We’ve all done it but it’s still horrific to watch. In a moment of madness we believe we have disappeared from view and can do as we please. It’s not true; everyone can see. Everyone. On train this morning I watched a young woman pick her nose. The man next to her watched. The girl opposite too. I suspect we weren’t the only observers. She remained oblivious to the attention, focussed as she was on the matter in hand.
There’s a curiously common ritual associated with public picking, not that I’ve considered this at length, you understand. It is thankfully rare that one comes across a flagrant and apparently proud picker. Most partakers are modest and rely on wishful thinking, sleight of hand and distraction to cover their activity. They are deluded.
She started with a nonchalant scratch followed by a careless rub. Believing that these simple gestures constituted a magic charm and rendered her invisible to her fellow travellers the real work began.
There was nothing obviously untoward about her nose. She had an ordinary sized face and all her features seemed in proportion so it was quite a surprise to see her finger disappear entirely up the left nostril. I wondered briefly if she was actually scratching an itch on her frontal lobe. Or maybe she was a novelty sword-swallowing act. Frankly, the tell-tale nasal bulge came as a welcome relief.
There was a good bit of exploratory poking. She had a real dig. A seriously good ferret. Then, like a lucky angler, she clearly caught a whopper. It took her a while to wrestle it out though. We watched transfixed. The tension was palpable: would it get away? Would it pull her in? After what seemed a lifetime of struggle, out it popped.
I can’t imagine where it’d been hiding - it was the size of a house brick. She inspected it slowly; a look of pride spread across her face. Then without looking up, she rolled it into a ball with her fingers and dropped it on the carriage floor. I think I heard it land.
She leaned back. Exhausted but content. She raised her eyes for the first time in ten minutes. She was smiling. We looked away, imperceptibly.
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