This entry should be skipped by the easily upset. I was off to work this morning, my mind lost in a fog of morning thoughts. I usually take the express train half-way in the morning because of the obvious convenience (the train doesn't run the whole distance to work though). Our train is speeding along somewhere between one stop and the next, the outside world a distant blur. My eyes scan a webpage listing something incidental about life on planet earth, my mind is distracted. Suddenly there is a thud, and the emergency breaks slam on. The video displays light up in vivid orange, alerting passengers that the emergency breaks have been applied. The train shutters to a stop at a non-regular station. There is a heavy pause, and then the young train driver gets on the intercom. His voice is shaking slightly, he sounds unsteady. "Due to a human body incident, the train is currently stopped. Your understanding is greatly appreciated." The euphemism is not lost on any of us, someone just jumped in front of the train. In less than a minute, the first responders from the station rush towards our train car. They are looking down below us. People start to stare in our direction. One train worker starts to put up "do not enter" tape to hold off the gawkers. An old lady next to me says to the air, "The body is under us." My eyes meet a young woman across the way as the old woman says that. The young woman begins to cry, upset and grossed out. Another old man sitting on the other side of me mutters, "No way he could have survived that. We are in an express train." The emergency workers have now crowded onto the platform, from various support services. Several of them hold a large blue tarp around our train platform to shield the extraction from the other people on the opposite platform. I am surprised by the speed of their arrival, but realize we have been in the train for quite awhile. The old woman gasps, "Here comes the body!" and I look away. I think about the axiom "what has been seen can not be unseen" and decide to not look. Most of the other people in the train can't rip their eyes away. We are still in the train. Workers with sponges and buckets arrive. About this time I notice the jumper's shoe on the platform, encircled by chalk. The emergency workers had circled it to better capture it in their digital documentation of the incident. The shoe, which had apparently flown off in the impact, stood alone with it's sole next to it. Alone on the platform, the last verification of the man's jump.
