Now let's chronicle this story through my shuffled mp3 list that was blaring through my socially acceptable damaged earbuds.
The Patient - Tool
"If there were no desire to heal The damaged and broken met along this tedious path I've chosen here, I certainly would've walked away by now."
The song is about halfway through when I board bus 75 - Eastbound. The bus driver is friendly and says hello, and about 6 people are scattered throughout the bus, each involved in their headphones or IPad. Seriously, this one guy had his IPad out for all the world to devise stealing. You can barely see out the windows due to the coated brown sludge from our most recent blizzard, the sun is setting and everything has a blue-green cast about it. I sit behind everyone else, towards the backdoor, and have a pretty decent view of the aisle from my hard plastic seat. The bus comes to an unexpected screeching halt, and I see a man running alongside the bus and then a poofy tail. My first thought was, "Good save, driver! You could have missed him!" Seattle bus systems are rad in that you can bring your leashed pets aboard and this was the first time I've witnessed anyone actually doing it. So this rider takes like 2 minutes to get on the bus, dig in his pockets for change, and pay in full. The dog, a shaggy black mutt with a brown underside, wiggles his way between the guy's legs. The rider, let's call him Homeless Guy... which is short (and polite) for OVERPOWERINGLY STINKY GUY looks around, and the people sitting in the front actively avoid his gaze. The first person turns away, as if telling Homeless Guy (now let's call him Roger), 'Go past me.' Roger recognizes he's not going to get this convenient spot and shuffles forward a step. Person 2 immediately gets up and Person 3 follows suit, and they move a couple chairs down, being fully accommodating to Roger and his fuzzy dog. I remember visibly flinching as a wall of stinkiness hit the interior of the bus.... like a bus.
Uncontrollable Urge - Devo
"Got an urge, got a surge, and it's outta control!"
We ride along. I watch as the dog makes himself comfortable in the middle aisle. Everyone on the bus is visibly shifting uncomfortably, all the while trying not to face their heads in the direction of Roger, who has permeated the air with his exquisite scent eau de Garbage. Roger is squirming around, almost in time with my music. I wonder if he had an uncontrollable urge.
New Coke - Delton 3030
If you haven't heard this song, it's a bunch of vocal samples from the old lady who played the nasty mom in The Sopranos. It's a short song, but here's the lyrics, which I found quite appropriate to the events that unfurled around me.
Look out the window Look at all that bullshit going on down there in the street What's all that shit floating out in the water? Yea we gotta get out of here we gotta go to some island Grab your shopping cart Grab your cane Let's get the heck out of here We gotta move closer to the equator When are they gonna start showing those Mr. T reruns I used to love that guy Remember how we used to watch Mr T. wrestling? Coca Cola doesn't taste the same as it used to Remember when a bowl of soup was a nickel All that bass is gonna break my ears
Someone hits the signal to stop the bus, and the bus halts, and goes through this process of beeping and leveling itself to the curb. After a couple minutes, it felt like this process was taking longer than necessary, and then people started hollering to the driver. The driver finally heard the beckons over the loud beeping noises and left the safety of his walled-in driver's seat. I looked into his eyes, and could read his thoughts. 'Oh fuck, they don't pay me enough for this.' Turns out, there's a guy sitting directly across from Roger in a wheelchair, and he was ready to depart the bus, but Roger's stinky dog had somehow gotten his leash tangled in guy's wheels. Seriously, I don't know how it happened, but this was turning out to be the most interesting bus ride I've ever been on. The bus driver immediately begins trying to untangle the leash/wheel combo and Roger remains completely oblivious, trapped in his own little world.
While this is happening, there's an angry black man, dressed like a gangster in a matching white hoodie and white hat that sits askew on his head, yelling outside. At first he wasn't directing his yelling at the bus, it was the kinda yelling that you hear from drunk people who are just yelling for the sake of yelling. It was easily tuned out, until my music track changed and he started directing his angry yells at the bus.
"What the fuck, man! You're messed up! Why you gotta be like that?"
To this day, I'll never understand why he was so angry...
Push the Eagle's Stomach - Man Man
(please note, this song is full of lots of aggression and energy)
"Don't beat around the black jack night!'
Wheelchair guy finally books it off the bus. Some normal guy gets on the bus and says in the most serious voice you've ever heard, "Let's Go." I think our greasy-haired driver was smoking crack, because he talks to the black guy out the door.
"Do you need a ride? If you have fare, I can take you where you need to go."
The angry guy keeps yelling, at this point unintelligibly. Normal guy behind me yells again, 'Let's go!' and other people on the bus start voicing the same.
The driver takes the hint, closes the doors, and tries to book it, but a public bus doesn't just BOOK it. The wheels spin, their loud squeal filling the air, and the bus takes off... slowly but you can tell the driver is doing his best to get the hell out of there. Angry guy continues his barrage and then we here a big THUMP on the side of the bus. Apparently he was so angry that he threw something... clodlike at the bus. People ducked like there was going to be a driveby.
I couldn't hold my laughter.
Black Star - Radiohead
"What are we coming to?"
After this, the normal kind of stuff happened on the bus. The dog was tucked under one of the chairs, Roger kept going back and forth to the driver while he was driving, trying to have a conversation with him, and when he finally decided to settle down, he pulled out his nice touch-screen smartphone and called "Al" and questioned 'Where da ladies at tonight?'
I got off a few steps later, but I'll always wonder if Roger got some ladies. I mean, a homeless guy with a dog? SO HOT.
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