Subterranean

With my plunder I descend under Central Park; the subway is the fastest escape route in the city. The streets are flooded with surveillance cameras and police protecting Trump Tower 24/7, paid for by the lovely citizens of New York. Every taxi and Uber these days are monitored with cameras and the traffic during the holidays is unbelievably horrendous. The subway is the safest and fastest getaway.

Don’t think that the subways are monitored cause they’re not. The MTA is so greedy they won’t install cameras in their stations, except for inside the attendant’s booth, to watch their precious currency of Metro Cards. The truth is that the MTA doesn’t want to be held liable for anything that happens in their tunnels. Robberies, rapes, record sales, as long as it isn’t taped, they can’t be held accountable in court. Did you know that one person “accidentally” jumps in front of a moving train on a weekly basis? Ask any train conductor. Did you know that there is no way of figuring out exactly where the trains are at any given moment? They have no GPS or trackers and it would cost too much money to update the ancient system, so the MTA just runs as is, while hiking up the fairs of course. It’s true, a train could disappear, and no one would ever know what happened.  

The subway system is over 120 years old with dozens of unused tunnels and passageways, like the Worth Street Station or 91st Street Station. You can see the abandoned stops while riding on the 6 line. There’s entire subway stations, lost railways, tombs and vaults mazed below this city. Haven’t you heard the legends of underground bomb shelters and hidden treasures stored in massive caves below the World Trade Center? Just the basement area of the WTC enclosed twice as much space as the entire Empire State Building. One of the many 9/11 conspiracy theories is that the buildings were demolished to unearth the giant vault containing somewhere between $200M and $10B in gold and silver, give or take. And take they did, Giuliani claimed to only find $230M in gold bars. Of course that was after the NYPD and NYFD pillaged the scene. Excavators and firemen searching for their brothers’ bodies instead found upside-down attics 70 feet below ground zero stuffed with gold, silver, Godiva chocolates, assault weapons, old furniture, bricks of cocaine, fake taxicabs, CIA files and Secret Service assault vehicles, just to give you an idea of the treasures beneath your feet. Imagine what else runs under these concrete streets.

The underground tunnels are the entrances of hell. No one knows what goes on in the subways, not the MTA, not the police, not the mayor, not even Batman himself. This is the home of no-man’s land, where the invisibles live; the rejects, vagrants and vagabonds, more commonly known as bums and this is their world.  

Bum world is filled with goons, goblins, trolls, moles and monsters. They are unaccounted for and outnumber the NYPD. Bums move militant minded, trained by forgotten veterans who are always ready for war. I’ve heard fucked up stories about cannibalism in winter months, rampant homosexuality, suicide, rat eaters, rape, murder, exorcisms, human sacrifices and other fucked up fairy tales. There isn’t a one size fits all classification of bums, they are a species unto themselves with many subsets. 

Let’s start off with the alcoholic, degenerate gambler, homeless prototype. He’s usually running away from the law for some stupid shit he did while intoxicated like beating the eyes out his wife or molesting his stepchild. Alcohol is the only one with empathy, no one understands, it was a mistake. So, he spends his days collecting change for a 40 oz, sometimes when he’s lucky he scores E&J brandy. At night he sleeps in a rolling cart until the 6am morning commuters kick him out of his bed. He lives and breathes for the bottle, usually a loner. One out of ten train delays are caused by an alcoholic’s “accidental” suicide. You’ll never hear about it though; the body is too mangled up to identify so the city tucks it away like an aborted fetus. 

Then there’s the night watchers, like Batman but smelly. They patrol the streets, vigilantes in their own rights. Though Batman is a billionaire and Bum-man is no heir, they fight for justice all the same. Draped in cloaks of armor, layers of metal scales, piles of trash bags and canvas blankets, they appear to be a moving mountain. You wouldn’t catch ‘em in the day though, only out at night, surfacing like a dark moon, pushing a shopping cart full of handouts to their beggar kind; weapons, ammunition, first aid kits, food, clothing, etc. Kinda like the Red Cross, but for tramps. They protect the bum men from society and its discontents. Anonymous like the Dark Knight, and ever present; always watching, waiting, serving, slaying. 

The Niks are the hustlers. They know more about real estate than the Rockefellers. Niks scour the city for dumpsters and moving trucks. They know every company that moves in and out of any office building. Aware of every bankruptcy, foreclosure, eviction, divorce or quitter moved back broke to the Midwest cause they couldn’t keep up. Niks are more connected than the sewer lines. They hear about a death as soon as the morgue picks up the bodies, giving them time to loot the deceased crib before the family does. Every in and out in real estate goes through them. They live in the dumpsters, making your trash their treasures. You can spot em at night, scurrying through Midtown with TVs and computer monitors on their backs, always hustling, trading with other Niks, working with pawn shops or selling off their finds at the weekend street market. They’ll sell anything, half full bottle of Windex, broken spectacles, ancient fax machine, cracked iPhone’s and Macs. When you throw it out, it’s all fair game. You can consider them independent city recyclers actually. 

On to the Vets. What’s left of the Vietnam veterans and the new flood of Iraq War youngins pollute the underground battlefield. They’re on the run for crimes against humanity. The Vets suffer from PTSD, anxiety, stress, trauma, depression, addiction, paranoia, and a whole bunch of unclassified mental mind fucks that our government performed on Jacob’s Sons. Have no fear, they won’t hurt you, they can’t; too busy warring with the demons in their head. You see, as humans we are born free. Free to think, free to choose, free to be whoever we want to be and do whatever we would want to do. Free will, given to humans by God Himself. And what happens to these militants is that their freedom has been compromised. They’re trained automatons that must always answer yes to big Sam. Kill a child, yes sir, leave your family, yes sir, bomb civilians, yes sir, ask questions, never. They then return to society with the weighted guilt of carrying another man’s sins. Who is the guilty party? The general that gives the orders or the soldier that takes them? It doesn’t even matter, what’s done is done. And for what? For a college tuition? College is supposed to be free. Now these vets live in constant fear; fear of humanity and its carnage. They’ve unsuccessfully attempted suicide so many times that they’re convinced they’ve become vampires of their sins, immortally doomed. Rather than have to deal with another, “Are you OK?” from family and friends who wouldn’t know how to cope with the trauma of blowing up innocent children held in the arms of mothers for the sake of political profit, they go all dead presidents or disappear into the tunnels, aimlessly taking comfort in the underworld. They’ve seen hell, lived in it. This is the only place they feel at home, closer to the hell they’ve come to know. They’re finally free, free from the normality we’ve been so accustomed to; joys of Netflix and chill, Sunday brunch and water cooler banter will never know them.  There’s no therapy cut out for this shit. How can you un-train a killer? So, we let ‘em be and turn a blind eye to the havoc we’ve created. 

What do you mean you didn’t create it? You create war every time you don’t vote, every time you miss out on a rally, every time you blindly make a purchase for a Made in China American flag pin on the Fourth of July. You don’t believe in the elections? Vote with your dollar instead and chose not to squander. Show the government where the real power is. There are wars going on all around us, regardless if we’re too preoccupied on our phones to see. There’s a war on cash, a war on journalism, a war on censorship, cyberwar and spywars, our constitution is damned, our rights have been stripped away and traded in for barrels of crude and a 401k, all bought on the backbone of these Vets. If you didn’t create it you sure as hell stood by and let it happen, so did I. 

The junkies are funny as fuck. They’re real life Disney dwarfs; Doc, Dopey, Sleepy, Sneezy, Grumpy, Happy and Bashful. They’re the tired people you see asleep on a piece of cardboard on 5th avenue when they’re not pan handling in Times Square, feeding off the remorse of privileged tourists. They’re the kids that graduated to dope and meth from percs and oxys. Only reason why junkies beg is because they’re too stupid to steal, usually getting caught before the robbery ever takes place. Their MO is only to get high; they’re not looking for problems, usually chilling in a squad of users. More girls are in this scene compared to the latter trolls. This subset is a lot younger too.  One thing about junkies, they are fucking invincible, especially the crackheads. I’ve seen one get hit by a car, fly across the street and bounce back like nothing happened. He didn’t even want to go to the hospital for an insurance claim, settling on $120 cash from a scared shit driver. 

You can usually catch the runaways hanging around the junkies due to the age parity. They’re the misfits, outcasts, dropouts, usually victims of abuse; sexual, emotional, physical, psychological. Juvenile delinquents, who’ve been robbed of their adolescence, robbed of their future, stolen laughter. Urgency of survival forced children out in the streets to become little men and women. Robbed of thought, all they can think to do is survive. So, they hustle; sticking up tourists, pilfering Duane Reades and 7-11’s, petty crime, prostitution, wheeling and dealing. They don’t make it in the tunnels for too long. Naïve and eager to be loved, the innocent youth get scooped up by gangs, pimps or perverts. 

Why don’t they just go back home? Because it’s easier to be hurt by a stranger than to be hurt by the people that are supposed to love you. Imagine barricading your door at night so your drunk dad doesn’t fuck you in the ass when he gets home from the bar. My boy Tommy confessed that story to me when we were high on molly at some Brooklyn rave. He was lucky, got picked up by Nazareth house, got his GED, is now a makeup artist at Barneys and an Instagram sensation. He hasn’t seen his dad or mom, who ignored his cries for help, in over 10 years. We’re his family now; sometimes you pick your own family.  

The bird ladies are chill. They’re super religious, denouncing all material goods and any pleasures of life to become a city pilgrim. They chill by the churches, always praying for more bread and wine, body and blood. They feed the pigeons because they believe the birds communicate directly with God, safely bringing up prayers. Any money donated to these nuns is spent on bird food, sacrificing their sanity for salvation. During the summer they live in Central Park, closer to their bird angels, but as the sun hides, so must they, deep in underground caves with the bats and bums. 

Bag ladies are the witches of the netherworld. The bags they haul are loaded with potions, amulets, charms, spells, human hair, nail clippings, rat tails, pigeon wings, squirrel hands and other hexes. Don’t look ‘em in the eye or they’ll steal your tongue. Spooky shit. The bag witches comb the trains and tunnels for rat specimens, human teeth, dog hair, used condoms, anything they can use to brew hell’s soup. They gather together from all five boroughs every full moon and bathe their nude corpses with the blood and fat from toxic hospital bags before running through the old burial grounds of Washington Square Park. They celebrate insanity, jinxing the subway system and all its passengers to perpetual lateness, broken dates and missed deadlines. Why do you think you’re usually late to work, no matter how early to try to make it? You can thank the bag ladies and their supernatural writings on the grimy tile walls. 

There’s a bunch of unclassified species of tramp; weirdoes, wackos, criminally insane. My favorite bum is this tall, obese, black guy with Don King-esque hair, a white afro spiked straight up. He’s draped in layers of oversized black and grey tattered rags that could resemble Rick Owens. He shuffles his swollen feet up and down the crowded tunnels repeating the same sentences over and over and again, year after year, in a James Earl Jones voice;

‘To preserve the empire, you need gladiators.’  

‘In the cold darkness of night, not an angel in site’ 

‘When two people love each other, they’ll trash the room making sure everything is unbreakable.’

 ‘We’re all lesbians. Heavy duty. Batteries not included.”

One time I caught him talking to a beautiful older woman, maybe in her early 70’s and very well put together. She sported a soft grey cashmere tracksuit underneath a long black wool coat. Her hair was naturally white, puffed into a mini fro. She wore black sneakers, a black purse across her chest, and a string of pearls graced her neck. She was standing with a man, who looked identical to the tramp, except clean and composed. A group of people surrounded them as the woman cried out, “Please Edward, please come home!”. He didn’t even acknowledge her, kept going through the lint in his pockets. The lookalike pulled who I’m guessing to be his mother away and placed a large brown bag at the foot of the tramp. 

Aware of the scene surrounding them and desperate as ever she pleads with the crowd, “This is my son, do you know who he is? He graduated from Harvard business school! He worked at Goldman Saks for over 10 years! He has a family!” she was crying now, not hysterical just as silent as the snow falling down her cheeks. “Can somebody help me please?!” No one did anything, not even pull out their phones to record the tragedy. When she finally left the station, the man erupted in laughter. He laughed so hard everyone was afraid he was going to snap. He dumps the contents of the bag onto the platform; a sweat suit, a flashlight, a cellphone, some cash, a bottle of Tylenol, two underwear, two pair of socks, a toothbrush and toothpaste, three bananas, three oranges and two plastic wrapped homemade chocolate brownies. He took the brownies, leaving the rest to be found by a fellow troll and walked on singing to himself. You can catch him moving around the 5thAvenue E/M stop or at the Rockefeller Center F/B/D station. Dude’s probably transporting nuclear codes to subterranean aliens. 

 I almost forgot about the handicaps. They’re the blind, limp, lame, one legged, no arms, deformed and demented. They’ve lost all social benefits and are forced to collect their own taxes from the healthy. Aint shame a bitch? I hate feeling guilty, it’s the worse feeling in the world. I can do what I do to these rich men and not feel a morsel of remorse, but I see a guy with no legs, and I feel guilty. Like, wtf? I didn’t do that to him. But it works every time, so we pay up a buck to justify our morning splurged seven-dollar Starbucks grande caramel macchiato; half milk, half foam, extra caramel guilty pleasure. On palms and kneecaps, sometimes moving through the train cars on top of a skateboard, because they can’t afford a wheelchair of course, the handicaps drag through the labyrinths, looking for their long-lost limbs. 

They all live in the trenches, right beneath your feet as you stroll up and down NYC’s grimy streets. They are lawless; do not abide by any moral codes. Best advice is to mind your own business and cough up the cash, otherwise suffer the consequences. A death in bum world endows no funeral, no procession, not even an investigation. The rats eat through their flesh till a skeleton is piled up with the other martyrs, like the catacombs in Paris.  So they’re doomed to live in the subterranean, communicating only in grumbles and grunts. The silent sighs of a lost society. 

I thought about all these things as I waited for the R/N train downtown. Staring at the tracks I watch rats fight over some popcorn. Their shrieks pierce my brain, ugh it skeeves me out. I wonder why there aren’t cats in the subways; you’d think that the street cats would eat the rats right? Wrong. These rats are radioactive. Anyway, the rats will probably be lunch for some bum soon, bionetwork of the slums.

A grumbler walks behind me, invisible to the crowded platform, dragging his heavy feet as if in chains, draped in mountainous layers of tattered rags, his bullet proof vest against the cold night, stabs and fights. He’s looking for revenge; I can smell it on him. People don’t see him; they watch me instead. Rich little bitch in her fur coat and shopping bags. Can’t she afford a taxi? Dumb bitch probably maxed out daddy’s credit cards. Hyperaware I see it all and ignore it all the same. Where is this train? 

The subway smells of urine-soaked steel and stress sweat - metal madness. Masses of vomit, trampled leaves, cigarette buds, sewage and car grease from the city seeps through the sewers and compress by the pressures of the mountainous steel towers into a sweet city crude that fuels the vagabonds in the underworld. I see gremlins and goblins huddled under the platform. Melted black city snow drips into mud icicles. The padding of the puddles plays a light song, gradually speeding up as a train finally rolls in. 

My feet are killing me, these damn red bottoms are such bullshit. More like blood bottoms, always causing blisters, bruises and cuts. I catch an empty seat at the end of the subway cart, a two-seater. My fat ass squats into the space, tucking my bags between my legs.  I watch the commuters on their phones Instagram stalking, swiping left, crushing jewels, Tetris stacking and distracting themselves from the banalities of their existence.  Literally 90% of the commuters on this train and I’ll therefore assume every transit in this city, are awkwardly bended over with eyes down, heads down, head down, head down, les Misérables.  

The cell phone is their prison, clocking in and out every day, monitoring every move, hypnotizing and constantly marketing. How have we as a race evolved backwards to choosing our enjoyment and entertainment to rest between the thumbs? It’s absolutely absurd. Opposable thumbs separate man from ape yet we’ve retrieved to ape like tendencies. The two-finger precision grip is very important in the evolution of our species.  The primal forefinger, allows grasp, precision and control of the hand, enabling fine motor skills for surgery. Thumbs are used to plant, cook, type, grab, paint, sculpt, write, play instruments, test chemicals, touch anything with a 360-degree area. The Greeks, says Montaigne, ‘Called it an anticheir, as who should say, another hand.” Thumbs make a soldier, Chambers Edinburgh said. Augustus Caesar is said to have confiscated the estate of a Roman knight who had cut off the thumbs of his two sons to save them from war. I guess its cause you can’t hold a sword or a gun without a thumb. Also, thumbs allow humans to punch; no other animal can do that. They can scratch, claw, bite, but can’t punch. Alas we’ve evolved from thumb suckers to app scrollers and thumb texters, playing phone games, zombies on trains, ghosts at the dinner table, thumbing through pictures, thumbing through life brain dead. Pleasures of the poor, not poor of wealth but poor character, poor self-esteem, rich ego, stroking in masturbatory ecstasy like a society full of jerk offs. No sir I won’t indulge in such self-gratification. I get my kicks elsewhere.  I could go on and on about what I think about cell phones, or what I don’t think about them because the phone in all its app glory and phony photo filters do not affect one iota of thought from me on a daily basis. I’m interrupted by a voice.  

“There’s a curse on this land”   

“Pardon me?”   

Sitting besides me is an elderly, copper skinned, Native American woman. She has two, long, silver grey braids running past her breasts, over a thick cable knit black sweater. A single purple black feather ties the tails of her twisted hair. Her jacket is a heavy, worn in tan hide shearling coat. She wears blue jeans in that thick, original Levi’s material, brown moccasin boots with fringed ankles decorated in red and black beads. Besides her tired, wrinkled, amber eyes, her face is taut and dewy, glowing even. She is makeup free with a natural blush on her cheeks, thick undone eyebrows with grey highlights, prominent cheekbones and an age defying grace. Because of how serene and calm she appears, and well dressed, I deduce she isn’t a crazy person, so I entertained her convo. I have 10 more stops before I reach my place and she looks like she has something important to tell me. 

“My ancestors have cursed this land”

“What tribe are you?” I instigate.

“My ancestors represent the Jicarilla Apache Nation. The white man has pillaged our land and raped our women, killing the innocent for greed. Because of this greed, greed for land, oil, gold, timber and all that our mother earth gives freely, because of this insatiable hunger, this nation and all its peoples are cursed. You will consume and consume and never be satisfied. You will eat and never be full. You will buy” her eyes point to my bags, “and feel spent, empty. You will have sex and never feel love. You will watch TV and never learn anything. Chronic dissatisfaction is the curse on this land, a thirst never quenched. The gods of my people have spoken: in your abundance, you will always want more. You have betrayed humanity, guilty of pilfering our land, evil incarnate. You are the recipient of an imperialist tradition. Your Declaration of Independence is the definition of hypocrisy.” She stares at me intently, her eyes never leaving mine. Is she reading my mind? I look away, afraid she’s read my sins. 

“I’m not white, those aren’t my ancestors” I defend. 

‘You are a slave. In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy.’ She kicks my Bergdorf bags, ‘You are a slave of addiction. This water will not quench you. Go to God for life giving water.’ 

‘I believe in God’ I show her the diamond cross on my chest. 

“Does He believe in you?” she speaks like Yoda. “Leave this land young blood. Save yourself from the perils of Affluenza. Your African blood runs deep, Berber kings and queens. Take back your land.” 

How did she know that? Everyone usually thinks I’m Brazilian or some Latin American hybrid love child. Sometimes I get Sicilian, darker tones mixed with the moors. But no one knows my mom is Berber Moroccan. 

“23rd street station” the loudspeaker announces. And just like that she gets up and walks out of the cart, doesn’t even say goodbye. 

Why the fuck did she tell me this?