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Let's Talk About My Commute This Morning

Every blogger at Barstool has written this blog. But given the rage that is coursing through my body right now, the venom that is circulating through my bloodstream, I felt it apropos to channel that vitriol through my fingertips, onto the keyboard, and into your brains.

I live in Brooklyn Heights, a beautiful, quiet, historic neighborhood that overlooks the Hudson River. It is marketed to potential tenants as having “easy access to Manhattan via the 2/3/4/5/A/C/R trains.” For years, this was true, until Hurricane Sandy came along and corroded the subway tunnels that bridge Manhattan and Brooklyn. The MTA finally decided it was time for repairs and pinned it on Sandy, though everyone knows those tunnels were in dire need of a makeover long before the hurricane. In short, the 4/5 has been shut down on weekends for the last year. With that finished, they switched over to the 2/3. These are the two lines I use the most when heading into Manhattan, which is every single day, so it’s been pretty annoying on the weekends. But for the most part, my morning commute isn’t affected because they keep all the lines open during the week.

However, this morning, shit took a turn. I boarded the crowded 4 train at Borough Hall. The next stop is Bowling Green, the first stop in Manhattan, and the distance between my stop and Bowling Green is the longest stretch on the ride because we’re passing under the Hudson. Anyone who suffers even a hint of claustrophobia can’t help but recognize that during this stretch, you are in a tunnel… underwater. It certainly doesn’t help that heightened sense of pressure when you’re standing, mashed into the metal railing between the doors and the bench.

Directly in front of me was a woman in formal business attire. She wore a long skirt, shiny cream heels, and a blazer. Her hair was pulled back so tightly into a bun that I wondered if she could blink. She wasn’t white, but her ethnic ambiguity was not the sort of thing one asked about, then lived to tell the tale. The entire ensemble was a billboard that screamed “Don’t you FUCKING touch me,” which was extremely difficult given the jostling of the train and the fact that we were packed in like cattle en route to the slaughterhouse. Preparing for the worst, I kept my hands on the ceiling, knowing my plight would be far improved were she to turn around and see that I’d already surrendered.

To my right was an enormous black man. He was listening to music through headphones with the volume so loud that I could distinguish the lyrics. At the same time, I was grateful to his enormous frame for creating a pocket for my right foot. By widening my stance, I was able to maintain a solid foundation that lessened the chance of me accidentally humping the all-business businesswoman.

3 minutes into our subterranean traverse of the Hudson, the train slowed to a halt. Moments later, the conductor crackled over the intercom:

“Attention ladies and gentlemen. We are delayed because the train in front of us pulled the emergency brake.”

Groans.

“We apologize for the delay. We should be moving shortly.”

In recent weeks, the MTA has changed their policy regarding delays. They used to issue boilerplate platitudes to explain the holdup, such as “we are delayed because of train traffic in front of us” or “we are delayed because of a sick passenger.” A month ago, however, the MTA became far more transparent with their announcements. The “sick passenger” is now “someone jumped in front of the train,” which we all suspected but never had the satisfaction of knowing for sure. And it is satisfying, knowing you’ll be late to work not because some wimp threw up on the train, but because the police are currently scraping human hamburger meat off the tracks with shovels. It seems… worth it. Plus, there’s the added bonus of knowing that ground beef chuck will be stowed in the MTA break room until the coroner comes to collect it, which could take a while. If only I could come on THEIR loudspeaker and say “attention workers of the MTA. The coroner is delayed because of train traffic. Your break room will be cleared of the dead body shortly.”

5 minutes pass.

“Ladies and gentlemen, once again… we are delayed because the train ahead of us activated the emergency brake. We should be moving shortly.”

“Yeah right!” chimes the guy to my left. He’s sitting down on the bench like an asshole. Potentially pregnant women encircle him, but he buries his face in his book to avoid their simmering glares. How dare he be the one to speak? He sits like a king on a throne. You have no sense of our struggle, man; we didn’t appoint you to voice our collective displeasure. Spend a few minutes hyperextending your knees to make your body as pencil-like as possible, so as to avoid a sexual harassment lawsuit. Only then can you speak to the miserable conditions we currently face.

10 minutes pass.

“Ladies and genlemen, once again… we are delayed because the train ahead of us activated the emergency brake.”

Silence. No groans this time. It’s real now. We’re in it for the long haul. No cell service, so nobody can let their office know they’ll be late. If I’d known I’d be this late, I would have slept in. I didn’t bring a book this morning, but even if I had, there wouldn’t have been enough room to raise the book to my face. No games on my phone because I was trying to be an intellectual this year. No headphones or music because I wanted to read on the subway. In other words, it might be time to move back to Manhattan.

30 minutes in. I’ve already decided which people we’ll eat first when we resort to cannibalism for survival. I also think I can charm the businesswoman, eventually. It will take weeks, but somehow she’ll realize that we should procreate for the continuity of our species. There must be a doctor on board who could deliver our baby. We should definitely figure out who the doctor is, so we don’t eat him.

45 minutes. Out of nowhere, the train shudders forward. Half the people in the car nearly fall over because, despite 10 announcements reiterating the delay, they didn’t see a reason to tell us we were about to move again. I gave up on my athletic stance 20 minutes ago, around the time I gave up any hope of survival. There’s no sensation in my feet and I wonder if the frostbite has set in. There are no cheers, no whoops, no applause. Our ragtag crew is too beleaguered to celebrate. We pull in to our first stop, where the platform is stacked 6 people deep with commuters expecting to board a train that, finally, is here. They’re already jockeying for position, trying to sense where the doors will open.

On the train, we smile grimly at each other. These motherfuckers aren’t getting on.