Standoff on a Friday evening..

I am not usually that guy. The guy who's got an appendage of some sort stuck in door of the subway as it closes, holding up the train from moving. But it's Friday night and I just really wanted to get home.

As I came down the stairs tonight at the 50th Street Station there was the 1 train... Yes! Quickly maneuvered through the turnstile, got up to the the platform edge, one foot in the doorway... and despite the efforts of a woman who was on the train to help keep the door open for me-- swoosh- the doors shut on my foot. Generally speaking, the conductor will just open the door back up and you can hop right in... not this woman, not tonight. May be she was on her way home too.

I peered down the length of the train, her head peaking out of the conductor's window glaring at me- although too far for words. Rather than flinging it open real quick, the doors slowly inch closer to the center of my foot... at this point I couldn't get my foot out if I wanted to... I actually tried. Not budging. I give another look down, and add kind of a mild shrug, try to win her over from fifty feet away with sheepishness... she responds by increasing the pain to my foot.. there but for the grace of rubber stoppers on the doors go I... Then in a flash the doors part a tad, and I get my foot out, and just when I think all is lost and the doors come together... they come flying all the way back open and I jump into the train! Victory.

I give everybody on the train a sort half-hearted, "Sorry," but no seems to pay me mind either way... especially since there is another woman shoving her torso through the door as it attempts to close again. The conductor lets her off far easier than me, and she gets on the train as well.

"This is not the last train," the conductor lady announces as the doors finally close peacefully, which garners chuckles from those on the train- myself included. And while that's true, we New Yorkers also know that Murphy's law more than applies when it comes to mass transit- this morning I just missed the A train on my way in to work- only to have wait another twenty minutes for another to show up.

So I will fight. While I won't ever be one of those people who throws a tantrum and kicks the train and screams bloody murder when they miss they train... if there's a chance I can make it on that train... I will do my damndednest. I will not trust announcements of "There is a train directly behind this one." I will do what I gotta do to get home. If I have to, I will be that guy.