THE DEUCE DEUCE

Friday, 8:35 p.m., 16th Mission - Haight Fillmore

2009-11-30T18:22:00.000-08:00

What exactly is one's obligation here?

He was thin, malnourished, or, perhaps, nourished on all the wrong things.

He had a cane that he didn't really use, although, he moved slow shaking with each step.

If you gave E.T. the crack-cocaine for 20 years and laid him in the sun in an alley way, well, you get the idea.

As he stands to exit at 16th and Guerrero, I can already see what will happen. Three wobbly steps toward the bus exhaling closer to the ground for an easier exit and WHOOP! pants below the ass.

Full moon charred E.T. ass for all to see.

And he doesn't know. But, we do.

I'd tell you if you have a booger hangin' on the front porch, if your zipper is down, if there are small, cotton undies stuck to your sweater or if there is a trail of toilie on your shoe. But, something kept me six rows back from jumping up to pull up this man's pants and we all just looked away.

Thursday, 10 p.m., 16th Mission - Haight Fillmore

2009-11-30T18:00:00.000-08:00

To be honest I made the choice not to sit next to her.

I was smelly, but she looked smelly. She had fewer teeth than tribal citizens being immortalized by the HGP. So, I stood and hung on and tried to look past myself through the window out into the night.

A man drunk from celebrating another long day of what appears to be construction work boarded.

"I have tattoos too," he said pointing at the scribbles on my underarm. Stumbling down the aisle he lifted his shirt sleeve.

He put his head far too close to my armpit which for my entire life has resided directly next to my left tit.

"What's it saaaaaay?" And I pulled my arm down.

"Nothing. A secret," I responded, eyes deadpan.

"Coooome on," he slurred, dangling like an orangutan.

And then, "It says 'Leave her the fuck alone." The woman sitting to my right, next to a vacant seat, piped up.

"That's prolly what it says? Yeah?" she asks me.

"Actually, yes," I said smiling down at her and taking a seat. "That's exactly what it says."

I'm sorry. Sometimes on the Deuce Deuce I have a hard time looking past myself.

Thank you, lovely lady.

Damn Skippy

2009-11-22T22:17:00.000-08:00

My posting “Fare or Fair” was sent to me by a reader with a note that said 'this was a part of an effort over ten years ago.' The reader was astonished in looking over it how the problems that were occurring then are still the problems that are occurring now and that he was surprised how one could not decipher without knowing the date that this information was ten years old. To me, interesting.

Am I calling for a fare strike? No.
Would I call for a fare strike? Sure.
Does a fare strike solve anything?
Yes it does.

Is a fare strike timely? Granted we have just been hit with an increased fare strike, another may well be on the way, but that matters not to me. Just because I pay my two dollars every day since July does not urge me onto any platform of acceptance.

I spent the summer abroad in London, Spain, Italy and other drool-inducing countries. I paid much more than equivalent of two dollars for transit nearly every day. But, I got what I paid for. Think of the concept of “priced to sell.” Apple loves this concept. A MacBook costs somewhere in the range of say $1400 and is expected to last with excellent care about four to five years. Apple could very well make a laptop that lasts longer, but it would cost $4000 and no one would buy it. So, we accept in our purchase that balance, that what we are getting is a mediocre product appropriately priced for its service. When I board the underground in Barcelona for five Euro I know it is going to be clean, it will arrive quickly usually under five minutes, it will be right on time, get me to my destination on time and be a safe ride. Muni is dirty, late, slow, inconvenient and dangerous. Point being, given the economics of transit, San Francisco is one area where one does not get what they pay for.

Secondly, I do not believe in fare increases in the same way that I do not believe in sin taxes. Simply, it scrapes the people in the lowest bracket of income. Big tobacco takes a lot of heat for how much profit it makes from selling cigarettes. But, about fifty percent of a pack goes to the government; that is, hello, the government is profiting big off of tobacco. And no one seems to mind either that they profit from Muni - what should and could otherwise be a public service. It is not functional and otherwise crappy to save our system through means of our poorest citizens.

Is fare evasion why we are in this mess? Is it all the little mongrels that I see jump in the back door at Haight and Fillmore every morning? I will give that argument the benefit of the doubt. But, I still say, don’t pay.

Because…

Not everyone runs a blog. Not everyone is running for political office. Not everyone has the educational opportunities, the agency, the time, the confidence, the fortitude to write something, organize something, say something or do something. Fare strikes are a uniting means of passive protest. They will not solve the Muni problems, but they are a way of focusing attention where attention ought be focused on an unfair fare.

Postsecret bus secretZ

2009-11-22T14:34:00.001-08:00

Everyone has a secret

2009-11-22T14:33:00.001-08:00

Another Muni Fight

2009-10-10T19:42:00.001-07:00

Ew!

Bloodlust

2009-10-10T14:09:00.000-07:00

Friday, 8:40 a.m., 16th Mission - Union Fillmore

She sat on the steps and said, "I don't understand what is with the bloodlust."

Bus #1 - Four early teens are running down the street. "Stop the bus!! Let us On!" They board.

"Aw, man. I can't believe that! She messed her up good."

Three others are running and the four aboard go to the windows to make fun of them.

"What was with that bitch, all she did was say "Scuse me, can you move back?""

"But, in her defense, she did have a baby in her arms and like six kids with her. She kinda couldn't move back."

"But you don't gotta freak out like that. You can't move back then you just say you can't move back. She wouldda freaked out on me like that I woulda killed a bitch."

Bus #2 - "This woman with like a baby in her arms and then this other chick like wanted her to move back and I don't know. I don't know. I can't take it anymore. I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't know how I'm gonna get to work, but I'm over it. I'm just over it. She was like, 'You mess with me I got a baby in my arms.' And I'm all like, "Yeah, awesome Mom, you're fuckin' fighting, literally fighting like pulling hair, while you're holding your baby and all of your other kids are like looking at you fucking frightened. And the little Mexican ladies were freaked. They were like terrified. Yeah, she like messed with her hair and shoved her off the bus. I can't handle it anymore. I'm so over it."

Bus #1 - Three more board. "I didn't think you was gonna catch up!" "Man that was awesome. She messed that girl up! The rest of them didn't make it - they gonna be late."

Bus #3 - "There was a fight and I had to wait for another bus. And I just posted a comment on YouTube about another fight. I don't understand why people are so into it. People on the next bus were all 'Man, I wish I would have been on that bus. I wanna see a fight."

The Spark that Started a Fire That Bore a Blog

2009-10-10T13:09:00.000-07:00

Thursday, 3 p.m., Union Fillmore - Haight Fillmore

It was one of those days that you just wanted to shit in your pants and walk around in it.

I boarded.

School had just let out and it was loud. Monsters, jacked-up on sugar and hormones had taken over the back third of the bus. They were like bouncy balls in a circular room, and let's just be honest, they are fucking LOUD. The Deuce Deuce can serve as a daily exercise in meditation. It is so easy there on a mat, in a studio with serene clouds painted on the ceiling, to keep it cool - so easy to swim when the waters are calm.

The noise from the rear is all-consuming, the way sometimes I can only hear squeaking shoes when I watch a basketball game.

I stretch my neck left, then right. I close my eyes and breathe deep.

"FUCK YOU you Fuckin' Busted Ass Whore!"

Inhale, Exhale.

"You the slUt, Ho!"

Inhale, Exhale.

At Geary it gets crowded, it gets sardines.

An elderly man, nearly a foot shorter than me is nestled in, his head pretty much in my armpit.

A pushing match ensues. It's like a PCP Red Bull MTV Spring Break South of the Border Dog fight back there.

I close my eyes.

"AHHHHHHHHHH, Don't grab my titty you busted-ass motherfucker!"

I open my eyes and lay my head back and begin an internal mantra of, "I sold my car for the right reason. I sold my car for the right reason. Not having a car is an ethical choice. Not having a car is an ethical choice. I love this city. I love diversity. I love this city. I love diversity."

And then, I get chucked.

"Move BITCH. This is our stop!"

I get pushed and knock over the little old man I was essentially coddling, who falls to the ground.

I'm helping him up, one of the girls steps on his ankle as they pile over us, pushing through the crowd to the door. My stop too.

I step down.

"Dumb Bitch! Don't just stand there like nobody got any place to go but you!"

And I, my bad, but I, "DO YOU EVER SHUT THE FUCK UP?!"

And what ensued, what was said, we will never know. It was three teenage, female, hyennas and it sounded like, !@%$@^Y&$EHFG$%$ Of FUCKetfwekfnwefwe BITCH worqjwor ME GUNNA fwieohf49hwekrjker9ef I'm about to slap this fuckin'2rf 35r9wrfyhwei9rfw9efjsdofjsdlfjsd!!!!!!!!!!

I started to walk. They followed me.

"I'm gonna get my brother to fucking kill you!"

They followed me for four blocks spouting equally eloquent comments until one said, "Oh you wanna know if I ever shut the fuck up well..."

And I spun around, "NO! I know the answer. It's 'No,' you never shut the fuck up. You haven't shut up since Union Street - so I have my answer, the answer is 'No.' Now go home."

"We are goin' home."

"Oh, awesome. We're neighbors. This way it'll be easier for your brother to kill me. Awesome."

I turned, they turned. I could hear them fade into the distance planning my demise.

I could have stopped riding, but instead I started writing.

-photo compliments of eviloars

Saturday, 9:00 a.m., Haight - Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-10-10T12:44:00.001-07:00

Sometimes with my headphones up, I will Nestea plunge into a song so whole-heartedly that everything around me seems to move synchronistically and make intrinsic sense the way an anteater's snout is made for eating ants - a choreographed dance of chaos.
I swear if one person had given me a smile I would have sprung from my seat, dipped them back low and laid one on them, rattling beautiful nonsense like, "I know! I know! Going to a dead-end job never felt so good!"
You see, I simply couldn't take my headphones down to hear what was going on on the Deuce Deuce today because this is what was going on for me.

Listen

or

Watch Video

The Lazy Boy

2009-10-01T13:11:00.000-07:00

Friday, 7 p.m., Union Fillmore - 16th Valencia

Last week he was sitting in the four-seaters, 10 maybe 12 years old.

Who knows, the older I get the younger they look. Someone asked me if I didn't know my age how old I would think I was and I told her, "Too old to play pretend."

The teen-year-old, with shiny Nike's that match his ear buds that match his backpack, sits with his feet up taking up two seats.
An older white man, maybe 55 maybe 65, depending on how many wars or divorces and how long he's been riding the Deuce Deuce, approaches and places his hand on the boy's legs.
"Don't you touch me, old man!" the boy pops off.
"I want to sit down, please."
"Ok, but you don't go touchin' my fuckin' legs. You ask me and I'll move."
"I'm sorry. There is no where else to sit."
He sits and the boy murmurs out the window. "Shit, don't be touchin' me. Old motherfucker think you can be touchin' me. I'll fuckin'....."

Tonight, the bus is full.
The teen-year-old is lounging in the very back row, taking up three seats. I walk up to him and look down. He acts like he doesn't see me.
"Really?" I say.
And I grab a pole. I'm in no form to fill an attention deficit.
A Black woman boards, maybe 40 depending how many children and how long she's been riding the Deuce Deuce, and moves to the back of the bus.
She, "Get your damn legs down, boy! I need to sit. What you think this is your damn house? You see a TV in that aisle? People need to sit, we been workin' today. Thinkin' you can just take up the whole damn seat. You should be ashamed a yo'self. This ain't your damn living room! Who's your mother?"

And I think, 'You are.'

-photo compliments of eviloars

Fare or Fair

2009-09-30T13:42:00.000-07:00

In a fare strike, passengers ride the bus, but do not pay the fare.

Nobody has to do anything they don't normally do. Ride the bus wherever you normally go, just like you do every day. But, when you get on, don't pay.

The object of a fare strike is to convince Muni that they are going to lose more money because of the fare strike than they are going to gain by raising the fare and cutting service. This is entirely possible if enough people, over time, participate in the fare strike.

Get on the bus anyway you can. Go in the front door or the back door, whatever feels right to you. Don't cause a scene. Just don't pay.

Whatever you do, be polite to the driver. They are not the enemy. They have a very difficult and stressful job. Fare hikes, service cuts and layoffs make their job more difficult. Many, if not most, of the drivers are sympathetic to our efforts. Together, riders and drivers united, we can win.

It is Muni policy that the drivers should ask you to pay the fare, but just drive on if you don't pay and don't cause a scene. The reason for this policy is that the whole system would come to a halt if busses didn't move everytime somebody didn't pay. Muni is a big system, and some individual drivers may act outside of Muni policy. But most will obey the policy and drive on when you don't pay, because that is exactly what they are supposed to do.

Muni does have a few fare inspectors that may ask for proof of payment. Muni has not hired new fare inspectors in response to our strike. They already have too few fare inspectors to adequately police the system. If you are approached by a Muni fare inspector, again, be polite. They are just doing their job. Walk away from them if you can, again without causing a scene. If you get a ticket, get in touch with our legal team. They will do everything they can to make tickets go away. Click here for more information on our legal team.

Remember, a fare strike is very simple. Ride the bus like you always do. Just don't pay.

To Miss it Is to have Loved It

2009-09-29T19:04:00.000-07:00

Taking the 22 last Saturday night at 3:30 am, there was a woman sitting next me who was talking to herself. The way she said 'bitch' was beyond compare. Only a lifetime of practice leads to such results.

-Prawnpie

Saturday, 6:30 p.m., Union Fillmore - Church Market

2009-09-26T11:06:00.000-07:00

Haunched over carrying a bag of books and two grocery bags that are soft and crumpled from repeated use, he boards.

"Are you Chinese?!" he asks the driver, loud enough to be asking the whole bus.
"No sir, I am not," the driver responds.
"Well then, I can't help you! I am a Chinese professor, but I cannot help you if you don't speak Chinese."

Two stops later he is standing at the yellow line.
"Nihaoma," says the professor.
"Ching ting toooww," responds the driver.
"Nihaoma," repeats the professor.
"Jing tee wooo," says the driver, laughing.
My cheeks flare.
"Nihaoma! It means 'How are you?' It is Mandarin. I taught you last week!"
"Oh yah, I've had you before," says the driver. "Nee-hey-moa."

Friday Night White

2009-09-26T10:35:00.000-07:00

From the Poynter Institute for Journalists,

"Journalists need to challenge the presence of racial identifiers and could even help the public talk more openly and directly about race..."

This is an apology.
I am as guilty as big, over-sized grandma underwear under a little black dress on a Friday night because I want to make sure I don't go home with my date. I, like so many others, writers and thinkers of the world at small alike, have decided to pretend that race does not exist. (Which for the record it doesn't, it is a social construct) We delude ourselves under the notion that we are color blind, which is really just a PC way of saying blind.

So, I'm gonna talk about race from now on 'cause the 22 is one world, two classes and four wheels.

Friday, 8:35 p.m., Union Fillmore - Fillmore Oak

Friday night, leaving the Marina, the Deuce Deuce is packed with more white people than one will see at any other time.

Why?

Reason 1 - Heels. The three stretch mountain is no place for bejeweled 4" Louis V's to be treading.

Reason 2 - Booze. Five guys, striped shirts, torn jeans, shiny shoes, token Dad watch, board the bus. One uses a pole like a stripper.
"I'm gonna get fucked tonight."
"Yeah it's that kind of night."
"Fucked up is not the same as fucked."
"Not if you're a girl."
Laughing ensues.

At Fillmore and Jackson - thousands of dollars of heels step down.

By California, a parade of alabaster bro's exit checking their iPhones again for no missed calls.

Saturday, 7:15 p.m., Union Fillmore - Fillmore Hayes

2009-09-12T10:01:00.000-07:00

Just another creeper story.

He sits next to me and he smells like outside, like a boy playing in fallen leaves all day, sweat and wind, but he's a man. His jeans have a a dirty sheen to them, but he looks like any white guy U.S.A.

He sits with his legs a little apart. At the next stop his legs are a little farther apart and his knee is touching mine.

It's the bus, I left my body bubble when I took my transfer, but there really is no need for us to be touching knees - so I move away a bit.

He does this shift like he's adjusting his jacket and his knee is up against mine again. With each progressive stop his legs get a little wider and a little wider, my face is smashed against grafitti, until I, "Seriously, dude."

He looks at me.

"If you get any closer to me I am going to be out the window."

He jumps up and exits.

Three blocks later I look out the window and he is walking the sidewalk along with the bus and looking back in the window right at me.

I flip him off, which the Mexican kitchen worker to my right, wrongly interprets as meant for him, but I don't bother to explain.

-photo compliments of eviloars

Thursday, 8:30 a.m., Haight Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-09-12T09:49:00.000-07:00

Three women, all toting Louis Vuitton bags, are discussing, complaining, about the new $2.00 bus fare and my life-long search for irony is now over.

-photo compliments of epugachev

Friday, 9 p.m., Union Fillmore - Haight Fillmore

2009-08-31T14:55:00.000-07:00

Dangling from rails like it is a jungle gym, his jeans, price tag still on, $189.00, fall closer to his knees with every bump of the bus revealing worn blue boxers at my eye level.
He says, "Where your brother been? I ain't seen 'em."
She, acrylics that match her shoes that match her sunglasses at night, says, "In jail." "No shit. Fo' what?" "Attempted murder." "Again." "Yeah....I left my Jordan's in my locker at school. I hope they still there tomorrow." A girl to her left whose shoes match her belt which match her bangles, pipes up, "You a fuckin' idiot. You ain't even dumb. You's a fuckin' idiot. No one leaves Jordan's in their locka if they wanna see them again."

-photo compliments of eviloars

To Feel and Deal

2009-08-31T14:46:00.000-07:00

I have plenty of stories regarding the 22 bus. Anyone who rides it often enough must too.

I was terminated from my job this day and I simply got away from the bad news by photographing my journey home.

-dollop

22 Fillmore Story

2009-08-29T13:00:00.001-07:00

- eviloars

Friday, 8:05 p.m., Union Fillmore - Haight Fillmore

2009-08-29T12:42:00.000-07:00

THE CALL TO ACTION

She's haunched over permanently, the way she perhaps was 12 years ago when she was reaching down for something.

The bus hydraulics hissssss as the driver lowers it for her.

She is coming out the front door, backwards, and every step she holds to the rail clenching her shaking hands, small like baby bird's claws.

She's well-dressed with hair set and a smart hat.

We all wait patiently to board, each thinking different things about our common fear of old age.

A man helps her step from the street to the curb.

"Thank you," she says warm and gracious. "Do you want this?" she asks, holding out her transfer. "Two dollars now. Two dollars now," she repeats.

"Anyone? Anyone want this?" she says waving the transfer, low and quiet, back a forth.

She stands before me, two feet smaller. "I do" I say.

"Well here, take it. Won't do me any good. I'm goin' home."

"Thanks, darlin'," I say.

CAN WE ALL DO THIS?

A CALL TO ACTION!

PASS ALONG THE TRANSFER!

What we have really boughten is time, and I don't know about you, but I'll take all the free time I can get.

-photo compliments of JuicyRai

Wednesday, 12:01 p.m. Haight Fillmore - Fillmore California

2009-08-29T12:12:00.000-07:00

I look again to see if she is muttering to herself or if she was talking on a headset. No headset, she's not in a meeting.

We make eye contact. This means different things in different cultures. It can mean, "Do me," it can mean, "I'm paying attention," but it's the 22, and apparently it means, "Come here, perfect stranger, let's give sanity a run for its money."

Where in God's name are you supposed to look on the bus? If I look out the window the narcissist in me kicks in and all I can see is myself in this zombie lighting. If I look anywhere else, it's either a crotch parade...or this happens.

She gets up from her seat, she's large - larger than a seat allots, and I thought she was getting off, but she scurries over to me, throwing hips so anyone lining the aisle falls into someone else's lap.

She sits down in the now vacant seat next to me. This woman I have never seen before my misinterpreted eye contact only moments ago says, "I didn't see you here, I'm sorry."

"It's cool," I respond.

"I'm so sorry. I would have sat here if I would have known you were here."

And I say, "Well, you're here now."

She mumbles. I considered mumbling too.

She rises two stops later to exit. Holding the rails on both sides she says to me, "You be careful. You never know, there could be some crazies at the next stop. You know what I mean?"

Kindly and plainly I say, "No, I don't."

"You don't?" she asks, swollen hand with four gold rings and hot, pink nailpolish held to her chest.

"No," I say with direct eye contact, "but we're just going to have to live with that."

-photo compliments of Thomas Hawk

Saturday, 7:10 p.m., Union Fillmore - Fillmore Hayes

2009-08-18T08:01:00.001-07:00

If you're a seasoned rider you should know if the person you are seated next to on the Deuce Deuce is tolerable, if they don't have a seeping head wound or aren't masturbating under their over-sized hoodie, then don't move.
I'd seen her on the 22 at the same time before, so she should have known.
She's quiet in manner, folded in, wearing her mousy brown hair held to the side with a girl's barrette placed high on her head close to her part. She is sitting next to another girl, the kind of white, blonde girl that I wager hears, "You look like someone I know."
At the stop the four-seaters open up and the meek little lady moves to the window.
This is always slightly offensive. 'Do I smell?' 'Am I talking to myself?' we think.
And I see the blonde say to herself, "Mmmpht."
At the next stop four about 14-year-old hood rats brimming with brand names and testosterone get on and encircle the invisible woman, sitting on all sides of her.
Their conversation, uncomfortable to write let alone hear, goes, "You look like a house nigga."
"A What?!"
"Like a nigga they be keepin' in the house all day with that wide nose."
"My nose is the same as yours faggot."
"Naw, you be lookin' like one of them workin' in the field all day niggers."
"Man, fuck your face, nigga."
"Nigga, please."
And my attention goes back to the girl, her sharp pointed nose glued to the window.
The girl sitting next to me points discretely, looks at me and says, shoulders shaking to withhold laughter, "Awesome, she moved to that seat."
And we can't help but to crack up together as the boys begin to pass a basketball back and forth in front of her inch-thick glasses.
Don't move on the 22, unless you are being felt up or actually sitting in vomit.
You can always get someone crazier.

-photo compliments of goodsista

To The Aid

2009-08-17T07:33:00.000-07:00

It is not where you want to be. I think the crazies there are just cognizant enough to actually do...I don't know, something.
So there I am waiting for the bus at 16th and Mission in the middle of the night.
And this woman is hobbling up to me. So I prep myself, toughen myself up, to say, 'No.'
As she gets close, I act as though she is invisible, and of course she asks, "Do you have a band-aid?"
I was taken aback.
I said, "Uhhhh, actually...I do."
And I reached into my bag and produced a bandage.
She smiled a gummy smile and went to speak again.
'Oh, here we go,' I thought.
"Do you have two band-aids," she asked.
"Actually, I do," I said, pulling the second bandage from my purse.
You see, if you are a woman, well equipped with a rack, you understand the pain of an under wire from your bra slipping out and slicing into your flesh while you try to carry on a conversation at dinner and act as though you are not being stabbed in the chest with a ninja ice pick.
That evening I had thrown my torn bra on the sewing machine and stitched it up, but just in case it came undone, I threw two bandages in my purse. And that, that, is exactly what she needed.
She thanked me graciously as she applied the bandages to what appeared to be some sort of serious warts on her hands. She continued with the shower of gratitude, telling me that she could now wait until the morning to go to the hospital.
We talked as I waited. She told me that she lost her teeth because of smoking and she always understood the repercussions, but she was going to smoke anyway.
My heart has grown so callous. This city is so fucked up and I don't even see it.
I was prepared to tell her, 'No!' before I even knew what this other human was going to ask me for.

-miss watson

Fillmoe

2009-07-06T06:53:00.000-07:00

I rode on and cursed at that bus for many, many years.

- Salim Virji, http://salim.virji.net/

Sunday, 7:50 a.m., Haight Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-06-28T13:12:00.000-07:00

She rides up front, a new rider. I would have noticed her before.
She's got some sort of disability, but that is not why she caught my eyes.
I was sitting four rows back once when I saw her ankles.
She's got these perfect ballerina ankles - an extension that any other dancer could spot from a mile away. They are quietly admirable.
So, last week I tried to talk to her about dancing. I tried to ask if she had ever been a ballerina.
She mumbled and wiggled and I caught harsh glances from other riders for "bothering" her.
I felt a pest. Perhaps, her disability might be on levels more than I had presumed.

But this morning I was moving toward the back and passed her trying to carry on a conversation plain as a political sex scandal with the stranger next to her..
She waved good-bye to a woman who ignored her at Fillmore and Golden Gate and stepped off through the front doors.
She walked with a cane, but all the more daintily across the street.

I was jealous of her gait and pained that it was me that she didn't want to talk with.

-photo compliments of Art Barn

Thursday, 3:20 p.m., Union Fillmore - 16th Harrison

2009-06-28T13:03:00.000-07:00

Dancing.

Holding on to the top bar, bumping her hips into the person to her left and then the person to her right, with a little pop-pop uuuh, on each side.
In her other hand she totes a blue iPod mini with no scratches from use.
She sings along so we can all enjoy the song.
She yanks one ear bud out and says to her friend next to her, "Aw, hell no. I'm gonna kill that bitch."
"Who?" her friend asks.
"That girl at the stop. She got my same color iPod. That bitch tryin' to gank my style."

My Husband is Black

2009-06-23T09:10:00.000-07:00

She'd told me a story before about moving seats away from a man on the 22 and him calling her a racist.

So this day...
A middle aged black man gets on the bus and sits right next to me. I was in the back row and the bus was fairly empty.
There were two Eastern European girls, cute, sitting to my right in the back row.
The middle seat would have been a more appropriate choice.

But he sat next to me and I was like, "Okay. Okay, let's see what this is all about."
He crosses his legs away from me and begins to grind.
His hands in his pockets, no eye contact, just staring off into the distance, he's humping.
It looks like a dog trying to itch its ass on carpet.
A few stops later I get up and have to pretty much crawl over him.
I say, "ExCUSE me," in a way that means, "You've got to be fucking kidding me with this humping business."
I was just like - alright dude, I've had enough - and if you call me a racist I'm going to tell you that my husband is black.

-JRo

Saturday, 6:50 p.m., Union Fillmore - Oak Fillmore

2009-06-21T09:13:00.000-07:00

He's roughly eighteen years old, Mexican. His friend sits across from us and does the Catholic cross bit every time the Deuce Deuce passes a church.
He's on the phone next to me and drooling everywhere.
Drool down his chin onto his Raiders tee/dress.
He reaches into his mouth and props his lower grill to the side and continues the conversation.
We had a double grill situation.
And his friend throws one more Hail, Mary as I step down.

-photo compliments of Matthew Lee

Sunday, 8:32 a.m., Haight Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-06-21T09:04:00.000-07:00

Distraught, but I had to get on the bus. I had to go. There's more life than time.
The stranger next to me, I wanted to lay my head on his shoulder and cry, the way I've held firm hands with strangers on planes during turbulence. "We're in it, in this life, we're going to make it, but only together," we say.
He and I really can't be all that different that he wouldn't understand how the weight of the world was too much today to even tie my shoes.
He got off at Geary and I missed him.
Encapsulated by people, totally hollow and so alone.

-photo compliments of Josh Damon

Saturday, 7:10 p.m., Union Fillmore - Fillmore Hayes

2009-06-19T12:04:00.000-07:00

If you're a seasoned rider you should know if the person you are seated next to on the Deuce Deuce is tolerable, if they don't have a seeping head wound or aren't masturbating under their over-sized hoodie, then don't move.
I'd seen her on the 22 at the same time before, so she should have known.
She's quiet in manner, folded in, wearing her mousy brown hair held to the side with a girl's barrette placed high on her head close to her part. She is sitting next to another girl, the kind of white, blonde girl that I wager hears, "You look like someone I know."
At the stop the four-seaters open up and the meek little lady moves to the window.
This is always slightly offensive. 'Do I smell?' 'Am I talking to myself?' we think.
And I see the blonde say to herself, "Mmmpht."
At the next stop four about 14-year-old hood rats brimming with brand names and testosterone get on and encircle the invisible woman, sitting on all sides of her.
Their conversation, uncomfortable to write let alone hear, goes, "You look like a house nigga."
"A What?!"
"Like a nigga they be keepin' in the house all day with that wide nose."
"My nose is the same as yours faggot."
"Naw, you be lookin' like one of them workin' in the field all day niggers."
"Man, fuck your face, nigga."
"Nigga, please."
And my attention goes back to the girl, her sharp pointed nose glued to the window.
The girl next to me points low to her back and looks at me and says, shoulders shaking to withhold laughter, "Awesome, she moved to that seat."
And we can't help but to crack up together as the boys begin to pass a basketball back and forth in front of her inch-thick glasses.
Don't move on the 22, unless you are being felt up or actually sitting in vomit.
You can always get someone crazier.

-photo compliments of goodsista

Sunday, 12:45 p.m., 16th Church - 16th Guerrero

2009-06-17T04:42:00.000-07:00

A blind man boards the bus and my life seems easy.
His feelers are out for a seat. No one knows if he/she should help. Do we say, "There is a seat there. No, two over, there."
Is that belittling? The only standing rule on the Deuce Deuce seems to be ignore, so no one says a thing.
The bus takes off and he adeptly puts on his sea legs.
He tap-taps until he finds a seat, negotiates his space, taps again and sits.
The last thing, I think to myself, I would want is heightened senses on the 22.
The piss smells more pungent. Perhaps, he can deduce whether it came from gin or vodka. The noise is louder. The tightness of quarters, a jungle even with the courtesy of vision.
He is smiling. And I'm humbled and a little jealous.
He may be getting more out of life, more out of the ride, in certain ways, than I ever will.

-photo compliments of Megan Allison

Sunday, 12:30 p.m., Haight Fillmore - 16th Guerrero

2009-06-17T04:15:00.000-07:00

While the two men sitting across from me were not wearing, "I'm not gay, but my boyfriend is" t-shirts, they certainly were gay. Enough time in San Francisco, and being a single little lady with a thing for six-packs, will quickly hone one's ability to, at singular glance, identify a man whom could cook a better quiche than me.
These men were actually dressed exactly alike. Overly tight, exorbitantly priced tees, relaxed, pressed jeans and very neat and clean Chucks.
One says to the other approaching Church and Market, "This bus can get pretty ghetto. And it's not because of homeless."
"Oh, really?" replies the other.
"All these black kids get on and are obnoxious. One goes to me, 'What you don't got a job?' And I was like, 'Yes, I have a job.' And he was like, 'Then why don't you get a car?'"

The two men exit the bus just as six foot tall penguin contemplates whether or not his hips, spanning that of three people, will fit through the Deuce Deuce doors. He decides not and continues waddling down Church Street.

-photo compliments of Henry Goins

If It were any other City

2009-06-17T04:03:00.000-07:00

Oh God, I do have a story.
This one time I was on the Deuce Deuce and these two huuuge crackheads got on. Big, white guys with these huge dilated eyes.
And then this little geeky old man got on, just a little Jewish guy with glasses.
And they all went to the back of the bus. Something happened where the crackheads called the little, old guy a nerd.
And he squeaked, "I am not a nerd."
And they started beating the shit out of him. Just like wailing on him on the back of the bus.
And, you know bus drivers in San Francisco, the driver was just all la-da-da driving along, nothing happening.
And no one on the bus did anything.
If it were any other city, or if the crackheads had been black, the bus would have been pulled over, there would have been cops, there would have been arrests, but it's the Deuce Deuce.

And my friend one time saw this guy get on after being shot. No, wait! That was me. I saw that guy. He got on after being shot and was just holding his head.

And this one time, this guy got on after robbing a bank. A Wells Fargo....yeah, they caught him.

I've just seen so much.

- Sterles

-photo compliments of monty

Deuce Deuce Live (Dirty version)

2009-06-13T16:06:00.000-07:00

You're not going to believe this story, she starts by saying.

I was riding on the 22 to work and I looked up at some point and realized I was the only white person on the bus. Not only was I the only white person, but everyone seemed to know each other. The 22 is its own community like this living, breathing thing.

And so the driver, for whatever reason, had to slam on the brakes and everyone lurches forward. And one lady was like, "Ohhhh my neck." And some other lady was like, "Owwww, my back."

And the bus starts to rumble, "My neck, my back, Lick my pussy and my crack," until the ENTIRE bus is chanting the dirty version from Khia. They all knew the words.

And I'm just like, Wha, What? Is this really happening? I'm just like this little, like white girl and I don't know the words so I'm bummed that I can't join in. And people are getting up out of their seats and bumpin', "My neck, my back, Lick my pussy and my crack."

And I thought of all the times to be riding solo because no one is going to believe that the 22 fully just broke out into this completely awesome nasty hip-hop chorus line.

And, well, now I know the words.

-B. Blackburn

Riders' Digest

2009-06-13T15:49:00.000-07:00

Although you can't look into his eyes, you can see the peace beneath the shades he's pulled down. To bother him would to be to ask someone diving into a book, "What are you reading?"

With our body in the seat and our gaze out the window, we riders crawl into our minds and digest what the day has laid before us. From the Marina to the Mission - a moving meditation.

-photo compliments of juicyrai

Toddlers

2009-06-13T14:35:00.000-07:00

Only toddlers, she says, could love the 22.

-Leanne Waldal

Typographic Pet Project Prototype

2009-06-13T14:28:00.001-07:00

The Deuce Deuce is a love affair.
We could ride bikes.
I could ride a motorcycle.
But I keep coming back.
I want the abuse.
I want the love.
We love the life of the ride.

-photo compliments of Tag Savage, whom shares the affair

I Heart Alexander Crane

2009-06-10T21:27:00.001-07:00

This sign reads: "To the girl with the Feather Earrings: We saw each other on the 22 on May 28th - Find me on Facebook - Alexander Crane."

Sign seen from the 22 Fillmore near Haight. True part of the story: I had just seen a girl with feather earrings waiting to get on the bus on Fillmore near Sutter. She was on the phone and at the last second didn't get on the bus. Hope AC finds his woman.

- Jen Maiser

The 22 @ Walgreens, A Good Day

2009-06-08T09:49:00.000-07:00

A good day on the 22. The bus is chill. It is sunny. A rare ride of leisure, knowing well I would have roughly two hours with no appointments, depending on when the bus finally crawled past my work. Personal soundtrack: Bob Marley's Mister Brown, very apropos for Fillmore and McAllister. At Fillmore and Geary an immense, motherly black woman gets on toting two handles of KFC. She sits down one seat removed from me, sets one bag on the seat between us, the other in her lap and goes to town eating the chicken. It smells so good. I put the song on repeat. She is a very adept fried chicken eater. No crumbs. No grease on her LA Lakers jersey. I close my eyes and taste the KFC deeply in my nose and listen to Bob Marley.

- JRo

photo compliments of Art Bowers

Serenity Times Twenty-Two

2009-06-08T09:39:00.000-07:00

I saw her on the bus
and thought she looked so serene
and at peace and I wondered
what her "life story" was.

- Laura Wiggs

Friday, 2:50 p.m., Haight Fillmore - Fillmore California

2009-06-06T14:59:00.000-07:00

I got on and was overcome by a sense of you. It made me drop some of my change. The driver grew tempered as I scrounged the perforated ground for impossible dimes. I stood and looked to the back. You weren't there. Maybe I had just missed you. I know that feeling like my right hand pinky knows the home key and the delete key as well.
"Well good," I thought. I looked like hell and felt worse. There's no hiding on the Deuce Deuce - or from deadlines and unforgiving sunshine. And no amount of makeup will cover my ass after three whiskey sours, two cups of coffee, two term papers and two hours of sleep.
My headphones on, three songs in to Electrelane's Powers Out and nearly asleep - there you are - boarding and walking down the aisle.
Of course, of course I would see you today, with my hollowed out eyes like a deranged zeppelin, after all this time.
But, at least I can still rely on my instinct. I knew you were on this bus. I smelled your intentions before I could smell you.
And you do. You sit next to me and you smell so nice.
I think about opening the window and jumping out. I'm so tired it would be a pathetic attempt, resembling falling off of a bed more than fleeing.
I think about opening your mouth and crawling inside of you.
Small talk is mean.
I'm playing polite with the one person I can still feel rustle on the horizon. We used to talk about children's names, now it's the weather. What an insult.
But, it was humbling to see your inescapable face - I'm responsible for my regrets, holding them close like my passport in Mexico.
It's your stop. And you rise to exit, and say, "Good-bye," in a way that sounds nothing like, "See you later."

-photo compliments of A modern girl, Tina, from San Francisco

Sunday, 9:00 a.m., Hayes Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-06-06T09:57:00.000-07:00

Why am I always surprised. I am such a feeble creature. The way I have weather amnesia in SF. I find myself saying, "It wasn't this cold last summer. It didn't rain this much last Spring. It wasn't this warm last May."
But it's Sunday morning and the bus is not supposed to be this full. But it is and for some reason, I am surprised.
I get herded to the middle next to a teen mom. There is a small, Chinese woman sitting in front of me. I'm damn near straddling her. And she smells. I know in America we have some absurd obsession with hygienic smell, but really, she smells like how my ex who worked in a kitchen, how the bottom of his pants would smell after being dragged in sink water and discarded beef cutlets soaked in garlic all night.
The mom is holding her maybe two-year-old son. The boy is staring at me and I quick stick my tongue out at him, lowering my defense status to that of a toddler. He looks away and begins kicking the Chinese lady in her little dome covered in a floppy hat. I think of saying something, but if I open my mouth I imagine smell particles flooding in like a whale eating krill, so I would taste her.
Finally, the woman grabs the child's foot and says, "He kick me. He kick me too much."
And the teen mom responds, "So? It's a fuckin' crowded bus. Get a car if you don't like it." Everyone goes quiet and stiff. Confrontation on the bus mimics an instant game of freeze tag.
"You old bitch," mutters teen mom.
At Geary the man sitting next the elderly woman gets up and teen mom sits down with her child. The child, a little over an inch away from the elderly woman, just stares. Stares and then stares some more at her now.
And then...I fart.
I have no idea how it escaped. Liked a trained double-agent, it is silent and violent and it smells grotesque in the way that only unassuming girls can fart. It is peeling my eyelids back it is so bad. It is too warm on the bus for farts of this magnitude and it just expands and lingers at nose level like a half-dead balloon.
I look down at the Chinese woman and try to glance over and place blame, feign like it was the boy. But, she is covering her nose and mouth and glaring with two, angry round eyes. There is no fooling her.
So, I start to laugh. My shoulders are shaking. Because my smell trumped her smell and that is some accomplishment.
The teen mom sees me laughing and says, "Holy God, was that you?!"
And I can't stop laughing, my face clown red, and I say, between chuckles, "Yeah."
"Oh my fucking God. My baby's shit don't even smell that bad."
I say that I am sorry, but I can't stop cracking up.
"Woo, girl. Daaamn." The toddler is hysterical with giggles.
An older guy behind me, pushing me and also pushing 300 lbs. says, "That's almost impressive."
And now, we're all laughing. Me and the hundred people crammed into the 3 x 3 space where we are standing smelling my ninja fart. Everyone laughing, except the little, smelly Chinese lady still covering her nose and mouth.

The 22 Transfer

2009-06-06T09:54:00.001-07:00

The 22 lets me off at the corner of Fillmore and Chestnut where I make one of two sorts of transfers. The first is the kind to curse. The second, also to curse. Okay, the first is a running forward curse. The second is a running behind curse.
At 7:40 am, the 22 to the 30 is an unreliable route. Fillmore street descends two steeply for the bus. So it moves over to Steiner. The bus cannot turn when a car is parked to close to the corner. If a Mercedes or Audi or a garage truck blocked the zigzag down the hill for five minutes all of us on the bus sat for five minutnes as the driver honked. On occassion the driver changes to a different line midway down the hill. “Everyone off,” he announces without warning. At that point, I am running the remaining 6 blocks to Chestnut.
Assuming I arrive at the corner of Fillmore and Chestnut, I catch the 30. The 30 runs turns off Chestnut at Van Ness to get over a couple of blocks to North Point. That runs into Fisherman’s Wharf where I’m going. During commutting times though, the 30 bus picks sides. Three of four 30 buses run as the 30X, the express bus to the financial district. It has fewer stops because its only purpose is to haul people in the Marina to downtown. Riders on the 30X wear ties, skirts and suits.
The leftover 30 buses took the rest of us. Schoolchildren, moms, dockworkers, construction workers and asian highschoolers rode nest to me.
In running kind of curse I step off the 22 to see the 30 is already at its stop, across the street. If I miss it, I get chewed out at work for being late. So I’m chasing after it. Some mornings I climb on just in time. Other mornings, I run for two blocks before watching it pull away from me. I arrive late.
For the second curse, I wait with the suits in front of a swanky Marina restaurant. A small group of them swells before the 30X collects them. Some mornings, I watch a handful of groups amass and board before a regular 30 comes. I tense up, one eye pegged to the clock as the minutes pass and no 30 bus whines up the street. 30X, 30X, 30X, finally, a 30. 7:55am. I hope there are no more snags. If there aren’t my boss won’t be on my case.

Riding the regular bus.

-J. Marchildon

To the Fillmore on the 22 Fillmore

2009-06-06T09:48:00.001-07:00

Pete had sprained his ankle performing ill-advised feats of strength and agility in order to impress a pretty lady. Jordan had not yet grown his beard. Their was another person with us, mild mannered, jovial. I can't remember his name, but it was probably Ben. I was oblivious to their intentions until we boarded the 22 Fillmore at 16th and Mission. It was Monday, an Indian summer's late afternoon. Pete had bought tickets to the Spoon show at the Fillmore. It turns out dancing on crutches is not all that difficult. Thanks guys. Thanks 22 Fillmore.

- David Murphy

Waiting

2009-06-06T09:40:00.000-07:00

I had been waiting at the stop for so long that I thought I would die of old age before it came.

- kid ampersand

A Poem and a Driver

2009-06-04T14:04:00.000-07:00

Driving the Twenty Two

Driving America to America,
Indian, Irish, German,
Spanish and Swedish ghosts
looking over the shoulders
of black and Asian and Latino:

Being a shuttle
gathering all these threads
red and black and gold and brown and white
and weaving them into
this town's fabric -
Ah, who would not smile?

- Birrel Walsh

Ladies and Gents Represent

2009-06-04T13:52:00.000-07:00

http://www.munishirts.info/

Eddie Murphy Doppleganger

2009-06-04T13:46:00.000-07:00

I was fairly convinced that I was sitting behind Eddie Murphy, in a jacket he wore in the 80s.

I tapped him on the shoulder to ask for his autograph, and he socked me in the head.

Darn near punched my lights out. T'wasn't Eddie.

- Anders Porter

Gato

2009-06-04T13:22:00.000-07:00

I got on the 22 Fillmore. I've lived around the corner from it for 20 years.You never know what you're gonna find.
I see this woman sitting there with a CAT in PUBLIC, on the BUS, dressed in a kitty-sized SOMBRERO with the word "Mexico" embroidered on it and looking completely serious like there was nothing wrong with any of it.

- Lisa Geduldig

Another Day In Paradise

2009-06-04T10:07:00.000-07:00

- Shanan Delp

Mrs. Doubtfire

2009-06-04T09:58:00.001-07:00

Mrs. Doubtfire rides the 22 and so should you.

Bus stop, Market - Marina

2009-06-04T09:21:00.000-07:00

As I was waiting at the bus stop, a couple of black girls probably around 13 years old sat down beside me and began arguing about when it was their friend was shot."It was Monday night she got shot!""Uh uhn, Tuesday night."They didn't look all that stunned or distraught. Is it really that common? Someone pop my bubble.As the bus goes from Market St. to the Marina, the bus fills with minority school kids and elderly as it nears and passes through the Fillmore, then empties out almost completely by the time it hits the Marina district, which is full of well-maintained houses and BMWs.

- Jin Zhu

Thursday, 8:35 a.m., Haight Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-06-04T08:53:00.000-07:00

The bus is packed, so packed that my friend called to ask me to set up her room at work and I told her I was on the same bus as her - she just couldn't see me. "Hell ride," she replied.

I am in the very back row all the way in the corner seat. This seat carries with it a certain sense of anxiety. I know if I have to be let out everyone will be slightly upset. It is like having to turn left with traffic behind you. Everyone is thinking, "Why the shit do you have to turn left in front of me?!" My stop is coming up and the two people next to me think as I pass through the laps of as-is strangers, "Oh great! Of course you have to get off the bus here. Just when I got to sit down and space out. That's just great!"

Two rows forward and facing me a small, Hispanic woman is looking out the window and one tear escapes her eye. It dangles there in the corner and she looks too sorrowful to care, frozen in morning despair. It begins to cascade down her cheek and she pulls her shirt sleeve over her hand to wipe it away. She clenches her eyes tight to keep any more from escaping, but it squishes out a few more and she takes the corner of her cuff to her lash line to sweep running mascara. One deep swallow. She's staring like a fish trying not to blink - eyes like good, glassy surf. She wipes her nose a couple of times. She's holding it together for the sake of the bus.

I wanted to go over and hold her. I wanted her to look over so I could mouth, "Are you okay? It will be okay." I wanted to be a monster and ignore her, spare her the embarrassment of being human.

She got off at Broadway. I imagine she will go into the bathroom and shut the door at her place of work and dump the emotion out of her eyes without the reflection of an unforgiving public.

7 p.m., Fillmore California - 16th Potrero

2009-05-29T09:57:00.000-07:00

Actually I do have a story. I almost had to say something this time. I never say anything on the bus. Someone could be on fire and I wouldn't say anything. But these three guys get on, teenagers, and they're making all of this noise and ruckus. And one of them gets up to pull the cord to stop and the other goes, "What?! You think you're fuckin' Obama leadin' this group? This isn't even our stop." And I was like, "Really? Are we already using Obama in the negative?"

-a.y.v.

Wednesday, 7:05 p.m., Haight Fillmore - 16th Guerrero

2009-05-28T09:40:00.000-07:00

It would be nothing short of alarming if you put kittens in a box and they each went to a corner, stared at the wall, not engaging with one another. No butt smelling, no meowing, not even any eye contact. But this is the 22Fillmore and the name of the game is avoidance through subtle mechanisms of defense. Humans, with all the cerebral fortitude in the world, which we use to ignore one another.

Mechanisms

1. The hoodie. A hood up on the bus is like having your own room. It is a car to a teenager who owns nothing in the world. It is "my dance space." It is impenetrable. No one can come into your hoodie.

2. The sunglasses. Last night at 7:10 p.m. a pregnant woman boarded the bus at Church and Market wearing sunglasses. She kept her sunglasses on, although technically night and also indoors. In 1956, this meant that you had a shiner. In 2009, on the 22, it means, "Who me? Oh, I'm not actually here. I'm invisible."

3. The iPod. Practically a necessity for sanity some days on the 22. The drunk across from me is yelling, maybe yelling at me, but I wouldn't know. From my standpoint, it just looks like he is singing along to The Dirtbomb's Here Comes That Sound Again. No sir, he won't get a reaction out of me. I can't heeeeaaaar you. I look around and almost everyone is a part of the white ear bud army. Eyes glazed over singing or crying or screaming inside. We are all at our own concerts. Perhaps, we all love music. But, perhaps, we all hate each other.

Late night, bus stop bums

2009-05-27T13:38:00.001-07:00

Late one night, I was waiting for the 22 Fillmore bus in San Francisco, and an aggressive crackster started begging for change, escalating as he ranted: "I need a dime! A quarter! Fifty cents! A dollar, I need a dollar!" "I don't have any change, damn it!" I swore at him. Thing was, I had on a pair of Levis that I loved and washed frequently, and it was exactly at this moment that the thin cloth of the front pockets gave out, cascading coins onto the sidewalk. I tell this story because Steve Powers' graphic-arts book illustrates such tales—street hassles in which one hustler is outwitted by another, much as an immovable object will sometimes overcome irresistible force. "You can't win if I don't lose" reads one of Powers' captions.

-Richard von Busack of Metro Newspapers

3117 16th St. SFCA

2009-05-26T17:33:00.000-07:00

Where we find truth and beauty in the gritty of the city.

1949

2009-05-26T17:10:00.000-07:00

Saturday, 8:05 a.m., Haight Fillmore - Union Fillmore

2009-05-26T14:22:00.000-07:00

Every Saturday morning when I get on the 22 I am reminded of just how hard the working class works. Each double seat is filled with a Hispanic man, with his hood up. The man against the window is leaning his head, his face is smashed into the glass, and the man next to him is asleep on his shoulder. It is admirable, miserable and adorable all at once.
It is quiet. The fog is heavy and we, the Saturday workers, begin our journeys towards our invisible destinations of little consequence.
We sit in the back row.
A couple also boards and sits to our left. They beam with post-coital hipster glow. And in a sour morning mood I can't help but think, "You better use condoms."
The man in front of us sits alone and he takes out his phone.
And he pierces the air with -
"BAOOOOOO-WOOOOOOOOOW BAO-WOW-Wow-WOW BAAAAAOOOOOO-WOOOOOOOW BAO-WOW-Wow-WOW Ba-Bao-ner-ner-ner-NOW"
It's Sleepwalk by Santo & Johnny, the ballad from La Bamba.
He lies his grey-hoodied head back and let's whatever memory he seeks pour into him as he closes his eyes.
The T-Mobile Nokia emits just enough sound to play the song at the perfect diner level.
No one is speaking. We all look out the windows, where we can see nothing through the fog, but memories of lost loves or days spent with our brothers under weeping willows.
For a moment, we are not on the 22 at Geary and Fillmore with sirens going to give a shot of adrenaline to someone at Turk and Jones. We are each held by nostalgia and dripping, perhaps, just one tear of gratitude while listening to what I now know as chulo emo.
Fade.
And I'm so mediaized that I can here La Bamba's "Riiiiiiiitchie!" as if someone has said it.
The MP3 cuts to Ice Cube's Today Is A Good Day.
Almost all of us know the words.
We bob our head and exchange smiles. Some cannot resist bumping their hands, and why would they?
Even the couple, with bed head, wreaking of dollar PBR's, and I look at each other and I think, "I love you, you crazy kids."
I don't know about them, but we had a good day.

Friday, 7 p.m., Haight Fillmore - 16th Valencia

2009-05-26T13:26:00.000-07:00

You see the bus coming toward you and it's just a black mass like a two ton black brick on wheels. There's no light shining through and you know it's packed - packed worse than sardines, more like one of those surprise snakes in a can. And as it sort of stumbles to the stop like a drunken sumo-wrestler, the door opens and vomits out two or three thousand people.
But, there is still no where to stand. I get on and I don't pay because I can't even get to the driver. People are crammed tight so I have to stand on the stairs. Many are in front of the sacred yellow line and we all keep throwing glances to the driver for spacial approval.
The bus begins to move and there's nothing to hold on to so the two strangers next to me and I get to second base.
And then...the roar.
It comes from the back and sounds like someone is roasting two hundred hyenas.
It goes something like.... ASFFFFEQPOHFEENSDVOEW BOYFRIEND MOTHERFUCKERAFGSBDAAAFASFas IPod QWDASNFwd qweiodasseqf Fuck YOu Bitch MotherFuqa qwwwfrqnniggeriofhaf Sit on Me Awedapushed me iwfdhasv WHatchoo Lookin at Bitch aSQEWFEFGsv Ipod alihqwf FAt aSS lknfiohewefd Get Off Me asfnnewiofhefwndiqwnd bITCH Q:WEFNwefw Mine mine mine!
We throw one another glances. Smirks. It is almost impressive how loud it is.
There is an elderly woman totally intrigued by the chaos. She's moving left and right on the stairs next to me trying to get a peep at who or what could possibly be causing so much noise.
"What in God's name is going on back there?" she asks wrinkling a brow full of lines from a thousand such similar inquiries.
And then the driver chimes in.
"I'll tell you what it is. It's a fuckin' show. They are on display right now. You think they do this at home?! You think they do this in front of their parents?! Mmm-mm. Nah-uh. But because it's nice and warm in here and they have a captive audience, they have to show off, like a bunch of fucking ignorant bastards disrupting everyone's ride. But if no one was payin' attention, they would shut the hell up! I'm supposed to be their papa? Naw-uh. Nobody cares about those kids and I'm tellin' ya, neither do I."
And then...silence.
And the bus driver says, "Aw shit, did I have the speaker on?"