Jasmine Takes the Bus
(Photo: Would this face of celebrity ride the bus?)
The following is a Chicagoans Project guest post from local Chicago blogger Jasmine Davila. For the genesis of this project, please see here. To tell your story, email me at mike (at) chicagocarless (dot) com.
“I loathe the bus. There has to be a more dignified mode of transportation.”
–Samantha Baker, “Sixteen Candles”
36. 135. These are the buses I take on a regular basis. The 135 on the way to work, and the 36 on the way home in case I decide I want to stop at Aloha Eats, Lito’s Empanadas, or Crisp to pick up dinner.
I try not to make these fattening, though delicious, stops too often.
If I happen to have a free seat next to me, I like to count the number of people who get on the bus and bypass that free seat before it’s taken. I imagine people may avoid that seat because I’m not a small person. I’m not super-big but I don’t imagine that I look so bulky that people would rather stand than sit next to me. Last I checked, being fat isn’t contagious? Or is it? (See FreshYarn.com).
In any case, I don’t spill too much out of my own seat. I shower regularly, people tell me I’m funny, and I usually have extra reading material. So if you see me on the bus, please sit down and introduce yourself. I’ve got a copy of Us Weekly you can totally have.
I want to lobby CTA president/hottie Ron Huberman to rename the 36 bus “The Hot Mess Express”. Beyond the usual loud cellphone talkers and the folks who block the aisle with their shopping carts, this line seems to attract a special kind of people whose grasp on reality is just this side of tenuous. Like this lady I once saw who was attired entirely in blue. Blue denim jacket, spandex bike shorts, sneakers. Blue eye shadow, nail polish, and lipstick. She looked like a Smurf that had exploded into a full-size human lady.
I also love the 151, as it seems to embrace humanity, in all its levels of sanity. Once I saw a man strut up and down the aisle of the bus, like he was determined to reenact “Paris Is Burning” for this crowd of Saturday afternoon tourists, before he got off at Michigan and Oak. Truly it was like the spirits of Linda Evangelista, Naomi Campbell, and the other great supermodels had converged in this young man in the pleated acid wash jeans who wore a flannels scarf wrapped around his head like a turban. It was kind of amazing though I seemed to be the only person who thought so.
I’ve never taken the bus from one terminus to the other, but I was thinking of making that my summer project. 8. 36. 49. 55. 56. 72. 151. I think I’ll start with these.
___
Jasmine Davila writes when she isn’t procrastinating, eating empanadas, watching television, working at her day career, or riding the bus. Visit her blog, News from the Flip Front, or browse JasmineDavila.com for more information, clips, and, um, that about sums it up.
As of November 2011, my subscriber feed has changed! To get the new feed, go here or click the orange logo in the right sidebar. Thanks for being a regular reader!
Other posts you might like from Chicago Carless:
The front-page story in today's Sun-Times chronicles a northwest side paralegal, Melissa Monroy, who has decided to dump her car to get to work. The way she is quoted in the article, you would think not having a car in Chicago--the city with the second largest train, bus, and commuter rail system in America is a death sente...
No one could be more thrilled than I am about the end to the CTA operating funding impasse. For transit users like me, the draconian cuts threatened in January would have essentially confined me to my neighborhood--and most likely have pushed me and many others out of Chicago.
Now I've heard a lot of creative funding schemes before, but I've sure never heard of a state lending money to its cities' transit systems to keep them running, much less yanking the same money back later. Well, unless that state is run by Governor Rod Blagojevich.
Pleated acid wash jeans? Plaid scarf around his head like a turban? Sounds like a Revolutionary Outfit to me. People like that make cities more interesting, and add to the “color” and “flavor” of a city (provided they behave and don’t start screaming and soiling themselves in the middle of the bus, as sometimes happens here in San Freakdisco). I personally think he may be on to something, fashion-wise.