Two cruelties marked my wait for the train on that platform. The first sort easily recognizable, even to an outsider: a bitter winter wind that showed no favor as it cut through coat and resolve alike. The second sort was a torment reserved for those who frequented the tracks. A 15% fare hike. Across the board. Eight years of static ticket prices had ended, broken by a billion-dollar deficit and ridership numbers decimated by a pandemic. For months we had known it was coming, yet like the coming of winter itself, knowing made it no easier to bear. Some part of me had clung to hope, believing that surely someone would find another way, that some eleventh-hour budget deal would emerge. Yes, I understood the necessity. But that brought no comfort for me then, no comfort to ease the pain of this suffering.
The age of the ten-trip flex pass, too, had come to pass. That small mercy which once rewarded those of us wise enough to plan ahead, now a memory undimmed before the breaking of this new dawn of “operational sustainability.”
Near me, I eavesdropped a conversation of a fellow commuter who spoke of silver linings. He suggested that future inflation might eventually make these new fares seem reasonable. I envied his optimism, but could not share in it. I knew what he did not: that hidden in the fine print lay a promise of tomorrow, a tomorrow that guaranteed 3% annual inflation adjustments. No, our fares would keep pace not with inflation nor wages, but with the arithmetic of necessity.
I thought of Time, that last refuge of that cost-conscious commuter. The Board of Directors were too clever to let Time be our friend. Forward, they promised these endless increases; backward, they compressed the ticket’s 90 day expiration period into 30. Past and future, twin children of Time, both conscripted into the board’s service.
My train approached through the grey morning mist, its headlights piercing the haze but bringing no warmth. I lingered on before stepping forth. The light of my eyes was quenched, and I had become cold and grey as the world around me, as nightfall in winter that comes without a star.
