Grace on the Greyhound
‘If
you want to meet the poor, take the bus.” That’s a saying I’ve heard
many times from my brother Jesuits. It refers not so much to
transportation within cities (though it certainly could) as to
long-distance travel. My own preference, especially here in the
Northeastern United States, is traveling by train: in these parts Amtrak
is quick, reliable and relatively inexpensive if you plan far enough in
advance. As for planes, well, to be charitable, I’ll pass over that in
silence. But generally speaking, those who are poor and need to travel
from city to city take neither the plane nor the train—but the bus.
So a few months ago, when I was invited to
speak at an event sponsored by the Sisters of St. Joseph in Springfield,
Mass., I happily accepted their suggestion to return to New York City
by Greyhound bus, or “the Dog,” as some of my friends call it.
Before continuing this tale, which takes
some surprising turns, I would like to say three things. First, I love
the Sisters of St. Joseph, no matter where they are—from Springfield,
Mass., to Chestnut Hill, Pa. Second, I admire women religious in
general: they are my heroes. Third, on that particular Sunday, there was
only one convenient way to travel from Springfield to New York: the
bus. The trains were not running at that time, and of course I don’t own
a car; so when a bus ticket was offered, I eagerly accepted. In short,
none of what I’m about to recount was the “fault” of the generous
Sisters of St. Joseph.
In any event, after my afternoon talk, a
friendly S.S.J. dropped me off at the Springfield bus station. The
sisters had even packed me a nourishing dinner in a brown bag: a ham
sandwich, a ginger ale, a bag of peanuts and a banana. I located a
comfortable seat on the bus, took out the latest copy of The New Yorker
from my backpack and looked forward to an enjoyable and economical drive
back to New York on the Dog.
But it was not to be. Directly behind me
were two people who, it soon became clear, were a prostitute and her
pimp. (I’m not sure if “pimp” is still the correct term: I’m not up to
date on prostitution slang.) From the moment the bus pulled out of
Springfield station, the two started arguing loudly. The woman was
furious at the man, who was also her erstwhile boyfriend. She recounted
in lavish detail his cheating on her. For a good hour she shouted, over
and over, “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” while hitting him. In response to
her invective and her punches, he unleashed his own fusillade of
foul-mouthed rage, all the while dropping the “F-bomb” liberally.
Since the bus driver seemed largely
unconcerned, I thought of saying something. At the time, I was in my
clerical collar, and so I thought perhaps a glance might effect some
sort of change. But given that the two of them seemed as high as kites, I
figured that they might (a) have a gun, (b) freak out and punch me or
(c) have a gun, freak out, punch me and then kill me. So I figured I’d
wait it out. How long could it last, anyway?
It lasted the entire trip.
But in the midst of this seedy drama was
grace. Sitting beside me was a dark-haired, middle-aged woman, wearing a
white nurse’s uniform, who read her Bible through the entire trip. She
gave no indication that the commotion from behind us bothered her at
all.
As the Dog raced on through the night and
the two continued their very public battle, my traveling companion
calmly pored over her Bible (Romans, I noticed). Once again, I was
reminded that the poor put up with such indignities all the time. It
filled me with admiration for the woman seated next to me, and I
wondered if her serenity might not be the result of long experience. It
was probably not the first, or last, time she would endure something
like this.
Talking about “the poor” is very often
misleading. They are, after all, individuals, as was the woman on the
bus. So it’s often inaccurate to generalize, and say, “The poor are like
this.” On the other hand, many are the things we can learn from people
with personal experience of poverty. Many are the experiences that they
take for granted that others would find intolerable. In their patience,
in their fortitude, in their dignity and in their hard work, the poor
can often be our models. And so blessed are they.
Women religious, then, aren’t the only women who are my heroes. Now I have a new one: the woman who sat beside me on the Dog.
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