April 7: A Bus Ride

Yesterday, I got on a bus and rode it until it made a complete circle, dropping me off at the same stop I used to board it.
Here is a chronological order of bus activities:

12:14 - I arrived at the bus stop.
12:37 - I boarded the bus.
1:43 - The bus reaches the stop across the street from the one that I got on at.
2:20 - An announcement was made that the bus had reached the end of its route. The few people that were on remained seated, so I did the same as the bus started the route over.
2:41 - Driver change
3:05 - Bus completes its circle. I get off.

Here is a list of random thoughts I had on my journey:

• Bus riders have it right. I know some of them don't have the money for a car, but some of them do and they prefer to ride public transportation. These are people that don't necessarily care how long it takes them to get from point A to point B. They aren't rushing through life. I wonder how their levels of stress compare with the rest of society's.
• A woman just sneezed into her hand, snuck a peek into her palm and then grabbed the hand rail next to her seat.
• I like riding the bus because I'm not yelled at for not wearing a seat belt.
• Boy, they really strap in the wheelchairs, don't they? What a show! The driver lowers the ramp, folds the seat up, waits for the person in the wheelchair to park, and then uses two straps in the front and two in the back to anchor the chair down.
• Person A gets on. At the next stop, person B gets on and greets A with a skin-slap high five. One would think they're good friends, but when they both depart at different stops, I begin to wonder if they just recognize each other from riding the bus every day.
• At a particularly busy stop, while people are getting on and paying for their rides, a young man wearing bright yellow sunglasses in his early twenties loads his bicycle to the rack on the front of the bus. He has two lower lip piercings, long blonde hair that falls out of a black backwards ball cap and a long cigarette jutting from his mouth. He wears plaid shorts and a dirty wife-beater. His pale, white legs are scarred and scabbed as if he's been picking at them for weeks. He stands on the sidewalk just outside of the bus' door and takes a few more puffs. The driver and riders wait patiently as he takes the cigarette from his mouth and paints the burning end on a nearby streetlamp to extinguish its flame. He then bends down and places the end on the ground and rolls it between his thumb and middle finger to make sure it is completely put out. He says something to the driver as he walks up the stairs. He then points down the street and gives the driver a quizzical look. He needs to take a different bus.

Throughout the course of my ride:

• Four people struggled with their payment
• Fifty-nine people walked up the steps and took a seat
• Three of those fifty-nine people were riders that I had seen earlier
• Only one baby rode the Capital Metro Transit
• I had to share the seat next to me three times. Two guys and one girl.