Last Car of the F Train

There was a time when every other Missed Connections posting on Craigslist seemed to reference the F Train. Often it was the last car, which I think may have been dubbed the pick-up car or something like that. It was known--and written about in who-knows-how-many-publications--that if you wanted to flirt with a purpose, the last car was your destination car.

That came and went, though.

Tonight the last car of the downtown train was so pleasant, it was like sitting in an ideal office space. Across from me was a guy tapping on an Apple G4 Powerbook. Down to my left, a woman reading "The Power of Now" was stretched out along the bench seat. People generally spaced themselves nicely around the whole car, and everybody seemed to be bent over a book.

Not a newspaper, not a tabloid, not a magazine.

No couples. No children. No iPods.

If Harper's (okay, Lewis Laphams's Harper's) were a subway car, this would be it.