A follow-up bus story.
I pick the boys up at camp. I’m using public transportation – in this case, the Big Blue Bus line #7 followed by #3 at Lincoln.
Everything is cool. While waiting for the first bus a lovely older gentleman reveals to us that he grew up in New York City and that he thinks that our city is lovely and he hands one of his cards to each of us individually. I don’t want to point out t F. and W. that an actual filmmaker of the type they would have heard of would not actually be riding the Big Blue Bus; instead I encourage them to pocket the cards. He asks me if I’m writing a screenplay – apparently that is indeed the opening question that one asks – and suggests I target big stars, suggesting George Clooney, who can do it all, including directing to his many acting talents. While I am a fan of many of Mr. Clooney’s films, I’m not sure that he would be much interested in me or my writing, but I thank this gentleman for his kindness to me and my boys and we enjoy his company for the few minutes in the sun.
After a few stops, though, we switch to the #3, and take the last few stops to where we get off. At Ocean Park it gets crowded – we’re on the Rapid 3, after all! – and seats get a bit tight. But we’re off soon and it’s W.’s turn to pull the string for the stop – each boy gets a turn for this, as they each tend to think it a privilege – and so I give him the okay to pull the string.
As he stands to do so, the woman next to him reacts immediately. I should pause here to here say that we had noticed her when she got on, partly because she sat down right next to W. but also because she was carrying a lululemon bag. F. immeditely pointed this out to me, excited because that’s what J. carries sometimes. She was, though, perhaps not the prototypical SoCal yoga type. Although carrying the Lululemon bag and wearing the typical yoga gear of black pants and black top, I could tell pretty much right away that she had not, in fact been to a class recently, if in the last few days. Her hair – blonde, scraggly, frizzy – represented a clear attempt to suggest that she was younger than she actually was.
Not that this mattered to me in the least. Not, until that is, she said something to W.
“Do not put your dirty feet on me,” she said to him in a German accent. I had not known she had a German accent.
W., as you might imagine, stopped, not sure what to do. He had been excited to pull the string. On the last bus trip it had been F.’s turn. I told him to pull the string.
“Get your dirty feet off of me,” the woman said. W. had turned to pull the string and his sandals had rushed the woman sitting next to him as he twisted to sit up to pull the string.
Again, I told him to pull the string and he did.
“He doesn’t have dirty feet,” I said to her, addressing her.
“Of course he does. All children do. They have dog poop on their shoes.”
“What?”
“They have dog poop on their shoes, all of them.”
“What is wrong with you?” I asked.
“What is wrong with me? Nothing. What do you allow your children to do? Walk around with dirty shoes and putting them on other people.”
At this point, I knew, I should say nothing, grab my two kids, and head to the hills. But I couldn’t let it go quite that easily. The minute she said this, I reacted. I knew she was nuts, but so what? They ALL have dog poop on their shoes? What the hell does that mean?
“Actually,” I said, “he put these shoes on just before he got on the bus. He was at a pool. there wasn’t any dog poop.”
“Of course there was. Everyone walks in dog poop, every day.”
And that sealed it, of course. But I can’t say that this was it. Immediately, I recognized the crux of the situation: regardless of how crazy she was, it was not her place to speak to my children in that one of voice, nor in that directive manner.
It was our stop and W. had stood, but wasn’t sure what to do. She had turned her eyes from him to F. and had begun to glare at him. And she then said, not quite as inaudibly as she had hoped, “I hope you will grow up to be as ugly as your father, and as bad as manners.”
I laughed at this, for more than one reason. F. – and I’m saying this as a proud dad – is a beautiful kid, much better looking than his dad and a hell of a nice kid. (When he got off the bus, he kept saying, “She was mean. Really mean.”) And my kids can certainly be lacking the manners category, but not in this case and rarely in the case around those they don’t know. I wasn’t worried about her little curse, but I was a bit concerned about the effect on my kids.
At that point I kind of lost it. “Don’t ever tell my children to do anything. Who the hell do you think you are? Be quiet. He didn’t touch you, and don’t talk to either of my children. Do you hear me?”
It was our stop. People were staring. This had actually gone on longer than I had imagined – a minute or two. The driver was waiting, which was a bit of surprise. I gathered F. and W. and shuttled them toward the back exit door. She continued muttering. As we worked out way out the door, I turned around said back to her, “Congratulations, you should feel good about yourself. You bested a seven year old boy.”
We got off, made light of what had just happened and headed home. I made an effort not to show my fury. Everyone was fine and okay. I knew that if J. had been on the bus she would have actually attacked the woman with a voraciousness that would have probably frightened me. But everything was fine and the boys were okay and I repeatedly made sure that W. understood that he had done nothing wrong and that the woman was not nice, and that she was crazy and whatever other word might apply in this case. He didn’t have any dog poop on his shoes. None of us did. And he and F. started feeling better eventually, but they were shook up by it and haven’t forgotten it and are a little hesitant about getting back on the bus.
I’m not fully yet living in the land of no worries.