Greyhound Bus trips

Fuck!

The middle of nowhere.

I was merrily riding along on the Greyhound, and I was just emailing my little sister and telling her about what a great time I had during my trip to Humboldt County. How everything went exactly like I had planned (for once!).  And then . . .  the Greyhound bus . . .  broke down . . . . IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE!!!

Fuck.

We were about an hour from the nearest town. From the nearest anything! But the bus driver told us not to worry.  “Another bus will be here to pick us up in about 7 or 8 hours.”

Fuck.

I feel like I’ve stumbled into a scene from Deliverance.

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Actually, it turned out pretty cool.  Since I had time to kill, I hiked off into the woods to see what was out there.  Turned out at the bottom of the hill was a mountain stream.  Completely untouched by humanity.  I took off my clothes and went skinny-dipping.  I haven’t done that in years!  It was around 90 degrees so the water felt great.  It was like one last hit of summer.

 

 

 

 

And this was even cooler.  We’d been huddling around the bus on the side of the road for about 5 hours in 90 degree heat like contestants on “Survivor.”  When this car pulled off to the side of the road.  This elderly couple got out of the car and said:  “Does anybody want some water and food?”   They had seen us stranded so they went to the next town and bought a bunch of iced bottles of water and granola bars and other food.

“When I was in trouble people always helped me out so I’m returning the favor,” said the old guy.

“What goes around comes around,” I said rather brainlessly.

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I thought that was pretty darn cool.   Stuff like that almost reaffirms my faith in humanity.  It’s weird when everything goes wrong, and yet that turns out to be the best part of the trip.  This life often makes a weird kind of sense.