In which my A-cup drives you WILD.

After last week’s complain-fest on the horrors of being employed outside of the city, I’m reluctant to admit that there are also certain pleasant upsides to commuting by car to Long Island each day.

Namely: No catcalling.

As every city girl knows, being subject to the horny hooting of men on the street is one of the most irritating, and constant, hazards of commuting to work in New York – and this is particularly true in the summertime. Not that it ever really stops. No, there will always be devoted catcallers who, no matter how many layers of winter-wear you might be sporting, truly believe that they can and should make highly vocal judgments about the size, shape, and desirability quotient of your various parts... but when the warm weather comes around it becomes exponentially worse. The leering legions emerge in full force, their limited vocabularies at the ready, their eyes peeled for female passers-by upon whom they can bestow such heartfelt and high-quality sentiments as “I'd hit that!” and "Show me your tits!"

Given that I spent three years living in Harlem – where many of the resident dudes, when not just showing a penis to you outright, are delighted to tell you exactly where on your person they would like to insert it – I have experienced enough catcalling to last several lifetimes. Walking to the subway every day was like an anthropological survey of the Catcalling Underworld. There was the mystifying array of whistles, hisses, and smooching sounds; the moany-groany cries of “Mamiiiiiiii!”; and of course, the delightfully subtle, “Girl, I want to fuck you in the ass.”

Seriously, kudos to that guy for getting straight to the point. My dick, your ass! End of story! Screw your niceties and piddling chit-chat, lady – this is New York!

But whereas summertime commuting in the city is akin in stress level to the Running of the Bulls (you know, if the bulls were really small and wanted to have sex with you), summertime commuting to Long Island – in a car! – is a delightfully solitary, non-stressful activity in which the only real annoyance is turning on the radio to discover that NPR is in the middle of an obnoxious fund drive again.

So I was alarmed when this morning, as I cruised slowly with the flow of eastbound traffic and idly listened to the news, my en-route reverie was suddenly interrupted by loud honking. Startled, I looked out my window.

There was the source of the noise: A large truck had pulled up beside me and was sounding its horn. The driver, seeing that he had my attention, honked again and pointed at my car.

I looked back at him, confused. Had I done something while driving? Had the smooth voice of Soterios Johnson lulled me into a semi-aware fugue state in which I’d stupidly begun drifting into the other lane? Yes, I decided, that was probably it. Embarrassed, I waved sheepishly and put both hands firmly on the wheel, fixing my attention fully on the road in front of me.

A second later, there was another honk. The truck had pulled alongside me again, and this time driver was pointing furiously at something in my car.

What’s going on? my brain started to shriek hysterically as I looked back up at him, confused. What does he want? Isn’t there an urban legend that starts this way? Isn’t there… HOLYFUCKINGSHIT is there somebody in the backseat?

Wide-eyed, I looked into the rearview mirror. Nothing. I stole a glance back over my shoulder, but nobody was crouching there.

He could be hiding in the way back! my brain insisted. Pull over right now!

Panicking, I searched ahead for the nearest exit, when the horn sounded again. I looked up.

The truck driver waved frantically, then suddenly removed both hands from the wheel, bent his elbows, and momentarily held his cupped hands palm-up in front of him. Then, grinning broadly, he pointed again.

At me.

“Oh,” I said out loud.
OH, said my brain.
The truck driver clapped his hands back onto the wheel and veered away, narrowly missing a collision with a passing van.


New York catcallers, take note: You might think you’re hot shit, but until you have risked your life at 60 miles per hour just to convey to your target the all-important message of "YOU HAVE TITS!", I'm afraid your supremacy is no longer absolute.

Also, what the fuck.