My Morning Commute

This morning on the way to work, the purple line was running ten minutes late, so I arrived at the Metra station right as my train was pulling away. I was in the middle of a group of el riders that had also missed the train and one of them was complaining loudly about it.

“You should call the CTA and file a complaint,” I said having already taken out my phone to do so.

“I don’t know the number,” he responded.

Three or four of his friends stopped to listen to our exchange.

“It’s 888-your-cta. It only takes a second.”

“Don’t kid yourself,” he said, “it’s not like they’re going to do anything about it. Plus, I don’t have time.”

I shrugged and walked towards a nearby diner. This guy annoyed me for several reasons.

1) It was early in the morning (before seven o’clock), and I was crabby about missing the train.
2) His tone implied that I was a tattletale nerd.
3) He did have time to call. The next train wasn’t coming for an hour.
4) Why would the CTA have a specific line dedicated to taking complaints if they don’t do anything with them?

I call about once a month* so when I reached the customer service agent, I already knew the information she would want: train number, train line, where I got on, where I got off, what my complaint was and how I’d been affected. It took less than a minute. Afterwards, the operator thanked me and told me she’d forward the comment on to the General Manager’s office.

While I didn’t feel fully vindicated, calling to complain did make me feel better.

*Whenever the el causes me to miss the train. Fine. I am a tattletale nerd.

Afterwards, I ate some pancakes at the diner, called in to work to beg people to do my bidding and then headed back to the Metra station to catch my train. When I boarded the train there was only one seat left that was open. It had somebody’s bag on it. When I saw who the bag belonged to, I flinched inwardly. It belonged to quite possibly the rudest person alive. She’s a tiny blonde woman, who based strictly on appearance looks like your basic, run of the mill yuppie commuter. But she’s not. There’ve been several instances where me and many other innocent commuters have witnessed a shouting match between her and the conductor. Typically these shouting matches are about her unwillingness to share a seat, but today I was in no mood for her crap.

I stood there for several seconds waiting for her to move her bag to make room for me to sit down. In response, she glared back at me with open hostility. I was eventually forced to speak.

“Can you move your bag? This is the only seat available.”

She made a noise that was a combination of a drawn-out groan/unintelligible curse and twisted around to scrutinize the car for other open seats. When she couldn’t find any she finally lifted her bag and heaved it onto her lap as if it contained an oversized lump of cement.

“Thanks,” I said sitting down.

A moment later, she violently wedged the bag between us.

Now. I’m not overweight, but the train seats are designed to comfortably fit two normal sized people with about six inches of space between them. There was a rack in front of her that was designed to hold peoples’ bags, but I assumed she was punishing me for being so brazen.

Again, I was in no mood for her crap so I decided to exact my revenge in as immature manner as possible. Whenever turning a page in my newspaper, I would fully close then snap it back open in a rapid, clumsy motion. To the layperson, it may have looked as if this were my first time dealing with the unwieldy size of a newspaper. The bag was wedged so tightly between us, that even my slightest movements were transferred to her via the bag. Once I’d finished with my newspaper, I began to jiggle my knee against the bag steadily.

Throughout all of this she emitted odd noises and tossed angrily about as if trying to get comfortable.

About five stops later, the train began to empty, and normally I would have gotten up to move to a more spacious area, but today I stayed where I was. Towards the end of the ride there was only the two of us and the conductor. We must have looked like a set of Siamese triplets (her, the bag and I) as we sat there crammed together and surrounded by a multitude of empty seats.

My stop was first. I had brought a backpack that day and instead of standing up to pull it over my shoulders like a normal person, I jerked it into position while sitting down. This process involved a lot of lurching and flailing on my part. I waited until the last possible second to get up, leaning forward in my seat, knee still jiggling as if I were filled with anticipation.

After exiting the train, I spent much of my morning thinking of snappy things I could have said to her like:

“What’s the matter? Did your limo break down?”

or

“You want some cheese with that whine?”

or

“If you get a chance, would you mind taking a break from being a giant whore-bag?”

I’d actually thought of the limo one while waiting for her to move her bag and had almost said it, but then chickened out.

Happy Labor Day! I plan to spend mine watching college football and goofing off.

- EEK