For Me? WOW !!

It had been a few weeks that the teasing and harassment continued from a fellow classmate I did not get along with. Each day was a journey of hell being in the back of the bus, minding my own business and getting lost in the 'roadtrip'. I figured sitting way in the back I could be in no ones way and sit there as if the world around me could simply disappear. Sometimes the visual of a 'hiatus' was provided through the cassette player our busdriver had attached to the side of the rearview mirror that would play some of her favorite music.

As I discovered, she liked and listened to some really good stuff. We were bonding on a lyrical harmonic sense and I figured we could get along. She witnessed the tolerance I had for the bully, she appreciated me not getting in his face and continuing the reaction he was looking for. I came up with a plan that would eventually have him to nervous to mess with me because I was 'protected'. I began, each day,moving closer and closer up front, seeking some sort of protection from the busdriver. She was the nicest lady and part of the 'watchful eyes and powerful body' group that had people ready to haul your butt right off any, specifically her bus, whenever she, or they felt like it ! You did not upset the bus driver nor pick on her riders that were never a problem.

I felt safer the closer I got to where she sat in the drivers seat so everyday it was one seat up, one seat up till finally this bully just left me alone for awhile. The bus drivers recalls how often I would just stare out the window trying to find an escape on my journey from school to home with the likes of a kid that clearly disrespected women ! Despite being teased and my hair pulled or my body tripped, I never fought back with punches nor obscenities but I held back tears and kept very quiet, pondering on why ?

I had a knack for missing my stop and this bully had a knack of staying at a different kids house afterschool so there was no telling how long my tormenting would last. The bus driver always tried to get to his drop-off point the fastest so as not to encourage the torment for me. As the week drew itself to a close, Friday I had made it up front where her and I could chit-chat. It was great that an older person wanted to talk to me who knew nothing, or so I thought. Even if she never looked at me, just kept her eyes on the road, I felt her caring more than one who might stare you in the eyes and lie by appearing interested.

I talked to her about life for me as a first run teenager. I am thirteen, the first 'teen' you live through till the twenties attack you and you acclamate to that decade. So, I am a newbie 'teen', 13 and feeling life is going to fast. More and more complex issues came into play as I started looking more appealing to boys but still, despising them. Boys bothered me, got under my skin like a teensy-weensy bug you can't see but irritates you so much you want to jump in a lake and rinse it off. Irritating, boring, and of course far from intelligent . . . at thirteen with girls and boys, girls exceed intellect and then shrink back to acceptable 'norms', whatever 'normal' really is.

She listened for a few weeks and she became my best friend, Rubes (real name withheld)was the most gentle lamb finding other lost lambs and helping them find their way home. She told me of ways to slow down the chaos in my head by day-dreaming about roses, bending down, physically touching the soft petals bringing them to the olfactory department and really inhaling deep the sweet seductive smell of calm. Rubes listened to great music, eclectic absorption, she called it.

She was born in the south and had slavery as part of her genealogy, but she never criticized what others would consider misfortunes. She felt blessed because her grandmas family was delievered into promise by the very people who bought them and made them recognized in their own right: new property owners. What grand property she used to tell me of. Plantations that European slave traders owned was willed to loyal family members, yes Rubes's family such as great grandma, grandma, uncles, aunts, great uncles and great aunts had been classified as 'family' offering them a paradise they had struggled long and many years to be delivered into. I related as I knew my great grandparents and grandparents and great aunts and uncles equally struggled at the hands of persons like Hitler.There misfortunes, as people would refer to them as, were also blessings . . .

I had a friend in the busdriver of my elementary school memories and am grateful I was taken seriously and protected, so to speak. Rubes has passed away but will never be forgotten ! She will be fondly remembered as having given me a retreat to "Thunder Island" !