divided

The F train was pulling into 14^th street as I began descending the stairs to the station. I heard it shriek to a stop, but I didn’t hurry up or anything, hoping to avoid an embarrassing situation where the train doors slam in my face as I am panting. I simply walked down the stairs, went through the turnstyle (I admit – perhaps a bit quickly to beat out the person heading toward the same turnstyle from the other direction), and carefully avoided the people walking up the stairs as I walked down. By the time I got to the lower half of the staircase and noticed that the train was still sitting there and only then did I hurry my pace a bit, because while I didn’t want to be shut out by the closing door, I felt it would have looked even dumber to have been shut out due to ostentatiously playing it cool.

I mention this not only to bring to you the inner workings of the mind of someone boarding the subway, but to try to illustrate approximately how long the F train had been sitting in the station. Well, needless to say, I got on the F train with a slight trot, and it sat in the station for even another couple of minutes. This is all quite enough time for any trains that this one might have been trailing to clear out ahead. However, even once the train did leave the station, it crept and crawled, crept and crawled.

By the time we got to 34^th street, the train was outlandishly crowded and the conductor was getting upset with people for holding the doors open. The inevitable announcement came, alerting people that they would be advised to wait for the next train, as it is right behind this one. But, of course the next train is right behind this one. It had probably started off about five to eight minutes behind this one, as per the schedule. But, with the speed this train was running, of course the train behind it had caught up. So then what was the problem? Having a train tailing another train is not good practice, and the avoidance of that very situation was the only possible reason I had thought of for the train staying at 14^th street for so long. So, if we don’t care about having trains trail each other – and in fact advertise it as a way to appease customers who don’t fit on to crowded trains – then why did we wait at 14^th street and then creep along the rest of the way? (by the way, I waited at the Lexington avenue stop, where I got off, to check to see that there was in fact another train right behind this one – and there was.) A possible answer for this one is that not only do they not not mind having trains trail each other, but they actually like it! They would rather have a window of 2 minutes at a given station where service is quick and trains are abundant, than the mundanity of consistent, reliable service. It is part of the [escalating nerves à release] cycle of emotions that we are manipulated into. Waiting, waiting, waiting, abundance.

After 34^th street, and the conductor angrily telling people not to crowd and to stand clear of the doors and that the doors can’t close unless you stop holding them, etc. the train crept away. No sooner than it was out of the station did the electronic message play, telling people to guard their belongings and not display them, especially electronic devices. I find it ironic that they would employ an electronic device to tell us all to not display electronic devices. Such is their self-assuredness and confidence that we are all so desperate for guardian figures that we would accept hypocritical and patronizing messages from a subway car. Of course, we were also reminded, by the electronic voice, to “remain alert and have a safe day.” Soon thereafter, a woman was trying to get off the train and knocked into another woman, who got angry and yelled, “say excuse me!” Tensions were high, manners were sought. But, how can we think about manners when we are so busy remaining alert? Seriously though, people shouldn’t let the electronic messages divide us. Just because it is implied that everyone on the train is a thief and after your electronic devices, or a pervert who wants to molest you just because the train is crowded, doesn’t mean that we have to be rude to each other. The fact that the train is so crowded that it is hard to move is more to blame for the person bumping into you – not their bad manners. The reason the train is so crowded is because it spent so much time at 14^th street taking on waves and waves of passengers and allowing waves and waves of waiting passengers to accumulate at the subsequent stations.