Pride and Public Transportation

There's something irresistibly old-world about the train. I can't explain it, but as I climbed aboard the shiny Morristown Line at Penn Station, I felt like a Jane Austen heroine, headed to a mysterious boarding school in the pristine mountains. I have all the time in the world, and no altitude adjustments to make, I thought. I settled my black weekend bag at my feet, rearranged my coat, and put my bouquet of flowers across my legs. If I were in a novel, I thought, that bag would contain all my worldly posessions, and this coat would be too shabby to keep out the cold. In fact, I was shivering a little, but only because my jacket was too trendy for the weather. So what if I'm not poor enough for romance? I decided to enjoy the view. The city gave way to green countryside and suburban parking lots. I had just settled into the pages of my decidedly quirky Zadie Smith novel when I heard a strange man's voice behind me.

"No, man, it's totally going to be you," he said. Who, me? I thought. Can this be?
"Why, cause I'm the most approachable?" It was Stranger #2. Oh, I thought.
"No, you're the most desperate." Stranger #1.
"Mike's the one who looks desperate, in those pants." It was Stranger #3. Desperate for what? I wondered. Naively.
"Who, me? I'll bet you five whole bucks - shit, I'll even buy you a drink - if a hooker comes onto me before one comes on to Dave. I will buy you a drink." The mysterious desperate Mike.
"I mean, you could just pay her."
"Yeah right, five bucks?"
"It's Atlantic City, man."
"Huh. That's cheaper than the lunch special at [some Chinese restaurant.]" Long pause while everyone worked out the financial implications. And then Stranger #1 chortled to himself and muttered,
"Hey, so my uncle told me a really filthy joke about this Atlantic city hooker once."
And that was when I stopped listening.

I turned instead to this tried and true passage from Pride and Prejudice, in which Mr. Darcy expresses his affection to Elizabeth, "I have been a selfish being all my life, in practice, though not in principle. Unfortunately an only son, I was spoilt by my parents, who allowed me to be selfish and overbearing; to care for none beyond my own family circle; to think meanly of all the rest of the world; to wish at least to think meanly of their sense and worth compared with my own. Such I was, from eight to eight and twenty; and such I might still have been but for you, dearest, loveliest Elizabeth! What do I not owe you! You taught me a lesson, hard indeed at first, but most advantageous. By you, I was properly humbled. You showed me how insufficient were all my pretensions to please a woman worthy of being pleased.''

While I turned the page Mike finished telling the joke about the hooker, and the old man next to me finished his copy of Men's Health and started to snore. Well, I thought, I may be riding a dream train into an imaginary sunset, but at least I'm getting out of Manhattan for a while.