commerce

The 8:07 pulls out of Croydon on time, plenty of seats available in the lead carriage. A woman in her fifties sits opposite at Ringwood East, cigarette pack poking out of her handbag, long dark hair with a silly fringe falling over her forehead.

She works her phone’s keyboard, fingers trembling, not nerves but infirmity. Reminds me of Carol, lupus sufferer, former lover. We were a good fit; twenty-two years of on-off fun and heady fucking, marriage not in our natures. I remember good moments, forget the bad, feel a wave of gratitude to her. Half a dozen former lovers measure my life, memories of all cherished. Human commerce.

As we approach the underground loop the driver announces we’ll go direct to Flinders Street: a sick passenger and a train are stranded at Parliament. Our packed but silent train remains wordless, as it has all the way from the outer east, no rustle of surprise, protest, or disappointment. It’s the sound of hundreds of people psyching up for the day ahead.

Everyone exits at Flinders Street, engages plan B, moves off on new trajectories. I hop a 19 tram up Elizabeth to Bourke. Two young Indian men sit next to me. They speak Hindi, rapid-fire syllables. Some deal is going down. One shows the other the reverse side of his gold credit card, points at the metallic strip. They laugh.

I gaze out the window, commerce all about. Everything going on out there is human commerce, thousands of human interactions about to begin or resume as people settle into their offices, meet on trams, over coffee, breakfast, lunch, moving individual agendas forward, making and breaking deals and alliances, another day’s lectures, meetings, texting.

On it goes, every day, ceaseless, implacable human commerce. No war or natural disaster stops the human desire to trade in money, power, sex, love, a flux of restless hearts and minds jostling their way through each day, week, month, year.

I am a mere mote in the cosmos of human commerce. And I should not forget my place.

Rock on.