Award Winning "Top Five Thai Restaurants"
Here in the Bay Area, there seems to be a universal hatred of the various public transportation systems. They are too expensive, they are always late, they stop operating before last call, the workers strike (or threaten strike) too often, many of the lines inexplicably run on simultaneous routes for miles and miles while, elsewhere, entire areas are not serviced at all. Bitching about this is one of the things that brings us together when it's actually possible to get together.
However, one positive side of BART is that they'll let you bring your bike along with you on the trains. (This actually turns out to be one of the easiest ways to avoid paying a fare...but that's a different story). So in July, my commute to Berkeley became this little commuter biathlon in which I would fly down Nob Hill to the BART station, tote my bike with me on the train to Berkeley, and then bike up the U.C campus. During the train ride, dudes would sometimes approach me to talk about my bike. It was cool. I like when strangers strike up conversation. It validates my otherwise meaningless existence in the community.
The weird thing was that most of the people that I had bike conversations with on BART were actually bike thieves. Well, ex-thieves supposedly. (Once a bike thief, always a bike thief according to a pamphlet that I once found in the Richmond District). OK, so I only ever actually talked to three people on BART about bikes and two of them were at some point into stealing them. But one of them had done jail time for burglary. And he was talking to me about it, completely matter of factly. Not bragging or being obnoxious, just kind of talking to me about his life. Anyways, it got me thinking: how is it possible that it's so easy for me to attain this genuine level of honesty with a complete stranger on a train, but getting to the same place with people around here I actually know can sometimes be so impossible?
A cliched question to be sure (I think that's the plot of at least 4 Meg Ryan movies), but that doesn't really make it any less valid. Is it me? Is it people that I am around? Is it just how things become once you hit a certain age and everyone is just kind of doing their own thing and maybe sometimes you overlap on a certain level? Or is it just that this dude in front of me doesn't give a fuck what anyone thinks, so why would he give a shit? Most importantly: why are there 10 Muni lines that run down Market Street!
Fuck getting places in the Bay Area.
However, one positive side of BART is that they'll let you bring your bike along with you on the trains. (This actually turns out to be one of the easiest ways to avoid paying a fare...but that's a different story). So in July, my commute to Berkeley became this little commuter biathlon in which I would fly down Nob Hill to the BART station, tote my bike with me on the train to Berkeley, and then bike up the U.C campus. During the train ride, dudes would sometimes approach me to talk about my bike. It was cool. I like when strangers strike up conversation. It validates my otherwise meaningless existence in the community.
The weird thing was that most of the people that I had bike conversations with on BART were actually bike thieves. Well, ex-thieves supposedly. (Once a bike thief, always a bike thief according to a pamphlet that I once found in the Richmond District). OK, so I only ever actually talked to three people on BART about bikes and two of them were at some point into stealing them. But one of them had done jail time for burglary. And he was talking to me about it, completely matter of factly. Not bragging or being obnoxious, just kind of talking to me about his life. Anyways, it got me thinking: how is it possible that it's so easy for me to attain this genuine level of honesty with a complete stranger on a train, but getting to the same place with people around here I actually know can sometimes be so impossible?
A cliched question to be sure (I think that's the plot of at least 4 Meg Ryan movies), but that doesn't really make it any less valid. Is it me? Is it people that I am around? Is it just how things become once you hit a certain age and everyone is just kind of doing their own thing and maybe sometimes you overlap on a certain level? Or is it just that this dude in front of me doesn't give a fuck what anyone thinks, so why would he give a shit? Most importantly: why are there 10 Muni lines that run down Market Street!
Fuck getting places in the Bay Area.
posted by Jon at 5:20 PM
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