Personal Narrative: Traveling Via The Subway

This is a Manhattan-bound B express train. The next stop is Sheepshead Bay” The words rang in my head and echoed around the platform as the people around me sprung to life and entered the train. Suddenly, my body tensed up, and a lifetime of anxiety shook me to my core. Traveling via the subway is an effective way of getting from point A to point B; however, my unfamiliarity with the subway system made me overwhelmingly nervous. Throughout elementary school and middle school, I walked to and from school with my mother alongside me– supporting me and shielding me from the surrounding world. It was a simple ritual: we would walk to school together and when school was over, she would be waiting for me in the exact spot I had left …show more content…
For the first couple weeks of school, I continued to keep my head down while riding the train; however, as time passed, I started to adapt to my surroundings. In the beginning of the school year I was often late to class because I had missed the 7:00 AM train to school. Since my former school was a five minute stroll away from my house, I was not accustomed to setting an alarm or to following a set routine in the morning. To adjust to the different circumstances that I was faced with, I set my alarm back 20 minutes and ran to the train station daily. In the winter, I would have to walk home from the train station after sunset, yet my inexperience traveling alone in the dark left me fearful of the dangers that may have been lurking around me. To alleviate my anxiety, I would walk home slowly, remaining vigilant of my surroundings and eventually my fear vanished. Occasionally, I would be tasked with traveling to Manhattan to visit museums for school projects. Although the city seemed to be a massive labyrinth for a young Brooklyn native such as myself, I used my phone’s GPS and the maps in the trains to find my way