ARE YOU BEING AN ASSHOLE, OR IS IT JUST ME?

So I stayed over at K.’s place the other night. She had to be at work by ten the next morning, and I planned to spend all day at my future CUNY digs, studying for my Phonetics of American English class back in the year 2000. It was a little after nine by the time we got on the subway bound for Manhattan. Little did I suspect, however, that upon entering the alphabetically-designated tin can projected via electrified rail, I had also crossed the threshold into "The Glaring Zone."

(doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo)

It went down like this: K. and I entered the car from the rear door, and proceeded up the middle aisle towards the center, where we saw more room. The car wasn’t crowded. All the seats happened to be taken, but we gravitated towards the middle of the car because no one was standing there. Also, K.’s my girlfriend. Standing next to her in the subway makes conversations between us a whole lot easier.

As we proceeded towards said empty space, I noticed this woman—business suit, haired tied straight-back in a ponytail—staring at me. This moment of recognition occurred very briefly, and at first, I looked away. But a few seconds later, as K. and I walked past her, I took another glance. Lo and behold, the woman was still staring at me. She was holding onto the bar that rises vertically from the subway car floor to the ceiling. I was standing at a completely different angle from where the front of her body was positioned, which made her glaring at me all the more obvious.

To this day, I’m not sure why this person felt I required so much of her attention. Perhaps I had something hanging out of my nose; maybe my hair was on fire, and I didn’t realize it. Or maybe she just found me so darn cute, she couldn’t help staring at me. It could have been any one of those things, but I doubt her motivations were so innocent. If scientific inquiry had been the primary justification of glaring intently at me, the scowl on the woman’s face lent an air of undeniable menace that countered such idealistic expectations. That was no friendly eye-lock projected from her twin head-orbs. And walking past her, beneath the shadow of her icy stare, I couldn’t help feeling the woman was trying to intimidate me.

So I did as my inner third-grader commanded: I stared the woman down. The contest didn’t last very long. I clearly won when she adjusted her stance and said to me, "Do you have a problem?"

"Hmm?" was my reply. I should have answered more clearly, but I was still basking in the glow of my staring contest victory.

"Do you have a problem, because you’re starin’ at me," the woman said.

"No," I said, though I never quite ceased staring at her. Nor did I rescind my wide, Cheshire Cat grin.

"You better not have no problem, ‘cuz this is the wrong day to mess with me." Bold words, but the woman’s eyes retreated from their affront for the first time since I walked into the car. Her sentinel orbs went wandering off in other directions, as their bearer muttered something under her breath. Doubtlessly, whatever brief spasms that came sputtering out of her pharynx bore weighty importance. Trust that I kick myself regularly for not hearing what the woman had to say. But alas, as she turned her head away from me, thus giving me full view of her brown-skinned earlobe, I couldn’t help noticing the pearl earring which hung from the drooping wad of skin. Very understated, very pleasant to look at. I wondered if I should get my mother something similar as a present.

"Nice earring," I said aloud. Then I turned away once and for all.

The woman mumbled something else, then sucked her teeth, and groused incoherently. Or maybe she expressed her thoughts coherently, and I just didn’t bother listening. A few stops later, I bid K. good-bye and got off the train.

Had I been, like Prince’s father, too bold? My mother, had she been there, would have looked down upon my actions. Let people stare at you, is what she would say. You never know. They might be crazy. If you confront them, they might shoot you.

Also, I realize that any actions I perform are an expression of my personal politics. In hindsight, I wonder: Did I stare down the woman who was staring me down because I dislike black people, or dislike women? After giving the subject lengthly thought, I can honestly say no. I did not, and do not, have problems with either blacks or women. If anyone had an issue with anything, it was the Tyler Perry drama character-wannabe who glared at me menacingly over the victimless crime of walking onto the same subway car as her. And frankly, her immediately hostile response to my going eyeball-to-eyeball with her—after she had been the first to fire invisible eyebeams at a non-hostile target—only proves she was the one with the attitude problem.

As far as my personal politics go, I believe every man, woman, and child has the right to get on a subway car in a majority-Negro neighborhood, without getting glared at by a mad black woman. Unless you’re boarding the specifically-designated "Mad Black Women Who Glare at You Only" train. But I’m pretty sure that, on that particular morning, there were other people on the car who weren’t mad black women glaring at me. Or maybe I’m wrong and everybody was a mad black woman glaring at me. Maybe I should count my lucky stars that I didn’t get shot.