Crying Lady

This took place early December 2008, and what you are about to read is not an exaggeration, if anything it’s a watered down version of the original event. I had been unemployed going on three months, and as a way of making a little extra cash I donated plasma. I had just finished having my blood sucked in and out of my arm for the last hour, and was now $40 dollars richer. For me donating plasma was a draining experience (get it?). Seriously though, it left me exhausted. It was also freezing outside and I was getting ready for a forty-minute bus ride home. Needless to say, I was in no mood for any shenanigans.
I approached the bus stop to find that the bus that would get me home wouldn’t be there for the next fifteen minutes or so. This particular stop is right by a community college so I decided to step inside to keep warm. While walking inside I noticed a crying of some sort coming from a figure approaching the stop. I stepped inside wondering what could’ve been going on. My curiosity got the better of me and I went out to see what was happening.
I walked up to the stop to find a shorter woman looking up at the schedule talking and sobbing (and I do not use the word sobbing lightly). I assumed, still being fairly new to riding the bus regularly that this woman must have been on a bluetooth and was crying to someone on the other end of a telephone line. How little I understood the rules of bus then. Let me make one thing clear, crazy people ride the bus. This is not to say that an average sane person doesn’t, but let’s get real, it’s about half and half.
The woman flips around, both ears exposed and voila, no bluetooth. Her eyes got wide and set on none other than me. Her and I are making direct eye contact, standing face to face, just the two of us at a bus stop. At this point inner dialogue is saying something like, “What have I done!”.
“Is everything alright?” I ask timidly.
“NO!” she exasperatedly gasped.
“Well, what’s the matter?”
“Just because I don’t carry a bag!” ,she yells. She then begins to stomp her feet and lift her right arm up and down as if she was heaving something heavy. Alright now I’m terrified. The bus isn’t going to be there for another ten minutes and I can already tell that I’m in this one for the long haul.
My face was clearly puzzled and I asked, “What?”.
The woman then went on to explain that she had just completed an interview at Costco and while attempting to leave she was stopped by the quote-un-quote “Bitch at the door!”. Now, this woman has a backpack, cause like she said, she doesn’t like to carry a bag and let me tell you the thing was busting at the seams on account of how full it was. More or less, when she approached the gate with a full backpack and no receipt, her bag was searched. Yes, I know that it is embarrassing her but those people are just trying to do their job. I would’ve done the same.
Now based on the way the woman was sobbing in a front of me I cannot imagine (nor do I want to) the hysterics she must have been in while her bag was being searched. She started talking about how that was another job that she couldn’t have (you’ve got one thing right, I’m thinking to myself.). She then proceeds to ask me what’s wrong with her, apparently I look licensed to do so. Should she wear her hair differently, dress differently, wear makeup? According to her she didn’t wear makeup, which I thought was odd considering the copious amounts of mascara cascading down her cheeks.
“ I mean if people I know won’t tell me what’s wrong with me then people I don’t know should.”, she says.
At this point I’m thinking, “Maybe you should start by not sobbing to complete strangers at bust stops.” You know, that’s just one idea.
Being the polite the person that I am, and also one that doesn’t want to get shanked by a middle aged woman at a bus stop (after all I had no idea what was in that bag of hers), I told her that she looked fine. Which is true she looked just fine, minus the crying, the mascara, and the backpack which induced a kind of hunchbacked body stance. I told her to just keep on trying and to not let that get her down.
She told me that she had been unemployed for the last three months, ring a bell anyone?
“Well I know how you feel”, I said
“NO, you don’t!”, she said angrily.
Excuse me, I’m trying to be nice to the crazy lady in the night and you’re giving me sass, I don’t think so. I would’ve told her to leave me alone right then and there but then things took a turn. Turns out that she had been living in her car for the last little while and then came the sentence that worsened the situation.
“I hope I just die tonight.”
Oh no, I’m cold, my body is running on a lot less blood than it had been an hour previous and now not only am I dealing with a crazy crying lady, but a suicidal one at that. Like I said, really not in the mood for this.
I replied with obvious stun in my voice, “That’s a horrible thing to say.”
“Well it’s true! Who would want to live?”
I then went on to explain that I know things are tough but dying is really not the answer, and right about that time the bus rolls up.
She steps on the bus before I did, still sniffling. The driver looks at her, and looks at me. I gave him a look that said don’t even ask. At this point I’m wondering now should I sit with her? Are we friends now? Should I give her some money? What do I do? I opted to sit on the other side of the aisle a few seats back. She rested her elbows on the seat in front of her and buried her head. The bus riders were all watching and listening to her muffled crying, and everyone kept looking at me like I possibly could’ve been the reason she was crying. Like I had upset the woman. All I could do was look at them and I shake my head. I mean they had no idea what I had just endured. 15 minutes of pure crazy.
The bus reached the station and I hopped on my next bus home, as I watched the woman wander off, still in total disbelief of what had just happened to me. This particular story is still one of my more poignant ones to date. It was very surreal, I still can’t believe it happened to me.