Tales From The Underground Part I

It's been hard to write about anything after being immersed in reading about and watching the aftermath of Katrina, but I'll save my comments on that whole situation for another time.

I've been meaning to write a little entry about commuting for a while now, but it just hasn't come to the forefront of my mind lately. Until recently, the entry would have been about the sometimes-quirky types of people who are regular Metro commuters. It might have mentioned something along the lines of how, really, I have a relatively easy Metro ride to and from work every day: I get on the Orange line early enough to secure a seat, ride it to L'Enfant Plaza, and hop on a couple more stops on the Green. As long as I rouse myself from my nap or tear myself away from my book or crossword in time for L'Enfant, I'm as good as gold. The Metro really isn't all that confusing, after all, is it? Not like that craziness up in New York. Just five colors to choose from, and they're even fairly recognizable shades, at that.

Well, as Gina's mom says, today was "Terrible Tuesday," the Tuesday after Labor Day, when apparently all prior rules established during the summer are thrown out the window. I was prepared for some kind of wholesale chaos, but the morning ride into work was no different than usual. And really, the evening ride back home wouldn't have sucked so much if not for some unforeseeable - and unfortunate - mishaps.

As a wise man named Steve once told me, "If you ride the Metro long enough, you'll see all kinds of weird stuff happen." Today proved that motto true. Somewhere on the Orange line between Foggy Bottom and Rosslyn, a door apparently came open in-transit, so the driver had to stop for a physical inspection. Ultimately, they had to take the entire train out of service, leaving our full crowd stranded in Rosslyn waiting for another train, amidst an already growing throng of rush-hour mania. As the car I was on unloaded, a couple of guys got in a bit of a kerfuffle, one claiming that he was being shoved and stepped on by a certain younger guy, who tartly responded to the older gentleman that "he could have stepped back a little." Before they could resort to fisticuffs, I and several others from the car separated them out of necessity, since we needed to get off the platform of the departing train. This whole exchange prompted a man in an Air Force uniform to laugh and quote Ghostbusters by exclaiming "dogs and cats ... living together!"

I appreciated the lighter side of the moment and waited for three more trains to go by before I finally caught one that had room for me. Ah, the sweet, sweet life. And you know what? When I first moved up here and started commuting, I vowed to not get angry over having to commute, because I could have it a lot worse. And even after an evening like this, it really ain't so bad. More to come on this topic in the future.