Transported
Today Twinkie was in the shop, so we were down to one car, which doesn't really work for us. Maybe next year, when Mermaid Girl will take the bus to school and RW will be able to bike to work, but not right now, with me working across the bridge and RW needing to drop MG off at preschool in the mornings.
I got a ride to work with a co-worker, but she was staying late for a meeting and the other co-worker who gave me a ride back across the bridge could only take me as far as downtown. That was still better than the three-bus, hour-and-a-half one-way trip I would've had to do otherwise, so I was happy. I walked to the bus stop and sat on a bench and waited for the bus to my neighborhood. It was a sunny late afternoon and I had a book. People were all around me, ending their workdays or heading for dinner, people I didn't know, all with their own stories. Then on the bus I didn't have to do anything, didn't have to drive or pass or signal or worry about which route was best or what that funny noise is when I turn left. I could just sit there with my book (and I can still read on the bus! Yay! I don't get carsick like I do now in cars!) and wonder vaguely about the people around me and look out the window every now and then.
Then while we were stopped at the open drawbridge I was able to transfer to the bus that goes even closer to my house. And it turned out to be a poetry bus, poetry all over the walls, including some by 8th graders. This one was my favorite.
When I first moved here, I didn't have a car and I lived near the middle of the city. For a while I worked as a substitute clerk in the public library system. The scheduler would call me at 7:30 or so and ask if I could get to one branch or another by opening time at 9:30, and the answer was always yes. I took a lot of buses, sometimes for an hour or more each way. It was lovely, meditative time. Not like driving at all.
I wish I could take the bus now. But I don't have time.
I got a ride to work with a co-worker, but she was staying late for a meeting and the other co-worker who gave me a ride back across the bridge could only take me as far as downtown. That was still better than the three-bus, hour-and-a-half one-way trip I would've had to do otherwise, so I was happy. I walked to the bus stop and sat on a bench and waited for the bus to my neighborhood. It was a sunny late afternoon and I had a book. People were all around me, ending their workdays or heading for dinner, people I didn't know, all with their own stories. Then on the bus I didn't have to do anything, didn't have to drive or pass or signal or worry about which route was best or what that funny noise is when I turn left. I could just sit there with my book (and I can still read on the bus! Yay! I don't get carsick like I do now in cars!) and wonder vaguely about the people around me and look out the window every now and then.
Then while we were stopped at the open drawbridge I was able to transfer to the bus that goes even closer to my house. And it turned out to be a poetry bus, poetry all over the walls, including some by 8th graders. This one was my favorite.
When I first moved here, I didn't have a car and I lived near the middle of the city. For a while I worked as a substitute clerk in the public library system. The scheduler would call me at 7:30 or so and ask if I could get to one branch or another by opening time at 9:30, and the answer was always yes. I took a lot of buses, sometimes for an hour or more each way. It was lovely, meditative time. Not like driving at all.
I wish I could take the bus now. But I don't have time.
posted by elswhere | 10:13 PM
3 Comments:
i soooo wish i could use my commute time to DO something (besides reminding Harris NOT to wake sleeping Toby) productive, like reading or knitting (if i knew how). but as you'd imagine...public transportation in Texas is pretty much a laugh. and what would i do with the boys? i can only imagine that they'd be running up and down the buses...and it would take us an hour to do our 20 minute drive.
I would love to be able to take the bus too, but I too live in Texas where the bus only goes Downtown and I don't work downtown.
I read at railroad crossings!
I always get seasick but even more so if I'm not reading, even though reading makes it all a bit worse. Doesn't make sense at all but there you go.
I actually loathe buses w a passion, I do. The smells, the trepidation, gah, I am thankful for my car every day.
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