Mickey Z

Cool Observer

Monday, October 01, 2007

Running up a flight of steps at breakneck speed

Every single day, as I climb the stairs to the elevated subway train, I see groups of crazed commuters frantically running past me. These are people who have essentially just woken up (and the odds are stacked against the possibility of them having done a full body stretch as I did) and, of course, they’re wearing clothes clearly not designed for walking—never mind the slightest athletic exertion. Yet, there they are—day after day—sprinting like sick gazelles in their high heels and their tailored suits just to catch a subway train...in order to be “on time” for work.

Never once do they stop to think that they can seriously injure themselves by running in designer shoes without doing any type of warm-up exercises
Never once do they consider being a little more organized so they can leave their houses a tad earlier and make that train they are currently running for
Never once do they question the societal formula that requires the utter neglect of human evolution
Never once...oh, never mind

This morning, I observe a man in his mid-fifties as he hauls ass to make the N train that is just now pulling into the station. He’s clearly out of shape and is obviously not used to even walking briskly. In other words, running up a flight of steps at breakneck speed is something best left for others. Yep, this is a guy who sits at his desk all day and then sits in front of his TV all night yet he magically expects his fifty-something body to respond like friggin’ Jim Thorpe when “his” train is coming. Then, if he gets hurt, he’ll have to deal with our country’s joke of a health care system, which is really a disease care system. It is an ongoing criminal enterprise—sort of a curative Cosa Nostra—that has helped reduced the life expectancy of a man in Harlem to lower than that of a man in Bangladesh.

But don’t get me started…