WARNING: this entry is rated PG-13, or possibly R. You might think I’m kidding, but then you’ll realize I’m not. OK, you’ve been warned.
On Monday night I attended the second meeting for a theatre-related organization of which I’m proud to be a founding member. We’re basically combining two awesome things: recycling/sharing and the arts. When we get it up and running, it will be a big warehouse with a meeting room and a bunch of space to store all kinds of arts materials (in the theatre world, we’re thinking set pieces that have been used and would otherwise be thrown away due to lack of storage space). We want to keep art materials/supplies out of the landfills and also enable them to be reused to make MORE ART!
But this is not the point of my story.
After the meeting on Monday night, at the late, scary hour of 8:40 pm, I took the train home. It’s about a 20 minute ride from downtown to my stop, and with the approach of summer, the last threads of dusk light faded as I boarded the train.
I sat in the first bank of seats by the door, the kind that are a group of four, with two facing forward and two facing backward. If you put a table in between them it might be a good place to play checkers or have high tea – you know, if it wasn’t a public train in the no-fare zone smelling faintly of booze and body odor.
I almost had the train to myself. My section of “high tea” seats was nestled comfortably between the barrier of glass (I wonder if it’s bullet-proof? I wonder why it’s there?) on either side of the doors in front of me, and a partial wall hiding the accordion-turning-thingy (that’s the technical term for it) separating the front part of the car from the back part of the car. A guy chillin’ with his headphones was slouched about six seats (and two bullet-proof glass sheets) in front of me, and a girl talking on her cell phone was sitting all the way in the front. The back of the car was empty. I had one stop to enjoy my quiet, stress-free evening ride.
At the first stop, a biker dude carried his bike up the steps and headed toward the back of the car, and I wondered vaguely why he didn’t choose the next car (there is always at least one train car that doesn’t have steps up, to accommodate bikers, wheelchairs, elderly people, strollers, and people who have a disaffinity to stairs). He was followed by a guy and a girl whispering rapidly to each other, and a skinny pale guy wearing running shorts and a baggy black sweatshirt. He’s really the star of our story; we’ll call him Creepster McGillicutty.
Creepster McG, seeing (I’m sure) the vast array of available empty seats in both parts of the train car, took one look at me in my yoga pants, windbreaker, and blank expression and thought, “SHE needs a BLOG entry. I have JUST the story for her.”
Ah, but Creepster McGillicutty was a man of few words and many body positions. His first posture, as he sat down in my seating bay facing toward me, revealed to me that he was not, in fact, wearing running shorts. No, he was wearing a baggy black sweatshirt… and sneakers.
It occurred to me at this moment to get up and exit the train before the doors closed. It occurred to me, in fact, to scream loudly as I did so “Somebody call the driver! Somebody call the cops! Somebody give that guy some underwear!” But you see, Creepster McG had stretched his legs out toward me, so that exiting would have forced me to step over them, and in my shock and rising panic at Creepster’s law-breaking boldness, I had the smallest suspicion that I might not reach the doors alive. Or, that I would stumble and touch something that should be reserved for police reports and porn.
So the doors closed and the train rumbled on. Aiming my eyes out the window but focusing my peripheral vision on my view of Creepster McGillicutty, I forced my gaze to remain bored and standoffish. My mind raced. Creepster leered, opened his legs a bit wider and leered some more.
Nobody got on at the next stop, and I thought, again, about trying to get off the train. Panic turned into fleeting celebration as Creepster McG got up and moved, but only one seat away. Now he was sitting in the aisle seat across from me leaning forward into the aisle, his eyes still boring holes into me, his unmentionable parts flopping freely. I wondered: is he going to say something? Does he want ME to say something? But I didn’t move; I didn’t speak; I didn’t take my peripheral vision off him.
The train raced on, stopping once more before crossing the river. I heard a group of people talking as they got on at the doors behind me, and I was glad of more possible witnesses of my plight. But they didn’t take any notice, and Creepster and I remained alone in our semi-private room of bullet-proof glass, accordion-partial walls and “high tea” seats.
As we took off across the river, Creepster McGillicutty settled in for the trek. He scooted over one more seat and leaned against the window, putting one leg up on the chair beside him and opening the other leg, if possible, a little wider. He leered at me. I held my front of disinterest. I decided to get off the train at the next stop, even though it was three stops early.
An eternity later, at the next stop on the other side of the river, a man entered the train through the doors ahead of us. Although he didn’t seem to notice the situation, Creepster McG decided to move on and end my misery. He got up and walked toward the back of the train, and the partial wall blocked my vision, so I don’t know who else he harassed.
I got off at my stop, power walked home, raged at Steve, posted a humorous Facebook status, bought some mace… and here we are, five days later, at the end of our story. I heard that the first Friday of May was National No Pants Day, and according to Google, it’s true. But also according to Google, you’re supposed to wear thick, modest underwear on National No Pants Day, and also my story happened on the SECOND MONDAY of May, and also we don’t live in a society of Aborigine hunter-gatherers, and also… just… PUT ON SOME PANTS and LEAVE ME ALONE!
That’s all.
On Monday night I attended the second meeting for a theatre-related organization of which I’m proud to be a founding member. We’re basically combining two awesome things: recycling/sharing and the arts. When we get it up and running, it will be a big warehouse with a meeting room and a bunch of space to store all kinds of arts materials (in the theatre world, we’re thinking set pieces that have been used and would otherwise be thrown away due to lack of storage space). We want to keep art materials/supplies out of the landfills and also enable them to be reused to make MORE ART!
But this is not the point of my story.
After the meeting on Monday night, at the late, scary hour of 8:40 pm, I took the train home. It’s about a 20 minute ride from downtown to my stop, and with the approach of summer, the last threads of dusk light faded as I boarded the train.
I sat in the first bank of seats by the door, the kind that are a group of four, with two facing forward and two facing backward. If you put a table in between them it might be a good place to play checkers or have high tea – you know, if it wasn’t a public train in the no-fare zone smelling faintly of booze and body odor.
I almost had the train to myself. My section of “high tea” seats was nestled comfortably between the barrier of glass (I wonder if it’s bullet-proof? I wonder why it’s there?) on either side of the doors in front of me, and a partial wall hiding the accordion-turning-thingy (that’s the technical term for it) separating the front part of the car from the back part of the car. A guy chillin’ with his headphones was slouched about six seats (and two bullet-proof glass sheets) in front of me, and a girl talking on her cell phone was sitting all the way in the front. The back of the car was empty. I had one stop to enjoy my quiet, stress-free evening ride.
At the first stop, a biker dude carried his bike up the steps and headed toward the back of the car, and I wondered vaguely why he didn’t choose the next car (there is always at least one train car that doesn’t have steps up, to accommodate bikers, wheelchairs, elderly people, strollers, and people who have a disaffinity to stairs). He was followed by a guy and a girl whispering rapidly to each other, and a skinny pale guy wearing running shorts and a baggy black sweatshirt. He’s really the star of our story; we’ll call him Creepster McGillicutty.
Creepster McG, seeing (I’m sure) the vast array of available empty seats in both parts of the train car, took one look at me in my yoga pants, windbreaker, and blank expression and thought, “SHE needs a BLOG entry. I have JUST the story for her.”
Ah, but Creepster McGillicutty was a man of few words and many body positions. His first posture, as he sat down in my seating bay facing toward me, revealed to me that he was not, in fact, wearing running shorts. No, he was wearing a baggy black sweatshirt… and sneakers.
It occurred to me at this moment to get up and exit the train before the doors closed. It occurred to me, in fact, to scream loudly as I did so “Somebody call the driver! Somebody call the cops! Somebody give that guy some underwear!” But you see, Creepster McG had stretched his legs out toward me, so that exiting would have forced me to step over them, and in my shock and rising panic at Creepster’s law-breaking boldness, I had the smallest suspicion that I might not reach the doors alive. Or, that I would stumble and touch something that should be reserved for police reports and porn.
So the doors closed and the train rumbled on. Aiming my eyes out the window but focusing my peripheral vision on my view of Creepster McGillicutty, I forced my gaze to remain bored and standoffish. My mind raced. Creepster leered, opened his legs a bit wider and leered some more.
Nobody got on at the next stop, and I thought, again, about trying to get off the train. Panic turned into fleeting celebration as Creepster McG got up and moved, but only one seat away. Now he was sitting in the aisle seat across from me leaning forward into the aisle, his eyes still boring holes into me, his unmentionable parts flopping freely. I wondered: is he going to say something? Does he want ME to say something? But I didn’t move; I didn’t speak; I didn’t take my peripheral vision off him.
The train raced on, stopping once more before crossing the river. I heard a group of people talking as they got on at the doors behind me, and I was glad of more possible witnesses of my plight. But they didn’t take any notice, and Creepster and I remained alone in our semi-private room of bullet-proof glass, accordion-partial walls and “high tea” seats.
As we took off across the river, Creepster McGillicutty settled in for the trek. He scooted over one more seat and leaned against the window, putting one leg up on the chair beside him and opening the other leg, if possible, a little wider. He leered at me. I held my front of disinterest. I decided to get off the train at the next stop, even though it was three stops early.
An eternity later, at the next stop on the other side of the river, a man entered the train through the doors ahead of us. Although he didn’t seem to notice the situation, Creepster McG decided to move on and end my misery. He got up and walked toward the back of the train, and the partial wall blocked my vision, so I don’t know who else he harassed.
I got off at my stop, power walked home, raged at Steve, posted a humorous Facebook status, bought some mace… and here we are, five days later, at the end of our story. I heard that the first Friday of May was National No Pants Day, and according to Google, it’s true. But also according to Google, you’re supposed to wear thick, modest underwear on National No Pants Day, and also my story happened on the SECOND MONDAY of May, and also we don’t live in a society of Aborigine hunter-gatherers, and also… just… PUT ON SOME PANTS and LEAVE ME ALONE!
That’s all.
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