Just sayin'.
Now it's true that I do see good things while on public transportation on occasion. I do. There are things that tug at my heart strings and there are things that open my eyes.
But there are also things that make me want to ram my head into a wall, repeatedly and forcefully.
Today was one of those days. Have you ever noticed that when someone doesn't have a very strong argument, they resort to yelling their stupid opinions louder, as if more volume will give them more validity?
There are times when I hate the world that I live in. Because the world that I WANT to live in is a place where I see the good in everyone and realize that everyone is a human being with wants and desires and fears and who is just trying to make their way in this hard, confusing world. But the world that I DO live in, is a place filled with crazy people where you don't have the time or opportunity to get to know them and instead are focused on self preservation and survival. I don't want that to be the case. And when you deal with people one on one, that isn't the case. You see one homeless person on the street in a small town, you can help them. You get on a bus full of crazy people, you just try to make it to your stop without dying.
So I get upset when I ride public transportation because I have to deal with angry and ignorant people for starters, but because I am also not being the person that I want to be- someone who helps the situation get better.
Today an overweight hispanic woman and a young (not very good smelling) black man were SHOUTING back and forth at each other. It started innocently enough. The black man was hitting on some woman (this was before I got on the bus) who wasn't interested in him and asked him to leave her alone. He persisted. The hispanic woman jumped in and told him to leave the woman alone because she obviously wasn't interested.
Simple enough, right?
And you have to commend that woman for trying to help a fellow passenger/woman from being harassed.
However, she broke cardinal rule number one: never initiate conversations with crazy people on public transportation.
It of course ended, as it always does, with him threatening her with bodily harm and them yelling insults at each other, him getting out his mace and telling her that if she touches him that he will use it and her taunting him for being worthless and not having a job.
It was ugly.
It was loud.
It broke my heart.
It also made me think that "conflict resolution" would be an EXTREMELY beneficial thing for them to be teaching in school these days since people's only current solution seems to be shouting their opinions and repeating them over and over again over the other person's talking.
There are so many facets of my life that I have control over. I can make my relationships with my family and friends and coworkers and clients be beautiful and wonderful and fulfilling things. I can create beauty. I can strive to help people. I can listen. I can love.
And that's all well and good.
But I want to do more.
I want to be the voice of reason that calms people down on the bus. I want to be the girl that helps that boy see his true worth. I want to be the girl that helps him see that harassing that girl is not a good thing. I want to be the girl who helps that hispanic woman have compassion for the young man who doesn't have that much going for him at the moment.
Instead, I'm the girl who avoids eye contact and breaks out her headphones because the yelling is giving her a headache.
I often do a self-reflection type thing before bed. Usually I will ask myself what I am thankful for that day. I think maybe I need to start asking myself, "Was I the "me" that I want to be today?"
Today I give myself about a 75%. I avoided any and all conflict on the bus (which, in my defense, had I tried to butt in, would have just led to more fighting and yelling) which I am not proud of. But I did get some good writing done and I did make my best friend laugh and I did volunteer and give a free massage to a woman with cancer.
Not a bad day. But not 100% either.
I guess I have a reason to get up tomorrow- there is more work to be done!
Hey, take it easy on yourself! I know that feeling though, like when the woman dropped at our feet and instead of making one move to help, I completely froze. I hated that blank "please someone else help, I can't think" feeling.
ReplyDeleteSo I'm going to take a first responder class, that's what I'm going to do.
And you could take a conflict resolution class. It's true that you would probably use it more on the el than anywhere else, but it ...the more I type, the more I think I want to take one too, would probably come in handy in other moments as well. YOU would then be armed to help say/do the thing that will diffuse the situation one way or another. Notice that it wasn't just YOU that didn't help, you and 98% of the people there preferred to save their breath and pray for the idiocy to stop- which, by the way, is sometimes actually life saving. It's sad, but we really never know just how far someone will go to make a "point". So take it easy on yourself, girlie. *going to find a class now* XOXOXOXO