Definitely Better
I love driving. I love the freedom, the power to go anywhere, any when, really any car commercial cliché applies. Sometimes I wake up in a panic hoping I’m not living in a universe where I never get a chance to drive cross country. There was a good while where I seriously considered quitting my job to travel the nation working in diners and sweeping shops until I got bored and moved onto the next state. It’s the only time where I feel a reasonable amount of control over my life, I’m at peace.
But even on the road, in my most passive state, some things push through my fortress of steel, wind, and teenaged-pop-singles to demand my full attention. I get caught up easy, and whatever I had been passively thinking about is long gone, replaced by some asphalt-borne annoyance that sends me from Buddha to Stalin in the time it takes a normal person to move on with their life.
There are times I would fantasize using the guardrail as a balance beam to drive rage-first into a construction zone because I happened to lock eyes with a road-worker at the same exact moment he decided to lay the drain-cover line-side-out breaking that beautiful streak of yellow conformity. Maybe the foreman went over and noticed his subordinate’s offense, docking his pay and righting the wrong. Realizing what an issue it was, had the local sign shop print up posters to hang on the outside of work trucks. A state wide initiative would be born to flip covers and grills that stepped out of line. Paradise. Or, the foreman went over and admired his partner’s knack for chaos. With only a 180° rotation that grill could haunt drivers for years. Decades. What if the next worker who replaces it continues the trend? Thinking “wow, this is so horrific, so wrong. Such an affront to drivers there must be an excellent reason for it.” What if they reline the highway before it’s corrected?! Is that grill supporting marriage equality or was it just installed by sadists? I wonder, does Waze even have an alert for that? “You get six points for alerting fellow drivers of infrastructure inconsistencies.”
Naturally, with my hair trigger rage, love for operating motor vehicles, and desire to press every single button on any overhead console I come across, I was a perfect fit to become a school bus driver.
I got a fist full of endorsements, training, and stories then bailed after a year for a field technician’s job in IT. More driving, more buttons. During that time as a bus driver it was drilled into my head that anyone who passes a bus with its sign out is actually a demon wearing a people suit. A soulless creature whose only purpose on this planet is to stop children from getting to their next birthday. Too lazy to actually catch and eat a kid these beings take to the streets, driving recklessly and citing ignorance when caught.
We all had papers to write down such incidents, and I did so with pride every single time. Whenever someone ignored my sign I took it personally, because it weighs on you, knowing the consequences of impatience. Besides the whole “children are precious thing”, if I got hit I’d have to wait hours to pee in a cup, and I was most likely already 6 coffees in and ready to pop. It sticks with you though, even as a civilian no matter how late I am, I’m never upset at the handicap bus taking 20 minutes to wheel and lock a kid down. Tomorrow I’ll find another way, buses are pretty predictable. It’s kinda the point.
Once I was fortunate enough to be directly behind a bus on a two lane road, followed her for a half hour and 5 different stops. It was soul crushing. But I was a good boy. I didn’t try and shoot the gap when she dipped into the shoulder, right between the 1/100th of a second between yellow and red. Which would have been very technically legal, but still a jerk move. I waited. Looked in my mirrors, a delay stretching out of my line of sight. I’d like to think the driver was feeling powerful, tens of people just begging for her to turn off, or park, or burst into flames. Nowhere in the New York State Driver’s manual does it say you need to wait for a burning bus. (I checked) No, no relief for us.
Suddenly, a champion of darkness appears. Sporting a 6 ton robin’s egg colored Denali, fueled by souls and leaded gasoline, this road beast lurched forward into the middle lane blowing past the line of nearly parked vehicles, defiant and unwilling to waiver before the bright red glow of warning hanging off the side of the loading bus. The Denali races past missing all potential hip-height targets and gets caught at the next intersection. I see red. Then black. Then the red stop sign swings back against the bus, and it holds its position in the shoulder. An opening. I slowly and carefully pull past and take off in a full sprint towards the stopped Denali. I have no idea what I’m going to do when I catch up, but the bus had already pulled back into traffic. I was the chosen one. I had to do something.
Now behind the vile beast’s chariot I can get a better look to see what I’m against. I’ve already texted myself the license plate, make, model. There was a sticker on the back, the creature’s son is an Eagle Scout. I bet he’d be disappointed.
The light goes green, the demon takes off and pulls back into the middle lane to turn. I notice the windows are open. Here’s my chance. Slowly creeping up alongside the foul beast’s mount I see the driver turn towards me looking through into the back seat, we make eye contact, it’s a middle aged woman. Here we go.
I yell “HEY ASSHOLE YOU…” and then I see why she turned. A young kid — sitting in the back seat — eyes wide, fixed on the disheveled bearded monster screaming at his mother. She was handing him a snack. Committed, I finished my statement. “YOU PASSED A LOADING SCHOOL BUS”.
And I drove off, confident that I was still the better person.
Originally released for The Storymaker’s Association as an audio podcast. Check out the other stuff Nick does at NickSequeira.com or FailedInitiative.com.
