tragedy on the train
Seems like yesterday was just meant to be a dramatic commute... In the morning, there was a car crash just behind me as I was walking the final block to the office, and in the evening at the Metrolink station, a 4-year-old nearly got himself run over by an arriving train. Kudos to the Middle Eastern man standing next to me who acted without hesitation and threw himself into the boy's path before he went off the edge and into the train/tracks! The kid, he was just a happy little boy running in an exuberant circle, but his timing couldn't have been worse. I think everyone standing around was spooked to some degree.
On the train, the quick-thinking man slumped onto the seat next to me and began to shake as he talked it out with me. He told me that he has two boys in the same age range, and that just before the train came in, he had been down at the end of the platform reflecting on a makeshift memorial that had been put up over the weekend for a man who was killed on the tracks. So in his mind, he was there when he saw the little boy bolt. He was ready! I listened to every word, and from time to time tried to encourage him by acknowledging and praising his quick actions.
A few years ago, this man was on a train that hit a pedestrian. Immediately, the conductor got on the loudspeaker and instructed people not to look out the left side of the train ... well, of course knowing human nature, you know that practically everyone glued themselves to the left side window, my new friend included. He told me how much he regretted his curiosity in that case, and how there are things in life that you just can't un-see. Sadly, I understand what he means. If I had been on that train and was still in my 20s, I probably would have looked too ... but there's something about being in my 30s that makes me much more ready to obey if someone says, "Don't look." I know it's for my good and I know it's for my protection.
In the mid-1990s, my family took a train trip on which we hit a vehicle. Mom and I were in the last car, so we saw the wreckage as the train braked to a halt past the crash site. But my brother and Dad were up in a forward car, and they saw the fireball as the family in the car burned to death. I can't imagine having that in my memory...
On the train, the quick-thinking man slumped onto the seat next to me and began to shake as he talked it out with me. He told me that he has two boys in the same age range, and that just before the train came in, he had been down at the end of the platform reflecting on a makeshift memorial that had been put up over the weekend for a man who was killed on the tracks. So in his mind, he was there when he saw the little boy bolt. He was ready! I listened to every word, and from time to time tried to encourage him by acknowledging and praising his quick actions.
A few years ago, this man was on a train that hit a pedestrian. Immediately, the conductor got on the loudspeaker and instructed people not to look out the left side of the train ... well, of course knowing human nature, you know that practically everyone glued themselves to the left side window, my new friend included. He told me how much he regretted his curiosity in that case, and how there are things in life that you just can't un-see. Sadly, I understand what he means. If I had been on that train and was still in my 20s, I probably would have looked too ... but there's something about being in my 30s that makes me much more ready to obey if someone says, "Don't look." I know it's for my good and I know it's for my protection.
In the mid-1990s, my family took a train trip on which we hit a vehicle. Mom and I were in the last car, so we saw the wreckage as the train braked to a halt past the crash site. But my brother and Dad were up in a forward car, and they saw the fireball as the family in the car burned to death. I can't imagine having that in my memory...