What Would You Say?

Two weekends of traveling in a row makes me fondly recall going to see Planes, Trains, and Automobiles with my dad and brother over Thanksgiving years ago in Indianapolis. Both my dad and my brother have those contagious laughs that will get me going every time even if the source of their amusement isn’t remotely funny by my standards. That’s not to say Planes, Trains, and Automobiles was beneath me. To the contrary, it still ranks up there as one of the funniest movies I’ve ever seen. But I digress. This post isn’t really about that. It’s just that, in the past two weeks, I have indeed traveled by plane, by train, and by automobile . . .

This weekend, I took the Amtrak up to Philadelphia en route to New York City with my husband for an anniversary getaway. If you haven’t traveled up the East Coast via Amtrak, let me tell you - it is interesting. It’s a little like Southwest Airlines (which I like to refer to as the “Air Bus”). A lot of people think Southwest is the greatest thing since sliced bread. But you can’t sell me. For me, no assigned seats = automatic stress. And especially so with the train. Did I pick the right car? What if there were empty seats in another car? What if I have to sit next to someone really smelly (completely within the realm of possibility)? What if I can’t find a place to sit at all?

Last night, I sat next to Kelly Osbourne. Kelly was okay. She didn’t smell. She did, however, insist on stowing all of her luggage “under” her seat (i.e., right where her feet should be), meaning her Chuck Taylors spilled into my space. I was not okay with this, but whatever. I could at least sneak my feet out into the aisle. [side note: it was not the real Kelly Osbourne].

Phew – I was seated. I was lucky. I watched at least 10 people go back and forth looking not just for the perfect seat but for any seat. This was some high quality people watching. As I watched some guy walk by with his New York Jets paraphernalia on, I suddenly felt the urge to yell out “Chad Pennington sucks.” When really, I could care less about the Jets or Chad Pennington. I guess I was just tired of waiting mute for so long (our train was 30 minutes late).

It is not the only time I’ve had that feeling about wanting to shout out nonsense to a stranger. I mean, at least five times a day I want to yell out to some yahoo on a cell phone in a confined space that no one cares about whose cousin’s boyfriend’s sister saw Ferris last night at 31 Flavors or whatever. It’s just that someday, I’m afraid I’ll actually act on my urge.