Vent

I was going to blog about my first Cubs game but why waste your time with that when the CTA (Chicago Transit Authority for those who are ignorant of the hate) has provided me with such grand...fodder.

The CTA and I, we're good friends the way that ex-lovers are: You ride 'em 'cause it's convenient, but you'd really rather have another. Ride, that is.

We've come to terms. I catch her an hour before I have to be at work. Usually I'll arrive right on time. Sometimes early. Sometimes 5 minutes late. That's fine. She's a public transportation system. I can't expect her to pay attention to only my needs. But today? Today, she must have forgotten those terms.

Things started out well enough. I wanted to be at work a half-hour early, but I actually only left the house 15 minutes early. I resigned myself to being 15 minutes early. Fine. However, when I got to the train platform, lo and behold, a train pulled up. I'm going to be a half-hour early! Aw, shucks, CTA. You didn't have to.

Things are going smoothly: I'm listening to my friend Tyler's podcast, Battleship Pretension; I've got a Decemberists concert (the reason I'm leaving early) to look forward to; the sun is shining; the stops are flying by. Nice.

Then we hit the Jarvis stop. And stay. For a while. Longer. Longest. How long are we going to be here? Eventually we move. I check my watch. Down to 15 minutes early.

Howard stop. As we pull up, I look for a Yellow Line train to Skokie, my next transfer. None waiting. Still 15 minutes early. And I've got a little cushion.

But not enough cushion. This is when things go haywire. I'm waiting, watching train after train (red, purple) pass with nary a yellow in the mix. People are starting to complain. CTA attendants are stopped and asked what's going on. One tells us to go to the other tracks, the southbound tracks, where we see two yellows waiting. A little unusual since we (there's a number of us now) want to go north, but not unheard of on the CTA. And so we obediently go down one stairwell and come up the other to find one of the yellows leaving. Never fear; another awaits. Down there. We wait for it to come up a bit and meet us as it usually would on the northbound side. But there's nothing usual about today. It sits, and sits. We go to meet it. It moves. We wait to see where it will stop. It doesn't.

I'm a calm person. But at this point, I'm ready to talk to someone. I'm now going to be on time if a train leaves RIGHT NOW. Across the way on the northbound side, the correct side, a yellow line has snuck past us and is boarding. WHAT? People are pointing fingers, asking questions of one another; two CTA workers (one of whom was the one who told us to come to this side) are doing the same thing; and a yellow pulls up dropping people off from Skokie, that now fabled place where I once did travel with great convenience.

We're at the breaking point. I've got a pitchfork in my hand, the man beside me is trying ineffectually to light his torch with a butane lighter, when a voice from on high sounds: "This train to Skokie leaving right out from here."

I board. I check my watch. It's going to be close. Ah, well. Tyler and David are discussing spaghetti on a movie podcast and things are looking eerily normal. I arrive at Skokie and set my feet on the platform as one who has been lost at sea and waded ashore. I begin to kneel to kiss the ground but someone bumps my butt with their bag so I think better of it.

I am on the last leg of my journey. I need a bus right now to be on time. I look. No bus. OK, maybe I have a minute. 5 minutes later, one arrives. I'm going to be 5 minutes late. And just to thumb her nose at me, the CTA has provided me a driver who can't make the turn without backing up: BEEP, BEEP, BEEP.

I did arrive 5 minutes late at 9:05. I began my odyssey at 7:45. You do the math.