dietsch

Sniffin'

I saw a guy yesterday on the uptown 6 train, stretched out on a bench, passed out. In his mouth was the nozzle for an aerosol bottle of cleaning spray from Staples. He slept on one half of a bench. A family came on and tried to occupy the other half. The kids sat at the end farthest from him. Dad stood, but taunted Mom and tried to cajole her into sitting next to passed-out man. A look of revulsion crossed Mom's face, but she sat down, all scrunched up, and as far from him as she could get. Then at the next stop, some hipster kids boarded the train. One of them got pissed off that the guy was taking up so much space. Have you ever seen self-righteous hipster fury? It's funny. It's so passive-aggressive. Hipsters say it's okay to be non-hipster, just so long as you're non-hipster somewhere over there, where you won't smudge us with your uncoolness. He started nudging the guy. His friends told him not to bother. I turned away with a smirk, not wanting to see aerosol man pull out a knife and slice off a hipster ear for his collection. But as I left the train at Union Square, I saw that aerosol man was sitting up and making room, so I guess all ended well.