Ffffuuurrrooonnntt!!
May 8th, 2009
Between Battery and Jackson Streets in downtown Seattle anyone can hop on the bus and ride for free. Attorneys, doctors, drug addicts, deli-cashiers, techies, Nordy’s shoppers, derelicts and the homeless all catch a ride from one end to another. As a result, you never know what your ride is going to be like.
In most cases, everyone manages to ride together in peace for few the short minutes it takes to get from King County Courthouse to Westlake Center. However, on occasion, you’ll witness some sort of outburst or scuffle or smell that makes you wish you drove to work every day. Sometimes the situation can get so bad (gross guy trying to pick up on you) that you vow then and there to never to ride the bus. EVER. AGAIN. (But then you always do because parking downtown costs a small fortune.)
On Tuesday, I was waiting in the bus tunnel to catch a ride to the International District to meet @Shih_Wei for the first time. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a man who appeared to be walking in circles and gesturing to himself. “Oh God,” I thought. “Here we go ….” I proceeded to go into my shut down mode – thinking to myself, “Okay, steer clear. Make no eye contact. Do not engage in any way. DO NOT ENGAGE.”
But somehow I just knew he was going to get on the same bus as I was.
Sure enough, he did.
And as luck would have it, instead of moving to the back of the bus, the man decided to stand in the aisle – RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME. I prepared for the worst – keeping my eyes down and repeating the mantra – “Steer clear. Do not engage. No eye contact.” There was no way I was going to get roped into a conversation about conspiracy theories or Vietnam or spaceships.
But my plan to ignore him backfired. I couldn’t pretend he wasn’t there because after about 10 seconds, he started mumbling to me in a low growl, “Frr-rrruuunttt.”
My eyes stayed locked on the ground.
“F-fr-fr-fr-fruuunnt.”
“F-fr-fr-fr-fruuunnt.”
“Oh God.” I think. “No fucking way. NOT TODAY.”
“F-fr-fr-fr-fruuunnt. “F-fr-fr-fr-fruunnt. “F-fr-fr-fr-frruunnt.”
“F-U-R-RONT. F-U-R-RONT. F-U-R-RONT. F-U-R-RONT.”
“FFFFEEEERRRRROOOOONNNNTTTTT!!!!!!!!!”
“Of all people, WHY ME?”
At this point I was definitely not going to make eye contact.
“FFFRRRRROOOOONNNNTTTTT!!!!!!!!!”
Two seconds after the last outburst, I look up towards the bus driver who shouts out over the intercom, “HEY LADY, the man is DISABLED and wants to sit up FRONT! MOVE IT!”
The bus goes silent.
I look up and the “crazy” is not crazy at all. He’s disabled and for the last 25 seconds he’s been trying to combine the word “front” with hand gestures as a way of asking me to move so he could sit near the driver.
I never even bothered to look up.
Sigh. I can be such an asshole sometimes.
This entry was posted on Friday, May 8th, 2009 at 5:17 am and is filed under Daily. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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