To be sad that no one would help

[Parpadew]

Emergency last night and I needed someone to drive a forty minute round trip. That's all. Never asked for this or any favour really before. I offered to pay. No one would help. Not my mum, siblings. One friend would have but she's on holiday. Got a taxi in the end but it was sheer luck one turned up as it's not a well covered part of the country.

Feel really alone right now!

I don't own a car. I live in a city. The train was not in the city. Obviously.

It's a 20 minute drive so unless they can walk at 30mph then it would be far longer than 40 mins to walk. More like a 5 hour walk.

I understand. This is kind thing is absolutely shit. I once had to take a £300 taxi for a similar reason…

was there a hotel near the station? That could have influenced my willingness to help if I was incredibly tired or stressed out.

Do they not like your partner/husband?

I'd do it for my family for sure. Especially as a one off.

And I don't find the situation unlikely at all, there's plenty of stations round here where you'd struggle to get a taxi. Especially if the trains were all screwed up. We don't even have Ubers.

@Shinyandnew1 what difference does it make really? I agree the op was initially a little unclear but updates (if people bother to read them) said it was her stranded and the "partner" bit was a rhetorical question. Loads of posters here seem to be going out of their way to be obtuse and find the most far reaching scenarios of why no-one could help, rather than seeing that yes it is pretty rubbish in a general sense.

Someone said "it's life, you're on your own" which I thought was pretty bloody depressing and explains a lot about why so many people are depressed, have anxiety, don't want to ask strangers for even small things like lifting a buggy up steps etc. Maybe we need to think about why so many posters are so keen to jump and nitpick at the op .. another symptom of the general nastiness these days or is it just online twattery and actually most people would in fact help if they possibly could?

OP if my sister's ex partner was stranded I wouldn't help him either because he was an abusive arse.

You are still active.

Do you drive?
Do you have a car?
Do you live with your partner?
Does your partner drive?
Does your partner have a car?
How old is your partner?

Why are you choosing not to answer these questions as this makes you look like an unreasonable person.

I agree. You can tell that a lot of posters must live in London or cities with plentiful public transport/taxis. A twenty minute drive would be a walk of over three hours, and given last night's driving rain it would have been extremely unpleasant. Add in no pavements or streetlights it would have potentially been quite dangerous. Some people just don't have a clue.

I find it staggering that these city dwellers have no concept of the actuality of country living. We don't even get Uber round here.

@Parpadew it would have helped if you had given the whole story in your first post instead of turning this thread into an episode of Twenty Questions. We aren't psychic.

Reading this thread makes me wonder more than ever why/how people live in the country. How do you manage when you can't walk to places? What if the car breaks down? It sounds like your house is a little island surrounded by an impassable ocean.

Sorry if I've got it wrong but so many people on this thread are saying they would never walk on the roads near them and there are no pavements anyway - I'd feel so stranded.

They do like him (he is nicer than me by most measures) but just couldn't be arsed. I have lied to him about why they didn't help and given fake excuses because he'd be really hurt.

I don't understand. If you live in a city, how was it not possible to get a taxi or uber from the city to go and pick up your DH from a rural station?

Well, you know what to do now when you are asked for a favour by those particular people. Lesson learned.

Are you going to give us any details at all? I still don't understand why you are calling this an emergency

I was responding to the poster who was referring to the Scotsrail incident and the knowledge that hotels were being paid for. You didn’t provide much context but someone else was trying to shed light, so that’s what I was referring to.

They may have had a drink of alcohol like OP admitted she normally does have wine in the evening.

So was the train meant to be getting to the city but stopped? Thenrelatives you asked, are they nearer the rural station? Where were you asking them to take your partner to?

@Squiblet we live in a city. The train broke down between cities. Do you never leave the city?

some people clearly never use trains very often and/or don’t live rurally!

it is not at all unusual for trains to terminate suddenly at a random station especially if the line is blocked and leave passengers stranded. most rural stations are unmanned and so the train staff will have next to no idea about what they could get locally either

Where I live, you have to book a taxi days in advance, uber isn’t a thing and there aren’t a bunch of hotels! That’s why it’s called a village not a town

I could walk from my nearest station as it’s about 3 miles but in the dark & wet I really wouldn’t fancy it and it would take a good 2 - 3 hours up & down hills and along unlit roads

No that's shite, I've done similar for someone I've met once. you have shitty friends.

Ah, I’ve just seen that update.

definitely not walking distance under these circumstances.

I was also wondering whether they don’t like him.
but it sounds as if they’re just really unkind (and lazy). :(

in these situations people sometimes unfortunately assume that “somebody else will surely do it”. Having too many people available therefore seems to have the opposite effect IME.

Does your partner not have any friends he could have asked?

Could you read the OP's posts???
She has made reference that it was her husband that was stranded due to an issue with the train service.
She was* *able to get a taxi but it took her 5 hours of trying to find one.
Had her husband tried to walk home it would have been in the dark and on roads where in parts (probably large parts given how long it took to get a taxi) there are no footpaths and if there are no footpaths, there is probably little or no street lighting.
It was late, it was dark and she only asked her relations could they collect her husband from the train station and drop him home and they refused.
I haven't seen reference to why the OP herself couldn't drive but perhaps she hasn't passed a driving test???

What is clear is that there is a very high percentage of responses to this thread that appear to live in well lit, well serviced areas where getting a taxi doesn't take longer than a few minutes and walking home if stranded is a safe activity.

OP - I can guarantee that there is a very high number of people who would have gone to get your husband or anyone they might know if they were in a similar situation. It seems though that we've encountered a lot of the people who would want to put said stranded people through the Spanish Inquisition before going to help them.

My parents live in a tiny village of three houses, in an extremely rural area. No train stations. Just three houses and a disused Norman church. Miles into the countryside via a single lane.

They cannot get Uber but they can and have called a taxi. At great expense obviously. The op did eventually get a taxi, so clearly that was in fact a possibility.

But those same conditions also make driving very dangerous. I don't think it would be unreasonable to prefer someone to sit in the safety of the train where they are sheltered, rather than risk driving in the dark with no lighting at all, in the driving rain, on country roads. The kind of pitch black you get out there even without rain is daunting enough. I don't think it's reasonable to risk my life or safety if the person needing rescuing was otherwise safe, just bored and inconvenienced.

If you live in a city why would it take you five hours to find a taxi?