Subway riding is torturous in this city. Imagine willingly subjecting yourself to a confined, metallic cart that shoots down the tracks at unyielding speeds, curtailing corners like a race car driver and careening passengers into each one another like juggled packages of sardines. Sounds like fun, doesn’t it?

If you’re a tourist visiting the city, or the occasional train-user riding the NYC subway is potentially an enjoyable experience. There is entertainment galore for the novice rider - enough activity to keep your eyes wandering long past your planned stop. But for those everyday users, the subway becomes more than a simple method of transportation. The subway becomes, in fact, a living breathing entity. The beast’s timely arrival or inauspicious tardiness is capable of manipulating the entire debut or finale to one’s day.

At one point, in my relatively short time living in NY, I was living in a Brooklyn apartment nestled precariously, much to my chagrin, between the boisterous L line and the dreaded G line. Some days, when I woke too late, I opted to roll the dice and head down into the chambers of the apathetic “going-nowhere-train”. Hoping against hope that MTA stars would align, I would always bring adequate reading material for the journey.

On one despicably cold January evening I was in the aforementioned situation. Heading home from a 10-hour day spent logging film footage in the dark basement bowels of an office building I was in no mood to let G-fate wreck havoc on a speedy arrival home.

As luck would have it, the L line was not an option on this particular soiree. Having nothing more than a few crumpled dollar bills and my trustee MTA card, I rolled my hood a little higher, folded my scarf a little tighter and set off to brave the elements.

Forging onto the G platform, after arriving at Queens Plaza, I silently prayed the train gods would be with me. As I walked down the stairs, my footsteps echoing throughout the vast empty space, there was nay another passenger in sight. I let out a deep sigh, closed my eyes and imagined a sweltering hot July day.

As the wind started to pick up, twisting and turning its way through the tunnel, I suddenly heard murmurs and approaching footsteps. Turning around I was faced with three teenage kids, dressed more for commando action than this blistering cold evening. With their sly smiles and glazed eyes I became convinced their baggy clothes where serving more concealment purpose
than fashion statement.

Nevertheless some clicks and clacks started reverberating on the tracks. Aha, just in time, I thought. The train is coming! As I balanced carefully over the platform’s edge to peer down into the tunnel I was overcome with a tremendous letdown. It wasn’t a train at all, merely a work-trolley carrying half a dozen or so maintenance men down the tracks. How could this be? With all these abominably dressed workers inching alone, the next subway can’t be anywhere nearby, I determined.

By this point my blood had turned to ice and my feet to frozen blocks. I felt woozy and tired. My sense of coldness was saturated. My eyeballs had turned to glass.  “ I HATE the G-train,” I started muttering aloud like an incensed lunatic. “This is INSANE!”

I had no choice. I had to seek warmth. With the grace of an injured animal fleeing imminent death I bolted for the stairwell leading up to the Plaza’s main entrance. I just needed a few moments surrounded by heat - just a few moments to make a rational decision. Was I lost in the Himalayan Mountains or was I indeed waiting for a subway in New York City? At this point, which could be worse? Queens was about as foreign to me as any hidden valley in Nepal. What could I do? Where could I go? Who could I call?

As a million thoughts raced through my slightly defrosting brain cells, a rattle beneath my feet signaled my greatest relief. Has the train really arrived? Am I too late? I took off like a shotgun, barreling down the corridor, hurdling over the stairs, arriving at the base just in time to see the doors clamp shut.

“Wait,” I yell. What a horror to be left behind!

Suddenly, I see one of my supposed ruffians standing there sandwiched between the jaws of the subway door.

“Oh my God, oh my God, thank you so much,” I sputtered profusely as I nudged through the opening.

“Don’t worry, little lady,” the guy offered. “This train's going nowhere.”

“That’s the problem”, I replied smiling. “From now on, I’m sticking to the bus.”