Welcome to a retelling of my latest adventure on the 39! As many of you know, it's back to school time. This time of year makes me rather nostalgic. I feel the need to buy school supplies and sharpen pencils into what can best be described and school yard shivs. I want to bake things and wear sweaters. I get misty-eyed when I catch the smell of fireplace or burning leaves. I have a feeling that the majority of this nostalgia is manufactured by television or Disney. I grew up in the south and this time of year was still hot (it's going to hover around 80 degrees for the next week in Atlanta). I'm also shocked by the number of times I've smelled "fireplace". Seriously folks, is it that cold in your house? Open the windows and let some of the heat in.
Along with all this nostalgia comes a feeling of dread. I now dread school being back in session. I don't go to school, at least not yet, but the kids are back. The nearly teenager free bus that I have enjoyed these few months has changed. The kids who sit one to a seat, the ones who stand in the aisles and block my ability to exit the bus, and the ones who chatter on about inanity, are all back ruining my bus ride home. If they're not riding the city bus, they're riding the yellow bus. This yellow bus is magic. Not the Magic bus (which is kind of a stupid song about a guy buying the bus he rides everyday to visit his girlfriend... maybe he should just buy a car), but magical in the sense that it has the power to create traffic snarls that add roughly 30 to 45 minutes to my commute. Yes, it's true. I have no love for those attending school right now. The pill is too bitter, and I've just swallowed it. When the aftertaste finally fades, I'll resign myself to the facts of crappy teenagers on my bus.
Today, I saw something that helped me forget about everything that was mentioned above. There was a man on the bus, who I didn't even notice until he was trying to get off the bus. He was sitting in the front, and as you know, I like to sit in the back. His stop was on Centre St. near the Purple Cactus (yummy burritos if you're ever in JP, but not if you're my friend who I can't mention on the Internet. She does not enjoy the 2:1 rice and beans to meat ratio). In this poor man's attempt at getting off the bus, he nearly takes out the front section of seats with his walker. Apparently he had folded it to keep it out of the way. Whilst unfolding this contraption, he found the need to swing it about as though it were alive. Similar to the way a fish on the line will thrash with all it's might. The walker was the fish. I'm actually surprised that no one clubbed it to death. The Walker Wrangler finally righted himself and his walker, and proceeded to exit the bus. Now, these are kneeling buses, which means that they have some sort of hydraulic capability to lower themselves (even though I always imagine them kneeling in church listening to a priest), but WW didn't even blink an eye at the nearly two foot drop from bus to curb. He simply placed his walker on the ground and used it as a pivot point, much like a gymnast on the parallel bars. WW then proceeded to cross the street while carrying the walker in front of himself. By god, he'd do what the doctor told him, but he was going to do it his way (that's my impression of how he thinks). The bus drove away too soon. I would have enjoyed watching him carry his walker for a while, but that wasn't to be. I was on my way to another day. I hope the Walker Wrangler got to where he was going without having to use his walker, that he was able to stand on his own two feet and not feel gravity pulling his shoulders to the ground. I wish this for myself and for anyone who reads this.
For your listening pleasure. HUGE disclaimer. This was the only decent version of this song that I could find on youtube, but some guy set his screenshots from The Sims to this song. My suggestion is to listen to it with the window minimized, otherwise, it's really creepy.
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