Journey // equivocality

Posted in: Photo/Misc, Thoughts | Tags: inspiration

Bus rides are always either really good or really bad.

They’re really good when I find a window seat. That’s when I can tune out completely, lose myself in my music, and become totally oblivious to anything going on around me. I get to watch everything pass by and drift in and out of my thoughts. It’s when I get the most thinking done during the day (even more than in the shower).

They’re really bad when I can’t find a seat and I’m left standing up. I keep my music low so that I can hear any announcements by the bus driver, or people trying to get by. I’m always on guard about where I should be moving or when a seat might become available. And music on a low volume isn’t really worth listening to.

One of the reasons why I haven’t bought a car is because I’d lose all my thinking time. Every day I can reflect for an hour going to work and an hour coming back when I’m on the bus. If I was in a car, I’d be too busy paying attention to the road, to bad drivers, to traffic lights, to pedestrians. I wouldn’t be able to think, and I’d probably write a lot less.

Some days, when I’m coming close to my stop, I wish that the bus would just keep going, just keep driving, and never stop. I’d ride it from morning to night, listening to my music, just enjoying the feeling of going somewhere and nowhere at the same time.

Thinking about nothing and everything.

3 comments — Follow the feed

#1 number18

What’s sad is that I moved from Philly to a suburb in Massachusetts, where there is no public transportation…and I went from writing every single time I was on the bus or subway to writing on my breaks at work…to not writing at all. I can’t wait till I move back to Philly…

#2 Jeff

I hope I’d never get to not writing at all if I ever stopped taking the bus. It think it would just take me longer to collect my thoughts. I hate being dependent on something like that, but there’s always the option of taking the bus with no destination for the sake of writing.

#3 number18

Hm. It’s not just that there isn’t public transit here, though. It’s a number of different factors that sort of suck the inspiration to write from me. Just a monotonous life with very little stimulus, except what’s good to look at on the internet or on music television. It’s interesting, however, to see how people become the sterotypical suburban types. There really is nothing for them to do.