Switch Problems

There is only one thing that crosses my mind when I finally get to the train station on my merry way home only to be met by an unusually dense sea of stoic heads pointed unwaveringly towards the track announcements… switch problems.  Days like these are bad enough but sometimes the issue isn’t revealed until it’s too late.
   

Our train was geared for action.  People had taken a seat, pulled out their phones, and put in their earbuds like all good little commuters should when the train slowly began rolling away from the platform.  All was well in our little corner of the world until the moment when it wasn’t. The train came to an abrupt halt.  The hardened commuter knows that a full stop is never a good sign and days passed by before the conductor’s voice could be heard over the PA system minutes later.  

“Well there seems to be some kind of problem up here.  Some operators are walking out onto the track now to see what’s going on.  We should be on our way shortly.” 

Lies.  As a young commuter I clung to these words like a person clings to a life preserver after a shipwreck, now I take them for what they are, crowd control.  People who had perked up to listen to the announcement roll their eyes mumble some indiscernible slur and hunch back into their glowing screens prepared for a dramatically minor wait before the train gets moving again. 

            
The beep, which dutifully precedes a conductor’s announcement, is heard once more.  It isn’t until the conductor’s voice returns with haunting news that people begin to understand the full gravitas of our situation. 

“Ladies and gentlemen, I have been notified that there is a problem with the switch on our track and we are being asked to reverse and empty the train.”

This announcement is met with an overt sign of frustration amongst the riders as people sigh, mumble to their neighbor, and begin to shuffle around in their seat packing up their train ride paraphernalia as lines begin to form at each exit.        

Once the doors open, people, now visibly aggravated and 20 minutes late begin to funnel out and towards the stairwells and escalators they had just recently descended.  The escalators, however, had not gotten the memo that we were going to be headed up not down.  It became clear as one adrenaline driven man picked up his carry on suitcase and made a move towards them that this would not slow anyone down.  Like an army of Marios fighting through Bowser’s castle the second then third then fourth person fought upwards against the infinite loop of escalator stairs until no one even gave it a second thought.

      
 Riders who did finally reach the top were met by chaos.  The switch problem had caused a backup in the station that was quickly filling to what had to be at least twice the fire marshal’s safety capacity.   At this point people were livid and tensions were high.  Not only had they been stuck on the little engine that couldn’t for 20 minutes but to top that off now they were thrown into a dangerously high-strung crowd of late commuters while the man behind the curtain clumsily began rescheduling the late trains. 

Unbeknownst to most, there was one train on the screen that, amidst the turmoil, had continued to read, “now boarding” even after it had left the station.  This came abruptly to everyone’s attention when a visibly shaken woman complete with disheveled hair, puffy red cheeks, and lopsided coat who had clearly fought through the sea of late commuters to reach her platform rounded a corner to announce that “THE 6:14 TRAIN HAS LEFT US… IT LEFT US HERE… NO ONE TOLD YOU BUT BELIEVE ME IT IS GONE.” She sullenly looked down for a moment before picking her head back up to mumble, “The 7:02 is still there though.”

         
This woman’s day was about to get worse as the 6:14 and the 7:02 shared a doorway so she was actually standing in front of the very door led to platform.  People who had previously been unaware that their train was still in the station flooded the doorway and the puffy red lady was nowhere to be found when the dust cleared.

           
Minutes later the 7:02 track was officially announced and ever so slowly order was restored.  Commuters just entering the station were blissfully unaware of the ordeal they had marginally avoided and, much like the misdirected escalator, the wonderfully mind-numbing monotony that is the daily commute continues its infinite loop.