4 a.m. Streetcar…

I’m trying to buy a ticket at the dispenser. I hear her before I see her. That voice of despair. “You got a dollar, sir?”

It’s too fucking early for this; so I stop trying to buy the ticket in a dispenser that isn’t taking my change.

I bounce to the back of the empty train and bury my face in a book. I hear her coming.

“Did you call me a bitch?”

“I didn’t say anything to you! I don’t want to listen to you. I don’t want to talk to you.”

“You look familiar. I know your face.”

She’s not as old as she looks. It appears she has one tooth left. She has the look of defeat. I get up and move past her to the front of a streetcar. I soon exit.

I question myself for not having more compassion and acknowledging that this city chews people up…

The next bus is filled with early morning workers. It’s 4:35 a.m. No one looks happy.

Back to my book.

I was thinking, partly listening. I was nodding, but deep in past.

You were talking. I know it’s shocking. You were thinking this can’t last.

The balance is fractured broken. . There’s a movement in the air.

All that talking, and no listening. Spinning stuck in, ‘I don’t care.’

All this yammering about being happy.

I don’t believe it’s what you want.

Your addiction to your suffering.

You’re just a tease. The way you taunt.

Your voice it sounds so clear now.

Such perfection. That attitude!

I have heard of people who…

Complain about free food.

I’ve been patient with understanding…

And all things that I don’t know.

They piled up and not withstanding…

Except those marks from letting go.

We were holding onto dear life.

Confused like children in a war.

Lack the words for clear expression.

Peace and love were not in store.

There is something in the shadows.

Dare take a look? Oh, just a peek!

There’s something Holy in the answers.

When the strong protects the weak.

Dennis Mantin

I’ve been working into evenings.

Sometimes until the dawn.

I would d like to say there was a plan.

It’s not clear to where it’s gone.

I’m retiring in springtime.

No more talks of getting rich.

I’ll be riding into that sunset.

With no complaint that lifes a bitch.

My Grandfather said of his son, my father: “He behaves as if the world owes him a living.“

Neither of those men, like me, is without our flaws. However, it appears to me now that the old man might have been ahead of the curve on this one.

I see many people behaving this way now, which brings me to ask: where are they getting this idea from. It has to be either their parents or the internet? I really don’t know, but this is really a bizarre source of entertainment!

On a 6a.m. morning streetcar, empty of passengers, except one,the train stopped at stopped at Bathurst and Queen and opened the doors. The man waiting for the train didn’t get on. Instead, he stood directly in front door the streetcar and stared at the driver. The driver yelled: “What are you doing?” The man stated matter-of-factly: “You’re late… I’m very angry!”

The driver was later heard mumbling…

“What am I? A fucking taxi?

You can’t really make this up.

When people were dying in wars for our freedoms; I’m certain that this is not what they were envisioning with their dying breaths…

In the past week, I’ve been taking public transit, which, for my money, there’s no better way to get in contact with the common man or woman…

On Saturday on the subway, I encountered the first person I ever saw openly smoking crack on the train. It seemed no big deal to him; a man who looked to be in his mid forties and whom, otherwise I would not have noticed.

Yesterday evening on the streetcar, a blue haired woman of about 30 years of age sparked up her crack pipe.

On the same streetcar outside Saint Michael’s Hospital, the train was delayed for 15 minutes because another middle-aged man decided to stand directly in front of the streetcar, facing the driver and not moving.

It’s an interesting world, taking shape seemingly without consequences.

Hold on!