Let's Band Together and Help Each Other!

All right--I apologize for being serious. I know my stated credo is to "complain and cuss," but I've got an idea I think could make life a little better for a lot of us.

When SoCal got hit by the wildfires last year, a lot of folks used a social networking application called Twitter to disseminate information about where the fires were and where it was safe to be. I think we could create a Franklin Line Twitter community that would allow us to share information up and down the line about where the trains are and whether they're moving or whether we should quit our frozen train platforms and drive over to the Providence line.

Friday, for example, my train into Boston was a half hour late. The reader board at Norwood Central kept alternating from "All trains on or near schedule" to "You're Doomed! Doomed, I say!!" The guys who write the stuff for those boards are dissemblers. And they're jive turkeys, too. It wasn't until my commute home that I met a Forge Park person who said her train (the 6:35) had limped about 200 yards down the track, sputtered, wheezed, and died. That's what stopped the whole inbound line. If I'd known, I might have chosen to head over to the 128 station.

I know the MBTA is testing a text messaging system for cell phones, but I'm afraid that'll be manned by the same guys who write fiction for the reader boards. I'd much rather get a tweet from a fellow commuter with real information like "Currently under attack by hippogriffs between Franklin and Norfolk; should be moving again soon," or "Wheels have fallen off, have decided to settle in new land of Wall-Powell and raise family here with lady I met on the train."

So . . . I propose a Twitter community for the Franklin / Forge Park line. I'll start. Check out https://twitter.com/FranklinLine. Sign up to follow and I pledge to tweet whatever I may learn on the front lines of the commute (so if you're at Dedham Corporate and there's a recalcitrant cow on the tracks, you'll know to decamp for 128).

At the very least, it'll give us something to do when we're standing on the platforms!

So c'mon, whaddaya say? Neighbors?

Now back to our regularly scheduled buffoonery and self-pity . . .