Re Cognition

Red-faced, running through Grand Central, Joe turned up his Ipod to try and drown out the incessant holiday muses blaring out across the Christmas Eve hubbub. He double-timed it down the stairs, through the turnstile and headed for the Times Square shuttle. He looked down the long corridor trying to see the Next Train sign. He didn't see the man with the magazine until it was too late to avoid brushing into him. "Oh, sorry." Joe said, "'cuse me." and he hurried on towards the platforms. A train was just arriving, it would be the next to leave. The doors opened and there was a mad rush of people out of the cars and towards Grand Central where they would grab a Metro North Train for Yonkers or beyond. He waited for the mob to subside then joined a dozen other people picking seats for the short trip over to Times Square. He looked at his cellphone to see what time it was. You couldn't make a call from underground but the thing could always tell you how late you were. Everyone in New York, whether they were in motion or not, was late for some where else. He had told them he'd be there by five. It was ten 'til.

Out on the street, traffic was a mess. Blowing snow had been falling most of the day, the forecast had been for mostly cloudy, but what are you going to do? It was just another in the series of things that had gotten in the way lately. The world seemed out of synch somehow, here he was rushing somewhere to really go nowhere. Shuttling but not moving. One more meeting led to three more meetings led to much excitement over one more meeting. The whole thing, this whole life, seemed circular and enclosed.

"Uh um, hey, excuse me. Hey"

It was the modern condition he told himself, there were factors that... .

"JoeBo?"

His head snapped up at the sound. It was the man with the magazine. The lights made it hard to see his face clearly. No one had called him Joebo for years, not since the Sixties or the part of the Seventies that everyone thought were part of the Sixties. There was a sound in his head like a teakettle's whistle and he shook his head a bit to try and stop it.

"It's me, uh, Paulo." The man grinned at him. "I thought that was you back there. How are things with you?"

How are things with me, thought Joe, I was just wondering that myself. How are things with me? There were things about the man with the magazine that he thought he remembered, there was a sagging in the eyes and the face was rounder and balder but it did seem like someone he knew.

"No one calls me Paulo these days. Just Paul. Hey, Paul. heh, heh."

The whistling grew louder, lower in tone but louder. Joe's lips moved but nothing came out.

"I haven't got much time, uh, well, that's not true, but I know you don't, so I just want to say thanks to you. I never got the chance to give the recognition. You know. So. Thanks."

Joe reached for his Ipod to see if it was on or off. It was off. His brain seemed off as well, he kept sending messages asking who the heck this guy in front of me is and his brain kept sending up scenes of coffee house singers and protest marches and granny-dressed hootnanny girls clapping hands and smoke and posters with fists and serious faced people around tables covered with burlap.

"I still sing that song of yours, you know, the Pond song." He leaned in over Joe's head. "Do you? You know, ever think about it.. 'Throw a penny in the pond', hey?"

There was a cloud of dust inside his head. His brain had found the files. At one of those tables in one of those coffee house backrooms, Paulo was sitting, bent over, convulsed in tears. Additional information not available...... something about the universe and you, making reality as you want it to be, hippie dippie stuff.

"Yeah, that's it." Paulo leaned in closer. "Throw a penny in the pond, and watch the ripples go, the Universe responds, the answer's never no."

When was that? And who was that? Joe watched the movie in his head. There he was on stage, slightly out of focus from the grass, lifting the crowd over his head. They flew around and around and held their arms out and embraced each other and swooped and soared with the bass line. "Toss a poem to the wind, fly to where it may, Providence takes notes, and sweetly moves your way." There was a cascading bridge of thunderous chords followed by a thin, almost silent, tickling of E's and D's to the end. There was Paulo, sometimes called Apollo, and uhStevarino, Billbo from whom came Joe Nation's JoeBo, along with LouieLouie and the girls, Mary, Annie, Kathie and Patrice or more properly MaryLou, AnnieLou, KathieLou and PattieLou. It was crazy and wonderful and wild. The JoeBo Nation, and nothing was going to stop them from changing the world. Not the uptights, not the normals, not the frigging war. No matter what, they joined hands over the burlap, looked right into the centers of their essence and knew this that they had was eternal.

"Say yes to the universal vibe, you said. I've been doing it ever since."

"Good for you." said Joe.

"What?" replied the man with the magazine. Joe's eyes cleared. It wasn't Paulo. The man looked away, shaking his head and moved down the car a little way. Couldn't be Paulo.

"Times Square." the P/A announced, "First, last, and only stop on the train. All out for Times Square, the Center of the Universe, Happy Holidays everybody. Grand Central next" The passengers grinned a little as they exited the cars. Joe walked about twenty steps before turning to look back. The man with the magazine was sitting on an end seat. He shook the magazine's pages and settled back waiting for the doors to close.

Joe looked at him. No. Couldn't be Paulo. He headed back to the train just as the doors shut. As the cars eased away he flipped open his cellphone, it was still ten 'til.