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2002-04-16 - 8:57 p.m.

THE BUS DRIVER AND THE TOURIST

The big girl scout field trip to Chicago went swimmingly. Well, we didn�t exactly swim although we were by Lake Michigan and it certainly was warm enough to swim. (Who expects temperatures in the high 80s in the Midwest in April? Then again, who is foolish enough to presume what the weather will be like on any given day in the spring in the Midwest?) We did take the Amtrak train to Chicago and visit the Shedd Aquarium�and we had a wonderful time. The girls fell in love with the adventure. I fell in love with the bus drivers.

Once we had decided to go to Chicago by train, I had to decide how we should get from Union Station to the Shedd Aquarium. We could have taken cabs but that seemed expensive, decadent, and non-educational. Most of my girls, my very suburban girls, have had only limited experience with public transit systems so I decided taking the city bus would be educational. Then I realized that this time of year there is no direct bus. We would have to change buses. But I still was game. I could teach them about the beauties of transfers.

If it had poured, I might have chickened out. But the weather was clear and I spent enough years living in New York City and Brooklyn to feel more confident about public transportation than your average suburbanite from the Milwaukee area. I planned the trip on the Internet. I got myself a city map. I was set.

I needn�t have worried. While New Jersey bus drivers are, in my experience, gruff, New York bus drivers are, in my experience, often rude and dismissive, and Milwaukee bus drivers are, in my experience, sullen and dismissive, Chicago bus drivers are WONDERFUL. I know we were instantly identifiable as tourists. After all, we were wearing tags that included the words �Girl Scouts, Milwaukee Area.� We got on the bus as a group of fourteen. Still, that wouldn�t have melted the hearts of other bus drivers I have met.

The first bus driver was patient as I fed the $25 one dollar bills and the twenty cents into the fare box and asked for 14 transfers. She asked where we needed to change busses and called out our stop. When we got off, she opened her door to explain to us as I counted heads out on the sidewalk that we needed to walk around the corner.

The second driver was even nicer. He was patient as the girls tried to figure out how to put the transfers in the transfer card box and to get it back out. He showed the third girl the procedure just as gently has he had showed the first girl. When I explained that it was the first time doing this for most of the girls, he commented that there had to be a first time for everyone. He asked where we were going and made sure we got off at the right stop.

The kindness was neither a fluke nor luck of the draw. The first driver on the way back was a little more brusk but she too wanted to know where we wanted to switch buses and to which bus. The second driver also was patient (although he needed less patience because the girls had it now) and called out our stop for us on a much more crowded bus than any we had taken previously.

Now, you need not think that Chicago bus drivers are just constitutionally incapable of impatience or a bit of rudeness. At least three of them could lay on the horn in heavy traffic as well as any New York City bus driver or even a New York cabbie. As with New York bus drivers, the definition of a driver who hesitates too much seems to be one who does not dart out the very instant the light turns red. But that�s okay. I like my heroes a bit edgy.

So, if I ever divorce Mr. Philately (which I�m not really contemplating and is not particularly likely), perhaps I�ll be ready for a blue collar guy. Perhaps I�ll try and nab me a Chicago bus driver�but only if he promises we can play the bus driver and the tourist for the rest of our lives.

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