Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Am I a horrible person??

originally written on 4/17 but due to technical issues I am only now able to post...
I hate standing on the train.
In order to avoid doing so I always hustle my butt across the Hill from Longworth to Union Station in less than 20 minutes so that I can get a seat on the train.
Assuming there are no train issues (mystery delays etc) I am always successful in getting a seat where I want.
Today was no exception. Left my office and was in the elevator at 5:35 and I had my butt in a seat at 5:53. 18 min. Not bad.
The 6:05 to Baltimore is ALWAYS crowded so for this train I hurried even a bit more than I do for the 6:40.
Everything was going as expected - I had my seat and was working on my soduko and the car started to fill. In a matter of 5 min the car was full and people were starting to stand and claim their "space".
At 6:04:45 one of the train conductors informs me and my seatmates (the other 3 people sitting next to me) that we need to get up b/c someone in a scooter needs to park in our area.
So we stand up and realize there is no where to go. The train is packed and people are even standing in the vestibule. Great. I successfully get my lean on against the folded up seat next to the door and that is where I am right now as I type this.
Now - in my mind there are a few things going on here.
1. We were sitting in the handicapped area and on the VERY rare occasion that someone in a scooter needs the seats we are bound morally, socially, and probably legally to get our butts off our hard earned seats to accomidate the handicapped.
2. However - after initial observation this particular handicapped person has ridden the train before and is familular with the general train customs - because of this I find it quite rude of her to show up at the train 15 seconds before we depart and expect us to get up when there are clearly no seats for us to go to.
I am irritated.
Am I a horrible person?

UPDATE 4/22: because of the above described situation I decided that I was not going to get displaced again if I didn't have to, so I got one of the individual seats near the door that is not in the handicapped area - and good thing I did b/c the same thing happened and folks had to vacate their seats for this same woman. At least this time the train wasn't as packed and I'm pretty sure they were able to find other seats - if not in our car then in the next car... fun times.

1 comment:

ART said...

Yeah, you're a horrible person.

kidding. :)