Naked Pictures and Public Transportation

I take public transportation on a daily basis. It's ok; not the greatest, but it gets me where I need to go, which is home. The train is fine; nothing much to say about it. There is the occasional goofy or weird person, but for the most part, it's really not that bad. Now, the bus on the other hand, that's another story.

Let me start by saying that I hate taking the bus. It takes me through some of the worst and scariest neighborhoods in my area. That being said, it does give me some great stories. The one I'm about to tell is one of the funniest, if not the weirdest, experience I have ever had on public transportation.

There is a woman I see on the bus almost every day. I never paid her any attention, as I do to most of the people on the bus. However, as much as you might want to, you cannot ignore her. She is loud. She spends most of every bus ride talking on her cell phone, and not in a normal voice, but in a loud, black-woman-telling-everyone-her-business type of voice. (You know those kinds of people, I'm sure. They get on the phone, and begin to talk so loudly that you can't help but hear, and you learn more about them in one ride than you learned about your coworker in a month.) She does that the first few times I see her, and if not talking, she's texting.

On the bus one day last week I see her, and, as usual, she's on her phone withn two minutes of getting onto the bus, and as usual, she's loud. But this is not her usual, blah blah blah conversation. She starts yelling. (Oh, I forgot to mention, she has this loud, raspy, kind of smoker-type voice.) "What?! He said that???!!!!! Why would he say that???!!!!" Silence (bless the second), and then "Why would I do something like that? Why would you believe him? I'm so steamed right now, you have no idea!" And she hangs up.

In the meantime, I'm thinking, "Thank goodness. Maybe if she's mad at the guy, she won't talk on the phone to him and the rest of the ride will be (fairly) quiet." Nope. Not at all. Wishful thinking. Not even five minutes later she's on the phone again, yelling. This time, louder than before, if that's possible. So, the bus makes a few stops, and a few minutes later, it comes to what I like to call the "Grunge Stop." I call it this because it stops in an area where all the "grunge" people get on. I know, not nice. But it's true. It's the type people who, when they get on, just creep you out. I'm sure you all know those types of people. Anyway, I hate the stop. The creepiest people get on the bus there.

So, we make the stop, and everyone is slowly shuffling their way of the bus, while she's still yelling on the phone, saying the same things as before. However, just as everyone gets off the bus and the bus is about to close it's doors, she gets up, walks across half the bus (she was sitting in the middle section), and gets off. But as she's doing this, she's yelling, "WHY THE HELL WOULD I SEND HIM NAKED PICTURES OF MYSELF??????!!!!!" Yes. No joke. We ALL heard. And you knew everyone heard because the whole entire bus was quiet after she got off. For about five seconds that is.

I still see her. In fact, over the last week I learned she has a three year old daughter who loves Dora and changes her clothes about five times a day. Just last week she bought a little Dora necklace for her daughter--a surprise. I guess I'm saying this because it reminds me that they are people too. Loud, obnoxious, and annoying, but people nonetheless.