#9 in the Transit Epiphanies Series

This is going to be a multi-ride pass of bus stories I never got around to blogging:

1/20/2007--the coldest day I ever waited for a bus. There's a wild snowstorm that attacked the city around 1 pm and the Library has closed early. I am very glad I had the foresight that morning to wear my boots to work, but I'm a little irked that I felt the need to wear a skirt. Like everyone else, I exodus to the bus at 5 pm, hoping to get out of downtown within a couple of hours, traffic and snow being what it is.

I'm waiting at the bus stop and the 55 never comes. A young, cheerful guy is waiting with me. Everyone else is cranky, cold and occasionally mustering up the energy to state the bloomin' obvious, "the bus is late." It's been over 40 minutes and I begin to count the buses that go by. This is the second 38 I've seen, the third 24 and the third 71. I make a joke to my transit pal, "We're playing Texas Hold'em with buses!" He laughs and sez, "Yeah, we are! Check it out, I got two of a kind!" as a 71 whizzes past. We start taking serious note of the bus numbers. I'm up to two pair and he has five of a kind before a winner is declared. The winner is the person whose bus arrives first.

A couple of days later, I catch the last 55 heading south. We don't get more than three blocks when the bus stops abruptly in the middle of Main Street. No one pays any attention as we wait. But after about three minutes, passengers begin craning to see what the hold up is and we notice the bus driver getting agitated. Seems there's a car stopped in the middle of Main. And all the honking, yelling and obscene gestures can't get this blind, deaf, and idiotic auto-bovine to move.

Our bus driver angrily puts the bus in park and stomps off the bus. Those of us up front watch him walk to the driver's side of the stopped car and point angrily at the bus and then shake his finger in the driver's face. We watch our driver storm back to the bus, get back on and sit down heavily. He smacks his hands on the large steering wheel, then grips it tightly for a moment. His hands loosen on the wheel and the bus driver lets go. He quietly open the door again and steps off the bus. This time, he hails a cop, points to the obstinate driver and then returns to his bus.

The cop takes it from there. He saunters over to the reason for the by now cacophonous traffic jam and pleasantly addresses the driver. The driver still doesn't move. The cop leisurely pulls out his pad and issues the nuisance a ticket. The bus passengers cheer, the bus driver pastes a self-satisfied smile on his face and the inducer of road rage moves his car to the side of the road. Seems he's there to pick someone up from work and he's waiting for the person to arrive.

As the 55 starts making its way south, some of the passengers begin a conversation about evolution and road rage. I can't see the correlation myself, and go back to the book in my iPod.

8/20/08--I get the afternoon off for having worked a 14 hour day the night before. I'm boarding the 57 South Oak, which isn't a bad bus to ride and usually more interesting than the 55. Right after I board, a very strange, but nice enough man gets on. He's wearing a short sleeve shirt and khaki pants. Around his shin is tied a blue bandanna. It's a strange fashion statement, but, hey, could be seen on Project Runway next week.

The man sits down and greets the person next to him, a Metro bus driver on his way to pick up his next run, with, "Hey there Metro man, Metro Dan metro!". Loquacious Bandannaleg starts digging through his belongings, "I know it's here, I know I have it. My transfer is in my pants. My transfer is in my box. I'm on my tenth cigarette. I sit right here next to the metro bus man." The resting driver doesn't even look at his seatmate who continues the running commentary on In Search of...Bus Transfers.

"Bless yer heart. It's here, it's right here. What? Yes, sir, kind man. I'll sit down and shut up. It's in my bag. It's in my pants. There's my cigarettes! Oh, here it is. Here you are, sir." It's about five stops since Bandannaleg boarded and he holds out his bus pass to the driver and the driver points to the fare box. Bandannaleg gets up from his seat, clutching his pants and says, "Bless yer heart, man. Thank you. Thanks for your driving, Mr. Metro Driver Man, Driver Dan, Metro Man."

It's no wonder I'm not getting any reading done any more on the bus.

Bus du Freak

#78 in in the Transit Epiphanies

I've been riding the bus regularly, green girl that I am, but it's a very boring bus line. Nothing interesting happens on the 55. Everybody reads, though. I spend my rides craning my neck and straining my eyeballs trying to readsdrop on my fellow passengers.

But occasionally I have to take the Max. Last Tuesday, I had to pull an unexpected 14 hour day at la libraire. The work part doesn't suk, but the not-having-anything-to-gnosh-for-dinner and having-to-take-the-bus -home-at-9:30pm parts kinda do.

I was dog tired when I climbed on the 9:22 Max at Petticoat Lane. And my mood didn't improve when I spotted the smart-mouthed Vietnam vet from a couple of bus rides ago. He's very chatty and a bit of a pushy wanker who wants to talk to everyone. He gives me the hairy eyeball and I glare back with my best "keep it to your effing self, slimebag" look.

But one of my favorite passengers is on the bus. A very large and jolly African-American man who carries a pink boom box with him and at least three pieces of luggage. He's never any trouble. Just talks to himself or any rider who'll chat back. But it's obvious he's not having a good day today. He's sitting in the seat behind the bus driver and staring at his reflection in the window. He's saying, "Talk about food. Talk about chicks. Talk about the...Not today. Gotta go. Not on the phone. Not today." He shakes his finger at his reflection and says, "Not today. Gotta go."

The mouthy vet starts bitching about how hot it is on the bus. It's about 67 degrees outside and the driver, bless her, has turned off the AC. Having just come from the Arctically-temped library I'm not interested in the vet's kvetching. But he turns to me and sez, rudely, "Hey! Ainchu hot? Ain't it hot in here? How 'bout some AC, huh?" I say, loudly, "I'm not warm." No one else says anything. It's a crowded bus, but everyone is eerily quiet, as if they're waiting for something to surface. One of the downtown CID bike officers sits in the seat behind me.

Badday Jollyman continues to stare at his reflection in the window, saying, "Not today. Hey, fella. I gotta go." The vet keeps trying to start conversation with everyone on the bus, but no one's having any. He remarks on my cons, calls them PF flyers. Continues to stare. I stare back. I have perfected the blank, don'tfuckwithme stare. Anyone who wears contact lenses can do this. We stick shit in our eyes every day. We can stare down any badass on the bus.

The Vet thinks the Badday Jollyman is talking to him since he's, well, TALKING to somebody. And the Vet starts in, "Hey, man, you're freaking me out. Do not freak me out. I don't care how big you are, don't freak me out. I'll freak you up. I'm a Vietnam vet. Don't freak me out. Don't like to be freaked out."

This is what the other passengers were afraid would happen. It's just hot enough to annoy the shit out of everyone, but not so hot anyone will throw a punch or pull a switchblade.

Then the Badday Jollyman turns to the Vet and says something about Tina Turner and Luke Skywalker. He turns back to the window, points his finger at his reflection and says, "You keep that girl to yourself. Luke Skywalker was a rapper!" The Vet pipes up and says, "No, he's a producer!" Badday Jollyman replies, "Luke is nasty. Get back, Luke, that's nasty." To the window, "I said, keep back, that's nasty. Whoever you are, you have no business coming into QuickTrip."

The mugginess of the bus overtakes the Vet and the Jollyman and they fall silent. The CID officer gets off at 39^th Street and says he'll see me tomorrow. He notices I've been scribbling furiously and grins. The Vet gets off at the Plaza. He leers once more at me and my notebook. I deadstare over his shoulder as he gets off the bus. Jollyman gets off at Il Centro. I miss him already.

But Will He Have a Bus Pass?

#50 in the Transit Epiphany Series

This morning the first 55 Rockhill bus is early. It's always early. It's supposed to pick me up at 6:53 but if I'm not at the stop by 6:45, I'm SOL. The bus picks me up and I settle into a seat. Then the bus stops short. The guy in the seat in front of me calls out to the driver, "Sir?" and looks out the right side of the bus.

I see a woman in a tan jacket, big gold hoop earrings and a perky caramel beret with fists full of crushed soda cans and plastic water bottles waving an arm at the bus. The driver stops and the woman strolls over to the door. She climbs the first two stairs and instead of feeding the fare box, leans into the bus, looks at all of us passengers and says, in a firm, optimistic voice, "Jesus sez there'll be murculls. Onct a month. If you claim 'em." She nods once at us, looks at the bus driver and nods again before hopping off the bus.

The bus passengers are thoughtful for a moment, stunned by this cheery message. I replay what the woman said in my mind over and over and think, "Yes, she's correct. Jesus said there'd be miracles. We claim them, when we recognize them."

I think, for a second, that woman is one of them.

#59 in the 47 Roanoke: Transit Epiphanies series

On October 26 I rode the 47 Roanoke home for the last time. I was moving from the Roanoke neighborhood over to Brookside and would be taking a new bus to and from work.

I thought it would be an uneventful ride until I saw "handicapped seat" at the bus stop. You remember him. He's the fat, filthy, grizzed Santafreak who grumbled at me for sitting in the handicapped seat he wanted and called me "four eyes."

Since I caught sight of him in time, when I got on the bus, I bypassed his favorite seat and sat by the second door in the middle of the bus. A middle-aged woman was sitting behind "Bad Santa" when we all got on the bus. After a couple of seconds she whooshes "ooooooEEEEEE!" and moves to the back seat of the bus. Apparently Santa is smelly and it's beginning to waft across the aisle and I struggle to open my window. The bus hasn't started moving yet, we're waiting for the clock to reach the departure time. The woman who moved to the back of the bus suddenly charges up the aisle, demanding to be let off the bus, "Lemme out. Lemme out NOW! Stankin' fool." She will take the 6:05. No doubt it will be more aromatic.

I decide to take her place at the back of the bus, right next to an open window. The bus starts its slow rumble up Main and two blocks later a young Mexican woman in running shoes gets on and sits in the double seat behind "Aromatherapy Santa." One stop later she moves closer to the back of the bus and struggles to open her window. A chubby girl in a great white skirt with gold and orange sequins trimming it helps her open the window. Sequin Skirt looks at me after helping Running Shoes and we all start to giggle as we realize why we're sitting in the back.

"Santa Stank" begins to mumble to himself and Sequin Skirt pulls out a cheap bottle of Raspberry Fling roll on perfume and offers it all around telling us to take a healthy whiff. "It'll block da' smail!" Running Shoes and I do it. Sequin Skirt tells us she bought it in a gas station on Brooklyn for a dollar. I fish in my bag for my tin of Altoids and pass those around, too. We all start laughing about the unbearable stench in the bus and Sequin Skirt says, "Yeah, this'll keep you sinus clear!" as she takes two Altoids. Running Shoes says thank you politely and the guy in front of me takes the whole tin, pours a handful into his palm and gives it back. I just grin.

We continue to giggle like fifth graders at "Santa Stench" who continues to grumble to himself and turn around to shoot withering glares at us for laughing in the back of the bus. All of us have our faces pressed up to the small open spaces in the window, breathing in the cool air. Sequin Skirt says, "Man, I rather be col' than breathe dat stanky butt!" Running Shoes and I crack up at this.

When we get to Running Shoes stop, she looks at me and Sequin Skirt for a beat and says goodbye and thanks. I tell her goodbye and feel a little drop in my chest. I won't see her again. The next time I need to ride the bus, I will be on the Max, the suburbanites' bus. Two stops later, it's my turn and Stinka Claus gets off at that stop, too. I turn to Sequin Skirt and tell her her outfit is sensational. She smiles proudly and tells me she made the skirt herself. I am very impressed and again, feel a little pang. I won't see Sequin Skirt again, either. She says, "Have a good one. See ya nex' time!" I toss a grin back and get off the bus. Santa Smells is wobbling his way into D.B. Cooper's and I start walking down Bell.

It's the last time I will walk this street and I look at everything closely, to make sure I can take it all with me.

#161 in the Transit Epiphanies Series

I have new buses to ride now. And I have a lot of choice. I can ride the 51, the 55, the 51X or the MAX.

I have a much shorter walk to and from my bus stop, but I never take the same bus to and from work. I'm too lazy to get up in time to catch the 55. DJClem drops me off at the corner of 59th and Ward Parkway so I can catch either the 51, 51X or the MAX.

The first time I rode the 51X I didn't like it. I ride with some bloodthirsty people and they are all blond women "of a certain age." They have sensible hair and earmuffs. I engaged in one of my favorite public hobbies, readsdropping and notice that one of them is reading In Cold Blood and another is reading The Empty Chair by James Patterson. The third person is reading a Mrs. Pollifax mystery. Nothing gory in that gentle little book.

But I do notice that we are all quiet. The bus driver has gold teeth and a sunshiny grin. He teases me when I get on the bus because I had to run the last half block to get on. He says good morning and I laugh and huff while I swipe my bus pass. This busride is eerily quiet and all the passengers are suburbanites.

I do not feel civilized enough to live in my new neighborhood. I wasn't cool enough for my old one and I'm not refined enough for this one. I'll get used to it.

The 55 going home is a little different. A blind lady rides with me every night. It's my job to tell her which bus is ours. Lots of buses stop at our stop and she needs to be certain she gets on the right one. The first time I ride the 55 a grandmotherly figure is driving. The blind lady asks Grandriver to drop her at 59th. It's too dark to see the bus stop. I ask if there's a stop at 61st and Grandriver says, "I'll make one."

The MAX is the bus I take in the morning. It's always crowded with business and office folk from the outer lying suburbs before we get into midtown and all the interesting people get on. There's Tweaky. She gets on at Linwood and is whippet thin. Not scrawny, just thin and sharp. Everything about her--her lips, her legs, her hair, her face--is sharp and thin. She has this high-pitched voice and talks like a projekt chik. She twitches a lot.

Until yesterday, there was never anything interesting about the bus riders on my new bus lines. Yesterday, something interesting happened. This tall guy in a Chiefs jacket and red ball cap, carrying a bottle of soda, got on the bus. He leaned against the bus wall behind the driver and when the bus lurched, he dropped his soda. It didn't spill, but he let out a "Dayyy--um." Some folks got off at the next stop and he sat down in one of the handicapped seats and pulled out his cell phone, flipped it open and tapped out a number. As usual, the MAX is full of quiet office-folk reading books, the morning paper, plugged into the morning news on NPR, snoozing, staring out the window, but not talking to each other. It's like riding a graveyard to work, I swear.

But THIS guy breaks the silence with, "Hey! Hey, is Peggy there? Peggy? Is she there? Put her on." I glance over, interested that FINALLY, there's some noise on this bus. Dude says, "Peggy? You 'member me? You know who this is? This is the tall white guy you used to cheat on!" INSTANTLY everyone on the bus looks up from whatever it is they're not doing and tunes in. The double take of the other bus riders cracks me up. It's a cranial chorus line to the left to look at the Cuckold. His Cheated Hart goes on, "Yeah, I bin outta town breakin' horses and ridin' bulls. Hey, how's yer sister?"

Maybe the MAX ain't so boring.

#17 in the Transit Epiphanies Series

In a not so desperate attempt to avoid completion of the book proposal I promised my editor last Monday (hell, i promised it in flippin' December 2004. The woman has the patience of Penelope. I'm her biblio-Odysseus, flailing around in the world and not quite getting my act together.) here's another entry for Toast in the Bus Ride Follies.

Yesterday I rode home with my favorite bus driver. She's a large black woman with the most generous laugh and body and spirit. I see her and just want to climb right into her and I know I'll be in heaven. She's the kind of person that the only thing you see when you look at her is HER. Not her body, not her face, not her color. She wears HERSELF on the outside. You'd have to be made of granite not to smile just by looking at her.

She's laughing and talking and hooting at the passengers, her friend in the front seat, other drivers, pedestrians. Some fancy white car with cheap looking gold chrome stuck its nose out a little too far in the intersection. She taps the horn, waves, and says, "Gi' bak, honey! Ah tare yo grill off! Shoo'." She steps on the gas and revs the motor and we go flying up a short hill in downtown. She stops short to let on some passengers and those of us in the back bounce in our seats. Some wacky guy gets off the bus in downtown, about three stops from where he got on. He hoists his overstuffed backpack onto his back. You can tell he's a traveling homeless. In return for the free short ride, he sat up front and told animated stories to the bus driver. When he gets off the bus, the driver cackles lovingly and says, "He strang. Look at 'im, but he goo'. He goo'." And the guy trots across the street in front of the bus and starts flapping his arms as if he's about to take off for St. Louis. The passengers watching him walk away smile and laugh.

The bus stops short again in the West Bottoms and she yells at a young teen on a skateboad. He's contemplating the rush hour traffic on Summit and how to cross the street. "Li'l boy! Li'l boy! Don' go out dere!" she hollers as we drive by. He can't hear us, but he does stop. She's that powerful.

She resumes her conversation with her friend in the front seat. She talks about picking up her paycheck and going to the boats. Her seat bounces with every little dip and rise in the poorly repaired street. The bus stops and someone tries to use the rear exit. The door doesn't open. She hollers back, "Lee' it 'lone! Lee' it 'lone! Don' brayk it. Shoo'. We lucky this bus don' brayk dayown." Everyone laughs with her and we make jokes about the metro buses. She tells a story about a driver who had one of the new buses and it broke down and he couldn't finish his route.

I put away my book the minute I saw who the driver was and moved up to listen to her talk. I think I grinned like a simpleton the entire ride. When she gets to my stop she tells me to "have a good one." I tell her she's my favorite bus driver. She laughs that big worldengulfing laugh and smiles wide enough to feed the universe. She says, "You goo', baby. You goo'."

#77 in the Transit Epiphanies Series

Editor's Note: I'm moving all my favorite blog posts from the MySpace page. I'm using the original post date so I know when I wrote certain posts. The only changes made are typographical or grammatical.

MToast likes to hear my bus stories and has been needling me to put them up on the page, so Toast, these little tales of vehicular weirdness are for you.

Who rides my bus, the 47 Roanoke? Well, quite a few folks, but it's the memorable characters you want to hear about.

The DragonLady is a surly woman who sits up front in the handicapped seats. She doesn't move for anyone. If you got on the bus holding a lung in one hand and your bus pass in the other, she wouldn't move over for you. She's got the looooooonnnnnnnngggggest fingernails I've ever seen. They are painted a myriad of colors and have little jewels, cartoons, stars, swirls, you name it. I wonder what she does for a living. Just what the hell could a person DO with nails like that?!? And I'm sorry, but her hands ain't that great looking. So she's not a hand model.

Jolly Esperanza used to get on the bus down in the West Bottoms, but she's recently moved and she's much happier. She picks the bus up at a much safer location. She is the nicest strangerlady I've ever seen. She's always in a good mood, always says hello and my day is made better just by her getting on the bus.

Her polar opposite is Cranky Sporty Lady. A scrawny pale woman in loose-fitting grey or washed-out blue sweats. She sits in the back of the bus and scowls.

Graphic Girl gets on at the stop right after mine because I'm too lazy to walk to her stop. She wears business-casual lingerie tops with slacks that should grab her butt but don't. They just hang off her ass. I call her Graphic Girl because she looks like a graphic artist. She's trying for that hipster downtown look and missing by inches but enough to notice. I can smell near miss on her like last year's trendy perfume.

Graphic Guy gets on a stop or two after Graphic Girl. Same deal, except he's ably managed the downtown hipster look. He watches Top Model and that makes me NOT want to have a drink with him.

Lost Beat Lady looks at her photos when she rides the bus and is always about one second behind whatever is happening.

Hipster Waiter sat next to me. He is dangerous-cute. Bad call on the occupation, though. He works for KMBC. He has lots of interesting tattoos and I bet he's a camera guy. He's lean in a white shirt, black jeans, one silver ring and cool shades. It's 100 flippin' degrees out and the dude does NOT sweat. He's in BLACK. He's the kind of smartsexyinteresting guy I'd hit on in a club if I were still doing that sort of thing. I just know he has interesting things to say. Let's start with the tats and the job.

Tattooed Mama is new. She has a big heart tattoo on her right bicep and her hand is clutching the industrial size Big Gulp cup from 7 Eleven. It could hold an entire liter of soda. She has electric blue finger nails and is reading something but I can't tell what book it is.

BeeBopGeek Boy is wearing the latest pair of futuristic deafphones and bobbing his head erratically in time to whatever is being piped into his lobes.

The Smiling Schizo has only ridden twice but he makes every trip memorable. The first time he sat in the back talking to himself in an off-beat intelligent way. I thought he had one of those StarTrek earpiece phones and was talking to someone in a Blockbuster trying to pick out a movie. He kept talking about Eddie Murphy. I knew he was a bit off when he mentioned Eddie Murphy and William Safire in the same garbled sentence and said "We're on the Red October! We're turning right, is everyone with me? Second turn SAT. Right turn SAT." He smiles the entire time. The second time I saw the Smiling Schizo he was telling passengers to "Talk to your parents. Talk to your children. Most of those brothers look like that. National Shirt Shop. None of those brothers look like that. None of those girls look like that. If I can get one thousand in plastic I can get five thousand in plastic. Ain't nuthin' but big business." His monologues are the verbal equivalent of Chex party mix.