Po-Russky

Po-Russky is one of the few Russian phrases I know, and if I remember it correctly, it just means "speaks Russian." I also can say please (Pozhalujsta) and thank you (Spasibo). And, of course, the ever useful "Ja ljublju tebja" (which sort of sounds like "Yellow blue bus," and means "I love you") as well as the ever more useful "Ja shozhu po tebe s uma," which means, roughly translated, "You are driving me INSANE."

I figured this little Russian lesson was as good a way as any to start off a post about The Russian. At the very least, you've learned something useful should the communists finally take over at long last, right?

But here's the thing about The Russian: I have no evidence whatsoever that The Russian is actually Russian. I've never heard him talk, and aside from asking to see his Green Card, which seems unnecessarily intrusive, I'm not sure how else I'd be able to tell.

The Russian is named "The Russian," though, because he LOOKS Russian to me. First, there's his face, which very much reminds me of the face of a Russian scientist I used to work with years ago (and whom I had a major crush on, I might add -- he was utterly hunkazoidal). And then there's his body -- not fat, but somewhat stocky and strong. And then there's his taste in clothing -- not quite right somehow, suggesting that he may be foreign.

And then there's the real dead giveaway: his stoicalness. (Note: I actually prefer the look of the word "stoicness" there, but apparently, it is incorrect. "Stoicalness" looks ridiculous, though, doesn't it? And it sounds ridiculous too -- try it out. Nevertheless, stoicalness it is, as these days, with hunched-over grammarians skulking around every corner, it's best to reserve poetic license arguments for when they are really and truly necessary. Say, for example, the next time I use the word "hunkazoidal.")

Russian Scientist was also very stoic. And it was a very distinctive type of stoicalness, too -- the same type I see in The Russian. Not just quiet, but disarmingly calm as well. Calm and quiet, but also firmly in control of the situation, though not necessarily willing to step forward and take action unless absolutely required to. Calm, quiet, and firmly in control of the situation, but also somewhat cautious, looking around as though suddenly aware that things are not going quite as anticipated. Calm, quiet, firmly in control, cautious, and very, very alert. All at the same time. All wrapped into one stocky, oddly-dressed package on the bus.

Also, though this is likely an ignorant thing to say, both Russian Scientist and The Russian look like solid men who have stood in long lines for hours waiting for loaves of bread or shoes. You would get stoic and calm and quiet and cautious after that, don't you think? Do Russians still have to wait in long lines for food and shoes? I confess to not knowing much about Russia these days -- I've been infernally confused ever since the USSR shattered and changed its name and broke regions up into other countries. Commonwealth of Independent States? But "CCCP" looked so much cooler on tee-shirts!

Anyway, The Russian is on my afternoon bus almost every day. That bus is usually quite crowded, and whenever it is that he is getting on (not at my stop, but at a previous one), he is usually left standing in the aisle. Since I'm typically the first person on at my stop, I often end up standing directly in front of him, looking back at him every time we hit another stop just in case someone is coming up behind us to get off the bus.

Yesterday was my first "conversation" with The Russian. It went like this:

[empty seat finally opens up -- it is located directly between me and The Russian]

Me: Do you want to sit down?

The Russian: [mute, tips head in direction of seat, blinking eyes at the same time, symbolizing, "No, you take it."]

This is typical for The Russian. I have seen him have other "conversations" with people on the bus in which they talk to him and he responds with nods, shaking of his head, weak smiles, or a look of stoic, calm, cautious waiting-ness. I have never seen his mouth open to let words or even the most basic of phonetic sounds come out. I find this intriguing. He clearly speaks English, as he not only seems to understand what people are saying to him, but also carries books and newspapers that are written in English. But why so quiet?

Is The Russian Russian? Someday I hope to hear his voice, and to discover that I was right about him. But then there's the fear of finding out I was wrong -- my God, what if The Russian turns to speak to me and what comes out is a Southern drawl? What if he's from the OTHER Georgia, the one down there with Alabama and South Carolina? What will that do to my worldview, I wonder?

Aside from, perhaps, making me a little less likely to judge people simply by the way they stand in an aisle on a crowded bus, exuding serenity with a stoicalness unmatched by any other, wearing an odd-colored, too-short tie with a checked, short-sleeved, button-down shirt tucked unevenly into strangely ill-fitting, retro-colored pants. Hmmm. Food for thought.

Charts and Graphs

Last summer, I moved into a new neighborhood, and that's when I started to take a smaller commuter bus instead of a massively packed regular-route bus. It was then that I really started to notice riders, primarily because the same riders tend to be on that bus every single day.

The first person I ever took notice of on my new commuter bus was Charts and Graphs. Figured it was probably about time I wrote something about her. I first noticed her when she irritated me with her early-morning giddiness. Our bus driver had announced that it was his last day on the route, and she broke into happy, grateful applause, practically bouncing in her seat (not happy he was leaving, but instead happily applauding his greatness). I'm not sure why that irritated me, but it did.

Since then, what I've primarily noticed about Charts and Graphs is her love of, well, charts and graphs. Almost every day on the bus, when she's not chatting with Nice Lady, C&G has a steno notebook out and is drawing up elaborate charts and graphs that make no sense (to me, anyway). I have often sat near her and sneaked peeks at her pad, and I never can figure out what the heck she is doing. Often, the charts will consist of multiple circles, overlapping, into which various things will be written. But though that makes one think instantly of a Venn Diagram (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venn_diagram), it's not really what she's doing. Things in the circles don't seem to overlap with each other, or even relate to one another.

Other times, she will be scribbling things into a calendar book, but they aren't calendar items -- they're more like to-do lists that don't seem related to any particular date. I've seen her actually go through multiple calendar books -- she fills one up with scribbles and then buys a new one.

At first I thought maybe she was just nuts. But a few times, I've seen her write logical lists of things. Things to remember to pack in her suitcase for a trip, financial goals to reach before retirement. The lists usually make sense. It's the charts and graphs, some of which become quite elaborate, that are total mysteries to me.

I have to confess I'm really hoping that one day she sets her steno pad down on an empty seat and then forgets to pick it back up so I can go through it. Isn't that awful of me? But by this time, after a year of watching Charts and Graphs scribble away, I'm absolutely dying for a chance to see what it is she's doing that requires so MUCH note-taking and diagram-drawing. It doesn't seem work-related. It seems like private life kind of stuff. What the heck is Charts and Graphs up to? I just can't figure it out.

Anyway, now, a year later, Charts and Graphs no longer irritates me with her excessively sunny outlook. She's become more of an enigma over time -- less predictable, less cliche. Plus, the fact that Nice Lady likes her tells me she can't be all bad or all crazy. Nice Lady, though very nice, doesn't make friends with everybody on the bus (incidentally, she's taken to calling me "dear" periodically now, which suggests to me she's decided I'm a keeper). She's discerning. I suppose that means Charts and Graphs is interesting to her as well. Strange what people do on buses to pass the time. Though I do prefer frenzied scribblings to nose picking. On the whole.

Frog-Face Girl, You're the One for Me

This morning, one of my favorite passengers was back on the bus. She kind of comes and goes, and I like to watch her and try to figure out why. For a time, I thought maybe she was retired and just riding the bus to run errands or do something fun. But she carries too much stuff for casual trips -- and when I finally caught a glimpse of the inside of her bag and saw a sack lunch, I decided she must actually have a job. A job with a flexible schedule, perhaps. Maybe some kind of volunteer thing, even.

Anyway, it's not really her sporadic attendance that intrigues me the most about her. The real reason she's one of my favorite passengers to watch is because she has the most interesting face I have ever seen on a human being (and that's including the woman who used to ride my old bus and was nicknamed "Herman Munster" for reasons that would be obvious if you saw her). In my head, I call this woman "Frog-Face Girl," but though it sounds mean, it's really not meant to be derogatory. It's just that FFG has the face of a very, very unhappy frog. Well, actually, it's more the face of a toad. In fact, it's the face of Toad from the "Frog and Toad" childrens' books. But "Toad-Face Girl" doesn't have the same ring to it as "Frog-Face Girl," and once my brain latched onto the F-F alliteration, I haven't been able to shake the moniker since.

I realize the name "Frog-Face Girl" sounds utterly awful -- like I think she's ugly or green or disfigured in some way, with bulging eyes and slimy amphibious skin. But the connotation of that phrase does not really match my intention for it. In reality, I think she's one of the most beautiful older women I've ever seen, and most of the time I'm watching her, I'm thinking to myself, "Man, what I wouldn't give to have a face like that."

FFG is not actually a girl -- in fact, she's probably in her 70's, and her face and gravity have clearly been duking it out for some time. Gravity seems to be ahead by a nose -- well, by more than a nose, to be honest -- but I have to say, it's only done her appearance good in the long run. I think if her face were younger, tighter, it would not be worth looking at twice. But her face now -- if I could sculpt, I would sculpt the curved shapes and droops of her face. If I could paint, I would paint the shadowy creases and crags of her face. But I can neither sculpt nor paint, and now that I'm in the middle of this, I'm realizing I can also not do it full justice with words.

Suffice it to say, I spend a lot of time looking at FFG while she's on the bus. And while I look, I confess I like to wonder about what her life is like. She must have an amazing life, mustn't she? With a face that interesting and classy? Her husband must be a fascinating man, smart and affectionate. Hers is the kind of face that would inspire theories on the nature of the universe, so maybe he's a physicist or a philosopher. Or a poet.

Or, I suppose it's possible he sells insurance and comes home every evening beaten down and exhausted. As he comes into the living room and sets down his briefcase, he looks at his wife's froggy face in the flashing light of the evening TV show. She sits stiffly in her chair, knitting things no one will ever wear, and he sighs quietly and thinks to himself, rrrrrrrrribbit!

He doesn't know what he's got, and she could do so much better.

I confess I worry sometimes about Frog-Face Girl. She's not a happy person -- at least, she isn't when she's on the bus. She just sits there, still and quiet, not opening a book or looking around but instead perching straight up on her seat with her hands crossed in her lap, pursing her lips like someone who wants to say something to a misbehaving child but doesn't have the energy or motivation to actually open her mouth and speak.

I love Frog-Face Girl's hair most of all. Oh, how I envy her hair. I'm utterly green with envy. Frog green. Toad green. She has long, wavy hair that corresponds perfectly with the curves of her face, and she wears it up in a loose bun with a large clip holding it all in place in the back. Strands fall down onto her shoulders, and it's just so beautifully swept -- so casual and yet so dignified, somehow. Her gray is more a very pale, silvery yellow and it's there in streaks that almost look intentional. It's exactly the kind of hairstyle I should be wearing as a librarian. But instead, I have extremely short hair, and it's virtually impossible to make it look serious and knowledgeable. But Frog-Face Girl's hair? Looks serious and knowledgeable to me.

I suppose I don't have anything profound to say about Frog-Face Girl, now that I'm here. I simply find her fascinating and I wanted to try to put into words just why. I wonder what life would be like if one looked like she did. I wonder what she was like when she was younger, before whatever it was that gave her lips that permanent purse happened to her. I wonder what her hair looks like when it is down, after she's woken up in the morning and padded into the bathroom to brush it and put its clip in place. I wonder if her husband looks at her the way I do, with such an intense appreciation for the way her face looks in the early morning sunshine. That sounds like a weird thing to say, really. But if I were a man, I honestly don't think I'd be able to take my eyes off her. Heck, I'm a woman, and I can't seem to take my eyes off her. I don't know why, but I feel somewhat passionately curious about Frog-Face Girl.

I wonder if someday I'll get the opportunity to sit next to her and strike up some kind of conversation. Would she talk to a wrackin' frackin' young'un like me? Or would she just tip her head, tighten her mouth, and turn her straightened back in my direction, staring out the window instead, her face unhappy. Her eyes stern.

Frog-Face Girl, I have only two words for you: Don't settle.

Tone-Deaf Singing Guy

Yesterday was one of those rare, perfect spring days here in My Town, USA. After months and months of unceasing rain, and I do mean unceasing, it was like being reborn when I walked outside after work and discovered the clouds had disappeared and the light had come out. It was clear, sunny, bright, and the absolute, most perfect temperature -- warm enough that I immediately shed my coat, but not so warm that I worked up a sweat hoofing it up the hill to the bus stop to go home.

All winter long, I've pretty much dreaded my end-of-day wait at the bus stop. It's been 15-20 minutes every evening in the dark, in the rain, in the cold, after a long day at work, EVERY DAY. So, today, with the sun shining and the breeze tickling the little hairs on my now-exposed, vampirically winter-pale arms, I was surprised to discover I was actually looking forward to it. A few quiet minutes spent standing in the sunshine, breathing in the warmth and reading my book -- not a bad way to end a day. I tromped up the hill to the bus stop, pulled out my paperback, and took my usual spot standing just outside the shelter and leaning against its support beam. But only moments after arriving and settling into position, I knew things were not going to go quite as planned. Because there was someone new at the bus stop. Someone instantly dubbed Tone-Deaf Singing Guy, for reasons that are about to become apparent.

The other day, as some of you may know, the new Bruce Springsteen album came out -- the tribute-to-Pete-Seeger album, We Shall Overcome. Lots of people were abuzz about it all week long. And, apparently, one such fan was Tone-Deaf Singing Guy. One minute he was sitting on the bench at the bus stop admiring his shiny new copy of the CD, and the next, he had the liner notes in his hands and had begun to belt out song after song in the most disasterously out-of-tune voice I've heard since William Hung's rendition of "She Bangs" on American Idol.

At first, I, like many others at the bus stop, was kind of annoyed by TDSG. Shut UP, already. I'm trying to read my book and enjoy the glorious weather! But after a couple more ridiculously awful verses of "Dan Tucker," my emotions began to shift.

As Tone-Deaf Singing Guy paused, cleared his throat, and then started back up with an absolutely brutal assassination of "Jesse James," I started to think about how great it must be to be him at that moment. To be able to sit down on a bench at a crowded bus stop, pull out the lyrics to your favorite songs, and let all your enthusiasm and love for music burst right out of your mouth and into the air. To not even care what the people around you thought, but instead to be completely consumed by the moment and your joy and your intense affection for a set of songs you had probably known since you were a child.

Maybe TDSG thinks he's a great singer. Maybe he knows he's terrible. Maybe he's just plain crazy. But haven't you ever listened to your MP3 player in public and been suddenly overwhelmed by the urge to start dancing up the sidewalk, singing your heart out along to some rockin' tune that just started running up the wires into your ears? I know I have. But my god, I'd never actually DO it. Because I know I'm bad. And everybody else would know I was bad too. And what could be worse than being stared at, or laughed at, or, heavens to Murgatroid!, being written about in somebody's bus blog!

Yet, listen to this guy. He is literally one of the worst singers I've ever heard in my entire life. But despite that fact, when my bus finally pulls up and its doors open, I actually hesitate for a moment. There's another bus in ten minutes -- should I wait for it? Because I'm suddenly smitten with TDSG. I want to see what he'll do next. I want to see how much longer he'll be keeping this up. I want to keep watching him. I want to keep standing near him and be fully infected by his gumption and his enthusiasm and his happiness. This guy is having a great day, and combined with the weather, I can't help but want to stay here in my sunshiny spot and bask in all the cosmic and karmic rays I suddenly feel coming at me from every direction.

And now I'm thinking: is this not exactly what music is supposed to be about? The sharing of passions and feelings and histories and affections and a lust for life and all the complexities that go along with it? After years of piano teachers and classical theory, as well as thousands of hours spent listening to every kind of sound I could get my hands on, I suddenly realize I've just been taught one of the most important music lessons of my life. By a big, unkempt guy sitting on a bench at a bus stop, letting his soul spill out into the streets like the puffy black gusts of exhaust that billow out the back of my bus as its doors close, I sit down, and it all becomes clear.

I'd love it if Tone-Deaf Singing Guy turned out to be a new regular. Maybe next time, he'll take a few requests? But in the meantime, I'm looking forward to getting my own copy of the new Springsteen album. Every time I listen to it, I hope I'll be reminded of yesterday -- its sunshine, its breezes, its characters, and its epiphanies.

Eh, we should all be so lucky.

Oldest Man Alive

Here's a transcript from an actual conversation I had the other day at the bus stop with a man I'm going to call "Oldest Man Alive" because, in short, it's apt. I'd never seen Oldest Man Alive before -- he's no regular -- and I feel fairly certain I will never see him again. However, I'm not sure if I'm glad or sorry about that latter fact, as this was certainly one of the most bizarrely interesting conversations I've had in a long time.

Scene: I'm standing at the bus stop in the afternoon waiting to go home. Oldest Man Alive begins walking very slowly towards me -- kind of like a wind-up robot with no knees, tottering slowly and methodically from side to side, leg to leg. I'm not really looking at him -- I'm just keeping one peripheral eye on him as he wobbles in my direction. He gets up very close to my right elbow and then speaks:

OMA: [in a barely detectable monotonous growl, speaking extremely quickly] Do you have a smoke? Do you have smoke? Do you have a smoke? Are you a student or a professor?

Me: Um, sorry. . . what?

OMA: You -- you a student or a professor?

Me: [pulling headphones out of ears] Neither -- I'm a librarian at the university.

OMA: No you aren't. A university librarian. You. are. not. one. What do you know?

Me: Sorry?

OMA: What do you KNOW? What do you know -- IN YOUR HEAD?

Me: What do I know? Uh, well. . . Just enough to be dangerous?

The girl sitting on the bus stop bench behind me laughs at my response. She's been watching OMA peripherally as well, I can tell. In fact, at this point, I look up and notice that most of the women at the bus stop have at least one eye on OMA and probably have for the last several minutes, just as I was doing earlier myself. Interestingly enough, most of the men barely seem to notice him, and this fact makes me think for a second about the marked difference between women and men's instinctive reactions to odd people on the bus. Before I can delve too deeply into this thought, however, the girl asks me "What library?" and I don't have time to respond before OMA continues. . .

OMA: [harrumphs] I know everything, you know nothing. You don't even know how much a pack of cigarettes costs.

Me: $4.19.

OMA: [startled] What?

Me: [pointing at sign on smoke shop across the street, shrugging] $4.19.

OMA: [starts to follow the direction of my finger but gives up quickly and returns his gaze to me] Librarian, give me enough to buy a pack of smokes.

Me: I'm sorry -- I literally have no cash on me at all today.

OMA: [speaking so rapidly I can barely understand him] Then what's in your wallet? What's in your purse? WHAT'S IN YOUR WALLET?

Me: Just a bus pass and some cards.

OMA: You're no librarian. You're not. You're a liar. Nobody has no cash.

Me: [opening wallet and showing him the utterly empty inside] You were saying?

Before OMA could come up with what I'm sure would've been a knee-slappingly witty retort to this, or perhaps just an extremely nonsensical and obfuscating one, a woman walks by us with a smoke dangling from her lip. I instantly become the human equivalent of chopped liver, and as he wobbles off to follow her, knee-less, wound-up, and doing the robot-totter from leg to leg, side to side, I can hear him saying, rapidfire again, "Do you have a smoke? Do you have a smoke? Do you have a smoke?"

About five minutes later, I got on the bus and when I looked out the window, he was standing in the bus shelter again, this time with a cigarette, victoriously puffing on it so hard and so fast I felt sure he was going to hyperventilate any minute. As he stood there gasping down that smoky air like he'd actually been drowning in all the clean atmosphere he'd been inhabiting just moments ago, I suddenly realized what he reminded me of -- the nightmare-inducing (for me, anyway) Skekses from that old kids' movie, The Dark Crystal. Same beaky face. Same hunched look. Same beady eyes. His grabby hands had overgrown, sharp nails on them, black with nicotine or dirt or both or worse. And I was torn between feeling sorry for him -- for clearly he was a poor, somewhat senile old man with a nasty addiction that would no doubt kill him and soon -- and shivering from the frisson of such a close encounter with a creature that once haunted my childhood nights with ferocity, beaks, and long, dark claws.

In the end, I did neither. Instead, as the bus began to pick up speed, I turned away from Oldest Man Alive, cracked my book back open, and reabsorbed myself in the capitivating lives of the fictitious.

I'm not sure what this says about me. Probably nothing good.

Da Bear Bus

Wow, did I get a great big happy surprise on the bus this morning. It was The Bear! The Bear was back on the bus this morning! The Bear! THE BEAAAAAARRRRRR!

Who is The Bear, you are wondering? The Bear is, quite simply, my favorite bus passenger in the world. There is a certain je ne sais quoi about The Bear that simply radiates happiness and kindness. I am immediately soothed when I am in his presence. He's the kind of guy who makes you think, "If I ever have to run into a huge man in a dark alley at night, I really sincerely hope it's THIS huge man."

When The Bear is on the bus, I know I am going to have a great day. There is no way not to end the morning commute on a happy note when you've had the pleasure of being seated near The Bear.

Now, despite my obvious affection for him, I confess I didn't actually notice The Bear was gone for several weeks. In fact, come to think of it, I don't think I've seen The Bear since before Christmas. I've been so busy watching others these days (like Bookman, who has been on a curious John Le Carre kick the last several weeks), I didn't really realize we were missing someone. But when The Bear came loping down the aisle this morning to take his usual seat (center, back bench), and I realized how much I had truly missed seeing him, it was hard for me not to literally stand up and cheer.

God, I love The Bear. If I weren't married, and he weren't married (he's wearing a ring, anyway), I would flirt shamelessly with him. Shamelessly, people. Because The Bear has all the qualities I love in a guy -- he's enormous (tall and rotund -- I cannot resist this combination), he's got lots of fuzzy hair on his head and his face, he's got gigantic hands, he listens to music with the volume at a reasonable level, etc. Everything about The Bear makes me happy. His clothes. His facial expressions. Even his ponytail brings me joy, and I usually hate long hair on men.

But the thing I love the most about The Bear? The fact that he's a people-watcher like me. You see, The Bear takes his seat in the back of the bus, headphones on, and then spends the entire ride very openly watching everybody around him. He's not as clandestine about it as I try to be -- if you look up at the right moment, you WILL catch The Bear eyeing you, which is something I try to avoid myself when I'm on the ocular prowl, so to speak. I don't want people to know I'm studying them, looking at the books they're reading, thinking about their lives. I suppose it could seem kind of creepy, in some ways, even though that's certainly not how it feels from my perspective. I'm just fascinated by my fellow bus passengers. Utterly fascinated. That's all there really is to it.

But The Bear? He just seems friendly and curious. Not like he's making any mental notes about what he sees -- just that he's thoroughly enjoying the experience of having us all gathered around him for twenty-five minutes on his morning commute to the daily grind.

Life for The Bear seems peaceful and gracious. It is a simple, pure, honest pleasure to be seated near him. In the back. On the bus. On a gray Thursday morning. With the rain slowly pattering on the steamy glass windows behind our heads.

I'm glad you're back, Bear Man. You have been dearly, dearly missed.

The Scarfer

It's taken me eight long months to finally come up with the right name for The Scarfer. When I first started to notice her on the bus each afternoon, I quickly dubbed her Stubs, short for Stubble, in reference to the patch of hair she missed on the backs of her thighs when she shaved each morning. Stubs is one of those odd people who wears shorts every day, even when it's cold outside. And it was, for some reason, extremely disconcerting for me that she so carefully shaved every day (you could tell -- pristine gams on this gal) and yet never ever thought to shave the backs of her thighs. For me, seeing that patch of dark, straggly hair each afternoon threw me into an absolute etiquette tizzy -- it's like when you are talking to someone and notice they have something in their teeth. Like, say, THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING. What do you say? Do you say anything at all? It's impossible not to notice that THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING is hanging off of one tooth and you know -- know without a doubt -- that the person would want to know about it. Would be mortified to know, and would want to correct it posthaste. But -- ack! I'm always at such a loss in these moments, so I usually just end up trying to pretend it isn't really happening. To them OR to me.

And so, Stubs it was. For about two months. Then I started to notice something else about Stubs -- the fact she was perpetually cranky. Like, ALL THE TIME. Without fail. Tired of having to think about the stubble on the backs of Stubs's legs every time I saw her, I quickly redubbed her Permascowl (not to be confused with Permasmirk, which is what I call Wentworth Miller from Prison Break). And Permascowl as a name lasted for about six months, until The Incident last Thursday that changed it all.

The Incident took place on the afternoon bus home. Permascowl had taken a seat directly across from me at the back of the bus, and I was intrigued to see that she had two books in her hands. One was about puppies and the other was about knee injuries. Now, the knee injury book explained the scowl -- I know what that can be like. But puppies? How can you be so cranky AND be reading a book about puppies? Does. Not. Compute.

Anyway, about five minutes into the bus ride, Permascowl did something that absolutely horrified me. She opened up her backpack and took out her lunch bag. Inside the lunch bag there was a package of string cheese and a chocolate energy bar of some sort. Hmmm. Interesting, I thought. Knee injuries, energy bars, does Permascowl wear shorts all the time because she is some sort of athlete? She pulled the string cheese out, opened the package, and then. . .

Quickly bit the top half of it off, chewed, and swallowed. Then popped the rest in her mouth, chewed and swallowed again.

I could not believe my eyes. Had she eaten an Oreo in one bite without first unscrewing it and scraping the filling out with her bottom teeth, I could not have been more astonished. You can't eat string cheese like that (or Oreos, for that matter)! What the. . . ?! I mean, honestly, people, what is the POINT of eating STRING CHEESE if you aren't going to EAT IT IN STRINGS?

Oh, the humanity!

And thus, The Scarfer was born.

To sum up:

1. Don't forget to shave the backs of your thighs if you are going to wear shorts. Do a mirror check before leaving the house. Or else make sure you go up the steps to board the bus behind me instead of in front of me. For my sake. I beg you.

2. Eat string cheese in strings.

3. The Scarfer is not so dubbed because she knits a lot.

Bookman speaks!

I have a confession to make. Though I am happily married, I have a bit of a crush on the Bookman.

The Bookman is one of the morning regulars -- I almost never see him on the evening bus, though I get off work at 4:30 and perhaps he's an 8-to-5er instead. But every morning, he gets on my bus and sits in the back, usually directly across from me.

He immediately takes out a book and begins to read. And while that's fairly normal behavior on a bus, I confess I took notice the first time I saw him do this, because the book he had with him was one I had read myself and didn't think anybody else had ever heard of. Since then, I've made a point of sneaking a look at his book every day, and, in the process, have made a discovery: it's my contention that the Bookman only reads when he's on the bus.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just an observation I find interesting for some reason.

Why do I think this? Because the Bookman gets through about a book every 10 days to 2 weeks, and never any faster than that. This seems to me to rule out a lot of extracurricular reading. Unless he saves one book for the bus and reads another one when he gets home? Perhaps he saves the paperbacks for the bus, and reads hefty tomes in hardback when he's in bed at night?

Anyone for Tolstoy?

The Bookman is married, and he has an earring and a grizzled gray beard that I am especially fond of. But my favorite part about the Bookman is that he's gigantic. He's like someone from Brobdingnag, really. Not fat -- just extremely tall and broad-shouldered with large hands and large arms and large everything else. I love tall people. I'm a tall people. Tall people rule. And I also love the fact he kind of lumbers when he walks, and that people often have to shift a bit to the side when he sits in between them. The Bookman seems larger than life and looks exceedingly gentle, intelligent, and kind. This is my favorite type of older man.

The other day, I had my first verbal encounter with the Bookman, after weeks and weeks spent sitting across from him and clandestinely scoping out the insides of his bag every time he removed his book from it (yes, I am a disgusting bag snoop). He hadn't been able to get a seat that morning, and was standing by the back door (note: not in the stairwell, thank god, as that makes me bananas). It was time for me to get off, and I had to squeeze by him, and as I did, he turned to me and made a joke (which I won't repeat, as I'm trying to make sure no one I talk about here can recognize themselves). I misheard the joke, as I was listening to the Ramones on my MP3 player, which I guess I'd better quit doing whenever there's a chance someone might say something interesting in my direction. And the upshot of this mishear was that I didn't laugh at the Bookman's joke, but instead just responded, "Okay, no problem!"

He gave me a quizzical look, which I didn't understand until later when the joke was finally filtered correctly through my brain. But the next day, he caught my eye and smiled in my direction. I took this to mean that he either thinks I'm crazy and thus had better stay on my good side, lest I suddenly snap and lunge for his throat. Or else it means he thinks I'm cute in a quirky, nonsensical kind of way, and that he's rather fond of that quality in young, strange women he encounters on the bus.

Either way, he had a nice smile, and I hope to see it again soon.

Meditation Guy

This morning, I was struck, as I often am, by the perpetual calm of Meditation Guy. Meditation Guy is a regular on my morning bus, and he gets on before I do. He always sits in the back of the bus. He has a beard. He usually wears a hat. He's probably around sixty years old. I think he's married -- he wears a ring, anyway.

He's called Meditation Guy (by me, that is) because he spends the entire bus ride with his iPod headphones in his ears, his eyes closed, and his hands folded together in his lap. No matter what is going on around him, Meditation Guy never opens his eyes. Never. Our bus could crash into a telephone pole, and I fully believe Meditation Guy would sit there with nary a flinch until the ambulance crew came to wheel him away. He's just always there, always still, always exuding this almost disturbing level of calm throughout the whole ride.

Today, I saw the whites of Meditation Guy's eyes for the first time ever. He opened them slightly to throw a look of compassion to the fellow sitting next to him, who was talking very animatedly about the fact rotten ref calls cost the Seattle Seahawks the Super Bowl yesterday. Actually, pretty much everyone on the bus threw a look of compassion at that guy at some point during his tirade, as he was clearly in a great deal of distress over the matter, and even those of us who didn't care one way or another about the Super Bowl still know what it's like when your favorite team gets shafted by a bunch of zebras with whistles. But, somehow, coming from Meditation Guy, that look was the most meaningful for us all. It also had the bonus effect of answering one of my most-pressing questions: Is Meditation Guy aware of his surroundings AT ALL? Actually two of my most-pressing questions: Is Meditation Guy aware of his surroundings at all AND Is Meditation Guy listening to everything being said around him?

Answers: yes, and yes.

Figuring out how he knows when it's time to get off the bus without opening his eyes, however, I suspect may require a thorough reading of the I Ching.

Nice Lady

Nice Lady is a daily rider on my morning bus. She, by turns, either irritates or pleases me enormously. It all depends on how tired I happen to be at 7:35am when she gets on board and sits down. If I'm in a good mood, I'm happy to be seated near Nice Lady, where I can listen to her talk to fellow passengers and offer to hold the bags of anybody who ends up having to stand in the aisle when there are no seats left (Nice Lady's favorite thing to do, despite the fact no one ever takes her up on the offer). On mornings when I'm tired, however, I try to get a seat in the back of the bus instead, preferably next to Sullen Teenager, who is far less likely to try to engage me in conversation.

This morning, Nice Lady cracked a relatively funny joke and everybody laughed out loud, including me. Even Sullen Teenager, who is usually tuned out in the back seat with headphones blasting, cracked a little smile. Was it a joke worthy of an LOL? Probably not. However, it was one of those odd mornings when everybody on the bus was in an exceedingly and inexplicable good mood. I can never figure these mornings out -- they are as likely to occur on a Monday as any other day, a day when you'd think most people would be ill-tempered. And today, we were all abounce with joy, despite the fact we were crammed to the gills with twice the usual number of passengers, due to an earlier bus that went MIA.

In the afternoons, a crammed bus is, in short, a recipe for disaster. You want to know what Road Rage is truly like? Get on my single-length afternoon bus on a rainy evening and watch the competition for Most Emotive Scowl begin. But for some reason, a crowded bus in the morning is usually no big thing. Maybe it's because nobody is in a hurry to get to work, the way they are in the evenings to get home. Maybe it's because we're all fresh from our breakfasts and coffee pots, instead of exhausted from hours spent at our desks. I don't know. All I know is that mornings on the bus like this morning always leave me slightly confused and pleased. It's not a bad way to start a day, in other words. I don't get it. But I think I kinda like it.

p.s. Confidential to Nice Lady: Thanks for offering to hold my bag this morning. If not for the fact it weighed about 87 pounds and I was afraid it would crush you, I would've taken you up on the offer, just to make your day.

Low-rise jeans -- Are they really for you?

As I was riding home on the bus last night, I suddenly realized that I hadn't noticed anything interesting yet. I mean, here I start this blog, purporting to be about all the strange, fascinating things I see every day on the bus, and I'm halfway home with nothing to say.

But then I saw her. Butt-Crack Girl. And I knew I'd been saved. You see, I hadn't noticed her earlier on because she'd been sitting in the middle seats -- the bench ones that put your back to the street instead of to the rear of the bus. But she was preparing to get off soon, and it was when she turned her back to me to put on her coat that I realized I had my inspiration.

Butt-Crack Girl, in case you haven't met her yet, is a member of the club an unfortunate number of women these days belong to. It's the club of people who wear low-rise jeans and shouldn't.

BCG turned her back to me and lifted her arms to put them in her coat sleeves. And I knew instantly something terribly, terribly bad was about to happen. Up, up went her shirt and then -- ugh! There it was! Butt-Crack Girl's butt-crack! Right there for us all to see! I thought, maybe, maybe it'll all be over soon. But, no, no, noooooo! She was having trouble with her coat! She was twisting and turning and shifting and all I could see was ASS ASS ASS. ASS EVERYWHERE! As far as the eye could see!

Now, all of you women who are wearing low-rise jeans, tell me this. Are you not AWARE of the fact your ass-crack is constantly being exposed? Or do you just not care? Or do you, god-forbid, actually think people see that and think, "Ooh, sexy!"? Because even if you think this has never happened to you since you began wearing low-rise jeans, I'm here to tell you it has. I see at least three female butt-cracks a week these days, and the women displaying them seem to be completely unaware that it's happening.

Back when I was a kid, pretty much the most horrifying thing that could ever happen to you would be to have your butt-crack be seen. We called it a "plumber's crack" and it would make you an instant target for weeks and weeks of mercilous teasing. I'm glad so many women today are confident enough to be willing to go outside wearing the most unflattering pants they've ever owned -- so confident, in fact, they actually think they look GOOD. But you women -- listen up:

I, and the rest of the modern world, am tired of seeing your ass. Put it away. And buy jeans with a higher rise. You'll look a hundred times classier. You'll look a hundred times sexier. And, what's more, you won't completely horrify and disgust the entire back of the bus when you shift around to put on your coat.

We who keep our butt-cracks safely stored away will salute you.

The guy I hated on the bus this morning.

You know what one of my big pet peeves on the bus is? It's the guy who, when the bus hits "standing room only" status, thinks it's okay for him to stand in the stairwell for the back door. Sure, this is a comfortable place to be -- you can lean back against the sides of the stairwell there and can keep your balance pretty easily. I get it. I really do. And, actually, this is an okay place to stand as long as you are being HYPER-aware of the passengers around you -- especially the ones, like me, who are about to get off the bus. But you can't just plant yourself in there and not pay attention. Not unless you want to incur my wrath, Rude Boy.

When the little *ding* rings, the one that means someone wants the next stop, you need to move yourself out of the way so that I can use that stairwell. You need to do it well in advance of that stop, so that you do not delay me. If the bus is really, really crowded, of course, this is going to be next to impossible because there won't be anywhere for you to go. In that case, you are an ass for standing in the stairwell to begin with, because, well, what were you thinking would happen when someone needed to leave via that door? Were you thinking we knew some "Crouching Tiger" move that would send us gracefully flying over your head and out onto the sidewalk? Because, though I am lovely and smoothly-shaped, I am not a CGI-enhanced special effect. Much as I would sincerely love to be.

If it was the very last spot to stand on the most crowded bus in bus-crowd history, then, okay, I can see the need to stand there. In that case, however, please take note: what you need to do when it's time for me to get off is NOT attempt to flatten yourself to make room for me to squeeze by, because there isn't room for two people in that stairwell. And if I have to try to slink by you and your massively oversized, SUV of a backpack, I'm going to get peevish. No, what you need to do -- listen up! -- is GET OFF the bus, wait for me to get off myself, and then get back on and continue to occupy your ridiculous amount of space.

You, guy who was in the stairwell this morning with your iPod in your ears, your complete lack of fellow-passenger awareness, and your gigantic backpack? I hate you. And the same goes for you, guy who was standing behind him with your iPod in YOUR ears who also wasn't paying any attention to the fact people needed to GET THE HELL OFF THE BUS. MOVE IT, PEOPLE! MOVE IT!

Thank you, and welcome to Scenes from the Bus.

Introduction

I've been a daily bus commuter for over a decade now. You see a lot of weird, interesting, or annoying stuff on the bus. This blog is going to be about that.