As usual, it came down to the wire for me as far as packing and getting ready to leave goes. When my mom came to take me to the bus station, I was just pulling the last load of laundry out of the dryer. When she walked in she just smiled and I knew what she was thinking: what she had guessed before walking in the door was true.
As it turns out, we could have been incredibly late and it would not have mattered as the bus did not leave until 45 minutes after it's departure time of 3:30. Not really being on any sort of schedule, this didn't bother me at all. Others, it did. I was almost sure there was going to be a first fight between one man and the people behind the counter. And let me tell you, the folks working for Greyhound were not about to take any crap off any of us. They basically told this guy to stop being a jerk and if he wanted to get on an imaginary bus then he could go outside. When the bus finally did show up, we all got on without further incident.
One of my hopes for this trip is to meet and talk with as many people as possible. Turns out the very person whose story I wanted to hear sat next to me in the back of the bus. Her name was Wanda, and I had seen her sleeping in the bus station when I first arrived. She wore a faded purple windbreaker, shorts and high-top hiking boots as well as a pair of brown-framed glasses which I assume she had worn since the late 80's. Her skin was tan and a bit leathery from much time spent in the outdoors. Best as I could tell from her story she was in the neighborhood of 70 years old.
Wanda had come from bus all the way from Oregon and was on her way to the Mayo Clinic where she has to go for tests once a year. I gather she did not own a car since many of her experiences were dependent on the bus going where she wanted to go. She told me she had grown up as a girl along the Hudson River, went to school in Michigan and studied abroad in Germany in 1957. On returning home she road her bicycle from the east coast to western Missouri before joining the Army (what she did for them she did not say). She had also gone to optometry school in Chicago. Wanda had backpacked for several months in New Zealand as well as in Patagonia, wanting to be as close as she could to Antarctica. She now lives in a cabin and travels around the times that her garden is not in need of attention.
We talked essentially from before pulling out of the bus station all the way to Mankato. It made the time fly. At our one break in Jackson we both got out and walked around the McDonald's parking lot. When I got back on the bus, she was eating a salad she had purchased. She handed me a bag and said that there was another one in there which was for me if I wanted it. This was much appreciated.
Wanda and I parted ways at the Minneapolis bus station and I met up with my brother. It was good to see him and we both ate out of the half-eaten bag of Doritos which I had brought from home. Since that salad and a Snickers bar were the only things I had had since noon and it was now after nine at night, I was really hungry. Luckily, my brother made me his new specialty when we got to his apartment: a cheese and veggie burger quesadilla. My compliments to the chef!
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