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January 9, 2007

Thank You Very Little

A man falls from a subway platform, a toddler tumbles from a fire escape — two quintessential urban nightmares. Three men race to the rescue. One jumps onto the tracks to save the fallen man. The two others position themselves to catch the child.

Both dramas occurred in New York City and were celebrated nationwide.

Yet the reflexive willingness to pitch in, to involve themselves in other people’s lives at crucial moments, seems so at odds with the decades-old (or maybe centuries-old) stereotype of New York as a hard-nosed, hardhearted place where everyone is on his own, where even innate do-gooders squelch the impulse to do something to help out. If you fall on the tracks, that is your problem. - What Would You Do?

That article reminded me of situation where helping didn't exactly go the way one would think.

I was crossing Broadway one early evening during the pre-holiday December rush. Looking ahead of me to the corner in front of the neighborhood Starbucks, I saw a baby stroller and a man standing near it. As I stepped up the curb to continue walking (the stroller right in my path,) I noticed the stroller, with baby inside, began to roll toward the sloped part of the curb (on every street corner, the curb slopes downward.) The guy standing near the stroller was busy yapping on his cell phone and did not have his hand on the stroller, but it was obvious it was either his child or a friend's or relative's offspring. Without thinking, I reached down to the front of the stroller, extended my arm and hand and stopped it from rolling down the curb and tumbling into the street. Then I looked up at the guy, who was still on his cell phone yapping away, and he glared at me in a way I can't describe other than THE LOOK OF DEATH.

EXCUSE ME?

I couldn't believe it. I COULD NOT BELIEVE this guy would shoot me a look like I did something wrong, unless his plan was to let the stroller roll along on its way to disaster. Un.fucking.believable. Had I not been in a hurry, verbal warfare would have ensued and you can be sure I'd use the word ASSHOLE.

So much for being helpful in NYC.

Cindy

Comments

Brain matter deposited by: Mike Macgirvin on January 10, 2007 4:34 PM

Brain matter deposited by: Cindy on January 11, 2007 12:34 PM

Brain matter deposited by: Greg on January 16, 2007 8:07 AM