Short Bus Blues

I was on the bus yesterday when the driver publicly shamed another rider. This was before we started moving, we had a couple of minutes yet, and the driver had stepped out of his seat to stretch. He noticed a girl sitting across from me on the partially filled bus, toward the back, listening to her headphones. Her feet were comfortably tucked up on the seat beside her. "Ma'am, could you come down here?" he called. The girl and I looked at each other. What did he want? For a fleeting moment, I felt disappointed that he hadn't chosen me. "I'm a good girl too," I thought; "I can help the driver!"

When the girl reached him, the driver pointed to a large sign taped to the wall by the door. "Read that aloud," he said. "This bus stops only at designated stops?" she asked. "The other one," he said, looking away. She read dutifully. "No food, no drink, no...feet on the seats. Oh. Sorry." The driver said nothing, waiting, I suppose, for the girl to consider her sin. She stood there for a moment, then returned to her seat, somehow diminished. This time she kept her feet pressed primly together on the floor. The driver lumbered back to his own seat, back straight, chin up, looking grim. The other riders pretended not to notice. I was embarrassed for us all.

That driver did other things right. He made the bus "kneel" so that I could load my bike on the rack more easily. When he drove, he didn't tailgate, or gun through yellow lights. Still. There had to be a better way of getting his point across, something gentler than this public calling out. He was puffed up with his own integrity, and it was so off-putting. It didn't make me want to do the right thing. It made me want to put my own feet on the seat, for spite. "What's more important, fatso," I taunted silently; "being right, or being kind?"

I spent the rest of the ride imagining the dressing down I could give him, had I balls enough, and the appropriate props. I'd wait til he brought the bus to a full and complete stop. Then, "Sir, could you come here, please?" I'd ask. I'd pull a handy poster of the Food Pyramid out of my backpack, and ask him how many servings of DingDongs and Hostess cupcakes he'd indulged in that day. "Just because it's at the top of the pyramid," I'd lecture sternly, "doesn't mean you should eat more of it." The driver would nod, stunned at my tough love revelation, shamed before the public congregation in their seats. "Now, go, and drive, and sin no more," I'd say. How smug that would make me feel. How good.