Ups and Downs Over an Hour

Already a mixed day of emotional ups and downs and "oh, New York!" moments. To start on a sad note, I came down into the subway station to find the front page of the Post revealing the untimely death of a friend's brother. The total sadness I feel for her family is almost too much to imagine. I know they are a very close family and this can be anything short of total devastation for them. My thoughts and prayers go out to them. Caught up in that thought, I mindlessly got on the train, and had to stand for two stops. As the train started to clear out at the express stop at 96th Street, a sole seat opened up next to an older man in a WVU t-shirt. I smiled at him, took the headphones out of my ears and asked him if he was from West Virginia. John's dad was from Beckley (which I have a strong familial connection to). The conversation weaved around WV and its many beautiful attributes and random other topics John disjointedly threw in. John got off the train with the parting words: "did you kow it rains almost every other year on the day of Columbia's graduation?" I shook my head no, smiled and put my headphones back on.