A World of Speculation

Bus people 7

The gaggle of women stand at the bus stop downtown, one of them yelling, her tone echoing down the canyon of the street, but her words lost in the roar of traffic. When the No. 19 arrives, my bus, they get on it. There are five of them, finished with a Twelve Step...

Post-modernism

A professor came to our parish to discuss post-modernism in the 21st-century church. It’s hard to get a handle on what we learned, and maybe I’ll collect my thoughts for another post. As an introduction, our priest ran a couple of clips from the movie (or...

Bus people 6

He’s dressed in black, with a black ponytail, and he smells of cigarettes. He’s looking at his cell phone as he boards the bus and finds a seat in the front, side-facing seats. I’m in the front front-facing seat (my favorite, because of the good...

Bus people 5

They’re cute, they’re young, they’re high-school students. The blonde tells her friend that she’s giving up coffee, because she only makes $400 a month, and she spends $100 a month on coffee and another $100 on junk food. She’s only got...

Bus people 4

A guy in his 20s sits in the back of the bus exchanging crime stories with two white-haired women, twins and identically dressed. Sitting toward the front of the bus, I hear his voice spinning yarns about his brothers’ and sisters’ run-ins with the...