Saturday, January 13, 2018

Suspend Gravity






Most of my memories of buses are bad memories. The good ones, though, are really good. I remember the driver's voice on the scratchy intercom:

"Dothan. We'll be here for forty five minutes."

Grandma and I would hurry into the little Greyhound station to find a place at the counter and I would have a grilled cheese and a chocolate malt. The long trip was time that I spent with her, my most valuable memories.

Then there was the tour bus with Gene Vincent and the Coasters and Bill Haley. Bo Diddley would squat in the aisle next to me and tell tall tales of life on the road with the likes of Jimmy Reed and Etta James. Chuck Berry wouldn't ride the bus. He flew and got to the next town after we did.

The last time I rode a bus my pal, Walt, and I took the Greyhound from Nashville to Knoxville. We had only been out of the depot for fifteen or twenty minutes when the driver threatened to stop the bus and put me and Walt off the bus if we didn't quit talking. It was raining and we were in the middle of nowhere.

I hope this doesn't sound snooty but we had our own teeth and we weren't transporting poultry. I'm pretty sure we weren't talking very loud. We're both pretty low-key.

Pretty sure that was my final bus memory.




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