Monday
Everywhere else there was the characteristic New York impatience – shouts, curses. … Yet the old men sat in a state of stoic introspection, uniformly indifferent to their rate of progress, or the noise, or indeed the city through which they traveled."
-E. L. Doctorow, The Waterworks
It was on a similarly dark morning last October or November that I myself stood stock still, staring through my front window whilst holding a cup of coffee that promised to clear the fog that follows me from the Land of Nod each day. On this particular morning however, (and to this day I can’t fathom how I had missed it until then) I heard the telltale screeching and growling of a school bus as it made it’s way up our street. I double-checked the time… 7:05 am. I rubbed my eyes in an effort to refocus them, and sure enough a few seconds later I saw a big yellow bus rumble past. This bus, thankfully, was not steeped in an aura of magic realism that caused it to glow with a strange radiance as did Doctorow’s omnibus; had it, I’m sure I would still have the heebie-jeebies to this day.
This school bus, however, was singularly ghostlike as it was filled with middle school students who were, to a one, “…in a state of stoic introspection, uniformly indifferent to their rate of progress, or the noise, or indeed the city through which they traveled.” They were, in short, a wretched bunch, each with a pitiably mournful expression that spoke volumes about the side effects of the zealous achievement and conformity that we allow society to expect of our children.
Oh all right, it’s not as grim as all that, but jeez, that bus wasn’t just really early, it was almost full when it went by at 7:05. What time did all those kids have to get up? And how about all those breakfast-making, lunch-packing moms and dads? Whatever happened to the reasonably civilized 8:35 school day of my youth? And what’s up with my fondness for rhetorical questions?
Anyway, I found that this bus experience was yet another reminder that we always have to be wary of the indifference with which institutions and bureaucracies regard human beings. (Speaking of which, may I recommend Tom Hodgkinson’s How To Be Idle? It’s mostly a light bit of work that I would argue has few practical implications for those of us busy trying to keep our lives reasonably tidy as we raise kids, but it sure does remind us to keep our priorities in perspective.)
So in the end, I know that the world has always had, and always will have its share of 7:05 busses, and that part of life is learning how to deal with them when you must. But I do know this as well: all those little school-bound faces I saw that morning convinced me that my boys and I will be playing more than our fair share of hooky in the years to come.
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