I am not in a particular rush to get home, whether that is defined as my parent’s house or my college. Today, I will take a day for me, although I told my professors I had a “family emergency.” Looking through the 6:35am languor hanging heavily in the air of the New York Trailway bus, I notice other travelers lack companions too. The Amish man kitty-corner to me comments how the bus driver was late to our pickup by 20 minutes. I suppose 20 minutes is a long while if one travels by horse and buggy. He smells like patience and hard work. He keeps asking me for the time; I wonder where he is going. His year-old beard is wiry, but not yet gray. He must have been recently married because the Amish men only shave their beards when they are single. I feel safer.
We are at the halfway point between Canton and Syracuse. Four church steeples compete for divine rights in the heart of downtown Watertown. The bus driver is crackling over the intercom how the “traffic” of Canton has the bus running behind schedule. A Bluetooth device looped around the bus driver’s left ear whispers of the businessman aspirations he never achieved. His demeanor projects how he will soon be promoted to a conductor at Grand Central Station as he warns lethargic passengers to not get lost at the rundown terminal. The bus is pungent with the smell of a curmudgeon’s day old deli tuna sandwich his dead wife can no longer prepare fresh each morning.
People come and go on the bus, pausing only to check social media in their palms. The passing air characterizes each person two or three feet after they mosey down the aisle. One woman with a flouncy skirt and clacking heels smack the aisle seats with her overbearing baggage that matches her personality. Another young man saunters out of a Ralph Lauren advertisement with sharp patent leather shoes and seductive woodsman scent. A strong woman, Independence, has a purpose as she scooches in tightly to the window seat in front of me. I prefer the aisle seat when traveling alone to fend off unwanted conversations; I admire her confidence. Independence puts on the glasses I already assumed she wears. Plastic black frames that accentuate her high-boned, double chin jawline. A soiled piece of tape is wrapped tightly around the nosepiece.
Commas let the reader know when they should pause or slow down Section 7.2 of Intro to Communications hardcover textbook reads in the calloused hands of Independence. That breakfast bar she is meticulously unwrapping is probably the only substance her stomach will digest all day, except for the cup of black coffee when she arrives at her destination ten minutes early. Her wiry coarse hair does not obey the barrettes attempting to pin back the fly-aways. The rigid padded shoulders of her navy blue blazer hide the round set underneath.
I must have dozed off because the Amish man isn’t there for me to keep track of passing the time. Independence is still on page 101 of Section 7.2. She succumbs to the rhythmic motion of the bus, pushing her intended time management skills to the aisle seat. With care, she unwinds the rubber hair tie holding her practiced bun in place. I can feel the relief of her sigh as she tilts her face towards the sunlight beginning to flood the bus. I hope today she splurges at a hidden coffee shop off of Main Street for a medium French vanilla coffee, $2.16, instead of the bitter dark blend, $1.85, at the rundown gas station that is along her way. Maybe she will even ask for a shot of cream, but no sugar. I hope she sits in the faded, overstuffed, roasted mahogany armchair by the window to write her communications paper due on Monday. That she abundantly uses commas, even if incorrectly, and orders a raspberry scone with a second cup of coffee causing her to miss her meeting at noon.
