Coughing on the R6: A Neurotic's Guide to Coping

Someplace around the Ivy Ridge segment of my commute, my statuesque seatmate began to cough uncontrollably. She covered her mouth admirably, in an effort not to contribute to the speeding metal Petri dish that is the average SEPTA train. The coughing cacophony stopped momentarily. But then there it was again. She took a sip from a container. This gesture gave her no relief. Soon, the glasses were removed and she began dabbing her eyes with her fingers, as the airing of her internal unrest was clearly causing her some distress. As her coughing continued unabated, I did what any good narcissist would do: I thought about how her coughing was affecting me.

Seriously, what are you supposed to do in that situation? My first inclination was to offer her a lozenge or something. However, as I quickly realized, I am not sick, so I was not carrying any lozenges. So first, I made a note to start carrying around lozenges to give to sick people on the train, and then I thought of a different way to ease this poor knockout’s suffering. At that point, I remembered that I had an unopened bottle of Gatorade in my man-purse/workbag. "Why not offer her a sip of it?" I thought. After all, if the beverage she had in her sippie cup was coffee, the texture of it (especially the cream she may have added to bolster her enjoyment) might be aiding the clogging of her esophagus rather than alleviating it. But then I realized that the Gatorade I had was one of those new A.M. varieties, Cran-Raspberry flavor, to be exact. The taste is quite similar to old-school Mountain Berry Punch Kool-Aid, which I have been trying to find a duplicate of since I was in fifth grade or whatever. To give her a sip, I would probably have to sacrifice the entire bottle and that was out.

So the coughing continued. As more zombies in corporate wear boarded at East Falls, I found myself analyzing my companion’s coughing for signals of its origin. Careful analysis revealed that it wasn’t very phlegmy, and for a moment I thought maybe this gal wasn’t really sick. Maybe she just had something caught in her throat, or something just went down the wrong pipe. In that case, maybe I could just do one of those “pat on the back” moves that sometimes seem to give people comfort. But then I though, “Huh, does this woman really want some freak she never met patting her on the back?” Furthermore, would she take it to the next level and think that the back pat was just some sort of sloppy lead-up to a seedy, extramarital phone number request? So I kept my hands on my iPod, and chose to begin looking out the window in earnest.

As the Beirut-ian landscape of North Broad and Allegheny came into full view, the coughing rampaged on and I began wondering if it was time to notify the Guinness Book of World Records. With all of my options seemingly eliminated, I began to wonder if the simple mouthing of three words would do any good. After all, what would be wrong with saying “Are you OK?” to this person? Has the onset of increased technologies such as text messaging, instant messaging and Blackberry…ing rendered communication between two unfamiliar peoples a thing of the past? Does the simple act of offering verbal comfort have to be ceaselessly overanalyzed? Well, yes and yes, in that order. So I thought about the fact that yes, she might want me to check on her well-being, but she might just want me to pretend that nothing is going on, and not treat her like the germ-conveying pariah that most people are probably looking at her as. So I admired the scenery of burned-out cars and condemnation-worthy buildings while acting as if she didn’t exist.

The train seemingly glided into Market East with a particular smoothness on this day, not because the engineer had decided to have one less beer the night before, but simply because the woman next to me was still coughing at a ridiculously loud and alarming rate, drowning out the symphonic sounds of skidding and rumbling. Literally, there are SUVs that put out less air pollution in a day. For a moment, I imagined that this must have been how Yul Brynner sounded toward the end when he wasn’t doing those anti-smoking commercials. With all my options exhausted, I decided to do the one thing that made sense to me: I dismounted the train at Market East, even though my stop is Suburban Station. After all, I couldn’t just move to another seat. This would bring shame to a young lady whose only crime was nursing an ailing internal system while trying to go earn a hard day’s wages. So as I stepped past her on my way off the train, I flashed her a smile and a nod that I can only hope conveyed my sympathies.

As I walked the six blocks down Arch to my workplace, two thoughts entered my mind. First was “Wow, this walk is a lot longer than it seemed in my head,” and second was “Sheesh, how much better would this city be if someone in my position could have just asked someone in that lady’s position if she was OK instead of pretending that she didn’t exist?” I let that sentiment linger as I thought about someplace to buy some Echinacea.

Image Credit: Flickr user afiler