I had the displeasure of a very strange encounter in the BART station this morning.
First of all, I used to try to walk up the stairs in BART. Now that I'm in my 8th month of pregnancy, two very long flights of stairs is pretty daunting. So I take the escalator, but because I'm 1) still trying to get SOME exercise and 2) usually in a hurry, I walk up the escalator steps when I do so. Seems normal, right? Well...
As I was getting off BART in the city and walking towards the escalator, a man came up alongside me who seemed 1) in a hurry and 2) grouchy (he was muttering to himself under his breath, but not in a crazy way), so I instinctively let him get onto the escalator ahead of me. He was a heavyset black man with dreadlocks wearing jogging pants and a sweatshirt — seemed fairly normal.
Big mistake.
You know how you're supposed to stand on the right side of the escalator and walk on the left? This fellow stepped onto the left side and stopped dead in his tracks. Since the right side was full of people, I had no way to get around him.
So I said politely, "Excuse me, can I get by you?"
Now, lots of people stand on the left (even though they shouldn't) because they just don't know the rules. If you ask to get by them, 99 times out of 100, they'll oblige.
Not this guy. He started arguing with me instead! "Well, you should have taken the stairs if you wanted to walk up!"
I said in a louder, somewhat-less-polite-I'm-sure voice, "Excuse me, I'm pregnant. Can I please get by you?"
He still didn't move, but somebody else did, so I walked around him and up. Meanwhile, grouchy guy is talking louder. "You should have thought about it before you got on the escalator. Why didn't you take the stairs!??!"
"None of your business!" I yelled back and kept walking. He kept grumbling something I thankfully couldn't hear by that point.
When I got to the top, I yelled again, "What a gentleman!" (Sadly, or perhaps luckily, I didn't add, "I bet you really charm all the ladies with that attitude!")
I know I shouldn't let that stuff get to me, and most people are really nice about me being pregnant, but that, added to the large number of seated people who pretend I'm not there when I get onto a crowded train, really makes me think about how hostile our culture can be pregnant women.
Wait until I have a screaming child! Then the fun will really begin!
