One of the drawbacks of being a school bus driver is being around snotty, rude, obnoxious kids. One of the perks of being a school bus driver is being around beautiful, gracious, thoughtful kids. Unlike teachers who spend hours, days, and weeks with the local youth population, school bus drivers only see the kids for a few seconds each day. Of course the drive to and from school takes longer than that, but the only time we actually see the kids are when they are getting on or off the bus. Sometimes there is also that momentary eye contact when glancing in the rear-view mirror. In those few seconds I get snapshots into the kid s lives that don t tell me a lot, but they do tell me something.
I took the junior high school run the other afternoon. When I opened the doors I almost cringed. A line of preteens and early-teens streamed in. Awkwardness and ignorance sloughed off of them like slime from a frog. Most of the cringe I felt was from momentarily being taken back to my own junior high days with all its memories of loneliness and confusion. One face stood out as he got on the bus pimples, loud, raw. I saw this face again near the end of the route when I walked to the back of the bus to investigate a spitting incident. The owner of the face had spit out the window. The spit immediately made reentry onto a girl s face. I didn t look forward to confronting him. He looked tough with a large amount of I could care less written all over him. In spite of this he looked nervous as I approached. That gave me hope. We chatted for a moment. I helped him understand what happens when one spits out a window on a bus. He understood there would be greater consequences if he did it again. As I walked away it struck me that he really hadn t intended to be rude to the girl he accidentally spit on. He just didn t have a lot of common sense.
Early one Saturday morning the girls volley ball team got on the bus. I said Good morning to one girl as she passed. She didn t respond didn t
even glance my way. I noticed she walked halfway back the bus and took a seat some distance from the other girls. It may have been she just wasn t a morning person. Maybe there was trouble at home or with the other girls. I don t know. One of the other girls came back to the front of the bus to offer me a muffin. Somehow, within the horizon of her early morning ride, she saw the bus driver. I was touched.
I was dropping a load of elementary kids off at school. One third-grader was dressed in a colorful dress and leggings. As she stepped onto the sidewalk I called out, That s a pretty dress. There were lots of kids filing out right behind her so I didn t think she would hear. She did. She looked over her shoulder and flashed a happy smile of pure sunshine. It s been a week and I can still feel its warmth. The last girl off the bus that day wore a blue blanket with a shark-head hood. It made it look like her head was in the shark s mouth. It was cute. As she walked down the aisle I said, Sharks are not allowed on the bus. They are dangerous. She wasn t sure if I was seriously scolding her or not. Then I smiled and said, I like your blanket. She stopped beside me, smiled, and took a big, happy, breath. Then she left without a word. Her smile and breath told me she appreciated someone noticing her favorite blanket.
I picked up eight kindergarteners. We drop kindergarteners off at their homes. I had never driven this route and didn t know where they lived. I asked them for help and they excitedly complied. There was no Drive to the highway and turn left kind of instructions. Instead I had eight kids calling out Drive this way. Then turn that way! I had to look in the mirror and try to decipher their finger pointing. One little boy adamantly indicated I should go down this street. I did. Two other kids overrode his instructions telling me it was the street with the rocks on it. It took a moment, but then I realized they meant the gravel road. I knew where that was. As we approached a pasture with cows they told me to honk. Our regular bus driver does, they said. My bus has an air horn. It sounds like a train when you pull the cord. I love it and look for opportunities. I gave it a yank. Eight voices yelled out in unison, Hello, cows! And they waved. Heading up the highway I saw three bored looking horses in a dusty corral. I yanked the cord again and pretended I was a train. The five remaining kids yelled out, again in perfect unison, Hello, horses. They all waved. I eventually got each child home and watched him or her run happily to the parent waiting in the doorway.
Some cars, not very many, still have radios that are tuned by turning a dial. If the dial is turned fast voices and music quickly resolve and then disappear in fragments. A practiced ear can get a sense of what the fragment of sound was about. Being a substitute bus driver is much like turning the radio dial. Instead of sound, faces flash past giving a momentary glimpse into a child s day or life. It isn t much of a glimpse; it is just enough to make me care.