"We miss your blog," people tell me, "why don't you write anymore?" The thing is, I do still write. Sadly, it's all been in school. And, even more sadly, it hasn't been any fun at all. But if you're so sweet as to still check this, I feel obligated to at least give you something to read. So here's what I am writing lately, now that I'm all grown up and boring and going to Whatcom. . . .

Despite the fact that I ride the bus to and from school every day, I rarely take notice of what happens during those 25 minutes. I’m always unnerved by the complete lack of interaction between passengers on my daily commute. They sit stone-faced in their seats, staring straight ahead and avoiding eye-contact, counting down the minutes until they arrive at their destinations and hurry off to their busy days. People on the bus are somewhere between point A and point B, thinking only of what they need to do when they reach point B. If the people around me have nothing to do with my looming schedule, they’ll hardly enter my consciousness. “Seeing” Annie Dillard writes, “is very much a matter of verbalization. Unless I call my attention to what passes before my eyes I simply won’t see it. It is, as Ruskin says, ‘not merely unnoticed, but in the full, clear sense of the word, unseen’” (122). I find this to be all too true. Even if I sit beside someone day after day, I may be too engrossed in my own little problems to ever notice the unique person in the seat right next to me.

On rainy mornings, I wait as far from the bus stop as I can. Not because I dislike the rain, but because when the bus hisses to a stop in front of me, it plows through a puddle and attempts to drench me in mud. I climb the three steps aboard and stumble into the first available seat, carefully laying my backpack on the seat beside me to prevent anyone from sitting too close. Today, I’ve determined, I will not waste the 25 minutes I’ve been given with some of my town’s fascinating characters. Seated with my back to the window, facing into the isle, I steal glances at the people sitting in the blue bucket-seats across from me.
I note several familiar faces—people who’ve been on the same bus with me day after day. Just to my left sits a woman who I guess is in her mid twenties. She’s wearing a hat that looks like a panda, complete with two large, black ears. Across the brim of the hat are nestled an array of pins, my favorite of which says “Glomp Me” in bright orange letters. Her shoes are bright blue, and at her feet lies a scooter much like the one my little brother owned when he was ten. She hunches over a video game, completely engrossed and content.
Just behind me sit several Asian exchange students. One of them, I realize, is in a class with me at school. Today she is wearing a plaid skirt, baseball cap, strappy gold sandals and knee-high socks. I admit I’m jealous: Despite her criminal fashion record, she always looks adorable. The same can be said for her two friends as they sit close together, chatting softly in a language nobody around them can understand.
At the next stop an older woman climbs aboard. As she sits next to me, the smell of cigarette smoke and the Starbucks she clutches so tightly betrays her to be a creature of addictions. Expressionless, she slumps in her seat. I catch her eye and smile shyly; she glares through me unblinkingly. She does not budge for the remainder of the trip.
“Do not touch your sister!” the woman who has just boarded shouts from the front of the bus. Behind her follow two bickering children, one still in footed pajamas. Though they move toward the rear, I can hear children fighting, a smack, then a wail. The mother threatens, the children argue, the noise increases. I can feel the poor woman’s embarrassment as those riding near her turn their bodies to face out the window, pretending not to notice what has escalated into a three-way brawl.
A scrawny teenager climbs aboard and slinks to the far back corner. Somewhere under the mop of pink and black hair I spy part of her face; her eyes dart from person to person. She studies the woman and her children, then turns up the music on her iPod. Her sneakers tap beat on the linoleum floor. I imagine she has a math test today, and is seeking refuge in comforting arms of the mall instead. My mind flits to my upcoming Spanish quiz, and I wonder if she wants a shopping partner.
The bus churns and vibrates. Gears grind. It’s impossible to tell where the engine noise comes from: the whole vehicle throbs and hums louder as we merge onto the freeway. Feeling like Jonah in the belly of the whale, I clutch the edge of my seat as we sway and jolt along. Like half the people on the bus, I’m wearing headphones. Mine, however, are off. What’s the use? I couldn’t hear a thing over the engine anyway. Motion sickness means reading is not an option. My hands find themselves useless, crumpled in my lap.
I realize the ruckus behind me has abated. Peeking back, I observe that Child One and Child Two have been separated, sitting on opposite ends of the isle with their mother planted resolutely between them. No one makes a sound as we hurtle through the rain.
I’m suddenly overcome by the urge to stand up in the isle and lead my fellow passengers in a song, like children on the way to summer camp. Come one everybody, I’d start, If you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands! I stifle a giggle at the sheer absurdity of the thought.
“What right have you got to be smiling your fool head off like that?” a voice nearby interrupts my thoughts. An older black gentleman, grinning gap-toothed at me, repeats his question. “I guess its ok, you do have a pretty smile,” he adds. I blubber something in response, and feebly attempt small talk. He tells me he just moved up from New Jersey, and is living with his girlfriend, who just got out of prison. I’m relieved when we arrive at his stop and he disappears.
Embarrassed to have been called out like that, I stare out the rain-streaked window for the remainder of my ride. Autumn reds and oranges are seeping into the trees, a splash of color under the granite sky. I notice things I’d never have seen if I were driving—a hawk glowering from a telephone pole; a hedge of purple flowers swaying beside the road; carefully tended flowerboxes beneath a tiny, Victorian-era home.
The bus lurches to a halt at the station and its contents spill out and disperse. In less than a minute not one person is left at the stop, each has scurried away to the pressing appointments, the meetings, the classes and the deadlines which run their lives. I holler my genuine thanks to the driver, not just for transportation, but for the gift of time he has given me—time to stop, observe, open my eyes, and really see. Then I too, join the herd of people rushing to class.