The number 8 bus

My beloved is off riding her bike to Tomales today for a training ride.  I am staying behind to do some of the logistics for our brief trip to Big Sur.  I worry about her as she bikes along our idyllic yet dangerous roads without any shoulders, praying for generous country drivers and following the sport in which she loves to participate.  It is a gamble and I understand those kinds of choices.  In life we make them and some have much broader implications than we imagine.  We cannot know and that is the nature of life and life's choices.

Yesterday we moseyed to the fair and saw lots of incredible local art, ate some overpriced ice cream, people watched and rode the Ferris wheel.  We talked with an older woman from the Democratic party and as she ran her political ticker tape spiel by us, I mentioned my choice to leave my former profession.  I slid this fact into her monologue in order to stop the diatribe and try to bring something real into her passion for liberal politics.  However, when she mentioned that I was "brave," I recoiled.  Other people have said those very words.  Some I greatly admire but never worked alongside.  Those other folks remain at the place I left, still toiling away at something I stopped believing in last winter.

Life choices, my choices, present these dirt trails off into the brush, that we look towards and then move towards or away from and hope, always hope, it is the "right" choice.  Yet behind all that mind gymnastics is fear, and some sorrow about loss, regret, wisdom, excitement and courage.  I think courage is the kite tail for me.  The thing that boosts the decision.  And that doesn't mean that every moment is filled with courage.  I am out here, jobless and wondering if I shall ever work again.

So, when the Greyhounds and I are returning from our morning walk, along the bus route, and we see two older women running towards the bus that then drives past the bus stop and pulls towards the curb at an angle to stop for them. I feel myself come to the moment and smile.  We pause and watch.  The bus #8 doors open inward and the two women stop running and begin to climb the steps up into the bus.   I imagine them smiling at their good luck and I feel happy for them.  My faith in life's choices is restored, for the moment, and I realized it can happen that fast with something as simple as the route of number 8 bus and a choice.