I was recently speaking in San Francisco and, because I live locally, I
always take the BART into the city. At the end of a very long day I headed
onto the platform to wait for the train with the crowd. As you can imagine,
the train cars are even more crowded than the platforms!
This particular day, as I crowded onto a train where there are no more
seats, this was happening:
I want your opinion! Would you find that fun or frustrating? Would you be happy and enjoy or move to a different car? And, I’d love to know what you thought I did?
If you choose to give your opinion you agree to:
- Sharing your point of view in a collaborative manner that does not attack others’ opinions.
- Not “jumping on” someone in the stream because you disagree with their opinion.
- Sharing in the spirit of sharing! This isn’t about agreement or disagreement, just a safe place to share opinions!
I would say that 95% of the time, I would enjoy the entertainment, although in this situation, people probably didn’t have much choice. Since the car was so crowded, and I probably would be standing, I would be a captive audience as it would have been hard to read or do anything until the car started emptying out. If I didn’t enjoy the entertainment, I could always move to another car, although again, in this particular time, that would have been difficult to do.
There would be 5% of the time that it would probably bother me. I might be really tired and grumpy and feel I was being ‘forced’ to listen to something that I didn’t make a choice to listen to. That would just make me more cranky. But luckily, I don’t have many of those days.
I guess it comes down to choice. People should be able to chose whether or not to listen. But, if you were in this crowded car on this particular day, you really wouldn’t have a choice (other than get off the train, which is actually a choice!). But all in all, people would probably be a captive for all of 10 minutes before it would have emptied out enough to change cars if you didn’t like it. When you think of 10 minutes in your entire lifetime, that is not a whole lot of time to be forced into listening to someone who is being creative and enjoying themselves. And by the next day, you wouldn’t even remember! So, chill out, enjoy.
Candace Davenport
Our Little Books ~ Little Books with a Big Message
http://www.ourlittlebooks.com
At times, I would find this fun and enjoy it. But if I was tired at the end of a long day, I would probably rather zone out on the noise of the background and not hear music. I would get irritated and move. Then get irritated I’d had to move! Lol I’m gonna guess you got into it and stayed, as you found it lifted your mood. You could even have put in a request or two…
I took BART daily for many, many years and most of the time this would not have bothered me. Occasionally, if I was super tired, I might have been annoyed but I would get over it quickly!