Cabalgar el Greyhound
El Viaje
I have passed through the states as if they haven't existed. They were barely colored prints that rotated on a track outside my finger-smudged window. I know the rain came with Missouri, the blood with Oklahoma, the lightning Texas; but I know nothing of these states. The state of our bus, however, I know well. We have formed our own commonwealth here, each traveling together in state-like fashion through a faceless nation. I've come to realize that my experience cross-country had nothing to do with the red sands of Texas or the windmills of Oklahoma, but everything to do with the people in this bus. THIS IS AMERICA. I wanted to know, and I suppose I found out.
El Ciencia de Viajar
The act of traveling by bus seems to be the most intimate means of all public transportation. We are total strangers who eat and sleep together, we gaze out of our windows listlessly and alone, we get confused and huddled together--relying on a collective ignorance to induce correctness--we say our goodbyes like old friends. My destination seems unimportant now; it's the getting there intrigues me. I have grown comfortable in my discomfort, and expect nothing more.
Mirando Hacia Atras de Aqui
And now, as I adapt to life life in a new state, I think back on the many people I have met; the lives that have been so intricately woven together, like silk tapestries draped on Egyptian tombs. And I miss those people I know so little of, but have come to know in the purest state of human interaction, at our lowest and most vulnerable.
I have learned that young black men otherwise classified as a threat in common American society were the individuals who made me feel the most protected. I have never met more fascinating young men whose intellect is ignored by a world that keeps them oppressed, mere laborers judged by their sagging pants and beaded hair rather than their brains. I have learned a lot from these young black men in regards to the justice system, society, family values, and spirituality. These young men were fathers and philosophers whose charisma and dignity had been overlooked by street cops with bad attitudes and business-tie men. And somehow they were discussing just behind my ear the kind of mental and spiritual strength it takes to become a man unchanged by societal oppression. I have been comforted to sleep by the sound of their slang.
I think often of the man I met in Albuquerque, his slurred nonsensical speech, his reddened eyes, his borderline offensive compliments. I was the only one who stopped to listen, and though his eyes gazed often at places they shouldn't, I enjoyed his company in a peculiar sort of way. His eyes got wet and glazed over (beyond what they already were) and he looked beyond me at some point I couldn't see, and knew he couldn't either, when he spoke of a fellow Native American who had been shot trying to escape the cotton fields of his imprisonment. He spoke of years and years of Native American discrimination, of a hard life lived in the country he loves. And it made me unbearably sad to know he was hanging around the bus station at four in the morning, drunk because he couldn't bear to face life otherwise. I will never forget his sad eyes.
These people have become a part of my life, their lives engrained in my memory--an intrusion I have readily welcomed.
