Last night, I took Douglas over to the in-laws to visit. We left rather late for a 3-year-old (7:15pm out the door) and walked together to the subway. I've managed to convince him to do a lot more of his own walking, which is a 30lb relief to my shoulders and back :) So as we start heading down the first set of steps into the subway, I could just hear the telltale beep of the "train coming" warning sign. As Douglas negotiated the steps, I listened and could tell that it was a train going the direction we wanted to go. Figuring the chances were slim/none of making it, I grabbed Douglas up, and tore down the rest of the steps, swiped my card and slipped around the turnstile, only to hear the ding-dong sound warning the doors were about to close. I kept trotting down the stairs, and as I reached the bottom I could hear the train starting up, headed towards be about 20 yards away.
I swerved over to the track-side of the pillars and started gradually slowing down, wanting the conductor to know that they were leaving a disappointed pair of passengers behind on the platform. To my utter amazement, the conductor (conductress?) leaned out of her window and asked "Did you want to get on the train?" My "Yes, yes please. Thank you!" was rather stuttered than spoken, and we watched the train stop right in front of my stunned eyes. This just does NOT happen in nyc. I've never, in any kind of situation, seen a train stop for anyone, anywhere. I was VERY thankful to not languish on a platform with an un-suppered and hyper child for a likely 20 min on a Sunday night! So nice to know I was seen as a human, and not another statistic.
The fact that we didn't get home till after 1am and Douglas refused to nap at the p's produced a rather fragile child this morning, but it was all worth it.