I hopped on the F in the afternoon to go to Coney Island. I couldn't take any more news. A man on the train was screaming at his lover on the phone, all down the line from Fourth to Stillwell Avenue. It was a wild ride. We all sat silent in the car, careful not to stare. We tried to tune him out, but despite ourselves were drawn in to the details of their sexual and domestic woes. The sea air came as a relief.
I got a drink & fries at Ruby's, & sat behind the usual guys while the music stalled in Rat Pack mode. It got a bit much & I took a walk. The weather was perfect. It was busy enough, but low key. Along the pier a man drew a gleaming sea robin out of the water, & told me it was only good raw. "Sushi," he repeated several times.
I'm always a people watcher & Coney's still the place for Everyman & Woman, but today it was Every Child that mattered most. I looked at the parents, sluicing the sand off the kids in their swimsuits or queuing up to get them sodas. Kids rode on shoulders. Kids took rides. A kid at the water's edge was playing alone, while a mother farther back was busy with an older child. The mother's shirt read Too Tired to Care but exhausted or not you knew her third eye was operating fine. Another mother had a pair of toddlers with her. Over & over they tested their boundaries & ran away from her, slowed by the sand, stumbling & falling, & laughing, picking themselves up again, & turning around to check she was still there. Of course. Of course she was.
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