Two years ago, while on vacation in New Mexico, Rachel stretched her arms out radiantly and declared that this vista before us, popping with mountains, was where her soul felt most at home. "Don't mountains just make you feel right?" she asked me.
I mumbled noncommitedly. They're nice. Mountains, like Broadway musicals, inspire great happiness in other people, and I have nothing against them. I just don't seek them out. Sometimes I feel bad when everyone else is having crazy endorphin rushes and I'm looking at my watch. Am I calibrated incorrectly? Does this lack of mountain-love signal a deeper character problem?
This morning, I woke up early in my New York hotel room. I walked to Zabar's bakery in Grand Central Station, before the big rush of commuters. I prowled the corridors of that big, beautiful train station and took the time to drink in the schedules, the brilliant Zodiac ceiling, and even the informational display about the long-delayed Long Island Rail Road tunnel connecting the Sunnyside yard to Manhattan's East Side. I read it all. I touched the displayed sample of 500 million year old mica schist that the tunnel borers are digging through.
There's going to be a new train station in New York for the first time in 90 years! There hasn't been a new mountain in New Mexico in, like, forever.
Grand Central Station is where I feel that happy tingle that my family was enjoying on the Southwest trip. It reminds me of being a kid and visiting my grandma. I thrill to being part of the rush at salmon spawning speed, and I love standing still, out of the way, and watching the motion from a single vantage point.
I recall a New Yorker cartoon where a woman says "I thought I liked babies, but as it turned out, I mainly like baby clothes." That's kind of how I feel about trains and stations.
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