I never expect that 11ish at night would be a good time for a subway girlfriend, but tonight, taking the long ride from Brooklyn to Queens (through Manhattan) was a veritable revolving door of subway girlfriends. When one got off, another got on (or was already on board, just waiting to be discovered). It seems I’ve found the secret Subway Girlfriend Training Route!

Although it helped that today’s subway girlfriend was pretty, what fascinated me about her was that her eyes seemed to perfectly match her olive green jacket. I wonder if this is a case of “chameleon eyes” … you know, where a person’s eyes seem to change color to match whatever they’re wearing.

It’s eyelash day

So there’s this girl standing next to me reading her phone. I can only see her profile, but what stands out (literally) are her eyelashes. They’re not those fake stick-on lashes, but maybe they’re that new fiberwig thing that’s being advertised on the subway. All I know is that she’s got more petroleum product on her eyes than a pelican in the Gulf of Mexico.

The NYC National Female Uniform

… seems to be black boots, black pantyhose, short black miniskirt, and then something on top. I for one welcome our new black miniskirted overlords.

Today was another day that I just kind of “found” myself in a subway relationship. It was crowded, so I had to smoosh myself in front of this seated girl, and I moved my messenger bag in front of me so as not to be an asshole to the people behind me. My bag has a map of NYC on it, and the girl sitting in front of me was staring at it (partially because it’s so fascinating, of course, but partially because it was suspended about a foot in front of her eyes. I’m not trying to fool myself here). Eventually I noticed she was alternating looking at my bag and glancing up at me. So of course I started alternating looking at her and pretending not to look at her.

This morning’s subway girlfriend made me spontaneously break into a (silent, of course) version of Brickhouse. I think that’s really all that needs to be said on the matter.

It’s a Friday night, there are plenty of choices tonight, but the clear breakaway winner tonight was a Brazilian girl who … get this … was wearing leg warmers! Hello, 80’s!!

I love hair too

This morning a woman with extremely thick, long, dark, well-conditioned hair stood right in front of me with her back turned to me so that her hair was right at eye level. It was so long she’d even folded it in a little loop at the ponytail and it still went halfway down her back. Seriously, this hair could keep an entire Himalayan village warm for the winter.

I love eye makeup

Like, really love eye makeup. Go ahead, cake it on, make it dark, look like a panda, I love it all. I guess this is day 3 of “bad grrl subway grrlfriends”. But seriously, don’t plaster layer upon layer of makeup on your face and have jewelry hanging off of every part of your body; just overdo the eyes and go easy on everything else. Because the eyes are the windows to your soul. Or something.

Furthering the bad grrl theme from last night, today’s subway girlfriend was similarly decked out as a bad grrl, but she was with her boyfriend and was talking and laughing and carrying on in a manner very unlike what you’d expect a true bad grrl’s attitude to be like. And in fact, this is the main reason I wouldn’t want to deal with such a girl in real life. But this one showed her tender, or at least “normal” side, which made her a surprising win!

I will subway date girls who I would have nothing to do with in real life

Not in the “OMG she’s so hot I don’t stand a chance with her” sense. But, for example, today. There was a total bad grrl with spiky beach blonde hair, tattoos, too much eye makeup, ripped jeans, you know the type. Just way beyond my radar in real life, but on the subway, anything goes.

I’ve been in NYC for almost 15 years, but I’m from Boston, and this is one of my rare visits to my hometown. First of all, let me express my disappointment at the fact that the automated, computerized voice announcements on trains, while a positive boon in NYC, completely sterilize Boston’s T. I mean, where is the old Irish guy yelling out “AAAAAHHHHHLINGTON!!!!” on the Red Line? I mean, I don’t even know if “Arlington” is the correct stop!

Second, I forgot how similar all the girls in Boston look. There are all the college students, of course, who might as well be carbon copies of each other, but even the townies have that typical Boston look. Today’s subway girlfriend was exactly such a “typical” Boston girl In fact, the most typical I could find. Aah, Boston.

I should start a “missed connections” section of this blog

The train pulled into the station right as I got there, an extremely unusual occurrence. One of the people rushing to get out was a woman with salt-and-pepper hair who looked into my eyes as she passed. I swear she looked longer than a “just looking around to make sure I don’t bump into you”, but maybe that was my imagination. But anyways, despite her graying hair she looked really good (probably a gym rat) and her eyes were a piercing slate gray. There was also a powerful charisma about her. Definitely a subway missed connection.

You: salt-and-pepper hair, slate gray eyes
Me: completely shocked and taken aback by your stare. Probably slightly open-mouthed.

Sometimes you just settle

This morning I had some postal business to take care of. As you know, that’s pretty much the equivalent of saying that I had an appointment for Satan to assrape me. So after that harrowing experience (they lost a $500 package of mine, if you have to know), I got on the subway to transport me to the joy that is the thing that I do to make money to pay rent. I really wasn’t in the mood for a subway girlfriend, and if I was, the poor thing would have to deal with my understandably not-so-great attitude this morning. I sat down (I guess the advantage was that at 10:30am I actually got a seat) and the woman who was directly in front of me was not attractive, not really unattractive, a little overweight, not really dressed well, but it’s like a 7-year relationship where you just go home, see her there, don’t say a word, both of you know not to fuck with each other, but at least you have some sort of stability of a relationship. My 7-minute/7-year subway girlfriend.

Today’s subway girlfriend grabbed my attention right on the platform. Tall, thin, short haired, and very, very elegant-looking. I’m sure the moviestar sunglasses helped. She was just wearing tight bluejeans and a black peacoat, but she carried herself as if she were wearing an evening gown and the finest diamonds money could buy. (In the interest of full disclosure, she also reminded me of a former flame of mine. Come to think of it, a number of my former flames have had that tall thin short-hair elegant look. Hey! I just found out something about myself! Thanks, subway girlfriend!)