I remember once listening to someone talk about how New Yorkers talked. Apparently one of their primary forms of small talk consists of speaking about the subway. I was intrigued but confused. I asked how can you make small talk about the subway.

"Oh they just talk about which route they took. How long they had to wait. Stuff like that."

I've never spent more than two months in large city, so you'll never see me writing about the subway in such an intimate manner. But I do get the appeal. There's a quote I think from 

Warren Buffett

joking about how 

New York

is the only place on earth where people take rides in Rolls Royce's to take advice from people taking subways.

There's something beautiful about a classless place. A place where people of such different means can congregate without having their financial background dictate what they can do there. At a subway the fare is the same for everybody, and even the richest person there has to wait in line.

It's hard to find such settings in the 

midwest

. I think one of the closest thing to it is a true 

diner

. That's probably one of the reasons why I love writing about them.