Pools and Trains

Posted March 31st, 2003 by Sean Williams

The NCAA pool this year is sort of boring. It’s boring every year, but the group that I get in to is filled with people who don’t know anything about basketball. It is actually filled with monkeys and dogs and, y’know, girls… people who make their picks by how cute the point guard is. My friend Mac chooses his team by which name would make a better play title. Gonzaga takes the whole thing, Holy Cross is a close second.

So the fact that my final two are still playing should be cooler than it is. I never pick this shit right. But I have Kansas and Syracuse in the final game. It won’t happen, but it’s cool to be close.

The N train was stopped at Queensboro plaza this morning and Jordana switched to the 7 to go into the city. I decided that, since there were already 150 people waiting for my seat I would just hold off and go into the city later. It dawned on me only once we were in separate trains and the doors were closed that the “police action” which had stopped the N from going in to the city might be the thing that kills her, and I watched her disappear into the tunnel.

She called me on her cell the minute she got out of the train, and then she called me from work to tell me about another Food Trade Show that we are invited to. But it sucks. Every time we do our daily shit, it feels like it could be waltzing us into a bad situation. Michelle is too scared to take the train, Ian and Tessa are almost never in the city, and we have devised a plan for what to do when the attack hits and our phones don’t work. It isn’t If, it’s When.

But it is still New York. It’s still home. It is still the Mecca for people like me. I kind of understand why some Jews won’t leave Jerusalem, no matter how bad it gets. I still see the Empire State Building every day, so it just doesn’t get any better.