Knee high by the Fourth of July.

The only available seat in the subway car was near a group of five young boys. They were around thirteen or so, all gangly limbs and awkward movement. They were all Middle Eastern, their voices cracking to the consonant-heavy, percussive cadence of their language. They had with them a black plastic bag; one of the recycled bags that are stocked by all the bodegas.

One of the kids reached into the bag and distributed small packages of cheese doodles and corn chips...the generic kind that come with extra grease. They each reached grabby hands in for a plastic bottle of "juice" too. You know what I'm talking about...it's basically corn syrup and water, with a hint of tangerine...

They guzzled the liquid corn. They used their fingers to scoop handfuls of fried corn into their mouths. The salt in the snacks made them thirsty and they drank more. Watching this, my own mouth became parched as I imagined the thick sugar water sliding down their throats and totally failing to deliver the clean H2O their cells needed. I knew that in about a half hour, when their bodies noticed the lack of nutrients in the food, as the high-fructose corn syrup blocked communication between belly and brain, they would be hungry again, craving more of those salty snacks and sugary drinks.

They would each shove a few snacks into their mouths and then wipe dirty fingers all over their pant legs. One boy left greasy streaks on his blue shorts. Two of the kids were standing and holding on to bacteria-infested subway poles, alternating hands to reach into their own snack bags or each other's snack bags or lick fingers or wipe mouths. They all fought grabbily over a PSP--I can only guess how many varieties of diseases the thing carried.

On their way out, the boys were good about staying clean...one tried to furtively leave his plastic bottle under the seat and the other four clearly chided him for it, making him pick it up and return it to the black bag with the rest of their trash. They all swarmed out the door at Canal Street and the bag holder did a little lay-up motion, tossing the bundle into a garbage can. As the train pulled away I saw one of the boys picking his teeth through a window full of greasy fingerprints.

Mmm, corn.