10 minutes later…

“HOW YOU DOIN!!?” yells the old Native American man without teeth.

“How am I doing?? 10 minutes later you ask me how am I doing?!” calls the bus driver.

“YEAH!!! HOW YOU DOIN!?” yells the old man.

“Haha… doing well, young man. What have you been doing all morning?” says the bus driver.

“I SLEPT UNDER A BRIDGE!!!” yells the old man.

“Slept under a bridge!? Ain’t there any shelters or churches??” says the bus driver.

“I GOT KICKED OUT!!!” says the old man.

“Kicked out!?! For what!?” replies the bus driver.

“THEY SMELLED MY BREATH!” yells the old man.

“Smelled your breath?! Were you drinking!?” asks the bus driver.

“POT!!” yells the old man.

“Haha I can’t help you out with that one. ” Says the bus driver.

“WELL CAN YOU ROLL ME A CIG!!!!?” yells the old man.

As I sat on the bus on my way to my boyfriends house I noticed some gambling/betting happening. I was in a seat close by so I watched what was going on. The dealer had 3 cards out on a briefcase that was sitting on his lap and players were betting that they could pick out the Queen of Hearts from the two spades once the cards were scrambled. The dealer kept chanting bets “10/20, 20/40″ and a player would say “OK”. The player would put down their $10 and if they picked the correct card the dealer would give them $20. I kept watch for a while and noticed I could always follow where the Queen was. The person sitting next to me noticed that I was watching intently and asked if I thought I could do it. “Yeah, I can always tell where it is”. We watched a while longer and chatted a bit. She asked when my stop was and told me I was good at this and should try it.

He chanted “10/20, 10/20″, I jumped in “OK, I’ll do it”. He scrambled the cards, I picked which was the queen and double checked with my new friend to see if she agreed. She nodded, and I had him turn over the card. I WON! I was reluctant to play again, but the other player who was up $30 or $40 already wanted to do 50/100. The dealer got all extra serious and got to mixing up the cards. She picked what I knew was the right one, and won $100!!

“20/40, 20/40″. I thought, “alright, if I did that and lost I’d only be out the $10 I put up the first time”. “OK, I’m in!”. Some frantic scrambling and then we were on. I was fairly certain which card it was, but not as sure as before. I checked with my friend again, and she agreed. My stop was coming up soon, so I pointed to a card. A flick of his wrist and it was reviled that I had lost.

He picked up his earnings, his cards and his case, gathered his 3 buddies; my new “friend”, the winner of $100, and one other “player” at the side door of the bus where they stood chatting about where they were going next and watched to see if the connecting bus was on it’s way.

I watched, dumbfounded as I realized the scam and then I smiled. I maybe even chuckled and I swelled with love, real LOVE for this guy. My heart was OPEN, way open to learn from every experience and see the best in every challenge.

What an idiot. I blame Leo Buscallia.

—————————————————————

I wrote the story to my other boyfriend. The one away at college, the one I was in the process of breaking up with. I wrote it in the middle of the letter that basically said I was choosing the other guy. It was full crazy LOVE talk. This is what I had to say about being scammed with a game of Three Card Monty.

“So I lost! I’m sure it was all illegal and stuff, and he’s kind of an a**hole but its really cool — I love him for letting me learn that. I’ll play him again — as soon as I win one time I’ll get off the bus! I really did feel love for him.”

———————————–

LOVE: What Life is All About — Leo Buscallia. I received this book from an ex-boyfriends girlfriend when I was 17. Just as I was struggling with choosing between my current “long distance” boyfriend, and the new guy I was “hanging out” with. I was already prone to hippy, loving ways. I was trusting and happy and idealistic and this book brought out the worst of it all.

Twenty years later and I am still VERY close friends with the guy I wrote the letter to, and still married to that “new guy”. I don’t think I love the dealer anymore though, I got over him.

I can’t afford to be buying all these transfers… I have a 22 year old, a 21 year old, a 19 year old, a 16 year old, an 8 year old and now a three year old!!! I know why dem young girls have em so young! that’s what I should have done! I’m too old for this I just turned 41.”

The driver sympathizes with her and let’s her sit without paying. Then a young man with two back packs hops on the bus at the Hiawatha and Lake stop and walks past her and the lady says hi to him and he realizes who she is. He then replies, “Oh do you need some stuff?” And she goes “Oh for sure I do. The good stuff.” He takes off his fitted hat and the 3 year old runs to him and takes his hat and gives it to her mom and she then puts a wad of cash puts it in the hat and the little girl runs back to the man where he is taking out a baggy of weed and puts it back in his hat and the little girl brings it back to her mom. The bus driver then chuckles and goes “BOY AREN’T YOU JUST SANTA CLAUSE GIVING THINGS AWAY!”

She swipes her bus pass and continues to touch the railings and handles on the bus and sits down. As she sits on the bus she begins to dig and her bag and pull out a granola bar. She unwraps this granola bar and pulls it out of the package with her bare hands. Let me remind you that she had just got done touching the “swine-infested” bus. She then lifts up her swine flu mask and ingests the swine-flu covered granola bar. Last time I checked the whole purpose of wearing a mask was to keep it on your face and help against the dreaded swine flu.

When we arrived at the Chicago/Lake transit station we picked up an old man who was yelling “HOLD IT! HOLD IT!” while smacking the bus with his metal cane. His monochromatic ensemble of grey track suit, cane, messenger bag, and suitcase should have been a tip off. After refusing the help of the lift he dragged his suitcase on the bus and fell into one of the front seats. The bus driver didn’t move until the man would pay his fare, to which he responded: “don’t worry, i’ll f•ckin’ pay.” We went a couple blocks…the first call to transit police.

An innocent girl got on the bus shortly thereafter and made the mistake of sitting near him. Almost immediately he scooted over and asked “who braids your hair?” To which she responded “my sister.” “WHAT?” he asked. “My sister,” she repeated. “WHAT?” he asked again, getting ever closer to her face. Eventually he caressed her head and asked “what’s your name?” She refused to tell him, to which he replied “well you OUGHT to know my name!” A couple seconds went by and he inquired about her age. “I’m fifteen,” she answered. “Well shoot! I’m 27,” he shouted. (He was clearly not 27.) Luckily the girl got off soon after.

“Sir, what’s in your bottle?” asked the woman driving the bus. “None of your f*cking business,” retorted the belligerent man. “I payed my fare, drive me to where I want to go.” Another swig of his alcoholic concoction cleverly disguised in a children’s fruit smoothie bottle and we had another call to the transit police.

A woman and her toddler got on the bus around the YWCA and this was his next muse. Throughout the rest of his ride he tried to lean over and touch the child, offer it candy, and sing to it. The woman looked ready to hit the man; the child did not say a word until after the man got off the bus.

Right after crossing the river to Marshall we picked up a handicapped man. “Sir, you’re going to have to move your suitcase to let the man on. If you don’t you’re breaking the law.” “Calm the f•ck down, woman! I’ll move it when I want!” Eventually a teenage boy came from the back of the bus and picked it up and moved it out of the way. Another call to transit police.

“Do you want to hear the best singer in the world?” he asked passengers nearby. He broke out in song, singing Temptations classics. Personally, I’ve never been more creeped out.

He got off at Snelling & University. “The drunken man is off the bus and sitting on the bench.” The fourth call to the transit police, who, the whole time, were too busy to respond to the numerous calls the driver had made.

I snapped this lovely picture of the man with my phone after he got off the bus:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mjd/2480622550/

Before he could respond, a St. Paul squad car signaled me over; my heart sank – I have a lead foot and had already been warned. The officer came to my window and asked to speak to a customer. As I opened the door, pillow-case guy was dropping change in the farebox; did he think I had a hot-line to the police for lack of payment?

The officer asked pillow-case guy to step off the bus a moment; he wanted to leave his belongings on the bus, but the officer said they couldn’t delay the bus and asked me to give the passenger a transfer.

I got a phone call at home that evening from the officer who explained that the pillow-case was full of goods from a burglary and asked if I had observed anything suspicious. I told the officer about the late, and sudden, fare payment. The officer thanked me and said rare coins were part of the booty, so he’d try to retrieve the evidence.

Along the same lines; I grew up in Latin American and as such am a fluent spanish-speaker. Seeing as how I was doing drugs there, I know the lingo used in the black market drug-trade. Sitting on the 21 one day, I overheard a hispanic gentleman talking about ordering some “mota”(marijuana) over the phone. Feeling amused & mischeivious I decided to sit closeby and take advantage of my caucasian appearance to be able to appear unaware of his conversation topic. When he was done, I decided to call my sister a few blocks before I got off and speak to hear in spanish. As I got off the bus, I smiled and nodded to the gentleman whose facial expression was priceless.

Going west on the 21 I found myself as a central player of what I have been calling Justice on the Bus. JOB is a code of conduct enforced by riders. For example, when a bus approaches a stop where there is someone who uses a wheelchair, not only do riders fly out of the handicapped seating area to make room, in preparation they flip up the seats and straighten out the buckles used to secure the chair. Or when the driver pulls away from a curb as a woman with a stroller and two children in tow is running to catch up, he’ll catch hell if he leaves her stranded.

I’ll never forget the time when I sat across from a man who looked like a bad scene, in my estimation someone to be avoided. I’m not big on chatter anyway. I generally don’t want to answer the meddling questions of a stranger about where I work, live, shop, whatever. Nor do I want to hear about the trials and tribulations of a man that smells funny, how his ex-wife screwed him over three years ago, what an asshole his landlord his, or why he can’t seem to hold down a job for more than a few months at a time.

It’s not that I don’t care about the people on the bus, practically roommates. I do. I care about the young mom who’s a little awkward with her new baby, holding it more like an old doll than a first born. I care about that teenage girl who’s got this great spark in her eyes, some originality, a fabulous coolness factor that makes me feel like a big fat square, but in a good way. I want this girl to graduate from that alternative high school in the strip mall where she’s a student, attend college and quit smoking before the lung cancer settles in. I care about the creaky old man who takes forever to board and without fail makes me late for my connection, the fat people who don’t fit so good in the seats, the drug addict who sleeps with her garbage bag full of crap strapped to a flimsy dolly, and the gaggle of Somali women off to their English classes. I care.

So, here’s this guy who looks like trouble. He has holes in his sneakers, he’s dressed too warm for the weather, and he’s carrying a plastic jug half full of red juice that sloshes around with the lurching of the bus. It’s easy to imagine it splashing on me. I’ve seen his type a million times before and I’m not in the mood to entertain him. To his credit, Juiceman respects the vibe and leaves me alone. A few minutes into the ride another man boards. He’s trying to pay with transfers he picked up from the sidewalk and he’s about to get the boot when Juiceman offers to pay his fare. Handshakes are exchanged. Juiceman says that he’s glad to help. If he were in a bind, he’s certain someone would step up and lend a hand. Not a problem. No big deal at all. It’s just money. As the men are having this moment, I can’t take my eyes off of those ratty shoes.

I have a lot to learn about Justice on the Bus.

JOB takes many forms on a daily basis on every route, to be certain. When a kid who wants to exit out the back door can’t get the attention of the driver, a chorus of young black men wearing giant cartoon ball caps, flawless white shoes, and their pants mid ass yell, “Back door!”

I have not seen JOB take the form of telling some loudmouthed asshole on his cell phone to shut the hell up. While I once did see a driver take issue with one of these idiots who had mistaken the bus for his personal phone booth, he did not get the standing ovation that I thought he deserved. Nor did the riders cheer on the driver who gave the boot to the cocky bastard who was spitting sunflower seeds on the floor. And no one said a word when the backseat was cracking open beer and chugging them one after the other. So, I can’t say precisely where the lines are. I just know they’re there.

So, how did it come to be that I went from being an anonymous commuter who mostly avoids engaging people to someone who had the kind of backup that makes a person feel puffed up enough to pick a fight with a Potty Mouth?

Here’s what happened. Mr. Potty Mouth slips on the bus passed a woman who’s getting off using a walker and all of the rigmarole with the ramp that goes with it. She’s slow and Potty Mouth is clearly irritated. He sits across from me and right away I sense he’s trouble. After a zillion people file off and another zillion people file on, we’re off.

Potty Mouth grumbles something about “Americanos”. His tone is menacing. He looks out from over his sunglasses to gage reactions. No one takes the bait including the other Latinos within earshot who are now staring straight ahead, presumably to avoid eye contact with the man. It is obvious they are uncomfortable, maybe offended or even intimidated. The best I can tell Potty Mouth is talking about Americans using the most obscene language imaginable.

At some point, an old man with a cane gets on the bus and I give up my seat to him. As I turn around to take an overhead strap, I see Potty Mouth kick the old man on the back of the heel. It was not an injurious kick. The old man is completely oblivious. Nevertheless, I have had enough.

“Hey!” I say, knowing that Potty Mouth doesn’t appear to speak English and that I don’t speak a word of Spanish. He grumbles something at me.

“Hey!” I say again. “I saw that! You kicked that man!” I say.

Again, insults fly. I resort to cursing. I tell Potty Mouth to F— off. I figure the F-word is universally understood.

That’s when I heard a quiet steady voice behind me.

“I’ve got your back.”

Others chime in. “Me too. We’ve got you covered.”

A developmentally challenged man tells me to kick Potty Mouth in the teeth.

I turn around to see a young black woman sitting behind me. She looks me dead in the eyes and repeats, “I’ve got your back.” Then she sets her eyes on Potty Mouth. I look to my left and there are young black women poised on the edge of their seats, ready to go if it comes to that.

I am absolutely fearless. At this moment, I could do anything. I can take this guy. I could kick him in the teeth. He deserves it!

Did I disappoint my backup when I simply approached the driver who certainly must have heard Potty Mouth the entire time, being that he was sitting right next to him by the door? I firmly tell the driver, “This man is harassing people and you’ve got to put him off the bus right now.” After repeating myself a couple of times, the driver says he’ll call the police.

Apparently, Mr. Potty Mouth understands some English. He gets off at the next stop.

I look over my shoulder one last time at my lead backup.

“Thanks.” I say. She gives me a nod and I feel invincible.

It’s a good feeling to have Justice on the Bus at your back.