Perspective

The train car reeks of rotting vegetables, like depression and anxiety given a smell that permeates the air. I look around me in disbelief, since normally a smell this pervasive and high-toned will attract notice, but aside from the car being a little less crowded than usual, people just stay in their conversations and reading their newspapers like no one even smells it.

At the next stop, I flee the rampaging odor to the next car, where I find three young men shoveling what looks like rice and chicken and beans out of aluminum take out containers and into their faces. The smell of food, just normal take-out from some bodega, while usually unwelcome, smells like manna after the catastrophe in the other car, and I settle into a seat directly across from them with a smile and a sigh.