"​Harlem Station, and the Kindness That Finds Us"

The kindness of strangers—found between trains, beneath rain, and beside a voice that felt like home.

Even when you’re tucked into your own world—playing Monopoly Go on your phone, minding your business—someone might come along and ask you a question. And because she’s elderly, in her golden age, you pause the game and give her your attention. That’s how I met Miss Martisha.

What struck me first was her voice. It reminded me of Miss Ruby, a woman I once knew in Florence, South Carolina. Not a relative, but someone who felt like one. For a moment, I thought I was speaking to Miss Ruby herself. Same chocolate complexion. Same cadence. But no—this was Miss Martisha with a Jamaican accent.

We met at Harlem’s 125th Street station. She seemed unsure whether she was in the right place, or maybe she just wanted to chat. Either way, I put down my phone and listened. She was waiting for the New Haven line—what she called the Connecticut train—but had just missed one and wasn’t sure when the next would arrive. She sat beside me and asked, kindly, if I could look up the schedule for her. Though she had a phone, she preferred my help. Her train was due after mine, the one back to Peekskill.
 
There is something about brief encounters with unfamiliar people that draws me in, while the prospect of regular socializing holds little appeal.

I was, indeed, savoring those precious minutes spent with someone I had never met before.

​In my experience, strangers often prove to be more entertaining than the people you already know. Each brings their own unique stories and personal history—baggage that is wholly theirs. What you share during these brief encounters is always fleeting, yet undeniably real.

There’s a certain freedom in knowing that there is no obligation to meet again. The interaction exists solely in that moment, unburdened by expectations. Unless, of course, you happen to cross paths by chance once more. That possibility, I find, is something I can comfortably embrace.
 
She joked that her train should come first—because she was a woman—and laughed at the impossibility of changing timetables. I laughed too.

Before I boarded my train, Miss Martisha said she hoped we’d meet again. I agreed...As Blanche DuBois once said in A Streetcar Named Desire: “I have always depended on the kindness of strangers.”

And sometimes, it’s the kindness from strangers that stays with us longest.