Commuting

Commuting to work in Atlanta is usually pretty uneventful, but not so for the last few days.

A couple of days this week I've hopped on the train and plopped into a vacant seat, only to realize that a homeless person was seated directly in front of me. I feel great empathy for these people, but you cannot imagine the horrible smell that living on the streets produces. It usually takes several minutes of meditation to stifle the automatic gag reflex.

No, seriously - the smell is horrible. Beyond horrible.

But there's usually nowhere else to sit, and everyone else deals with it, so I figure I can too. It's always interesting to watch the faces of the other passengers, especially the women. I watched one lady board the train: she immediately assessed the situation and raised her eyebrows to the ceiling. She was obviously very disgusted, and I tried not to laugh out loud.

But this morning something happened that wasn't funny at all. The traffic was crawling along, inching forward, when a nice looking little car in the "fast" lane slipped out of traffic and began scraping along the concrete barrier. My first thought was that he had fallen asleep in traffic, but it quickly became obvious something was wrong, as a Good Samaritan in the next lane turned on his blinkers and tried to get the other guy to stop. I paused the sermon I was listening to and started praying for the guy.

Before long several cars were on the side of the road, about 100 yards ahead of me, and one guy was climbing on the barrier to try to get to the guy. A cop just happened to be sitting on the opposite side of the road at that exact moment, so he was on the scene in seconds; when I drove by the man's head was flopped back onto his seat. He looked about 35.

Did he just have a heart attack? Or maybe he just needed some insulin? I dunno. I hope he's OK.