The MTA, once again, is hitting the little people (no, not dwarves, per se; regular, everyday folks) where it hurts the most: our wallets.

They aren’t hiking the fares again, not just yet, but jacking up the price of a Metrocard is but one way to deplete the ridership’s funds. By curbing essential bus and train service, the MTA is denying New Yorkers the opportunity to easily travel to where is the best (perhaps this should be in quotes … read: highest paying) — or only — available job.

I know people who commute from Brooklyn to the Bronx because the latter borough is where they found work, despite that they already lived in Kings County and therefore could not easily relocate closer to work; nothing locally or in Manhattan availed itself to them, so they took what did.

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“I just want to be happy, and happiness comes from the achieving of goals.” – Darwin Mayflower

It’s a goal of mine to keep my commute at 30-minutes or less. Maybe, like Mr. Mayflower, I need to find myself a new goal, but I’m not quite ready for world domination; I’ve only just managed to again make my commute 30 minutes.

As much as there were things to rue about my previous life in my previous apartment, that Bed-Stuy commute was the stuff of dreams. Twenty-five minutes at its best, it was almost reason enough to stay at a shitty job because who wants a better one that’s going to take longer to get to? Time is of the essence in this town. It is the utmost. If it takes me 50 or more minutes to get anywhere, I feel the tug of mortality on my existential marionette strings.

Since moving from the Stuy, my commute balooned to a whopping 45 minutes. It was obscene. Disgusting. I found the trip to and fro so revolting that I pondered looking for a new place to live without even having been at my new place for three months. Today, though, I found the solution.

Ridiculous as it is that where the transfer takes place could determine the length of the commute, that it could in fact shave off 15-minutes, it’s true. I had long ago the epiphany that the taking a Manhattan Bridge train is not faster; they crawl along the span. It is maddening, the pace. Putt-putt-putt they go, and there’s always a train on the other side of the bridge, going in the same direction as mine, but faster … whether I’m on the IND or the BMT, I’m on the train that hoses me.

So, I stuck with the IRT today. I told myself if the 5 came, I’d take it to Union Square. The 5 came. I still pondered getting off at Atlantic, but when a woman voided her seat, I took it and hung on until 14th Street. The transfer to the BMT was pretty quick, despite the distance. Shorter than the trek between the same lines at Atlantic. Lo and behold a Q was waiting for me and right as I got on it the doors closed and spirited me to 34th Street. A W-train waited at 42nd Street. It was the absolute perfect commute. It took 28 minutes.

That doesn’t bode well for me having the same experience every day, but it’s promising. It at least tells me it’s possible. If I get saddled with the 2-train, I’m just going to take it to 42nd Street and walk from there. I’m done with the Atlantic transfer; it sucks.