The Man on the Train

Inspired by Shift Your Spirits I am going to try and put some of my more interesting experiences into a series of posts...

I was in New York City in the Spring 1989. I do not know who I was with or why I ended up there but I was on a subway train.

At the moment our train stopped in a station that I do not remember the name of the train doors opened and across the platform, in another train with their train doors open was a man. He was young. Approximately my age or a few years older; early twenties. He wore a trench coat and sat on a bench mirroring my position on my own bench.

We locked gazes and I had a stunning jolt of recognition.

The trains doors shut and my life resumed. I spent the entire next week searching for him in crowds. I looked into the faces of every person I passed on the street. That search is almost the only thing I remember about that trip to New York. Searching and searching for that man that I just knew that I knew.

That memory of the phantom man on the train has persisted... One of the odd things about myself that most people don't know about me. I often wondered if he was indeed a real person, a ghost... an angel? Was I supposed to see him? Or was it an accident? I don't believe in accidents... 

I know that at the time I thought perhaps it was John who I had met the summer before for only 15 minutes but had been exchanging letters with and felt a deep spiritual connection to. 13 years later John and I would get married...

(the photograph is London's Barking Cross station from a Wapedia article about cross platform interchange)