It sat on top of the pile of boxes and luggage the woman next to me on the platform had to get onto the train. She was fairly well-dressed, somewhere in her fifties, nervous about getting it all on and grateful when I offered to help. With two minutes to go we both moved everything up to the line. It wasn’t that bad - maybe six or seven pieces plus the painting - and I figured she was an artist who’d either been caught by surprise or just over-estimated what she’d be able to manage. She wasn’t desperate, I could see that. I’ve only been on foot in LA now for a couple of days now, but you learn to spot desperate pretty quick.
No, she was probably some quirky artist and if this was a romantic comedy her minor trackside predicament would be the start of a whacky, mismatched but passionate relationship where she’d teach me not to worry about things so much and just to take life as it comes. And I’d teach her about… I don’t know… logistics I suppose. I could see two solid plot complications right off the bat: 1) I was taking a different train and 2) if that was her art I was pretty sure I didn’t like it.
It definitely wasn’t Frida. It was a man’s face with exaggerated feminine features and a thin mustache. It was drawn in pencil on paper, then cut and pasted onto a patterned black and white canvas with some metalflake gold meant, I think, as a necklace. The earrings in his ears were real - two small opalescent studs poked through the canvas - giving a collage effect that probably worked better in the concept stage. While the drawing itself wasn’t exactly horrible, the proportions were off, making the feminization look cartoonish, possibly even mean-spirited. The short-term problem about different trains was easy for Hollywood: I would either fall in love or throw my back out while moving her stuff just as the doors closed behind me. Our artistic differences though, that was a conflict that’d probably run the length of the film.
With maybe a minute to go I said “I thought that was Frida Kahlo at first…” She said “No, that’s my son. He was a suicide - just seventeen - happened just over there…” and tilted her head towards the freeway about a quarter mile to the west. “They 51-50’d him and then let him out and he threw himself in front of a semi…” No hesitations or dramatic pauses - just the matter-of-fact summary of a story she’d had to tell too many times already.
“Oh, I’m sorry.” I said, or something like it.
“His pain is over,” she said, “He’s in a better place.” I looked back at the portrait, only this time just the eyes, which looked sad and knowing, staring out from an incomprehensible distance.
And then the train pulled in and the doors opened up. Only a couple of people came out and there was plenty of room so everything went in without a hitch. When the doors closed I was back on the platform, breathing deeply, thinking about my daughter and everyone I knew and loved - and everyone else in the world - and seeing them all through different eyes than I had just one minute before.
It was a much shorter film than I expected - hardly romantic and by no means a comedy - but that’s how the woman with the painting and too many bags taught me not to worry about things so much and how much I had to learn about taking life as it comes.