to press my suit then? Giving both of us time to regroup, this was definitely an attractive option. Wryly, the third and most likely scenario: imagining myself silently descending the escalator to the downtown number 6 train, thinking wistfully of what it might have been like, as after a friendly goodbye, we part ways for different areas of Manhattan. Do I dare?

I had dared to ask her casually if I could buy her a drink after exercising, as she was heading for the bikes. She had accepted, and left me with a smile to exercise her incredibly lithe body a bit further towards perfection. Wondering as I approach the bench press. What to say? (unh) I don't know. (unh) ...maybe to invite her to dinner. (unh) ...fifteen... maybe to make a broad hint while looking at her pointedly. Try on the lopsided smile to show there's no real pressure (unh). Her breasts, slightly large for her size, would be firm against my chest. Perhaps, if I could kiss her, I would try to kiss her solely with the mouth, to hold my hands against her face to prevent myself from cheating. Her mouth would probably taste warm, and slightly salty from exercise. Cold air is best; outside, then? Near a corner, before we (would have) parted ways, to show the options.

The iron, uncaring, slams down against the stack as twenty reps fall past me in the waterfall of time to rest like cinder blocks on my arms as the loll towards the floor. I attempt, successfully, to contain my growing erection. Exercise shorts in a room full of men (well, two men) and they'll wonder about you, won't they? Perhaps the next set. One (unh) and two (unh) and what would it feel like, to gently cup her bottom as she presses herself against me? Would I be able to lift her slightly from her feet, and would she wrap her legs about my waist? ...empty dreams. (unh) and six and (unh) and seven...I wonder if she's finished yet. I don't want to leave her sitting in the bar too long. I used to think I was above such fantasizing and primal goals. Now I wonder if that's why I've had such a miserable time of it with women. Probably. Nobility always seems to lead to martyrdom, and the line between the two is downy fine, too narrow to feel until you've lost your footing on the wrong side and are trying to claw your way back up with your fingers. I wonder if I'll manage without ripping my fingers apart before I'm thirty. (unh). T-- (damn him) used to have a saying as we exercised casually in our suite atop the Campus Club. Men, he'd say, why do we do this to ourselves? Booty, we'd answer laughingly, as we forced another few calories from our muscles. For Booty. Deep down, below the sentience, Darwin laughing as the organisms try desperately with intellect-deadened instincts to increase their chances of breeding and transmitting their genetic codas into theSymphony Sapiens.

Damn T--. He never lacked for it. Enough to make one cry, the way he sailed through, defying every guideline the noble martyr complex forced on me, never feeling, as far as I could tell. I desperately didn't want him to feel. For him to be that successful in the hunt and still feel while I spend four years single and celibate would probably be enough to make me open a vein. Success, T-- used to say, is equal to exposure times kill ratio. Laugh. I used to laugh with him. Impossible to take out my frustrations on him; he was a friend, a roommate, a companion. Good man to drink a beer or nine with.

Third set behind me, and the muscles are appearing, pumped from within with blood and adenosine tri-phosphate. On to the curls. Twenty-five pounds, even though I'm not quite ready, making the trip over the line into powerlifting for the thrill of having muscles I don't have to hide my face from in the mirror. Right arm. One. Two. Three. There is no rhythm, a bad sign, only effort, as strain occurs on the first set. Stubbornness and a desire for harder biceps won't let me back down a weight. Eventually, logic tells me, I will be able to do three sets of ten without cheating on the 25 lb. weights, and then I'll begin tone lifting. Or maybe aerobic exercise, which would at least let me talk to her. Of course, that may be a bad thing. What would I say? Would we use up all our conversation there, before we even adjourned to the bar?

Left arm. I'll have to take a shorter shower if I'm to meet her. N----- always jokes about what long showers I take. I guess it's just routine, a pattern that holds me there. I don't feel clean unless I've followed it. Head, scalp, shampoo (twice), face, arms, neck, chest, stomach, left leg up to the bar so I can do left leg, left calf, foot, up to hip and buttock. Right leg up; repeat. Rinse. And most important, stand under the shower with the hottest water I can stand playing full on the muscles of my neck, which have been hurting recently. I refuse to believe it is the workouts. Probably my chair at work. Yes. The chair. Weighing, a thrice-weekly ritual of shame. Two hundred and seventy- three pounds, up six pounds from four days ago. Undoubtedly those two days of daiquiris and one Sunday night of beer and zouched coffees. Grin. Putting on my clothes; I always feel a letdown. Best is walking back from the shower, dry, my hair done (coiffed, as N----- and I would put it jokingly) and able to see, to really see in the mirror, the difference the work has made on me, the musculature beginning to appear from beneath the fat, the arms that I'm finally proud of.

I reach the bar, but she's not here. Her name hadn't been signed out below; undoubtedly she's still changing. Maybe showering. Overcome, I manage to make it to a table with my drink through iron control before fantasizing of what she'd look like in a shower. Lithe, slim, shorter than I, her breasts thrusting firmly upwards and out. Her ass just slightly fuller than muscles alone would produce; a pleasing softness there for one to grip. Perhaps to press her up against the wall of the shower, to feel her warm skin dripping against me...it's really time to study, I think. The Cessna Manual of flight. A good title; not too presumptuous...I laugh at my own self-misdirection. Opening the book, I begin to study lines of text that all will someday theoretically allow me to fly further and farther, alone and unfettered, or, alternatively, to share the joy with friends. One must open the flight plan after departure by radio communications. If communicating with a tower or approach control, ask them to relay the information to the flight service station with which your plan is filed. Do not forget to close your flight plan immediately after reaching your destination, or to extend it via radio and landline relay if conditions require enroute.

I drink my drink. Al makes strong spritzers here; his idea of a white wine spritzer is to fill a glass with ice, bring wine almost to the top, add a twist of lime, and wave the barwand at it with the soda button held down. I smile at him across the room, over my drink, and he waves back. It pays to tip the bartender in a club where tipping is not permitted. Perhaps she's gone already? And didn't stop to sign out? I am, after all, forty minutes past the time she said she'd finish cycling. No. Don't think that way, after all, she's probably as slow as you are in the shower. Keep reading. The enroute climb times and distances are listed in the Performance section of your aircraft manual. Refer to them when planning a flight. Hmm.

Ah, there she is. Walking across the bar with an apologetic smile. Sorry I'm late. No problem. Easily; asking her what she'd like to drink. Tomato juice with lemon? Al, a tomato juice with lemon and another of these. We chat, easily, lightly, about her roommate and men, about travel (she's been to Europe, as have I- we chat for an animated ten minutes about regions of France and Switzerland we've visited) and she tells me that she wishes some time soon to travel in the Far East, or perhaps South America. She will start saving soon. The levels in the glasses slip softly downward. We talk, briefly, of relationships and their endings. I tell her my last one ended with me being dumped, long distance, from another state. Sympathy; when? Oh, long ago. I wave it off. But it's still with me, left unsaid. Eventually, she notes that it is late and she should be starting home. We find that we are walking in the same direction, and she waits for me to retrieve my outerwear. When she sees that it is the cape, she laughs, saying, you and that cape. Hey, more of a statement than an umbrella. She smiles. Oh, it's cool, it's just, so you. I'm not sure what to make of that. The scenarios slip between mental fingers as silt through an unseen hand below a murky lake. Although the hands cannot be seen, the premonition that if suddenly clenched they will grasp only air and empty water makes itself felt in the soft sliding of the bottom sands across one's palm. We walk towards Grand Central, and as we reach Madison, she spots her bus, and with a wave and a see you later, she runs for it. She doesn't look back. I smile, knowingly, at myself, and continue eastward, to the doors which will give me entrance to the second level of a large warm room in which humanity waits eternally for its train, a train that will probably never come, and if it does, will be ten to thirty minutes delayed.

The Main Lobby is warm. As I come in, making sure surreptitiously that the cape is straight and closed in front of me, and aware of what I look like to others, I place a poker face on my features as I attempt to glide down the steps to the marble floor below. Remember, failing to close the flight plan may result in unnecessary search and rescue operations being mounted along your flight path from your last known position. There is a sound, here, that I am aware of as I am a quarter way across the silently echoing space towards the womb of the subway. A saxophone, releasing oiled paintings of sound across the water of the silence, swaying and dancing up towards the ceiling oh so far away with the hole that they knocked in it to put the nose cone of the Redstone missile through. He is standing under where the Kodak ad used to be, in the light in front of the bank travel center, slightly out from the lit marbled wall. His saxophone case is open, and some monies gleam within. I fumble under the cape as I walk, attempting to juggle the $1.20 I have in one hand for the train, the knapsack, and my other change to find some that I might donate, as it sounds like he's actually playing, for himself, and not for others, a performance worth supporting. I manage, after dropping the dimes twice, to find fourteen cents. Not much, but, I tell myself, it is all the change I have. I draw closer, and note the small group of folks standing a respectful distance from him in a loose semicircle as he talks in his own language to the ceiling across the lobby, perhaps three or four hundred feet from where he stands. Maybe more. I throw the change in among the dollar bills and quarters (dollar bills?) and attempt to maintain a properly enigmatic bearing as I shift course and head for the subway PAIN as the saxophone leaps from the opposite wall of the lobby, dashes back and wraps velvet hands around my head to turn me about, and I turn to look at him. Unremarkable, his eyes closed and his hands wooing the metal horn in his hands, the music, in slow, unhurried riffs, travelling around the space to impact on many. Some, the hardened commuters, rush past, some rush past after throwing change, others- I lean back against the wall near the corner, where I can hear the echoes from three sides of the space. The warmth is greater, here. Fumbling, I retrieve a dollar from my wallet, and advance to drop it in the case before edging back against the wall. The saxist does not acknowledge me; he is too busy talking to his muse, the browns and purples and deep greens of his song passing around the lobby. The echoes come back a half second late; muzzy, warm and distant, but there nonetheless, the air is never entirely silent. Others come forward, from the small crowd, to donate; I watch him take in, in four minutes, an hour of my salary. Smiling is the only appropriate thing to do. Waiting there, I lose perhaps ten minutes. He stops, finally, to break, just as I am rousing myself from my wall to go. I approach, wait for him to focus on me before I speak. "Thanks, man."

He smiles, a truly wonderful thing, as if I understand (ridiculous notion) and nods back. "Welcome. Thank you." And I tread off towards the subway, thinking of things that might have been, had I not been me, and what I have to expect when I reach home (an empty bed, and empty cupboard, some bills, on the plus side an affectionate cat or three) and as I descend the escalator towards the platform of the downtown number 6 train, I feel the last scenario trickle away beneath my fingers, and Grand Central FSS, Cessna November Five Four Five Three Romeo closing flight plan filed at fifteen hundred zulu time with Universal FSS, thank you and good day and there is a last whorl of iron saxophone carried down towards me, overlaid with the crash of weights as (alone) I enter the warm noisy train that will carry

me

home

new york city nov. 11th, 1991

I think this one is perhaps oen of the better self-indulgent pieces on here. :-) IMHO, of course.

-The Custodian