So we had a nice little wildcat strike in Toronto’s transit system, and it caught me entirely by surprise, embarassingly enough. Wildcat apparently means I don’t know anything about it, get screwed over as none of the cabs will return my calls or my hails, and end up near death trying to get to work. I had lots of time to try to do something about it, I was up at 6, but I tossed and turned and watched episodes of things on my computer, since I was intending at showing up at 10am anyway. Silly me.

I went out at 9am, walking uncharacteristically to the next stop to avoid all the kids who get off there (and thus block all attempts at getting on at my usual stop). At first, I was like ‘it’s been 15 minutes, where the hell is the 34″… then I thought for a minute… “hmm, it’s been 16 minutes, where the hell is any bus at all?”
Then a passer by asked “Oh, is the strike over?” “What strike is that?” “TTC is on strike, but it was supposed to be resolved for the morning” “When the hell did this happen” “Earlier this morning….” “Damn.. thanks.”

And so I decided to go home to regroup, which is fairly easy when you are a single person. I walk in to find maintenance being done on my ceiling (which I had reported friday when I was home sick, and they came in several times over the course of a few hours to look at it, disrupting my attempts to block out the jackhammering on the balconies outside, whilst trying to recover) and go into my room to consult webpages. Ah, there we go, TTC, no service, thestar had things to say as well, strike on, not over yet, woe to you mere mortal. Joy.

So I pull out the phonebook and start phoning cab companies at random, since I never consider cabs a viable form of transportation (they fall off my radar usually), to get endless busy signals, which seemed about right. So I resolve to walk and try to flag down a cab, which proved fruitless and embarassing. So, in a final sigh of stupidity, decide to walk it.

Essentially, the walk is straight down Eglinton from Mt. Pleasant to Don Valley Parkway (There are more bits to either side, but for anonymity’s sake, I’ll use major roads). On the bus, it seems so plausible. And it might have been too, if not for the heat. 30 degrees, 42 humidex, not pleasant when standing still, but marching for the two hours required to get to work was somewhat more painful than I expected. I had only bought a single 710ml Powerade at a store at the start of my journal, and it is fortunate I did that much, as I’m sure I would have collapsed otherwise. However, buying two would have been better.

The problem with Eglinton once you get down to about the halfway point between Mt Pleasant and the DVP is that there just isn’t anything around, it’s just a pavement desert, no stores to buy drinks, not even shade for the most part. The heat was terrible, the slight inclines of the road unwelcome. I ran out of drink near Leslie, had to start taking more frequent breaks, my heart was racing dangerously, and it was hurting in my chest. I was getting more tired, dizzy, and wanting to collapse. I might find a little bit of shade behind a utility pole, and try to rest, but as soon as I trudged on, my heart would race again. Not to be melodramatic, but it felt like I was near death. Not sure what sunstroke is, but if I were to give a name to the feeling I was having at about the Leslie point, that would be it. What I experienced was more dehydration (which to me is ludricrous, I mean, I have my own hump) but maybe my dizziness, weakness and heart-speed would have been in the sunstroke category.

Finally made it to work, and collapsed a bit, it’s been hours, and I’m still recovering, my head still hurts and I’m a little dizzy. I’ve drunk rather a lot of liquid, and only hours later needed to use the washroom, to discover I not only looked like hell, but have sunburn on my face as well.

I’m not sympathetic with the drivers this time, or with TTC, or with anything at all. I mean, if only they had bantered about a strike for a bit before this, there might have been time to do something (which I guess was the point). They can’t screw the owners directly, but we can, only through being screwed ourselves. Which is how it is for public-facing services. We are merely the tools they weild, they risk backlash at themselves, but if they convince us that they were pressured into the position, then it’s hoped we will direct our anger at the owners themselves. In any case, we’re the ones who get dicked around with. I pay higher fares (or in this case, lose a day’s use of my Metropass) and I doubt any lasting change will come of this.

I mean, there are other actions, like the TTC apparently refusing to side with the drivers when they get kicked and spit on during fare disputes. Their job action? To not argue, basically the bus is free (sorta, some will still argue, the rest will just be really angry at you, or suggest you wait for another bus). I was with them on that, since it was against the TTC and not the fare-paying public.

I’m tempted on my next ride to pay my exact fare, and then kick and spit, well, not really, but it’s certainly going to be hard to go down to the station this week to fork over approx $100 for the June Metropass and feel I’m making a good move. I should just buy a car.