Commuter Virus

Psssst…I should get this in before you read any further in case it sours me in your opinion, but the voting for the Irish Blog Awards ends this evening at 5pm, so if you were planning on putting a vote in you’d better get going! Oh, and there’s five copies of Windows Vista Home Premium to be won too so how’s that for incentive?

Happy Friday everyone. I know I’m a true 9-5er once more now that I measure my time in terms of how many days until the weekend.

An ugly thing happened the other day that let me know I’ve been infected with an unpleasant disease: As is my usual routine, I made my way to the DART station at the end of the day, struggling through the crowds of people to make it to the platform before my train arrived. I could feel my frustration mounting all the way along the quays as everyone seemed to be intent on stepping in front of me, or muscling against me. The mood was ugly and there were plenty of fierce looks and clucking tongues every direction I turned so by the time I made it to the final battle spot, the pedestrian crossing at Tara Street, I was feeling a tightness in my chest.

This crossing point always reminds me of a movie battle scene when the two opposing armies rush headlong into eachother with a crash and start lopping limbs and heads from bodies. The lights are fitted with a digital countdown which counts the time until the green man appears and everyone waits and watches on the balls of their feet, jostling slightly for a place in the front row before the neon digits reach zero and the two sides mash together, fighting to reach the opposite side.

I made the station with just seconds to spare and the DART trundled in as I was walking along the platform. Anyone who takes the DART on a regular basis soon learns the exact spots along the platform where the doors of the train will line up and there is some competition for these places. As the train rumbled slowly to a stop I was thinking of nothing other than that I wanted a seat. I had an hour’s journey ahead of me but I wasn’t desperate to sit down because of that, I was caught up purely in the competition. All around me people were tense and on edge waiting for those doors to open. Shoulders were set and feet were planted and nobody was about to let anyone else get past them, let alone the poor unfortunates who needed to get off the train. The doors slid back and for a few awkward moments there was a stalemate as those that were leaving the train and those that were determined to get on the train tried to occupy the same space. I am ashamed to say I was among them. I jostled and shoved and glared with the best of them, refusing to step backwards until I was onboard. Once on, I rushed for a seat managing to plonk my bum on one of the very last empty places right under the nose of another girl who scowled at me and sloped off to stand with the other losers.

As I sat there catching my breath I suddenly came back to myself. I didn’t feel triumphant at all, instead I felt a little bit sick. I’d been so sure of my absolute right to a seat that I’d become exactly the type of person I hated. I was a DART commuter!

The person who sits in their seat reading their paper and ignores the pregnant woman standing beside them.

The person who pretends to be sleeping so they don’t have to relinquish their spot to the old man.

The person who plonks their bag on the seat beside them so they can have both seats to themselves.

It wasn’t a pleasant realisation. I find myself having to be constantly vigilant or the red mist will descend again and, before I know it, I’ll be kicking the white stick away from a blind person in an attempt to stop him getting on the train before me!

So, is there a cure? A meeting I can go to? DART Commuter’s Anonymous?