Yawning of a new era

        I was treated again to an unedited view of the inside of a woman’s mouth today.

        It was on the 7:42 from Main Street in Downers to the city. We were making that big turn into Union Station— my fellow commuters, neighbors, familiar strangers I’ve seen on and off since I started taking Metra downtown nineteen years ago. We were huddled in the vestibule trying to guess which doors would open, left side or right.

        Then there it was: fillings, bridgework, Juicy Fruit, the whole show. A lady, and I’m stretching the term here, let loose with an all-out, open-mouthed, hippo yawn. It was like Animal Planet a foot and a half away. People do these now, the wide-open cavern yawn. On the street, busses, stores, wherever. Extending their jaws like snakes swallowing a pig. And never even the slightest attempt to reach a hand up to obstruct my view.

        Sometimes I think they don’t remember where they are. They’re unaware that they’re outside. They forgot they put on pants and left the house for the day. Or maybe they don’t see a dozen other people around. Could be they don’t realize they’re yawning. Maybe they’re just really proud of their dental work.

        I think about these yawning hippos as I dodge the globs of frozen spit, hocked up loogies spattered freely across the city’s sidewalks interspersed with cigarette butts, burning and not burning, and samples of products nobody seems to want even for free.

        Ah, but then I think: you know, I’m lucky. That open-mouthed yawn could’ve been an uncovered sneeze.