Surrounded

Bibles and Dan Brown books. There's a textbook, and, oh look, that one's got a book about black men not letting white men "have all the fun." The white guy behind him doesn't appear to be having much fun, but that's probably because his infant son keeps trying to crawl over the back of his seat and get at the laptop of the woman sitting behind them. (She too, incidentally, looks to be stewing in a foul mood.)

All this can mean only one thing: you're on the train and it's the evening rush home. Depending on your gambler's luck, you may or may not have landed a place in the party-wagon, where that boisterous pack of friends seizes the corner seats and proceeds to heehaw for 60 minutes about the various episodes in their day. On Friday, wine or beer often flows, and -- if the week hasn't transformed you into red-eyed grump -- you're welcome to invite yourself into their group, where you'll become temporary best friends on the subjects of football and the weather.

And there will be villains, as well.

Some curmudgeons will selfishly sit on the outside of two seats, or they'll place their bags on the outside. Either way, you're forced to engage them in order to sit down beside them. This treachery among fellow passengers is vile but widespread. The most you can do is single these people out and plant yourself at their side, whenever possible.

The Christians read their ditties, sometimes in raw Ole Englishe and sometimes broken up into more digestible snippets, like nuggets of steak for a puppy that would otherwise choke itself. There are Orthodox Jews, too, wearing their Amish clothes, dragging their 900 kids everywhere. This can make for an altogether different party wagon.

Before you sit, you survey the isles, hoping not to select or invite as a neighbor anyone too large, too perfumed, or too awake. You wander the train, maybe angry or perhaps relieved, to find yourself flanked on all sides by the sleepy, screaming people of the Earth.