Asleep at the Wheel—My Career as a Bus Driver
A man can only kill so many dogs and cats before he wakes to ungodly howls and screeches in the middle of the night. Call it a Human Society if you want, if it shields you from Nazi guilt over canine and feline genocide, but trust me, when you throw the unwanted creatures into an incinerator, excuses won’t cut it. Euthanasia. Let’s call that a convenient euphemism. Killing is pretty much killing.
So I left my minimum wage job at the Pound. Lasted 3 months, probably two too long. A metro driver job I’d filled out a forgotten application for popped up. Good money, three times minimum wage, drive these 40 foot buses all over the city of Madison, Wisconsin. I took a training course, learned every route, joined the Teamsters and got assigned to everything from school bus duty to fill-ins for sick drivers. When I kicked a mouthy high school kid off my bus miles from his house in sub-zero weather, my boss called me in and explained their insurance would frown on frozen juvenile delinquents abandoned along my route. I said I understood, but actually I didn’t.
We drivers were in the Teamsters Union, contracts for 60 plus hours a week, six days a week one day off. I asked the boyz — there were zero women drivers then — why on god’s green earth they’d negotiate slave labor hours … and they told me they’d get overtime pay. And the best part, they said, they wouldn’t have time to spend it. This, needless to say, was Incomprehensible to me! You work 6 days a week, 60 hours or more and see how long YOU last. Me, you guessed it, 3 months. I mean, if I wanted a career, I’d have gone to college. Wait! I did go to college. If I wanted a career, I would have taken courses Other Than literature, philosophy and poly-sci. Obviously, I didn’t want a career. Or a job that lasted longer than 3 months.
So when my boss, this gruff no-nonsense sort of drill sergeant, called me in again for another little sit-down, only to inform me that a passenger had complained about my humming — my humming! — and would I cease and desist my musical annoyance. Also — ALSO! — the passengers complained that I drove only 15 mph at the end of the route. Yeah, I said, if I drove the speed limit I would pass stops 10 to 20 minutes ahead of the printed times. You want me to sail by early, I asked. He said he didn’t want me driving 15 mph. Neither do I, I said. He said,
So we’re clear on this? I said, You want me to stick to the schedule or you want me to leave folks waiting at the stop when I’ve gone by 10 or 15 minutes early, subzero weather, remember that insurance policy you got. He said, I don’t want complaints about you driving 15 mph. Catch 22.
My boss asked, Are we clear here? Are we done here? I said, you bet. And gave my notice…. I am not — I want to be clear here — I am not a man who avoids burning bridges. I have always believed the best days of my life are the ones where I’ve quit my job. Freedom, baby, freedom at last! Course, the worst days are the ones shortly after, looking for the next crappy job.
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Tags: Career Trajectory, Catch 22, Euthanasia euphemism