Criminal Links

Is that all you did? said Pliny the Elder. I thought you said you were busy. All you did was listen to music and conversations with limited interest. The conversation of the fat girl on the phone was particularly unedifying.

Didn't you like it? I asked. It was the connecting theme of criminality that I hoped would make it interesting.

Oh? said Pliny. I failed to pick that up. Please elaborate.

Well, I was listening to music that brought thoughts of criminality to mind, due to Frank Sinatra and the famous Rat Pack and all that. But I allowed myself to be seduced into liking it for various reasons, the youth of the players, the talent of the singer and the presence of a faux Buddy Holly who was obviously liking what he heard. Later, on the bus, I believe this earlier seduction had some relevance to my failure to act to validate my ticket.

Fascinating, said Pliny. Do go on.

I truly had forgotten to validate it. But when the driver called another passenger to come back
and validate his, I began to wonder whether I'd done mine. I couldn't remember doing it. But the driver hadn't called me back. It would have been easy to resolve. All I had to do was get out my ticket and have a look. But I chose not to. So, there I was sitting on the bus in a state of moral collapse.

What has this to do with the banality of the conversation you subsequently overheard? asked Pliny.

Everything, I replied. I was outside the general ethos in which I normally exist. So I listened to the conversation on the phone as an outsider, as an amoeba might listen if it had ears. I absorbed it, like the Sinatra standards, non judgementally. This is why the role of the lady sitting next to the sad fat girl was so important. She said what I would have said if I had been sitting next to her and felt myself to be a person capable of saying something nice.

I see, said Pliny, thoughtfully. So role of the lady in the second half of your story equates to the role of Buddy Holly in the first.

No Pliny, I said. If he equates to anyone, it is the straphanging man, who has a different point of view of the proceedings. The lady equates to me, even though we are in the same half of the story.

Well, said Pliny. There is more complexity to your story than first meets the eye.

There is, I agreed, but unfortunately it doesn't seem to have been all that apparent.

Never mind, said Pliny, look on the bright side. You will be able to use that bus ticket on another day.