Appreciation, Part II

Dear Upper East Side Girl with the Hacking Cough and Obese Nurse's Aide who Couldn't Stop Sucking Her Teeth:

I'd like to thank you both for participating in the Who Can Ruin a Subway Ride the Best contest, and to announce that, after careful consideration, I've had to declare a two-way win.

Hacking Cough, I have to hand it to you -- and could do so quite literally, since your hands are perfectly clean, seeing as you refused to use them to cover your privileged horse-like maw when you hacked and coughed every three minutes like clockwork all the way from Mosholu Parkway to 86th Street -- the cards were not stacked in your favor, seeing as I was half asleep upon coming off of an eleven hour workday at the end of a Very Long Week. Persistence paid off, though, and by the fifth unnervingly loud cough you had my full attention. I hope you didn't take my sudden sidewards glares as indicative of some sort of congenital tic on my part, or of some sort of surreptitious enamored gawking. What I was trying to convey, silently, was Please stop that, you're rupturing my gall bladder. I especially liked how, given the late hour and the location of the subway station, you clearly work in a medical setting and, given your alarmingly tasteless but clearly overpriced gold purse, you clearly have some money to burn, yet you still managed to convey absolutely zero sense of public decorum and/or health awareness by coughing directly and forcefully into the middle of the subway car. I certainly ate crow when I assumed that the poor man entering the subway car and sitting directly next to you might prod you to cough more gently and perhaps into the safety of your coatsleeve - - I'm sure he'll be regretting his seat choice when he wakes up tomorrow morning with a case of tuberculosis, ebola and whatever else it was that was so clearly causing your uncontrollable cough. Or was it just a cold? And are you just an inconsiderate ass wad?

And Tooth Sucker.....dear, large, sleepy Tooth Sucker. I have to apologize to you as well, as I fear my stares in your direction were only half as guarded as the ones I shot towards the Cougher. It's just that you were sitting directly across from me and, well, I was honestly alarmed that anyone could possibly have both the stamina and the incredible public disregard to suck their teeth for a solid twenty minutes. You probably noticed that my first five minutes of staring were focused mainly around your mouth, as I tried to discern what you could possibly be eating that would cause such an oral fuss! Was it bubble gum? Peanut butter? Taffy? I mean, seriously, my last guess would have been your teeth! Guess I lost that one! The next fifteen minutes -- the ones that weren't already reserved for the Hacker, that is -- were really just me trying to gently communicate to you via telepathy several variations of the same basic message: Please stop sucking your godforsaken motherfucking hell-rotting teeth before I throw both of us through the emergency window directly behind your enormous and sleepy tooth-sucking head.

Anyways, it was a toss-up, so you both win. I'm still trying to decide on an appropriate prize but, for what it's worth, the lingering headache and foul temper you sent me off with look like they're going to last me well into tomorrow morning. TGIF!

Hope your teeth and vocal cords fall out,

G.