From time to time, heading north to the farm, I catch an early morning train from Grand Central Terminal. It always departs from the lower level, usually track 108. At that hour — just after 7 — the lower level of Grand Central feels more like a waking village than a major metropolitan transit hub. Most of the food stalls are closed. A pair of soldiers wearing desert camouflage stand near a magazine rack. Delivery men, fighting gravity all the way, roll loaded hand-trucks down the ramp from the upper level.

Soon my train slides into the station and disgorges its passengers. I stand back and watch them come through the narrow door leading from track 108. And always I think of the title of a V. S. Naipaul novel, “The Enigma of Arrival.” Some arrive completely without enigma, alert and already deep in the day ahead. But most of the passengers seem to be emerging from pupal versions of themselves. They are not yet who they will be later in the day. These are nearly all professional commuters, running deep in the groove of routine. In the station, they take separate paths, ending conversations that will be resumed that evening, saying the same farewells they’ve said every day for years.

Eventually, after the last few stragglers — the deep sleepers, who had to be wakened — make their way out, the few outward-bound passengers take over the train. The lights are bright, but the seats are still warm and somnolence hangs over everything. Some of us give way immediately, and some wait until our train emerges from the underground tunnel, just to see what kind of day it’s going to be before we fall asleep. VERLYN KLINKENBORG