Personal cloud

For quite some time just as I was getting off the bus at my last stop of the day it would rain.  I live in an area designated as temperate so constant sunshine is not expected.  Regular rain unsurprising, but this was different.

It was not raining as we pulled into the town, not drizzling as we pulled into the bus station but as soon as I got of, yip rain.  However, that was not the sum of it, the rain would stop moments after I got into the house.  I imagined that I looked like a cartoon character with my own personal cloud raining over my head.

Logically speaking I know that this experience is probably akin to dropping toast and recalling it always landing butter side down.  It has been scientifically proven this is not the case just that it is human nature to recall the worst outcomes rather than the best.  I suspect that is also true of my cloud.

Either that or the weather is out to get me!  

Are we nearly there yet?

So smooth transition, long wait or being decanted aside I am on the last bus and heading home.  This is the most relaxing journey of the day.  Well mostly it is, if there has been a lot of rain, and recently there has, a dip in the road floods.  To date it just whooshes up and over as the bus hits it but it does generate a momentary concern.

This section of the route has some pleasant views across the fields and passes through a pretty village before turning into my home town.  Yes it is the same going but it tends to be a bit dark to enjoy the view (and my eyes are often shut which does not help) and views are always prettier with a day of work behind me.

One last bus related choice.  Get off a stop early and go to the library before heading home or stay on. Due to recent budget restraints this has become a choice which takes a bit more memory power and thought than it used to.  Why? Because it used to be the library was open the same hours each day ( with a half day Wednesday and a 4 p.m finish on a Saturday).  To save money whilst keeping the library open, the times have all been changed, each day different hours and to be honest I keep forgetting what times for what day.

I miss tripping lightly to the lenders of books, I must pop a timetable for the library in my bag.  It can nestle amongst all of the bus timetable I have accumulated.  Only this timetable will offer me a richer more varied travel experience, and of course this is travel I can take with me on my bus journeys.

Singular encounters

Sometimes the connections made in the to and fro of my day are singular encounters in both meanings of the word.  One meeting, one conversation which for some reason lingers in the mind.

I am not sure if there is something about my face that says "you can talk to me, it is safe" or just that I happen to be in the right place at the right time, but people talk to me about stuff.  Then again perhaps they are in a place that they are talking to everyone, who knows.

One such conversation was with a school girl, she was waiting for the bus on her own having just spent time in detention for an infraction which she informed me was not instigated by her.  She talked about her alienation from others at school and her feelings of low self worth.  She told me all about her martial arts class and her ambitions to be a police officer and stay out of trouble and be someone respected.  She was very open about her family being in general on the other side of the law and her firm intention to become the exception.  I provided a level of approbation for her future plans.  That was a couple of years ago now, I saw her only once more after that, but we did not speak, just a look of awareness passed between us as she waited now with companions for her bus.  I hope that she made her plans work and is well on her way to her goal.

Others have spoken of loss and grief, of joy and new families, wedding plans or holidays gone awry health issues and new beginnings.   

Some conversations are a delight and others are uncomfortable and a few are seriously though provoking.

Going, going

Gone!

Space is all there is in the bus station now, all the seats are gone.  All that remains of the seats are the concrete patches on the floor where they used to be. 

I would like to think that the vanishing seats will shortly be replaced with a full compliment of comfy new seating.  However, I am finding it difficult to hold onto any optimism for that outcome in the near future.