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There once was a woman named Becky who enjoyed crocheting (and sometimes knitting, but we don’t like to talk about that). Becky has one of those jobs where there is time during the day to crochet (or knit, but again, we don’t talk about it much).

We join Becky’s story on a ridiculously cold day in winter. Her bum knee was bothering her so much that she was walking with a cane (decorated with colourful butterflies). She’s a bit bummed herself that since she’s using a cane this day, it will make crocheting on the way to work a bit more difficult.

As she exited the elevator at Dundas West subway station she saw that the train was already in the station. Knowing that she wouldn’t be able to get to the train before the doors closed, and knowing that the people coming down the nearby stairs wouldn’t be thinking that way (by which I mean, logically) she slowed down to avoid a collision. Sure enough, a man went tearing at the train as the door-closing chimes were playing.

In his rush to catch the train he accidentally ran into another man, a man who had decided to wait for the next train since rushing the doors is both dangerous and stupid. The running man made it on the train. As the doors closed behind him he noticed that he no longer had his messenger bag. You see, it had fallen onto the subway platform when he ran into the safe, smart man.

Becky chuckled when she realized that this man would now need to continue on to Lansdowne station. Climb the stairs there, cross the tracks, go down the stairs on the other side, wait for the next Eastbound train, get out at Dundas West station, climb the stairs (the escalator has been out of service there for over a month), cross over, and go down the stairs on the other side and hope his bag is still there. She didn’t know how long that sort of thing would take, but it was certainly longer than the two minutes that she, and the smart man, and the others who witnessed this would wait for the next train to come.

Getting on the next train, Becky noticed that there were no seats available. This wasn’t unusual, for Dundas West station is halfway to downtown and serves four surface routes. She sighed and braced herself with the cane.

Happily, she only had to rely on the cane for one stop when a young woman in front of her saw her, then got up and offered her her seat. As the young woman stood, an older woman saw the seat opening up and promptly dove for it. The young woman noticed this, and blocked the way so that Becky could sit.

It was a good commute in to work, where Becky made good progress on a new baby blanket, which she would love to show you but her camera still lacks fresh batteries.

The lesson in this story: if you are well enough to dive for a seat on the subway, then you don’t need the seat as much as the girl with the cane does.

I don’t want to leave you with a picture-less blog post, so here is one that is somewhat related to the topic at hand. Recently a new ad campaign started on the TTC from atheistbus.ca. The United Church had an interesting response to it.

I came across a website that lets you make your own similar ad. Here is mine:

(Yes, I know it’s grammatically incorrect… I was following the format and wording of the original ad.)