How’s *Your* Commute?
I met a recent college graduate who spends two hours commuting to and from work each day. That’s four hours a day. In the car. Just trying to get somewhere! Ok, I’ll admit he’s pretty lucky to be fresh out of school and already employed. And yeah, he <em>is</em> looking for an apartment closer to work. But I couldn’t stop obsessing over all that time spent in the car!
And then repressed memories about my own previous commutes flew back into my consciousness: Two days after graduating college, I began working quite close to downtown Boston; to get there, I got a ride to the commuter rail station, jumped on the train, switched to the subway, dragged myself onto a bus, then walked 5 minutes down the street. Later, after buying a car of my own and moving to an even more suburban area, I eventually spent an hour or more in gridlock traffic – each way! – on the Pike. No matter how often I tried to remind myself that there were real problems in the world and people whose suffering was far greater than mine, I still found myself a cranky, whining beast. After chatting with this four-hour-a-day warrior and reminiscing about my own experiences, I realized that commuting is something most people are affected by and almost everybody wants to talk about. It’s plastered all over my friends’ Facebook pages, Tweeted about at lightning speed, and discussed ad nauseum almost any time a group of people comes together. So if it makes us so miserable, why do we do it?
I started researching commuting/traffic, even though I sort of assumed nothing would come up… and was slightly shocked to find article after article about why people commute (apparently we prefer a large house and a yard in a suburb to a cramped studio apartment down the street from the office in the city) and just what it does to us (“It correlates with an increased risk of obesity, divorce, neck pain, stress, worry, and sleeplessness. It makes us eat worse and exercise less.” – according to <a href=”http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2011/05/your_commute_is_killing_you.html”>this</a> interesting article). <a href=”http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/04/16/070416fa_fact_paumgarten?currentPage=all”>This</a> article from The New Yorker is pretty long at seven pages but is absolutely worth the time it’ll take you to get through.
So what’s <em>your</em> story? Are you one of the lucky/smart ones that made it a point to find a home as close to work as possible? Do you have to sit in stopped traffic for an ungodly amount of time each day? Do you look at your commute as precious time to yourself or do you find your blood pressure rising with every passing minute? (In case you’re wondering what my deal is, I now commute 17 minutes each way and get stuck in almost no traffic… and my life is noticeably happier each morning and evening. Just sayin’.)