On a snowy evening two days ago I was on a bus heading home
that stopped at one of the small main transit centres along the way. There was not many of us on the bus and most
of them were heading home from a work day.
A woman passenger who looked appalled and annoyed, suddenly got up out of her seat and went up to the bus driver and proceeded to
wonder if he went closer to one of the train stations. When he revealed that it did not she began to
inquire to him, almost admonishing him like a child that she didn’t understand
why the one of the main hubs we stopped at was not where one of the trains also stopped at.
He explained to her of a few potential stops she could get
off at and where she could either walk to the train station she spoke of, or
grab a train closer to one of the bus stops he goes by that she could catch a train that would take her straight to
the stop if she took it. But no matter
what, she was totally unsatisfied, and what she really wanted was somehow for
the world to change completely to her benefit; and that was for the train station to have been at the placed right where we arrived at the very moment, or, that a bus took her
and dropped her off there. To her the
whole thing was, “illogical,” which was a word she would say the rest of the
bus trip.
To be perfectly honest, based on her now extremely snotty
tone I thought this was odd that she assumed the universe should’ve have
changed to her will in that moment and no matter what the driver said, and what
us her fellow passengers tried to explain to her, she just got further frustrated, very dissatisfied. The worse she got, the
more she kept saying, “illogical.”
Someone asked her if this was a matter of urgency. No! So
this was not a matter of the situation being illogical but to be revealed as an, "inconvenience," which I had thought about going to the front of the bus and
voicing to her because now my calm bus ride was erupting with her presence of
disdain.
The issue was is that she lived right by the station she
desired, and therefore the setup of the stops and stations did not accommodate
her at all, especially on cold snowy days such as the one the city
experienced. As nice as it would seem
for any transit rider to have that luxury, it is not, and if this is a huge
deal and a person can afford a vehicle perhaps that is in their best interest.
I have heard people ask drivers to reroute the bus for their
own benefits with little disregard to what the driver’s job expectations were
and how that affected other passengers, and for a moment it seemed to me that
this was exactly where she was headed with the conversation… Sorry! Not
conversation! Accusations she made at him for the layout of the transit system
in the city in a tone that indicated a sense of entitlement and wished to have
her demands met.
One more factor was she was not prepared for the weather. We
live in a country of cold winters and plenty of snow to come with them and she
was barely layered in proper clothing for the wind chilled snowfall. She was dressed in very thin slacks, dress shoes,
a coat that seemed more for cool spring or fall days.
This is stuff like this that makes me realize how selfish
sometimes certain people can be. If I decided to be equally rude my
recommendations would be the following:
She gets a car, or
Car pools with someone who can drop her off, or
Dress properly for winter conditions, or
Move.
And if she did move I would recommend to another city, so I
do not feel like someone with this much attitude, a sense of entitlement, and
an actual belief in her unrealistic expectations was far away from the city I love, away from the transit system I enjoy and rely on, and because we could have worse problems in
this place I love than on where the stops are.
Just a thought...
~Ange
Copyright 2015 Lucky 33: Stories, Experiences, Perspectives, and Opinions of a Woman Who Made It To Her Thirties
