Mongrel Meets His Maker

Last night I hopped on the number 4 bus after work and began my commute home. Nothing out of the ordinary. Traffic is a little lighter, as it's an hour later than I normally go home. My entertainment is the activity on the streets and my sound track is DJ Shadow. I'm relaxed, unwinding from another long Monday, then He gets on the bus. The hair on the back of my neck stands up, like a dog when a predator is near. The guy is wearing a Budweiser jacket, unkempt, and speaking loudly with a crazed look in his eye. He, we'll call him Bud, sits down across the isle from me and immediately calms down.

"Next Stop, MCTC"

A few people get off, more get on. A guy sits down next to Bud. The bus gets going again, I turn my attention back to the scenery outside, glancing nervously to the other side of the bus. As I'm swimming in my thoughts, I hear his voice. I look back over towards Bud again, and I see he's a little excited. I turn off my headphones just in time to hear Bud yelling about how Jesus wants him to die. “Jesus wanting you to die? Then why the hell did he put you on this bus with me!?”

The guy sitting next to Bud, then turns to the guy in front of me and makes a motion like smoking a three-footer. He's got a smile on his face. I assumed he was just making the "this guy is fucked up" signal. Bud continues his tirade about JC tightening the noose around his neck. Bud's seat buddy then gets up to go to the front of the bus, and that's when I see it. Bud is leaned over, with a lighter. "Holy shit! That guy's.." And the guy talking to the bus driver finishes my sentence for me. Hitting a crack pipe.

Now, I’ve done a lot of smoking and in a lot of crazy places. I mean, when you get the itch, you get the itch. Of course it’s not every day you see crack heads getting’ jarred up on the bus.

“Don’t you do it Jesus. Don’t let him at me! My mind’s already melting at the sight of this lunatic, don’t make me get the golf shoes out!”

Right at this moment, I look back outside and realize we're on Hennepin, not on Lyndale. The bus driver missed his merge onto Lyndale. “Great, someone else failing at their job – hey, you aren’t hitting the glass tube too, are you?”

Some people get off, and as the bus driver makes his way back to deal with Bud, he darts off the bus. “You ain’t never gonna catch no crack head.” Jesus man, this was fucked up, but now I can go back into my head and revel in my mental fodder, right? I wish...

We go up to Franklin and take a left back down to Lyndale. While we're stopped at the light, the bus driver is yelling out his window, to the people at the stop he missed. He seemed to be yelling for a long time, which can only mean, the people he was yelling at thought he was indeed a nut job. Finally, a couple people come across the street and hop on the bus. As we're pulling off the curb, an older woman runs up and furiously pounds on the door to be let in. She gets on, which causes us to miss the light. Not a big deal. A woman in the front of the bus gets up to offer her seat to the woman who just got on. The woman who got on the bus the gives that woman the dirtiest look I've ever seen an older woman give anyone, and that's when I see it. The fury in her eyes. “Jesus, not again, not another one!” She's insane. I see now that she closely resembles the crazy cat woman from the Simpson’s, except with glasses. She all but pushes the woman, who was nice enough to offer her a seat, down in an attempt to get to a seat further back. The nice woman is stunned. She's confused. She pauses, then makes her way back to her original seat.

At this point, we're back on Lyndale, there's no crack being smoked, and a few of us are rehashing the crazy rantings of Bud. The lady, who just happened to sit down next to Bud's old seat mate, turns to him and asks him what we're talking about. He tells her, and that did it. I'm not sure what happened, but she flips. "Shit! Goddamn it!"

All of us are stunned. Bud's old seat mate hadn't said anything offensive, he'd simply said "There was a guy on the bus smoking a crack pipe."

"Son of a bitch! I meant to get on the 2! Goddamn it!"

And then she runs to the front of the bus. When I say she ran, I mean she ran, or at least as well as you can through a packed bus. She berates the bus driver for a minute and he lets her off the bus. A few blocks later, I get off the bus and make my way home.

Whew, home sweet home, my ride on the Twilight Zone Bus is over. For today.