Someone smiled at me on the subway ride home from dinner tonight. And it really threw me for a loop.

In the bustle of the city, where everyone has a million places to go and a million things to do, we’ve trained ourselves to channel out the people around us. It’s funny – I remember when I first got to New York and how enthralled I was with everything – with everyone.

I remember watching the old woman yelling from her fourth floor walk-up accross the street to her friend at the coffee shop below. I remember thinking about how they had probably lived in the same neighborhood for decades, and how they probably liked to sit around on the bench in front of their building on a Sunday morning, sipping coffee and gossiping about their neighbors.

I remember sitting in the coffee shop being served by a wait staff that was entirely from Russia, wondering how they all ended up in the same city at the same time, how they found each other, wondering what their hopes and dreams were that were powerful enough to compel them to make the trek accross the world to this itty bitty island.

I remember the first time I saw a guy walk through a subway car asking for money, watching as most people stared straight ahead as if he weren’t there, muttering under their breath about how his story about being a veteran was just a ploy, a method to justify the fact that they had over $2,000 in shoes or ties in the bag in front of them yet weren’t willing to part with the fiver in their wallet. I remember wondering what his life was like, what series of events got him to the position he was now in, the humiliation he must have felt in the beginning asking people for handouts, and the kind of strength it would take to deaden such humiliation.

I remember the models walking by my girlfriend’s neighborhood on a crowded Saturday afternoon, holding a dozen bags, wearing enormous furry boots and carrying teacup poodles in their purses. I remember wondering what they were like as kids, wondered which small town in Kansas or North Dakota they were from, wondered how often they call home to their parents, wondered if they were lonely.

My shock at that girl smiling at me on the train was surprising because I realized that in the short span of a year, I’ve managed to lose that wonder. I’ve been assimilated into the New York way of living, running from place to place, iPod blasting, not looking up at the amazing architecture, not noticing the people I pass by, staring straight ahead as the guy walks down the subway car asking for money.

The wonder we once had when we move here fades away so quickly. These days it’s relegated to the briefest of moments, catching a glimpse of the Chrystler Building as the sunlight is bouncing off of it, watching an obscure play in a dive theater with the most amazing actors you’ve ever seen, eating a meal that makes you forget about the mountain of work at the office and the ills of the world. The rest of the time, you’re focused, cold, hardened to the outside world. At least I am.

That girl was smiling very sincerely, not in a “I’d like your number” kind of way (for one thing, I’m slowly turning into a pear and any attractiveness I once had is rapidly deteriorating,) but in a “I wonder where he’s coming from and where he’s going. I wonder what he’s listening to so intently. I wonder why he’s frowning a little bit” kind of way.

She must be new here.