The man was talking to me but he was drifting in and our of focus. I tried to concentrate on what he was saying but the room was swirling like I’d had one too many puffs on a cigar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I need to get to work” I manage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“You’ve been shot.” the man replied, holding me down so I couldn’t get up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“But I need to get to work<\/em>“. It’s no use. He’s bigger than me and I feel so tired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Today started out well and good. I mean, the same as pretty much every day. I woke up before my alarm and enjoyed the sweet semi-slumber while listening to a couple of potheads and a Jew who make up the morningshow team on my radio. They were laughing at some girl who had had a child recently and had surprised her white parents and white in-laws when the child came out very, very Asian. The girl seemed nice enough. Her husband turned out to be gay and had even went so far as to find a gay boyfriend so the child wouldn’t be confused when the boy came over for extended visits. In my pre-dawn slumber this strangely made sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unable to see the radio-clock I had looked at my watch and a shot of adrenaline bolted me out of bed. I was late! Oh wait, no I was just reading my watch at an angle. I still had time. The adrenaline had done its work though. No further sleep was available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I showered. I ate. I dressed. I left. So I had done for every morning that required my personal attendance at my job, which was pretty much every weekday and ocassionally on weekends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The subway was crowded. A young couple standing near me were nuzzling. The subway car pulled up beside us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “This reminds me of Schlinder’s List<\/em>,” said the male, “you know, when they’re on the train being taken to die”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “That’s rather depressing” I say to him, unasked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Yeah, it is” said his female companion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I prefer to think of it as transporting cattle<\/em>” I reply, knowing he’d rather not compete in verbal jests with a stranger. His cute companion (for I looked more closely now) thought it was funny and I took a passing satisfaction in noting that. We crowded into the train like cows heading to slaughter, or perhaps like Jews to Auschitwz. I wasn’t sure. That had happened long before I ever saw the light of day. Sure was a depressing thought though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I felt more than heard a commotion somewhere in the train. When in close quarters with packed cattle it is best not to make any sudden noises or movements that might start a stampede. So it is like people. Panicking humans can be just as destructive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Down the car I could hear some one speaking angry. That itself was enough to upset people. No one speaks on the morning train. It’s eerie. Even when people who know each other will talk quietly in hushed voices. So I knew trouble was brewing when someone ignored this morning protocol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Don’t touch me<\/em>” an old woman said crossly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Her ‘opponent’ was a slightly younger middle aged woman who was offering her seat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I was just wondering if you’d like to sit here” responded the younger woman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I can stand perfectly well” the old woman said haughtily. “And no nigger <\/em>is going to tell me where to sit.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I’m not a nigger” said the middle aged woman (who obviously frequented a tanning salon). “You’re more nigger than I am.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n And so it ended. The two women ended a battle as quickly as they had started it. “This is why you shouldn’t be nice to nobody” I say to the female who had still not resumed her nuzzling, who nodded. The middle aged woman sat back down and the older woman turned to face toward the front of the subway car. Everyone else in the car visibly relaxed. Racism may be politically incorrect in the big city, but then again so is criticising old pissed off women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I stared into space tuning out everyone around me. I let the tension from the racist exchange wash over me. Find your centre<\/em> I thought to myself, Fear is the mind killer. I will face my fear. I will let it pass through me. Only I will remain. <\/em>True, I wasn’t exactly afraid but the thoughts helped my muscles relax. I thought of how’d I tell my friends this story and chuckled out loud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We stopped at Bloor subway station. My eyes were closed but the subway attendant had informed me of where we were in a pleasant East Indian accent. Being close to the door, the river of humanity swept me off to the side and streamed toward the connecting subway line a floor below. I was satisified to see the two old ladies safely exit the train hopefully never to be seen again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gunshots. Oh sure other people knew what they were but I didn’t. It’s not like I’ve heard any in the last 10 years. They’re not exactly a common ocurrence. That’s all I’m saying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So there was screaming and I immediately figured out something was wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Ravi, my physics teacher in grade 12 came from Austria and had fought the Nazis during the war. He never spoke about it but it came up during my “How Sound is Recorded on Magnetic Tape” presentation. My opening statement for the presentation began:<\/p>\n\n\n\n “One of mankind’s greatest achievements is the recording of the speeches of great men and heros. Even today, long after they’re dead we can hear the speeches of Kennedy, Martin Luther King or Hitler. The recording onto magnetic tape is accomplished by adding a zinc oxide…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Wait what was that?” he had asked now suddenly alert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Zinc oxide”, I had said not quite sure what he wanted me to repeat. “You see there’s a white powder that is sprinkled liberally on a film…” I droned on about the physics of recording and he did not interrupt me again. Until the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “What was your opening speech again – what you said at the beginning. I missed it” he had asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I repeated it with flourish, for it had been the reason for doing a project on the topic of recordings. “Mankind’s greatest achievement has been the recording of voices and the speeches of great men. In ancient times, mankind could only orally repeat what was said or wrote it down, often losing the exact message or all the nuance’s of intonation.” I had raised my one arm as if flexing my bicep. “But now we can hear those speeches in their own voice. Exactly what they had said, every nuance, every syllable, every word<\/em>.” I banged the raised fist on the counter top from which I spoke. I looked down at the class who looked exeptionally bored and uninterested so I raised my voice in pitch. “Great men like J.F. Kennedy. Martin Luther King or Hitler in his speech during the 1936 Olympic Games that can STILL be heard today… ” I look around and feel somewhat awkward. “..Not that Hitler is any kind of hero of course” I mumble as I finish my opening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Mr. Ravi’s face was flushed and he was visibly shaking. His hands were in his eyes behind his glasses and for moment I wondered if he was angry about some aspect of my presentation. The class turned around to face him because he was having trouble speaking. No one else was laughing but Mr. Ravi couldn’t contain it anymore. He just let it all rush out and laughed heartily, waving me off the stage. Only later would I find out he had fought the Nazis. Well you can’t know everything<\/em> right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n He did however leave me with this bit of knowledge. When fighting in the war young men would cringe at the sound of gunfire. Older war vets who had had a few tours of duty would tell them to relax. Bullets travel faster than sound, so if the you hear the bullets that means you didn’t get hit (else you’d be dead). Instead, only worry when you DON’T hear bullets. Often this would not help the rookies relax.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All of this ran through my mind as yet another gunshot rang out, echoing through the underground cement subway station. People were covering their ears. Other people were screaming. And a few were running for the exits. I leave the ‘safety’ of the subway car wondering why the TTC drivers don’t close the doors and get the eff out to the next station. I never ever get to see shit like this go down and part of me wants to see the man (or woman) who is shooting up the joint. Other people always come back with great stories of seeing car chases or banks robbed but I’ll always be on the wrong side of the crowd or busy doing something so I never see the action. Sure it’s probably some sort of evolutionary survival instinct but damnit, I want to have a better story than a couple of racist black-like women who hate each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Where the fuck are you going?” a voice behind me cries. It’s that nuzzler girl who I had spoken to earlier. Her male-friend is on the floor but she is unsafely standing in the doorway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Get down, it’s not safe for you” I call back, making a hand gesture to indicate that she should get down. I wander further into the subway car keeping in mind where the solid columns are in case I need to dive somewhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gunman (gunwoman?) can be located by noting where everyone else is running from. I push my way forward secretly wishing I had some sort of digital camera for a half decent photo for my website. More gunshots, but some screaming. I follow the sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Then there he is. I mean I just walk past a pillar and boom, there he stands. He’s facing away from me so I take the time to look him over. He’s dirty. Unwashed. The way you can instantly tell if someone is a street person – one who has no home. Sleeping on the ground, no showers for weeks, hell maybe even the smoggy Toronto air – whatever it is, it makes the homeless folks instantly recognizable. Okay <\/em>I think to myself, he’s some sort of pissed off homeless guy. Noted. This’ll make a great story.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n The screaming is actually a man in a charcoal grey pin-striped suit with pink shirt and tie. This I also made a mental note for future story telling. And the homeless guy is screaming at the bloody, screaming Bay Streeter. “Stop screaming. STOP SCREAMING or I’ll give you something to REALLY SCREAM ABOUT.” I also noted that this did nothing to lower the volume of anybody. The gun was some kind of revolver. It probably wasn’t even registered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Around me there weren’t many people left. There were a couple of people lying in pools of blood to my right. They were quiet though. I hoped they were okay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The homeless guy moved to stand over the Bay Street guy. “Shut the fuck up. I SAID…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the homeless guy raised the pistol something comes over me and for one insane moment I think I’m going to rush the gunman. Adrenaline kicks in. That guy might be important<\/em> I think to myself, he could be like some kind of head of investment trading or something<\/em>. I rush the gunman. The tackle goes perfectly and we colide to fall on the floor. I smell the rancid smell of rotten meat and try to push it out of my mind. We struggle together, both desperately trying to keep the other from getting the revolver. We wrestle. With my free hand I punch him in the face before he grabs my hand with his. The two of us are now locked with neither holding an advantage over the other. But neither can we make a dignified retreat. We roll around the cold tile floor, each desperately aware that this could be the end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gunman manages to get to his knees with his weapon and still holding his wrist he falls forward. His weight pushes me down and I am unable to push him off me. Something just doesn’t seem right<\/p>\n\n\n\n My eyes focus on the cool flourescent lights above me. I hadn’t ever really noticed the lights in the subway station. They were always just sort of there. Now they seemed to be the most interesting thing in the entire world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The man was dragged off me and it sort of becomes apparent that he was shot by some police officer or somebody. The bullet had penetrated the gunman and, with a slightly slower velocity, proceeded to penetrate me. As this fact slowly dawned on me, I wondered if I could make a joke along the lines of “killing two birds with one stone” but for some reason no combination of words sounded funny enough for me to tell any police officer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I need to get to work” I mumble.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “You’re going to be O-KAY” the man over-pronunciates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “I’m two stoned with one bird” I blurt out. Oh no, that’s not it either<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “You’re pretty stupid, you know that” the man says to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n What an asshole<\/em> I think to myself. But boy, this is going to be a great story.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The man was talking to me but he was drifting in and our of focus. I tried to concentrate on what he was saying but..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reading-corner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84\/revisions\/109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/massiverainfall.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}