A Slight Diversion

Ok, this is a travelogue. Sorry. You don't need to read it.

I had a conference in the McCormick Place last Monday. I was kind of looking forward to it, if nothing else but to have a free lunch away from the normal routine. Of course, I needed to obsess and plan my route with split second accuracy to make sure I got there at the right time. Get to bus station. Get on Route 606. Grab the Blue Line to Clark/Lake and transfer to the Green Line. Get to the McCormick stop and head east to the center. I've been there before so no worries....

About a week before, I had to get a bus card. It has been years since I rode the bus, pretty much since I started with my bad insomnia and also got the bike. (They aren't related.) They went to a credit-card type pass and one morning on the way to work, I decided to make a quick stop at the bus station and pick up a pass at the vending machine they have there. I wanted to be familiar with the situation so I wouldn't be stuck in Chicago with no way to get home because I'm too stupid to use a machine. So, mission accomplished. Hey, look, this thing accepts coins. I used to get rid of all my change on the bus. It looks like I can use this thing to get rid of my change too. Keep that in mind. Allow time to put in the money when I get there on Monday....

I counted my coins for the fateful day, mostly just to get rid of my nervous energy. I've already determined that much that will be at the conference is stuff I've already done so if there isn't anything to do, no biggie. I'll just enjoy riding the trains and seeing something different.

I woke up at 2am that morning, just like every other day. I swear there's something biological going on. I've already been tested and there isn't any real reason why I keep waking up then. That is all besides the point. I get in the car and arrive early enough to at least turn in some of that $18 in change I want to put on my new bus pass. I hide anything of any value in the car ( I read about a lot of car break-ins in Oregon at the State Parks so I'm now nervous about that ) and head to the machine. You know, putting a lot of coins in a slot of all varying sizes gets your fingers to hurting. Plus, and I never anticipated this, but every $4 or so, the machine would lock up and require me to start a new transaction. Goll, that was annoying. Still, one goal off the list.

Might as well meander towards the bus stop....Hey, look at that, the bus is just pulling in. Well not exactly. It was route 600 and not the 606 so Bingo!! I'm taking the express. Arrived at Rosemont Station in good time. I guess I'll have some time to just sit at the conference center. No biggie. Got on the train after a short wait. So far, so good. Pass works as expected. Things are going quite well.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, there's been a medical emergency on the tracks ahead and we'll be letting you off at the Jefferson Park station. There will be shuttle buses there to get you to Western where you'll pick up the train there and continue on towards downtown and the Loop. We apologize for any inconvenience."

Well, I wanted to know how all that works. I've heard on the news and traffic reports about them shuttling people over a track outage. I guess I'm going to experience it. Glad I'm not really in any kind of a hurry. So the train stopped at the station and large CTA workers rushed everyone off the train. They pounded on the windows by any lurkers, "Hey you, get off the train!" I imagine if I was fresh off the farm from my home town, I'd be incredibly intimidated by their herding us off the train platform. In my current state, I was smiling. It was something new and different. My day just became more interesting, more interesting than the conference and a stale donut would be, at least.

Outside the station, any bus that pulled into the lot was commandeered by the CTA workers and crammed full of people constantly flowing outside of the train platform. I made it on the 6th or 7th bus that stopped. I got a good seat and counted myself lucky that I was sitting. I had no idea where I was in the city. At some point, the driver announced that we were going to the Damen station. That really didn't help as I was merely a passenger of my fate at the time. Along the way, I just watched the city go by. All the buses on the street were filled with people being moved between stations. The sidewalks became full of hopeful passengers wondering why no buses were stopping for them. Seriously, some stops had well over 100 people waiting. The buildings were fairly uniform 3 story buildings and almost every other storefront was vacant. I noticed that the placards were ads hawking vacations for my hometown. That was kind of neat and I felt the hick desire to tell someone that uninteresting fact. I wanted to take a picture but again fought the urge. People were pretty silent, just wanting their day to begin and not show how upset they may be lest others consider them petty.

When we arrived at Damen Station, we were once again greeted by "Get off the bus!" this time by the driver.  I again smiled at the rudeness that seems to be part and parcel of Chicago behavior. They weren't perceiving this as rude, just being direct. I tried to snap a picture of the Traverse City ad as I left but the result was just a blur. The entrance was just a narrow door and they were thrown wide to allow all the people to enter. It was a fairly old station and aside from the electronic pass readers, it had the feel of the 1800's. The next 20 or so minutes were spent on the stairs as the platform was full. Still, no trains went by. It seems our promise of getting picked up down the line was hollow.

My attempt at capturing the TC ad as I was shouted off the bus.

I passed the time just taking the surroundings in. I'm fairly amazed at how we've let things deteriorate in this country, infrastructure-wise. I'm a proponent of "Take care of it or take it down." The station was rusting and not all that conveniently placed, although I'm sure the residents of the area depended upon this system in their lives as much as I did now. People began to be frustrated and started leaving which freed up space on the platform and where I eventually made my way. I found a little nook to rest and started a conversation with a woman approaching retirement age as well as a younger woman who worked for a start-up writing iPad software for schools. (I kept silent about my opinions of Android solutions that are cheaper by far.) Eventually, a worker came by yelling that the tracks had cleared and trains would be arriving shortly but they will be busy as they will be picking up the backlog. The whole outage lasted well over 2 hours and since the Blue Line is one of the busiest, I was sure I'd have another 40 minutes or so to wait. Yep. While waiting I struck up more conversations and another guy kept shooting glances at me about his frustration. I marveled at how much can be said non-verbally and how he found my face as an inviting one that such sarcasm would be interpreted correctly.

All in all, it was a nice day so far. I'd experienced something new, met some new people, and even observed a confused pigeon on the roof of a nearby shop while we were all waiting for the 'L'. I'm sure I saw it's confusion as it stared at hundreds of people up so high just doing nothing. I appreciated how well behaved everyone was as we hear so much how people suck when in such groups, and this was a very diverse crowd. Everyone still said "excuse me" and "sorry". I also was struck by how beautiful people can be. I know that might be an odd thing to say, but for an introvert like myself, seeing the beauty of random people is something fairly new to me. I wondered what interesting stories people had to share if situations were different. Yeah, my plans for the day were shot to a good degree. That breakfast of doughy goodness was long gone but it was worth it so far. I might as well forge ahead and see what else the day brought. I finally slipped on to about the 10th train that stopped and with my back pressed against the door, I went on to Chicago.

Continued....

http://wgntv.com/2016/04/18/part-of-cta-blue-line-suspended-after-person-struck/