bus thoughts ..pretty boring and pointless

My thoughts come to me like lines from a shitty novel. Printed words on yellow pages. Short sentences, frequent periods and no commas. I’m sitting on the bus back from Boulder, examining a bald head. The owner of the head is driving the bus. I stare. No hat. He isn’t embarrassed of his baldness, probably even shaves his head. He scratches it periodically. I’m not sure if that’s a sign of stupidity, or just the hair growing back. RTD emblem on his sweater. A neat, ironed collar peaks from underneath. And when the head turns, the fat on the back of his neck wrinkles and folds. Two small “flesh tunnel” piercings in each earlobe. Still a tough guy. Driving a bus. With an ironed collar? Must be married. I could be wrong, no one wants to marry a bus driver.

How much can you learn about a person based only on their physical appearance? It seems the answer lies within the details. Streaks of originality, personal touches (if they do exist) are found in the meticulous elements of a way of life. Conformity is a general term, especially when it comes to appearance, precision escapes its glance, as it escapes the glance of most persons.

The owner of the head, which I am studying so carefully, stops the bus. A blond, sun burnt kid steps on. Elongated “luggage”, bag, whatever. An Athlete. Skier. He asks the bald head how much it is to go to the airport. The head turns, the fat neck wrinkles, and a surprisingly kind voice answers, “ten dollars”. The kid only has a twenty, 7 in single dollars, and no change. A young woman behind the bald head starts shuffling through her purse. She hands the kid three bucks. He starts to say something about ‘at the airport….” She smiles and says that it’s fine. I think of derailed and close my purse. My thoughts come to me like lines from a shitty novel.

The skier tries to justify himself to the bus driver, he wants to stick all the bills into the machine at the same time, but the head corrects him. A man sitting next to me finally bursts out laughing, he’s been smiling at the poor kid the whole time. I shrug my shoulders and smile while thinking how to pronounce schadenfreude. I should have known, the word comes from German apparently. The bus moves. The kid talks on the phone “ aw dude, the competition last night was sick, one of the skiers broke a leg..i was…” assumption confirmed.

I stare at the bald head in front of me. Big guy, with a kind voice. The type you wouldn’t expect to be a serial killer when he actually is. My imagination takes off. Time goes by fast.

Last stop on the east side of the airport. Apparently I didn’t have to pay ten dollars. the driver, the big, bald, ear piercings and everything, driver, makes a puppy face. I shouldn’t have paid that much. He hands me a transfer note so I don’t have to pay on the next trip. Maybe he likes his job. I step off the bus. The kid is waiting for me. He thanks me again. I smile again. I don’t have time for this. He looks like he wants to say something deep. I want to say something deep, something like maybe we’ll meet again, along the lines of God works in mysterious ways, just to make an impression. Instead I walk towards island 5 to catch the next bus. It's chilly, but it's not raining like it would be in a shitty novel.