I get to the train platform on time for my usual train. An older woman, and not – I am 61 for reference, is loudly kvetching to all who will listen how the time arrival board has stated a train will approach in 1 minute for over 5 of them. After listening to her for a minute, and realizing this will not end anytime soon, I blatantly pull out my iPod in her face to tune her out – literally. It’s me grooving with some Brothers Johnson.
🎵Feel sunshine sparkle pink and blue playgrounds will laugh if you try to ask
“Is it cool?” (is it cool) 🎶
And yet I can still hear her whinging even as a train finally approaches the station.
As a several decades commuter of NYC transit I do not say a word for I drink and I know things. <– If you get that, you GoT that.
- The train approaching the station is going to be packed, so I step back and wait for the train after this that I know will imminently follow.
- That next train will be relatively empty because everyone will have crowded this coming train in the delay..
- There will always be another train.
🎵I get knocked down but I get up again you’re never gonna keep me down 🎶 - Bitching and kvetching only upsets the complainant more. And above all…
- Neither of which will make a train arrive any faster, so I chill.
Clearly these are not things some have learned. Or perhaps they enjoy the sound of their own whinge.
IDK and IDGAF as now it’s 🎵Me-ee an-and Mrs. Mrs. Jones... 🎶
Ms. Kvetching brushes past me to take the spot I vacated on the platform to be at the door and presumably push her way into the train. Lo and behold, instead of her boarding said train, everyone on the train push past her to disembark. The train is going out of service.
But dear me oh my! *clutches cyber pearls* The wailing and gnashing of teeth that commenced from her and other commuters!
It worsens when it’s announced over the PA system that no trains will be making stops on the local downtown side until the train that went out of service has cleared the track.
Passengers are advised to take the next uptown train, about seven minutes away by the time board, to the express stop one station away for access to the downtown express that will bypass the station. Several follow that sage advice, including Ms. Kvetching. Another woman then starts outright bitching – really, there’s no other word for it. She is bitching so loud on her phone that those like me who chose to stay on the downtown side can hear her clearly. I mean she is bitching so loud I can hear her from my side of the tracks over my Metallica which universe now plays on my iPod to amuse me.
🎵 Black heart scarring darker still, yes she’ll be there when I’m gone, Yes, she’ll be there when I’m gone, Dead sure she’ll be there…🎶
Two local trains pass on the express track to the chagrin of most on both sides of the track as complaints rise in volume. It does not help that an advert for positions available for hire in the MTA is announced. I have the giggles, but seem to be the only person finding the humor in this. And the humor deities, Thalia and Gelos strike again
🎵 I’m the kind of guy who laughs at a funeral, can’t understand what I mean? Well, you soon will…🎶
There is an unofficial stare down between the many who have now moved to the uptown side of the track and the few of us who have stubbornly?/knowingly?/hopefully? held our ground on the downtown side. Oddly enough it reminded me of the smug look some Mac users have when pulling out their sleek machines among us run of the mill die-hard brick carrying PC users.
A gentlemen seeing that I carry a bulky package I need to drop off to FedEx when I get to work offers assistance if I wish to go to the dark – erm I mean – the uptown side. I decline even as a third local train passes on the express track and he departs for the uptown track.
About seven-eight minutes total have passed
🎵 *Theme to “Rocky” plays* Gonna fly now, flying high now, gonna fly, fly, flyyyyyyyyyy…🎶
There are perhaps about eight of us in my line of vision on the downtown side when another local train approaches – on the downtown LOCAL track. Those of us who patiently waited have Cheshire Cat smiles amongst each other as the opposite side goes into a fresh uproar. I am on the train and smirk as a few young ones who hauled arse from the uptown to downtown side just make the train.
I am mentally howling with laugher at my iPod which continues to be one with the Cosmos in amusing me.
🎵My baby takes the morning train.. 🎶
I look out the window and catch the infuriated faces of Ms. Kvetching and Ms. Bitching as my train pulls out of the station without them aboard. I make eye contact with another experienced commuter who also waited and we knowingly smirk as we go our merry little way
Yes, the schadenfreude was massive with me and Digable Planets.
🎵Check it out, man I groove like dat, I’m smooth like dat
I jive like dat, I roll like dat
Yeah, I’m thick like dat, I stack like dat
I’m down like dat, I’m black like dat
Well, yo, I funk like dat, I’m phat like dat
I’m in like dat ’cause I swing like dat
We jazz like dat, we freak like dat
We zoom like dat, we out (we out, we out)🎶
Let’s see how others are chugging down their slice of life it down this Tuesday…
Slice of Life Tuesdays
Writing Challenge
Two Writing Teachers


