On Human’s Innate Capacity (and need) to Presume and Its Role In Specieal Evolution
It is no use to throw a good thing away merely because the market isn’t ripe yet.
- A Connecticut Yankee
[Scene 1]
The the green line heading north arrives, first-person perspective enters and sits down. It’s an older model car. The first-person sits towards the back, entering through the second door. The car peppered with people.
The focus being nearer the first-person. In the back, the first-person sits at seat immediately right of the entrance, entering from the left. Across is a pacific islander facing the first-person. To their left, facing north is a person sitting with a cast and crutches. That side empty for another rider at the very back, sitting down, facing east/right, back to east.
The person in the middle, sitting closest to the pacific islander is light skin. Shiny curly curs, one leg in a cast, wearing what appears to be hospital pants. The person in the very back dark skin.
(The light skin) “Hey, you got a dollar?”
(first-person) “No” (first-person shakes them off)
They continue their talk. They were all apart of it but the pacific islander and light skin carrying on the conversation. Otherwise, you wouldn’t think the person at the end was part of the conversation.
(light skin) “Yeah”
(pacific islander) “Right”
(light skin) “There’s no milk behind my ears”
pacificic islander nods (pacific islander) “yeah”
(light skin) “I mean, I’ve done it. But if I’m going to do it, I’m going to do it alone. I’m clean. If I ever got some, I’d just go do it by myself. Why would a want a group of people there. What would you do?”
(dark skin) “…yeh..” (agreeing)
(pacific islander) “yeah”
(light skin) “What do you do?”
(pacific islander) “What I do? I don’t really care. I’ll do it with people. I don’t do it as often any more.”
First-person checks ear buds to see if they are connected. They’re off but the conversation is so interesting they keep listening
- The Jackson Stop
[Scene 2]
[Light skin and dark skin exit, saying their farewells to the pacific islander. The train continues]
[White guy, water jug appears; a bit unwashed, dirty nails, greasy blond hair. Wearing two layers compared to the pacific islanders three-four, gloves. He starts walking up and down, jittery. Doesn’t know if to hop over the next car or not]
(Wgwj) [turning to the first-person] “Do you have any food?”
(first-person) “No” [waves them off]
(Wgwj) [turning to the pacific islander sitting across] “Any food? I only have water”
(pacific islander) [rummaging through his bag] “I gave my last food to this other guy”
(Wgwj) “Do you need water?”
[pacific islander starts looking for bottle instead.]
(pacific islander) “Is it filtered?”
(pacific islander) “Is it filtered?”
(Wgwj) …
(Wgwj) “No. I boil it. You boil it for 10 minutes.”
(pacific islander) “Oh, boil?”
(Wgwj) “Yeah. You boil it for 10 minutes and everything’s gone”
pacific islander finds bottle and hands it other. It’s a clear, plastic, single-use. Wgwj sits down where light skin was before but can’t be still for long. Wgwj fills out water bottle in moving train without spilling a drop.
(Wgwj) “Yeah, none of that store stuff. You just boil it yourself at home”
[Wgwj sits down where light skin was before but can’t be still for long.]
(pacific islander) “Yeah, that’s good”
[Wgwj casually takes out a vape pen and tries to hit it, interrupting his otherwise conduction of an orchestra with it]
[Wgwj gets up again and moves up and down, jittery.]
(Wgwj) “I hate this city. I can’t keep my head straight. It’s too much noise”
(pacific islander) “There’s this place downtown where you can stay at”
(Wgwj) “I don’t need a place to stay. I need to get out.”
(pacific islander) “Well, I stayed there and it’s a good place. It’s a bit south, near..hmm.. which stop is it?.”
(Wgwj) “Nah, I’m good”
(pacific islander) “Well I’ve stayed in mental hospital too. Wasn’t too bad. Sometimes the meth…”
(Wgwj) [whispering] “You know where to get meth?”
(pacific islander) “Oh yeah, this guy I know sells nickles that look like dime bags.”
(Wgwj) “you have his number?”
(pacific islander) “Oh number? Uh. No. I don’t even have a phone. I can take you to him.”
(Wgwj) “Yeah?”
(pacific islander) “Yeah, he’s off the red line at…um.. hm…what stop is it?”
[pacific islander searches his person, 8–9 pockets, backpack, over and over again.]
(Wgwj) “You got a light?”
[pacific islander] “yeah” [starts searching his person again, calmly but without stopping. Inquisitively asking himself where his light is]
(Wgwj) [sits down, jittery] “yeah…gibberish….my grandfater worked for a major airline. He can travel anywhere for free and he just stays home watching tv. Sitting on his lazboy.”
(pacific islander) “yeah, too tired. He wants to rest.” [slowly looking afar and wondering where his light is. searching his pockets again]
(Wgwj) “I would be traveling the world. Can you believe it? He just sits there doing nothing at home.. I have a lighter.”
(pacific islander) “yeah..oh..yeah” [continues to search]
(Wgwj) “But I need to get out of the city. I need to take care of my kids. I have two kids and I love seeing them happy. They live in Florida.” [tries to ignite the lighter but isn’t working]
(pacific islander) “yeah, kids are wonderful.” [almost defeated in his search. this went one for 10–15 minutes]
(Wgwj) “I love getting them toys. The boy plays with this car I got him. And he loves me.”
(pacific islander) “Oh, that’s great.” [taking off a glove and reaching into his boot. takes out a tube]
(Wgwj) “Yeah, and the girl too. But this city is going to shit. I just want my money.” [tries the lighter again and gets frustrated]
(pacific islander) “hmm”
(Wgwj) “As soon as I get my taxes, I’m out of here.”
(pacific islander) “yeah”
(Wywg) “This ligher” [throws it away after refusing to flick on]
[A train stop, not sure which. A few people enter. Four or five pro-Palestine supporters enter, one with a loudspeaker and the other ones handing out leaflets. Thankfully the loudspeaker person was at the other end of the train. Three of the supporters spread throughout the train. Two getting to where the other end where the interlocutors find themselves. Wgwj can’t make sense of what going on. Start yelling]
(Wgwj) “What’s happening? Make it stop? What the hell is happening?”
[Chants about genocide, wgwj gets handed a pamphlet. A third guy, white, that must have entered with the supporters but was not with them not stands next to pacific islanders, separated by a partition, the third guy (second white guy) standing against the door, facing inside the train also receives a pamphlet]
[Palestinian supporter tries to calmly speak to wgwj and explain what’s going in the Middle East]
(Wgwj) “What? No? What is going on?”
[Palestinian supporter assess the situation and tries gloss over it while not trying to agitate wgwj even more]
[The rest of the supporters are handing everyone else pamphlets and letting them know how certain factions are committing war crimes to non-combatant children]
[Wgwj reading the pamphlet and hearing the people say Palestine, screams “I want to live in Palestine, get me to Palestine” in all seriousness. The train laughs]
[The next stop, the supporters exit and jump train]
[The third guy, second white guy (tg-swg) looks at first-person, mumbles something about terrorist and crumbles the pamphlet, throwing it on the floor. At this time, the first-person realizes tg-swg has his jeans undone and they’re open but they seem to have a second pair of pants underneath.]
[The pacific islander tries to calm down wgwj and they decide to jump train. For some reason, tg-swg gather around with them and they all jump together.]
