Wednesday, January 12, 2011

The thing about New Yorkers is...

We love to complain. What separates the complaints of New Yorkers vs personalities of other cities is our anger and immense frustration we build up towards the people we blame. We HATE the MTA and it's president for cutting service lines, cutting jobs, and then raising fares! We HATE taxi cab drivers that continue to drive even though "we're walkin' he-ah!" We place the blame and believe that there's nothing to be done because there is nothing you can do about stupidity.

After the Christmas Blizzard the city was up in arms about Mayer Bloomberg's response. We were angry that our roads weren't plowed, that sidewalks remained covered in snow and that our train lines were disrupted. We hated the Mayer and the head of sanitation and we hated the weather. Weather, you are so stupid, who do you think you are throwing a blizzard on our city?!

But something interesting happened to me on the way to work today. I walk the 30 blocks to work, it takes about 30 minutes. I was in my normal mood of "don't mess with me or get in my way or I will run you over" when I got to a crosswalk where I clearly couldn't jay-walk (traffic had already started moving). A couple of us stood there waiting with a man who was shoveling the sidewalk. He took a break while we waited, we didn't notice, we never really notice anyone do we? Until the shoveler turned around and said "Here, let me clear this way for you," and he shoveled away the slush and grime. Then he smiled. I smiled back. The girl next to me tried to jay-walk but there was still traffic coming. The Shoveler said "Be safe today, you should always cross when the white light appears, ok stay warm, stay dry, have a good day!" It was the oddest thing. I had just received customer service on the street at a crosswalk. It was like New York City became a giant store that was catering to me. Thank you sir for shoveling that sidewalk, and being nice about it.

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