Friday, December 7, 2012

Family Man

I missed my train yesterday by 30 seconds.  So for my punishment I sat in the car for 30 minutes, ate my breakfast, and thought about how close I could be to work if I had only left the house earlier, not gotten stuck behind the bus, yadda yadda yadda.

So this morning, one might think that after my negative experience yesterday, I would have left the house extra early.  Instead, I got frustrated with finding a shirt to wear, and ended up getting to the train station 2 minutes before the train got there.  As I parked, grabbed my bags and started my frantic sprint to the train, I ran past a man with what looked like 4 suitcases, 2 car seats, and zero luck.  Due to my frantic sprint and un-caffeinated brain, I didn't process that I should have helped him until I was almost to the other side.  So I felt like a giant A-Hole, but I still needed to add money to my metro card..and ugh, I suck.

As I finish loading up my card, the train is coming to the platform, and I hear him coming around the corner, so I step aside to see if I can help.  He throws the luggage to the ground, looks at his wife and two children, and says "Ok, you got the tickets, right?"
His wife gives him probably the dumbest look ever, and says "Uh, ummm...no, I had the kids, I couldn't do that"...

I wanted to hit her, and I didn't even know her.  So we've learned that not only can this woman not help carry her own suitcases, she can't figure out a very user friendly ticket machine while her poor husband struggles with the entire family's luggage.

The guy, with a complete look of hopelessness, sprints to the ticket machine, while a random woman steps forward and takes charge.

"You get the kids on the train, we'll take care of the rest."  She looks at me, points at a few other people, and says "You know what to do".

We all grabbed a bag, carseat, whatever, and got on the train.  Lady in charge let the conductor know that we needed to wait for the guy buying tickets, he sprinted onto the train, and we all piled the luggage around loser wife and her husband...nearly everyone said "good luck", it was unclear if they meant on the rest of his trip or in his marriage.


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