The Wheels on the Bus....

This morning, I was listening to the Preston and Steve show as I travelled the 95 corridor. They were discussing riding the bus when you were in grade school and middle school and it got me thinking about some of my fondest bus memories. Which, you have to remember, I rode from Pre-First to my Sophomore year in high school. My junior year, I started driving with my neighbor Jen H. who smoked cigarettes on our way into school and made me give intricately folded notes to her boyfriend who Beanorama and I had classes with at our brother school.

Anyway, I rode Bus 7, then Bus 12....but they were always the same stops.

Some highlights of my time with M&K:

• meeting my best friend from 1-9th grade Karen, on the 1st day of first grade because we both had to sit in the first seat.


• having Sue, one of the best bus drivers around, bring us Burger King for the drive home. She worked there also and would take our orders. Very cool.


• getting to drive with Earl on the North Wilmington bus. He was cool and really old. He even had a vanity tag on the front of his bus that read, "Earl the Squirrel." (Sidenote: The North Wilmington kids were different than the Hockessin and Pike Creek kids. They knew about Wawa and Lickety Split. I knew about Pike Creek Bowling Alley and Delcastle.)


• meeting my first boyfriend, Chris, who gave me a silver bracelet for Christmas. I gave him a fisherman Troll doll that I thought was so cool. We talked on the phone for a few months, then I broke up with him (also on the bus) by giving him a box of dog food and the silver bracelet back with note telling him I couldn't handle the way he flirted with other girls on the bus (ah, the drama started early).


• listening to Elliot and the Nut Hut on Eagle 106 and learning the words to Bohemian Rhapsody.


• getting kicked off the bus in 8th grade for having a lighter. I wasn't lighting anything, I simply retrieved it from my J.Crew barn jacket and in a fit of pre-teen rebellion, flicked it a few times. One of my fellow busriders told his Mom I tried to light the seat on fire and I was kicked off for 3 months. Momsy J was not happy.

Riding the bus sucked. You had to fight car sickness. It was humid when it rained (but you could write cuss words on the fogged up windows). You had crushes. Everyone saw when your bookbag pulled your skirt up and showed your world to the St. Edmond's boys. But the day you finally realized that you were the old, cool kid, and could then sit in the back, that was the day. By God, that was the day.