Although I do tend to weigh up
the potential dangers first, such as the threat of being stabbed or shot by
today’s feral youth, I am quick to complain if I feel that someone isn’t
behaving correctly. If I’m crossing the road and a driver forgets to indicate I
will point it out, usually by sarcastically telling them that their indicators
aren’t working. Bad customer service is something that I especially have a
problem with, and will complain until I am satisfied that things have been
dealt with.
It is a clichéd view that in
this country we deal with things by tutting and firing disapproving looks. I
like to think that I am helping to break this stereotype down. People dropping
litter is a particular peeve, especially if there’s a bin nearby, and I will
express my annoyance with offenders. If more people did this, then the power
would go back to the nice people, instead of the anti-social members of society
intimidating everyone into complacency.
The worst thing in the world
is being on a bus, train, or tram and some skid-mark on the underpants of
society is playing music too loud, sometimes without headphones. It is never
someone with a decent taste in music either; it is always a terrible din that
sounds like a car alarm having violent sexual intercourse with a 1980s computer
game. People sit on the bus with their blood boiling rather than politely
asking them to tone it down. My stock response in the first instance is to ask
if their headphones are plugged in properly, this is a question that goes over
the heads of the brainless morons who think that I’m the stupid one. Eventually I will ask them to turn their
infernal shite off for the sake of everyone else on the bus, and everyone else
on the bus secretly thinks I’m a hero for bringing on some peace and quiet. I
had the opportunity today to bring quiet to the bus and become the bus hero
once again, but it all went a little bit wrong.
A young mother was sitting
with a baby in a pushchair in that section at the front of the bus, and I was
standing next to them. The baby didn’t stop crying for the entire journey, and
even having my music on loud didn’t drown out the noise. The baby’s mother just
half-heartedly rocked the pram and made shushing sounds. Now before I continue
I feel as if I need to make a few points clear; I do not hate children or
babies, I am a parent myself and can remember that babies cry to communicate
that they need something, I know that babies always seem to know when it is the
most inconvenient time to cry. When Emily was a baby she used to cry, she also
used to stop crying. Maybe she needed feeding I used to think, so I would give
her a bottle and if she wanted milk she would stop crying. Maybe she wanted
reassurance that her dad was still there, and wanted to feel that warmth and
security that being cuddled brings I used to think, and pick her out of her
pram and hold her. If we were on public transport, or in a public place, I
would try to get to the bottom of her crying as soon as possible. The one thing
I didn’t do was let her carry on crying. Some people, (who obviously don’t have
and should never be allowed children) advocate leaving the baby to cry, these
people are wrong.
I reasoned that my fellow bus
passengers appreciate it when I stop some chav from blasting out his or her
appalling music out, so I assumed that I was about to become the bus hero again
with my next move.
It turns out that I was wrong,
or at least if I was right then nobody was going to let me know. This was a bus
situation that nobody wanted to be a part of. I simply approached the woman and
said that her baby was crying. Maybe she was deaf and can’t hear her baby’s
distress and I am doing her a favour. She replied that she knew that the baby
was crying and that there was nothing she could do. When I suggested that
picking the baby up and giving it a reassuring cuddle might shut it up, she
looked at me aghast. How dare I suggest such a thing? When I pointed out that
she was on a bus full of people, she looked at me as if I’d suggested throwing
the baby out of the bus window. Another woman on the bus took the side of the
mother, telling me that I would understand if I had a child. Of course I told
her that when my daughter was a baby I would try to stop her crying as soon as
possible, and if she wouldn’t stop then out of consideration for my fellow bus
passengers I would have got off the bus. This was met with arguments with the
mother and her supporter about how babies cry and there’s nothing you can do to
stop them, which of course made me repeat my suggestion that she picks her baby
up and acts like a mum by showing the poor little thing some love.
I could see that I wasn’t
going to win this argument, (although my comments on Twitter were supported by
way of a ‘favourite’ by Kim, not only a woman but also a mother, so I knew I
wasn’t totally in the wrong), despite everyone on the bus getting visibly riled
by the baby’s relentless crying. It was a small baby too, so the noise was a
monotone loop that went straight through you.
If this scenario had taken
place in a café, restaurant, pub, (especially a pub) or anywhere else, then the
parent would remove the baby from the area to deal with it. Why then, couldn’t
she just get off at the next stop and try and sort the baby out, before getting
back on the bus and continuing her journey? Maybe it is just me, I am annoyed
by people in general if I’m honest; loud phone talkers, queue jumpers, people
who get in front of you and then slow down or just stop (I put my arm out and
gently move them to one side), pavement cyclists, (I NEVER get out of the way,
even if they say “excuse me”, as they should be on the road), people in front
of you at the counter who hand over a ten pound note for shopping worth seven
pound twenty five, and then spend ages looking for the twenty five pence in
change, (there’s no fucking need, the tenner covers it), the list goes on. We
need to complain more, because annoying people have one major problem, they don’t
know that they are annoying.
As I got off the bus, ‘Too
Much Too Young’ by The Specials came on my MP3 player. As a radio presenter, a
perfect link like that was a gift.
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