Not Your Average Joe
Sunday, February 01, 2009
He sat there all the way towards the end of the bus staring at the folks who walked in from the front door, taking off their ear muffs and scarfs, gloves in one hand and bus pass in the other. He sat there with a smile on his face, with a cap ON that barely protruded and covered his eye. Had an inner shirt that covered till neck and with no jacket or gloves he had made a point of getting noticed in the 30 some group of people taking the 8:25 bus to the train station.
He smiled often, staring out of the window looking at the passing trees maybe, trees that could barely be called trees as they had shed their green long back, staring at the frozen lake that had an Ice cap with a few cracks in them, staring at the sea gulls that sat on the cap staring at the sun looking for the air that would bring change and ask them to move to the north.
He didn't blink, didn't talk to anyone, didn't read anything but just sat in the same pose throughout, keeping his legs a few inches apart, the same angle throughout, not a move, not an inch. He was not bothered by the small kid wearing a pink hoodie and pink shoes talking to her daddy asking him questions that would make a normal person giggle. He wouldn't look up when the girl and her daddy ask the driver to open the rear door so they could get out and wouldn't stare when the daddy piggyback's his daughter on the sidewalk.
He kept looking at his stylish watch often calculating the time the driver has wasted and probably realizing that he's about to be late in reaching his destination, wherever that may be. He looked uncomfortable for he would never have been late, never allowed to. A left, a right, a 90 degree turn and a honk - nothing would bother him as he kept staring straight not bothered by the folks who were looking at him trying to read him gauging his dress from top to bottom. A dress that had patches and stars but definitely an elegance, a cap that had stitches but covered the few grey hair that had grown on his scalp.
He wouldn't blink wouldn't worry, for he had the four letters ARMY stitched on his right pocket.
Posted by Rajesh @ 12:18 PM; PERMALINK,
