Monday, December 12, 2005

Anarchy rules!

3:10pm at Park Royal. Four “Not in Service” buses have gone by and still no sign of the #257 Horseshoe Bay Express, which is now half an hour late. No way we’re going to make the 3:30 boat now.

An agitated group of strangers bound for Bowen and Langdale, we decide to pool our money for a cab but there’s too many of us and we can’t leave the teens behind just because they have no money.

The #257 finally arrives and we all troop rather sullenly on board. No one is in the mood to say hi to the driver, even though we are all probably aware that if he's half an hour late, his day hasn’t been exactly perfect either. But he flies down the highway, sails past the usual overpass turnoff at Horseshoe Bay with its slow winding route by the fire hall, and takes an entirely new and faster route straight through the parking lots to the ticket booth. Everyone cheers the driver and the boat’s still there! And now we’re all running with pieces of someone’s luggage and deputizing a young guy to run ahead and stall because the mum with the little kid can’t keep up.

There’s the business guy, the teens, a young guy, an old guy, the couple going to Langdale, the girl with all the luggage, the mum with the little kid, and me. We’re all strangers but we all look around and instinctively space ourselves out between the boat and the mum with the little kid because everyone has to make it.
Everyone does.

These are the rules of anarchy.
From the bus driver going way beyond his duty to his surly passengers, to the guy running with the luggage of someone who wasn't even getting on the same boat as him.
Anarchy rules.

2 comments:

Chris said...

YAY!

Mutual aid sees us through again!

Anonymous said...

Did you say Mutual of Omaha?

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