71 Express
Alright, let’s not fool ourselves. This is the first post in a couple months. I’m starting to see it kind of like a TV series: sometimes we have a season finale and then it’s reruns for a couple months.
Problem is, I’m totally not ready for sweeps.
Anyway, I’ve moved to Edmonton again. Working at CBC radio until September. Old friends. Old sights. New experiences. That sort of thing.
I’m working downtown for the first time. As such, I take bus or LRT to work every day. A couple weeks ago, I set myself a challenge – I wanted to write a short piece about the bus ride home. But, I had to have the first draft done before the ride was over.
Well. I picked the right way to do it, as the ride took longer than usual. Here’s:
I’m watching a woman in a bright blue dress wave at disinterested cab while the heat drifts up from the sidewalk in sheets. The sun has long ago dipped behind the downtown office towers, but its touch lingers in the thick, humid air. Before the woman’s drama reaches the final act, my bus pulls up. Strangers and I crush together on the 71 Express.
The driver takes “express” seriously. I’m only a few steps down the aisle, dodging baby strollers and squatting backpacks when the bus lurches forward. I stumble – elbow connects with cruel glass, which shudders, and I tumble in to one of the scarred plastic seats. The bus has started slowing down before it was done speeding up. Brakes scream at the people standing at the next stop. I brace my shoulder against the window and hand against the seat before me.
Next stop: Old Strathcona.
The bus lurches, swerves and expresses down 100th street. Tall buildings and hotels are killed off as the driver angles the nose down the hill, surrounded by the lush green of the river valley. Below, the dark-green-light-green of the tree tops are broken up by the flat grass of a baseball diamond, where a tiny black speck rushes down freshly-chalked white. The wide blue sky to the east is devoured by the dark grey clouds that sweep in. A thick shadow marches in lockstep below, swallowing up the trees that line the muddy prairie river.
The driver punishes the gas, whipping down the hill. As we plunge deeper in to the valley, my face is forced to window. Through spots of hot breath streaked on the glass, I watch the strobing green leaves. We zip under a sleepy yellow traffic light. Molars vibrate in the back of my mouth and try to break free as we cruise over the grid floor of the bridge.
A lightswitch is flicked rapidly: the shadow of the bridge, in to the sunlight, under the overpass and then brightness once more.. The bus to hugs the smooth asphalt as the road branches to the left, and the green parks and yellow street signs melt back in to the thick green of the trees.
The 71 Express tears up the hill, and I watch in surprises as the path to Old Strathcona disappear to the right.
Suddenly, a thought: I wanted to get on the 70. Not the 71.
Next stop: Millwoods.
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