Monday, September 20, 2010

Dojna on the Green Line

I was sitting on the T this morning, staring out the window, when i saw Dojna's reflection from the other side of the train, a few seats ahead.
Only it couldn't be Dojna, because dojna lives in the Netherlands and has never been to America. If she'd decided suddenly to come here, it wouldn't be this week, when the new students had just arrived there and everything at the castle program was hectic. and even then, if she'd somehow decided to abandon the castle and come to boston, she'd have told me and her other friends here, and facebook would be buzzing with the news.

yet everything in the reflection was Dojna--the glasses, the large sweater, the small, wry half smile.

so i forced myself to look directly at her. she wasn't dojna; she didn't even look like doijna. I was annoyed: how dare she pretend to be doina in my window? I looked away from her and back at the window, where she became dojna again, and sat watching until the woman got off at boylston street, which is where the college is, and where, if she had been doijna, she most certainly would have gotten off to see all the kids who love her.
my annoyance dissipated, giving way to gratitude. this stranger, after all, had generously lent me her reflection.

and i did so love seeing dojna again.....