geekpat

Some mornings on the way to work I don't want the bus to stop. I want to keep riding around, past my stop, past the last stop, somehow just keep riding around. Back around to the beginning of the route, start the whole trip back through the city again. I don't want to get off and go to work. I want to keep leaning against the glass, looking out the window, looking at all the people on the street, looking at this small glimpse into their lives, looking at their expressions, their gestures, the way they walk, the way they hold hands, the way some of them look at the ground while others look straight ahead. Sometimes there's beauty, but there's a lot of ugliness too. I wonder what percentage of people are happier than I am, what percentage are sadder. I wonder what the ratio is. I wonder how many of them are struggling, how many of them have issues and neuroses and problems that they're trying to keep to themselves, trying to keep up a brave face in public, just trying to keep functioning, to get through each day. How many of them are scared? How many of them are lonely? How many of them are feeling hopeless? How many of them are content, how many of them are exactly where they want to be? I wonder if I've ever ridden past someone, looked at someone for an instant, someone who has gone home that night and killed themself? How would I know what to look for? Were they thinking about it, planning it when I looked at them? I wonder how many of these people during the course of the day will go to the bathroom stalls at work and cry silently to themselves and then wait until their eyes are no longer red and puffy before returning to their desks/cubicles/whatever and carry on with what they were doing like nothing happened. How many people are going to cheat on their partners that night? How many of them are going to get their hearts broken? How many are going to find out that a loved one has died? How many are going to suffer? How many would give anything, anything at all for a change in their circumstances? How many are going to go home to empty lives and wait for nothing to happen?

Some mornings it breaks my heart, but I still don't want to get off. I just want to keep going. I don't even know why.