Yesterday, I had a lovely afternoon with friends at the Yankee game. The weather was beautiful, it was cap day, and the company was great. The Yanks didn't win, but such is life.
I was in such a good mood that, my friends having gotten off the train a stop earlier, I decided on impulse to get off the 4 train at Brooklyn Bridge and walk over the bridge home. The sun was shining, my camera was in my bag, and "99 Problems" had just kicked on over my earphones. I was happy!
Then, as I emerged from the station, a confused-looking middle-aged woman asked me how to get on the bridge. I told her. Then, because we were both going to the same place, the awkwardness set in. Each time I was about to pull ahead and resume being a free-floating stranger, along would come another question: How far was it across? (About a mile.) Was it all uphill? (Only to the first set of arches; then it leveled off, more or less, then went down after the second.) Was I at the Yankee game too? (Yes.) Did I hate that bastard Farnsworth? (Nope.) How many arches are there really? (Only two.) Is it safe? (Yes.)
I began scouting out the place where I would pull over, make an excuse about taking pictures, and then take a boatload of photographs as she walked ahead and went on her way. Just before I could, things went off the rails. First she was talking about how her kids wouldn't believe she'd done this (noncommittal noise as I looked in vain for a way to pass the clump of tourists ahead of me). Then she started talking about how depressed she'd been for so long, how her one child was driving her to despair, how she'd been growing more and more suicidal.
And that, for me, is where it all went to hell. It's no good being burdened with the problems of strangers; I have enough of my own and frankly, I'm not in a position to help even if I didn't. But I also can't in good conscience walk away from somebody who throws the word "suicide" around. So there I was, fucking life-coaching this woman across the Brooklyn Bridge like the worst-ever episode of Starting Over. Do I know what it's like to be depressed? (Yes. Unspoken: everyone does.) How do I keep going? (This was asked several times. My answers included the tried-and-true standards about not making decisions in the worst state of mind, about owing friends and family better than that, about simply wanting to know what happens in the lives of people you care about.) What should she do? (Call the friend she mentioned. Get professional help. Think of what she wants to have happen; she can't make it happen by herself, but she can do her part to make it possible, or she can refuse and make it impossible. The unspoken answer: ask a professional or somebody who actually knows you for help, not strangers.)
She was a very slow walker, so the whole thing took over half an hour. I might sound flip in the above paragraph, but it was very upsetting. I was throwing bullshit around, trying to be kind without completely forfeiting the privacy I, as a stranger, was entitled to. I can't know how sincere she was; my thinking is that the person whose behavior is a cry for help, needs the help. But that doesn't mean she had the right to ask me for it.
I got her over the bridge and onto her train, and ordered her to call her friend when she got above ground. When I finally stepped off the subway, I was spent.
And now I'm wondering: will the bridge ever be my place again?
For some time now, walking over the Brooklyn Bridge has basically been my substitute for meditation. If I was alone, I was either taking photos--my way of absorbing how lovely this city can be, and of keeping the creative part of my brain alive--or I was just on a walk to calm myself, to be alone with my thoughts in a beautiful place. If I was with a friend, it was invariably a happy time--either practicing a hobby with an in-town friend or having the gratifying experience of taking a visitor to see something guaranteed to delight.
My first thought is that this won't tip the balance; the next time I go over the bridge, this thought goes, I'll feel that same sense of wonder. But I worry all the same. Not about Esther, the possibly suicidal, certainly troubled woman whom I will not likely see again. I tried. I did what I could. But I do, selfishly and unapologetically, worry about what I'll do if the next time I step on the bridge I feel, instead of awe, only wariness of the people around me.