While the morning sun shines on our freshly cleaned faces and pressed shirts, everyone is simultaneously swaying with the bus through Boston potholes and the roughness of the driving. No one is talking. It almost seems like they are in awe of the scenery along the pike. To me, it’s a sacred time of day where your mind wanders and focuses on anything that happens to float by.

Then somewhere you hear Beethoven’s fifth in loud beeps, then some shuffling of personal belongings, followed by a ‘hello.’ The serenity has been interrupted by a cell phone call. She continues to talk about the night before when she was at a car with another girlfriend talking about their boyfriends and other people and THEIR lives. My pleasant morning comes to a halt, my brain now surging with disbelief that my quiet time is taken over by gossip. There is a place and time for that and it’s certainly not 7:18 in the morning. I suppose most of my bus rides are uneventful so one rotten out of however many is fine.

This and every morning on the bus are rituals for me. I look forward to this time when the sun and I are just waking up together to another new day in Boston.