Glisten for Mandela

(why public transportation is dangerous)

Train experience today – I was talking with my fellow commuters about the NY Post cover, we had a collective sigh and head shake over Mandela’s funeral and the Post’s front page image focusing on Michelle Obama’s “jealousy” at Obama’s “flirting.”

Right after that, a black dude walks in to do a speech. And he does not ask for money. He says he is speaking to get over his fear of public speaking, he says he’s rich and does not need our money. He says that he is there to tell us that we all have a light, a greatness inside of us and we can all do grand things like end apartheid as Mandela helped to do. He said that we are all working jobs that strip away our souls and we need to seize that part back.

Politics aside, we were a bunch of surprised commuters, the guts on this dude. Conversations evolved as people started talking about their inner painters, singers, playwrights, activists that we’ve ignored for our wage work. One dude said, “you know, I was in this car for a reason.”

Now that’s what I call remembering Mandela, when you can use a persons’ life to remind us that we all got magic in our hands, even if we don’t always use it as it should be used. Cynicism about Mandela is good, but today, I’m ok with me and my fellow commuters having a little glisten.