Back in the 1990s, I worked downtown and took a second job four nights a week at a school for psychology. I sat by myself in a room for four hours and simply collected faxes and put them in the proper offices after making copies. There were other campuses and so I waited for the last faxes to come in from Hawaii. 5PM there, 9PM here. I had a little hand-held cassette recorder and always brought a few cassettes to play.

Afterwards, I’d walk to the elevated train and head home. One night, a young guy was playing rap music from a big radio. People were seated close to him, most looked at him but ignored him.

I set my backpack down and looked for my Big Steve and his Polish Stevedores cassette and flipped it in the holder. Then I stood up and starting playing polka music as loud as I could, standing as close to the kid as I could, otherwise I couldn’t drown out his music.

I’m half-Polish and Big Steve didn’t just play the standards like “Beer Barrel Polka” and “Money Polka”, he was like the Bruce Springsteen of polka. You know how Springsteen will go nuts with the guitar? Well, Big Steve would wail on his accordion for minutes at a time.

Everybody near us watched. The guy was the first to shut off his music. He got up, looking to walk through the door to the next car. People were already starting to clap. I stayed behind him, the polka music low, and said to him “I’ll just follow you. Me and Big Steve. That’s him playing.”

The guy turned around and got off the train at the next stop. I was a minor hero on the Orange Line that winter night. Things like this never make the news.