BUS STORY # 382 (Shorts 33: Other People's Shorts 2)

Downloaded from Muni Diaries; originally posted by Fionna Escalona on Twitter.

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On the M100 bus in Inwood with about 30 obnoxious Tweens -- the bus driver pulled the bus over, got on the mic, stood up and gave them all a stern talking to about all the swearing and bad behavior. Dead silence. Then thunderous applause and church meeting callbacks from all the adults. Awesome.

Posted on Facebook October 10, 2013, by Emily Ackerman, via my daughter.

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In my 20s I moved from San Francisco to Manhattan to pursue my (speech-obliterating cough) acting career. The Bay Area is fuzzy and friendly and relatively warm. Manhattan is spiky and cold and exhilarating. I was terrified. And my first few months there were probably the loneliest of my life. I wasn’t sure I was going to stay. One miserable winter morning on the bus, late for the day job I hated, I asked a woman near me what time it was. She looked closely at my face and said with great tenderness, “It’s 9 o’clock, baby.” It was as if she had looked into my soul and saw my self-doubt and fear. And when she smiled at me, it was as if the city itself was opening its arms. I stayed for four years.

From an essay published October 21, 2012, by Carolyn Russell, in The Boston Globe Magazine.

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Formal. Everything about her shrieks staid, stiff, and starched. From the top of her tightly wound hair bun to the tips of her perfectly black and pointed shoes, everything fits in her orderly and unembellished look. Her face is not unattractive, although frozen in a completely neutral, Stepford-esque mask. As the bus makes a particularly swoopy turn, her black handbag momentarily swings by my view, and within its depths, I see something rather silky, with a garishly fabulous leopard-print. Somewhere, at some moment, someone is going to encounter the jungle cat that waits, purring, deep inside her formal carapace.

Posted October 13, 2013, 2011, by Richard Isherman, on Bus Stories: Observations on Life In Transit.

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I was standing at my stop, sweating in the full sun and trying to keep the wind generated by cars whizzing by from blowing my skirt up, wondering if I should just get out the umbrella to give myself some shade.  That’s when a car with two typical South Carolina preppy, fraternity types stopped at the light nearby.  When one rolled down his window, I was expecting more bus stop lewd/rudeness.
But instead I heard:
Hey! I like your shoes!
I was so taken aback all I could say was, “Thanks!”

excerpt from the story posted June 9, 2009, by Sarah in the collected bus stories from The Adventures of Ernie Bufflo.

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The photo at the top of this story was downloaded from Muni Diaries and was originally posted by Fionna Escalona on Twitter.