There's a man, he's riding the C-train, headed downtown toward Brooklyn, after a long day playing with numbers on the upper west side. He's reading a book, about consciousness and metaphysics, and all that crap that seems to be oddly trendy right now in New York City, and other cities where it's never quiet outside, and even harder to keep quiet inside. He looks like he's reading this book, but he's really thinking about how much he hates his job, and misses his family, and feels guilty for never being present. Even when he takes them on vacations to places where the skies are blue and the air is moist, and you can breathe real deep, he's still doing work, or thinking about work, and numbers and money, or on his computer, or phone, answering emails about numbers. He's there on the beach, his family is playing at the shore line, they are laughing, they are calling his name and he doesn't hear them. He's never present. He's always playing with those numbers in his head, instead of playing with his children. And even when he is playing with his children he's still playing with numbers in his head. He doesn't hear them calling. His eyes are scanning those words on the page, he looks like he's reading, but he's really just seeing family portraits, and he's not in them, and no one is smiling, and his wife is sleeping with another man, and he convinces himself it is okay, because he feels guilty, but he misses her, he misses them, he misses who he use to be, but now he's just another number riding downtown.
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