You haven’t truly lived in New York City until a local train you’re riding suddenly goes rogue and decides, mid-ride, to become express. No announcement. No warning. Just BAM! like Emeril seasoning your morning commute with a dash of unpredictability and a sprinkle of subway-induced stress.

One minute you’re comfortably wedged between a guy holding a bicycle and someone whisper-singing 90s R\&B, and the next, your train is bypassing your stop like it owes it money.

Ah, New York. The city that keeps you on your toes literally, because if you sit down and get too comfortable, you just might end up in the Union Square when all you wanted was Borough Hall.

Now, some might call this chaos. But I say no! This is jazz. Improvised. Rhythmic. Barely holding itself together but somehow, somehow, making a kind of beautiful sense. Because there’s always a method to the subway madness. That local train suddenly becoming an express? It’s behind schedule. It’s got performance anxiety. It’s trying to get to the end of the line so it can start over, fresh and punctual, like a New Yorker after a weekend in the Catskills.

And if you know the secret language of the MTA those little code phrases and non-apologies you realize they’re actually telling you something. “We’re running express due to train traffic ahead” is code for We screwed up the schedule but don’t worry, another local is breathing down our neck.

See? It all makes sense… in that upside-down, hot-summer-platform, rats-on-the-rails kind of way.

And this is why I don’t fall asleep on trains. Except once. ONCE. On a commuter train. And wouldn’t you know it, I woke up at the very last stop, groggy and surrounded by chirpy suburbanites with reusable grocery bags. Had to take a cab home while clutching my Metro-North shame. Never again.

This is why in NYC, even when things go off-script, you learn to predict the plot twist. The subway, like life here, is a living organism. It adjusts. It reacts. It occasionally ghosts you. But it rarely flatlines.

So next time the local train zooms past your stop like it’s auditioning for Fast & Furious: MTA Drift, just nod knowingly. The city isn’t failing you. It’s just doing triage in real time.

And remember, the next local is probably just a few minutes behind. Unless it’s the weekend. Then… Godspeed.