Slow journey to a lost heart

Today, I had several appointments and chores that required me to travel all over the city. For the most part, I got from one place to the next by taking the subway, which was just fine with me because I love riding trains.

The main reason for this, I think, is because trains give me the sensation of always being in movement. I also get the same sensation in automobiles and trams, but not on airplanes. In aircraft, the sensation of movement seems to disappear once the plane reaches cruising altitude. That's when I get bored and antsy. The thought of being in a closed cabin with 300 other people where we all have no place to hide is not good for anyone's state of mind.

But the subway is different. It continuously speeds up, slows down, stops, starts again, and making different sounds the entire time. My favorite part is going around curves. The wheels cling to the tracks with all their might as the train's speed naturally tries to propel it in a straight line. The overall effect is one of great stress and suspense as the roaring sound produced by the friction and traction between track and wheel fills the train's cabin.

Sure, all of this carries the potential of danger, and an awful danger to be honest. Yet, the probability of something happening is very low, much lower than most other things in life. So I just enjoy the roar and the sensation of being whirled around a giant curb, just like on a good roller-coaster.

Sometimes, I even drift off to sleep. The continuous drone and occasional roars of the train affect me like a rushing river or a waterfall, or the sound of the ocean. The overall experience is one of relaxation and comfort. It delivers a sense of well-being and peace, and all of this taken together can induce sleep out of me even in the most stressful of times

The slang German word for this type of sleeping is "pennen." It's a word that you won't find in every dictionary. It is by no means a vulgar word, but it is slightly unsavory. It connotes the sense of sleeping somewhere and at some time when you should not be. The closest English equivalents I can think of are "catnap" or "snooze."

But the Germans have taken this concept one step further: The have come up with a related noun that describes bums who are drowsing away on park benches or, if they can get away with it, on trains. The word is "Penner." If someone calls you a "Penner," you know that you have been royally insulted.

Nine years ago, when I still lived in Hamburg, I caught the subway out to the edge of town so that my 10-year-old terrier, Agnes, could run free in the open fields and surrounding woods. She loved that more than anything else in the world. It allowed her to live out her natural terrier instincts to the fullest: dig wherever and as deep as she wanted, and chase anything that moved – mice, rats, moles, lizards, insects, snakes, birds, rabbits, squirrels and, her lifetime favorite, ground squirrels.

Such trips generally lasted four to five hours. Agnes never wanted to return home until she had used up every drop of energy left in her body. I usually let her stay as long as she could still stand up since the experience seemed to make her more content than any other activity in life.

When she was finally exhausted, I carried her back to the subway and boarded the train. As we rode, she stared out the window, fascinated as always by everything that we passed along the way.

A couple of stops later, a few passengers got off and a few new ones got on.
One of the new ones took the seat directly facing Agnes and me. Only about six inches of knee space separated him from us.

It was only after he had settled into his seat that I realized, to my horror, that he was a "Penner." He was dirty from head to toe, and he stunk to high heaven.

Usually, such characters triggered an instant response of revulsion in Agnes. She would growl at them, show her teeth and raise the hair on the back of her neck. I normally had to rein her in to keep her from lunging at them.

But this time was different. For some reason, she responded to him with nothing more than great curiosity and calmness as their eyes met.

Suddenly, my customarily Miss Minister of Defense Agnes flipped over on her back in my lap so that her hind feet were only a few inches away from the Penner's hands.

To my dismay, the Penner extended his right hand and gently grasped Agnes's left hind foot. I thought that, surely, this would be more friendliness than Agnes would put up with. Instead, her whole, very muscular body relaxed to its full extent in my lap.

Then, both she and the Penner closed their eyes, and both were soon snoozing away.

The proper part of me whispered in my head that I should gently extract Agnes's hind foot from the Penner's hand and go find another seat.

But I was somehow so transfixed and confused by the situation that I couldn't muster the clarity to take such a step. Besides, Agnes was more content and relaxed than I had ever seen her. I simply did not want to be the one to rob her of such an experience.

So the train continued. It stopped and started at one station at the other, and took us around all the magical curves along the way.

Agnes and the Penner did not budge or wake up the entire time. They remained attached foot-in-hand, unbothered by any of the train's stops, bumps, or swaying.

I did not quite know what to make of it all.

When we finally reached my home station, I gently detached Agnes's foot from the Penner's hand and tried to slip out of my seat without waking either of them.

But both of them did wake up. They both stared at each other longingly, and as I headed for the door with Agnes in my arms, she kept stretching her neck back around to catch a final glimpse of him. The Penner smiled knowingly at her and she strained to go back to him, though I was not about to allow that.

As I stepped out of the train, a great sense of sadness and shock swept through me. On the one hand, I was bothered by a sense of guilt, as if I had just separated two souls that were meant by heaven to spend the rest of their lives together. On the other hand, I felt that the dog I had loyally dedicated my life to had just turned her back on me for another, more desirable suitor.

I had always suspected that Agnes was not 100% loyal and content with me. Yet, I had just assumed that I would never be supplanted by anyone else in her heart.

But she had just demonstrated that I, indeed, had been deceiving myself for the past ten years. Yes, I was a bit angry, but that was more than offset by a greater sense of disappointment, not in Agnes, but in myself!

I now knew that, in its purest form, dog truth can be a very brutal thing.