You’re halfway through the longest car ride of your life. The music play list started to repeat songs an hour ago. Your chauffeur—I mean, driver—I mean, gracious friend who offered to haul your ass all the way across the state, is way too focused on swerving in and out of rush hour traffic to entertain you. The other people in the car are ignoring you (or maybe they really are fast asleep in the back). And you’ve run out of interesting car games to play. There’s nothing for you to do but stare blankly out the window, and even that loses its appeal after hours of trying to distinguish one painted white road line from the next.
So you take to people watching. A mini-van drives by with one of those built-in DVD players that you’re parents always said they would install, but never did. You can almost make out what movie is playing before the van falls back into the swarm of on-coming cars. One passenger in a nearby car has her feet dangling out the window, and you spend a few glorious minutes working out how she could possibly be comfortable. You watch two kids fighting in the back of a Volvo, until their mom turns around to break them up. A golden retriever lazily sticks it head out of the window, ears flopping in the breeze. A school bus pulls up alongside your car, complete with sing-a-long-tunes and a bored bus driver.
The bus has just about passed you, when you notice someone starting back. He’s an average boy. Probably in high school. But he sees you. And you see him. Instead of quickly turning away as most people tend to do, he smiles and flashes you a hang-loose sign out the window. With nothing else to do you return the gesture, just as the bus pulls out of your line of sight.
And now your back to counting mile markers: Mile 65. Mile 66. Mile 67. You wonder what you’re 67 miles from. Mile 68. Mile 69.
The same bus is back. The same boy stares at you from the window. But he’s not alone. Now there are three others looking back. The boy points to you, and yet again holds up a hang-loose sign. You retaliate with a rock-on/peace-out combination. The boys cheer, fists pumping in the air.
And you’ve passed the bus. But now you keep an eye out for it. From the side mirror you can just see it starting to speed up again. It disappears from view, and you twist around in your seat in anticipation. However, the bus is changing lanes away from you, heading toward Exit 7C.
Just as the bus hits the off-ramp, and you’ve all but given up hope for a new form of entertainment, you catch a glimpse of the boy, still staring out the window. You wave a small good-bye, that he returns, as you speed off down the highway.
* * *
“Did this actually happen?” you may ask. Yes and no. The little twit never actually waved back at me. And I was having so much fun too! So what did we learn from this little adventure?
Life Lesson #45: Always wave back.
It tends to make the world a better place.
