America loves the automobile. Almost everyone owns a car, and we use them to go to work, visit friends, run errands, drive to church, and everything in between. I appreciate the freedom of the horseless carriage, but nonetheless I maintain that everyone, if he is able, should ride public transportation every once in a while.
I use public transit to visit my friend who lives in St. Louis city. The route takes about an hour and a half to traverse: a 2.3-mile walk to the bus stop, a bus ride to North County, a Metrolink train ride to the city, and then a half-mile walk to my friend’s apartment.
A couple weeks ago when I boarded the bus, I found myself listening to a conversation between the driver and the passenger sitting in the front row. They were both elegant black women, their skin the color of coffee, with only a few darkened spots and creases to give away their late middle age. They were talking about how terrible America was. “The rich people don’t care about people like you and me,” the bus driver said. “They just care about the rich. There’s so much corruption.”
“Uh-huh,” the passenger said, nodding seriously. “They don’t care about the black people, either.”
“There’s so much racism in America.”
“If I ever won the lottery, I’d move to some other place. They’re just too racist here.”
“And then you got those Asian women moving in and opening up beauty salons, stealing our business.”
“I know! And of course there’s the war.”
“And here everybody eats so badly— everything’s full of transfat and prepackaged.”
I listened in fascination, simultaneously confused at the double standard of their logic and feeling vaguely apologetic for being white. I wondered how many times each of them had been treated poorly by a white person. I wondered how many times they had written off a white person simply because she was caucasian. I wondered the same about myself.
At the Metrolink train station, I was headed to the platform when I heard a friendly voice say, “I haven’t seen you here in a while.” It was a man I had met once who spends his days hanging around the bus station wearing a bright blue parka. He is tall and round, with an expressive face and a jovial love for everyone he sees. It had been several months since I’d seen him, but it was clear he remembered me. We chatted for a few minutes before I headed up to the platform and he returned to his place among the bus stops, waiting to talk to anyone who wanted to listen.
On the other side of the bench I sat on, a young man was tossing three slightly-bent cards onto the pavement, one at a time. I ignored him until a young couple joined him, and he began moving the cards around, using sleight of hand to make them hard to follow. The girl gave him a twenty and flipped over one of the cards. It wasn’t the one she expected, and she groaned. I saw the card man had a wad of cash in his fist, one of the bills a hundred. The girl pulled out another twenty, and the game began again.
A woman of quiet grace came up and stood beside me, watching the game through her small brown eyes. She wore a hooded coat against the cold, and she held her lips as if withholding a thousand important things to say. I caught her gaze, and she shook her head. The game continued, and we both tried to pretend we were ignoring it. At last she opened her lips and pronounced a single judgement with another shake of her head: “Young people.” Even though my young age was obvious, she made it clear that I was not included in her statement.
On the train, I sat next to a well-kept young man with braided hair and stylish skater clothing. He listened to his mp3 player while I stared out the windows at the city flashing by. Ruined brick buildings, patched up and boarded over. A row of windows in an old factory, replaced with so many different kinds of glass that the squares resembled a painter’s palette of earth tones. Trees and vines finding life in abandoned streets.
I hopped out at the train station, the leftovers of a place that had once run steam engines. I jogged up the steps, one white passenger in a sea of diverse colors, crossed the street, and arrived safely at my friend’s house.
The same distance covered by car would have been about forty minutes quicker. But it would not have been the same vivid slice of life, close to other heartbeats, that the bus and train rides gave me. Once in a while, it’s important to step out of the car-induced bubble and travel a few miles with some strangers.
~Lisa Shafter
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