Riding the subway (or BART as we locals say) in San Francisco is to plunge yourself into a melting pot of like and unlike creatures, encapsulated in a moving vehicle, underground and in the dark. It’s hard to separate the hippies from the homeless on trains heading towards notoriously dangerous West Oakland on their way to notoriously liberal Berkeley. The haves and have-nots are forced to share space and put aside their differences because everybody wants a seat. We don’t speak to one another; in fact I’m oddly surprised to hear someone say “Excuse me” outside my own mouth. Every once in a while one, two or maybe a group of people will on occasion cause a “scene”: make too much noise, get rowdy, throw out insults. We say nothing. As if we “peace keepers” had mutually agreed that by ignoring such behavior we would give it no context in which it could be important and therefore there ceases to be a “scene” when no one is paying attention. These railroad gangstas tend go cold from such a tepid reception of their worst antics.

There are of course lovers that travel on BART. In fact I’ve seen some of the most disgusting displays of affection at BART stations and sitting across the aisle from me. Then again I think I was single when I noticed them.

Among the many curious individuals traveling on my train today was a girl pierced through the nose, right between the eyes. With her hoodie collapsed over a bandana covered head, everything about her from her studded vest to her black, acid wash jeans said hard rock in a way commercialism tirelessly fails to impersonate. With her was a man with a new take on the Mullet: he had shaven almost all of his head with the exception of a back portion of long flowing locks. Similarly attired, his jeans had punctuated holes and his hoodie was deliberately ripped in the front. As they began exchanging kisses over the top of one row into the next I wondered to myself “How in the world had these two extremely odd yet perfectly matched for each other people found each other in this great big universe?” Before I could get caught starring I found myself looking at another young woman who was gazing at the same couple with what I imagine to be the same longing eyes as my own. It’s from watching their spectacle that begged us both to question “How come I can’t find someone that matches me like that?”

I took an inventory of who seemed to me like single women on the train. We just had a look to us (and wouldn’t any man in the universe pay for that information!) We were all paying attention to that couple! There was a very affectionate lesbian couple on the train as well, but somehow the two chubby women had no effect on our visible introspection. We each snatched glances at the odd/perfect pair trying to figure out their secret. What was it that they’d figured out that we’d been missing? Could the relatively “normal” miss their perfect pairing because we had no visible road signs to tell you who we are? Did we have to pierce, tattoo or dye something to give off the right signals? If they could be whomever they wanted, why couldn’t we be completely ourselves to meet our perfect mate? One more stop, must get ready to get off. One last survey around: those lonely girls wouldn’t have been single in any other city. Would I?