I'm a PC

This morning I took a cab to work. Not a common occurrence especially given the $30-35 fare when you factor in the morning rush hour traffic. You see, I woke up late. I worked until 1:30am the night before. On my 8th anniversary no less. Honey, I hope you enjoy the ads I made for you.

For us.

Where was I? Of yeah, the cab. Well, as I was hustling to the train station this morning after sleeping through my cell phone alarm. I had a 10:00 creative review with the "big client" and couldn't be late. I was fast walking like chicks who just had a baby, and exercise on the beach every Tuesday with their overweight friend Maureen. Moving my arms with determination, and with labored breathing, I looked at the subway app on my phone.

No. Impossible. This thing is wrong. No way.

According to the app there were several trains on the north side of the city, but none on the south side. My side. There must have been some sort of accident. Or incident as they like to call it. Weird, I never got the alert. Fuck. If all went according to this schedule I would arrive, with one transfer, at my stop at 10:17am sharp.

Exactly 17 minutes late for a meeting I was running. Awesome.

Realizing my desperate fate, I dove into the backseat of a cab waiting outside the station.

Back Bay station!

The cabbie sensing my desperation stepped on it. Or he just did what was inherently familiar to him and drove like an asshole. We weaved in and out of traffic like an ambulance with a stroke victim in the back. Right up until we got to the bridge. The fucking bridge that has been under construction for over 2 years. As the three lanes merged into one, I asked the driver if he knew how long this "Little Dig" would take to complete. He said he didn't know.

Says October 2012. Looks like we have one more year of this bullshit, I informed him while tinkering with my phone.


We spoke a lot about construction projects, and wondered if it would be cheaper to run a 24/7 crew for a few months versus the typical work schedule of two 8 hour shifts over a few years. I brought up Carmageddon, the work that happened over the summer on the 405 in Los Angeles. If I remembered correctly, the contractor needed to complete 10 miles of construction in 48 hours, or he would face ridiculous penalties. Like a million dollars per half hour. The cabbie didn't believe me. And I assured him it was true. I had friends in LA who told me about this.

Nope, I lied. It was 53 hours. Not 48. Yeah, it says here that they even finished earlier than expected. Can you imagine being in charge of that project? What balls?

We finally got over the quarter-mile bridge, and I checked my app to see if the subway had caught up to us. It hadn't, but it was close. We hit a snarl on the highway. A fender bender right at the Morrissey Blvd. exit. I checked the map, and it looked like it was clean sailing after the bottleneck. And true to form, once we got past the hard-ass Statie lecturing the two commuters who accidentally bumped each other we were fine. Traffic moved along at the normal pace just like my screen indicated.

We zipped in and out of side streets in the South End. We were making such great time that I began to think we had enough time to hit Starbucks before my meeting. I would have blown someone for an iced coffee. I was tired. Really tired, and the meeting would be better, I rationalized, if I were more alert. We'd sell the idea in if I were just able to get my coffee.

We're gonna make it. We're gonna do this.

And that's when I saw him.

He was wearing a grey hoodie sweatshirt over his head concealing most of his face which was otherwise covered by a scraggly beard. He was dancing on the yellow lines, and peering into cars stuck at the red light as if they were trespassing onto his private property. He was outraged. I mean, after all, this was his main city thoroughfare. He was entitled to make sure only "friendlies" passed through on his watch. He shouted. He grimaced. He made hand gestures. He walked backwards into oncoming traffic.

OH SHIT?!?!?!?!


Yep, the junkie walked directly into a city bus that was careening down the street. He wasn't clobbered like Brad Pitt in Meet Joe Black, but instead just sort of walked into the side of the bus like a clueless moose on a Maine highway. Naturally, he stayed on his feet thanks to the drugs coursing through his veins. At 9:48am. He sauntered off to the side of the road, and suddenly found danger where it didn't exist. His brain was about 30 seconds behind reality so he panicked as he bumped into a parked car. He put his hands in the air, and crab-walked sideways to avoid being crushed by the stationary vehicle. He looked around wondering if anyone saw just how close he came to getting crushed by the parked car. He gave an incredulous look of disgust to imaginary passerby who still remained out of his focus.

Did he…just get…

Yes, the cabbie assured me. Yes, this guy was six milometers from death. And he will never know how close he came. Ever.

Right now, this man sleeps in an alley, or a shelter, with a perfectly healthy pancreas, while arguably the greatest innovator of our time lies on a slab. This junkie will live to the ripe old age of 84. His days will be filled with chasing a high. Shoplifting, begging and robbing to get his fix. He will be a net loss on society yet Steve Jobs' life ended prematurely this afternoon at the age of 56.


But that's not the crime. It's us. Not the helpless cases like the poor slob who battles demons in his grey hoodie every day. It's those of us who swim in the middle. The ones who appear successful yet are squarely positioned in the sea of mediocrity. The ones who commute every day to an otherwise meaningless job. We're the ones who won't learn the ultimate lesson of this great loss. We'll continue to produce things that are just good enough, and meet our budget and timeline. We'll consume television shows that are common and safe. We'll patronize chain restaurants. We'll listen to music that is spoon fed to us by conglomerate record labels. We'll pay exorbitant fees to see these bands in concerts, and pay $9.25 for a draft beer.

That's what bums me out.

"Do you want to spend the rest of your life selling sugary water, or a chance to change the world?"



Most of us are selling sugary water.

Including me.

As such, we should expect to spend more time in traffic.