Hilarity on the Underground
While stood on the underground train travelling east beneath London, we arrived at one of the stations and a young guy with a beard and headphones scampered past me to claim the last empty seat in the carriage.
As he turned into the seat, a large older gentleman (perhaps early 50s) appeared behind him who obviously thought he was going to get the seat. It turned out after a few moments that the big old guy had a bad leg, and couldn't stand easily. A lady behind him offered her seat, he thanked her, and sat down. The old guy the proceeded to sit and stare at the younger guy across from him. Really glare at him. While sitting down he made a point of leaning towards him in the most threatening way a big old guy with a gammy leg probably could.
Several things occurred to me.
Neither of them said a word to each other.
The younger guy had no idea the older guy was there – his back was to him when he got on the train – so the older guy had no business being angry at all.
Why didn't the younger guy at least ask what was wrong?
Why did the old guy have to behave in such an overstated manner?
I considered speaking out – telling the big guy that he had no reason to be angry because the other guy didn't even know he was there – and on first appearance, you couldn't see he had a bad leg. It strikes me that the world would be a much happier place if only people would communicate more. Of course I would probably have been told to go forth an procreate, but still...
A few minutes later, two old gentlemen both went for the same spare seat. One of them got there first, looked the other in the face, inches from him, neither of them said a word, and the loser proceeded to snap his paper open in the middle of the carriage in an annoyed manner...
What on earth is going wrong with the world?