I have been on hiatus. Why did I let so much time pass?? I blinked and like 6 months passed! So I started a new job… Well, more like I officially started my “professional career.”
I am now a Train Commuter. I spent three years driving back and forth to Baltimore, spending countless hours in horrifying traffic. Now I spend almost four hours a day on a train getting my ass back and forth to our Nation’s Capital, Washington, D.C.! When I first accepted the position, I was elated at the fact that I would no longer have to sit in traffic. And while sitting in rush hour traffic will always be worse, I have to say that I was not prepared for what I was about to encounter as a daily Train Commuter.
I always knew I had a little bit of a problem when it came to control. I like to run shit. I like to be the one making the final call, handling my own business, and always having the opportunity to just stop and get the fuck out if necessary.
You can’t do that on a train. There is no escape. You are trapped. Stuck. You are most definitely not in control. The daily struggle is so real, I don’t even know where to begin.
You can’t touch anything. I mean, I am literally taking a chance with my life every day. I touch the handrail: Ebola. I touch the armrest: Bird Flu. Someone sneezes: Fuck Yeah! I just got a head cold. Just yesterday, I dropped a delicious Green Apple Jolly Rancher that was perfectly wrapped in sealed plastic onto the floor. NOPE. That shit is now one with the floor.
There is always someone talking excessively loud on their cell phone at 6:00 o’clock in the morning. And it’s usually in some god awful foreign language like drunk, broken Russian.
There is always that one 50 year old man who pours the entire bottle of Stetson Original onto himself before leaving the house in the morning. The scent is so suffocating, it literally seeps into your pores and releases itself at random times throughout the day just to remind you that you are, in fact, not in control.
The flip-side of that. The commuters with eye-watering, sour body odor. It doesn’t matter if you breathe through your nose or mouth, because the stench is so great it penetrates every part of you. I usually end up settling for short small breathes through my mouth and exhaling through my nose.
The creepy guy that wants to spend the entire trip talking about you. “What’s your name, sweetheart? What do you like to do for fun? Where do you live?”
People eating. The amount of horse chewing I have to sit through qualifies me for the Nobel Peace Prize. The gum chomping, finger licking, milk slurping, and chip crunching is enough to send me into a fit of rage that will cause me to set fire to every tongue on the train. But I don’t. Instead, my skin crawls and my body gets all hot like I am about to combust. I turn my headphones up to Level Deafening and I pray to all things holy to keep me from snapping.
Speaking of loud music. There is always that one wannabe rapper who truly believes his $20 headphones from Walmart are the same quality as BEATS By Dre so the entire train car gets to experience, “I pissed on that bitch, bitch wasn’t quick- go head girl, give it another lick.” Or something like that…
The Avid Nose Picker. They just dig and dig and dig and then examine the shit out of that booger like it holds the cure for cancer or something. Once they are done they either eat it or flick it. What is wrong with you?!?!
That moment when the train conductor comes over the intercom and announces that the train is having some kind of electrical issue and we will be sitting in the middle of nowhere for approximately 35 minutes while they try to fix it. Also, the ventilation system is down so there is zero air circulation. It is hot, smelly, and sticky. Your cell phone battery is at 20% and the two-year-old three seats up just took a hot steaming dump in his diaper. This happens at least once a week.
Let’s not forget about the woman who feels it is necessary for the entire train car to hear her conversation with the person next to her. She will literally spend the entire 1 Hour and 45 Minutes talking about how she can’t afford to feed her six kids because all her baby daddies are too busy buying designer shoes for their side hoes. She talks about what she had for lunch, who pissed her off at work today, what show she is currently watching, and anything else she finds important to share. All of this is done at the highest octane possible so that every last person has to hear about her life as well.
By the end of my day, I am just ready for pure unadulterated silence. I thoroughly enjoy sharing some of these experiences through Snapchat with all of my understanding friends because it can be quite entertaining. But usually, I am just one second away from pulling the Emergency Exit handle on the train window and making a grand escape. Train commuting is on a whole other level.
The Slightly Spiked Latte 