$4.50/day keeps the driving away

Commuting to work via public transportation is something I've definitely never experienced before. Ft. Worth, Memphis, and Austin are driving cities. (We can argue about biking in Austin, but most people drive mostly everywhere). Here, driving to work is not an option, because parking downtown is a fortune. By fortune I mean, $200-300/month and $30/day minimum. At $4.50/day for the bus or train, public transportation it is! I live right next to both the train and bus, so I actually get to work one way and get home another.

Onward: The bus stop I need is about two blocks from our house. Because my stop is literally the first one on the route, there's always a bus sitting there and sometimes another in tow, so I never have to worry about waiting in the cold or getting a seat facing forward (thank you motion sickness) or not getting a seat at all.

Good morning!

By the time we get downtown, it looks more like this.

Homeward: Ugh okay so here's the problem with getting home. I take one train, then transfer to a different one, and then arrive a block from home. Same price, a little more walking, and 15 minutes faster than the bus. But having someone else's workbag shoved up your special spot is not my idea of a good time. Now would also be an appropriate place to mention my pet peeve of smelling strangers...e.g., I don't like walking by someone in the grocery store and then smelling a waft of their perfume, personal odor, whatever. It just a little more intimacy than I'm interested in. Well, compared to the grocery store, the train is a whorehouse. I've smelled armpit, drunk stench, and old lady, and someone literally yawned on me last week.

To my left

To my right

Clientele: Everyone's just trying to get home from work, man! I'm willing to bet that taking pictures made me, by far, the creepiest person on the train that day. Although if you get on some other train lines at different times of the day, I've heard your chances of encountering human excrement drastically increase. Here's to keeping 2011 poop-free, for me!

Passing the time: It's a 35-40 minute trek either way, which is a great amount of time to a) check email, b) play Words With Friends, c) read a chapter in a book, or d) listen to an audiobook. I cranked out The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo last week alone!

All in all, I'm really happy with my to-and-fro each day. This is a drastic revision from my initial statement that "commuting is gross." While the whole endeavor takes twice as long as driving, which is too bad, I've managed to cut down my transit time since my first day, and financially speaking it's the best option I've got. Oh and reducing pollution in the meantime never hurt anyone, right?