The 26

The 26



I could not help but feel tangled in my thoughts. Unlike other days there was some peculiar awareness that altered my common routine. On that day there was poetry wandering, which could not avoid me.
I ran in long strides with a heavy bounce on my shoulders. I hurried pass pedestrians, leaped broken sidewalks, and dodged fresh links of dog poo. I wore a heavy bag of books strapped to my back, that pulled on my shoulders and strained my neck. I was ambitious enough to have hoped to finish my homework on the bus ride to school. I took the number 26 bus which arrived every fifty minutes at the Irvington Terminal Station and took thirty minutes to reach Kean University where I attend class. That morning like many others was a panicked rush to complete tasks that should’ve already been done and to arrive to class on time. Unfortunately, it is a challenge that I am too familiar with. I always passed an old man on my way, who on most mornings sits on his steps ripping wedges from a peeled orange and chews on them, seed and all. And he watched me on most mornings sprinting passed in a hurry. I ran until the 26 was in sight but it was still too far for anyone to hold. I ran across the busy street while cars passed. The bus slowly pulled off and took its time around the corner, taunting me. I kept pace hoping I would catch it at that immediate red light. I darted pass the bus stop and cut the corner. The light was green and it cruised right through the intersection till I couldn't see it anymore. I was breathing heavy and cursed loud enough so that people would hear me. It's embarrassing missing your bus. The failure is what hurts most and even worse is failing publicly. If you walk casually and then realize that your bus has already left, well that’s unfortunate enough. But to chase it desperately with 40 pounds bouncing on your shoulders and failing despite the best of your efforts, that is more than unfortunate. Cynics would enjoy the humor.

Okay, so I'll be a little late for class. At least I can finish my assignment at the terminal. Even a minor defeat as this is discouraging and evokes a frustrating cycle of perpetual failure. It feels like I often arrive just a little too late to things that I should be on time for, but well early enough for me to catch the next one. I conditioned myself to block out memories of times when there was no next one, when I am left pondering alone with the heavy gravity of pitiful regret. True regret never blunts over time. It cuts sharp and vivid then lingers just out of sight. Even disguised as opportunity, its true face remains.

I walked slowly and thoughtfully back to the Terminal. Pass that old homeless man covered in his torn blanket, sleeping huddled over on a bench. Pass the concrete colored pigeons with red eyes that are unafraid and strut lamely on a stub for a foot. I opened the heavy glass doors to the Terminal and dropped my bag on the round metal bench that centered the room. I sat and rested trying not to look too much at the handful of people that would be waiting with me for their own buses. It was quiet and uncomfortable and filled with the awkward collective tension of simply waiting. Everything in the room felt cold and silver. The circled bench, the counter walls, even the toilet in the bathroom was silver. I can't imagine who could or would ever sit on that. But, I still had to finish my assignment. I pulled out my papers, scattered them on the seat and flipped to Emerson’s, “The American Scholar”. I eased into the essay and a couple paragraphs through, I blocked out everything around me. It takes full focus to think critically on an Emerson address. But as I read I felt something happening. There is poetry here, happening now, that could not avoid me. I felt stretched between two opposing sides. Reading further, I quickly glanced at the room and noticed worn and weary faces, made hard by the weight of their worries. I allowed myself to assume this, wondering truly what they were thinking, where they were going, what they thought of me and my running. There were no smiles, just patience or impatience. During the late morning hours of a weekday which are usually devoted to stability or its pursuit, there is always a single group of people stored in this terminal of middle aged and older, men and women waiting for their bus to arrive, that around the schedule of our transit system is replaced and rotated with new members and a new group as diverse as their destinations. And me, with my papers scattered around me, nudging my glasses from the tip of my nose and hastily scribbling notes every minute. Who was I in comparison to them? It felt safe to assume that they weren’t waiting for the same bus that I was. Thiers arrived at a different location than mine. Despite the brilliant contrast I felt between them and myself, I plunged deeper into Emerson’s Oration before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Cambridge in 1837. Emerson one-hundred and seventy-one years ago, made this address to me, the student and the American Scholar. The average working class who make up the majority of our American population might not fully understand the practicality of being a scholar. But the scholar however, does also distinguishes himself in his trade like many others. Like the carpenter who delegates himself to tools, the Mechanic who delegates himself to machines, the Attorney who delegates himself to the statute books of law. The scholar delegates himself to intellect and provides with it his most basic interest to share and explore it with others. This, added to a far reaching measure that dedicates itself to helping people in need, flows particularly from myself naturally and finds a port for every person who has no choice, little hope, and even more despair. But even then I am still here waiting, as patiently as virtue requires for that 26. I looked at the clock and realized that my class will start soon while I was waiting. Buses had come and gone and so were the people who waited for them They were replaced with a new room of people that seem to rotate shifts. A rambling vagrant limped on through in old tattered clothes stepping on the heel of his shoe. A younger man with thick, messy dreadlocks blasted the music on his earphone so that everyone could hear it, and a woman complained about the price of a bag of potato chips to the ticket master who sold snacks and drinks from behind a glass. I was almost through with my paper when the bus that I had waited for came. I gathered my stuff and found a good seat in the back. I took a short time wondering what it was I had felt that scented the Terminal such a curious mood. Maybe it is what I shared with everyone that waited in that room. That there is something about riding the bus out of all modes of public transportation that evokes despair. It’s dirty, it smells, it’s crowded and you don’t get to choose where you go. It just stops and you had better get off when it stops for you. There is no sense of security, not like a car that goes wherever you tell it, stops when you’re ready and waits patiently for you until you decide to leave. We wait for the bus. It is unforgiving and constantly reminds you that you should get a car. No one chooses to ride the bus, they just have to. For me, it doesn’t matter which vehicle takes me to school, because I am always there. Whether I am at the stop or at home I am still there. Or maybe sitting in that Terminal it is that naive ambition of hope that burns hot inside of me, against the glowing embers of fading fires started long ago. Whatever it was, we all waited together patiently or impatiently for our buses to arrive. That takes us to our own selective destinations.