It had been a quick summer. And a busy one. One filled with work, and play, and birthdays, and barbecues, and friendships. With frisbee games, and water fights. A summer of moonlit hikes and adventures on mountain bikes. Of runs, and canoe trips, of camping, and backpacking and in all the slots in between these things we were being entertained, constantly, by a very sweet and very active two-year-old brother who was often joined by the very sweet but slightly less-active 17-year-old brother. But, there was one thing that we were missing. That stuff, that substance that without it, summer just wouldn't be summer. And that stuff is, of course, real good relaxing, doing nothing, absolutely nothing, of not doing ANYTHING you don't want to do, having no obligations, not even the obligations you don't mind having.

We needed to escape.

We needed an absence of what you just don't get in a house full of six people, where friends and your extended family, and the families of your friends, and the extended families of your friends are always coming and occasionally going. Nothing just doesn't quite happen. And it doesn't happen at college. No explanation necessary. What we needed was a cross-country bus ride to college. And when we say cross-country, well, we mean just that. In fact, we mean 62 hours of sitting in the seats of a Greyhound. We mean 2,500 miles. We mean from Helena, Montana to Hartford, Connecticut, and all the places in between. And that is what we wish to tell you about, all that stuff in that gap of space in between.

There are two types of people in this world: the kind you want to meet and the kind you don't want to meet. And as the governing laws of our universe have it, it seems that those who fall into your "don't-want-to-meet" pile often include you in their "want-to-meet" pile. Do you remember the movie City Slickers? Well, we observed some men straight out of the movie. No, we didn't get to enjoy entertaining Billy Crystal schtick or cuddle with a calf named Norman....but the bus was, instead, graced with the presence of the ice-cream brothers, who as you may recall were the size of Norman, that is, Norman full grown.

GrOaNnNnnnn.

At least that's what the whole bus was doing upon laying eyes on perfect examples of characters who generally fall into everyone's "don't-want-to-meet" pile, and perhaps into a vast majority of the populationŐs "really-don't want-to-meet" pile. Now, we are not ones to pass judgment on anyone; chances are they might be very nice men, but as seat partners come they were at the bottom of the ladder, for reasons as simple as the seat-size to person-size ratio. As these particular men approached the bus, the groans rapidly began to subside, but not because of feelings of immense relief. Rather, because they did not want to attract attention.

Nuts:

On Delta you eat them
On Greyhound you meetthem

And as these men began utilizing the tape measure they'd brought along to measure the horizontal dimensions of the bus door people began to stealthily reach up into the overhead compartments, pulling down items to fill the seats beside them. And while one of the brothers was fumbling in his bag for a screwdriver, one that was, no doubt, heavily used, you could sense that passengers were fabricating stories about their dear bus partners who were in the bathroom, but would, of course, be back at any moment. We grinned wildly amused grins, happy that we were traveling together, as all those sharing seats with their invisible friends assumed a common pose. That is, the timeless classroom pose that students adopt when they havenŐt done the assigned reading, yet don't know enough about the topic to bullshit. Now these brothers may not have been able to pick the perfect ice-cream to complement any meal. But they made up for it in their knack of choosing perfect seat-partners, or perhaps we should just leave it at interesting seat-partners and very much in line with the law defined above. Fat brother A chose the seat next to the woman whose steady stream of words were quite in proportion to his weight. We speculate that she became that lucky bus partner because she didnŐt quite have the classroom pose perfected due to lack of necessity, having been "blessed" with the talent of bullshitting. Too bad it wasn't Norman, as Norman would have been aghast at someone who could have surpassed him in the bullshiting department. An opportunity for a comparison just can't be passed: We imagine that Norman's bullshit, on most days anyway, must consist of small pies of digested grass. In contrast, this woman's bullshit consisted of elaborations of her plans to put her midlife-crisis on hold for a wild weekend in New York City with relatives she'd never met. Now we can reiterated her bullshit in one sentence, whereas it took her from Cleveland to Cincinnati to unload her story. And if this bullshit had taken material form, it probably could have covered a cow pasture, a large cow pasture, say the size of Ohio, three times over.

Fat brother B chose the seat next to the young college student with the Boston accent who was trying to pick up the hooker across the isle.....but we'll pick up here another time.

© Trincoll Journal, 1995.